“It used to be on the Internet no one knew you were a dog. Now not only doeseveryone know that you are a dog, they know what kind of a dog you are, whoyou run with, where you hide your bones, the accidental piddle behind thecouch, the fight you got into with the boxer, and your thoughts on the hotpoodle down the street.”

“Our house is quiet, small and plain,and yet its rooms run far and wide. A hundred pencils, swift as rain, writing on sheets of beaten goldwould not be quick enough to holdthe strange adventuresshadows hide...”

“Well, there is rough old Albert, as ornery as any big brother a girl could have, putting his arm around Savannah and cooing to her like a repenting hound dog, and promising her she is not common nor shameful. I watched all this and thought you just never know sometimes what's in a man's heart. When you think he is all tough nails and boards he can be different on the inside. It makes me wonder about other men I know, too.”

“Keep your whiskers crisp and clean.Do not let the mice grow lean.Do not let yourself grow fatLike a common kitchen cat.Have you set the kittens free?Do they sometimes ask for me?Is our catnip growing tall?Did you patch the garden wall?Clouds are gentle walls that hideGardens on the other side.Tell the tabby cats I takeAll my meals with William Blake,Lunch at noon tea at four,Served in splendor on the shoreAt the tinkling of a bell.Tell them I am sleeping well.Tell them I have come so far,Brought by Blake's celestial cat,Buffeted by wind and rain,I may not get home again.Take this message to my friends.Say the King of Catnip sendsTo the cat who winds his clocksA thousand sunsets in a box,To the cat who brings the iceThe shadows of a dozen mice(serve them with assorted dipsand eat them like potato chips),And to the cat who guards his doorA net for catching stars, and more(if patience he abide):Catnip from the other side.”

“One thing I know, whispered Savannah, is that if he was quiet, and you were quiet, and neither of you minded it, then you are in love.”

“I say, thirteen is too many dogs for good mental health. Five is pretty much the limit. More than five dogs and you forfeit your right to call yourself entirely sane.Even if the dogs are small.”

“One thing I'd learned from all the burying I'd attended was that sometimes it's hard to pay attention. Burying someone you know will set your mind down some distant trail, as the one you're really on is too painful to view.at the burial of Ernest, Sarah's brotherp177”