If he says jump, she doesn't even ask "How high?" She goes out and buys a pogo stick.

As a child, what I was missing was so much bigger to me than what I had. My mother-mythic, imaginary-was a deity and a superhero and a comfort all at once. If only I'd had her, surely, she would have been the answer to every problem; if only I'd had her , she would have been the cure for everything that ever had gone wrong in my life.

I always hated when my scars started to fade, because as long as I could still see them, I knew why I was hurting.

Just because fate had thrown another obstacle in my way didn't mean I had to give up my dreams.

Grief is a curious thing, when it happens unexpectedly. It is a Band-Aid being ripped away, taking the top layer off a family. And the underbelly of a household is never pretty, ours no exception. There were times I stayed in my room for days on end with headphones on, if only so that I would not have to listen to my mother cry. There were the weeks that my father worked round-the-clock shifts, so that he wouldn't have to come home to a house that felt too big for us.

The Inuit say that the stars are holes in heaven. And every time we see the people we loved shining through, we know they're happy.

I believe that having something to hope for - even if it's just a better tomorrow- is the most powerful drug on this planet.