I know. I was there. I saw the great void in your soul, and you saw mine.

There aren't many great passages written about food, but I love one by George Millar, who worked for the SOE in the second world war and wrote a book called 'Horned Pigeon.' He had been on the run and hadn't eaten for a week, and his description of the cheese fondue he smells in the peasant kitchen of a house in eastern France is unbelievable.

But the old man would not so, but slew his son,
And half the seed of Europe, one by one.

He had volunteered early, rather than waiting to be conscripted, for he felt a duty and an obligation to serve, and believed that ... being willing to fight for his country and the liberty it represented, would make some small difference. ... His idealism was one of the casualties of the carnage [of Verdun].

It was such a heavenly dream: dreamed between the reality of war and the reality of hereditary madness.

A romantic is someone who believes that something is valuable even if it doesn't last. And a non-romantic is someone who says that if something doesn't endure, or can't be logically proved and pinned down, it's worthless.