Unfortunately, he still hadn’t asked for my number, or a date, or my hand in marriage, and my drink was getting low.

I told him I had once lost everything I had, too, and that I think that can be God’s way of building walls around us to force us to look up at Him.

And so I just kept writing to myself.

I didn’t answer. We were not buddies. We could not chat about the proximity of our offices, or football, or forgiveness.

The voice sang on, “I am ready, I am ready, I am fine. I am fine, I am fine, I am fine.” I played it again. I was not fine.

Each guy stamped the passport of my heart. “You’re worthy.” Stamp. “You’re enough.” “You have not failed completely.” Stamp, stamp.

I remembered learning from my favorite professor at Belmont to “surround yourself with people who are better than you, ” and I was now living that mantra.

I used to cover my windows in heavy curtains, never drawn. Now I danced in the sunlight on my hardwood floors.

That’s how it felt – that the loss of him had a life of its own. I lived with it as I could have lived with him. Some nights it was quiet and sometimes it pounded on my door.

But I tended not to date men who ever showed up for me.

I threw his framed picture off my balcony just to hear my heart break.

Until we know the assumptions in which we are drenched, we cannot know ourselves.

A man does not see where he treads in battle, for he is watching the enemy.

I think we're at a time where people just want to join together and cause change. People don't want to live like this any more.

Those who say only artists and architects can create are the ones who are elitist.

When markets go down, opportunities go up for smart real estate investors. I would much rather play the downturn than the upturn.

Title deeds generally outlast poems.

My life was a mystery even as I lived it.

I think soul is soul. I don't see new soul as any different to old soul.

Man can be that which he wishes to be; form and substance, they are but shadows. The mind, the ego, the essence of the god-dream -- that is real, that is immortal.

Never anger made good guard for itself.