From The Lost: A Search for Six of Six Million

“I told her that I, too, was interested in facts, of course, that we had started out on this long series of journeys because we wanted to find the facts. But I said that because of what we’d heard on our trips, I’d also become extremely interested in stories, in the way that the stories multiplied and gave birth to other stories, and that even if these stories weren’t true, they were interesting because of what they revealed about the people who told them. What they revealed about the people who told them, I said, was also part of the facts, the historical record.” (p. 411)

“I did and do believe that if you project  yourself into the mass of things, if you look for things, if you search, you will, by the very act of searching, make something happen that would not otherwise have happened, you will find <span style=”font-style:italic;”>something</span>, even something small, something that will certainly be more than if you hadn’t gone looking in the first place, if you hadn’t asked your grandfather anything at all. I had finally learned the lesson taught me, years after they’d died, by Minnie Spieler and Herman the Barber. There are no miracles, no magical coincidences. There is only looking, and finally seeing, what was always there.” (p. 486)

The book is incredible. Read it.