I just want to do something that matters. Or be something that matters. I just want to matter.

Imagine others complexly.

Imagining the future is a kind of nostalgia

Books—they weren't ladders out of the abyss, but they were companions.

Nothing ever happens like you imagine it will," she says.The sky is like a monochromatic contemporary painting, drawing me in with its illusion of depth, pulling me up. "Yeah, that's true," I say. But then after I think about it for a second, I add, "But then again, if you don't imagine, nothing ever happens at all.

I wondered if hurdlers ever thought, you know, "This would go faster if we just got rid of the hurdles.

What is the point of being alive if you don't at least try to do something remarkable? How very odd, to believe God gave you life, and yet not think that life asks more of you than watching TV.