All girls should be treated with respect regardless of whether or not they’re virgins. Being a virgin doesn’t make me any more or less worthwhile than a non-virgin.

The truth is, as an adult, I am always waiting to be left behind. I’m always ready to be discarded and, therefore, I spend a significant amount of time preparing for this eventuality. I lower my expectations, I don’t seek out meaningful relationships, and I don’t engage in any sort of real intimacy, physical or otherwise. Engage is the key word here.

He reminded me of the Viking god Thor, if Thor had been a reclusive federal game warden from Texas with excellent manners.

After dinner, we were all in the kitchen helping with the dishes, and I had the thought, Someone should go check on Momma. And that’s when I started to cry.

He was so silly. So I said, “Duane, you are so silly.

You are loveliness personified; you are grace and fascination. I think of you and I stop breathing. I worry that any movement will steal the image of you from my mind’s eye. But the memory is a pale, hollow specter to luminous reality.

I’d once overheard my daddy tell my momma that the six Winston boys had inherited their father’s ability to charm snakes, the IRS, and women.

My type has a romantic soul. He’ll make my brain and my heart fight over who gets him first. He does what’s right, even when it’s not easy – actually, especially when it’s not easy. He knows the value of discipline, education, honor, and restraint. And his strength of character is the only thing that outweighs the strength of his love for me.

Over the last several days, I’d done a fair amount of practiced focusing on my present state of “lesness” – homelessness, joblessness and relationshiplessness. Less was not more. Less was an unstable, uncomfortable place to be.

For some reason it always irked me when people felt it necessary to draw attention to my height as though I wasn’t aware of my larger than average stature. I once responded: “Yes, and you’re very small.” but that didn’t go over very well, even though in that situation it was true.