The world was large, so large. Bigger than it had been before. Family, too, a bigger word. That felt like a good thing. An essential thing. There was power in numbers.

This is not just a simple story of "money can't buy happiness." Or maybe that's just what it is. And if it is, why shouldn't it be? Because if this is something we are already supposed to know, then why don't we know it? Why do we chase and scrabble and fight for things to flaunt, why? Why do we reach for power over other people, and through the thin superiority of our possessions, believe we have it? Why do we let money make people bigger, and allow those without it to be made smaller? How did we lose the truth in the frantic, tribal drumbeat of more, more, more?

You wouldn't match Melanie and me up, and if we hadn't gotten stuck together as lab partners in junior high science, I doubt if we'd have matched us up either. I'm not sure why we even stuck, except that we each probably find the other to be entertaining...Besides I feel like it was a personal mission of mine to broaden Melanie's world, though I think she felt the same for me.

You've got to say what you mean and mean what you say...Doubt in your voice is an open door people will shove right through.

I finally learned that it was all right to say something wasn’t working for me when it wasn’t working. The world doesn’t come crashing down when you speak the truth.

Because words were hills and valleys you traveled, so lovely sometimes that they hurt your eyes.

Darkness does this. It finds all the places you are hiding in. It finds all the things you are holding onto tightly and makes you let go.