If it's important, your heart remembers.

The most assiduous task of parenting is to divine the difference between boundaries and bondage.

I learned to produce whether I wanted to or not. It would be easy to say oh, I have writer's block, oh, I have to wait for my muse. I don't. Chain that muse to your desk and get the job done.

For Lou Ann, life itself was a life-threatening enterprise.

Now I'm starting to think he wasn't supposed to be my whole life, he was just this doorway to me.

In exchange for his first taste of powdered milk, Pascal showed me a tree we could climb to find a bird's nest. After we handled and examined the pink-skinned baby birds, he popped one of them into his mouth like a jujube. It seemed to please him a lot. He offered a baby bird to me, pantomiming that I should eat it. I understood perfectly well what he meant, but I refused. He did not seem disappointed to have to eat the whole brood himself.

All of the promises of politicians, generals, madmen, and crusaders that war can create peace have yet to be borne out.