“As children, we are profoundly loyal to our parents, and to their pain: I wanted to be related to my mom, not ruined by her”

“First we are children to our parents, then parents to our children, then parents to our parents, then children to our children”

“We do not inherit the Earth from our parents. We borrow her from our children.”

“At some point as adults we cease to be our parents' children and we become our children's parents instead.”

“...I had to point at Hanna. But the finger I pointed at her turned back to me. I had loved her. I tried to tell myself that I had known nothing of what she had done when I chose her. I tried to talk myself into the state of innocence in which children love their parents. But love of our parents is the only love for which we are not responsible. ...And perhaps we are responsible even for the love we feel for our parents.”

“Old age doth in sharp pains abound;We are belabored by the gout,Our blindness is a dark profound,Our deafness each one laughs about.Then reason's light with falling rayDoth but a trembling flicker cast.Honor to age, ye children pay!Alas! my fifty years are past!”