My parents were constantly afraid they would lose their jobs. The idea that we were always a paycheck away from disaster was drilled into me.

The radio station was playing Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake, a sure sign that things were much worse than they appeared.

In America, the distance between wanting something and having it delivered to your living room is not terribly great.

... I'm the fortieth-ugliest man in this bar. But so what! So what! What if someday she lets me kiss each one of her freckles again? She has like a million. But every one of them means something to me. Isn't this how people used to fall in love? I know we're living in Rubenstein's America, like you keep saying. But doesn't that just make us even more responsible for each other's fates? I mean, what if Eunice and I just said no to all this. To this bar. To this FACing. The two of us. What if we just went home and read books to each other?

Don't be pretentious is my first advice to young writers. This is the big problem - just because you're getting an MFA doesn't mean you have to write for the Academy. Be true to your personality. Don't temper your personality down with words. Don't build defensive fortresses around yourself with words - words are your friends.

We are now part of this giant machine where every second we have to take out a device and contribute our thoughts and opinions.

I love to act, I've always wanted to be an actor. I think that acting and fiction go nicely together - being able to visualize language as something you perform, not just something that's there on the page.