“From my earliest memory, times of crisis seemed to end up with women in the kitchen preparing food for men.”

Households that have lost the soul of cooking from their routines may not know what they are missing: the song of a stir-fry sizzle, the small talk of clinking measuring spoons, the yeasty scent of rising dough, the painting of flavors onto a pizza before it slides into the oven.

Parenting is something that happens mostly while you’re thinking of something else.

The most important thing about a person is always the thing you don’t know.

Back then I was still appalled that God would set down his barefoot boy and girl dollies into an Eden where, presumably, He had just turned loose elephantiasis and microes that eat the human cornea. Now I understand, God is not just rooting fo the dollies.

As long as I kept moving, my grief streamed out behind me like a swimmer’s long hair in water. I knew the weight was there but it didn’t touch me. Only when I stopped did the slick, dark stuff of it come floating around my face, catching my arms and throat till I began to drown. So I just didn’t stop.

The changes we dread most may contain our salvation.

If you’re standing in the manure pile, it’s somebody’s job to mention the stink.

All of the promises of politicians, generals, madmen, and crusaders that war can create peace have yet to be borne out.

Every time I step onto an airplane, I turn to the right and take a good, hard stare into the maw of the engine. I don’t know what I’m looking for. I just do it.

No human eye had looked at this moth before; no one would see its friends. So much detail goes unnoticed in the world.

It’s one thing to carry your life wherever you go. Another thing to always go looking for it somewhere else.

He needs to go rub his soul against life.

I grew up aware of all the people I depended on and who depended on me.

Maybe life doesn’t get any better than this, or any worse, and what we get is just what we’re willing to find: small wonders, where they grow.

The first steps toward stewardship are awareness, appreciation, and the selfish desire to have the things around for our kids to see. Presumably the unselfish motives will follow as we wise up.

You could love your crazy people, even admire them, instead of resenting that they’re not self-sufficient.

I consecrate myself to God to do His will where I am, be it in school, office, or kitchen, or wherever He may, in His wisdom, send me.

Since my kitchen is the most important part of my home, I want to be creative and innovative, not only in its aesthetic, but also in the tools that I’m using to cook.

Our cellar home had a kitchen and a combination bedroom and half bath, which meant we had a sink next to the bed.

I’m at the age where food has taken the place of sex in my life. In fact, I’ve just had a mirror put over my kitchen table.

I just never saw my mother in any other room but the kitchen. There were always pots going.

Kumquats ripen, open and plop flatly to the floor-and outside, in a neat, trimly-hoed kitchen-garden.

I love the way they run in fright when I turn on the kitchen light. And when I squish them on the ground, they make a pleasant crunchy sound.

When I was a young teenager my mother always encouraged my brother, my sister and I to get involved in the kitchen.