We make messes of our lives, but every now and then, we manage to do something that's exactly right. The challenge is figuring out which is which.

What looks like garbage from one angle might be art from another. Maybe it did take a crisis to get to know yourself; maybe you needed to get whacked hard by life before you understood what you wanted out of it.

You know, the mind is a remarkable thing. Just because you can't see the wound doesn't mean it isn't hurting. It scars all the time, but it heals.

It turns out that I learned something from my dear old dad after all: firemen are experts at getting into places they shouldn't be.

Take it from me: love has all the lasting permanence of a rainbow-beautiful while it's there, and just as likely to have disappeared by the time you blink.

She shrugged. "You can be happy for someone else's good fortune, but that doesn't mean you forget your own bad luck.