Stories live in your blood and bones, follow the seasons and light candles on the darkest night-every storyteller knows she or he is also a teacher.

[On her father, Ronald Reagan:] How do you argue with someone who states that the people who are sleeping on the grates of the streets of America 'are homeless by choice'?

Some people, when they die, leave so much life behind that we wonder how they did it.

It takes strength to make your way through grief, to grab hold of life and let it pull you forward.

You have to separate yourself from your parents. You do. In order to find yourself.

It's one thing to show your love for someone when everything is going fine and life is smooth. But when the 'in sickness and in health' part kicks in and sickness does enter your lives, you're tested. Your resilience is tested.

I think we can work through a lot of political and international problems, but what really frightens me is what's happening environmentally.