Carmen prayed hard. She prayed while standing near the priest in hopes it would give her request extra credibility. What she prayed for was nothing. She prayed that God would look on them and see the beauty of their existence and leave them alone.

I am a totally public person.

Anytime you write about priests or cops, they're hot-button professions.

Do you want to do this thing? Sit down and do it. Are you not writing? Keep sitting there. Does it not feel right? Keep sitting there. Think of yourself as a monk walking the path to enlightenment. Think of yourself as a high school senior wanting to be a neurosurgeon. Is it possible? Yes. Is there some shortcut? Not one I've found. Writing is a miserable, awful business. Stay with it. It is better than anything in the world.

Coming back is the thing that enables you to see how all the dots in your life are connected.

There can be something cruel about people who have had good fortune. They equate it with personal goodness.

It was too much work to remember things you might not have again, and so one by one they opened up their hands and let them go.