When you don't know where you're going, maybe it wasn't such a bad thing to have more than you need.

I've given lots of people chances. But there's only so much faith you can have in people.

'I don't get it,' Caroline said, bemused. 'She's the only one with wings. Why is that?'

Editing is hard but nowhere NEAR as tough as facing that blank page and blinking cursor each day. You're all alone and no one else can do it. At least with editing you have someone in the trench with you.

The point,' Ms. Conyers continued, "is that no word had one specific definition. Maybe in the dictionary, but not in real life.

You can't just plan a moment when things get back on track, just as you can't plan the moment you lose your way in the first place. But standing there alone on the landing, I thought of Grandma Halley and how she'd held me close against her lap as we watched the sky together. I'd always thought I couldn't remember, but suddenly in that moment, I closed my eyes and saw the comet, finally, brilliant and impossible, stretching above me across the sky.

I just do the best I can under the circumstances.