Rationality squeezes out much that is rich and juicy and fascinating.

I wish I had thrown out the bathroom scale at age 16. Weighing yourself every morning is like waking up and asking Dick Cheney to validate your sense of inner worth.

I realized I was going to get through this disappointing service, and anyway, you have to be somewhere: better here, where I have heard truth spoken so often, than, say, at the DMV, or home alone, orbiting my own mind. And it's good to be out where others can see you, so you can't be your ghastly spoiled self. It forces you to act slightly more elegantly, and this improves your thoughts, and thereby the world.

I understood that the man I was calling for could never ever come back. Because I understood that the man that I was calling for was dead.

Forgiveness is giving up all hope of having had a better past.

For some of us, good books and beautiful writing are our ultimate solace, even more comforting than exquisite food.

My dad taught me that to be a writer is a decision and a habit. It's not anything lofty, and it doesn't have that much to do with inspiration. You have to develop the habit of being a certain way with yourself. You do it at the debt of honor.