Before she realized he was next to her, he had placed his hands over hers on the countertop, then hooped his fingers through hers. Gretel looked up at him, so startled she might as well have been shot. 'I just wanted to wake you up', he said. Which is exactly what he did. One look at him and her heart was racing. One look, and whatever had been before was all over.

Some people say, 'Save yourself and you save your ways.' I say, 'Be yourself and you save your soul.

Hawthorne has given us a tradition that some people refer to as Yankee Magic Realism, and I do think there is a certain quality to the landscape that definitely leads into the dark woods.

It was as though I had one map inside my head and it led to the man who was waiting for me. Someone who was alone - maybe even more alone - than I was.

Still, I couldn't help but wonder if it was a mistake for people like us to be tied to a place. If we weren't meant to be ready and willing to wander. If everything we needed was contained in who we were. And what we remember.

That is how you know you've left childhood behind-when you wish for time to go backward.

Love is worth the sum of itself, and nothing more.