I have lived with magic and without magic, and I can tell you with certainty that a life with magic is better.

Dead … might not be quiet at all.

My wife and I would be very comfortable having a baby at home, or using one of the terrific nurse-midwives at the hospital.

But it's funny how the memory works and how sometimes we just belive whatever we want.

I have lived with magic and without magic, and I can tell you with certainty that a life with magic is better.

Now it is you who everyone presumes is so fragile. Wounded. Scarred. Maybe they're right. Perhaps you are. A nursery rhyme comes into your head, and, like an egg, you allow yourself to topple onto your side, your legs still pulled hard against your torso. You lie like that a long while, watching the chrome shell of the tape measure sparkle until the sun moves.

My grandparents, like many genocide survivors, took most of their stories to their graves.