A few weeks ago, walking on the beach in Anglesey with my dogs and my husband.

In college, meeting my wife and then having our first child, and marching together to bring down the walls of Jim Crow.

When each of my three children was born.

In the hospital giving birth to my second daughter with my first daughter right there in the room as it was happening. I don’t remember any pain. I just remember feeling more alive and full of fierce mama bear love than at any other point in my life.

I’m lucky…that I’m free to do art, and presumably to keep my soul growing, by finding something else to do. Participation in the arts--drawing, dancing, and all that--makes the soul grow. That’s why you engage in it. That’s how you grow a soul.

Bad things happening to my children and grandchildren.

“Candide” by Voltaire, I guess.

I don’t much want to play anymore. I enjoyed the game as a young man, but I don’t enjoy it now.

Yes, well, that’s the reason that I don’t want to be in New York any longer. I don’t want to go to parties any more. There are no familiar faces anymore. You know, you go to a party and you hone in on the couple people you know. There are none of those people for me at parties any more. I’ve lost my sister, my brother, my editor, my publisher. It’s a whole generation gone by. Old war buddies of mine, my colleagues, my family.

In our lives, we do our best to serve our community well, behave decently, and treat people well.