Anybody can become a widow. There aren't any special qualifications. It happens in less time than it takes to draw a breath. It doesn't require the planning, for example, that it takes to become a wife or a mother or any of the other ritual roles of womanhood.

Being wanted is the tender heel of everything human.

Here is how it is for women. We become our schedules. That starts to feel good. Then it starts to feel necessary. Then it starts to feel like everything.

Nothing better for the hormones and worse for the heart than the right boy at the right time.

The ideal structure for a family is one that remains so.

our sons and daughters are only passing through. ... If we are lucky, they always will consider our home their harbor, but they are headed out to the open sea, almost from the first.

Friendship for me is made from a tapestry of personalities, each of whom shares a part of all I care about.