Monet, I realize, has painted that aspect of the world that can’t be domesticated by vision—what Emerson called the “flash and sparkle” of it, in this case a million dappled reflections rocking and melting in the waves.

In my life ahead, I will be needed and have needs; the hope is I will do everything I can and have others do the same for me.

the more I explore, the more I will see, the more I’ll understand how very little I’ve seen. The world feels like a surfeit of details that refuse to coalesce.

the Met’s old master wing

In fact, a cloister was the open-air center of a monastery, a place set apart from the wider world but not from the sun, moon, and stars.

By far my best conversational trick is asking questions, ideally wide-open ones begging for long-winded answers. I’m happy if I can get a person telling me their life story, and I find most people are surprised to be asked about it, and, once prompted, find they have much to say.

I belong to no particular religious tradition, but I often feel the need to be tied back, to brush away trivial concerns and commune with something more basic. I stare into the beautiful mihrab not as a pious worshipper but as a worshipper nevertheless.

Nature tends to prize hardihood over simplicity, which makes for beautiful creations but not necessarily artful or straightforward ones.

“One wish for yourself,” she says, “and another, just as big, for someone else.” I have never heard this before and immediately know I will say it to my children one day.