I need to have one foot inside and one foot outside a culture to be able to write about it. For example, I couldn't write about the gay culture if I were wholly inside or outside of it. Finding that distance is always interesting. I jokingly say that when I'm in America, I write about Beirut, and when I'm in Beirut, I write about America. A lot of my friends in Beirut think I'm more American than Lebanese. Here, my friends think of me more as Lebanese.

I wonder if being sane means disregarding the chaos that is life, pretending only an infinitesimal segment of it is reality.

I wonder whether there is such a thing as a sense of individuality. Is it all a facade, covering a deep need to belong? Are we simply pack animals desperately trying to pretend we are not?

I opened myself to you only to be skinned alive. The more vulnerable I became, the faster and more deft your knife. Knowing what was happening, still I stayed and let you carve more. That's how much I loved you. That's how much.

I long ago abandoned myself to a blind lust for the written word. Literature is my sandbox. In it I play, build my forts and castles, spend glorious time.

I'm an atheist, a devout atheist, but I find religion fascinating. Primarily because of cultural references, as in: This is what we grew up with. Both on a personal level and a collective level.

What is the purpose of a city if not to grant the greatest of gifts, anonymity?