“Semille wept not because she did something stupid; she wept because she *didn't* do something stupid. Sometimes, to do something stupid--to disobey your parents, to rush into battle, to speak out of turn, to ruin your life--is a far better thing to do than to do nothing at all.”

“In this way my mother fell short as a parent, which was something I had to learn to accept because it's how she was, and either you accept people as they are or you turn your back on them and walk away. Those are the choices: forbearance or flight, although that philosophy was slow in coming to me, and for many years, I expected more from people than they could give.”

“The moral of the story is this: sometimes, to do nothing, to do nothing at all, is the sorriest thing ever.”

“Maybe it has something to do with the pull of the moon because, despite the statistical improbability of any two people meeting up, it is inevitable that the tremulous are drawn to the languished, the sick to the broken, the forsaken to the sad, every pot has its cover, and the funny to the funny ones, too.”

“I probably said something about being happy for him, because I was happy for him, although to be happy for someone else doesn't mean that you are happy for yourself.”

“Everyone does deserve a second chance, although we don't often get one, and even when we do get a second chance, we're likely to make the same mistake again. The things we learn later rather than sooner tend to result from harsh lessons, but mostly we learn nothing at all.”

“Henry told me he is often the life of the party, as if he didn't already know that to be the life of the party is the most sad and pathetic of all things to be.”