Quotes About Family

And she finally told Nola that she was so worried about whether she could love two children, about whether she could make room in her heart for as much love as she felt for Bobby. Wasn't it betraying Bobby, to love another child? And Nola told her what her sister Patricia had said, after having her second. Patricia said she felt like she'd grown a second heart.

There are certain things in your life that will become every important to you. You might not be able to explain to anyone else why they're important. But you will expect the people who love you, the people who are your family, to respect those things.

Steven sits back in the booth, crosses his arms. "My wife was cremated." "Your wife…?" "She died when Maddy was two weeks old." "Oh, my. My goodness. That's a hard one. Boy, oh, boy. That must have been hard." "It never goes away. Never does." Arthur leans forward. "The pain, you mean?

Nobody knows what goes on in other families, because families lie about themselves to other people. Not only to other people but to one another. And to themselves.

Well, I was just going to say that it seems one of the things you have to do in order to finally grow up is to let that what-my-parents-did-to-me stuff go.

Lincoln sits on the chair and removes his shoes. Then he climbs in bed beside his mother, who does not respond. Jason hopes no one comes in and tells Lincoln to get off the bed. Because he would have to kill that person. He sits in the chair and watches as Lincoln touches his mother's hand, then holds it. The puppy has a name, he tells her. Nothing. Lincoln moves closer to Abby and closes his eyes.

I stood looking at it, and a thousand things occurred to me about the way that even in bitterness and confusion and anger, my parents love for each other endured. I saw that when I was looking at them, I was only seeing the tip of the iceberg. They belonged to each other more that they belonged to us.

bound to, and the ties to such families live in our hearts.

loved that he wasn't afraid of my mother, that he seemed to see past everything and acknowledge her as a person. It was a rare thing. Brooks had gotten all excited and said yes, that was right, he'd thought about that himself, he'd get to work on a design for it at the store tomorrow.

Because my mother is a third base.

You know your parents are going to die, but they are going to die later. They are going to die sometime. But that time will not come until you no longer need them. While you still need them, or might need them, they will have the good taste and

The dishes we ate from were not translucent china but, rather, the heavy white plates common in less expensive cafés. Still, the food served on them was prepared by my mother, and I believed then, as I do now, that it makes a difference in taste when one's thoughts and feelings and hands are employed in what one serves.

He wanted to be the guy standing in the dimness by their kids' beds as Nola kissed them, and then he would kiss them, too. "Night," he'd say. Why did that single word offer so much comfort? He guessed it was because it said so much. Home. Safety. The prospect of another day together as soon as morning came. He wanted to walk down the stairs to the living room afterward, and sit with Nola in the lamplight and talk.

I learned that the frustration and anger that comes up in these situations go both ways: you're frustrated and/or angry with your parents and they're frustrated and/or angry with you.

Abby was saying that all her illness had done was to make her love Link and Daddy more . And appreciate everything more. And to understand , in a way she never had before, that death was a natural part of life, just like the seasons in nature. And everybody's job was to love life while you had it and never to take anything for granted. It was hard to remember to do that, but it was worth it to try.

warmth of her house settles around her. Come here, dearie, says the kitchen. Come and have a nice slice of cake.

what I felt in that embrace was the knowledge that she would never be able to raise me, not by herself.

But for the outstanding fact of polio, my mother was remarkably healthy;

What is it that makes a family? Certainly, no document does, no legal pronouncement or accident of birth. No, real families come from choices we make about who we want to be bound to, and the ties to such families live in our heart. Thank you for inviting my father, who is not my real family, but to whom I am also tied.

These yanks into someone's personal past, that's the kind of history I like. Not wars, but who was your grandmother and what did she dream of? Did she walk up stairs to where she lived and what did it smell like and what was she wearing and who were her neighbors?

offering of love against fear. I had done it myself, determinedly made cards for my mother thinking that she would then have

She walks away, and Arthur stares at the headstone. "Isn't that something?" he asks Nola. "We have a family.

whether it was fortunate or unfortunate for Claire that neither of her parents had left be-hind any relatives suitable for raising her—all had either been too dilapidated, too debilitated, too disinterested, or too dysfunctional.

The whole house is impeakable.