A child's hand in yours - what tenderness and power it arouses. You are instantly the very touchstone of wisdom and strength.

Prayer, to the thinking person, is almost inescapable.

Thank you, God, for the dignity and beauty of self. The precious innate self. The only thing that can't be taken from us. The only thing we really own.

Young women especially have something invested in being nice people, and it's only when you have children that you realize you're not a nice person at all, but generally a selfish bully.

One day you're racing about the business of life, harried but vital, a part of its machinery. Then gradually but inexorably you are left out, until one day you find the machinery tearing along without you - and nobody even notices.

A child's hand in yours - what tenderness and power it arouses. You are instantly the very touchstone of wisdom and strength.

Oh, God, give me grace for this day. Not for a lifetime, nor for next week, nor for tomorrow, just for this day. Direct my thoughts and bless them Direct my work and bless it. Direct the things I say and give them blessing, too. Direct and bless everything that I think and speak and do. So that for this one day, just this one day, I have the gift of grace that comes from your presence. . . .