From the age of eighteen to twenty-one, I worked any job I could get my hands on. One of these jobs was selling fake paintings door-to-door. M. J. Hyland More Quotes by M. J. Hyland More Quotes From M. J. Hyland I often remember in this false, distorted way, and the memories are often cloaked in the colour of the sun. Sometimes I feel nostalgia for things I knew I hated when they were happening, for days spent at the beach or the swimming pool with my sisters. M. J. Hyland swimming memories beach Life is ruthless, and its bestowal of fortune arbitrary and capricious. I'd been born to morons, and mine was a shabby life. M. J. Hyland mine born fortune life Where writers are from is one of the world' s most boring topics. Where we're born, gender or race, wealth or poverty - those are the things we spend time talking about. Stop trying to label me. I'm a writer. Worry about whether I'm any good! M. J. Hyland good me time world I've just finished reading 'The Second Plane,' and I think it's some of the best non-fiction I've ever read. M. J. Hyland some best think reading I get into all sorts of trouble with my publicists and with newspapers because I won't do photographs. M. J. Hyland get because newspapers trouble I have been obscenely lucky. I've got most of the things I've asked for and done well at the things I've wanted to succeed at. M. J. Hyland things succeed lucky done I've never experienced writer's block. When it's going really well, my body temperature goes up, and I'm flushed. I get quite delirious. M. J. Hyland going well never body Law gave me some structure... all these rules and internal disciplines. M. J. Hyland rules some me law I might live in Manhattan or Edinburgh or Cardiff. I think of myself as without nationality. M. J. Hyland live without myself think As is the case for many people with multiple sclerosis, the effects of weakened limbs, spasticity and fatigue had cut my working life in half. Yet not a single GP, neurologist or nurse, and none of the MS websites, had mentioned the use of neuroenhancers for the treatment of neurological fatigue. M. J. Hyland single half life people I grew up in a bookless house with a father and brother who have spent most of their lives in prison, psychiatric hospitals, or living rough, and a mother who has spent her life slaving and scrimping to pay the bills, living a nervous and troubled life. M. J. Hyland brother mother life father I was the first and only person in my family to go to university, and I spent two decades redesigning myself: even my voice is the product of elocution lessons. M. J. Hyland go myself family voice Before MS moved in on me, I'd worked for seven years as a city lawyer, as the editor of a literary magazine, and before the age of 20, I'd also worked as a cadet journalist and as an assistant director in both film and TV. And then, after the lesions of MS, both on my spine and in my brain, I was the opposite of bionic. M. J. Hyland city me lawyer age