A lot of life is just surviving what happens.

Sometimes that´s all you need…, to know it´s not broken. To know you’re still whole and that you’ll heal.

She would bring you some great book because she was a book matchmaker, because she loved books the way other girls loved clothes.

I wondered if parents had an easier time with the secrets their children kept than children did with the secrets of their parents. A parent's secrets seemed like some sort of betrayal, where my own just seemed like a fact of life and growing up and away. I was supposed to be independent, but he was supposed to be available. Him having his own life seemed selfish, where me having my own was the right order of things.

I grow green beans in my garden. The one thing I know about harvesting them is that you need to train your eyes to see the beans. At first it all looks like leaves, until you see one bean and then another and another. If you want clarity, too, you have to look hard. You have to look under things and look from different angles. You'll see what you need to when you do that. A hundred beans, suddenly.

You look so good," I say, and s***! Oh god, that's not what I meant. S***! "It looks good. The book.

You take care of the people you love, but it’s true, too, that you take care of the things you own.