The process, not the final achievement, is what it's all about.

I am basically a pretty good autodidact. I can teach myself things.

I survive by finding the sweet spot between reason and unreason, between the rational and irrational.

I am sustained by the certainty that life has meaning...as does death.

To many people, free will is a license to rebel not against what is unjust or hard in life but against what is best for them and true.

In this uncertain space between birth and death, especially here at the end of the world in Moonlight Bay, we need hope as surely as we need food and water, love and friendship. The trick, however, is to remember that hope is a perilous thing, that it's not a steel and concrete bridge across the void between this moment and a brighter future. Hope is no stronger than tremulous beads of dew strung on a filament of spider web, and it alone can't long support the terrible weight of an anguished mind and a tortured heart.

I have a sofa on which I never nap, big windows with an ocean view that I rarely see because I keep the pleated shades down at all times while working. I know I'm a potential slacker, so I don't tempt myself.