Pigs in Heaven

by Barbara Kingsolver

This marriage has failed to warm her.

She needs some proof that she isn’t the last woman left on earth, the surviving queen of nothing.

No matter what kind of night you’re having, morning always wins.

Something like that is as bad or as good as a telephone ringing in the night: either way, you’re not as alone as you think.

But kids don’t stay with you if you do it right. It’s one job where, the better you are, the more surely you won’t be needed in the long run.

“Some people say religion is finding yourself, and some people say it’s losing yourself in a crowd.”

When you’re given a brilliant child, you polish her and let her shine.

Anybody can get worked up, if they have the intention. It’s peacefulness that is hard to come by on purpose.

She stops trying to talk for a while, since there is nothing to say about a lost child that can change one star in a father’s lonely sky.