His absence seemed a solid thing, a burden I must carry in addition to my grief... Yet I knew I would continue to live. Sometimes that knowledge seemed the worst part of my loss.

To be part of a family, or any community, is to have duties and responsibility, to be bound by the rules of that group.

We were both smiling, in that bittersweet way one does when imagining something the heart longs for and the head would dread.

Strange, how being left out of a secret always feels like a betrayal of trust.

...You won't even see what is put right on the table before you. Men. If it was raining soup you'd be out there with a fork.

...some secrets beg to be betrayed. The secret of undeclared love is like that.

Still I promise myself, "Next time I will do better" in the all-too-human conceit that I will always be offered a "next time.

There are few things so tender as a man's dignity.

You will never learn to fly unless you jump!

No matter how hard we try, we are at best imperfect people. When we allow sin, we allow our imperfections to show.

Fear may very well be a caveman fear of the predator, of the giant lizard chasing them - maybe that's what Steven Spielberg connects with so well in Lost World.

There ought to be a law about you coming around.

If you are a kid, reading is really important stuff.

The headline is the most important element in most advertisements. It is the telegram which decides the reader whether to read the copy.

When you work with great musicians, they are always a part of you . . . their spirits are walking around in me, so they're still here and passing it on to others.

What is conceived well is expressed clearly.

It seems to me that the soul, when alone with itself and speaking to itself, uses only a small number of words, none of them extraordinary.

There is no conflict between a better meal and a better world.