Good leaders being scarce, following yourself is allowed.

Just because you have stopped sinking doesn't mean you're not still underwater.

We can only die in the future, I thought; right now we are always alive.

Sometimes a flat-footed sentence is what serves, so you don't get all writerly: 'He opened the door.' There, it's open.

They say the smart dog obeys but the smarter dog knows when to disobey.

Wear your heart on the page, and people will read to find out how you solved being alive.

In my head there's a broken balcony I fall off of when I speak.

if it's true your life flashes past your eyes before you die, then it is also the truth that your life rushes forth when you are ready to start to truly be alive.

I sleep with a glass of water on the nightstand so I can see by its level if the coastal earth is trembling or if the shaking is still me.

I want to know everything about you, so I tell you everything about myself.

I exaggerated even before I began to exaggerate, because it's true — nothing is ever quite as bad as it could be.

While all other sciences have advanced, that of government is at a standstill - little better understood, little better practiced now than three or four thousand years ago.

To play well the scenes in which we are 'on' concerns us much more than to guess about the scenes that follow it.

At the end of the day, in brief summary: inerrancy is interested in the truthfulness of Scripture and it is a powerful way forcing people to think about that reliability that is God-given.

All right, let's not panic. I'll make the money by selling one of my livers. I can get by with one.

Me, I've concentrated on music pretty much to the exclusion of other things.

Breach of promise is no less an act of insolvency than a refusal to pay one's debt.

[Ronald] Reagan bitterly hated unions and wanted them destroyed. This began with the air controllers' strike and went on from there.

One day you will wake up and there won’t be any more time to do the things you’ve always wanted. Do it now. The simple things are also the most extraordinary things, and only the wise can see them.

Passion, friendship, love, loyalty, trust . . . if you found the right person . . . you really could have it all.

It is deep January. The sky is hard. The stalks are firmly rooted in ice.