His mother called such people ignorant and superstitious, but his father only shook his head slowly and puffed his pipe and said that sometimes old stories had a grain or two of truth in them and it was best not to take chances. It was why, he said, he crossed himself whenever a black cat crossed his path.

When I knew I was going to be able to write full time, I wondered, "What's going to happen to the relationships within my family?" Are they going to change? Is it going to be the kind of deal where you say, "I can't take this! Get me out of here! I can't stand these screaming kids!" The way it turned out was, I was able to change the diapers okay, after I stuck the pin through my fingers a few times. I had a dawning realization that children are not particularly hard to deal with.

The mystery of the universe is not time but size.

They had discovered one could grow as hungry for light as for food.

The universe (he said) offers a paradox too great for the finite mind to grasp. As the living brain cannot conceive of a nonliving brain — although it may think it can — the finite mind cannot grasp the infinite.

Was it pretty? Your country. . .your land?" "It was beautiful," the gunslinger said. "There were fields and forests and rivers and mists in the morning. But that's only pretty. My mother used to say that the only real beauty is order and love and light.

It hurt, of course, but more often than not the best things do, I've found.