Quotes & Sayings About My Dead Dad

I'm not complaining about Romance Being Dead - I've just described a happy marriage as based on talking about plants and a canceled Ray Romano show and drinking milkshakes: not exactly rose petals and gazing into each other's eyes at the top of the Empire State Building or whatever. I'm pretty sure my parents have gazed into each other's eyes maybe once, and that was so my mom could put eyedrops in my dad's eyes. — Mindy Kaling

Not much shocked me. You know, I worked in a home for Alzheimer's patients and my dad used to be really into murders and stuff, so I saw dead bodies. It desensitised me to a lot of things. — Ellie Goulding

My real name is Mica, spelled with a C. My dad is called Michael. He wanted me to be called Michael but my mother said over her dead body. She wasn't into the whole junior thing. — Mika.

He's been dead for so many years, but I'm still trying to impress him. That's what gave me my drive. 'Look at me, Dad, I've succeeded.' — Elton John

Damn it, Tod!" He glared in the reaper's general direction. "Do not sneak up on me in my own house
I don't care how dead you are! Show yourself or get out."
Harmony and I shared a small smile, but my father didn't notice.
The reaper shrugged and grinned at me, then blinked out of the chair and onto the carpet at my father's back, now fully corporeal. "Fine," he said, inches from my dad's ear, and my father nearly jumped out of his shirt. "Your house, your rules."
My dad spun around, his flush deepening until I thought his face would explode. "I changed my mind. Get out! — Rachel Vincent

The moment I heard my dad's voice, I started bawling. "This isn't the path," I kept saying, my words garbled with tears and snot. "It wasn't supposed to go like this." I remember feeling as though everything I had worked for had been snatched away. Dad saw things differently.
"Well-worn paths are boring," he said. "Embrace the detour."
But how can you tell a detour from a dead end? — Lauren Miller

And just when I thought the pain had dulled, my mind would betray me and bring Dad back to life in my dreams. Sometimes I didn't realize that he was dead until I awoke and then it was like a punch in the stomach. And sometimes I knew in my dream that I was dreaming, and I woke up crying. — Ilona Andrews

As I stomped across the school grounds, all I could see was Cal sitting with my dad in some manly room with leather chairs and dead animals on the wall, chomping on cigars as my dad formally signed me away to him. They probably even high-fived. — Rachel Hawkins

Every poem is a love poem, my dad had said. I'd always thought he meant romantic love...but there were so many kinds of great love: mother and daughter love. Father love. Best friend love. Aunt love. Mother's best friend love. Friendish friendesque love. Love for the living and love for the dead. Love for who you really are, for those weird parts of yourself that only a few people understand. Love for things you yearn to do, for putting words in a page. Love for traveling, for people and seeing new ways to live. Love for the world... — Margo Rabb

My dad is dead. And as I type this, by the window, on the rainy day, I am alive, yes. I am living. But sometimes it doesn't feel like I am doing it fast enough, or hard enough, or all the way. And it is times like that when I can understand wanting a cigarette in my hand, then my mouth, then my hand again. Holding the cigarette. Tending to the cigarette. Giving the cigarette what it needs. Tapping it in the ashtray. Sucking on it.
Then flicking it in the street, like it meant nothing to me. — Amy Fusselman

When my mom pulled the trigger my dad had a full house, three fives and a pair of ducks. He was all in. The paper says although dead, he ended up winning seven grand. I once heard someone on tv say we die as we lived. That sounds about right. — David Ebershoff

Can I have a tattoo?"
"Ask Dad."
"He says over my dead body."
"Well, then."
"Can I get one if I'm older?"
"Yeah. If you still want one when you grow a brain."
"When I'm seven? Cos that's well old."
"Aahh... bit older than that, maybe."
She goes tearing out of the room yelling, "PIP SAYS I CAN GET A TATTOO WHEN I'M EIGHT! — Richard Rider

I wandered over to the motorbike and read the work Triumph on the side. 'How long has he had it?' I asked Jack.
'No. Over my dead body.' Jack's expression was hard.
[ ... ]
'[ ... ] I told Dad I'd keep you safe and the Alex you know is not the Alex who drives that bike. He's not known to respect the speed limit.'
Now I definitely wanted to go on it. — Sarah Alderson

The border between the dead and the living, if you're Mexican, doesn't exist. The dead are part of your life. Like my dad, who's not here, but he's here.That's why there's the Day of the Dead. There's such a connection with the dead. — Sandra Cisneros

My dad was dead, so these streets had to raise me. — Ludacris

No I am not okay. I've just been pulled out of play tryouts where I had to be the first to audition and everyone's trying out for the same parts, I just had a very bizarre conversation with the school secretary, Megan may be throwing up her cucumber sandwiches, I've broken five of the seven deadly sins in as many hours, a demon may be inside a girl in my world religions class, Grant Brawner called me by name, my license photo looks like a dead fish, I have to drive my friends all over town in two hours when I've never even driven without Dad before, none of my birthday wishes have come true yet, and now you're here with muffins like I'm in second grade? So, no, I am not ok. — Wendy Mass

If it wasn't for my sport and my father, I'd probably be a fallen statistic. I'd be dead; I'd be in jail. Luckily, I had a great dad in my life. — Apolo Ohno

There's a guy here with a third of a dead giraffe in the back of his truck and it looks pretty messed up, so I thought of you." I considered responding with "Who is this?" but it was perfectly obvious who it was and I wasn't sure if I should be insulted or perhaps flattered that my dad knew me so well. — Jenny Lawson

Nikhilananda's birthday. Maybe we'd Morris dance, naked, around the base of an old-growth California redwood, its branches lavishly festooned with the soiled hammocks and poop buckets of crunchy-granola tree sitters mentoring spotted owls in passive-resistance protest techniques. You get the picture. In place of Santa Claus, my mom and dad said Maya Angelou kept tabs on whether little children were naughty or nice. Dr. Angelou, they warned me, did her accounting on a long hemp scroll of names, and if I failed to turn my compost I'd be sent to bed with no algae. Me, I just wanted to know that someone wise and carbon neutral - Dr. Maya or Shirley Chisholm or Sean Penn - was paying attention. But none of that was really Christmas. And none of that Earth First! baloney helps out once you're dead and you discover that the snake-handling, — Chuck Palahniuk

If/when I die, do not want Pam lonely. Want her to remarry, have full life. As long as new husband is nice guy. Gentle guy. Religious guy. Very caring + good to kids. But kids not fooled. Kids prefer dead dad (i.e., me) to religious guy. Pale, boring, religious guy, with no oomph, who wears weird sweaters and is always a little sad, due to, cannot get boner, due to physical ailment.
Ha ha.
Death very much on my mind tonight, future reader. Can it be true? That I will die? That Pam, kids will die? Is awful. Why were we put here, so inclined to love, when end of our story = death? That harsh. That cruel. Do not like.
Note to self: try harder, in all things, to be better person. — George Saunders

Hamburg totally wrecked us. I remember getting home to England and my dad thought I was half-dead. I looked like a skeleton, I hadn't noticed the change, I'd been having such a ball! — Paul McCartney

My dad studied at the American Conservatory in Chicago, so he lived on all those streets. He said the war probably saved his life because he'd have ended up a dead musician, with all the crazy stuff they did on Rush Street back in the day. — Kim Basinger

Grief should have been all-consuming. I hated myself that it wasn't. But sometimes I forgot. Jesus, how could I fucking forget? Sometimes I went for minutes without remembering my dad was dead, but that whole time it was regrouping so it could hit me all over again. — Lisa Henry

Dark thought started to slip into my mind, despite all my efforts to keep them out. What was the use of anything? We were born, we lived a few years, grew old, and then died. What was the point of it all? All those people in the County and the wide world beyond, living their short little lives before going to the grave. What was it all for? My dad was dead. He'd worked hard all his life, but the journey of his life had had only one destination: the grave. That's where we were all heading. into the grave. Into the soil, to be eaten by worms. Poor Billy Bradley had been the Spook's apprentice before me. He'd had his fingers bitten off by a boggat and had died of shock and loss of blood. And where was he now? In a grave. Not even in a churchyard. He was buried outside because the Church considered him no better than a malevolent witch. That would be my fate too. A grave in unhallowed ground. — Joseph Delaney

We hold each other and I'm shaking, because I'm thinking how close I came to losing her. If she'd been closer to ground zero in San Diego, she'd be dead now. So many people are dead, because for decades citizens like me and my dad, my uncle, and Lissa's parents - good people - quietly financed war after war because it's easier to pay our taxes than to risk our livelihoods by trying to change the system. Our silence let wealth accumulate in the hands of people like Thelma Sheridan, people who came to believe they could buy absolutely anything, even innocence. — Linda Nagata

I'm tired. Dead tired. So tired I can barely stay awake to write this. After helping Mr Bircher search for his head all night, I'm a little annoyed too. Dad doesn't help. He doesn't know what it's like for a girl my age, trying to fit in at school as much as possible, and trying to fit in all the dead people. It's not easy being a soul helper. — L.P. Donnelli

One thing left me, my dad died before few weeks and with the time will be very far... It will start with seconds, hours, days, weeks, months, years....
My grandpa died this year, my grandpa other died somewhere in 2012-2013, my dog died 2014, Robin Williams died... Everyone dies, what I can do for that??? — Deyth Banger

I'm nothing but a thought in the mind of God,
I'm Satan's slave; I open my eyes and flee,
I'm mankind, I worship, and I kill,
All in the name of Love, hate
I'm the slaughtered lamb, I'm luzbel
I'm the one paying for your sins,
I'm your son; I am your mom and dad,
I'm the one, who worships God,
I'm a killer and a saint,
I'm just a thought in the mind of God.
I laugh and I suffer, I get killed, and I kill others,
I'm nothing but a thought in the mind of God
I'm compassion and rage, I love, I cheat, and I lie,
I tell the truth, I'm dead, I'm alive,
I'm in hell, the place people called paradise,
I am just a thought in the mind of God — Quetzal

For a moment, my eyes shift focus to the glass wall beside her and I see my reflection. There stands Dominic Smith, whose tinted specs make him look dead cool, thank you very much, although the scraggy black hair manages to spoil the effect. My hair stages more uprisings than a nineteenth-century revolutionary. I inherited it from my dad. Thanks, Dad. — Simon Cheshire

Trent was positively smug. Showing me his back, he rifled through a rack of earth charms and watched his hair shift color. "And whereas I might otherwise object - "
"Bairn did the investigation on your parents' deaths," I interrupted, thoughts scrambling. "And my dad's." Bairn is supposed to be dead. Why is he across the road pretending to be a kind old man named Keasley? And how did Trent know who he was?
His hair now an authoritative gray, Trent frowned. "And whereas I might otherwise object," he tried again, "Quen assures me that between Bairn and two pixies - "
"Two!" I blurted. "Jih took a husband?"
"Damn it, Rachel, will you shut up! — Kim Harrison

Anna: Ash, I don't have anything planned with my Mother ... She's dead.
Ashley: What?
Anna: She died when I was seven. She drowned. It's just my Dad and me. I didn't tell you before because I just wanted a fresh start here, because before I moved, everybody knew about it and ... I'm sorry.
Ashley: ... You're like a Disney Princess! — Jessi Kirby

Did she say anything before she died?" he asked.
"Yes," the surgeon said. "She said, 'Forgive him'"
"Forgive him?" my father asked.
"I think she was referring to the drunk driver who killed her."
Wow.
My grandmother's last act on earth was a call for forgiveness, love and tolerance.
She wanted us to forgive Gerald, the dumb-ass Spokane Indian alcoholic who ran her over and killed her.
I think My Dad wanted to go find Gerald and beat him to death.
I think my mother would have helped him.
I think I would have helped him, too.
But my grandmother wanted us to forgive her murderer.
Even dead, she was a better person than us. — Sherman Alexie

She doesn't like ducks," Shane said, nodding. "I've seen a couple of dead ducks before my dad fishes them out. He says they died naturally, but I know she killed them. I don't know why, though. — Ron Ripley

My dad was actually against me being a photographer. He thought it was a dead-end job and that you end up doing baby pictures and weddings. — Rick Smolan

My legacy to me is-when I drop dead and they're at my funeral - I want my three kids to get up and say, 'He's an awesome dad'. — Dana White

Dad nods, looks me dead in the eyes; slowly and regretfully, he banishes all the smiling and joking from his face, and for once he's just my dad, watching his son who has fallen so low. — Ned Vizzini

I shake my head. I pick up the rake and start making the dead-leaf pile neater. A blister pops and stains the rake handle like a tear. Dad nods and walks to the Jeep, keys jangling in his fingers. A mockingbird lands on a low oak branch and scolds me. I rake the leaves out of my throat.
Me: Can you buy some seeds? Flower seeds? — Laurie Halse Anderson

Just watch yourself. You read these stories about kids who get hold of their parents' gun and... bang, someone ends up very sorry and someone ends up very dead."
"Are you saying I'm a kid with my dad's revolver?"
"No, I'm saying you're a kid with a thermonuclear device, with a big red button saying PRESS ME. — Sarwat Chadda

The front door slammed and Dad said, "Aurora, sure you aren't expecting a package?"
I leaned back to find him army-crawling under the window in the living room. Like all dads do. "Already told you no, Rambo."
"The new mailman is back." Dad reached up and pulled the curtains closed before standing up and peeking out. "Won't come to the door."
"M shot a tranquillizer dart at the last guy." Mom gave a tired look at M who shrugged unapologetically. "The fact that there's a new one willing to be on our sidewalk is a miracle. Don't scare him off, Clyde."
Dad tried to block me when I went for the curtains. "He won't let me sign for your package. Demanded you come out in person."
"I'll get my tranq gun!" M made for her room.
"Don't you dare!" Mom chased her.
I swished back the curtains to get a look at the petrifying postman.
"I find his interest in my teenage daughter creepy," Dad grumbled.
Oh, he had no idea. — A&E Kirk

Long Distance II

Though my mother was already two years dead
Dad kept her slippers warming by the gas,
put hot water bottles her side of the bed
and still went to renew her transport pass.

You couldn't just drop in. You had to phone.
He'd put you off an hour to give him time
to clear away her things and look alone
as though his still raw love were such a crime.

He couldn't risk my blight of disbelief
though sure that very soon he'd hear her key
scrape in the rusted lock and end his grief.
He knew she'd just popped out to get the tea.

I believe life ends with death, and that is all.
You haven't both gone shopping; just the same,
in my new black leather phone book there's your name
and the disconnected number I still call. — Tony Harrison

It's cold and clammy in the alley like White Scar Cave in the Yorkshire Dales. Dad took me when I was ten. I find a dead cat lying on the ground at the first corner. It's gray like dust on the moon. I know it's dead because it's as still as a dropped bag, and because big flies are drinking from its eyes. How did it die? There's no bullet wound or fang marks, though its head's at a slumped angle so maybe it was strangled by a cat-strangler. It goes straight into the Top Five of the Most Beautiful Things I've Ever Seen. Maybe there's a tribe in Papua New Guinea who think the droning of flies is music. Maybe I'd fit in with them. "Come along, Nathan." Mum's tugging my sleeve. — David Mitchell

My dad, may he rest in
peace, taught me many wonderful things. And one of the things he taught me was never ask a guy what you do for a living.
He said "If you think about it, when you ask a guy, what do you do you do for a living," you're saying "how may I gauge the rest of your utterances." are you smarter than I am? Are you richer than I am, poorer than I am?"
So you ask a guy what do you do for a living, it's the same thing as
asking a guy, let me know what your politics are before I listen to you so
I know whether or not you're part of my herd, in which case I can nod
knowingly, or part of the other herd, in which case I can wish you dead. — David Mamet

I dreamed you a field of running horses, Selah. For you, Bianca, a balloon the size of the sky, my body a kite you can throw into the air.Pull me by string and horse.Tell me everything won't end in death. That everything doesn't end with February. Dead wildflowers wrapped around a crying baby's throat.I've slowed my heartbeat to three beats a minute. I've redrawn the clouds into birds, a fox chasing them into the mountains.I'm going to move my hand today.I vomit ice cubes.There's a ghost next to me.Get up, Dad.(Light Boxes) — Shane Jones

As a kid in Fayetteville, N.C., I played golf all day, every day, a lot of it by myself. I spent hundreds of hours around the greens at Cape Fear Valley, the course my dad owned, hitting every shot I could think of - the one-hop-and-release, the chip that lands dead, the explosion from a bad lie. — Raymond Floyd

At night, with only the bedside lamp on, I would pretend to sleep and listened to Dad's muffled crying in the semi-darkness, wishing that I could cry like him, that I could bring Stevan back from the dead by the strength of my tears. But they were regular tears carving the same slicing-hot trails down my cheeks, and in the end, I could not summon a distinct kind of grief for Stevan. Just the same grief that has gripped mankind for centuries, which time would inevitably ebb into a notch in one's skin or a small limp in the way one walks or a bottled memory that would only resurface some nights. And soon, you'd struggle to remember how that person talked or how that person used to occupy a customized space in your life. And you don't want to forget, but you don't want to remember either, and there seemed to be no place where you could just exist. — V.J. Campilan

A little kid asks my dad why that man is chopping down the tree.
Dad: He's not chopping it down. He's saving it. Those branches were long dead from disease. All plants are like that. By cutting off the damage you make it possible for the tree to grow again. You watch - by the end of summer, this tree will be the strongest on the block. — Laurie Halse Anderson

Long after the other voices had dropped away, Sam kept howling, very soft and slow.
When he finally fell silent, the night felt dead.
Sitting was intolerable. I stood up, paced, clenched and unclenched my hands into fists. Finally I took the guitar that Sam had played and I screamed and smashed it into pieces on Dad's desk. — Maggie Stiefvater

My dad always said that water makes the dead feel safe. Nothing draws them more. Or hides them
better. — Kendare Blake

I remember, as a kid, my dad always told me, "Getting older beats the alternative." Although, now my father actually is the alternative, so I don't know what he would say. He's completely dead. — Leslie Mann

It took me a good thirty minutes to find Cal. That was actually a good thing, because it gave me plenty of time to come up with something to say to him that wasn't just a string of four-letter words.
There are a lot of freaky things witches and warlocks do, obviously, but the arranged marriage thing was one of the grossest. When a witch is thirteen, her parents hook her up with an available warlock, based on things like compatible powers and family alliances. The entire thing is so eighteenth century.
As I stomped across school grounds, all I could see was Cal sitting with my dad in some manly room with leather chairs and dead animals on the wall, chomping on cigars as Dad formally signed me away to him.They probably even high-fived.
Okay,so it's not like either of them are exactly the cigar-and-high-fives type, but still. — Rachel Hawkins

I rub my hand down my face, frustrated. This girl in front of me tests my patience like hell.
When she ran to me after her dad kicked her out, I thought she still had feelings for me. She needed a place to stay, and I needed her. I offered her a room, thinking if she was around me every day, she would remember she loves me. I was dead wrong. Somewhere along the way, we switched roles, I became the one who so desperately needed her and she became cold and closed off. She isn't my savior; she's my punishment. — Brittany Butler

"It wasn't a ruse. Everything I said is true."
He huffs and attempts a glare. But underneath, I see the same doubt and vulnerability I heard in his voice when he sent me to the train without him. I also see something more: a damaged and enchanted fairy who pushed aside his selfishness and faced the bandersnatch for me, who looked a train dead-on, who put himself between Jeb and Sister Two, and who saved my dad from having his life sucked away.
I'm overwhelmed with compassion and gratitude and another emotion I don't dare put a name to. I have to convince him that there's a place for him in my heart, too.
Just not yet.
I glance at the wings covering me, at his body, immovable in front of me, then rise up on tiptoe and take his smooth face in both my hands. He tenses for an instant - suspicious - but relaxes slowly, each muscle surrendering bit by bit as I stroke his jaw. — A.G. Howard