Everything that goes around comes around, they say, and although I've never been able to figure out who the mysteriously wise sages known as "they" might be, they're certainly right when it comes to time-travel.

A little talent is a good thing to have if you want to be a writer. But the only real requirement is the ability to remember every scar.

Thin clouds form, and the shadows lengthen out. They have no breadth, as summer shadows have; there are no leaves on the trees or fat clouds in the sky to make them thick. They are gaunt, mean shadows that bite the ground like teeth. As the sun nears the horizon, its benevolent yellow begins to deepen, to become infected, until it glares an angry inflamed orange. It throws a variegated glow over the horizon.

You learned to accept, or you ended up in a small room writing letters home with Crayolas.

Some tears have to be cried no matter what the hour- until they are, they simply rave and burn inside.

Say your name over two hundred times and discover you are no one.

Cats were the gangsters of the animal world, living outside the law and often dying there. There were a great many of them who never grew old by the fire.