With preference came point of view; with point of view, personality; with personality, uniqueness; with uniqueness, grief.
Jane SmileyThere are five things that societies do: They reproduce; they produce food; they organize themselves in terms of law; they organize themselves in terms of belief; and they make art. Four of them are about conformity, and in these, everything would go more smoothly if people just would shut up and do what they're told. But in art it doesn't work that way.
Jane SmileyThe fact is that the same sequence of days can arrange themselves into a number of different stories.
Jane SmileyBefore I write a novel, images float around in my head that work like icons - they are meaningless in themselves, but serve as reminders.
Jane SmileyYou know what getting married is? It's agreeing to taking this person who right now is at the top of his form, full of hopes and ideas, feeling good, looking good, wildly interested in you because you're the same way, and sticking by him while he slowly disintegrates. And he does the same for you. You're his responsibility now and he's yours. If no one else will take care of him, you will. If everyone else rejects you, he won't. What do you think love is? Going to bed all the time?
Jane Smiley