Wally Lamb

Getting a job scared her but she was determined not to shy away from risk. That__ what life__ all about. Climbing out onto the airplane wing and jumping off.

That melting pot stuff was always more about what this country wanted to believe about itself than the way people really felt.

Change what you can, accept what you can__, and be smart enough to know the difference

But what are our stories if not the mirrors we hold up to our fears?

I thought about how love was always the thing that did that - smashed into you, left you raw. The deeper you loved, the deeper it hurt.

You can be two things if you're a woman, Dolores. Betty Crocker or a floozy. Just remember your place - even if it kills you.

The seeker embarks on a journey to find what he wants and discovers, along the way, what he needs.

I didn't respond to him. Couldn't speak at all. Couldn't look at his self-mutilation--not even the clean, bandaged version of it. Instead, I looked at my own rough, stained house painter's hand. They seemed more like puppets than hands. I had no feelings in it either.

We are like water, aren__ we? We can be fluid, flexible when we have to be. But strong and destructive, too._ And something else, I think to myself. Like water, we mostly follow the path of least resistance.

Sometimes the closer we got to a situation, the less clear it looked.