Every one of my friends had a bad day somewhere in her history she wished she could forget but couldn't. A very bad mother day cha...nges you forever. Those were the hardest stories to tell. . . . "I could still see the red imprint of his little bum when I changed his diaper that night. I stared at my hand, as if they were alien parts of myself . . . as if they had betrayed me. From that day on, I never hit him again."LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Unpleasant questions are being raised about Mother's Day. Is this day necessary? . . . Isn't it bad public policy? . . . No politi...cian with half his senses, which a majority of politicians have, is likely to vote for its abolition, however. As a class, mothers are tender and loving, but as a voting bloc they would not hesitate for an instant to pull the seat out from under any Congressman who suggests that Mother is not entitled to a box of chocolates each year in the middle of May.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
As a mother I am often confused about how to help my children make wise decisions for themselves. One day I extol the virtues of a... free and open education and the next I tell them they can't watch TV until they finish their homework. One day I tell them to eat what they like, their bodies know intuitively what they need; and the next I say, "Okay, that's it--no more junk food in this house!" I flounder like this because I have no training and very little support for this work and there are days when I'm the one who needs the parenting, even more than they do.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
1946: I go to graduate school at Tulane in order to get distance from a "possessive" mother. I see a lot of a red-haired girl name...d Maude-Ellen. My mother asks one day: "Does Maude-Ellen have warts? Every girl I've known named Maude-Ellen has had warts." Right: Maude-Ellen had warts.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
My mother learned that she was carrying me at about the same time the Second World War was declared; with the family talent for ma...gic realism, she once told me she had been to the doctor's on the very day.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
I shun father and mother and wife and brother when my genius calls me. I would write on the lintels of the door-post, Whim. I hope... that it is somewhat better than whim at last, but we cannot spend the day in explanation.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
My mother, who hates thunderstorms, Holds up each summer day and shakes... It out suspiciously, lest swarms Of grape-dark clouds are lurking there....LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Mexico is a nineteenth-century country arranged for gaslight. Once brought into the harsh light of the twentieth-century media, Me...xico can only seem false. In its male, in its public, its city aspect, Mexico is an arch-tranvestite, a tragic buffoon. Dogs bark and babies cry when Mother Mexico walks abroad in the light of day. The policeman, the Marxist mayor--Mother Mexico doesn't even bother to shave her mustachios. Swords and rifles and spurs and bags of money chink and clatter beneath her skirts. A chain of martyred priests dangles from her waist, for she is an austere, pious lady. Ay, how much--clutching her jangling bosoms; spilling cigars--how much she has suffered.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The Holocaust was not an event that ended in 1945Mat least not for the survivors. Not for me. It continued on and on because my mo...ther and I were alone. Because my father's family no longer existed and I was its sole survivor. It continued on in the struggle of extreme poverty that we experience in the early years in this country. It continued on and on, coloring every thought I had, every decision I made. It continued on in the Bronx, on ordinary streets, at the kitchen table. It continued on invisible.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery; you shall have no other gods before... me. You shall not make for yourself an idol, whether in the form of anything that is in heaven above, or that is on the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I the LORD your God am a jealous God, punishing children for the iniquity of parents, to the third and the fourth generation of those who reject me, but showing steadfast love to the thousandth generation of those who love me and keep my commandments. You shall not make wrongful use of the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not acquit anyone who misuses his name. Remember the sabbath day, and keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work. But the seventh day is a sabbath to the LORD your God; you shall not do any work -you, your son or your daughter, your male or female slave, your livestock, or the alien resident in your towns. For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but rested the seventh day; therefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day and consecrated it. Honor your father and your mother, so that your days may be long in the land that the LORD your God is giving you. You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or male or female slave, or ox, or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »