The people we most love do become a physical part of us, ingrained in our synapses, in the pathways where memories are created.

Like my mother before me, I have always been a good speller.

Yet the story of Orpheus, it occurs to me, is not just about the desire of the living to resuscitate the dead but about the ways in which the dead drag us along into their shadowy realm because we cannot let them go. So we follow them into the Underworld, descending, descending, until one day we turn and make our way back.

Our minds are mysterious; our conscious brain is like a ship on a sea that is obscure to us.

I am the indoctrinated child of two lapsed Irish Catholics. Which is to say: I am not religious.

Many researchers say the dominant emotion experienced after loss is yearning or searching. And while you might feel more anger early on, it's accompanied by a whole host of other feelings.

Time doesn’t obey our commands. You cannot make it holy just because it is disappearing.