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.

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

With age comes acumen. With experience comes insight.

But history does matter. There is a line connecting the Armenians and the Jews and the Cambodians and the Bosnians and the Rwandans. There are obviously more, but, really, how much genocide can one sentence handle?

Dead … might not be quiet at all.

He recalls what that first German soldier said to his major: No God-not yours or mine-approves of what you're doing.

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