“(M)uch as we might imagine we can leave the past behind, it has a nasty way of pressing its hoary old face against the window just as we were sitting down to the feast.”

“We got a memory so we can carry the past with us some, but we got a mind so we can leave it behind for a spell an' git on down the trail.Marion Daniels, U.S. Marshal”

“To be lost and forgotten-to be abandoned-is a shared and terrible fear, just as our fondest hope, as we grow older, is that we might leave some parts of us behind in the hearts of those we love and in that way live on.”

“If we can forgive what has been done to us . . .If we can forgive what we've done to others . . .If we can leave all of our stories behind. Our beingvillians or victims.Only then can we maybe rescue the world.But we still sit here, waiting to be saved. While we'restill victims, hoping to be discovered while we suffer.”

“Dennis looked at the puppy in the window. We both did. It was the oddest thing. Normally, puppies in pet store windows sleep or pee or roll around on top of other dogs. This one ignored us its window-mates and was instead sitting with its nose pressed against the glass, looking at us with an extremely serious little expression on its face. An expression that seemed to me to be saying, "I am a sacred cow. Get out your wallet.”

“We might be fifty, we might be five,So snug, so compact, so wise are we!Under the kitchen-table legMy knee is pressing against his knee.”