And I find myself saying, “It wasn’t really about her.” And finding it’s true. What do you mean?” Norah asks. It was about the feeling, you know? She caused it in me, but it wasn’t about her. It was about my reaction, what I wanted to feel and then convinced myself that I felt, because I wanted it that bad. That illusion. It was love because I created it as love.

That's what it felt like - that if I let a little of the hurt out, it would keep pouring out until I was a deflated balloon of a person, with a big monster of hurt in front of me.

One of my best friends is named David Leventhal, and it has always been a constant source of amusement to see how the similarity and differences play out in our lives.

The tenderness between two people can turn the air tender, the room tender, time itself tender. As I step out of bed and slip on an oversize shirt, everything around me feels like it's the temperature of happiness.

I think one of the highest compliments you can give a person is that when you are talking to him, you are not thinking about the fact that you are talking to him. That is, your thoughts and words all exist on a single, engaged level. You are being yourself because you aren't bothering to think about who you should be. It is like when you talk in a dream.

I find I very rarely live up to my words. And since you know me primarily through my words, there are oh so many ways I can disappoint.

Yes, we could talk to you for days on end about all the bad first dates. Those are stories. Funny stories. Awkward stories. Stories we love to share, because by sharing them, we get something out of the hour or two we wasted on the wrong person. But that's all bad first dates are: short stories. Good first dates are more than short stories. They are first chapters. On a good first date, everything is springtime. And when a good first date becomes a relationship, the springtime lingers. Even after it's over, there can be springtime.