“That's when I saw—cleary saw—that there was more than one mountain in my life. Some could be seen and some couldn't be, but just the same, they were all out there. All out there waiting for me.”

“And taking care of somebody else made me feel good. Like discovering you're more than you thought you were. More even than you hoped to be. ”

“Like the Bible tells us, when a man will lay down his life for a friend, well, then there ain't no greater love in this here world than that.”

“But will somebody please tell me what's a person to do when they're too afraid of life to live and too afraid of death to die?”

“Experiencing life through a book can help you learn without all the pain of going through the experiences first hand.”

“It was like that. Sometimes I'd go for a period—days or weeks—without feeling the full sweep of my loss, and then as unexpected as a thunderclap, the realization would rip the protective coating from my senses. Maybe that's the way it is with trick knees and aging griefs. Totally pain free one moment and absorbingly painful the next.”

“A person's got to think, otherwise that person's no better than a trained seal balancing a ball on his nose. If only that seal could think, he'd know he was making a thousand children laugh.”