But even then I knew it wasn’t me that saved her life. It wasn’t about me. I was just there while she was maybe going to die and maybe not, and then she just didn’t.

To make a beautiful piece means you have really witnessed it and really made decisions about it.

Here is the alphabet of the pulsing apocalypse that is fatherhood, a book in love with what words, like parents, create: beauty, terror, awe.

Follow Through is elegant, sure footed, smart—a nest of sticks that won’t stay sticks—a nest of sticks that snowballs—scary and marvelous.

Ideologically, I have a lot of problems with that, especially when people toss around that form of story as realism. What's called "realism" is actually highly formulaic.

You're seeing something that you've seen a thousand times and you just like it. There's nothing wrong with that but it's not a revelation. It's not a surprise. It's comfort.

I don't want to write the thing that I am a consumer of when I'm unconscious. I want to write the thing that makes me contend with the thing that I've been consuming unconsciously.

If you think it's worth writing a book about then that means you suspect that you're not the only one. You suspect that it has something to do with the larger patterns of your culture.

Threatened men live long.

Science is interesting, and if you don't agree you can fuc

When we experience dissatisfaction at work, which everyone does we can use our disappointment as fuel to wake up.

The advice he reads in Ann Landers – good advice as long as you don’t need it, perfectly sensible as long as you don’t have any use for it.

Thoughts were zipping around my head like fireflies in a jar, bumping into each other, blinking on and off.

Jim Norton and Harland Williams always make me laugh.

You must achieve the confidence of knowing that you possess absolute, unbending, unimpeachable integrity. Everyone must know that. Above all else, it is integrity that defines your character.

Love, real love, is not simply a state of bliss. It is an ever-changing state, the result of time and emotional development, of trust and commitment.

You want to sing this song. And so it goes on until eventually, after - well, however long it can take - sometimes a few days, sometimes months - you piece the whole thing together.

Love is cheering and sharing and compassion, and giving and receiving. Love is an action thing more than a word thing, that brings comfort or joy, or relief to anyone or anything.