I became a writer because I am the youngest of six children. I listen; I observe. I'm camouflaged as a moth. Mothers are unseen. It helps me write.

My father thought a novel was a broken short story. There's something to that. Many of my favorite novels are novellas. The authors of brief things must reckon with the precision of language.

I would like to give you more of my heart,but there is nothing more I can give you. I gave you everything and you crushed it into bits.

I am surprisingly optimistic, though lately that's been hard to maintain. Art and slow, small, close gestures help remind me of my optimism.

As a writer I feel more like a filter than a performer. I absorb and observe and then I name scatterings of stars into constellations. I don't usually spend time asking whether the stars are random or planned. I make a narrative in the darkness, the area subscribed by an outline of bright points. Sometimes they look like Ursa Minor, and sometimes they just looks like one day the world exploded.

I like the night. I like a slight terror to remind me how precious life is. Like I was sleeping with my smallest child and there were crazy coyotes howling outside. I knew how lucky I was to have her near me.

In writing I found a way to make silence and to be silent. The short story has a lot more silence than the novel and that is its success.