I learned long ago that loss is not only probable but inevitable. I know what it means to lose everything, to let go of one life and find another. And now I feel, with a strange, deep certainty, that it must be my lot in life to be taught that lesson over and over again.

I've come to think that's what heaven is- a place in the memory of others where our best selves live on.

I have a lot of empathy for women who fit their writing into the crevices of their too-busy lives, as I once did.

I never want to feel constrained by writing a novel for a specific audience.

And so it is that you learn how to pass, if you're lucky, to look like everyone else, even though you're broken inside.

She knows too well what it's like to tamp down your natural inclinations, to force a smile when you feel numb....The expression of emotion does not come naturally, so yo learn to fake it. To pretend. To display an empathy you don't really feel. And so it is that you learn to pass, if you're lucky, to look like everyone else, even though you're broken inside.

Time constricts and flattens, you know. It's not evenly weighted. Certain moments linger in the mind and others disappear.