The news of life is carried via telephone. A baby's birth, a couple engaged, a tragic car accident on a late night highway - most milestones of the human journey, good or bad, are foreshadowed by the sound of a ringing.

I hope you never hear those words. Your mom. She died. They are different than other words. They are too big to fit in your ears. They belong to some strange, heavy, powerful language that pounds away at the side of your head, a wrecking ball coming at you again and again, until finally, the words crack a hole large enough to fit inside your brain. And in so doing, they split you apart.

Strangers are just family you have yet to come to know.

As long as we can love each other, and remember the feeling of love we had, we can die without ever really going away.

For years I wrote in my basement. More recently I graduated to one floor above, an office with all my books and music and - ta da! - a window.

There is no formula to relationships.

Love each other or die.