“The world is a terrifying place, more than I ever realized. But if I had my whole life to do over again, that's literally the only thing I'd change. I'd stop being so afraid of other people.”

“They hurt you. You hurt 'em back. Or maybe it is the other way around. Whatever. Someday you might find a way to forgive each other. But it won't be like it used to 'cause that pain never really go...”

“You know that old clich about how millions of deaths being a statistic, while the loss of just one life is a tragedy? If that's true, what is it when you lose something that never even had a chance...”

“What cruel creatures men are. Our bodies tell us to love so many, but there's room in our hearts for so few.”

“Sorry, kid. Whedon got it wrong. Stakes don't kill vampires, they just give us heartburn.”

“I suppose the only time we ever really get to be happy in lifelike one hundred percent blissfulis when were little kids.""Because theres less to worry about?""Because were too stupid to know how wo...”

“Ask a child's guardians what it takes to be good at their jobs, and most will answer with a single word... SACRIFICE. Parents give up so much: time, sleep, freedom, money, intimacy... pretty much e...”

“A hallmark of virtuous adulthood is learning to find freedom in your work rather than freedom from your work, even when work might hurt.”

“Parenting requires a delicate balance of letting your child be your spiritual teacher while you maintain the clarity and boundaries to be her Earthly teacher.”

“Remember, nothing is ever created or destroyed. Therefore, unresolved emotional pain from childhood does not dissolve by itself. It sits waiting to be declared, and a child is the ultimate vehicle ...”

“I see them standing at the formal gates of their colleges,I see my father strolling outunder the ochre sandstone arch, thered tiles glinting like bentplates of blood behind his head, Isee my mother...”

“We realized that the version of the world they rendered for us was not the world they really believed in...”

“Id never heard my parents make love. If they made love, they did it silently, like bank robbers, like surgeons.”