The great teachers fill you up with hope and shower you with a thousand reasons to embrace all aspects of life.

I’ve never had anyone’s approval, so I’ve learned to live without it.

There are no ideas in the South, just barbecue.

I wanted to become the seeker, the aroused and passionate explorer, and it was better to go at it knowing nothing at all, always choosing the unmarked bottle, always choosing your own unproven method, armed with nothing but faith and a belief in astonishment.

What's important is that a story changes every time you say it out loud. When you put it on paper, it can never change. But the more times you tell it, the more changes will occur. A story is a living thing; it moves and shifts

My mother thought of my father as half barbarian and half blunt instrument, and she isolated him from his children.

I learned that if I could read, I could cook. I surprised myself I like it.