By the 6th grade I stopped doing ordinary things in front of people. It had been ordinary to sing, kids are singing all the time when they are little, but then something happens. It's not that we stop singing. I still sang. I just made sure I was alone when I did it. And I made sure I never did it accidentally. That thing we call 'bursting into song.' I believe this happens to most of us. We are still singing, but secretly and all alone.

something can only become an illusion after disillusionment. before that, it is something real. what caused the disillusionment? no one told me the print on the wall was just ink and paper and had no life of its own. at some point the cat stopped blinking, and i stopped thinking it could.

I live in constant fear of being fired or dropped for that dark part of my work I can't control.

but paper and ink have conjuring abilities of their own. arrangements of lines and shapes, of letters and words on a series of pages make a world we can dwell and travel in.

are memories pictures or the secret doorway?

In health we're doing the digestive system. We each got assigned a topic for an oral report. I got the small intestine. I swear to god I hate my life.

When I work on a book, I usually start with a question. And I don't sit around and go "I need to write a book. What's a good question?" It will be a question that's just clanging around in my head.