The journey I'm taking is inside me. Just like blood travels down veins, what I'm seeing is my inner self and what seems threatening is just the echo of the fear in my heart.

I go by the gut. I might not appear to have any talent but I've got plenty of gut instinct.

There was just one moon. That familiar, yellow, solitary moon. The same moon that silently floated over fields of pampas grass, the moon that rose--a gleaming, round saucer--over the calm surface of lakes, that tranquilly beamed down on the rooftops of fast-asleep houses. The same moon that brought the high tide to shore, that softly shone on the fur of animals and enveloped and protected travelers at night. The moon that, as a crescent, shaved slivers from the soul--or, as a new moon, silently bathed the earth in its own loneliness. THAT moon.

She was a keen observer, a precise user of language, sharp-tongued and funny. She could stir your emotions. Yes, really, that's what she was so good at - stirring people's emotions, moving you. And she knew she had this power...I only realized later. At the time, I had no idea what she was doing to me.

I began running on an everyday basis after I became a writer. As being a writer requires sitting at a desk for hours a day, without getting some exercise you'd quickly get out of shape and gain weight, I figured.

I'm not afraid to die. What I'm afraid of is having reality get the better of me, of having reality leave me behind.

It seems to me that very sad things always contain an element of the comical