Some of my Favorite Quotes

I was thinking about things people have said that I've found inspiring or supportive over the years. Some of them, I'm sure will be old news to many people and others are more personal. My mother told me a story about Eleanor Roosevelt because she met her at the Seattle Train station during WWII when I was a babe in arms. Mom said Mrs. Roosevelt was speaking to the travelers and especially young men in uniform but came over to compliment my mother on her baby and pat me on the head. Mom was delighted. She got on the train to Portland Oregon, and sat next to a young sailor who had spoken with Mrs. Roosevelt also and was also thrilled. Mom said he had a baby at home and offered to hold me for awhile. Ingrate that I was I shed white angora all over his navy blues, but Mom said he didn't seem to mind as he was pretty homesick. Off and on Mom would report stories she read or heard about Mrs. Roosevelt and so she became part of the tapestry of my life too. These first quotes are hers.

"Beautiful young people are accidents of nature, but beautiful old people are works of art." I always thought of my grandparents in this regard, but now I am including my self. Our lives are our works of art.

"Learn from the mistakes of others. You can't live long enough to make them all yourself."

And most meaningful to me was her statement "You must do the thing you think you cannot do." The rest of it is: "“You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience by which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, 'I lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.” Every time something comes up in my life that I think I'm not up to I remember that. It got me through shyness in high school, learning to do presentations at work, the loss of our first baby, my parents' deaths, divorce, learning to be a white water rafter, being a single mom to my big, tall, sons (it's hard to persuade a highschooler when you are eyeball to chest with him).

Then there is Oscar Wilde:

“Ordinary riches can be stolen, real riches cannot. In your soul are infinitely precious things that cannot be taken from you.”

A favorite Oscar Wilde that I suspect I like far too much : Always forgive your enemies - nothing annoys them so much.

Mohandas Gandhi:
"All the religions of the world, while they may differ in other respects, unitedly proclaim that nothing lives in this world but Truth."

Jesus: “Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble. Mathew 6:34 Don't sweat the small stuff.

"And I say unto you, Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you. For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened. Luke 11:9-10 Right on, keep on truckin'.

Buddha: Thousands of candles can be lighted from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared.

Gloria Steinem: We've begun to raise daughters more like sons...but few have the courage to raise our sons more like our daughters.

Douglas Adams, I like this because it encourages me to to be more adventuresome and try new things: Flying is learning how to throw yourself at the ground and miss.

And on the more personal side:

My Grandma Laura: "Never trust a pastor with more than two suits." Self explanatory I think, and pretty much I don't.

My Dad: "Avoid the appearance of evil." I know there is more to this quote than this but...this is what he said, and you cannot predict what a child's mind will make of it. I personally took it as inspiration to do extreme and inventive care in covering up my misadventures in my childhood home. Telling the truth to the parental units came to me late in college. I was karmically rewarded by offspring who told even better stories than I.

My Mom: "Housework sucks." Okay, she didn't say "sucks," but that was the general idea. Still her house was pretty tidy as I remember in spite of four kids.