Perfectionism means that you try not to leave so much mess to clean up. But clutter and mess show us that life is being lived.

The problem with God - or at any rate, one of the top five most annoying things about God - is that he or she rarely answers right away.

You want to protect your child from pain, and what you get instead is life, and grace; and though theologians insist that grace is freely given, the truth is that sometimes you pay for it through the nose. And you can't pay your child's way.

Listen to your broccoli and it will tell you how to eat it.

If you don't die of thirst, there are blessings in the desert. You can be pulled into limitlessness, which we all yearn for, or you can do the beauty of minutiae, the scrimshaw of tiny and precise. The sky is your ocean, and the crystal silence will uplift you like great gospel music, or Neil Young.

And as it turns out, if one person is praying for you, buckle up. Things can happen.

Mothers are supposed to listen and, afterward, to respond with some wisdom and perspective, but these things were not my mother's strong suit.