A kid thinks her mother is just that -- hers. A mother is also a woman, an independent being, who doesn't want to be reminded by anyone, child or otherwise, of her tree-trunk thighs. The world made women's private lives a public affair to people who knew them and even people who didn't.

I like dressing up for dates and dissecting a dinner conversation with a new guy to determine if he might be The One.

In high school, during marathon phone conversations, cheap pizza dinners and long suburban car rides, I began to fall for boys because of who they actually were, or at least who I thought they might become.

She thought about him all the time - not so much about Doug the individual, but rather about the nature of love, and the shock of learning how quickly it could disappear.

We don't always do the things our parents want us to do, but it is their mistake if they can't find a way to love us anyway.

I love the smell of a mans skin.

There were so many ways to be twenty-six years old.