I swung from one place to the next, sometimes backward, sometimes forward, capitalizing on my own momentum, knowing that at some point my arms—or, more accurately, my quivering bank balance, accessed through foreign ATMs—would give out, and I’d fall to the ground.

I used my captors names every chance I had. It was intentional, a way of reminding them that I saw them, of pegging them, of making them see me in return.

Getting on a plane is hard for me, but I do it, because travel is vital to me.

In my version of paradise, the air was always cold and the rivers ran with candy.

I, too, was carrying around my own fate. All the things I couldn't know sat somewhere inside, embroidered into me-maybe not quite fixed to the point of inevitability but waiting, in any event, for a chance to unspool.

Friendships that don't fit my life anymore have faded away, and new ones have come in.

I have watched lives change. I have seen women gain confidence.