“When I was little I would always stand in front of a mirror and cross my eyes. Then my mother would come in and say, "Stop that, nothing will ever come of it!”

“A mother who would stop at nothing for her child is dangerous woman when crossed.”

“My mother always said that I would come to a bad end but I never thought she meant this - writing allegory in literal times.”

“Was he coming to bury the hatchet? Was there a hatchet to even be buried? For some reason I started thinking of how weird it was that I would always be his son and he would always be my father, that there was nothing that could ever change. I didn't know whether this permanence was comforting or terrifying.”

“My mother and Joe have a lovers' shorthand, an economy of gestures that comes when you are close enough to someone to speak their language. I wonder if my mother and father ever had that, or if my mother was always just trying to decipher him.”

“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, "Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.”