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I got what they called a diabetic stroke. Here's what it is, my left hand and my left leg. You know when your leg falls asleep? It's like that constantly. It's not painful, but it's so annoying. My leg is all tingly and my arm is all tingly.

I was once in a very, very bad car accident. So my drawing arm is full of pins and platinum stuff. Occasionally it hurts. But I found that after the arm was put back together I could draw better than before. I have no idea why.

When I was very little my mother said I used to draw in the air with my fingers. I needed a pencil. Once I could hold one, I have drawn every day since.

As a novelist, you have to pick your battles. You are tired. You have begun to experience the first ominous tinglings of carpal tunnel syndrome. You wake up in the middle of the night with both hands lying across your chest like a couple of plucked bird carcasses, dead of all sensation.

In the back of my mind was the constant hankering, almost yearning, to write but something always stopped me in my tracks. Or if I did find my way to put a pen to paper or finger on a keyboard I'd give up after a few minutes. I'd find other things to do: Anything but writing.

It's self-soothing for me to draw. So if I'm upset, drawing makes me less upset.

Very few people possess true artistic ability. It is therefore both unseemly and unproductive to irritate the situation by making an effort. If you have a burning, restless urge to write or paint, simply eat something sweet and the feeling will pass.

I can't sit and twiddle my thumbs. I have to start writing even if it's miserable some days.

By the time I sat down to write 'Family Pictures,' I hadn't written anything in almost two years, and writing, I have discovered, is a muscle: if it isn't exercised, it will atrophy.