Prayer had always struck me as more or less a glorified attempt at a business transaction.

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.

For time and eternity there have been fathers like Nathan who simply can see no way to have a daughter but to own her like a plot of land. To work her, plow her under, rain down a dreadful poison upon her. Miraculously, it causes these girls to grow. They elongate on the pale slender stalks of their longing, like sunflowers with heavy heads. You can shield them with your body and soul, trying to absorb that awful rain, but they'll still move toward him. Without cease they'll bend to his light.

Our plans are small and somewhat absurd.

Maybe life doesn't get any better than this, or any worse, and what we get is just what we're willing to find: small wonders, where they grow.

How strange to read of a place in a book, and then stand on it, listen to the birds sing, and spit on the cobbles if you want.

I personally am inclined to approach [housework] the way governments treat dissent: ignore it until it revolts.