She was not good on the phone. She needed the face, the pattern of eyes, nose, trembling mouth... People talking were meant to look at a face, the disastrous cupcake of it, the hide-and-seek of the heart dashing across. With a phone, you said words, but you never watched them go in. You saw them off at the airport but never knew whether there was anyone there to greet them when they got off the plane.

You chose love like a belief, a faith, a place, a box for one's heart to knock against like a spook in the house.

I feared Sarah was one of those women who instead of laughing said, "That's funny," or instead of smiling said, "That's interesting," or instead of saying, "You are a stupid blithering idiot," said, "Well I think it's a little more complicated than that.

Make a list of all the lovers you've ever had. Warren Lasher Ed "Rubberhead" Catapano Charles Deats or Keats Alfonse Tuck it in your pocket. Leave it lying around, conspicuously. Somehow you lose it. Make "mislaid" jokes to yourself. Make another list.

I've never been to a dinner party where everyone at the dinner table didn't say something funny.

She smiled at him, with longing. 'Where do you live,' she asked, 'and how do I get there?

(Such a life)engaged gross quantities of hope and despair and set them wildly side by side, like a Third World country of the heart.