“I sat back, allowing Wes's words to sink in. Then I responded, "I guess it's hard sometimes to distinguish between second chances and last chances.”

“Do you think that we're products of our environments? I think so, or maybe products of our expectations. Others' expectations of us or our expectations. I mean others' expectations that you take on as your own. I realize how difficult it is to seperate the two. The expectations that others place on us help us form our expectations of ourselves.”

“...deeper lesson: that the written word isn't necessarily a chore but can be a window into new worlds.”

“When it is time for you to leave this school, leave your job, or even leave this earth, you make sure you have worked hard to make sure it mattered you were even here.”

“I learned that the way governors projected the numbers of beds they'd need for prison facilities was by examining the reading scores of third graders. Elected officials deduced that a strong percentage of kids reading below their grade level by third grade would be needing a secure place to stay when they got older.”

“...he was telling me that our [country's] blood-soaked and atrocity-littered past was important but that the future didn't have to be its slave.”

“What is missing in our time is not the willingness of God toact in biblical ways, but the willingness of his people to believehe is still the God of the Bible—and to act on that faith. To throwaway fear, to stride against common wisdom, to risk all that wehave and all that we are so we may follow only our simple beliefthat the God of the Scriptures is still alive and that he will stilldo what he says in his Word.”