“A Gift for YouI send you...A cottage retreat on a hill in Ireland. This cottage is filled with fresh flowers, art supplies, and a double-wide chaise lounge in front of a wood-burning fireplace. There is a cabinet near the front door, where your favorite meals appear, several times a day. Desserts are plentiful and calorie free. The closet is stocked with colorful robes and pajamas, and a painting in the bedroom slides aside to reveal a plasma television screen with every movie you've ever wanted to watch. A wooden mailbox at the end of the lane is filled daily with beguiling invitations to tea parties, horse-and-carriage rides, theatrical performances, and violin concerts. There is no obligation or need to respond. You sleep deeply and peacefully each night, and feel profoundly healthy. This cottage is yours to return to at any time. ”

“This imaginary gift is a journey for your imagination.I send you...A luxury train ride. On this train are all the inspiring people you've ever wanted to meet or talk to. You glide from car to car, sitting or lying down on velvet lounge chairs, listening and asking questions. There is also a voluminous library on the train, with every book you've ever wanted to read or look at. Kind people bring you delicious tidbits to eat and nourishing liquids to drink. If you take a nap, time stands still until you return so you never miss anything. You receive a large journal filled with photographs, drawings and descriptions of your journey to take with you when you leave. You realize that you can board this train at any time.”

“Turn right up ahead," he directed. "It'll take us directly to my cottage."She did as he asked. "Does your cottage have a name?""My Cottage.""I might have known," she muttered.He smirked. Quite a feat, in her opinion, since he looked sick as a dog. "I'm not kidding," he said.Sure enough, in another minute they pulled up in front of an elegant country house, complete with a small, unobtrusive sign in front reading, MY COTTAGE”

“Surely heaven must have something of the color and shape of whatever village or hill or cottage of which the believer says, This is my own.”

“As distasteful as it is to decline your invitation, I'm afraid that it is preferable to attending yet another half-assed weekend eating gunky canapes in that cesspool of a shack you call a beach cottage.”

“I'm with you in Rocklandin my dreams you walk dripping from a sea-journey on the highway across America in tears to the door of my cottage in the Western night.”