Home alone with a wakeful newborn, I could shower so quickly that the mirror didn't fog and the backs of my knees stayed dry. The one-minute hair conditioner was too slow for me.

Motherhood is like Albania- you can't trust the descriptions in the books, you have to go there.

Why are we, the most medicalized of societies, a culture in pain?

Housework hassles go on, are never resolved, and will probably extend into the afterlife ('Why am I the one who takes the clouds to the dry cleaners?').

This is a truism of child-raising, of course - whatever you give special time and attention to cooking, your children will despise and reject, with annoying gagging sounds.

I could still remember how having a two day old baby makes you feel faintly sorry for everyone else, stuck in their wan unmiraculous lives.

Well, delusions are a wonderful thing, and they keep you company, too.

Hasn't anyone thought to look at outcomes as a logical way to figure out what really works? Not until recently. That tells you how far out of the picture the patient has been.

At a certain point, the soul exits from a cherished photograph, because we have come to the end of our loving projection into that moment.

The first axiom of the family vacation is that someone, possibly everyone, will get sick.

Like an animal, cancer sleeps, prowls, hibernates, turns surly or placid.

What a large volume of adventures may be grasped within the span of his little life by him who interests his heart in everything.

Even the merest gesture is holy if it is filled with faith.

A funny thing is that you can't search me on Twitter because Adam Levine dominates there.

In a secular age, an authentic miracle must purport to be a hoax, in order to gain credit in the world.

There are nearly thirteen million people in the world. None of those people is an extra. They're all the leads of their own stories. They have to be given their due.

Indifference and pride look very much alike, and he probably thought I was proud.

Acting is a very limited form of expression and those who take it seriously are very limited people. I take it seriously.

To love others you must love yourself...You can only give to others what you have yourself.

Curiosity killed the cat, but for a while I was a suspect.

I would have been a Republican, if Karl Rove had returned my phone calls.