The world is so huge that people are always getting lost in it. There are too many ideas and things and people too many directions to go. I was starting to believe that the reason it matters to care passionately about something is that it whittles the world down to a more manageable size. It makes the world seem not huge and empty but full of possibility.

I remember thinking that a girdle was barbaric, and that never in a million years would I treat myself like a sleeping bag being shoved into a stuff sack. Never! Instead, I would run marathons and work out and be in perfect shape and reject the tyranny of the girdle forever.

Libraries are what is best about us as a society: open, exciting, rich, informative, free, inclusive, engaging.

I would argue that it might be easier to endure loneliness than to endure the idea that you might disappear.

I'm happy to be reminded that an ordinary day full of nothing but nothingness can make you feel like you've won the lottery.

Oversized houses, like oversized cars, seem to be a particularly American fixation.

Now we're e-mailing and tweeting and texting so much, a phone call comes as a fresh surprise. I get text messages on my cell phone all day long, and it warbles to alert me that someone has sent me a message on Facebook or a reply or direct message on Twitter, but it rarely ever rings.