As we write, so we build: to keep a record of what matters to us.

The study of maps and the perusal of travel books aroused in me a secret fascination that was at times almost irresistible.

What kills us isn't one big thing, but thousands of tiny obligations we can't turn down for fear of disappointing others.

I went to church and couldn't swallow it. The music was nice but I don't belong there.

Intimacy is the capacity to be rather weird with someone - and finding that that's ok with them.

It is not necessarily at home that we best encounter our true selves. The furniture insists that we cannot change because it does not; the domestic setting keeps us tethered to the person we are in ordinary life, who may not be who we essentially are.

There is a longing for a return to a time without the need for choices, free of the regret at the inevitable loss that all choice (however wonderful) has entailed.