When the creative impulse sweeps over you, grab it. You grab it and honor it and use it, because momentum is a rare gift.

Flawed, we're truly interesting, truly memorable, and yes, truly beautiful.

I preferred my brand of beauty where Norah was more beautiful than any bimbette, and Mom was beautiful whether sized extra-small or extra-large. Where Peony could look at herself in the mirror and murmur, wow, look at me. Just look at me.

Maybe we don't have the same definition of about what's beautiful. So define it. Define true beauty.

But even quashed rebellions leave us different. Because freedom may be a forbidden fruit in tyrannies, but once tasted, it is unforgettable.

There is a time to study a map passionately, obsessively. To see where you've gone, where others have gone before you. To commit to memory every obstacle, every danger. Shakespeare had a term for this obsession: mappery. But there is a time, too, when you say, come dragons. I challenge you to find me.

You would be surprised what two hours of daily exercise and five hundred stomach crunches can do for you.