The family - that dear octopus from whose tentacles we never quite escape, nor, in our inmost hearts, ever quite wish to.

Am I really admitting that my sister is determined to marry a man she has only seen once and doesn't much like the look of? It is half real and half pretense - and I have an idea that it is a game most girls play when they meet an eligible young men. They just...wonder.

My hand is very tired but I want to go on writing. I keep resting and thinking. All day I have been two people - the me imprisoned in yesterday and the me out here on the mound; and now there is a third me trying to get in - the me in what is going to happen next.

It's a beautiful sight to see good dancers doing simple steps. It's a painful sight to see beginners doing complicated patterns.

Though he had very little Latin beyond "Cave canem," he had, as a young dog, devoured Shakespeare (in a tasty leather binding).

I write this sitting in the kitchen sink.

Cruel blows of fate call for extreme kindness in the family circle.