If you were dying... If you were sixteen and dying... If your blood was spilling out of you, calling to them, the creatures of the night, and you knew you were dying... If you saw their pale faces and the gleam of sharp teeth in the moonlight, and yo...
It's easy to romanticize the people in our lives that mean something to us. We elevate them onto a higher plane that the rest of humanity. They appear glorious and pristine and full of wonders of the Universe all wrapped up into one person-sized box ...
All of us had problems, it seemed, whose sources were untraceable, crossing over one another like the trajectories of countless raindrops in a storm, blending to create a fog of delusion and counter-delusion. Powerful forces and connections were undo...
Life isn’t fair." I said. "It’s taken me a while to get that. It’s always going to disappoint you in some way or another. You’ll make plans, and it’ll push you in another direction. You will love people, and they’ll be taken away no matte...
As I sit today, I am a genuine, often pleasant person. I am able to imitate a human being for long spurts of time, do solid work for a reputable organization, and have, over the breadth of time, proven to be an attentive father and husband. So how to...
I had many things to say, I did not have the words to say them. Painfully aware of my limitations, I watched helplessly and language became an obstacle. It became clear that it would be necessary to invent a new language... I would pause at every sen...
Stories come in all different kinds." Hester scooted closer, clearly enjoying the subject at hand. "There's tales, which are light and fluffy. Good for a smile on a sad day. Then you got yarns, which are showy-yarns reveal more about the teller than ...
She wondered whether all marriages started out this way. Whether this initial stress and adjustment, push and pull and tremors and shakes were common to all relationships. Maybe the fact that they had started off as a long-distance couple had shielde...
So, Belle, what's new today?" Dad," I said, grasping his hands and looking directly into his eyes. "I'm in the deepest love that has ever occurred in the history of the world." Gosh, Belle. When someone asks you 'What's new?' the correct answer is 'N...
Peter's denial was not just a personal weakness. He was in a leadership position, honored as the one who spoke for the group, and was second in command (when Jesus wasn't around). But his choice to publicly deny his place in the community at the side...
It seemed as though he gave way all at once; he was so languid that he could not control his thoughts; they would wander to her; they would bring back the scene,- not of his repulse and rejection the day before but the looks, the actions of the day b...
In time, the hurt began to fade and it was easier to just let it go. At least I thought it was. But in every boy I met in the next few years, I found myself looking for you, and when the feelings got too strong, I'd write you another letter. But I ne...
Reason is God's crowning gift to man, and you are right To warn me against losing mine. I cannot say— I hope that I shall never want to say!— that you Have reasoned badly. Yet there are other men Who can reason, too; and their opinions might be h...
People in coats and ties were milling around the Talley gallery, and on the wall were the minimally rendered still lifes by Giorgio Morandi, most of them no bigger than a tea tray. Their thin browns, ashy grays, and muted blues made people speak soft...
We all have different beliefs, ways of worshipping, and ideas about religion. I believe it is a very personal subject, and so everyone should respect each other's beliefs. I simply live my life, and if someone is uncomfortable with who I am or what I...
He, too, was in the grip of rage and rhetoric. I saw that, attractive though his side of the political spectrum was. A cancerous violence had eaten into every political idea, had taken over the ideas themselves, and for so many, all that mattered was...
It would be inappropiate, undignified, at 38, to conduct friendships or love affairs with the ardour or intensity of a 22 year old. Falling in love like that? Writing poetry? Crying at pop songs? Dragging people into photobooths? Taking a whole day t...
I found that we must build our consciousness or faith step by step. When we make certain impressions on our subconscious mind and live for years by those impressions we cannot expect to destroy them in a few days. We must patiently substitute constru...
[Traveling] makes you realize what an immeasurably nice place much of America could be if only people possessed the same instinct for preservation as they do in Europe. You would think the millions of people who come to Williamsburg every year would ...
On the girl's brown legs there were many small white scars. I was thinking, Do those scars cover the whole of you, like the stars and the moons on your dress? I thought that would be pretty too, and I ask you right here please to agree with me that a...
You know you're my best friend, right?' he said. I shrugged. I guessed it was true. Now that I wasn't going to be at the parade, they would all hate me. Everything had been carefully choreographed, and me not being there would throw them all off. I r...
