When we accept dismissive judgments of our community we stop having generous hope for it. We cease to be capable of serving its best interests.

Fiction that does not acknowledge this at least tacitly is not true.

I do assume that a character or a place is inexhaustible and will always reward further attention.

These people who can see right through you never quite do you justice, because they never give you credit for the effort you're making to be better than you actually are, which is difficult and well meant and deserving of some little notice.

There is more beauty than our eyes can bear, precious things have been put into our hands and to do nothing to honor them is to do great harm.

And often enough, when we think we are protecting ourselves, we are struggling against our rescuer.

There is so little to remember of anyone - an anecdote, a conversation at a table. But every memory is turned over and over again, every word, however chance, written in the heart in the hope that memory will fulfill itself, and become flesh, and that the wanderers will find a way home, and the perished, whose lack we always feel, will step through the door finally and stroke our hair with dreaming habitual fondness not having meant to keep us waiting long.