is it like this every night, while we're asleep?

Being a parent wasn't just about bearing a child. It was about bearing witness to its life.

We believe what we want to, what we need to. The corollary is that we choose not to see what we'd rather pretend doesn't exist.

The legal system works really well, if you communicate a certain way. But if you don't, it all goes to Hell in a handbasket really quickly.

I realize then that we never have children, we receive them. And sometimes it’s not for quite as long as we would have expected or hoped. But it is still far better than never having had those children at all.

i know what it's like to wake up thinking you will be able to cast the people who play the starring roles in your life, only to realize that you have to watch it from the audience.

I imagined what it would be like to hold a butterfly in your hands something bejeweled and treasured and to know that despite your devotion it was dying by degrees.