If the Lord hasn't got a boyfriend lined up for me to marry, that's his business.

Everything you're sure is right can be wrong in another place.

High fashion has the shelf life of potato salad. And when past its prime, it is similarly deadly.

Our holiday food splurge was a small crate of tangerines, which we found ridiculously thrilling after an eight-month abstinence from citrus.... Lily hugged each one to her chest before undressing it as gently as a doll. Watching her do that as she sat cross-legged on the floor one morning in pink pajamas, with bliss lighting her cheeks, I thought: Lucky is the world, to receive this grateful child. Value is not made of money, but a tender balance of expectation and longing.

Recall that whatever lofty things you might accomplish today, you will do them only because you first ate something that grew out of the dirt.

It's as if cats live in a seperate universe that takes up the same space as ours, but is full of facinating things like mice or sparrows or special TV programs that we can't see.

I don't bring expectations to any of my books. I don't tell people what to do. I want to invite them in.