You know what I was thinking about on my way home? How different my life would be if you’d made that gash a little deeper. Or how different yours would be if I’d vaulted myself off a roof nine years ago. Do you ever think about things like that? Like, if either you or I wouldn’t have made it, where would the other one be right now? It was something I thought about all the time: how death changes every remaining moment for those still living.

Has the industry done to music what McDonald’s has done to eating?

I'd be a sucker for a guy who wrote me a song,” I said. “Like Beth or Rosanna or Sara. Or Sharona. Is that too much to ask? To be somebody's Sharona?

I would have remembered the good stuff. Nobody ever remembers the good stuff.

And no matter what anybody says about grief and about time healing all wounds, the truth is, there are certain sorrows that never fade away until the heart stops beating and the last breath is taken.

I took a closer look. Jesus had piercing blue eyes, dark hair that hung in a flawless mess, his body was emaciated and taut, his hands and feet dripped with blood, and nothing but a gauzy loincloth hid what looked like a nice package underneath. “Sexy,” I said. “He looks like a rock star.

Bottom line, Eliza— you’re my home and my family, and I don’t want to lose you. I could lose everything else, and as long as I still had you and a guitar I know I’d be all right. Do you get what I’m saying?