My mother told me many stories about her childhood in Cuba. Living there had a profound impact on her and how she regards herself.

Every person has a range. In fiction, you get to be it all. I’m as much the men in my book as I am the women. I write how I write and there is no mission to stake a claim.

To be alive is to listen quietly while other people talk. That's how you learn something.

I was doing that thing the infatuated do, stitching destiny onto the person we want stitched to us.

I’d been listening to men talk since I arrived in New York City. That’s what men like to do. Talk. Profess like experts. When one finally came along who didn’t say much, I listened.

Danzon is my favorite Cuban music, played by a traditional string orchestra with flute and piano. It's very formally structured but romantic music, which derives from the French-Haitian contradance.

People who want their love easy don't really want love.

For me, truth cracks open in the places where things do not cohere. That's how life is.

It's amazing how life conspires to set you up with what you need.

A funny thing about women and machines: the combination made men curious.

I don't regard the real and true and authentic as something to claim as a moral high ground.

I love to see people laugh and put a smile on peoples' faces. Anytime I'm doing that I'm happy.

What's troubling is that the Republicans to defend Mr. DeLay are weakening the ethics process.

The later stages of the enlightenment process are trickier, and it is really essential to have a teacher then. You need correction, direction, and most of all you need a master's auric empowerment.

There is no obstacle too great, no challenge too difficult, if we have faith.

Well, my mom was an Olympian, so we have some good genes on that front.

Remember that what pulls the strings is the force hidden within; there lies the power to persuade, there the life, - there, if one must speak out, the real man.

If parents snicker at racial and gender jokes, another generation will pass on the poison adults still have not had the courage to snuff out.

The day that I can no longer receive Our Lord in Holy Communion, Our Lord Himself will come to take me.

I only really and truly fully relax on my own. Give me a sun lounger, a pool and a sea view, and I'm happy.

Sometimes when things are particularly bad, my brain will give me a happy dream.