We say no to lots of things that would please us. I would like to punch people every now and then, but I don't. I would like to have something for free rather than pay for it. I would like to skip to the front of the line... I don't mean to brush aside the taste of meat, which is a powerful attraction. But its power is not without limit.

Words are capable of making experience more vivid, and also of organizing it. They can scare us, and they can comfort us.

In the morning, when the nothing vase casts a something shadow, like the memory of someone you've lost, what can you say about that?

There are a lot of things that we crave, there are a lot of things that would make us perhaps more fulfilled in a sensory way that we just say no to.

I felt it very moving to feel his touch, and to remember that hands can also show love.

I write because I want to end my loneliness. Books make people less alone. That, before and after everything else, is what books do. They show us that conversations are possible across distances.

And the joys I've felt have not always been joyous. I could have lived differently. When I was your age, my grandfather bought me a ruby bracelet. It as too big for me an would slide up and down my arm. It was almost a necklace. He later told me that he had asked the jeweler make that way. Its size was supposed to be a symbol of his love. More rubies, more love. But I could not wear it comfortably. I could not wear it at all. So here is the point of everything I have been trying to say. IF I were to give a bracelet to you, now, I would measure your wrist twice