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Quote by Anne Lamott

“People like to say that it--significance, import--is all about the family. But lots of people do not have rich networks of hilarious uncles and adorable cousins, who all live nearby, to help them. Many people have truly awful families: insane, abusive, repressive. So we work hard, we enjoy life as we can, we endure. We try to help ourselves and one another. We try to be more present and less petty. Some days go better than others. We look for solace in nature and art and maybe, if we are lucky, the quiet satisfaction of our homes. Is solace meaning? I don't know. But it's pretty close.”

Quote by Anne Lamott

Work

Stitches: A Handbook on Meaning, Hope and Repair by Anne Lamott

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Author

Anne Lamott
Anne Lamott

Anne Lamott is an American novelist born on April 10, 1954. Her works are known for their humor, directness, and profound emotional depth, primarily exploring themes of family, faith, and self-discovery. more

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“Jess and Polly stood without speaking, letting the sounds of the garden resettle. A flock of tiny fairy wrens darted busily in and around the base of a nearby plum tree, crickets ticked in the long grass, and a sense of timelessness, of nature, older and more pervasive than anything human beings and their histories could generate, grew thick and warm around them. "Shall we take a walk down together?" said Polly. Jess noticed a new note of self-possession in her mother's voice. Summery air threaded across the back of her neck, and she felt a pull, suddenly, deep inside her. She didn't know whether it was being here, in this place, or the beautiful weather that evoked long childhood days in which the hours stretched away to be filled only with pleasure, or the fact that it was Christmas Eve, or that her mother was standing here with her, solid and present in a way she hadn't been before, so that Jess was seeing her as if for the first time. But she felt a sensation in her chest that was quite the opposite of loneliness. "Are you with me?" Polly was searching Jess's face, waiting for an answer. Jess gave a nod and smiled. "I am.”

“A família talvez seja nossa primeira prisão. Muito do que somos hoje tem a ver com criações desestruturadas, inconsequentes ou castradoras. Ela é muitas vezes responsável pelas nossas inseguranças, nosso vazio, nossa falta de amor. E você sabia que até as famílias foram criadas para servir ao capital? Antigamente vivíamos em comunidades, em tribos. Casais se uniam por amor. As crianças eram criadas pela comunidade. Não havia casamento ou família. A família surgiu para dar conta da propriedade particular de pessoas poderosas que conseguiam acumular posses, riqueza, e queriam que ela ficasse somente com seus descendentes. O casamento surgiu, as famílias se institucionalizaram e os homens passaram a ser os donos de tudo - inclusive de suas mulheres.”

“He looked right into her eyes; didn’t she know the way she was? She had always treated him like that, his eyes argued. She did not agree—she had never treated him like this, he had spent his lifetime criticizing her. That was only true because she had spent her lifetime criticizing him—and that was how they always came back here, sometimes a wordless moment, their eyes glancing at each other like in a fencing match, each of them accusing the other of playing the role of the victim, portraying each other as the enemy to justify their self-inflicted wounds. She had turned into an uneducated woman (he would argue). He was evil (she would say), he was unable to recognize and acknowledge the good things people tried to do for him.”