“If I were to ever have a full-fledged vocation, as opposed to a half-assed avocation, I needed to love it and, in my experience, it isn't always easy to figure out what you love.”

“...in my family I have comrades-hearty and loyal-when what I need are intimates, and I've never figured out how to get us all to make the switch. I've never found a way in.”

“In my experience, people love what they love. They just do.”

“Yes, it’s true, what I said earlier: A real life doesn’t mean geting what you want; the achievement, the privilege, too, is knowing what you love.But getting what you love? Having what you love love you back? Oh, my friend, it’s miracle: your one tiny life’s head-on collision with divinity. ”

“Even if someone wasn't perfect or even especially good, you couldn't dismiss the love they felt. Love was always love; it had a rightness all its own, even if the person feeling the love was full of wrongness.”

“No one is ever quite ready; everyone is always caught off guard. Parenthood chooses you. And you open your eyes, look at what you've got, say "Oh, my gosh," and recognize that of all the balls there ever were, this is the one you should not drop. It's not a question of choice.”

“We talked and talked and talked. Maybe love comes in at the eyes, but not nearly as much as it comes in at the ears, at least in my experience. As we talked, lights flicked on inside my head; by the end of the night I was a planterium.”