The sound of natural things was wonderful to us. In the middle of all the suffering, it seemed pure, untouched.

I would stand there at times and remember how beautiful God created this world, and then I would be reassured that he would certainly take care of me and all of my loved ones.

By the end of the war, I could pick out Jewish people almost as if I had a sixth sense about it, even if they had blue eyes and blond hair. I would have been a very valuable Gestapo person.

I had no real communication with anyone at the time, so I was totally dependent on God. And he never failed me.

I felt peace, even though I was still scared to death. I thought that, whatever would happen to me - I could still be killed. I didn't know - and in what I'd already been through, God was in control.

To me it was real war and my life was at stake, and I believe that all those clandestine spy games we played as children helped when the Occupation came.

All during that prison time I really lived by prayer. Be in prayer always, we're told, and back then I was.

But miracles still happen, even if we don't think they do.

After the prayer they executed an armed robbery. That sounds very strange this many years later: prayer and then armed robbery.

I'm sorry to say it, but it was hard on me to see life continue all around.

The worst is, I remain so stone cold. Does this war make you an 'alive-dead person'? Is it not possible to remain yourself in this chaos? How long still?

When you discover your gift the whole world will seek you

He was like a shattered stained-glass window: something beautiful that's broken

I think when you are the parents of a gifted athlete, the best thing in the world you can do is to encourage them, in my opinion. My dad didn't push me and I didn't push my children in athletics.

I am fighting this. I want to get better, I want to work again. I do believe we are architects of our destinies, but with me somewhere along the line something came loose.

I think it's very troubling to see the reality of where the American political establishment is going - into this big tent, which is one happy Demo-Republican family.

The histories of the poor and the powerless are as important as those of their conquerors, their colonizers, their kings and queens.

Writers should take advantage of their surroundings, if only to trigger memories that juice their writing.

It's just not right that so many things don't work when they should. I don't think that will change for a long time.

He scorn'd his own, who felt another's woe.

These are the stories of travelers on a spiritual quest between worlds. Part mythmaker, part poet, Omar Castaeda is an original, and these stories are unlike any in our literature.