The truth is, part of me is every age. I’m a three-year-old, I’m a five-year-old, I’m a thirty-seven-year-old, I’m a fifty-year-old. I’ve been through all of them, and I know what it’s like. I delight in being a child when it’s appropriate to be a child. I delight in being a wise old man when it’s appropriate to be a wise old man. Think of all I can be! I am every age, up to my own.

But common sense has no place in first love and never has.

Suddenly, details seemed extremely important. Details were something to grab on to, a way to insert myself into the story.

Personally, I always wondered about authors and celebrities who loudly declared there was no God. It was usually when they were healthy and popular and being listened to by crowds. What happens, I wondered, in the quiet moments before death? By then, they have lost the stage, the world has moved on. If suddenly, in their last gasping moments, through fear, a vision, a late enlightenment, they change their minds about God, who would know?

the running boy is inside every man, no matter how old he gets.

...fairness," he said, "does not govern life and death. if it did, no good person would ever die." "Strangers," the Blue Man said, "are just family you have yet to come to know." "sacrifice is a part of life. it is supposed to be. it's not something to regret. it's something to aspire to. little sacrifices. big sacrifices. a mother works so her son can go to school. a daughter moves home to take care of her sick father. Sometimes when you sacrifice something precious, you're not really losing it. you're just passing it on to someone else.

Love- the infatuation kind- 'he's so handsome, she's so beautiful'- that can shrivel. As soon as something goes wrong, that kind of love can fly out the window.