I don't really do anything with the Internet except check my email. I have a much higher opinion of humanity because of that.

Thank God Roxane Coss had not fallen in love with one of the Russians. She doubted they could make it up the stairs without stopping for a cigarette and telling at least one loud story that no one could understand.

I could teach. I could wait tables. I could cook in a restaurant. Food and teaching were the two skills I had.

For the most part wisdom comes in chips rather than blocks. You have to be willing to gather them constantly, and from sources you never imagined to be probable. No one chip gives you the answer for everything. No one chip stays in the same place throughout your entire life. The secret is to keep adding voices, adding ideas, and moving things around as you put together your life. If you’re lucky, putting together your life is a process that will last through every single day you’re alive.

I think the best vacation is the one that relieves me of my own life for a while and then makes me long for it again.

You throw a person in the river and then make a spectacle of jumping in to save them.

When I wrote nonfiction, my best work was the really personal stuff.