"We can't understand when we're pregnant, or when our siblings are expecting, how profound it is to have a shared history with a younger generation: blood, genes, humor. It means we were actually here, on Earth, for a time - like the Egyptians with their pyramids, only with children."
"The very first thing I tell my new students on the first day of a workshop is that good writing is about telling the truth. We are a species that needs and wants to understand who we are. Sheep lice do not seem to share this longing, which is one reason they write so very little. But we do. We have so much we want to say and figure out."
"I have a very dark sense of humor. I swear. I have a very playful relationship with Jesus."
"Laughter is carbonated holiness."
"You can safely assume you've created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do."
"Lighthouses don’t go running all over an island looking for boats to save; they just stand there shining."