Like trying to hold a snowflake

This is a quote from the writer Ruth Ozeki, which I snatched from a Q&A with her over here.

"There’s something about the idea of writing, and thinking about writing as a form of prayer — the way as a writer you call out into the world and throw your words into the world. You’re not praying to a god, but you’re almost conjuring a reader to arrive. That’s what books do, they’re an invitation to readers."

She wrote "A Tale for the Time Being," which I am reading right now. It is wonderful. Consider this, which is in the voice of a teenage girl in Japan, writing in her diary:

"Then is the opposite of now. So saying now obliterates its meaning, turning it into exactly what it isn't. It's like the word is committing suicide or something. So then I'd start making it shorter...now, ow, oh, o...until it was just a bunch of little grunting sounds and not even a word at all. It was hopeless, like trying to hold a snowflake on your tongue or a soap bubble between your fingertips. Catching it destroys it, and I felt like I was disappearing, too."