Maybe life involves the pairing of unsuitable people, those who wait and those who keep others waiting, and the key to happiness is finding the one person with whom you share the same internal chronometer.

Maybe that is the greatest of wonders: that we can be shaped so much by those we've known closely, and equally by those we've never known at all - and that we too can change the world long after we've left it.

Nothing sells tombstones like a Girl Scout in uniform.

Victory [over homophobia] may require five or maybe 20 years. Yet I have no doubt that "don't ask, don't tell" and same-sex adoption bans will be as unspeakable and inexplicable to my grandchildren as counting a slave as three-fifths of a human being.

If you give a man a hammer, he thinks he can solve all problems by pounding. Well, God gave men penises.

I can handle being married for my money; it's being married for my life insurance that gives me pause.

I am grateful that I have rights in the proverbial public square - but, as a practical matter, my most cherished rights are those that I possess in my bedroom and hospital room and death chamber.