Quotes About Expectations

Something I did not know at twenty," said Nikys slowly, "that I do know at thirty, is that when a woman marries a man, she marries his life. And it had better be the life she wants to lead.

All happy endings are ultimately an illusion created by stopping short.

Aunt Lorna buys all our shoes big to grow into, Mina explained to Miles-san. That's why they slip around like that. Lieutenant Johannes, peering doubtfully into the depths of the refrigerator, murmured, Beer... ? Do you like beer, Mina? Miles-san asked. She shook her head, making her straight black hair swing around her chin. Thought not, somehow. You'll have to do better, Johannes. Aren't all you attaché fellows supposed to be ImpSec trained? Improvise!

Are you glad, or sorry?" "About children?" She glanced at his face. He seemed to have no awareness of having hit a sore point dead on. "They just haven't come my way, I guess." The

Am I to form myself into the pattern of a perfect Barrayaran maiden like trying to work a magic spell for absolution? I could spend my whole life working out that ritual and not come to the end of it, damn it!

A true Vor, Miles told himself severely, does not bury his face in his liegewoman's breasts and cry—even if he is at a convenient height for it.

Elena was observing him anxiously. "What's the matter, Miles? You don't look happy. We won!" A true Vor, Miles told himself severely, does not bury his face in his liegewoman's breasts and cry—even if he is at a convenient height for it.

Vorkosigan probably knew how, she reflected bitterly. Just like a man, to be underfoot in her life for days and then a quarter of a solar system away when she really needed him.

Men are taught to apologize for their weaknesses, women for their strengths.

I've decided it's important to love the life you get and somehow learn to let go of the life you dreamed of.

The problem with Thanksgiving is that the pressure for the meal and the conversation to be perfect is daunting.

She and Ray knew, and though Kelly felt no embarrassment, no shame at the knowledge, what she did feel was a sudden certainty that this wasn't a relationship she could endure. Not because of the knowledge. Not because of morality. Because she didn't love them. She loved Rowdy, and the discontent, the subtle anger building inside her for days now over his expectations were clawing at her heart.

If I ever coo at a man, Ray thought privately, I hope someone shoots me.

Every day is a new day and you've got to just go with the flow. Accepting yourself as you are and letting go of what society says you should be are first steps toward freeing yourself. "Free your hair and the rest will follow

Women now were told not to settle for second best, told that they deserved better, but at a time, it seemed, when there was so much less to go around.

The problem with a beautiful woman is that she makes everyone around her feel hopelessly masculine, which if you're already male to begin with poses no particular problem. But if you're anyone else, your whole sexual identity gets dragged into the principal's office: "So what's this I hear about you prancing around, masquerading as a woman?" You are answerless. You are sitting on your hands. You are praying for your breasts to grow, your hair to perk up.

It was true. Men could be with whomever they pleased. But women had to date better, kinder, richer, and bright, bright, bright, or else people got embarrassed.

He calls you occasionally at the office to ask how you are. You doodle numbers and curlicues on the corners of Rolodex cards. Fiddle with your Phi Beta Kappa key. Stare out the window. You always, always, say: Fine.

I was too fresh from childhood. Subconsciously, my deepest brain still a cupboard of fairy tales, I suppose I believed that if pretty woman was no longer pretty she had done something to deserve it. I had a young girl's belief that this kind of negative aging would never come to me. Death would come to me - I knew this from reading British poetry. But the drying, hunching, blanching, hobbling, fading, fattening, thinning, slowing? I would just not let that happen to moi.

I used to think that those essentially happy and romantic novels that ended with a wedding were all wrong, that they had left out the most interesting part of the story.

You were never to say you weren't fine, thank you — and yourself? You were supposed to be Heidi. You were supposed to lug goat milk up the hills and not think twice. Heidi did not complain. Heidi did not do things like stand in front of the new IBM photocopier saying, If this fucking Xerox machine breaks on me one more time, I'm going to slit my wrists.

She recognized the panic at even a moment's boredom that all these piles contained, as well as the unreasonable hopefulness regarding time.

Her parents had gone from a couple who would be different, who would be better than anyone, who were determined to be better than most, to a couple who would be different because they were worse.

You women today," Mrs. Mallon said. "You expect too much.