The 1st day, I stood in the kitchen leaning against the counter watching Annie feed the cats, and I knew I wanted to do that forever.

And Annie showed me how ailanthus trees grow under subway and sewer gratings, stretching toward the sun, making shelter in the summer, she said, laughing, for the small dragons that live under the streets.

The thing about mountains is that you have to keep on climbing them, and that it's always hard, but there's a view from top every time when you finally get there.

It's Annie and me they're all sitting around here like cardboard people judging; It's Annie and me. And what we did that they think is wrong, when you pare it all down, was fall in love.

Don't punish yourselves for people's ignorant reactions to what we all are. Don't let ignorance win. Let love.

Don't let ignorance win. Let love.

Liza-don't let it make any difference. It won't, will it? With us, I mean." "Of course it won't," I told her. But I was wrong. Six months of not writing-that's a difference. And so I lied to Annie. On top of everything else, I lied to Annie, too.