It's intrusive for grandparents to think they're in charge. It's manipulative. Also, it's self-destructive, since if the parents have to resist you, you won't get your mitts on the kid as often.

... one of the immutable laws of being human is that the people who show up are the right people. [p. 65]

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

What if we never 'get over' certain deaths, or our childhoods? What if the idea that we should have by now, or will, is a great palace lie? What if we're not supposed to? What if it takes a life time...?

I am skittish about relationships, as most of the marriages I've seen up close have been ruinous for one or both parties.

The reason I never give up hope is because everything is so basically hopeless.

It is unearned love--the love that goes before, that greets us on the way. It's the help you receive when you have no bright ideas left, when you are empty and desperate and have discovered that your best thinking and most charming charm have failed you. Grace is the light or electricity or juice or breeze that takes you from that isolated place and puts you with others who are as startled and embarrassed and eventually grateful as you are to be there.