To Be Next To Her Was To

Within Every Elaborate Lie, A Kernel Of Truth.

Dad Always Warned That It Was Misleading When One Imagined People, When One Sas Them In The Mind's Eye, Because One Never Remembered Them As They Really Were, With As Many Inconsistencies As There Were Hairs On A Human Head (100,000 To 200,000). Instead, The Mind Used A Lazy Shorthand, Smoothed The Person Over Into Their Most Dominating Characteristic--their Pessimism Or Insecurity (something Really Being Lazy, Turning Them Into Either Nice Or Mean)--and One Made The Mistake Of Judging Them From This Basis Alone And Risked, On A Subsequent Encounter, Being Dangerously Surprised.

It's Kind Of Funny...the Moments On Which Life Hinges. I Think Growing Up You Always Imagine Your Life - Your Success - Depends On Your Family And How Much Money They Have, Where You Go To College, What Sort Of Job You Can Pin Down, Starting Salary...but It Doesn't, You Know. You Wouldn't Believe This, But Life Hinges On A Couple Of Seconds You Never See Coming. And What You Decide In Those Few Seconds Determines Everything From Then On... And You Have No Idea What You'll Do Until You're There.

If I Scribbled A Few Words On A Cocktail Napkin And Showed It To My Family, They'd Proclaim It Astonishing And More Culturally Relevant Than The Bible.

Making Love To Aurelia Was Like Rummaging Through A Card Catalog In A Deserted Library, Searching For One Very Obscure, Little-read Entry On Hungarian Poetry.