Women were complicated creatures. Any man who thought he had one figured out simply wasn't paying attention.

But when you slice truth too thin, you deceive.

We don't go to the ocean for anything as simple as happiness, do we? We go there to feel alive. Like life, the ocean holds chance and change, grief and terror and beauty. It promises mortality, not peace.

Living is very serious, very real. It is also always a game. If we are wise, it is very real, very terrible, and very lovely, and a good deal of fun.

How to put this feeling, this certainty, into something as limited as words?

Dogs make sense. They understand hierarchy and the need to cooperate. They come when you call them. A cat though—a cat will take your number and get back to you. Maybe. If he’s in a good mood.

Marriage and especially the ceremony which announces it, the wedding... That is how we say to the world, 'These two are now a family, and with this joining our families are joined, too. And you had damned well better respect that.