“To Jana's mind everybody seemed happy to see BAbichka and resisted returning her, like a misplaced package sent to the wrong address. It was as if the recipient opened it up, knowing it should be returned, but wondering who long they could legitimately keep it before being changed with theft.”

“Her skirts are long and don't seem to have straight hems, and her shirts are loose and hang over the skirts, so it's hard to see where one ends and the other begins. But with her children, she has clear control. They flow around her like her long skirts, flapping away and returning. Karen knows they will return to her side, like a magnet assured of its eternal attraction to tiny metal filings.”

“Being in his arms made her feel like the sea finding its shore, like a traveler returning after a long, hard, distant trip - finally returning home.”

“We are like fruitflies, measuring everything in terms of our own lifespan. But since our lifespans are so short, our perspective is entirely wrong.God, who inhabits eternity, sees things differently. He knows that our lives are just a mist. We should trust Him. It was not that long ago that Jesus came and it will not be that long before He returns.”

“I'm talking about a little truth-in-packaging here. To be perfectly frank, you don't quite look like yourself. And if you walk around looking like someone other than who you are, you could end up getting the wrong job, the wrong friends, who knows what-all. You could end up with somebody else's life."I shrugged again, and smiled. "This is my life," I said. "It doesn't seem like the wrong one.”

“Returning to whereIt used to see blossoms,My mind, changed,Will stay on at Yoshino...Home now, and see anew.”