Quotes & Sayings About A Family Of Three

45,000 sections of reinforced concrete - three tons each.
Nearly 300 watchtowers.
Over 250 dog runs.
Twenty bunkers.
Sixty five miles of anti-vehicle trenches - signal wire, barbed wire, beds of nails.
Over 11,000 armed guards.
A death strip of sand, well-raked to reveal footprints.
200 ordinary people shot dead following attempts to escape the communist regime.
96 miles of concrete wall.

Not your typical holiday destination.

JF Kennedy said the Berlin Wall was a better option than a war. In TDTL, the Anglo-German Bishop family from the pebbledashed English suburb of Oaking argue about this - among other - notions while driving to Cold War Berlin, through all the border checks, with a plan to visit both sides of it. — Joanna Campbell

I was in Vietnam, and I was exposed to Agent Orange. And there's a high relationship between people that were exposed to Agent Orange and the kind of lymphoma that I had. The prostate cancer was genetic in my family. My father had prostate cancer, my - three of my four uncles had prostate cancer. — Hamilton Jordan

A psychiatrist once asked me to draw a picture of my family. This is when I was a member of a family of four. I drew the three other people in the family first, bodies and heads. And then, last, I began to draw myself - but gave up. — Jamaica Kincaid

The U.K. needs a system for family migration underpinned by three simple principles. One: that those who come here should do so on the basis of a genuine relationship. Two: that migrants should be able to pay their way. And three: that they are able to integrate into British society. — Theresa May

May 2 Numbers 6 The Nazarite was holy in three negative ways: (1) he must not touch the grape; (2) he must not cut his hair; (3) he must not touch a dead body. Were I to transopose such consecration into new testament parallels I suppose this would be the setup:
1. Grapes
the source of natural joy
that which makes glad the heart of man. This is denying oneself the allowable pleasures for the sake of a greater holiness.
2. The long hair of man is his shame. He must let it grow so that he becomes unashamed of shame
reproach bearing for God.
3. Seperation from evil in all their doings
yea,even from family pulls (v.7).
I know little of any of these. — Jim Elliot

Our neighbors were so excited when a black family moved in that they got them a welcome basket with the first three seasons of The Cosby Show on DVD. — Flynn Meaney

I got the idea from our family's plant book. The place where we recorded things you cannot trust to memory. The page begin's with the person's picture. A photo if we can find it. If not, a sketch or a painting by Peeta. Then, in my most careful handwriting, come all the details it would be a crime to forget. Lady licking Prim's cheek. My father's laugh. Peeta's father with the cookies. The colour of Finnick's eyes. What Cinna would do with a length of silk. Boggs reprogramming the Holo. Rue poised on her toes, arms slightly extended, like bird about to take flight. On and on. We seal the pages with salt water and promises to live well to make their deaths count. Haymitch finally joins us, contributing twenty-three years of tributes he was forced to mentor. Additions become smaller. An old memory that surfaces. A late promise preserved between the pages. Strange bits of happiness, like the photo of Finnick and Annie's newborn son. — Suzanne Collins

Under a system that sought to stamp out tainted blood for three generations, the punishment would extend to parents, grandparents, brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, cousins. A lot of people felt if you had one life to give, you would give it to get rid of this terrible regime, but then you're not the only one getting punished. Your family would go through hell. — Barbara Demick

I would like to point out, though, Lady Georgiana," he continued, "that you have decided to stay in a household with five single gentlemen, three of them adults."
"Four," Andrew broke in, coloring. "I'm seventeen. That's older than Romeo was when he married Juliet."
"And it's younger than I am, which is what counts," Tristan countered, sending his brother a stern look. — Suzanne Enoch

This child lent a solidity to him and Lil. They were a family now, an unbreakable unit of three. — Kate Morton

If fathers were to be mothers, then there will never have a family of more than three. — Laurence Housman

When I was a boy, one of my uncles had a cabin on a lake in Wisconsin. My family went there for parts of three summers, and I loved it! — Kevin Henkes

Your mother was a hero. She developed a spell for gnomeatic fever. And she was the youngest headmaster in Watford history."
Baz is looking at Penny like they've never met.
"And," Penny goes on, "she defended your father in three duels before he accepted her proposal."
"That sounds barbaric," I say.
"It was traditional," Baz says.
"It was brilliant," Penny says. "I've read the minutes."
"Where?" Baz asks her.
"We have them in our library at home," she says "My dad loves marriage rites. Any sort of family magic, actually. He and my mother are bound together in five dimensions. — Rainbow Rowell

Wrong' is why we have this office. 'Wrong' is why we both have the bank accounts we do. 'Wrong' is what our readers, our viewers, our subscribers ... what the public wants to see. 'Wrong' is why you and I are rich.

For the next two or three weeks, until you turn in that winning ticket, I will be the one person in the world you will need to trust. I will be the architect of the new life the two of you are about to embark on. I know your best case scenarios and a whole lot of the worst case scenarios you might run into.

Any publicity for you is publicity for us too. You might not understand it, but as far as the world is concerned, Celebrity Bounty owns you and your family. — Michael Vraa

There a lot of numbers you are going to pass for your life,
Zero- is a born number
One- is a lonely number
Two- is a number of love
Three- is a number of incomplete family
Four- is a number of Family — Federico Lomibao

I only need three things in my life: My family, A good book and a sense of purpose — Steven Aitchison

My parents were devoted. Civic minded. We had family counsels. Three of us children against two of them. We lived a 'Leave It to Beaver' time. — Sissy Spacek

They think my father has a lack of concern for human rights, but regardless of details, the Americans should be humanitarian in dealing with his family, because we are human. Saddam has three young ladies and they have children, I have five, Rana has four, and Hala has two. Therefore, our father is very dear to us. His grandchildren love him a lot. Why aren't humanitarian factors taken into account? — Raghad Hussein

Plays are a pretty big commitment. It takes a minimum of three months out of your life, really. And if you have family or kids, then at least during the rehearsal period for five or six weeks, you kind of say goodbye to everybody. — Philip Baker Hall

Dorothy lived in the midst of the great Kansas prairies, with Uncle Henry, who was a farmer, and Aunt Em, who was the farmer's wife. Their house was small, for the lumber to build it had to be carried by wagon many miles. There were four walls, a floor and a roof, which made one room; and this room contained a rusty looking cookstove, a cupboard for the dishes, a table, three or four chairs, and the beds. Uncle Henry and Aunt Em had a big bed in one corner, and Dorothy a little bed in another corner. There was no garret at all, and no cellar - except a small hole dug in the ground, called a cyclone cellar, where the family could go in case one of those great whirlwinds arose, mighty enough to crush any building in its path. It was reached by a trap door in the middle of the floor, from which a ladder led down into the small, dark hole. — L. Frank Baum

When our boulevards are lined with an infinity of bad eating houses filled with dead-faced people placed like mute beasts in their stalls; today, when one out of every three marriages ends in divorce ... It seems incredible that normal human beings not only tolerate the average American restaurant food, but actually prefer it to eating at home. The only possible explanation for such deliberate mass-poisoning, a kind of suicide of the spirit as well as the body, is that meals in the intimacy of a family dining-room or kitchen are unbearable. — Mary Francis Kennedy Fisher

His view of me and my ways were expressed with some degree of force to our family physician who, when at the age of a hundred and fifty-three I came down with the mumps, having summoned the whole family and said that I would burst before morning, was met by a reassuring observation from Adam that he wouldn't believe I was dead even if I had been buried a year. "It is the good who die young, Doctor," he said. "On that principle this young malefactor will live to be the oldest man in the world. — John Kendrick Bangs

She was Mattie Tucker now, mother of three and a good forty pounds heavier, casting that burning eye over them all, reaching way back for a southern pleasantry that was more like a Halloween apple with a razor blade in it: 'Well, don't y'all make just the perfect family of four? — John Burnham Schwartz

Liberals have shifted government into a position of being neutral between right and wrong. By concentrating power in government institutions, liberals chisel at the three pillars of society: the family unit, work ethic and faith. That's not good for America. — James G. Watt

Although I never married, my brother fortunately did, and I have had the pleasure of watching his three sons and daughter grow up. Several of them now have children of their own. We have been a close-knit family, although often separated by distance, and have shared each other's happiness, sorrows, and aspirations. — Gertrude B. Elion

If you're under 26, you can stay on your parents' plan. You can go back to school or get extra training without fear of a health catastrophe bankrupting your family. Over three million previously uninsured young adults are now on their parents' plans. — Kathleen Sebelius

I've done this sort of thing before. Not prophecies so much, but you'd be surprised how many people want to realign their ancestral lines to seem nobler, or rewrite their family history to remove more morally questionable episodes." He paused to recall a recent rewrite. "One lord wanted the murderers removed from his family line. His family was so corrupt, he ended up with three virgin births, two generations removed entirely and a lady who gave birth at the age of two. Still, no one questions it as there is evidence in the archives." Bubo smugly tapped a book. "There is one thing though, faking a prophecy in the past is easy, you already know the result. How will you make this come true in the future?"
"I have someone in mind for it, but I'm not sure he'll go for it. But then prophecy is all optional anyway." Corvid looked up as if a thought had occurred to him. "I'd best go check on my man, I've not met him yet. — Dylan Perry

I never knew what an extraordinary thing it could be to write a book. In the first place, the characters take the bit between their jaws and canter off with you into places you don't want and never catered for. I had smugly intended my book to be about a family rather like ours, but, lud love you! it's already turned into an account of a barmaid's career in an Edgware Road pub, and I can't squeeze us in anywhere!

Odd things happen, too. I had called my pub, 'The Three Feathers,' and counted on there being heaps of pubs in Edgware Road, not called that, but looking a bit like my description. Before we left home, I went down Edgware Road to investigate, and found my pub, even down to the old-fashioned phonograph on the table in the upstairs sitting-room. And I thought, 'I built that place. — Rachel Ferguson

I miss dogs, man. I always had a family pet, always had a dog growing up. It was almost equivalent to the prison sentence, having something taken away from me for three years. I want a dog just for the sake of my kids, but also me. I miss my companions. — Michael Vick

In Separation (1973a), Bowlby puts forward a theory of agoraphobia based on the notion of anxious attachment. He sees agoraphobia, like school phobia, as an example of separation anxiety. He quotes evidence of the increased incidence of family discord in the childhoods of agoraphobics compared with controls, and suggests three possible patterns of interaction underlying the illness: role reversal between child and parent, so that the potential agoraphobic is recruited to alleviate parental separation anxiety; fears in the patient that something dreadful may happen to her mother while they are separated (often encouraged by parental threats of suicide or abandonment); and fear that something dreadful might happen to herself when away from parental protection. — Jeremy Holmes

I am a living illustration of Bosnian mixing and converting. My grandparents lived in eastern Herzegovina. Very poor. The Turks came and brought Islam. There were three brothers in the family. One was Orthodox Christian. The other two took Islam to survive. — Emir Kusturica

Since Oliver Cowdery was born in 1806 and was in Poultney from 1809 to 1825, he was resident in Poultney from 3 years of age until he was 19 years of age - 16 years in all. And these years encompassed the publication of View of the Hebrews, in 1822 [1823] and 1825. His three little half sisters, born in Poultney, were all baptized in Ethan Smith's church. Thus, the family had a close tie with Ethan Smith. — Thomas Ferguson

When I was young, I had two older sisters, and since I was the youngest in my family, my mom took me around with her all the time. I was forever with her when she was having coffee in the middle of the afternoon with her three sisters. And they would talk about men. I absorbed a lot of that. — Richard LaGravenese

There are three lessons in philanthropy - one, involve the family, especially the spouse. She can be a remarkable driver of your initiative. Two, you need to build an institution, and you need to scale it up. Choose a leader for philanthropy whom you trust. Three, philanthropy needs patience, tenacity and time. — Azim Premji

Thus, seeking to produce a typology of forms of the art of government, La Mothe Le Vayer, in a text from the following century (consisting of educational writings intended for the French Dauphin), says that there are three fundamental types of government, each of which relates to a particular science or discipline: the art of self-government, connected with morality; the art of properly governing a family, which belongs to economy; and finally the science of ruling the state, which concerns politics. What matters, notwithstanding this typology, is that the art of government is always characterized by the essential continuity of one type with the other, and of second type with the third. — Michel Foucault

One reason the United States is one of three countries in the world that do not have any form of paid maternity leave is that many American business leaders, like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, oppose any family-friendly policies. They scare people into thinking maternity leave will be a job killer. — Madeleine M. Kunin

I'm living the dream. I've got a big tour bus, an incredible band, a big house, and a family that are all taken care of through my music. I've got a beautiful wife and three beautiful kids. — Aaron Watson

I'm actually taking advantage of my time off. You know, I had a film that was pushed, so I'm home spending time with my family, going to the gym and actually enjoying taking care of myself ... This year has been great for me because I've learned how to relax. The last three years have been amazing but kind of crazy. So I don't know, I feel grounded. I feel really good. — Eva Mendes

We were a bookish family. we loved our books, but before long they were lined up next to the stove and my mother and my uncle fought over which should go first and which should be saved to the very last. The Iliad was a beautiful first edition, the pride of our library, but it too went: Agamemnon, king of men, Nestor, flower of Achaean chivalry, the Black Ships, Patroclus' corpse, Helen's bracelets, Cassandra's shrieks, all met the flames, for he sake of two or three suppers. My uncle was loath to let Mark Twain go...Huckleberry Finn and his river did not deserve such an ignominious end. — Edna O'Brien

I realised when I sang at family parties and Christmases I'd suddenly get everyone's attention, and, being the youngest of three, I thought what a brilliant attention-seeking ploy it was. — Kiki Dee

After that I won a prize, I was with a group of ancient music of Spain that they helped me a lot with a grant, you see, during three years. And so I made my debut in 1944 and I found myself helping my family, it was a very poor family. — Victoria De Los Angeles

On the one hand, I was happy to have a proper diagnosis. Aside from a trust fund and a royal title, that was really the only thing I'd ever wanted in life. On the other hand, I was offended to learn that my brain was defective. Or, I suppose I should say, "differently abled."
One thing I was not was surprised. Four generations of manic depression on my mother's side of the family. Three of autism on my father's side. Drug addict uncles, a pyromaniac cousin, a couple of schizophrenics and suicides, several flesh-and-blood geniuses, and a pecan farmer. You just cannot mix those raw ingredients together and then stick them inside my mother for nine months and expect something normal to come out. It's a wonder I wasn't born with a set of horns. — Augusten Burroughs

It used to be trained professionals doing animation and they were great. Now they have celebrities and famous actors doing the voices, but that does not always work. But I think this film turned out really well, partly because the three of us (me, Ray and Denis) are comedians who are used to doing solo acts and doing certain types of voices. The three of us are New York guys, we all came up the same way in the profession and we are all edgy and enjoy doing family movies. It was a good combination I think. — John Leguizamo

You may not realize this, brother, but Izzy is loyal to me. So don't make me unleash her on you."
"And now you're making fun of me," Izzy complained.
"No. It's a serious threat," Celyn admitted. "Used by many in the family. Especially Briec. He loves threatening those who annoy him - "
"Which is everyone," Brannie stated while grabbing the last loaf of bread and tearing it into three pieces.
" - with his beautiful eldest daughter who will rip the scales from your back and tear the still-beating heart from your chest before spitting on your corpse."
Izzy put her hand to her chest, her voice trembling as she fought tears. "That is the sweetest thing I've ever heard. — G.A. Aiken

Leah looked at her parents, lost in their own fantasies, and decided that the three of them were a pretty pathetic family - but she wasn't sure who was more pathetic: the dateless girl spending the night of the big dance by herself in her bedroom, or the parents who foolishly believed a boy would arrive on their doorstep with flowers, a limo, and a promise to rescue their daughter from her solitude. — J.M. Reep

Just like our story, the original Christmas tales were stories of searching, not so much for the lost, as for the familiar. Mary and Joseph sought in Bethlehem- the home of their familial ancestry- a place to start their own family; the three kings from the East journeyed beneath the sentinel star to find the King of Kings; and the shepherds sought a child in a place most familiar to them: a manger. — Richard Paul Evans

I became an American citizen three years ago, and if I'd been arrested, maybe that wouldn't have happened. That was a very proud moment, by the way. I still have my Irish passport, but becoming an American citizen was important in terms of my family. — Jason O'Mara

Bloomsbury lost Fry, in 1934, and Lytton Strachey before him, in January 1932, to early deaths. The loss of Strachey
was compounded by Carrington's suicide just two months after, in March. Another old friend, Ka Cox, died of a heart attack in 1938. But the death, in 1937, of Woolf 's nephew Julian, in the Spanish Civil War, was perhaps the
bitterest blow. Vanessa found her sister her only comfort: 'I couldn't get on at all if it weren't for you' (VWB2 203). Julian, a radical thinker and aspiring writer, campaigned all his life against war, but he had to be dissuaded by his
family from joining the International Brigade to fight Franco. Instead he worked as an ambulance driver, a role that did not prevent his death from shrapnel wounds. Woolf 's Three Guineas, she wrote to his mother, was
written 'as an argument with him — Jane Goldman

Americans. They came right out with things. Hitchens family lore related the tale of how once, when I was but a toddler, my parents were passing with me through an airport and ran into some Yanks. 'Real cute kid,' said these big and brash people without troubling to make a formal introduction. They insisted on photographing me and, before breaking off to resume their American lives, pressed into my dimpled fist a signed dollar bill in token of my cuteness. This story was often told (I expect that Yvonne and the Commander had been to an airport together perhaps three times in their lives) and always with a note of condescension. That was Americans for you: wanting to be friendly all right, but so loud, and inclined to flash the cash. — Christopher Hitchens

You're a projectionist and you're tired and angry, but mostly you're bored so you start by taking a single frame of pornography collected by some other projectionist that you find stashed away in the booth, and you splice this frame of a lunging red penis or a yawning wet vagina close-up into another feature movie. This is one of those pet adventures, when the dog and cat are left behind by a traveling family and must find their way home. In reel three, just after the dog and cat, who have human voices and talk to each other, have eaten out of a garbage can, there's the flash of an erection. Tyler does this. — Chuck Palahniuk

My culture comes from everywhere. I'm sick of this notion of nationality, that if you're brought up in the same city or same country you're the same. Even three kids brought up in the same family with the same genes, they are not the same. Just consider a human a human. — Marjane Satrapi

He had one uniform practice, and a very bad one it was, during the time of family worship, and just three or four seconds before the conclusion of the prayer, he started to his feet, and ran barking round the apartment like a crazed beast. — James Hogg

I've only read three books by Stephen King. When I was 10 I read 'The Long Walk,' one of his pseudonymous Bachman books. In my early 20s, while trapped on a family vacation, I read 'The Dark Half,' which taught me a word I have never forgotten: psychopomp. Now I have read '11/22/63.' — Lev Grossman

I looked at my family and I said, "I've got a spouse. I've got three kids. There's no way I'm ever buying a music subscription service for the five of us. It's just not going to happen." So we wanted to do something really great for families ... It wasn't easy. We had to convince the labels it was in their best interests, too. — Eddy Cue

Look, Charlie," said Vince leaning back in his chair. "It's real simple. We will be four people
two men and two women
I figure it's better to have two women instead of three men and one woman so she'll have someone she can confide in and all. Women need that kind of thing. Anyway, we'll be four people
friends
housemates
equal partners. We'll be an alliance. We'll be just like family. And we'll help take care of one another. We'll have a nice home, each with our own private bedroom and bathroom, and a nice yard with flowers."
"And maybe a vegetable garden," added Charlie.
"That's it," grinned Vince. — Barbara Casey

No, now the domestic market is full up with other planters' troublesome slaves. Our only salvation is to scientifically breed a stable order of docile Negro. I've come up with three tenets: Isolation. Religion. Family...." Master Ben — Jonathan Odell

I have a burden on my soul. During my long life, I did not make anyone happy, neither my friends, nor my family, nor even myself. I have done many evil things ... I was the cause of the beginning of three big wars. About 800,000 people were killed because of me on the battlefields., and their mothers, brothers, and widows cried for them. And now this stands between me and God. — Otto Von Bismarck

I've always had different diet kicks. I grew up in a big Italian family, kind of grew up a chubby kid, then went vegan in fifth grade. I did that for three years, then I went raw in high school. It's always been extreme, but in the last few years I've gotten into balance. I don't restrict myself like I used to. — Nico Tortorella

I was born in St. Louis and lived in Pittsburgh for a bit, before my family moved to Nigeria, where they're from. We lived there for three or four years and came back to the States when I was about ten. I realised that I'd gone from place to place not fitting in. The thing that helped me fit in when moving around and not having a ton of friends was that I could make art. That was the through-line. — Babatunde Adebimpe

One of your three mothers did the cooking? How traditional,Naomi said with a smirk. — James S.A. Corey

When we are going to enter the water ... in the presence of the congregation and under the hand of the president, we solemnly profess that we disown the devil, his pomp, and his angels. After this we are immersed three times, making a somewhat larger pledge than the Lord appointed in the Gospel. Then we are taken up [a reference to the Roman tradition of recognizing a newborn baby as a member of the family]. We first taste a mixture of milk and honey and from that day we refrain from the daily bath for a whole week. — Tertullian

The bones said death was comin', and the bones never lied.
Eva Savoie leaned back in the rocking chair and pushed it into motion on the uneven wide-plank floor of the one-room cabin. Her grand pere Julien had built the place more than a century ago, pulling heavy cypress logs from the bayou and sawing them, one by one, into the thick planks she still walked across ever day.
She had never known Julien Savoie, but she knew of him. The curse that had stalked her family for three generations had started with her grandfather and what he'd done all those years ago.
What he'd brought with him to Whiskey Bayou with blood on his hands.
What had driven her daddy to shoot her mama, and then himself, before either turned forty-five.
What had led Eva's brother, Antoine, to drown in the bayou only a half mile from this cabin, leaving a wife and infant son behind.
What stalked Eva now. — Susannah Sandlin

But I don't think that it's a form of family that I would be comfortable in. I've found a way to this character and this family, but I still believe that a marriage is between two people and not seven or three. — Jeanne Tripplehorn

I hated all my life. I hated everybody. When I first grew up and can remember, I was dressed as a girl by mother. And I stayed that way for two or three years. And after that I was treated like what I call the dog of the family. I was beaten. I was made to do things that no human bein would want to do. — Henry Lee Lucas

stood a bit over five feet, and all who knew her knew what a force she was. In a household of three men and one woman, she more than held her own. She was the most vivacious of the family, a tireless, all-season — David McCullough

Liberalism is really piecemeal socialism, and socialism always attacks three basic social institutions: religion, the family, and private property. Religion, because it offers a rival authority to the state; the family, because it means a rival loyalty to the state; and property, because it means material independence of the state. — Joseph Sobran

I take 10 minutes. I focus on what I'm most grateful for. Then I do a little prayer for three minutes, a blessing within myself through God, and then out to my family and friends and all those I serve. Then my last three minutes are the three things I want to achieve most. At the end of 10 minutes, you are wired. Everything in your life gets filtered through that. — Tony Robbins

It was simple. His world was Kate. If he denied that, he might as well stop breathing right now.
"I have to go," he blurted out, standing up so suddenly that his thighs hit the edge of the table, sending walnut shell shards skittering across the tabletop.
"I thought you might," Colin murmured.
Benedict just smiled and said, "Go."
His brothers, Anthony realized, were a bit smarter than they let on.
"We'll speak to you in a week or so?" Colin asked.
Anthony had to grin. He and his brothers had met at their club every day for the past fortnight. Colin's oh-so-innocent query could only imply one thing - that it was obvious that Anthony had completely lost his heart to his wife and planned to spend at least the next seven days proving it to her. And that the family he was creating had grown as important as the one he'd been born into.
"Two weeks," Anthony replied, yanking on his coat. "Maybe three."
His brothers just grinned. — Julia Quinn

I could only relate [to the family] that I, the father of three sons, could hardly imagine what it would be to lose one, far less three of my boys, in such a cruel and senseless manner. — William Walker

Father Michaels' sermon was mercifully short. He had a reputation for three-minute homilies, tightly written, provocative and insightful. His words centered on the true meaning of Christianity. That is was all about love. Love of God, love of self, love of family, love of community.
Love was a gift. — Dorothea Benton Frank

And he got going from there to America. Worked his passage, I s'pose, like a lot more. And I heard he did well in America, too. Got married there. Had a family. But never came back. And you know why? 'Cause if he did, if he ever set foot in Ireland again, you know who'd be waiting for him, don't you?
That's right. The three of 'em. And their box. And the second time they'd make no mistake.
It is a much-overlooked fact that not all of the thousands who fled Ireland in former times did so to escape hunger, deprivation, and persecution. There were also those who went to escape the wrath of the Good People. Many stories illustrated this, the one here being typical. — Eddie Lenihan

I suppose it must be admitted that I was raised in a "dysfunctional" family, but in truth, I do not think I had any sense of that as I was growing up. Probably part of the reason was that all of my extended kin had families at least as dysfunctional as mine. Just to give a little of the flavor of it, my "Aunt Fern," who lived just across the street and was one of the most present and puissant female relatives in my life, was, to be genealogically precise, my mother's brother's, first wife's, second husband's, father's, 3rd, 4th, and 5th wife. (She married "Uncle Lew" three times in the course of her seven matrimonial ventures.) — Carlfred Broderick

A story is told of Alfred Adler, one of Freud's early followers, who once interviewed a prospective patient at great length, taking a detailed family history, and getting as elaborate an account as possible of what the man was suffering from. At the end of this three-hour consultation Adler apparently said to the man, 'What would you do if you were cured?' The man answered him, and Adler said, 'Well, go and do it then.' That was the treatment. — Adam Phillips

And I couldn't take my eyes off Pete. He ate dinner like he always did, in three or four huge, whoofing bites, before heading back out front to his cone of warmth, his coffee, his cigarettes, and ghostly tunes piping from his little transistor radio. And most important, to whatever thoughts drowned out the voices of his own family saying "hello" and "happy holidays."
I watched him because I couldn't believe that could be anyone's comfortable horizon. A tiny porch on a dark corner near a highway. We lucked out living on a planet made thrilling by billions of years of chance, catastrophe, miracles, and disaster, and he'd rejected it. You're offered the world every morning when you open your eyes. I was beginning to see Pete as a representative of all the people who shut that out, through cynicism, religion, fear, greed, or ritual. — Patton Oswalt

they argue that belief in a transcendent being conveys a genetic advantage: that couples who follow one of the three religions of the Book and maintain patriarchal values have more children than atheists or agnostics. You see less education among women, less hedonism and individualism. And to a large degree, this belief in transcendence can be passed on genetically. Conversions, or cases where people grow up to reject family values, are statistically insignificant. In the vast majority of cases, people stick with whatever metaphysical system they grow up in. That's why atheist humanism - the basis of any 'pluralist society' - is doomed. — Michel Houellebecq

The fact that nobody played tennis in my family and you'd say by chance they make three tennis courts in front of the restaurant that my family owned when I was 4, I think that's a destiny. That's kind of life circumstances that kind of come together for you to become who you want to become. — Novak Djokovic

[Clayton] Christensen had seen dozens of companies falter by going for immediate payoffs rather than long-term growth, and he saw people do the same thing. In three hours at work, you could get something substantial accomplished, and if you failed to accomplish it you felt the pain right away. If you spent three hours at home with your family, it felt like you hadn't done a thing, and if you skipped it nothing happened. So you spent more and more time at the office, on high-margin, quick-yield tasks, and you even believed that you were staying away from home for the sake of your family. He had seen many people tell themselves that they could divide their lives into stages, spending the first part pushing forward their careers, and imagining that at some future point they would spend time with their families
only to find that by then their families were gone. — Larissa MacFarquhar

If a country is to be corruption free and become a nation of beautiful minds, I strongly feel there are three key societal members who can make a difference. They are the father, the mother and the teacher. — A. P. J. Abdul Kalam

My mother saved our home with a minimum wage job. But in the 1960s, a minimum wage job would support a family of three above the poverty line. Not today. Not even close. I understood right then that people can work hard, they can play by the rules, and they can still take a hard smack. — Elizabeth Warren

We inhabit a three-body cosmos. Sophia is essentially the matriarch of a single-parent family - a single-planet goddess, if you will. But she relies on the support of the surrogate parents, sun and moon, to manage her terrestrial brood. — John Lamb Lash

He'd noticed that his grandson was working too hard, and he was the one who told him about the marbles. He told it this way. He said that the average life span for men was around seventy-five years. That meant thirty-nine hundred Saturdays - to play when you were a kid and to be with your family when you got older and wiser." "I see," I said. "Or to play once you got older. Or even to give lectures to anyone who'll listen." "Shush, Alex. Now, listen. So the grandfather figured out that his grandson, who was forty-three, had about sixteen hundred and sixty Saturdays left in his life. Statistically speaking. So what he did was he bought two large jars and filled them with beautiful cat's-eye marbles. He gave them to his grandson. And he told him that every Saturday, he should take one marble out of the jar. Just one, and just as a reminder that he had only so many Saturdays left, and that they were precious — James Patterson

There's a tradition of public service in my family. I'm one of three boys that joined the military. My father was in the Peace Corps. — Phil Klay

You don't know what it's like to grow up with a mother who never said a positive thing in her life, not about her children or the world, who was always suspicious, always tearing you down and splitting your dreams straight down the seams. When my first pen pal, Tomoko, stopped writing me after three letters she was the one who laughed: You think someone's going to lose life writing to you? Of course I cried; I was eight and I had already planned that Tomoko and her family would adopt me. My mother of course saw clean into the marrow of those dreams, and laughed. I wouldn't write to you either, she said. She was that kind of mother: who makes you doubt yourself, who would wipe you out if you let her. But I'm not going to pretend either. For a long time I let her say what she wanted about me, and what was worse, for a long time I believed her. — Junot Diaz

I think 'Lost in Space' certainly shifted from being an ensemble adventure series about a family facing the unknown alien environment to this trio of comedians - Dr. Smith, the Robot, and Will Robinson being the straight guy. It definitely changed its tone over the three seasons and 84 episodes we did. — Bill Mumy

June is gazing at Michael with a glow about her face, a well of feeling for her husband. Leo and Stephen are also looking at their father, Leo's expression sympathetic, nearly teary. The three of them as they look at Michael are like magnets, the ties drawing each one to him nearly visible. This is what family means, Nora thinks. — Maya Lang

My sister Jennifer is an Emmy winning journalist and mother of three amazing girls. She brings an exceptional dedication to her job, her family, and her community, and has been a role model of mine for many, many years. I'm extremely proud of her. — Ron Livingston

Buffett's methodology was straightforward, and in that sense 'simple.' It was not simple in the sense of being easy to execute. Valuing companies such as Coca-Cola took a wisdom forged by years of experience; even then, there was a highly subjective element. A Berkshire stockholder once complained that there were no more franchises like Coca-Cola left. Munger tartly rebuked him. 'Why should it be easy to do something that, if done well two or three times, will make your family rich for life? — Roger Lowenstein

A New Campus: Interviews with Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, Ann Bowers. Steve Jobs, appearance before the Cupertino City Council, June 7, 2011. CHAPTER 41: ROUND THREE Family Ties: Interviews with Laurene Powell, Erin Jobs, Steve Jobs, Kathryn Smith, Jennifer Egan. Email from Steve Jobs, June 8, 2010, 4:55 p.m.; Tina Redse to Steve Jobs, July 20, 2010, and Feb. 6, 2011. President Obama: Interviews with David Axelrod, Steve Jobs, John Doerr, Laurene Powell, Valerie Jarrett, Eric Schmidt, Austan Goolsbee. Third Medical Leave, 2011: Interviews with Kathryn Smith, Steve Jobs, Larry Brilliant. Visitors: Interviews with Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, Mike Slade. CHAPTER 42: LEGACY Jonathan Zittrain, The Future of the Internet - And How to Stop It (Yale, 2008), 2; Cory Doctorow, Why I Won't Buy an iPad, — Walter Isaacson

I was traumatizing her. I could only hope that at three she was too young to retain any of this in memory, that in the years to follow I could make up for any future need for therapy I was creating now. Could I? Or would she always have a deep insecurity, the kind that send people careening from one disastrous romance to the next? And why did I have to live my life obsessed with these kinds of concerns, this constant attempt to control the most uncertain of outcomes, my own effect on someone else's mind? — Leah Stewart

Levin had been married three months. He was happy, but not at all in the way he had expected to be. At every step he found his former dreams disappointed, and new, unexpected surprises of happiness. He was happy; but on entering upon family life he saw at every step that it was utterly different from what he had imagined. At every step he experienced what a man would experience who, after admiring the smooth, happy course of a little boat on a lake, should get himself into that little boat. He saw that it was not all sitting still, floating smoothly; that one had to think too, not for an instant to forget where one was floating; and that there was water under one, and that one must row; and that his unaccustomed hands would be sore; and that it was only to look at it that was easy; but that doing it, though very delightful, was very difficult. — Leo Tolstoy

I am familiar with the name Bassington-Bassington, sir. There are three branches of the Bassington-Bassington family - the Shropshire Bassington-Bassingtons, the Hampshire Bassington-Bassingtons, and the Kent Bassington-Bassingtons."
"England seems pretty well stocked up with Bassington-Bassingtons."
"Tolerably so, sir."
"No chance of a sudden shortage, I mean, what?"
"Presumably not, sir."
"And what sort of a specimen is this one?"
"I could not say, sir, on such short acquaintance."
"Will you give me a sporting two to one, Jeeves, judging from what you have seen of him, that this chappie is not a blighter or an excrescence?"
"No, sir. I should not care to venture such liberal odds. — P.G. Wodehouse

She stood in the middle of my bedroom, gazing around with wide eyes. I hadn't made my bed. In three years. And the walls were plastered with wakeboarding posters and snowboarding posters and surfing posters (I was going to learn to snowboard and surf someday, too). It all might have been overwhelming at first-not exactly House Beautiful.
"Is this McGillicuddy's room?" she asked.
"What! No. McGillicuddy's a neat freak. Also he collects Madame Alexander dolls."
She turned her wide eyes on me.
"Kidding! I'm kidding," I backtracked. Why did I have to make up stuff like that? My family was weird enough for real. — Jennifer Echols

Group, was only 29 when his father died suddenly in New York. His elder brother took the reins, but died of cancer just five years later, leaving behind a young widow and three children. Prior to that, another brother had decided to quit the family business. In parallel, a one year long textile strike spearheaded by Datta Samant had brought the textile industry to ruin; Morarjee Mills, the family's mainstay, was incurring massive losses. Piramal recounts that he survived those troubled times by reminding himself of one particular story: — Ashwin Sanghi

My parents were European immigrants. They came to the States with $1,500, two suitcases, and me, and they managed to build a business, a family, and a future for their family. They didn't have any of the resources of people who have lived here for two or three generations. — Stana Katic

One of my sisters wanted to be an opera singer. So, we spent a few dollars to try to train her, because Italian people would like to have an opera singer in the family. But she's got trouble coughing, let alone singing. One day, she was in the shower singing 'Madame Butterfly,' three days later the Japs attacked Pearl Harbor. — Pat Cooper

The three-story derelict is home to Smitty, Gale, and Gale's baby - a nuclear family nested on the corner - and Ella is accustomed to seeing them on the front steps, waiting for redemption or a cool breeze from the harbor, neither of which seems particularly likely. — David Simon

In the late 1600s the finest instruments originated from three rural families whose workshops were side by side in the Italian village of Cremona. First were the Amatis, and outside their shop hung a sign: "The best violins in all Italy." Not to be outdone, their next-door neighbors, the family Guarnerius, hung a bolder sign proclaiming: "The Best Violins In All The World!" At the end of the street was the workshop of Anton Stradivarius, and on its front door was a simple notice which read: "The best violins on the block." — Freda Bright

Liam's lips tightened. "She's only a little girl. She doesn't know anything about swords. What if she cuts herself? It's sharp, right?"
"Of course it is sharp, Liam. What would be the point ot having a sword that wasn't? — Deborah Blake

Some people insist they've never met a gay person. But Three Degrees of Jason Collins dictates that no NBA player can claim that anymore. Pro basketball is a family. And pretty much every family I know has a brother, sister or cousin who's gay. In the brotherhood of the NBA, I just happen to be the one who's out. — Jason Collins

I would like to forget the image of the ship's crane at Southampton docks when it lifted into the sky the three wooden trunks which held all that my family owned. There is only one memory I want to preserve. It is Maria, who is also Zama, sipping condensed milk on the steps of the doep at night. The African nights were warm. The stars were bright. I loved Maria but I'm not sure she loved me back. Politics and poverty had separated her from her own children and she was exhausted by the white children in her care, by everyone and everything in her care. At the end of the day, away from the people who stole her life's energy and made her tired, she had found a place to rest, momentarily, from myths about her character and her purpose in life." (from "Things I Don't Want to Know" by Deborah Levy) — Deborah Levy