My mom said the term heavy petting existed a lot when she was in high school.

Don't put yourself in situations you'd like to run away from. But when you run, run back to yourself.

When someone shows you how little you mean to them and you keep coming back for more, before you know it you start to mean less to yourself.

You just have to work, we all have to work really hard to take care of ourselves and feed ourselves good information, just like we feed ourselves good food. Feed ourselves good books and good messaging and the things that make us feel like we can be connected with ourselves and others in a deeper way.

Basically, anything a sexual predator might do to woo a small suburban girl, I was trying.

If you're writing, you're starting in private. It can really be this amazing, private, freeing experience. Forget that it's for other people - that comes in later.

But I also think when we embark on intimate relationships, we make a basic human promise to be decent, to hold a flattering mirror up to each other, to be respectful as we explore each other.