The decisive accidental …

… Mark Helprin - Bumping Into the Characters - NYTimes.com. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)

It happens all the time, and where it gets quite interesting is in your own house, because what leaps out at you is so often conjoined with your preferences and your history. Here, the conscious and the subconscious, intent and accident, will and grace, often intersect. In some respects the writer’s house is like an artist’s model. She is chosen, she is posed, but like all elemental beauties, hers is beyond your design and therefore a continuing source of elevation and surprise.