“People like to make up stories about things they don’t understand, so there are over a thousand myths about the moon. One legend claims that on the surface is everything that was wasted here on Earth: misspent time, squandered wealth, broken vows, unanswered prayers, useless tears, all the leftover bits and pieces of countless shattered lives.If you believe in that sort of thing.”

“Meanwhile, I work the route. I don’t quit, I don’t complain. Each day I learn more than I earn. Things are going to get better.”

“We’re all broken. We all have cracks. It’s not about making it through life in one piece it’s about narrowing the gap between the fissures so we don’t shatter.”Ted Basel to Jo Nehr in my next "Surrender" story”

“Yankee Stadium, it’s like everything else in this country. In Europe, they save all their old buildings for history. Here, we just tear them all down.”

“Failure is just part of the process, and it's not just okay; it's better than okay. God doesn't want failure to shut us down. God didn't make it a three-strikes-and-you're-out sort of thing. It's more about how God helps us dust ourselves off so we can swing for the fences again. And all of this without keeping a meticulous record of our screw-ups.”

“One good thing about music, when it hits you, you feel no pain.”

“Growing up in a violent house makes you hypervigilant -- you do everything in your life to make sure the egg doesn't break. The vigilance, along with the depression and the demons I battle, it all mixes together and shows up in my work. I beat myself up when things get out of control. I was supposed to be watching over it. Even more disturbing is the realization that I alone can create an utterly hopeless catastrophe. The only way to control it is to create it. Write it and it shall be so -- the prescient thought.”