Sometimes I don't get you,' I said. She didn't even glance at me. She just smiled toward the television and said, 'You never get me. That's the whole point.

Reading forces you to be quiet in a world that no longer makes place for that.

My responsibility is to try to tell true stories. To me a true story is always hopeful, but never simply, uncomplicatedly happy.

maybe she'd been scared of being paralyzed by fear again.

Being a person, I had come to realize, is a communal activity. Dogs know how to be dogs. But people do not know how to be people unless and until they learn from other people.

She taught me everything I knew about crawfish and kissing and pink wine and poetry. She made me different.

I'm just reveling in the glory of not having to hear the neediness and impotence of my own voice.