Quiet, deep breath after any prayer is another form of Amen.

If you fixate on the big picture, the whole shebang, the overview, you miss the stitching.

Here are the two best prayers I know: 'Help me, help me, help me,' and 'Thank you, thank you, thank you.' A woman I know says, for her morning prayer, 'Whatever,' and then for the evening, 'Oh, well,' but has conceded that these prayers are more palatable for people without children.

You don't want to spend your time around people who make you hold your breath. You can't fill up when you're holding your breath. And writing is about filling up, filling up when you are empty, letting images and ideas and smells run down like water - just as writing is also about dealing with the emptiness.

Write as if your parents are dead.

Right foot, left foot, right foot, breathe.

Having a baby is like suddenly getting the world's worst roommate.