Quotes About Family

My father's on my radar, but most of the time I shut it off.

I'm riding beside my best friend, and I tell him, in the same offhand tone my mother had used, That's my grandfather's funeral, and he looks at me as if I'm insane.

Everything he did, as long as you stayed in the village, whether shouting obscenities at passing children or sleeping in the cemetery, all would be remembered when they looked at you, they would say to themselves or to whomever they were with, It's his father, you know, the crazy one, the drunk, and they couldn't help but wonder what part of his madness had passed on to you, which part you had escaped.

It is the act of reading itself that I miss, the opportunity to retreat further and further from the world until I have found some space, some air that isn't stale, that hasn't been breathed by my family a thousand times already.

Hey, great idea: if you have kids, give your partner reading vouchers next Christmas. Each voucher entitles the bearer to two hours' reading time *while the kids are awake*. It might look like a cheapskate present, but parents will appreciate that it costs more in real terms than a Lamborghini.

Barry, you're over thirty years old. You owe it to your mum and dad not to sing in a group called Sonic Death Monkey.

That was his mother. When she wasn't crying over the breakfast cereal, she was laughing about killing herself.

You spend Christmas at somebody's house, you worry about their operations, you give them hugs and kisses and flowers, you see them in their dressing gown...and then bang, that's it. Gone forever. And sooner or later there will be another mum, another Christmas, more varicose veins. They're all the same. Only the addresses, and the colors of the dressing gown, change.

It's easier to have parents if you've got a girlfriend.

I work it out. It is the act of reading itself I miss, the opportunity to retreat further and further from the wold until I have found some space, some air that isn't stale, that hasn't been breathed by my family a thousand times already.

I personally find that for domestic purposes, the Trivial Pursuit system works better than Dewey.

One can only presume that people who say that their favorite record of all time reminds them of their honeymoon in Corsica, or of their family Chihuahua, don't actually like music very much.

His father fell off a window-ledge. No wonder his mum had cheered up.

Nobody should have children just because it made the photo library on the computer more interesting.

Tucker, please put him down, said Annie. You're frightening Jackson. He's not, said Jackson. It's cool. I don't like that guy anyway. Punch him, Dad.

They already knew that they would be telling people about the morning for a long time to come, maybe for the rest of their lives, and the taxi ride was the first attempt at a first draft of a story that would have to satisfy parents, siblings, children, and grandchildren.

Sitting at the table with the kids, and being told off like a kid, has liberated me; my disenfranchisement has empowered me.

That's what family stories were—amusing accounts of the messes and the fuckups. Take away the love and the laughter, narrate the stories as if the characters had acted with malice and self-absorption, and everybody was in a bleak independent film about alcoholism and schizophrenia and child abuse.

She didn't want her father to die. She would mourn him. She owed him . . . not everything, exactly, because there were lots of things she'd had to obtain for herself, but enough. If, however, the choice was between a brief good-bye and a new life, then it was no choice at all.

It had never occurred to Sophie that she would be forgiven so readily for her trespasses and she wasn't sure that she liked it. She had refused to visit her dangerously ill father in hospital because her career was more important to her, and the least he could do was judge her. You could get away with anything, it seemed, if you were on the telly.

Sapete com'è quando si hanno dei figli. Di loro si pensa il peggio solo quando non c'è scelta.

Berdua saja tidaklah cukup, itu adalah masalahnya. Ia selalu berpikir bahwa dua adalah angka yang tepat, dan ia benci untuk hidup dalam keluarga berjumlah tiga, empat, atau lima. Tapi, sekarang ia bisa melihat alasan dibalik hal itu: Jika seseorang menghilang, maka kau tidak akan tinggal sendiri.

Bagaimana kau bisa membuat sebuah keluarga jika tak ada seorang pun berada disisimu, kau tahu, untuk membantumu?

If people have to die, I don't want them dying near me. My mum and dad won't die near me, I've made bloody sure of that. When they go, I'll hardly feel a thing.