With any child entering adolescence, one hunts for signs of health, is desperate for the smallest indication that the child's problems will never be important enough for a television movie.

It's so interesting that we think we know the rules to this game, this total hypothetical game called, "Would you," "If you had it to do over." It's not out there.

Maintenance is what you have to do just so you can walk out the door knowing that if you go to the market and bump into a guy who once rejected you, you won't have to hide behind a stack of canned food. I don't mean to be too literal about this.

That's another thing about being a certain age that I've noticed: I try as much as possible not to look in the mirror.

I have for many years been puzzled by the persistence of Hugh Hefner. Why is he still here?

New Orleans is one of the two most ingrown, self-obsessed little cities in the United States. (The other is San Francisco.)

Don't you love New York in the fall? It makes me want to buy school supplies. I would send you a bouquet of newly sharpened pencils if I knew your name and address.