Relationships are never chance events.

My throat tightened, but I held back the tears and reminded myself that withdrawing from a woman is no different than kicking a drug; you feel shaky and you want it, but eventually the need passes, and you feel restored.

People blush when one of their core truths is revealed.

What about my rights? What about a person's privacy? Did all that just go to hell after 9/11?

The irrational thoughts were the ones with the power to burn holes in your gut.

But insight doesn't necessarily produce self-control. Sometimes you just see your destructiveness more clearly.

...the horrific fact that our lives and those of the people we love are impermanent and exquisitely fragile, that any of us can cease to exist without warning, that loving anyone, anywhere, at any time, leaves you infinitely vulnerable at every single moment. (20)