I think the Northern Ireland accent is one of the most beautiful in the world.

He looks like the sort of man who can't afford to leave, and doesn't want to stay, and so he is doing both at once.

Long ago, long ago. The simple things come back to us. They rest for a moment by our ribcages then suddenly reach in and twist our hearts a notch backward.

Sometimes thinking back on things is a mistake arising out of pride, but I guess you live inside a moment for years, move with it and feel it grow, and it sends out roots until it touches everything in sight.

We shape ourselves by our imaginative reach.

The person we know at first, she thinks, is not the one we know at last.

That's what sons do: write to their mothers about recall, tell themselves about the past until they come to realize that they are the past.