A voice is a human gift; it should be cherished and used, to utter fully human speech as possible. Powerlessness and silence go together.

She had her reasons. Not that they were the same as anybody else's reasons.

I didn't go to school for a full year until I was 12. In the summer I was a wild child in the woods, with no shoes, and in the fall it was back to the city, shoe shops and school.

Old lovers go the way of old photographs, bleaching out gradually as in a slow bath of acid: first the moles and pimples, then the shadings. Then the faces themselves, until nothing remains but the general outlines.

Why is it he feels some line has been crossed, some boundary transgressed? How much is too much, how far is too far?

I think the main thing is: Just do it. Plunge in! Being Canadian, I go swimming in icy cold lakes, and there is always that dithering moment. "Am I really going to do this? Won't it hurt?" And at some point you just have to flop in there and scream. Once you're in, keep going. You may have to crumple and toss, but we all do that. Courage! I think that is what's most required.

It's evening, one of those gray water-color washes, like liquid dust.