I think of the chimp, the one with the talking hands.

I moved through the days like a severed head that finishes a sentence.

Good leaders being scarce, following yourself is allowed.

nothing is ever quite as bad as it could be.

We can only die in the future, I thought; right now we are always alive.

I would like to go for a ride with you, have you take me to stand before a river in the dark where hundreds of lightning bugs blink this code in sequence: right here, nowhere else! Right now, never again!

I had a mother I could only seem to please with verbal accomplishments of some sort or another. She read constantly, so I read constantly. If I used words that might have seemed surprising at a young age, she would recognize that and it would please her.