I could see the concrete need only after they had pointed it out to the Japanese; I could recognize the neatness of their solution only after they had explained it to us. - P27
It was obvious that the interests of the people in the camp were really very much like those of people everywhere: their health, where and how they lived, the weather, their work, the neighbors, the inconveniences of life and, of course, sex. - P47
How quickly man makes his life—whatever its character may be—into what he can call "normal." What would have seemed a fantastic deprivation to a man comfortable, well fed, and serene in an easy chair at home, had by the end of a few short months become just "life" for us. - P47
Musing further on this tendency of man to "normalize" whatever may come his way, I decided this was, after all, a fortunate trait. - P48
Altogether, then, the normal interests of life were uppermost in our consciousness. Thus, as in the ordinary life of man, personal relations took the center of the stage. Man is primarily a sexual and communal being, and he can exist sanely and happily only in and through the various sorts of relationships he has with his fellow men and women. - P49
These meandering thoughts in camp received confirmation when I heard later of Reinhold Niebuhr’s famous prayer: "Oh Lord, help us to accept those things we cannot change, to be dissatisfied with what we can change, and to be able to discern the difference." - P49
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