If your ceiling should fall down, then you have lost a room, but gained a courtyard. Think of it that way.

Writers obviously have to bear witness to the harsh face of the age.

Everything has been something before.

Regular maps have few surprises: their contour lines reveal where the Andes are, and are reasonably clear. More precious, though, are the unpublished maps we make ourselves, of our city, our place, our daily world, our life; those maps of our private world we use every day; here I was happy, in that place I left my coat behind after a party, that is where I met my love; I cried there once, I was heartsore; but felt better round the corner..., things of that sort, our personal memories, that make the private tapestry of our lives.

But we make such mistakes all the time, all through our lives. Wisdom, I suppose, is seeing this and acting upon it before it is too late. But it is often too late, isn't it? - and those things that we should have said are unsaid, and remain unsaid for ever.

I have three older sisters, so we were a reasonably large family and, in general, a happy one.

If your ceiling should fall down, then you have lost a room, but gained a courtyard. Think of it that way.