Dads don't need to be tall and broad-shouldered and clever. Love makes them so.

In loneliness, in sickness, in confusion-the mere knowledge of friendship makes it possible to endure, even if the friend is powerless to help. It is enough that they exist. Friendship is not diminished by distance or time, by imprisonment or war, by suffering or silence. It is in these things that it roots most deeply. It is from these things that it flowers.

You are asleep. Deep, deep asleep - and then the world caves in. The cat has leapt from the top window onto your stomach. He is saturated. He is hungry. He taps you into full wakefulness with a sodden paw "Could you open a can?"

Bears being sent through the mail should never be squashed up to make them fit. It gives them indigestion.

A horse can lend its rider the speed and strength he or she lacks - but the rider who is wise remembers it is no more then a loan.

A friend is the only person you will let into the house when you are Turning Out Drawers.

Riding turns 'I wish into 'I can'.