“Look, Mother, I am never going to be thin.I'm Norwegian. If you wanted a thin daughter, you should not have married a man whose female ancestors carried cows home from the pasture”

“All the best women are married, yes, they are - to all the worst men' There was an infinite slow caress in her tone but she went on rapidly 'So I shall never marry you. How should I marry a kind man, a good man? I am a barbarian, and want a barbarian lover, to crush and scarify me, but you are so tender and I am so crude. When your soft eyes look on me they look on a volcano.”

“Love is a green sky on a blue pasture, and I am the flying cow eating it all up.”

“The best love in the world, is the love of a man. The love of a man who came from your womb, the love of your son! I don't have a daughter, but maybe the love of a daughter is the best, too. I am first and foremost me, but right after that, I am a mother. The best thing that I can ever be, is me. But the best gift that I will ever have, is being a mother.”

“If you want, I can carry you—” “I’m fine,” she said shortly. “Let’s go.”He’d said that wrong. He should have said, “I want to carry you.”

“Does this dress make my ass look big?" I ask him."You look like a fat cow in high heels," he laughs.Yes, I am married to this idiot.”