“I used to read a thesaurus searching for the words that meant exactly what I felt. And I could never find them. I could see shades of meaning in the different ways something could be said; I could appreciate the difference, say, between the verbs ‘fall’ and ‘catapult.’ But when I had a feeling like sadness, I couldn’t find a word that meant everything that I felt inside of me. I always felt that words were inadequate, that I’d never been able to express myself—ever. Even now, it’s so hard to express what I think and feel, the totality of what I’ve seen.”