Sometimes (what am I saying?, ALL the time) other people can say things better than I can.. These are some examples from Anne Lamott: "It's so different having a living father who loves you, even someone complex and imperfect. After your father dies, defeat becomes pretty defeating. When he's still alive, there are set backs and heartbreak, but you're still the apple of someone's eye" (225). "And she is going to dance, dance hungry, dance full, dance each cold astonishing moment, now when she is young and again when she is old." "I don't know why life isn't constructed to be seamless and safe, why we make such glaring mistakes, things fall so short of our expectations, and our hearts get broken and our kids do scary things and our parents get old and don't always remember to put pants on before they go out from a stroll. I don't know why it's not more like it is in the movies, why things don't come out neatly and l...