But if one had everything one could ever need or want, what was left to dream of?

But parents, she supposed, were not the pinnacle of perfection their children thought or expected them to be. They were humans who usually did the best they could but often made the wrong choices.

I prefer to believe the opposite - that there is always an indestructible beauty at the heart of darkness.

My happiness has to come from within myself or it is too fragile a thing to be of any use to me and too much of a burden to benefit any of my loved ones.

Why do I want to run from happiness?

Always guarding one's real, precious self in a cocoon of tranquility within a thousand masks. Life itself had become a secret affair.

Sometimes even the imagination lets one down.