I want to be braver and more honest about my life. When you're sexually abused, there's a lot of damage.

I very much wished not to be noticed, and to be left alone, and I sort of succeeded.

Wild sings the bird of the heart in the forests of our lives.

We all have a hungry heart, and one of the things we hunger for is happiness. So as much as I possibly could, I stayed where I was happy. I spent a great deal of time in my younger years just writing and reading, walking around the woods in Ohio, where I grew up.

Come with me into the woods where spring is advancing, as it does, no matter what, not being singular or particular, but one of the forever gifts, and certainly visible.

I tell you this to break your heart, by which I mean only that it break open and never close again to the rest of the world.

There were times over the years when life was not easy, but if you're working a few hours a day and you've got a good book to read, and you can go outside to the beach and dig for clams, you're okay.