Do all the other things, the ambitious things - travel, get rich, get famous, innovate, lead, fall in love, make and lose fortunes...but as you do, to the extent that you can, err in the direction of kindness.

For me, the fiction writer's job is to take the small, stupid process of learning to use an iPhone - and suddenly you're the guy who's asking your daughter, "When I go on Facebook, can it see me?"

We try, we fail, we posture, we aspire, we pontificate - and then we age, shrink, die, and vanish.

As one gets older, this question of death, becomes more vexing and urgent.

I wasted a lot of years working on my writing and very grandly saying, 'And now... My Novel!,' which would soon be reduced to a short story, then to a paragraph.

...There is no end to the making and selling of things there is no end to the making and selling of things there is no end... Man, it occurs to me, is a joyful, buying-and-selling piece of work. I have been wrong, dead wrong, when I've decried consumerism. Consumerism is what we are. It is, in a sense, a holy impulse. A human being is someone who joyfully goes in pursuit of things, brings them home, then immediately starts planning how to get more.

Don't be afraid to be confused. Try to remain permanently confused. Anything is possible.