Writers seek to create order out of the chaos of everyday life, and to extract meaning from both the tragic and the mundane

New York City is filled with random, quirky moments like this, chance collisions that just might change your life.

I am fooling only myself when I say that my mother exists now only in the photographs on my bulletin board or in the outline of my hand or in the armful of memories I still hold tight. She lives on beneath everything I do. Her presence influenced who I was and her absence influences who I am. Our lives are shaped as much by those who leave us as they are by those who stay. Loss is our legacy. Insight is our gift. Memory is our guide.

I couldn't chance failing in New York yet, letting the city fail me. It was the only place I knew I belonged. If I couldn't survive there, I would have no place else to go.

Our lives are shaped as much by those who leave us as they are by those who stay. Loss is our legacy. Insight is our gift. Memory is our guide

There is an emptiness inside of me -- a void that will never be filled. No one in your life will ever love you as your mother does. There is no love as pure, unconditional and strong as a mother's love. And I will never be loved that way again.

a mother's death also means the loss of the consistent, supportive family system that once supplied her with a secure home base, she then has to develop her self-confidence and self-esteem through alternate means. Without a mother or mother-figure to guide her, a daughter also has to piece together a female self-image of her own.