If your life was a story...

"Randall," she said, "if your life was a story, where does it go from here?"

"Well," I answered slowly, "first I get out of the mental institution.
That's going to be hard, because I'm not good at acting normal. But I
think I can keep up a sufficiently normal act long enough to fool the
shrinks."

"So chapter one is Randall Ahren tries to act normal?" she asked. "You
may need to inject more excitement. Perhaps you should try to
breakout and end the chapter with a cliffhanger."

"How about I have a little tete-a-tete with one of the other patients
and get kicked out? Every story needs a little a sex and romance."

"I like it," she replied. "But what about a theme? Something deep that
profoundly provokes the imagination."

"There's a theme," I said, "but it hurts too much to say what it is."