The debt of gratitude we owe our mother and father goes forward, not backward. What we owe our parents is the bill presented to us by our children.

When I stopped seeing my mother with the eyes of a child, I saw the woman who helped me give birth to myself.

The Bush administration has spent us into record deficits and piled mountains of debt onto our children, Budget experts agree that the line-item veto would do little to control deficits.

The older I get the more of my mother I see in myself.

Blaming mother is just a negative way of clinging to her still.

Spontaneous and honest love admits errors, hesitations, and human failings; it can be tested and repaired. Idealized love ties us because we already intuit that it is unreal and are afraid to face this truth.