Small change, small wonders - these are the currency of my endurance and ultimately of my life.

The flowers were beaten down, their bent-over heads bejeweled with diamond droplets like earring on sad, rich widows

Mistakes wreck your life. But they make what you have. It's kind of all one. You know what Hester told me when we were working the sheep one time? She said it's no good to complain about your flock, because it's the put-together of all your past choices.

What I want is so simple I almost can't say it: elementary kindness.

Being a novelist and being a mother have exactly coincided in my life: the call from my agent saying that I had a contract for my first novel - that was on my answering phone message when I got back from the hospital with my first child.

Listen. Slide the weight from your shoulders and move forward. You are afraid you might forget, but you never will. You will forgive and remember.