"Jeg hadde alltid savnet diskusjonene vi hadde, åpenheten mot verden og livet. Den var kanskje naiv, men det var også genuin. Den gangen trodde jeg at det var slik at livet ville bli. Vi ødslet med tiden og med tankene, og først da det var over, forstod jeg at det hadde vært unikt og aldri ville komme tilbake. Det er slik livet er, er det ikke -- som unge tror vi at det kommer mer, at dette bare er begynnelsen på noe, mens det i virkeligheten er alt, og at det vi uten å tenke på det har, snart blir det eneste vi hadde. [...] at livet var mer absolutt, betydde ikke bare at det var sannere, men også at det ikke var noen veier bort fra det. Ingenting stod lenger åpent, som det hadde gjort da vi var i begynnelsen av tjueårene."
"I had always missed the discussions we had, the openness towards the world and life. Maybe it was naive, but it was also genuine. Back then, I believed that this was how life would be. We squandered our time and our thoughts, and only when it was over did I understand that what we had was unique, and would never come back. This is how life is, isn't it -- as young people we believe that more is coming, that this is just the beginning of something, while in reality this is everything, and that thing which we had without appreciating soon becomes the only we ever had. [...] that life was more absolute meant not only that it was truer, but also that there were no ways away from it. Nothing remained open anymore, like it had been when we were in the beginning of our twenties."
-Karl Ove Knausgård, Morgenstjernen/The Morning Star
