Curiosity is my natural state and has led me headlong into every worthwhile experience (never mind the others) I have ever had.

To grow, to become spiritually alive, and vibrant, you really have to struggle. Without struggle, you do not move at all...I would appreciate it if readers who come to my work would try very, very, very hard not to think narrowly as we are taught to think in America.

You are saying, are you not, I said to Manuelito, that stories have more room in them than ideas? [...] He laughed. That is correct, Señor. It is as if ideas are made of blocks. Rigid and hard. And stories are made of a gauze that is elastic. You can almost see through it, so what is beyond is tantalizing. You can't quite make it out; and because the imagination is always moving forward, you yourself are constantly stretching. Stories are the way spirit is exercised.

Curiosity is my natural state and has led me headlong into every worthwhile experience (never mind the others) I have ever had.

I think there is a sense of being forced at this time to look at America's really large shadow and that's not all that bad.

I feel that the ancestors are that covering that will cover me. I feel like I can only be enveloped in them spiritually and physically.

When people become elders - when they're older; they can be old without being an elder, really. They [can] just be old and not very useful.