It's now expected of me that I will defy expectation, so I really generally seem to be free to write what I want.

Life is fundamentally up for grabs

I never have been a musician; I'm not actually capable. Because I can't even pretend to acquire the gift, all of my first feelings about art are still attached to music. I look at it yearningly, I look at it wonderingly. I behold it from afar, as something unattainable, something outside of myself, from which I can take nourishment, but I can't domesticate and master.

I'm a serial deconstructor of my own authority in certain areas.

Yet I'm making a book and I'm going to care immensely about what words get bound in the pages, and I want the object to look good. I won't believe in it and it won't be real to me until there's a finished book I can hold.

Some people have things written all over their faces; the big guy had a couple of words misspelled in crayon on his.

I hate feeling too complacent when I write. I like to be solving new problems.