A friend can tell you things you don’t want to tell yourself. – Frances Ward Weller

Ah, how good it feels! The hand of an old friend. – Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Often the magical elements in my books are standing in for elements of the real world, the small and magical-in-their-own-right sorts of things that we take for granted and no longer pay attention to, like the bonds of friendship that entwine our own lives with those of other people and places. – Charles de Lint