And then sometimes I think the people to feel saddest for are people who once knew what profoundness was, but who lost or became numb to the sensation of wonder – people who closed the doors that leads us into the secret world – or who had the doors closed for them by time and neglect and decisions made in times of weakness.

So where do you start when you want to start your life again?

When you're young, you always feel that life hasn't yet begun—that "life" is always scheduled to begin next week, next month, next year, after the holidays—whenever. But then suddenly you're old and the scheduled life didn't arrive. You find yourself asking, 'Well then, exactly what was it I was having—that interlude—the scrambly madness—all that time I had before?

All families are psychotic. Everybody has basically the same family - it's just reconfigured slightly different from one to the next.

what I remember is the silence in spite of the noise. In my head it might just as well have been a snowy day in the country.

I saw doves and I thought they were rocks, but they were asleep. My breath made them stir, and they rocks took flight, the earth exploding... and my only thought was that I wanted you to see them, too.

Jason said, "Yes. Gerard T. Giraffe." What does the 'T' stand for?" 'The.