Quotes from Anna Quindlen

There are many thrilling things about being a grandmother—who knew it would be so satisfying at my age to put my right foot in, to take my right foot out, to put my right foot in, and to shake it all about?

The cold in her makes cold in me.

we have a culture that reflects contempt and antipathy toward a realistic female body, which is just another form of hating women.

I hid my wounds because I was ashamed...but now I know that I was also afraid of being reduced..

She never sounded pleased about beef noodle casserole or chicken à la king, either, but she did seem to perk up at pork chops and ham. I guess she was a pig girl.

It was like death, except I had to go on living.

Words, words. They mean nothing, less than nothing. I know.

The night threw itself over the day fast now, sucked the light in and distilled it to one silvery spot in the sky where the moon hung.

But I've finally recognized my body for what it is: a personality delivery system, designed expressly to carry my character from place to place, now and in the years to come.

Becoming a parent changed and enlarged my son; it's no stretch at all to say that parenthood made us both better people. I've watched him be a father to my grandson, and I've been thrilled by his ability to put his own concerns and needs aside to minister to those of this little boy, to put himself in the place time after time where he is attuned to who his son is and what he needs, whether indulgence or discipline.

Funny, that no one had ever asked what had happened to the dishes, the scraps, the crumbs in the photographs, on the poster.

there is a piece of me missing so big that the pain doubles me over, clawing at my gut...

She wants to be someone else, somewhere else, and I can't blame her.

when people wonder how I survived being accused of killing my mother, none of them realizes that watching her die was many, many times worse. And knowing I could have killed her was nothing compared to knowing I could not save her. And know I'd almost missed knowing her was far more frightening than Ed Best and his little army of shrunken suits.

Obviously I was mistaken.

I had enough of real life everyday to last me forever.

That's harsh.

But I've finally recognized my body for what it is: a personality delivery system, designed expressly to carry my character from place to place, now and in the years to come. It's like a car, and while I like a red convertible or even a Bentley as well as the next person, what I really need are four tires and an engine. I don't require a hood ornament. It's not about how my body looks at this point; it's about how it works.

You can keep the sectional,she'd said. He hadn't, although it had been a bitch getting it out of the house, and he'd finally used a chain saw, which somehow made him feel better about things. - Jim Bates

Sometimes you say a word so many times that it loses its meaning...

Even in a marriage as truncated as her own—nine years, more or less—most of it is the mundane middle part. That was the part Peter couldn't bear. That was the part Rebecca had liked most.

stayed because I thought things would get better, or at least not worse.

Down time is where we become ourselves... a hiatus that passes for boredom but is really the quiet moving of the wheels inside that fuel creativity.

In the family sandwich, the older people and the younger ones can recognize one another as the bread. Those in the middle are, for a time, the meat.