It was like she was MADE of cake, light and pretty and decorated on the outside-with her sweet laugh and pink streak to her hair-but it was anyone's guess what was on the inside.

It looked like the world was covered in a cobbler crust of brown sugar and cinnamon.

Sometimes you weren't supposed to share pain. Sometimes it was best just to deal with it alone.

Happiness is a risk. If you’re not a little scared, then you’re not doing it right.

Every life needs a little space. It leaves room for good things to enter it.

Don't let anyone see your vulnerable spots. Once they knew how to hurt you, they would do it again and again.

I needed to stop being what everyone thought I was.

The next morning dawned bright and sweet, like ribbon candy.

She looked like autumn, when leaves turned and fruit ripened.

You can't change where you come from, but you can change where you go from here. Just like a book. If you don't like the ending, you make up a new one.

She was so Southern that she cried tears that came straight from the Mississippi, and she always smelled faintly of cottonwood and peaches.

I don't mind people talking about me behind my back. It means they know me, and I'm out in front.

Accepting that a person will die and shucking off any aversion to this blunt thought awakens the mind to realize what is possible in a human life.

...these vignettes I sketch for you - what are they? watercolors ..yes and dreams blurred with tears ...

I love New York. I was sad, depressed and incredibly moved by our fellow countrymen and what they've done. I wanted to give people a chance to see something funny, have a distraction.

I've been into exercise my whole life, been a runner and been into health and fitness always.

-Nunca dejaría de creer en ti -dijo-. Jamás. Lo que siento por ti...-Se atracó-. Es lo más grande que he sentido en mi vida. [pp.78]

If you find someone with wisdom, good judgment, and good actions; make him a companion.

I hope and pray that despite an unhealed past full of atrocities and deep divisions in the present, God can and will make "the distant near" and a "brother of the stranger" in America's future.

With the media, I could be quick and ugly and critical. I tend to wear my emotions on my sleeve.