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Since his mother died I have seen him steam a cucumber thinking it was zucchini. That's the kind of thing that turns my heart right over.

Amy Hempel

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Amy Hempel
Age: 72
Born: 1951
Born: December 14
Journalist
Writer
Chicago
Illinois
Thing
Steam
Kind
Died
Thinking
Seen
Since
Turns
Mother
Zucchini
Right
Cucumber
Heart
Cucumbers

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I thought, my love is so good, why isn't it calling the same thing back.
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When my mother died, my father's early widowhood gave him social cachet he would not have had if they had divorced. He was a bigger catch for the sorrow attached.
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I had a mother I could only seem to please with verbal accomplishments of some sort or another. She read constantly, so I read constantly. If I used words that might have seemed surprising at a young age, she would recognize that and it would please her.
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consolation is a beautiful word. everyone skins his knee-that doesnt make yours hurt anyless.
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I have written letters that are failures, but I have written few, I think, that are lies. Trying to reach a person means asking the same question over and over again: Is this the truth, or not? I begin this letter to you, then, in the western tradition. If I understand it, the western tradition is: Put your cards on the table.
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The worst of it is over now, and I can't say that I am glad. Lose that sense of loss--you have gone and lost something else.
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I've always known when I start a story what the last line is. It's always been the case, since the first story I ever wrote. I don't know how it's going to get there, but I seem to need the destination. I need to know where I end up. It never changes, ever.
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Just once in my life--oh, when have I ever wanted anything just once in my life?
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Dreams: the place most of us get what we need.
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if it's true your life flashes past your eyes before you die, then it is also the truth that your life rushes forth when you are ready to start to truly be alive.
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I meet a person, and in my mind I'm saying three minutes I give you three minutes to show me the spark.
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I think you would like Warren. He drinks Courvoisier in a Coke can, and has a laugh like you'd find in a cartoon bubble.
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I exaggerated even before I began to exaggerate, because it's true — nothing is ever quite as bad as it could be.
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They say the smart dog obeys but the smarter dog knows when to disobey.
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Maybe this is not a come-down-from-the-ledge story. But I tell it with the thought that the woman on the ledge will ask herself a question, the question that occurred to that man in Bogota. He wondered how we know that what happens to us isn't good?
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The year I began to say vahz instead of vase, a man I barely knew nearly accidentally killed me.
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Good leaders being scarce, following yourself is allowed.
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A five-hour flight works out to three days and nights on land, by rail, from sea to shining sea. You can chalk off the hours on the back of the seat ahead. But seventy-some hours will not seem so long to you if you tell yourself first: This is where I am going to be for the rest of my natural life.
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It is possible to imagine a person so entirely that the image resists attempts to dislodge it.
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nothing is ever quite as bad as it could be.
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