In December 1998, I considered myself an expert on love. I was almost a year into a relationship, one that had grown more slowly than I had wished, but once it flowered it was much more stimulating than any marriage or relationship I had known.

The thing about Republicans is that they don't care so much about respect, but they love fear, at least in others.

Most of my childhood revolved around wondering when we would be blown up by the Russians. I couldn't stand the news, I knew that if the missile were launched, mortality would arrive in half an hour, so I spent a lot of my childhood feeling that I was 30 minutes from being dead.

I have noticed before that there is a category of acquaintanceship that is not friendship or business or romance, but speculation, fascination.

My mom was paranoid about my safety.

The only siblings I have are half-siblings. My nuclear family would have been an extra-suffocating threesome. Instead, I have an interesting brother and sister, in-laws, and darling nephews.

A love story, at least a convincing one, requires three elements - the lover, the beloved, and the adventures they have together.