The child who ran weeping to you with a cut finger is now brought home, smiling gamely, with a broken collarbone and incredible contusions- 'it wasn't Jezebels fault, Dad.'

Riding turns 'I wish into 'I can'.

Medicines may be necessary. Flowers lift the heart. But your smile is the best restorative of all.

Music speaks of Platonic truth - the ideal river rather than the polluted reality, love as we dream it rather than we experience it, grief noble and uplifting rather than our distracted weeping. It is necessary to our survival and our sanity.

Cats can work out mathematically the exact place to sit that will cause most inconvenience.

If there is a heaven, it's certain our animals are to be there. Their lives become so interwoven with our own, it would take more than an archangel to detangle them.

If your sister is in a tearing hurry to go out and cannot catch your eye, she's wearing your best sweater.