The world, the human world, is bound together not by protons and electrons, but by stories. Nothing has meaning in itself: all the objects in the world would be shards of bare mute blankness, spinning wildly out of orbit, if we didn't bind them together with stories.

You seize your freedom in a spirit of rebelliousness, exuberance, defiant joy. But to live that choice -- over the weeks and months and years to come -- requires different qualities. It requires that you turn hard, turn rigid. Because it isn't a choice that the world encourages, you have to wear a suit of armor to defend it.

A piece of writing is only worth doing if you're a different person at the end of the process than you were at the beginning.

The river was so blue it seemed to be breathing.

What you are is a complicated girl with simple needs. You need your books and time to read, and you need a few friends and you need someone-not to take care of you, but to care for you. If you have all those things, you'll always be alright.

So we recast the wisdom of the great thinkers in the shape of our illusions. They are shiny from their makeovers, they are fabulous and gorgeous, and they want us to know that we can have it all.

Even in your smallest gestures, you express your sense of honor, if you have one.