No" is a complete sentence.

So Rita and I decided that the most subversive, revolutionary thing I could do was to show up for my life and not be ashamed.

This is one thing they forget to mention in most child-rearing books, that at times you will just lose your mind. Period.

I didn't write about my mother much in the third year after she died. I was still trying to get my argument straight: When her friends or our relatives wondered why I was still so hard on her, I could really lay out the case for what it had been like to be raised by someone who had loathed herself, her husband, even her own name.

It was not facing what life dealt that made you crazy, but rather trying to set life straight where it was unstraightenable.

Never compare your insides to everyone else's outsides.

...[T]here should be a real sense of your imagination and your memories walking and woolgathering, tramping the hills, romping all over the place. Trust them. Don't look at your feet to see if you are doing it right. Just dance.