We can start all the organic farms we want, but we can't stop congress from declaring pizza sauce a vegetable. - William Deresiewicz
[Jane] Austen was not a novelist for nothing: she knew that our stories are what make us human, and that listening to someone else's stories -- entering into their feelings, validating their experiences -- is the highest way of acknowledging their humanity, the sweetest form of usefulness. - William Deresiewicz