“When entertaining a party of six or more always use place cards. When guests know where they are sitting it puts them at ease immediately and they are assured you have given thoughtful consideration as to who their dinner partner will be.”

“Following the food from market to the kitchen made a huge difference. to this day, this is how I cook.”

“This is what one of the founding fathers of sociology, Emile Durkheim, meant when he wrote in 1895 that the establishment of a sense of community is facilitated by a class of actors who carry a stigma and sense of stigmatization and are termed 'deviant.' Unity is provided to any collectivity by uniting against those who are seen as a common threat to the social order and morality of a group. Consequently, the stigma and the stigmatization of some persons demarcates a boundary that reinforces the conduct of conformists. Therefore, a collective sense of morality is achieved by the creation of stigma and stigmatization and deviance.”

“We, who are so schooled in the art of listening to the voices of others, can often hear our own voice only when we are alone. . . For many women, the first choice, then, is to give ourselves the necessary time and space in which to renew our acquaintance with our lost voice, to learn to recognize it, and to rejoice as we hear it express our truth.”

“Aloneness is an opportunity, a state brimming with potentiality, with resources for renewed life...In the space of aloneness...a woman is free to admit and act on her own desires. It is where we have the opportunity to discover that we are not a half but a sovereign whole.”

“Since the invention of the kiss there have been five kisses that were rated the most passionate, the most pure. This one left them all behind. The End.”The Princess Bride (1987) – Grandpa (Peter Falk)”

“When grown-ups asked you to sit in a circle, they were usually about to tell you something you didn't want to hear. Ms. Aruba-Tate, Ivy and Bean's second-grade teacher, was forever gathering them in a circle for bad news. Like, the class fish died over the weekend. Or, everyone has to start using real punctuation. Or, the pencil sharpener is off-limits. Circles meant trouble.”