But I never cleaned thoroughly enough, my reorganization proved to be haphazard, the disgraces came unfailingly to light, and it was clear how we failed, how disastrously we fell short of that ideal of order and cleanliness, household decency which I as much as anybody else believed in.

I would have a flick of fear, as in a dream when you find yourself in the wrong building or have forgotten the time for the exam and understand that this is only the tip of some shadowy cataclysm or lifelong mistake.

We say of some things that they can't be forgiven, or that we will never forgive ourselves. But we do-we do it all the time.

He never wanted to be away from her. She had the spark of life.

Memory is the way we keep telling ourselves our stories - and telling other people a somewhat different version of our stories.

They were all in their early thirties. An age at which it is sometimes hard to admit that what you are living is your life.

people who believe in miracles do not make much fuss when they actually encounter one