A week passes but it feels as if he's never been anywhere else. It's one of the things war does to you. Everything you see works to replace moments and people from your life before, until you can't remember why any of it mattered. It doesn't help if you're a soldier. The effect is the same.

Knowing he was suffering pained me. That’s the way love tangles you up. I couldn’t stop loving him, and couldn’t shut off the feelings of wanting to care for him— but I also didn’t have to run to answer his letters. I was hurting, too, and no one was running to me.

Dogs are easy. If their tails are up and their eyes are soft, you're in.

If I can write one sentence, simple and true every day, I'll be satisfied.

I also liked to look around at the houses surrounding the park and wonder about the people who filled them, what kinds of marriages they had and how they loved or hurt each other on any given day, and if they were happy, and whether they thought happiness was a sustainable thing.

Maybe happiness was an hourglass already running out, the grains tipping, sifting past each other. Maybe it was a state of mind.

My life was my life; I would have to stare it down, somehow, and make it work for me.