““I’d lived a lot of years walking down the wrong roads, and those days had compacted like the folds of an accordion, into an inch of time. Now everything expanded. My life was wailing like a beautiful prayer, the moments stretching into hours, the days to years. I could see now that it was possible to live a long life poorly, or a short life well, and that at any moment one might shift their position and, after years of hibernation, decide to crawl out of the den and live.””