“Mentally Connie gathered her strands of thinking into thick handfuls, trying to braid them into a coherent whole.”

“When you write ,it's like braiding your hair. Taking a handful of coarse unruly strands and attempting to bring then unity.”

“I see autism as having many different strands. All of these strands are beautiful. They are all the colours of the rainsbow intertwined intricately into the child. If you try and take away the autism by removing the strands you also take away parts of the child as they are attached to them. Thhey are what makes them who they are. However autism is only a part of them, not the whole. It does not define them.This is for my Tom.”

“He moved to run a hand through her cornrows, then pulled back remembering the one time he's tried that-Connie had lectured him on the Eleventh Commandment: Thou shalt not touch thy black girlfriend's hair. Ever.”

“Passion is sweeter split strand by strand. Divided and re-divided likemercury then gathered up only at the last moment.”

“Because some information is better than no information. Life does not give you big, simple answers, Caitlyn. It demands patience, focus, and an open, intelligent mind to gather the pieces of a puzzle and fit them together into a coherent whole. Nothing worth knowing is ever easily learned.”