Granny Love Quotes

I still loved Granny. It flowed out of my chest. With Granny gone, where would my love go?

See! sweet and sound she sleeps in granny's bed, between the paws of the tender wolf.

Granny was the sort of person you brought with you when you went to war, and that was what Elsa loved about her.

Because when you love someone very much, it's difficult to learn to share her with someone else.

It's possible to love your grandmother for years and years without really knowing anything about her.

Humans take. They plough with iron. They ravage the land.' 'Some do, I'll grant you that. Others put back more'n they take. They put back love. They've got soil in their bones.

I asked Granny one time if she thought green might be God's favorite color since he'd made so many shades of it.

Mrs. Potter said you were a kind and loving soul, underneath all the rest. I guess that means your heart's so sad that it's hard to get out from under the weight. When I was sad about my mother dying, Granny used to say grief is the heaviest thing to carry alone. So I know all about that" -Mike

Granny Weatherwax was firmly against fiction. Life was hard enough without lies floating around and changing the way people thought. And because the theater was fiction made flesh, she hated the theater most of all. But that was it—hate was exactly the right word. Hate is a force of attraction. Hate is just love with its back turned.

And now the birds were singing overhead, and there was a soft rustling in the undergrowth, and all the sounds of the forest that showed that life was still being lived blended with the souls of the dead in a woodland requiem. The whole forest now sang for Granny Weatherwax.

To Tiffany's surprise, Nanny Ogg was weeping gently. Nanny took another swig from her flagon and wiped her eyes. 'Cryin' helps sometimes,' she said. 'No shame in tears for them as you've loved. Sometimes I remember one of my husbands and shed a tear or two. The memories're there to be treasured, and it's no good to get morbid-like about it.

Gran, for the gods' love, it's talk like yours that starts riots!" I said keeping my voice down. "Will you just put a stopper in it?" She looked at me and sighed. "Girl, do you ever take a breath and wonder if folk don't put out bait for you? To see if you'll bite? You'll never get a man if you don't relax." My dear old Gran. It's a wonder her children aren't every one of them as mad as priests, if she mangles their wits as she mangles mine. "Granny, "I told her, "this is dead serious. I can't relax, no more than any Dog. I'm not shopping for a man. That's the last thing I need.

I cannot control who was going to come, and who was going to go, and who will stay my buddy, my pal, and who'll find me enchanting, and oddly I feel relieved.

But Granny was the sort of person you brought with you when you went to war, and that was what Elsa loved about her.

I loved Granny Belmonte, but she didn't need a costume to look undead.

Oh, well, isn't that nice. You are a nice young girl. Be a good friend to her and set her straight. She has love bruises on her neck and didn't come home until this afternoon." Sweet Holy Jesus, why couldn't the ground just swallow me whole? Bones stifled a laugh and nodded solemnly. "Don't fret, Grannie. We're going to a Bible retreat to scare the devil out of her.

Granny would never love anyone the way she loved my grandfather, but that doesn't mean she never loved again.

Quick, think of a marvelous excuse he’ll totally swallow. Aha!“To practice. Unlike you guys, I haven’t tried my particular talent since Granny May signed me up for belly-dancing classes when I was fifteen.”And, by the way, why the hell did I consent to that? Or decide I loved it? Never mind, he’s buying it. In fact, he seems to be hot on the idea. Are his eyes glowing? And is Cole’s tongue hanging out? This is why I didn’t want to dance in the first place! “Anyway,” I rushed on. “I’m going to find a private place where nobody can see to laugh at me while you beat this tent”—or, more likely, these two idiots—“into submission.

Why in the name of God do you wear these ugly ass granny panties? I swear it looks like you could parachute from the Dallas Lincoln Plaza with these and have a nice soft landing! Why don’t you get on the internet and apply your online shopping skills while purchasing some panties that do not look like they came from your Grans drawer?

Anything.” I loved the way she said that. Granny’s “Christian women” came out like new spit on a dusty morning, pure and precious and deeply satisfying.

Women don't always want the right things in a man. And men don't have even an idea of what they want," she said. "Why, one minute their bodies tell them they want a wild woman that makes their blood rush. The next minute their good sense reminds them that they need a hard worker who is sturdy enough to help plow the field and birth the babies. They want a woman who'll mind their word and not be giving no jawing. But they also want a gal they can complain to when they are scared and unsure and who's smart enough to talk clear about the things goin' on." "So the wife has to be all those things?" "No, the wife is none of them," the old woman answered. "The wife is a wife and no further definition is necessary." Granny leaned forward in her chair to look more closely at Meggie. "Roe Farley married you and you were his wife. Nothing further even need to be said." Her face flushing with embarrassment, she glanced away. "But he doesn't... he didn't love me." "And did you think he would?" Momentarily Meggie was taken aback. "Well, yes." "Lord Almighty, child," Granny said. "Love ain't something that heaven hands out like good teeth or keen eyesight. Love is something two people make together." Shaking her head, the old woman leaned back in her chair once more and tapped on her pipe. "Love, oh, my, it starts out simple and scary with all that heavy breathing and in the bed sharing," she said. "You a-trembling when he runs his hands acrost your skin, him screaming out your name when he gets in the short rows. That's the easy part, Meggie. Every day thereafter it gets harder. The more you know him, the more he knows you, the longer you are a part of each other, the stronger the love is and the tougher it is to have it.

Eleanor (Roosevelt) wasn’t the light, witty type he’d been expected to marry. Just the opposite: she was slow to laugh, bored by small talk, serious-minded, shy. Her mother, a fine-boned, vivacious aristocrat, had nicknamed her “Granny” because of her demeanor. Franklin was everything that she was not: bold and buoyant, with a wide, irrepressible grin, as easy with people as she was cautious. Eleanor craved intimacy and weighty conversations; he loved parties, flirting, and gossip.

Be that as it may,” the Queen says dryly, “we must set a good example for the young ladies of Wessco.” She pats Sarah’s hand. “Explain it to him, dear.” My grandmother and Sarah have grown very close in the last year. Granny’s taken Sarah safely under her wing and become a wonderful, strong mentor to my lovely girl. Not unlike Emperor Palpatine and Darth Vader.

I live on an island called Ireland where most of the music is shite. I grew up listening to "Danny Boy"; I grew up hating Danny Boy, and all his siblings and his granny. "The pipes, the pipes are caw-haw-hawing." Anything with pipes or fiddles or even - forgive me, Paul - banjos, I detested. Songs of loss, of love, of going across the sea; songs of defiance and rebellion - I vomited on all of them.

There is no other love that’s as special as the love of a grandma. So warm and fuzzy, so calm and sweet, so cheerful and joyful. Grandmas are definitely a special gift from God. A treasure you must always keep. Memories that are never fading but always alive and well in our minds. Forever in my heart, Grandma…

Granny was truly marvellous; five feet of Yorkshire common sense, love, and superstition. She was always saying wise things. I remember, among many sayings, when one time she had given me a particularly good present, she said, "No it's not generous. Being generous is giving something that's hard to give." She was so superstitious that she kept a set of worthless china to break when she happened to break something good, on the grounds that breakages always came in threes and it was as well to get it over. I would have been lost without Granny, that I know.

Maybe money sits at the heart of every controversy about monarchy. Britain has long had trouble making up its mind. Many support the Crown, but many also feel anxious about the cost. That anxiety is increased by the fact that the cost is unknowable. Depends on who’s crunching the numbers. Does the Crown cost taxpayers? Yes. Does it also pay a fortune into government coffers? Also yes. Does the Crown generate tourism income that benefits all? Of course. Does it also rest upon lands obtained and secured when the system was unjust and wealth was generated by exploited workers and thuggery, annexation and enslaved people? Can anyone deny it? According to the last study I saw, the monarchy costs the average taxpayer the price of a pint each year. In light of its many good works that seems a pretty sound investment. But no one wants to hear a prince argue for the existence of a monarchy, any more than they want to hear a prince argue against it. I leave cost-benefit analyses to others. My emotions are complicated on this subject, naturally, but my bottom-line position isn’t. I’ll forever support my Queen, my Commander in Chief, my Granny. Even after she’s gone. My problem has never been with the monarchy, nor the concept of monarchy. It’s been with the press and the sick relationship that’s evolved between it and the Palace. I love my Mother Country, and I love my family, and I always will. I just wish, at the second-darkest moment of my life, they’d both been there for me. And I believe they’ll look back one day and wish they had too.

I love my grandparents, my aunts and uncles, but I'd take a bullet for my parents or my sister without a second thought." "Dude," Greg whispered,"you wouldn't take one for your granny?" "No one's going to shoot my grandma," Jace said dismissively.

Money’s like poison, Anna. Too much of it kills anything that’s worth having. Too much dough makes you paranoid, always wondering who―if anybody―loves you, and who’s just trying to get a piece of you. Truth be told, no one loved your Ma, not even Granny.

And in an apartment on the other side of town, everyone wakes up with a start when the hound in the first-floor flat, without any warning, starts howling. Louder and more heartrendingly than anything they have ever heard coming out of the primal depths of any animal. As if it is singing with the sorrow and yearning of an eternity of ten thousand fairy tales. It howls for hours, all through the night, until dawn. And when the morning light seeps into the hospital room, Elsa wakes up in Granny's arms. But Granny is still in Miamas.

Quite an affair had arisen from this circumstance. Miss Baker and Old Grannis were both over sixty, and yet it was current talk amongst the lodgers of the flat that the two were in love with each other. Singularly enough, they were not even acquaintances; never a word had passed between them.

I saw the same joy, the same uncontrollable smile in the faces of a Nigerian earth mama, a thin-lipped Scottish granny and a pale correct Japanese businessman as they wheeled their trolleys in and recognised a figure in the expectant crowd. Observing human variety can give pleasure, but so too can human sameness

America, I knew that Negroes had never been allowed to catch the full spirit of Western civilization, that they lived somehow in it but not of it. And when I brooded upon the cultural barrenness of black life, I wondered if clean, positive tenderness, love, honor, loyalty, and the capacity to remember were native with man. I asked myself if these human qualities were not fostered, won, struggled and suffered for, preserved in ritual from one generation to another.) Granny

My granny used to say to me, “The day you stop learning should be the day you die.

The monsoons had cooled down the temperature and a thick blanket, folded into a perfect rectangle, lay at the foot of my bed. Grandma must have come to inspect the settings a hundred times, being a perfectionist. Her love was evident in every little thing that was present in the house. It was soothing to be back in the house. Something unwounded from within, the moment I entered it.

Granny Sheeran told me when I’m looking for a partner to fall in love with their eyes cause eyes are the only things that don’t age, so if you fall in love with their eyes you’ll be in love forever.

Jesse squeezed her breasts ardently. "I just love your round parts, Miss Althea. They are just about the best things I ever felt in my life." He proved his enthusiasm for them by kneading, manipulating, and caressing until Althea was standing on her tiptoes, every muscle in her body straining to give him better access. "Oh, Miss Althea," he said finally, removing his hands from her body. "This is the most fun I ever had in my life." He was breathing as if he'd just run up the mountain, pulling Granny Piggott on the skid.

The way I see it,” she said, “God is not like a person or even a thing, really. People go around making God into whatever they want or need. But when you get down to it, I believe what my Granny Byrne said. God is love and love is about changing, becoming something more.

Here, let me do it,” Peter says, coming up close behind me. I jerk away from him. “No no, I’ll do it,” I say, and he shakes his head and tries to take the measuring cup from me, but I won’t let go, and flour poufs out of the cup and into the air. It dusts us both. Peter starts cracking up and I let out an outraged shriek. “Peter!” He’s laughing too hard to speak. I cross my arms. “I’d better still have enough flour.” “You look like a grandma,” he says, still laughing. “Well, you look like a grandpa,” I counter. I dump the flour in my mixing bowl back into the flour canister. “Actually, you’re really a lot like my granny,” Peter says. “You hate cussing. You like to bake. You stay at home on Friday nights. Wow, I’m dating my granny. Gross.” I start measuring again. One, two. “I don’t stay home every Friday night.” Three. “I’ve never seen you out. You don’t go to parties. We used to hang out back in the day. Why’d you stop hanging out?” Four. “I…I don’t know. Middle school was different.” What does he want me to say? That Genevieve decided I wasn’t cool enough so I got left behind? Why is he so clueless? “I always wondered why you stopped hanging out with us.” Was I on five or six? “Peter! You made me lose my count again!” “I have that effect on women.

That’s what I want, she thought, with the fiercest feeling of wanting she’d ever had in her life. She wanted that look her granny had, that look that told the world here I am, I’m somebody, and here is my life. I been young and old and in between, I loved a man, raised my children, worked, laughed, cried, and, see, even after all that, here I still am. “I’ll be

Afghan Girl Ice blue eyes that look to the morning sky as I knit the pieces and remnants of my life. I have No books, no paper, no pencils, and no black boards. I look at the holes in my life as I see the hills of the Appalachians that echo. I think to myself, who will I marry? Is my life-like Pari? These strings please come together. Snowflakes give me hope, and my dreams dance all around me. I‘ll put another log on the fire. I watch the brown paper bag over the broken glass pane letting the cold wind in; I’ll take some of these remnants and stuff it. These strings are come together. Mama told me that life would be hard. I bartered for flour the other day, and the chickens ain’t laying no eggs. I struggle with life and these strings. My hands are worn and tired. Now, I have granny square hands. I am unclean, unblemished, and finished, Afghan girl.

Grover: Oh, um—well, it’s a little embarrassing. I got this request once from a muskrat who wanted to hear “Muskrat Love.” Well ... Ilearned it, and I have to admit I enjoy playing it. Honestly, it’s not just for muskrats anymore! It’s a very sweet love story. I get misty-eyed every time I play it. So does Percy, but I think that’s because he’s laughing at me. Who would you least like to meet in a dark alley—a Cyclops or an angry Mr. D? Grover: Blah-hah-hah! What kind of question is that? Um—well... I’d much rather meet Mr. D, obviously, because he’s so . . . er, nice. Yes, kind and generous to all us satyrs. We all love him. And I’m not just saying that because he’s always listening, and he would blast me to pieces if I said anything different. In your opinion, what’s the most beautiful spot in nature in all of America? Grover: It’s amazing there are any nice spots left, but I like Lake Placid in upstate New York. Very beautiful, especially on a winter day! And the dryads up there—wow! Oh, wait, can you edit that part out? Juniper will kill me. Are tin cans really that tasty? Grover: My old granny goat used to say, “Two cans a day keep the monsters away.” Lots of minerals, very filling, and the texture is wonderful. Really, what’s not to like? I can’t help it if human teeth aren’t built for heavy-duty dining. Interview with PERCY JACKSON, Son of Poseidon What’s your favorite part about summers at

They were ashamed of it, or at least they didn’t think we should have it. The future was English. My grandad is dead no, but last year I went to my granny and said to her, in Gaelic, why did you hide it from us? And when she realised how much I could speak she started crying. She said they’d thought it was for the best. Gaelic would handicap us. But now I speak nothing but Gaelic to her and she loves it. I’m learning loads from her. I’m not fluent yet, but I’m getting close.

Blessed is that family where there are old people, says an ancient proverb, and happy the children who heed the counsel of the old, for it's as if they had already enjoyed a long life. Love your grandparents, children, for they love you as the sons and daughters of their sons and daughters, and hence with a double tenderness. If you see they love your company, don't leave them alone, and when it's their birthday, never forget to with them many happy returns, 'A hundred more happy returns, Granny and Granddad!

Peace and happiness!' Miss Ivy was laughing an ugly laugh that hurt Beka's ear. She jumped off the platform and went to stand a the kitchen door. There was a hurt look on Lilla's face, and seeing it, Granny Ivy said, in a much softened voice, 'Those things only visit in spells, Lilla, best to accept it. I have lived these sixty odd years, and I haven't yet met anyone at peace or happy. I don't even know what happiness means. Far as I can make out, it's like love, there when you need it less, gone when you need it more. Hope is the one reliable thing I know.

I'm really sorry, Jess, but she's going to have to have your room.' 'My room?' exploded Jess. 'There's a perfectly good spare room upstairs!' 'Yes, but you see, darling, Granny can't manage stairs quite so easily anymore. Since Grandpa died and she had that fall, you know- well, her house is too much for her to manage on her own. [...] Granny has to be on the ground floor, love. She can use the groundfloor loo, and we'll convert the old coal shed at the back into a bathroom.' Jess was too furious to speak. No, wait, she wasn't. 'Where am I supposed to sleep then?' she snapped. 'Out on the pavement?

They will eat him alive. On his current course, Henry will fail spectacularly.” My chest constricts so tight it feels like my bones may crack. Because she’s right. “He won’t.” “You don’t know that,” she swipes back. “I damn well do! I never would have abdicated otherwise.” “What?” “Don’t mistake me—I wouldn’t have married anyone but Olivia, and I would’ve waited a lifetime if I had to, until the laws were changed. But I didn’t because I knew in my heart and soul that Henry will not just be a good king, he will be better than I ever could’ve been.” For a moment I don’t breathe. I can’t. The shock of my brother’s words has knocked the air right out of my lungs. Granny’s too, if her whisper is any indication. “You truly believe that?” “Absolutely. And, frankly, I’m disheartened that you don’t.” “Henry has never been one to rise to the occasion,” she states plainly. “He’s never needed to,” my brother insists. “He’s never been asked—not once in his whole life. Until now. And he will not only rise to the occasion . . . he will soar beyond it.” The Queen’s voice is hushed, like she’s in prayer. “I want to believe that. More than I can say. Lend me a bit of your faith, Nicholas. Why are you so certain?” Nicholas’s voice is rough, tight with emotion. “Because . . . he’s just like Mum.” My eyes close when the words reach my ears. Burning and wet. There’s no greater compliment—not to me—not ever. But, Christ, look at me . . . it’s not even close to true. “He’s exactly like her. That way she had of knowing just what a person needed—whether it was strength or guidance, kindness or comfort or joy—and effortlessly giving it to them. The way people used to gravitate to her . . . at parties, the whole room would shift when she walked in . . . because everyone wanted to be nearer to her. She had a light, a talent, a gift—it doesn’t matter what it’s called—all that matters is that Henry has it too. He doesn’t see it in himself, but I do. I always have.” There’s a moment of quiet and I imagine Nicholas leaning in closer to the Queen. “The people would have followed me or Dad for the same reason they follow you—because we are dependable, solid. They trust our judgment; they know we would never let them down. But they will follow Henry because they love him. They’ll see in him their son, brother, best friend, and even if he mucks it up now, they will stick with him because they will want him to succeed. I would have been respected and admired, but Grandmother . . . he will be beloved. And if I have learned anything since the day Olivia came into my life, it’s that more than reasoning or duty, honor or tradition . . . love is stronger.

deathly quiet. Every muscle in McCallum’s body tensed, but he forced his face to remain calm, emotionless. The jurors wouldn’t look his direction, not even the little granny with the kinky white hair and the weathered face. He’d counted on her, but she avoided eye contact with him, as did all the others. Not a good sign. Was it possible? Had they really decided to convict him on the flimsy, circumstantial evidence that the prosecution had thrown at them? No murder weapon had been found and nothing linked Ross McCallum to the crime except the flimsy testimony of an old geezer known for his love of whiskey. And yet, he felt his guts clench with a new desperation. “Has the jury reached a verdict?

Maybe it’s not a coincidence that I’ve always been interested in heroes, starting with my dad, Phil Robertson, and my mom, Miss Kay. My other heroes are my pa and my granny, who taught me how to play cards and dominoes and everything about fishing (which was a lot), and my three older brothers, who teased me, beat me up, and sometimes let me follow them around. Not much has changed in that department. I’ve always loved movies, and when I was about seven or eight years old, I watched Rocky, Sylvester Stallone’s movie about an underdog boxer who used his fists, along with sheer will, determination, and the ability to endure pain, to make a way for himself. He fought hard but played fair and had a soft spot for his friends. I fell in love with Rocky. He was my hero, and I became obsessed. When I decide to do something, I’m all in; so I found a pair of red shorts that looked like Rocky’s boxing trunks and a navy blue bathrobe with two white stripes on the sleeve and no belt. I took off my shirt and ran around bare-chested in my robe and shorts. Most kids I knew went through a superhero phase, but they picked DC Comics guys, like Batman or Superman. Not me. I was Rocky Balboa, the Italian Stallion, and proud of it. Mom let me run around like that for a couple of years, even when we went in to town. Rocky had a girlfriend, Adrian, who was always there, always by his side. When he was beaten and blinded in a bad fight, he called out for her before anybody else. “Yo, Adrian!” he shouted in his Philly-Italian accent. He needed her. Eventually, I grew up, and the red shorts and blue bathrobe didn’t fit anymore, but I always remembered Rocky’s kindness and his courage. And that every Rocky needs an Adrian.

A familiar image of a grim, frozen Russia is the babushka, the old woman, hunched and determined, head wrapped in a scarf. Her gnarled face stares out from old Ellis Island photographs and modern cable specials, and never fails to elicit awwwwws from concerned Westerners who'd love nothing more than to hug poor, helpless Granny and tell her that everything's going to be all right. That is misguided, and potentially hazardous. Women who had survived long enough to become grandmothers by the 1980s were Russia's rocks. Their generation had a hard life, even by the unforgiving standards of mother Russia. Forged from the crucible of wars, famines, and purges, the babushki had witnessed entire populations of husbands and sons vanish into the grave. These women were instilled with fierce matriarchal instinct, the notion that they were responsible for the welfare of all society, not just their kin, and underneath their kerchiefs the babushki watched, and listened, and remembered, and commanded.

Has being on Duck Dynasty made you more comfortable in the public eye? Jess: I never thought I’d get up and speak in front of thousands of people. The show has made us braver. I’m willing to show the world who we are, to tell our story, and to use this opportunity God has given us to share His love and His Word with other people. Anyway, it’s all from Him, and we know we are blessed. Jep: I want to be a great role model, and so I’m willing to get up and tell my story, even the hard parts, if it will help others. I also want to help people get back to the old ways with hunting and how much joy it is to provide for your family. I don’t ever want to lose that and be some kind of a rich guy who has it made. Also, I never want to move away from Louisiana. I want my kids to grow up with their grandparents, cousins, and uncles and aunts. I learned so much from my granny, and I want my kids to have those relationships and teachable moments too. There’s something about being in a smaller town; the pace of life here is so different, but in a good way.

The same song was playing the second I met my ex–best friend and the moment I realized I’d lost her. I met my best friend at a neighborhood cookout the year we would both turn twelve. It was one of those hot Brooklyn afternoons that always made me feel like I'd stepped out of my life and onto a movie set because the hydrants were open, splashing water all over the hot asphalt. There wasn't a cloud in the flawless blue sky. And pretty black and brown people were everywhere. I was crying. ‘What a Wonderful World’ was playing through a speaker someone had brought with them to the park, and it reminded me too much of my Granny Georgina. I was cupping the last snow globe she’d ever given me in my small, sweaty hands and despite the heat, I couldn’t help imagining myself inside the tiny, perfect, snow-filled world. I was telling myself a story about what it might be like to live in London, a place that was unimaginably far and sitting in the palm of my hands all at once. But it wasn't working. When Gigi had told me stories, they'd felt like miracles. But she was gone and I didn't know if I'd ever be okay again. I heard a small voice behind me, asking if I was okay. I had noticed a girl watching me, but it took her a long time to come over, and even longer to say anything. She asked the question quietly. I had never met anyone who…spoke the way that she did, and I thought that her speech might have been why she waited so long to speak to me. While I expected her to say ‘What’s wrong?’—a question I didn’t want to have to answer—she asked ‘What are you doing?’ instead, and I was glad. “I was kind of a weird kid, so when I answered, I said ‘Spinning stories,’ calling it what Gigi had always called it when I got lost in my own head, but my voice cracked on the phrase and another tear slipped down my cheek. To this day I don’t know why I picked that moment to be so honest. Usually when kids I didn't know came up to me, I clamped my mouth shut like the heavy cover of an old book falling closed. Because time and taught me that kids weren't kind to girls like me: Girls who were dreamy and moony-eyed and a little too nice. Girls who wore rose-tonted glasses. And actual, really thick glasses. Girls who thought the world was beautiful, and who read too many books, and who never saw cruelty coming. But something about this girl felt safe. Something about the way she was smiling as she stuttered out the question helped me know I needn't bother with being shy, because she was being so brave. I thought that maybe kids weren't nice to girls like her either. The cookout was crowded, and none of the other kids were talking to me because, like I said, I was the neighborhood weirdo. I carried around snow globesbecause I was in love with every place I’d never been. I often recited Shakespeare from memory because of my dad, who is a librarian. I lost myself in books because they were friends who never letme down, and I didn’t hide enough of myself the way everyone else did, so people didn’t ‘get’ me. I was lonely a lot. Unless I was with my Gigi. The girl, she asked me if it was making me feel better, spinning the stories. And I shook my head. Before I could say what I was thinking—a line from Hamlet about sorrow coming in battalions that would have surely killed any potential I had of making friends with her. The girl tossed her wavy black hair over her shoulder and grinned. She closed her eyes and said 'Music helps me. And I love this song.' When she started singing, her voice was so unexpected—so bright and clear—that I stopped crying and stared at her. She told me her name and hooked her arm through mine like we’d known each other forever, and when the next song started, she pulled me up and we spun in a slow circle together until we were both dizzy and giggling.

Tonight, however, Dickens struck him in a different light. Beneath the author’s sentimental pity for the weak and helpless, he could discern a revolting pleasure in cruelty and suffering, while the grotesque figures of the people in Cruikshank’s illustrations revealed too clearly the hideous distortions of their souls. What had seemed humorous now appeared diabolic, and in disgust at these two favourites he turned to Walter Pater for the repose and dignity of a classic spirit. But presently he wondered if this spirit were not in itself of a marble quality, frigid and lifeless, contrary to the purpose of nature. ‘I have often thought’, he said to himself, ‘that there is something evil in the austere worship of beauty for its own sake.’ He had never thought so before, but he liked to think that this impulse of fancy was the result of mature consideration, and with this satisfaction he composed himself for sleep. He woke two or three times in the night, an unusual occurrence, but he was glad of it, for each time he had been dreaming horribly of these blameless Victorian works… It turned out to be the Boy’s Gulliver’s Travels that Granny had given him, and Dicky had at last to explain his rage with the devil who wrote it to show that men were worse than beasts and the human race a washout. A boy who never had good school reports had no right to be so morbidly sensitive as to penetrate to the underlying cynicism of Swift’s delightful fable, and that moreover in the bright and carefully expurgated edition they bring out nowadays. Mr Corbett could not say he had ever noticed the cynicism himself, though he knew from the critical books it must be there, and with some annoyance he advised his son to take out a nice bright modern boy’s adventure story that could not depress anybody. Mr Corbett soon found that he too was ‘off reading’. Every new book seemed to him weak, tasteless and insipid; while his old and familiar books were depressing or even, in some obscure way, disgusting. Authors must all be filthy-minded; they probably wrote what they dared not express in their lives. Stevenson had said that literature was a morbid secretion; he read Stevenson again to discover his peculiar morbidity, and detected in his essays a self-pity masquerading as courage, and in Treasure Island an invalid’s sickly attraction to brutality. This gave him a zest to find out what he disliked so much, and his taste for reading revived as he explored with relish the hidden infirmities of minds that had been valued by fools as great and noble. He saw Jane Austen and Charlotte Brontë as two unpleasant examples of spinsterhood; the one as a prying, sub-acid busybody in everyone else’s flirtations, the other as a raving, craving maenad seeking self-immolation on the altar of her frustrated passions. He compared Wordsworth’s love of nature to the monstrous egoism of an ancient bellwether, isolated from the flock.

Zap. Sports channel. Normal is nine innings, four balls, three strikes, somebody wins, somebody loses, there’s no such thing as a tie. Zap. Normal is unreal people, mostly rich unreal people, having sex with rappers and basketball players and thinking of their unreal family as a real-world brand, like Pepsi or Drano or Ford. Zap. News channels. Normal is guns and the normal America that really wants to be great again. Then there’s another normal if your skin color is the wrong color and another if you’re educated and another if you think education is brainwashing and there’s an America that believes in vaccines for kids and another that says that’s a con trick and everything one normal believes is a lie to another normal and they’re all on TV depending where you look, so, yeah, it’s confusing. I’m really trying to understand which this is America now. Zap zap zap. A man with his head in a bag being shot by a man without a shirt on. A fat man in a red hat screaming at men and women also fat also in red hats about victory, We’re undereducated and overfed. We’re full of pride over who the f*ck knows. We drive to the emergency room and send Granny to get our guns and cigarettes. We don’t need no stinkin’ allies cause we’re stupid and you can suck our dicks. We are Beavis and Butt-Head on ’roids. We drink Roundup from the can. Our president looks like a Christmas ham and talks like Chucky. We’re America, bitch. Zap. Immigrants raping our women every day. We need Space Force because Space ISIS. Zap. Normal is Upside-Down Land. Our old friends are our enemies now and our old enemy is our pal. Zap, zap. Men and men, women and women in love. The purple mountains’ majesty. A man with an oil painting of himself with Jesus hanging in his living room. Dead schoolkids. Hurricanes. Beauty. Lies. Zap, zap, zap. “Normal doesn’t feel so normal to me,” I tell him. “It’s normal to feel that way,” he replies.

Catty and Vanessa were vamping it up on the corner of Fairfax and Beverly, in bell-bottoms with exaggerated lacy bells that they must have pulled from Catty's mother's closet. Vanessa gave them the peace sign. "Feeling' groovy." She winked. She had gorgeous skin, movie-star blue eyes, and flawless blond hair. She was wearing a headband and blue-tinted glasses. Catty was forever getting Vanessa into trouble, but they remained best friends. "Love and peace," Catty greeted them. Catty was stylish in an artsy sort of way. Right now, she wore a hand-knit cap with pom-pom ties that hung down to her waist, and her puddle-jumping Doc Martens were so wrong with the bell-bottoms that they looked totally right. Her curly brown hair poked from beneath the fuchsia cap and her brown eyes were framed by granny glasses, probably another steal from her mother. "You like our retro look?" Vanessa giggled at all the cars honking at them.

That first day at school, maybe an agonising parting from your parents. The face of a loved one lost. A pullover knitted by your granny. A favourite toy. A doll, perhaps. A book of rhymes, tattered and torn. Someone who gave you a flower, a kiss on the forehead. To the end of your days you will carry that kiss with you. And may it protect you from all harm.

Life is a difficult choice between our loves and our fears. Love is the better use of a life, if you can find the courage for it. Love is hard, brave work, while fear is too easy - it is an early grave of comfy chairs and magazines and wasted heartbeats and hormones.

Okay, um…you guys have fun, and Dwayne, if you’re going to eat you need to be discreet. We’re used to a variety of Shifters down here, but not Vamps.” “Don’t you worry about nothin’. I’ve got his back,” Granny said. “Anyone calls him a blood sucker or homo will answer to my fist, my boot and my Taser.” With that lovely nugget she left the room to get gussied up. “Oh my god, if I were into women, I’d marry your granny so fast.

Granny’s affinity for wanting to feed people infected me. If there’s a cure for this infection, I hope I never find it. The love of feeding people is a gift from God that came by way of Granny. I felt like I needed to write about it. Granny singing, the aroma of blackberries cooking away, and the promise of cobblers and jelly . . . That’s what heaven will be like. Amen.

Shooting trips always put Granny in a good mood. Perhaps she’d be more open to thoughts of love?

My emotions are complicated on this subject, naturally, but my bottom-line position isn’t. I’ll forever support my Queen, my Commander in Chief, my Granny. Even after she’s gone. My problem has never been with the monarchy, or the concept of monarchy. It’s been with the press and the sick relationship that’s evolved between it and the Palace. I love my Mother Country, and I love my family, and I always will. I just wish, at the second-darkest moment of my life, they’d both been there for me. And I believe they’ll look back one day and wish they had too.

among the gray-haired belles of Cheerville. Perhaps that was because her husband had left her many years ago for a younger woman. That’s why she took the plotline of Endless Beach so personally. At seventy-two, more than a little overweight, and relying on a walker, she hadn’t exactly been Lucien’s most fetching offer, but when she had opened up her heart to him a few months back, the guy let her down easy. So easy, in fact, that she stayed in the reading group and everyone got along. At least on the surface. Could Pauline be angry and hurt enough to kill her autumn love? Or could Gretchen suspect the two had been having an affair and decided to bump Lucien off? Or maybe I had it all wrong and there

As soon as my girls were old enough to hold scissors, I taught them how to cut fabric into blocks for us to piece together into family quilts for them to keep so I can pass along my love of quilting, and my grandmother’s love of quilting, to the next generation. Jep’s granny was a quilter and a knitter. She kept her hands busy, and when I knew her, she was always sitting on the couch, knitting something. She knitted an afghan for every new grandchild, and Merritt got two afghans because she was named after her great-grandmother. I want to pass on a legacy of creativity and of taking something that seems of little value and transforming it into something beautiful. Our quilts are like our lives, each with a different story, each a little tattered and torn, but each unique and beautiful in the way the patterns, colors, and designs come together. Quilting is becoming a lost art that I never want to lose. To me, quilts are the perfect combination of love and art.

Piers Morgan Piers Morgan is a British journalist best known for his editorial work for the Daily Mirror from 1995 through 2004. He is also a successful author and television personality whose recent credits include a recurring role as a judge on NBC’s America’s Got Talent. A controversial member of the tabloid press during Diana’s lifetime, Piers Morgan established a uniquely close relationship with the Princess during the 1990s. I mentioned I’d been in contact with her mother. “Oh crikey, that sounds dangerous!” “She’s a feisty woman, isn’t she?” William giggled. “Granny’s great fun after a few gin and tonics.” “Sh, William,” Diana said, giggling too. “My mother’s been a tremendous source of support to me. She never talks publicly; she’s just there for me.” “And what about William’s other granny?” “I have enormous respect for the Queen; she has been so supportive, you know. People don’t see that side of her, but I do all the time. She’s an amazing person.” “Has she been good over the divorce?” “Yes, very. I just want it over now so I can get on with my life. I’m worried about the attacks I will get afterward.” “What attacks?” “I just worry that people will try and knock me down once I am out on my own.” This seemed unduly paranoid. People adored her. I asked William how he was enjoying Eton. “Oh, it’s great, thanks.” “Do you think the press bother you much?” “Not the British press, actually. Though the European media can be quite annoying. They sit on the riverbank watching me rowing with their cameras, waiting for me to fall in! There are photographers everywhere if I go out. Normally loads of Japanese tourists taking pictures. All saying “Where’s Prince William?’ when I’m standing right next to them.” “How are the other boys with you?” “Very nice. Though a boy was expelled this week for taking ecstasy and snuff. Drugs are everywhere, and I think they’re stupid. I never get tempted.” “Does matron take any?” laughed Diana. “No, Mummy, it gives her hallucinations.” “What, like imagining you’re going to be king?” I said. They both giggled again. “Is it true you’ve got Pamela Anderson posters on your bedroom wall?” “No! And not Cindy Crawford, either. They did both come to tea at the palace, though, and were very nice.” William had been photographed the previous week at a party at the Hammersmith Palais, where he was mobbed by young girls. I asked him if he’d had fun. “Everyone in the press said I was snogging these girls, but I wasn’t,” he insisted. Diana laughed. “One said you stuck your tongue down her throat, William. Did you?” “No, I did not. Stop it, Mummy, please. It’s embarrassing.” He’d gone puce. It was a very funny exchange, with a flushed William finally insisting: “I won’t go to any more public parties; it was crazy. People wouldn’t leave me alone.” Diana laughed again. “All the girls love a nice prince.” I turned to more serious matters. “Do you think Charles will become king one day?” “I think he thinks he will,” replied Diana, “but I think he would be happier living in Tuscany or Provence, to be honest.” “And how are you these days--someone told me you’ve stopped seeing therapists?” “I have, yes. I stopped when I realized they needed more therapy than I did. I feel stronger now, but I am under so much pressure all the time. People don’t know what it’s like to be in the public eye, they really don’t.

Do ye really love him, Trulie? Does yer love for him make yer throat ache with tears if ye canna be near him? Do ye pine to hear the rumble of his deep voice whisper yer name in the darkness?" Granny stomped forward another step. Her voice grew shriller with every word. "Say it, Trulie. Tell me the truth. If ye thought ye'd ne'er see Dan again, would ye rather die than live a day without him? Tell me. Tell me Dan is the other half of yer soul and I will ne'er talk about jumping back again.

Well, if isn’t my favorite bran muffin.” She was sitting at the kitchen table drinking a cup of coffee and smoking a Lucky Strike. “If it isn’t my favorite dinosaur.” I teased back. She stuck her tongue out at me like an errant child. “Roar!” I sat at the table and stole one of her cigarettes. How she smoked those things I would never know. “Looks like I’m off on another adventure. I don’t know how long I’ll be gone this time.” I said somewhat sulking. “Where to this time?” She raised a brow. “We’re off to New York carting around some rock star.” I waited for her reaction. Granny loved rock stars. “Who is it?” She prodded. “Jake Parker.” I said with disgust. “Oh, I’d like him to come clean out my cobwebs.” She beamed. I did not need the mental picture that followed. “Granny, that’s disgusting!” I shrieked. “Whatever, it’s true. That boy is a tall drink of water if I’ve ever seen one.” “Alright, I’m outta here. Thanks for the nightmares.

pillow.  I wasn't sure what I did to deserve this, but at that moment I hated my granny so much for leaving me. She promised she would never leave me, and she broke that promise.

Please don’t tell me you’re in love with my granny.

My life has been one long love story, and I have loved people, I have loved books, I have loved flowers, the sun, moon and stars, old roads, old trees, children, grannies, butterflies, seashells, fairies... And of course I keep falling in love, for where love begins, there is the border of heaven. Ruskin Bond

A fat man in a red hat screaming at men and women also fat also in red hats about victory, We’re undereducated and overfed. We’re full of pride over who the f*ck knows. We drive to the emergency room and send Granny to get our guns and cigarettes. We don’t need no stinkin’ allies cause we’re stupid and you can suck our dicks. We are Beavis and Butt-Head on ’roids. We drink Roundup from the can. Our president looks like a Christmas ham and talks like Chucky. We’re America, bitch. Zap. Immigrants raping our women every day. We need Space Force because Space ISIS. Zap. Normal is Upside-Down Land. Our old friends are our enemies now and our old enemy is our pal. Zap, zap. Men and men, women and women in love. The purple mountains’ majesty. A man with an oil painting of himself with Jesus hanging in his living room. Dead schoolkids. Hurricanes. Beauty. Lies. Zap, zap, zap.

is late morning and the phone rings. I look at the phone – young people won’t know that you never used to know who was calling until they told you or you recognised their voice – and think, oh great, it’s my daughter, we can have a nice chat. We talk frequently and it is a good way to relax, but also to keep in touch. She will tell me about how her work is going or what her son is up to or what she is doing for the weekend. Rarely anything hugely important, although that can happen, but a pleasing way to pass the time in the company of someone you love. And keep abreast of the day-to-day fabric of their lives. I

I kind of associate people with flavors. My grandpa? He's an acquired taste, but the closest I can get is crème brûlée. A caramelized shell on the outside. Burnt, bitter notes. But crack the surface, and you find nothing but sweet custard. And Granny? She's a lemon meringue pie. A classic. Pillowy, silken-sweet egg whites, tamed with a hint of sour lemon and a snap of rich, buttery crust." Squinting at him, she stopped rambling, feeling naked under his smoldering gray gaze. She lifted her heavy twists off the spot between her shoulder blades and fanned her neck. "Told you it was weird." "It's not. It's beautiful." He looked down at the water, then met her eyes. "Do you have one for me?" "I didn't. Before. I tried to figure you out, but nothing ever fit. I think maybe because my doubts got in the way. But now...?" "Now?" She traced her finger along the veins in his arms, watched his breath catch. "A ginger cookie. Not a gingersnap. Those are brittle and grate against your teeth. You're a chewy molasses cookie, the kind that gives when you bite into it, with exciting zings of crystallized ginger and pops of raw sugar." She dipped her chin, leaning on the railing again. He moved behind her and slipped his arms around her waist, melting her to the core. He placed his mouth right by her ear, his breath tickling her neck. "What I'm hearing is, you like things a little spicy." Laughing, she craned her neck around to catch the gleam in his eyes. "That's what you got out of that?" "I heard what I heard.

train, on this train …’ Ellie closed the journal. ‘Yes, she did. That’s why I’m here, really. Great Granny Nancy wanted me to follow in her footsteps. I think she was trying to inspire me.’ ‘And how did she meet Alex?’ Ellie looked towards the D-Day Dames rather than at Joe. ‘They met on the train, but she doesn’t say much about it, or about her time in Penberth during that particular trip.’ ‘They fell in love on this train, then?’ Ellie finally looked at him. ‘I guess so …’ She grabbed the

Apple Kuchen In the story, Jace and Grant both love sweets. This apple kuchen is something Cora Lee would have made that they both enjoyed. Happy baking! Apple Kuchen Cake 1 cup flour 2 tablespoons sugar 1/4 teaspoon salt 1/2 cup butter, softened Blend together with a fork, or pastry blender, until crumbly and well mixed. Pat into a greased 9” x 9” or 8” x 8” square pan. Set aside. Filling 4 cups apples, peeled and sliced (Granny Smith works great) 1/2 cup sugar 1 teaspoon cinnamon Mix apples with sugar and cinnamon. Layer over cake batter. Topping 1/3 cup flour 1/2 cup sugar 1/4 cup butter, softened 1 teaspoon cinnamon Use a fork to combine. Sprinkle on top of apples. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Bake for 45-50 minutes, until edges are lightly browned. Serve with lightly sweetened whipped cream or ice cream. Refrigerate leftovers – if you have any!

The two had a special reason for loving the plum candy. Because it has both sweet and blood taste. The candy was white with a mysterious sheen and a red stripe across its surface. Rolling it inside their mouths was one of their precious little joys. The red stripe would often cut their tongues as it melted away first. “I know this sounds funny, but the salty blood taste actually goes well with the sweetness,” Granny would say with a wide smile, a bag of plum candies in her arms, while Mom looked for ointment.

Marki, will you marry me? I love every part of you that I know. But I promise I’ll spend my life learning every part of you there is, so that I can love you in every way possible.

And there are billions of galaxies out there. But do you know which star is the most important star in the entire universe? “Tell me.” He gets up on one elbow and looks down at me. “You are. Because without you, my whole world was nothing but a black hole. You are my light… my gravity… and my love.

Granny was there. She’d popped in. On her way from church back to the castle. Meg said: Fun! I love grandmas. I asked if she knew how to curtsy. She said she thought so. But she also couldn’t tell if I was serious. You’re about to meet the Queen. I know, but it’s your grandma. But she’s the Queen.

Just like Adam and Eve, you've got choices. Dating is an apple-sorting bonanza. You're after the golden delicious, not the rotten Granny Smith. But beware, some apples are Oscar-worthy actors, all shiny on the outside but a letdown once you sink your teeth in. It's a fruit salad of chance, so brace yourself and take that first bite.

Now you’re making my mouth water,” Daisy said.    “Of course she is.  There are two precious things in life—love and chocolate.  When you have both, you can’t go wrong,” Granny Annie insisted.

I’ll forever support my Queen, my Commander in Chief, my Granny. Even after she’s gone. My problem has never been with the monarchy, nor the concept of monarchy. It’s been with the press and the sick relationship that’s evolved between it and the Palace. I love my Mother Country, and I love my family, and I always will. I just wish, at the second-darkest moment of my life, they’d both been there for me. And I believe they’ll look back one day and wish they had too.

One good chat with my grandmother, I felt, would bring this ordeal to an end. I said: Granny, are you free? Yes, of course! I’m free all week. The diary is clear. That’s great. Meg and I can come up for tea and then drive back to London. We have an engagement at Canada House the next day. You’ll be exhausted from the travel. Do you want to stay here? By “here” she meant Sandringham. Yes, that would be easier, and I told her so. That would be lovely, thank you. Are you planning to see your father too? I asked, but he said it’s impossible. He’s in Scotland and can’t leave until the end of the month. She made a little sound. A sigh or a knowing grunt. I had to laugh. She said: I have only one thing to say about that. Yes? Your father always does what he wants to do.

coughed. Granny, you know I love Meg very much, and I’ve decided that I would like to ask her to marry me, and I’ve been told that, er, that I have to ask your permission before I can propose. You have to? Um. Well, yes, that’s what your staff tell me, and my staff as well. That I have to ask your permission. I stood completely still, as motionless as the birds in my hands. I stared at her face but it was unreadable. At last she replied: Well, then, I suppose I have to say yes. I squinted. You feel you have to say yes? Does that mean you are saying yes? But that you want to say no? I didn’t get it. Was she being sarcastic? Ironic? Deliberately cryptic? Was she indulging in a bit of wordplay? I’d never known Granny to do any wordplay, and this would be a surpassingly bizarre moment (not to mention wildly inconvenient) for her to start, but maybe she just saw the chance to play off my unfortunate use of the word “have” and couldn’t resist? Or else, perhaps there was some hidden meaning beneath the wordplay, some message I wasn’t comprehending? I stood there squinting, smiling, asking myself over and over: What is the Queen of England saying to me right now? At long last I realized: She’s saying yes, you muppet! She’s granting permission. Who cares how she words it, just know when to take yes for an answer. So I sputtered: Right. OK, Granny! Well. Fabulous. Thank you! Thank you so much. I wanted to hug her. I longed to hug her. I didn’t hug her. I saw her into the Range Rover, then marched back to Pa and Willy.

Granny, we’re not going to make it!” Sabrina shouted, battling the roaring engine to be heard. “I love pancakes, too,” the old woman shouted back. I hate this car, Sabrina thought to herself.

Never underestimate a granny on a mission.

Obviously.” I rolled my eyes. “Well, you need to think harder. Get out there and hit the streets!” I laughed. “Granny, this isn’t an eighties TV cop show.” “Well, it’s a good thing. You’re certainly no Magnum, PI.” “You know, I thought grandmothers were supposed to be sweet old ladies who loved to bake goodies and knit you an endless supply of sweaters.” “I’m a ghost, dummy!” Granny threw up her arms. “You’ll have to make your own crap.

Why do you care what happens to a human teacher?” Sabrina said. “I thought you hated humans.” Charming said nothing. “You don’t want anything bad to happen to Ms. White,” Daphne cried. “You are in love with her. You want to kiss and hug her!” “Nonsense!” the mayor shouted. “I can’t have terrorists running around the elementary school, even if I approve of who they’re killing.” “You want to write her love notes,” the little girl persisted. “You want to hold her hand in the park and look at puppies in the pet store.” “Is there an Off button for this one?” Charming asked Granny Relda. The old woman grinned at the mayor. “You haven’t answered the questions.” “All right!” Charming surrendered. “Snow has a knack for getting in trouble. I would sleep better at night knowing she is safe.

Why, hello, Red,” said the wolf. “Don’t you look tasty—I mean, lovely today.” “Oh, Granny,” I said. “What big eyes you have!” “The better to see you with, my dear,” said the wolf. “Come closer, will you?” I stepped closer. “Granny, what big ears you have!” “The better to hear you with, my dear. Come just a little closer.” I stepped right beside the bed. “Oh, Granny! What big teeth you have!” “The better to eat you with!” The wolf opened its jaws and swallowed my head. I shrieked until its teeth tickled my neck, and then I laughed. Finally the wolf stopped and let me go. It reached up with hairy paws and pulled off its head, revealing Granny underneath. She smacked her lips. “You were delicious.

That is some farked up stuff you have in your blood, Vampyre," Granny grunted as she shook her head and chuckled. "I feel like I did after twelve hours straight of shopping on Black Friday last year." “Sorry, doll," Dwayne said as he ruffled her hair. "But thank you." "You're welcome, bloodsucker. You've become the undead grandson I never knew I wanted." "Oh my Donna Summer," Dwayne babbled as he hugged her tight. "As shittastic as this day is going, I'd repeat the whole damn thing to hear you say those words again." "I love you, you high maintenance undead girly boy," she said affectionately.

One Day Eight Years Ago - Poem by Jibanananda Das It was heard: to the post-mortem cell he had been taken; last night—in the darkness of Falgoon-night When the five-night-old moon went down— he was longing for death. His wife lay beside—the child therewith; hope and love abundant__in the moonlight—what ghost did he see? Why his sleep broke? Or having no sleep at all since long—he now has fallen asleep in the post-mortem cell. Is this the sleep he’d longed for! Like a plagued rat, mouth filled with crimson froth now asleep in the nook of darkness; And will not ever awake anymore. ‘Never again will wake up, never again will bear the endless—endless burden of painful waking—’ It was told to him when the moon sank down—in the strange darkness by a silence like the neck of a camel that might have shown up at his window side. Nevertheless, the owl stays wide awake; The rotten still frog begs two more moments in the hope for another dawn in conceivable warmth. We feel in the deep tracelessness of flocking darkness The unforgiving enmity of the mosquito-net all around; The mosquito loves the stream of life awake in its monastery of darkness. From sitting in blood and filth, flies fly back into the sun; How often we watched moths and flies hovering in the waves of golden sun. The close-knit sky, as if—as it were, some scattered lives, possessed their hearts; The wavering dragonflies in the grasp of wanton kids Fought for life; As the moon went down, in the impending gloom With a noose in hand you approached the aswattha, alone, by yourself, For you’d learnt a human would ne’er live the life of a locust or a robin The branch of aswattha Had it not raged in protest? And the flock of fireflies Hadn’t they come and mingled with the comely bunch of daffodils? Hadn’t the senile blind owl come over and said: ‘the age-old moon seems to have been washed away by the surging waters? Splendid that! Let’s catch now rats and mouse! ’ Hadn’t the owl hooted out this cherished affair? Taste of life—the fragrance of golden corn of winter evening— seemed intolerable to you; — Content now in the morgue In the morgue—sultry with the bloodied mouth of a battered rat! Listen yet, tale of this dead; — Was not refused by the girl of love, Didn’t miss any joy of conjugal life, the bride went ahead of time and let him know honey and the honey of reflection; His life ne’er shivered in demeaning hunger or painful cold; So now in the morgue he lies flat on the dissection table. Know—I know woman’s heart—love—offspring—home—not all there is to things; Wealth, achievement, affluence apart there is some other baffling surprise that whirls in our veins; It tires and tires, and tires us out; but there is no tiring in the post mortem cell and so, there he rests, in the post mortem cell flat on the dissection table. Still I see the age-old owl, ah, Nightly sat on the aswattha bough Winks and echoes: ‘The olden moon seems to be carried away by the flooding waters? That’s splendid! Let’s catch now rats and mouse—’ Hi, granny dear, splendid even today? Let me age like you—and see off the olden moon in the whirlpool at the Kalidaha; Then the two of us will desert life’s abundant reserve.

have you got an idea for a Big Plan?’ asked Mum. Dad smiled triumphantly. ‘I have. In fact I have thought of several ways we can either make money, or save money.’ No wonder Mum looked worried. Dad’s plans for anything usually lead to trouble. ‘OK,’ he announced. ‘Here is my first idea for making money: we sell the twins.’ ‘You can’t sell Cheese and To– I mean, James and Rebecca!’ protested Mum. ‘It’s only a suggestion,’ said Dad hastily. ‘Don’t get your knickers in a twist. I can see you don’t like that plan and I’m not very fond of it either, so here is my second idea: we sell Nicholas.’ ‘Dad!’ I yelled. ‘You don’t like that either? OK, quieten down. You’ll love this next one, I promise. Idea number three: we sell Granny.

In life and especially marriage, many individuals come from homes that they're well versed and know how to be loved, but unfortunately know nothing about how to love others. We continually receive love from our parents, siblings, cousins, grannies, closer and distant relatives, friends, teachers, leaders and everybody else that we get so entitled to be loved. It the process we lose the art and science of loving other people and we just expect only to receive from them. We lack the nerve to pay the cost to maintain healthy and valuable relationships or connections but easily let them fall apart. We need to learn how to love!

In life and especially marriage, many individuals come from homes that they're well versed and know how to be loved, but unfortunately know so little about how to love others. They continually receive love from our parents, siblings, cousins, grannies, closer and distant relatives, friends, teachers, leaders, spouses and everybody else around them that they get overly entitled to love. In the process they lose the art and science of loving other individuals around their life and only expect to receive affection but never reciprocate it. Simply said they have lost the nerve for the cost of healthy or valuable relationship but selfishly do let it crumble in their hands. They just need to learn how to love!

1¼ cups per serving 25 Minutes to Prepare and Cook 1 pound boneless, skinless chicken breast 2 tbsp chopped walnut halves 1 cup red grapes, seedless, sliced in half lengthwise 1 cup celery, finely sliced 1 Granny Smith apple, cored and diced into cubes For the Dressing: 2 tbsp reduced-fat mayonnaise 2 tbsp plain nonfat Greek yogurt 1 tbsp lemon juice

Girl, cut the crap. We know you haven’t been home because you’re still dodging that fine ass nigga you left. You better get your act together before I snatch him up and show him what this old cat can do,” Granny said with a playful sway of her hips.

Dear Grandpa Dan, Mom said you had a sense of humor, so you’ll appreciate the fact that for eleven years I never drank more than a couple sips of anything at once, because I had heard you died from drinking too much, and I didn’t want that to happen to me. Then in sixth-grade health class, I realized you died from drinking too much alcohol, which infected your liver. Weirdly, I still drink in small sips. It’s a hard habit to break. As you know, your timing is not good. Apparently, you were born on Pearl Harbor Day, two weeks before your own dad left for war (and never came back). And then you died two weeks before Danny was born. All of this made Mom nervous about bad things happening around babies’ births. But then nothing happened when I was born, so that was a relief. Anyway, Mom named Danny after you. She listened to your song, “Danny Boy,” every day before and after he was born. I heard her tell Granny that she’s scared she bathed Danny in sadness hormones, and that turned him into a sad child. Were you sad? I know everyone thought you were funny, but were you sad beneath it all? Is that why you drank too much? I think if you were here with us, you and Danny would be great friends. He loves cars, too, and he’s even funny sometimes. Maybe if you were here, you could talk to Mom and tell her not to be so worried all the time. Granny says if you were Danny’s parent, you would smack him upside the ear. I don’t know if smacking would work, but I’d love to see that. Anyway, I hope heaven bathes you in happiness. And I hope you’re waiting for Granny. She’s afraid you might have a girlfriend up there. Love, Your Granddaughter Molly