All Male Friendships Are Essentially Quixotic: They

His Dreams Had Always Been Houdiniesque: They Were The Dreams Of A Pupa Struggling In Its Blind Cocoon, Mad For A Taste Of Light And Air.

The Magician Seemed To Promise That Something Torn To Bits Might Be Mended Without A Seam, That What Had Vanished Might Reappear, That A Scattered Handful Of Doves Or Dust Might Be Reunited By A Word, That A Paper Rose Consumed By Fire Could Be Made To Bloom From A Pile Of Ash. But Everyone Knew That It Was Only An Illusion. The True Magic Of This Broken World Lay In The Ability Of Things It Contained To Vanish, To Become So Thoroughly Lost, That They Might Never Have Existed In The First Place.

I Don't Have A Problem With Many Uses Of The Word Genre, Just Certain Ones. I Have The Most Trouble When These Labels Are Used To Prevent Discussion, To Prevent A Work From Being Taken Seriously As Literature. When We Say "genre," We Generally Mean "something Crappy," Something That Would Be Sold In An Airport.

It Drains The Bars And Cafes After Hours, Concentrates The Wicked And The Guilty Along Its Chipped Formica Counter, And Thrums With The Gossip Of Criminals, Policemen, Shtarkers,and Schlemiels, Whores And Night Owls ... Three Or Four Floaters, Solitaries, And Drunks Between Benders Lean Against The Sparkly Resin Counter, Sucking The Tea From Their Shtekelehs And Working The Calulations Of Their Next Big Mistake.

Mr. Feld Was Right; Life Was Like Baseball, Filled With Loss And Error, With Bad Hops And Wild Pitches, A Game In Which Even Champions Lost Almost As Often As They Won, And Even The Best Hitters Were Put Out Seventy Percent Of The Time.