Quote

We each have a litany of holiday rituals and everyday habits that we hold on to, and we often greet radical innovation with the enthusiasm of a baby meeting a new sitter. We defend against it and - not always, but often enough - reject it. Slowly we adjust, but only if we have to.

Ellen Goodman

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Ellen Goodman
Age: 83
Born: 1941
Born: April 11
Journalist
Newton
Massachusetts
Habit
Defend
Greet
Baby
Meeting
Rituals
Hold
Slowly
Adjust
Often
Enthusiasm
Reject
Enough
Radical
Ritual
Always
Meetings
Rejects
Innovation
Holiday
Litany
Everyday
Habits
Sitter

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I wonder whether our adoption of Shrink-ese as a second language, the move from religious phrases of judgment to secular words of acceptance, hasn't also produced a moral lobotomy. In the reluctance, the aversion to being judgmental, are we disabled from making any judgments at all?
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This packrat has learned that what the next generation will value most is not what we owned, but the evidence of who we were and the tales of how we loved. In the end, it's the family stories that are worth the storage.
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Women have gained access to the institutions, but not enough power to overhaul them.
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The central struggle of parenthood is to let our hopes for our children outweigh our fears.
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We may never know why Joe Ellis fabricated a heroic past. But we know that the life he embellished has deeply diminished the life he'd earned.
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I regard this novel as a work without redeeming social value, unless it can be recycled as a cardboard box.
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In today's amphetamine world of news junkies, speed trumps thoughtfulness too often.
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Parents remain our touchstones, fellow travelers, even after death. They are both missing and present.
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I have never been especially impressed by the heroics of people convinced they are about to change the world. I am more awed by those who struggle to make one small difference.
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