“My gramma used to think that passage when Jesus said, ‘In my Father’s house are many rooms,’ didn’t mean there was a big hotel in heaven. It meant there were lots of different ways to worship.”

“Don't worry, Ian. I totally protected your anonymity. I told her you were my brother.""Great," he pouted."Now she's going to ask me about you. And I told you--I'm friendly and pleasant and then I move on.""You can do that. She'll find you perfectly understandable.""Oh? And why's that?""Well, she wondered about you. Said you ask for some heavy reading sometimes, but that you didn't make much conversation.""Oh, really?""Yes," Marcie explained. "I said you were brilliant, but not a very social animal. I said she shouldn't expect a lot of chitchat from you, but you were perfectly nice and there was no reason to be shy around you--you're safer than you look.""Is that so? And how did you convince her of that?""Easy. I said you were an idiot savant--brilliant in literature and many other things, but socially you weren't on your game.""Oh, Jesus Christ!"-Ian and Marcie”

“Hanging on to it a little, are you? … There’s a trick to letting it go, in case you’re interested… You can’t try. Trying is a struggle and doing is an act. You can’t witness the act of trying, but you can see the results of doing. Trying brings on stress because not only do you have the problem, but now you have all this frustration with it not going away just because you want it to. It’s kind of like being told not to think of pink elephants- impossible. What you have to do is stop. You say to yourself, this is over for now. I’m done for now. Take your mind to another place and concentrate on that peaceful place. Deep breaths. Go limp. Put your mind in another state. It takes practice, but it gets easier, over time… My gramma used to say, you can only feel one feeling at a time. For example, you can’t feel trust and fear together. If you want to trust but you’re afraid, fear is still in charge. If you trusted, there wouldn’t be fear. She also used to say you have to listen to what you feel- feeling fear could be warning, right? ... Don’t make love to your problems- they’ll never give you back the satisfaction you give them. And, your troubles aren’t worth the paper they’re written on, but that doesn’t mean writing them down won’t help you get a fix on ‘em. And, God respects you when you work, but he loves you when you dance… she also used to say, ‘if Jesus walked the earth today, he wouldn’t be hanging out with Billy Graham. He’d be found with the drug addicts and prostitutes and the like.”

“It’s no good to lose touch with people who mean a lot,”

“Now Preacher might manage a bar and hang out with men primarily, but he was unaccustomed to fathers who pushed their children out of sight. Rudely, at that. In his crowd, families were appreciated. Most of his friends were married with children, and the children were a part of everything. The women were nearly worshiped.”

“I crashed," she said."It was a helluva crash. If you're going to go down, go down big. You should be proud." And then he smiled.He held her hand as it lay on her lap while she lifted her brandy to her lips with the other hand, trembling a bit. When it was gone, he said, "Come on. I'm putting you to bed.""What if I cry all night?""I'll be right here," he said.”

“God, I know you’re sick of hearing me beg, but this is my woman, my wife. My best friend! No, she’s so much more than that—she’s the other half of my heart. I’ve waited my whole life for her—I’d give my life a hundred times to keep her safe! A thousand times! She’s every breath I take, every single beat of my heart. I don’t think I can live without her now. Not now…Please,God. Please. Oh God, please…”