There is no such thing as a good writer and a bad liar.

The past is a candle at great distance: too close to let you quit, too far to comfort you.

My writing process, such as it is, consists of a lot of noodling, procrastinating, dawdling, and avoiding.

Be real and be unashamed, even of your faults. I do truly know what my husband is made of and vice versa.

I do not say what I feel, and people often take that for shyness, even kindness.

To hold happiness is to hold the understanding that the world passes away from us, that the petals fall and the beloved dies. No amount of mockery, no amount of fashionable scowling will keep any of us from knowing and savoring the pleasure of the sun on our faces or save us from the adult understanding that it cannot last forever.

I met Jay Jonhson. I won him the way poor people occasionally win the lottery: Shameless perseverance and embarrassingly dumb luck, and every time I see one of those sly, toothless, beaten-down souls on TV holding a winning ticket, I think, Go, team.