There was a girl who could fly, a boy who had bees living inside him, a brother and sister who could lift boulders over their heads.

I used to dream about escaping my ordinary life, but my life was never ordinary. I had simply failed to notice how extraordinary it was.

There was a girl who could fly, a boy who had bees living inside him, a brother and sister who could lift boulders over their heads.

I've never really been interested in the vintage photos people pay lots of money for -- civil war tintypes or old daguerrotypes of famous people. Nor do I have any interest in the really gross, dark stuff that some people pay top-dollar, like post-mortem photos of babies (yuck) or press photos of old murder scenes or whatever. I collect in these little niches most other people don't care about -- dark-and-weird-but-fun -- and photos that have been written on, which a lot of sellers think hurts their value. All of which is good news for me!

Do you ever find yourself climbing into an open grave during a bombing raid and wish you'd just stayed in bed?

We cling to our fairy tales until the price for believing in them becomes too high.

Strange, I thought, how you can be living your dreams and your nightmares at the very same time.