I was born under the Blue Ridge, and under that side which is blue in the evening light, in a wild land of game and forest and rushing waters.
All the men in my life have been two things: an epic and an epidemic.
I have reason to be shy. I've been hurt plenty.
If whites bored me, it was because they bored themselves. They seemed to get little fun out of life and were desperately lonely.
Asking what I considered an impossible salary when I didn't want to work for someone has boosted my pay again and again.
I wondered what I would do if I didn't have my God to turn to and be able to read the Book He had divinely inspired.
Mom was the greatest influence of my childhood. She wanted to save me from the vice, lust, and drinking that was all about me.
I know you loved both he and I, the way a mother can love two sons. And no one should be judged for loving more than they ought, only for loving not enough.
One strand of psychotherapy is certainly to help relieve suffering, which is a genuine medical concern. If someone is bleeding, you want to stop the bleeding. Another medical aspect is the treatment of chronic complaints that are disabling in some way. And many of our troubles are chronic. Life is chronic. So there is a reasonable, sensible, medical side to psychotherapy.
I have never known the time when I did not wear stays. My stays are part of me.
I hope that this year, you make mistakes. If you do, then it means you have tried, learned, lived, pushed yourself, changed you and your world, and most importantly, you've done something.