Read a lot. Read broadly... Tell stories to your friends, and pay attention to when they get bored... Write a lot.

I believe in hope, in what is something called ”radical hope.” I believe there is hope for all of us, even amid the suffering. And that’s why I write fiction, probaby. It’s my attempt to keep that fragile strand of radical hope, to buld a fire in the darkness.r

In these pages, and in my memories, she reminds me that a short life can also be a good and rich life, that it is possible to live with depression without being consumed by it, and that meaning in life is found together, in family and friendship that transcends and survives all manner of suffering. As the poet wrote in the Bible's Song of Solomon, 'Love is strong as death.' Or perhaps even stronger.

Hurt tends to drown out sorry.

memories fall apart too.

Keys show up when you reconcile yourself to the bus.

Even with everything broken and decided inside her she couldn't quite allow herself to disappear for good.