Life was bitter and I was not

"I turned early to humour as my branch of writing ... [because] life was bitter and I was not." - Max Schulman

because no one else...

would have thought to say the things you said, or said them the way you did. if you were no more, nothing else would be quite like you. 

But to have dreamed the dream

But to have dreamed the dream is to have flown above the mountains so high in all but deed.

- Peter F. Hamilton, Judas Unchained (in the novel attributed to author named Manby)