I feel like I need to give people a note with the book that says, 'I'm OK, no worries!'

What a generous thing that is, I realize, for a husband to try to make his wife laugh.

To refuse has so many more consequences than submitting.

Sometimes I think illness sits inside every woman, waiting for the right moment to bloom. I have known so many sick women all my life. Women with chronic pain, with ever-gestating diseases. Women with conditions. Men, sure, they have bone snaps, they have backaches, they have a surgery or two, yank out a tonsil, insert a shiny plastic hip. Women get consumed.

Ironic people always dissolve when confronted with earnestness, it's their kryptonite

Nick is like a good stiff drink: He gives everything the correct perspective.

Sometimes I think I won't ever feel safe until I can count my last days on one hand.