Probably not needing to be published would give me more time to think about a book.

As I watch, the sky fills with clouds of snow feathers from every kind of bird there ever was and even some that only exist in the imagination, like the bluebirds that fly over the rainbow.

What if we had a chance to do it again and again, until we finally did get it right? Wouldn't that be wonderful?

I am mad, I think. I am mad therefore I think. I am mad therefore I think I am.

Love was the hardest thing. Don't let anyone ever tell you different.

Julia's vocabulary was "chock-full" of strangely archaic words - "spiffing," "crumbs," "jeepers" - that seemed to have originated in some prewar girls' annual rather than in Julia's own life. For Jackson, words were functional, they helped you get to places and explain things. For Julia, they were freighted with inexplicable emotion.

Most people muddled through events and only in retrospect realized their significance.