... people universally tend to think that happiness is a stroke of luck, something that will maybe descend upon you like fine weather if you're fortunate enough. But that's not how happiness works. Happiness is the consequence of personal effort. You...
My daughter is seven, and some of the other second-grade parents complain that their children don't read for pleasure. When I visit their homes, the children's rooms are crammed with expensive books, but the parent's rooms are empty. Those children d...
INTENSE SEXUAL DESIRE IS THE GREATEST THING IN THE WORLD Janey dreams of cocks. Janey sees cocks instead of objects. Janey has to fuck. This is the way Sex drives Janey crazy: Before Janey fucks, she keeps her wants in cells. As soon as Janey's fucki...
When David Markson wrote in June to complain about an author's getting an award he though should have been his, Wallace gently warned him away from the pitfall of envy: "Mostly I try to remember how lucky I am to be able to write, and doubly, triply ...
The minute that guy walked inside the front doors, Cody sat back and just stared. He was tall, dark, and exceedingly handsome with all that brawn and a killer smile. When he’d come to the bar and focused on Cody, training those amber eyes his way, ...
I want to love every piece of you. I want to be inside you. I want our bodies together, to make the two of us into one. I want it all, and I want it hard, soft, anything that will make you happy. I want to hold you, keep you safe, make you scream... ...
I'm beginning to wonder," said Kent, sitting down now on an overturned wooden tub. "Who do I serve? Why am I here?" You are here, because, in the expanding ethical ambiguity of our situation, you are steadfast in your righteousness. It is to you, our...
Daniel rested his hip on the counter, arms crossed, saying and offering nothing. “What? Are you thinking about sticking me with Luc permanently?” I laughed, the sound anxious. I waited for Daniel to laugh, too, at the sheer insanity of the idea. ...
I don’t like seeing you hit.” “Well, to be quite honest, I don’t like being hit unless it’s by you.” As soon as it was out of my mouth, I realized what I had said. “That sounded all sorts of wrong.” “Insanely so, actually.” “To ...
Life is such unutterable hell, solely because it is sometimes beautiful. If we could only be miserable all the time, if there could be no such things as love or beauty or faith or hope, if I could be absolutely certain that my love would never be ret...
If you notice, the moral law in the other legal codes separates people (the Laws of Manu, the caste system, the Code of Hammurabi with the slave/owner distinction). In Islam, the violator is inferior to the obedient one. By contrast, in the Hebrew-Ch...
Oh, September! It is so soon for you to lose your friends to good work and strange loves and high ambitions. The sadness of that is too grown-up for you. Like whiskey and voting, it is a dangerous and heady business, as heavy as years. If I could kee...
Annie turned away, her eyes glittering. 'Here's what no one tells you,' she said. 'When you deliver a fetus, you get a death certificate, but not a birth certificate. And afterward, your milk comes in, and there's nothing you can do to stop it.' She ...
...that left Francesca to slink into the chair opposite us. My feeling of superiority was short-lived, however, when she settled herself down and then crossed her legs. I didn't need a mirror to know my whole face had just turned red. With a hemline ...
The way Mom saw it, women should let menfolk do the work because it made them feel more manly. That notion only made sense if you had a strong man willing to step up and get things done, and between Dad's gimp, Buster's elaborate excuses, and Apache'...
An admirable line of Pablo Neruda’s, “My creatures are born of a long denial,” seems to me the best definition of writing as a kind of exorcism, casting off invading creatures by projecting them into universal existence, keeping them on the oth...
Love is like air, babe. It's there all the time, and you don't even think about it,or you take it for granted. Then all of a sudden, you need it, or you can't breathe. You inhale, and for the first time you're aware it's keeping you alive. You feel i...
You’re sorry? I damn near drank myself to death, I could barely get out of bed, I shattered my phone into a million pieces on New Year’s Eve to keep from calling you … and you’re sorry?” I bit my lip and nodded, ashamed. I had no idea what ...
There is a great difference between successfulness and fruitfulness. Success comes from strength, control, and respectability. A successful person has the energy to create something, to keep control over its development, and to make it available in l...
I think the highest forgiveness is to accept that creation is thoroughly tangled, with every possible quality given outlet for expression. People need to accept once and for all that there is only one life and each of us is free to shape it through t...
DEAR DIARY You are greater than the Bible And the Conference of the Birds And the Upanishads All put together You are more severe Than the Scriptures And Hammurabi’s Code More dangerous than Luther’s paper Nailed to th...
