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Link Quote Stars Tags Author
2a8f51f As we age, we become our parents; live long enough and we see faces repeat in time. family-relationships parents-and-children Neil Gaiman
ffafa7d No mother is ever, completely, a child's idea of what a mother should be, and I suppose it works the other way around as well. But despite everything, we didn't do too badly by one another, we did as well as most. parents-and-children Margaret Atwood
942bc85 There's nothing like your mother's sympathetic voice to make you want to burst into tears. motherhood sympathy mothers parents parents-and-children Sophie Kinsella
a77ab7e ...my father, [was] a mid-level phonecompany manager who treated my mother at best like an incompetent employee. At worst? He never beat her, but his pure, inarticulate fury would fill the house for days, weeks, at a time, making the air humid, hard to breathe, my father stalking around with his lower jaw jutting out, giving him the look of a wounded, vengeful boxer, grinding his teeth so loud you could hear it across the room ... I'm sure he told himself: 'I never hit her'. I'm sure because of this technicality he never saw himself as an abuser. But he turned our family life into an endless road trip with bad directions and a rage-clenched driver, a vacation that never got a chance to be fun. rage silence family heartbreak love abusive-parents mental-abuse abusive broken-home heartbroken love-lost fights divorce childhood-memories malice emotional-abuse anger communication fighting parents parents-and-children mother fury fight father childhood terror parenthood scared sexism Gillian Flynn
3b68fb4 We're taught to expect unconditional love from our parents, but I think it is more the gift our children give us. It's they who love us helplessly, no matter what or who we are. parents-and-children Kathryn Harrison
6fdb1ff "I tried to go to sleep with my headphones still on, but then after a while my mom and dad came in, and my mom grabbed Bluie from the shelf and hugged him to her stomach, and my dad sat down in my desk chair, and without crying he said, 'You are not a grenade, not to us. Thinking about you dying makes us sad, Hazel, but you are not a grenade. You are amazing. You can't know, sweetie, because you've never had a baby become a brilliant young reader with a side interest in horrible television shows, but the joy you bring us is so much greater than the sadness we feel about your illness.' 'Okay,' I said. love parents-and-children sickness John Green
23c63e5 ...but the truly frightening thing was to learn that his mother was no stronger than he was, that the blows of the world hurt her just as much as they hurt him and that except for the fact that she was older, there was no difference between them. life parents parents-and-children Paul Auster
97f44f6 I think maybe, when I was very young, I witnessed a chaste cheek kiss between the two when it was impossible to avoid. Christmas, birthdays. Dry lips. On their best married days, their communications were entirely transactional: 'We're out of milk again.' (I'll get some today.) 'I need this ironed properly.' (I'll do that today.) 'How hard is it to buy milk?' (Silence.) 'You forgot to call the plumber.' (Sigh.) 'Goddammit, put on your coat, right now, and go out and get some goddamn milk. Now.' These messages and orders brought to you by my father, a mid-level phonecompany manager who treated my mother at best like an incompetent employee. silence depression relationship family heartbreak love abusive-relationship bad-parenting abusive broken-home love-lost fights divorce childhood-memories abusive-relationships communication fighting parents parents-and-children mother fight father childhood parenthood sexism Gillian Flynn
8b879a5 The natural term of the affection of the human animal for its offspring is six years. parents parents-and-children George Bernard Shaw
7964300 Back then, things were plainer: less money, no electronic devices, little fashion tyranny, no girlfriends. There was nothing to distract us from our human and filial duty which was to study, pass exams, use those qualifications to find a job, and then put together a way of life unthreateningly fuller than that of our parents, who would approve, while privately comparing it to their own earlier lives, which had been simpler, and therefore superior. past life parents-and-children memory Julian Barnes
9ac736b Children would struggle desperately to feel love for their parents. Rather than hate a parent, in fact, they'd choose to hate themselves. parents-and-children Ryū Murakami
464c266 "It's a strange thing, having a child," he said. It completely alters your most fundamental priorities. When my eldest daughter was born, I realized that I would do anything - anything - to protect her. If I had to set myself on fire to save her from something, I would do it with the utmost relief and gratitude. It's quite a thing, quite a privilege, to care about someone so much that the measure of worth of your own life is changed so much." Tatsu." sacrifice-for-others value-of-life parents-and-children parenthood Barry Eisler
8d9fb57 she hated everything her parents loved hate life parents parents-and-children Stephen Chbosky
68cb86e Neither your mother nor I have any imagination at all and we certainly didn't bring you up to have one parents-and-children John Boyne
a6c163c More than Captain America your kids need Amelia Earhart - more than Ant Man, they need Abraham Lincoln - more than Green Arrow they need Gandhi - more than Iron Man they need Isaac Newton. fairy-tales parenting-children child-psychology parenting-101 parenting-advice parenting-teenagers parents-advice parents-and-responsibility parents-and-teenagers parents-quotes parents-responsibility raising-kids parenting fiction-fantasy parents parents-and-children children parenthood Abhijit Naskar
e5edbbf He wanted to argue like this forever. This was better than nothing. There was no exhausting his anger at his father, and every word, however well intentioned or intentionally barbed, was a pull at a scab on his bloody heart. It was too late for any of this. There could ultimately be no healing. Marty had terminal cancer, and so did the two men have a cancer between them. They were terminal together, as father and son. They remained, momentarily exhausted, but it was really only that quiet between lightning and thunder as sound lags behind speed. The lightning had cracked the ground already, you just hadn't heard it yet. relationships parents-and-adult-children families fathers-and-sons death-of-a-loved-one parents-and-children David Duchovny
ba33f6b Actually, they were very strange parents,' I told her. 'Neither of them were what you might call conventional people. And they had an extremely peculiar approach to parenting. Sometimes I felt as if I were little more than a tenant in their house, as if they weren't entirely sure what I was doing there. But they never mistreated me, nor did they ever do anything to hurt me. And perhaps they loved me in their own way. The concept itself might have been slightly alien to them.' 'And did you love them?' 'Yes, I did,' I said without hesitation. 'I loved them both very much. Despite everything. But then children usually do. They look for safety and security, and one way or another Charles and Maude provided that.' (p. 556) parents-and-children John Boyne
5ca9a48 "It felt strange to call them directly, to hear her father's "Hello?" after the second ring, and when he heard her voice, he raised his, almost shouting, as he always did with international calls. Her mother liked to take the phone out to the verandah, to make sure the neighbors overheard: "Ifem, how is the weather in America?" parents parents-and-children Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
a5e3620 I flash a fake smile of my own, refraining from telling her what I'm really thinking: that it's an unwise karmic move to go around feeling superior to other mothers. Because before she knows it, her little angel could become a tattooed teenager hiding joints in her designer handbag and doling out blow jobs in the backseat of her BMW. smugness parents-and-children Emily Giffin
b278ccc Children were vulnerable--helpless hostages to fate, their emotions so tender that a parent could with the smallest sentence, the briefest gesture, accidentally scar them. He did not want the burden of carrying that responsibility. parental-advice parents-and-children Penny Jordan
fb8b276 As I walk behind her down the halls, it happens. I shrink inch by inch until I am no longer an adult, but a baby toddling along in a comically oversized business suit. I have been pretending to be a grown-up this whole time. My briefcase is full of milk: I have been found out. 'This, then, is home. What is home? Is it a sort of lap of location, that exists only if certain conditions are in place? Is it the intersection of rigidity and comfort--a junction of familiartiy that you curl into? Is it a feeling? I don't know, but I'm being hugged hard against it, and I can't tell when I'll be let go. family home parents parents-and-children Patricia Lockwood
4cf300f My parents were two-faced. To me, they showed no mercy. They preached from theBook of Fallen Children - Commandment 1: The Child Is Always Ungrateful. At eighteen, the free ride would stop, and I'd be dumped into the mess of the world. But in their private moments, they were soft, cowed by love. They critiqued their own parenting skills and thought of all the ways the could help their kids get ahead. two-faced parenting-children parents parents-and-children Ta-Nehisi Coates
1a20f16 I'm saying that children are not supposed to get along with their parents. Your parents are not supposed to be your best friends. There's supposed to be some element of rebellion. That's how you define yourself as a person. family-relationships the-corrections jonathan-franzen growing-up parents parents-and-children Jonathan Franzen
3f858d0 Cyril about Charles Avery: 'Charles was a banker. He was quite rich but he was always cheating on his taxes. He went to prison a few times for it. And when he was younger he always had a string of women on the go. But he was good fun. He was always telling me I wasn't a real Avery, though. I think that I could have done without that.' 'That sounds quite mean on his part.' 'I honestly don't think that he was trying to be cruel. It was more a matter of fact. Anyway, he's dead now. They both are. And I was with him when he went. I miss him still.' (p. 557) parents-and-children John Boyne
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