The secret of growing younger is counting blessings, not birthdays.

Kids can be a pain in the neck when they're not a lump in your throat.

Winners see an answer for every problem; losers see a problem in every answer!

Your face is a billboard advertising your philosophy of life!

Violets are God's apology for February.

Forgiveness is a stunning principle, your ticket out of hate and fear and chaos. ... I know what regret feels like; I've earned my credentials. But I also know what forgiveness feels like, because God has so graciously forgiven me.

Teaching literature is teaching how to read. How to notice things in a text that a speed-reading culture is trained to disregard, overcome, edit out, or explain away; how to read what the language is doing, not guess what the author was thinking; how to take evidence from a page, not seek a reality to substitute for it.