Spiders should be the totem of writers. Both go into a space alone and spin out of their own bodies a reality that has never existed before.
All of which is only to explain how I came by a piece of equipment that most writers have to acquire one way or another: an unusual tolerance, even a preference, for instability. Not that they don’t suffer from being unsure of next year’s plans or this month’s rent. They do. But, unlike many people, they can live with it.
The things you regret sometimes turn out to be the things you celebrate. In other words: You learn from what you do wrong.
As we started on our journey, I noticed that without possessions, I felt oddly free.
We learn from difference, not from sameness.
It doesn’t matter if you love the people society says you shouldn’t love or do or don’t have children with more than one of them; it doesn’t matter if you have money, go to church, or obey the law; what matters is that you’re not cruel or wasteful, that you don’t keep the truth from those who need it, suppress someone’s will or talent, take more than you need from nature, or fail to use your own talent and will.
It’s time to leave – there is so much out there to do and say and listen to.
Sometimes life is like trying to paint the Sistine Chapel ceiling on the backs on five thousand turtles.
Women of all groups were measurably more likely than their male counterparts to vote for equality, health, and education, and against violence as a way of solving conflict. It wasn’t about biology, but experience.
Listening to these stories reminded me of the words of the great Ghanaian novelist Ayi Kwei Armah: “For seasons and seasons and seasons, all our movement has been going against our self, a journey into our killer’s desire.
Filters let in a cup of water,” he says, “but keep out the ocean.
There is no virtue in being on the same page if it’s the wrong page.
In thirty years or so, the majority will no longer be European Americans; the first generation of mostly babies of color has already been born. This new diversity will give us a better understanding of the world and enrich our cultural choices, yet there are people whose sense of identity depends on the old hierarchy.
Artists strive to free this true and spontaneous self in their work. Creativity, meditation are ways of freeing an inner voice.
A journey – whether it’s to the corner grocery or through life – is supposed to have a beginning, middle, and end, right? Well, the road is not like that at all. It’s the very illogic and the juxtaposed differences of the road – combined with our search for meaning – that make travel so addictive.
I like to believe that the road is sharpening my mind and lengthening my life with surprise.
I’m energized by listening to people’s stories and trying to figure out shared solutions.
Polls show that what women fear most from men is violence, and what men fear most from women is ridicule.
Part of traveling over years means coming back to the same place and knowing it for the first time.
The more polarized the gender roles, the more violent the society. The less polarized the gender roles, the more peaceful the society.