And sure, I know if you eat this way you'll die. So? If you don't eat this way you're still going to die. Why not die happy?

I get tired of hearing it's a crummy world and that people are no damned good. What kind of talk is that? I know a place in Payette, Idaho, where a cook and a waitress and a manager put everything they've got into laying a chicken-fried steak on you.

Weddings seem to be magnets for mishap and for whatever craziness lurks in family closets. In more ways than one, weddings bring out the ding-dong on everybody involved.

When my neighbor walks the dogs, he performs a ritual act of sacer simplicitas, to use the church Latin: "sacred simplicity." Walking the dog is in truth a ritual of renewal and revival on an intimate scale - a small rebirth of well-being on a daily basis.

Love is a fabric which never fades, no matter how often it is washed in the water of adversity and grief.

All I ever needed to know I learned in kindergarten. Share everything ... Don't hit people ... Clean up your own mess.

Just when you thought that you already learned the way how to live, life changes - and you're left the same as you begun.