“There is no pain but to genuinely hurt a friend.”

“Reach beyond the stars; read between the stripes.”

“Why (on Earth) would you want to be a would-be? Anyone who knows how to spell rose can be a romantic. Any Jesus freak with a hand grenade can change the world.”

“A friend is more to be longed for than the light; I speak of a genuine one. And wonder not: for it were better for us that the sun should be extinguished, than that we should be deprived of friends; better to live in darkness, than to be without friends”

“...the secret to writing is to get your own pain - shout it out till it hurts your throat - weep it into your pillow - then write it down ...”

“Even then, it hurt. The pain was always there, pulling me inside of myself, demanding to be felt. It always felt like I was waking up from the pain when something in the world outside of me suddenly required my comment or attention.”

“The good times and the bad times both will pass. It will pass. It will get easier. But the fact that it will get easier does not mean that it doesn’t hurt now. And when people try to minimize your pain they are doing you a disservice. And when you try to minimize your own pain you’re doing yourself a disservice. Don’t do that. The truth is that it hurts because it’s real. It hurts because it mattered. And that’s an important thing to acknowledge to yourself. But that doesn’t mean that it won’t end, that it won’t get better. Because it will.”