I think that to fully appreciate baseball, it helps to have been born in the U.S.

You changed the subject." "From what?" "The empty-headed girls who think you're sexy." "You know." "Know what?" "That I only have eyes for you.

Baba dropped the stack of food stamps on her desk. "Thank you but I don't want," Baba said. "I work always. In Afghanistan I work, in America I work. Thank you very much, Mrs. Dobbins, but I don't like it free money."...Baba walked out of the welfare office like a man cured of a tumor.

She was an extraordinary woman, and I went to bed that night feeling like I was perhaps more than ordinary myself. This was the effect she had on me.

I want to tear myself from this place, from this reality, rise up like a cloud and float away, melt into this humid summer night and dissolve somewhere far, over the hills. But I am here, my legs blocks of concrete, my lungs empty of air, my throat burning. There will be no floating away.

Michael Bealmear is a philanthropist, and he has become interested in the issue of refugees, and he proposed that we do an event in his community, where we could dedicate an entire evening focused on the global refugee crisis, focused primarily on Afghanistan.

A sudden happiness catches me unawares. I feel it trickling into me, and my eyes go liquid with gratitude and hope.