Quotes About Family

Rosemary was trying her best to retain good government in this family, against all the odds and without any help from a husband, for whom the quotidian demands of meals and housework and child care were meaningless

Why did you have children?' Bertie asked, later in their lives. 'Was it just the biological imperative to breed?' 'That's why everyone has children,' Viola said. 'They just dress it up as something more sentimental.') Viola

Gwendolen was so touched that she wept, but quietly, for her mother would have been monstrously jealous of such emotion. She had claimed grief for her own long ago.

one grief after another—her brothers, Father, the money, not to mention the war itself—had taken its toll on her and she had allowed herself to be worn down on the grindstone of Mother.

Did he know what love was? The love for a father, a sister, for a dog even, yes, but between a husband and wife? Two lives knitted inextricably together. Or yoked and harnessed. (That's the point, Sylvie said, otherwise we would all run wild.)

The father washes his hands of his son, so the boy is forced to set out alone to try and find fear, hoping that by doing so he'll fit in, that finally he'll belong. That maybe once he can shudder, he'll be able to go home. That's a line that always got me, that part about the shudder and going home.

It was in this way that my idea of brothers began-that brothers were sweet and needed much saving.

I remember one Fourth of July evening in Philadelphia, about a year after my surgery. I was walking home arm in arm with Lisa, my lover at the time, after the fireworks display. We were leaning in to one another, walking like lovers walk. Coming towards us was a family of five: mom, dad, and three teenage boys. Look it's a coupla faggots, said one of the boys. Nah, it's two girls, said another. That's enough outa you, bellowed the father, one of 'em's got to be a man. This is America!

My father is taking me to my first baseball game. The Philadelphia Athletics are playing. I feel I've been sitting on my strange hard seat for a long time. I stand up. It is the National Anthem. I want to go home now, I tell my father. He is looking down at the big green field. But the game hasn't started yet, he says. Then he shrugs. He laughs and his laughter is big like the wind. O.K., kid. O.K. And he takes my by the hand and leads me out of the stadium.

Finally Doug broke the stalemate and looked at Megan. Thanks a lot, he said sarcastically. Then he yanked off his plastic gloves, tossed them at her feet, and stormed away. Finn let out a sigh as he gazed after his brother. You know, my parents really should have stopped with me.

Boys everywhere. All seven of them plus their dad, running and laughing and shoving each other around on the front lawn, engaged in what appeared to be a full-contact, tackle version of ultimate Frizbee. They were playing shirts and skins. Shirts and might-fine-lookin' skins.

We've a bond, haven't we, Goaty? Fellow victims. Partners in survival. Though God knows what my mum will say If I try and take him home...

I would give up the unessential; I would give my money, I would give my life for my children; but I wouldn't give myself.

She looked into the distance, and the old terror flamed up for an instant, then sank again. Edna heard her father's voice and her sister Margaret's. She heard the barking of an old dog that was chained to the sycamore tree. The spurs of the cavalry officer clanged as he walked across the porch. There was the hum of bees, and the musky odor of pinks filled the air. (last lines)

The mother-women seemed to prevail that summer at Grand Isle. It was easy to know them, fluttering about with extended, protecting wings when any harm, real or imaginary, threatened their precious brood. They were women who idolized their children, worshiped their husbands, and esteemed it a holy privilege to efface themselves as individuals and grow wings as ministering angels.

She was fond of her children in an uneven, impulsive way. She would sometimes gather them passionately to her heart; she would sometimes forget them.

He reproached his wife with her inattention, her habitual neglect of the children. If it was not a mother's place to look after children, whose on earth was it? He himself had his hands full with his brokerage business.

In short, Mrs. Pontellier was not a mother-woman. The motherwomen seemed to prevail that summer at Grand Isle. It was easy to know them, fluttering about with extended, protecting wings when any harm, real or imaginary, threatened their precious brood. They were women who idolized their children, worshiped their husbands, and esteemed it a holy privilege to efface themselves as individuals and grow wings as ministering angels.

Edna had once told Madame Ratignolle that she would never sacrifice herself for her children; or for anyone. I would give up the unessential; I would give my money, I would give my life for my children; but I wouldn't give myself.

I would give up the unessential; I would give my money, I would give my life for my children; but I wouldn't give myself. I can't make it more clear; it's only something which I am beginning to comprehend, which is revealing itself to me.

My mother was a cook of the plain, simple, homey variety, which was perfect for our undeveloped palates. She wasn't a puritan or a health nut, but she greatly cared what we ate and took pains to serve us good meals every night. Sometimes, when she dished up one of her typical home-cooked dinners, and we told her how good it was and asked for seconds, she would say half joking, "Aw, it's nothing but a blue plate special!

But still, here are the words Despereaux Tilling spoke to his father. He said, I forgive you, Pa! And he said those words because he sensed that it was the only way to save his heart, to stop it from breaking in two. Despereaux, reader, spoke those words to save himself.

During the night, while Bull and Lucy slept, Edward, with ever-open eyes, stared up at the constellations. He said their names, and then he said the names of the people who loved him. He started with Abilene, and then went on to Nellie and Lawrence and from there to Bull and Lucy, and then he ended again with Abilene: Abilene, Nellie, Lawrence, Bull, Lucy, Abilene. See? Edward told Pellegrina. I am not like the princess. I know about love.

And he discovered, finally, the source of the honey-sweet sound. The sound was music. The sound was King Phillip playing his guitar and singing for his daughter, the Princess Pea, every night before she fell asleep. Hidden in a hole in the wall of the princess's bedroom, the mouse listened with all his heart. The sound of the King's music made Despereaux's soul grow large and light inside of him. Oh, he said, it sounds like heaven. It smells like honey.