A Spark of Light

by Jodi Picoult

Parenthood was like awakening to find a soap bubble in the cup of your palm, and being told you had to carry it while you parachuted from a dizzying height, climbed a mountain range, battled on the front lines. All you wanted to do was tuck it away, safe from natural disasters and violence and prejudice and sarcasm, but that was not an option. You lived in daily fear of watching it burst, of breaking it yourself. Somehow you knew that if it disappeared, you would, too.

There is a moment when you realize that no matter how well you plan, how carefully you organize, you are at the mercy of chaos. It’s the way time slows the moment before the drunk driver crosses the median line and plows into your vehicle. It’s the seconds that tick by between when the doctor invites you to take a seat, and when she gives you bad news. It’s the stutter of your pulse when you see another man’s car in the driveway of your house in the middle of the day.

Leonardo da Vinci: While I thought that I was learning how to live, I have been learning how to die.