You work three jobs? Uniquely American, isn't it? I mean, that is fantastic that you're doing that." To a divorced mother of three, Omaha, Nebraska, Feb. 4, 2005
[Strong marriage] starts with being married to a remarkable person. And I am. I jokingly say that I stood up in front of a crowd once and said, "Laura's the greatest first lady ever," and then realized my mother was in the audience.
When I was growing up, my mother would always say, 'It will go on your permanent record.' There was no 'permanent record.' If there were a 'permanent record,' I'd never be able to be a lawyer. I was such a bum, in elementary school and high school... There is a permanent record today and it's called the Internet.
You are very kind in planning presents for me to make, and my mother has shown me exactly the same attention; but as I do not choose to have generosity dictated to me, I shall not resolve on giving my cabinet to Anna till the first thought of it has been my own.
I am the poet of the woman the same as the man, And I say it is as great to be a woman as to be a man, And I say there is nothing greater than the mother of a man.
Even He that died for us upon the cross, in the last hour, in the unutterable agony of death, was mindful of His mother, as if to teach us that this holy love should be our last worldly thought - the last point of earth from which the soul should take its flight for heaven.
I've always got on better with boys. Most of my friends are boys. Like, if I have children, I want five boys. Boys love their mothers whereas girls can be so mean to each other.
Renounce and give up. What did Christ say? "He that loseth his life for my sake shall find it." Again and again did he preach renunciation as the only way to perfection. There comes a time when the mind awakes from this long and dreary dream-the child gives up its play and wants to go back to its mother. Renunciation is not asceticism. Are all beggars Christ? Poverty is not a synonym for holiness; often the reverse.
On Easter or Christmas Day, my mother might drag me to church, just as she dragged me to the Buddhist temple, the Chinese New Year celebration, the Shinto shrine, and ancient Hawaiian burial sites.
In Indonesia, I had spent two years at a Muslim school, two years at a Catholic school. In the Muslim school, the teacher wrote to tell my mother that I made faces during Koranic studies.
My mother became much older when I came out (ed's note: of detention). She had problems with her hearing and high blood pressure. But they still support me.