Once you'd broken through that invisible barrier that separates one person from another, you were connected forever, whether you liked it or not.

Once you'd broken through that invisible barrier that separates one person from another, you were connected forever, whether you liked it or not.

I was writing very early, like I was involved in our high school literary magazine, which was called 'Pariah.' The football team was the Bears, and the literary magazine was 'Pariah.' It was great. It was definitely a real sub-culture. But I wrote stories for them.

I think I'm fascinated by the power of religion in our culture. Like a lot of secular, liberal people, I ignored it for a long time. Lately, of course, just from a political perspective, it's impossible to ignore.

When things don't go well, it helps to think of yourself as a genius and the rest of the world as a bunch of idiots.

After all, what was adult life but one moment of weakness piled on top of another? Most people just fell in line like obedient little children, doing exactly what society expected of them at any given moment, all the while pretending that they’d actually made some sort of choice.

I write about kids growing up, I write a lot about schools and parents, and all of my experiences with those things have been suburban experiences.