As it happened, I didn't grow up to be the kind of woman who is the heroine in a Western, and although the men I have known have had many virtues and have taken me to live in many places I have come to love, they have never been John Wayne, and they have never taken me to the bend in the river where the cottonwoods grow. Deep in that part of my heart where artificial rain forever falls, that is still the line I want to hear.

To cure jealousy is to see it for what it is, a dissatisfaction with self, an impossible claim that one should be at once Rose Bowl princess, medieval scholar, Saint Joan, Milly Theale, Temple Drake, Eleanor of Aquitaine, one

A single person is missing for you, and the whole world is empty.

The fear is for what is still to be lost.

The last sentence in a piece is another adventure. It should open the piece up.

Only the dying man can tell how much time he has left.

The minute you start putting words on paper you're eliminating possibilities.