My instinct was always have your gun in your hand. Especially when you are telling somebody to do something. But, in fact, the police academy discourages this. They feel your gun should rarely, if ever, be brought out of its holster. Most certainly not when children are involved, which is exactly when I saw myself using my gun most often. A truant teenager loitering outside a movie theater is going to be far more motivated to return to school when he has the barrel of a .45 pressed against his cheek.

When you have your health, you have everything. When you do not have your health, nothing else matters at all.

Nobody's trying to kill you, Deirdre. You're killing yourself.

In the same way that a tornado rips the roof off a double-wide trailer, leaving the occupants dazed and staring at the clouds from the splinters of what used to be their living room, it was over.

Applause is a constant thing in AA. It's how we buy drinks for each other.

I can't tell you how much I love Target and Costco, that kind of culture, because it's something I never felt a part of. I've always felt like a tourist because I have never fit in anywhere.

Not crazy in a 'let's paint the kitchen bright red!' sort of way. But crazy in a 'gas oven, toothpaste sandwich, I am God' sort of way. Gone were the days when she would stand on the deck lighting lemon-scented candles without then having to eat the wax.p28