“Why don’t we just invite them to dinner and massacare them when they’re drunk?” “You heard the man, there’s 7000 of them” “Ah…so it would have to be something simple with pasta then?” Pratchett.

I come from a family that had an alcoholic and a binge drinker in it. Drinking and smoking helped kill my grandfather at age 70 and also helped kill my abusive first stepfather who died at the age of 45. It also took many years for me to overcome the flashbacks from my childhood. I lived it. I know the truth. Drinking has no place in the home.

Duane Alan Hahn

And we are governed with our mother’s spirits

Lydia Hoyt Farmer :

Happy is that mother whose ability to help her children continues on from babyhood and manhood into maturity. Blessed is the son who need not leave his mother at the threshold of the world’s activities, but may always and everywhere have her blessing and her help. Thrice blessed are the son and the mother between whom there exists an association not only physical and affectional, but spiritual and intellectual, and broad and wise as is the scope of each being.

It’s so much darker when a light goes out than it would have been if it had never shone. John Steinbeck,

Children don’t say his name or try to find him.

Dad is not a word they use. His absence is a thin

Erratic line through the years. At five, his own

Father left, and never returned. Call it a pattern.

The Welfare Of My Enemy by Anthony Lawrence

http://rochfordstreetreview.com/2012/03/27/poetry-of-the-great-australian-nightmare-rae-desmond-jones-reviews-the-welfare-of-my-enemy-by-anthony-lawrence/

“To show the thumb” is a vulgar act amongst children and stupid people in Kashmir .

I took out the ashes from the fire-place, I put them into a basket ,and then threw them away. I have done three works. 
I woke up the baby and gave him a little milk, and then I put him to sleep again. I have done six works. 

As busy as a hen with one chicken. 

http://archive.org/stream/dictionaryofkash014372mbp/dictionaryofkash014372mbp_djvu.txt

Are the horns too heavy for the bullock ?
No matter how large the family the father would not willingly part with one of his children 

A man’s true character comes out when he’s drunk. Charles Chaplin

Please Stop, Mom.

© Kayla S. Birdno

I smell the whiskey on your breath.
And you beg for me to put your temper to the test.
You slap me around, and call me names.
Mom, I’m sick of playing these games.

Source: Please Stop Drinking, Mom, Addiction Poem about Family http://www.familyfriendpoems.com/poem/please-stop-drinking-mom#ixzz2uPNTXqOz
Family Friend Poems

Alcohol is perfectly consistent in its effects upon man. Drunkenness is merely an exaggeration. A foolish man drunk becomes maudlin; a bloody man, vicious; a coarse man, vulgar.

WILLA CATHER, “On the Divide,” The Troll Garden

Read more at http://www.notable-quotes.com/a/alcoholism_quotes.html#K71wx3yMtQWE4xcO.99

Illustrated Sydney News (NSW : 1853 – 1872), Saturday 13 May 1893

 

 

There’s a special kind of freedom sisters enjoy. Freedom to share innermost thoughts, to ask a favour, to show their true feelings. The freedom to simply be themselves

 

Portrait of the Autist as a New World Driver”, from the 1974 collection,Lunch & Counterlunch:

LES MURRAY

. . . . .
they simplify
who say the Artist’s a child
they miss the point closely: an artist
even if he has brothers, sisters, spouse
is an only child

among the self-taught
the loners, chart-freaks, bush encyclopedists
there are protocols, too; we meet
gravely as stiff princes, and swap fact:
did you know some bats can climb side on?

 http://www.hotsdots.com/poetry/author/mduwell/

I smell the whiskey on your breath. And you beg for me to put your temper to the test. You slap me around, and call me names. Mom, I’m sick of playing these games.

Please Stop, Mom. © Kayla S. Birdno

The Daily News (Perth, WA : 1882 – 1950), Tuesday 8 August 1950,

http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article84473769

Where there is love there is no darkness.

Burundian proverb

http://afritorial.com/the-best-72-african-wise-proverbs/

 

Riches

© Jeanne D. Rhein

They say that times were tough then
That money was very tight
But I remember my childhood
And I know that can’t be right

Mom would cook our dinner
Dad came home at five
We were all sitting at the table
Waiting for him to arrive

We wouldn’t eat from a microwave
Or a restaurant down the street
We all ate Mom’s home cooking
And boy that can’t be beat

We didn’t eat in front of the TV
Or with a phone in our hand
We weren’t plugged into a stereo
bopping to the latest band

We would all sit at the table
Everyone in their place
There were never any surprises
We recognized every face

Brothers to the left of me
Sisters to the right
That’s the way we ate dinner
Every single night

We laughed we joked we talked we ate
We were a family don’t you see
Though some may have been raised poor
You can see it wasn’t me

We ate collards we ate biscuits
We ate fatback and blackeyed peas
We said yes sir we said no sir
We said thank you ma’am and please

So when you talk of family life
Or how it used to be
Though many had more money
None were as rich as me

Source: Poem About A Loving Family Eating Together, Riches http://www.familyfriendpoems.com/poem/riches#ixzz2rD8gkHlt
Family Friend Poems

 

 

All happy families resemble one another; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. ~ Lev Tolstoi

May God grant you always…
A sunbeam to warm you,
A moonbeam to charm you,
A sheltering angel, so nothing can harm you.

http://tacomaweekly.tripod.com/Irish-Quotations.html

It is as grandmothers that our mothers come into the fullness of their grace. Christopher Morley

foto of nana lynne in raleigh nsw summertime 2013

I’ll dance with mob on this red Land, munda wiru

place

I’ll dance away them half-caste lies ‘cos I got my

Nanas face!

Ali Cobby Eckermann

‘First Time I Met My Grandmother’

http://www.emsah.uq.edu.au/awsr/new_site/awbr_archive/147/Cobby.htm

Recognize others, be recognized, help others, be helped; such is a family relationship.

‘Ike aku, ‘ike mai, kokua aku kokua mai; pela iho la ka nohana ‘ohana.

Many native Hawaiians live with their extended family and family is the most important part of life for them. This saying teaches why they should put family first…In the Ohana or family, you know others and they know you, you help others and know you will be helped if there is anything you need.

http://www.k12.hi.us/~waianaeh/waianhi/olelo.html

ALI COBBY ECKERMANN

My heart is Round ready to echo the music of my

family but the Square

within me remains

 

The Square stops me in my entirety. 

God couldn’t be everywhere so he created Aunts.

KOFFEE KLATCH

Aunt Lorna’s Kisses by Elizabeth Honey

Aunt Lorna kisses into space

near your ear, not on your face.

I don’t call that kissing

I call that missing.

Some day you will be old enough to start reading fairy tales again.”

― C.S. Lewis

You don’t pay back your parents. You can’t. The debt you owe them gets collected by your children, who hand it down in turn. It’s a sort of entailment. Or if you don’t have children of the body, it’s left as a debt to your common humanity. Or to your God, if you possess or are possessed by one.

Lois McMaster Bujold

“Worry is a thin stream of fear trickling through the mind. If encouraged, it cuts a channel into which all other thoughts are drained.”

A.S. Roche

http://www.marinal-anon.org/pages/welcome/quotes-and-sayings.php

A longing to wander tears my heart when I hear trees rustling in the wind at evening. If one listens to them silently for a long time, this longing reveals its kernel, its meaning. It is not so much a matter of escaping from one’s suffering, though it may seem to be so. It is a longing for home, for a memory of the mother, for new metaphors for life. It leads home. Every path leads homeward, every step is birth, every step is death, every grave is mother.

― Hermann Hesse, Bäume. Betrachtungen und Gedichte

Those who derive fun watching lunatics, ought to have one as a child or relation to know the pains of it.

Nigerian

There are forty kinds of lunacy, but only one kind of common sense.

(Bantu

the lone one; the young and fatherless—the orphan

The old and wifeless—the widower; the old and husbandless—the widow; the old and childless—; these four are the people most in need below heaven, and they have no one to whom to cry, so when King Wen reigned his love went out first to them’ (Mencius, Book II, chapter 5).

Don’t move the ancient boundary stone. Don’t encroach on the fields of the fatherless: for their Defender is strong. He will plead their case against you.

 

The only creature on earth whose natural habitat is a zoo is the zookeeper.

~Robert Brault, http://www.robertbrault.com

http://www.quotegarden.com/a-rights.html

Parents are not mere caretakers who function like zoo keepers who feed, contain, and call the vet when there is a problem. Parents are to rear their children, not just to get them through school, on a schedule and out of their hair, but for the kid’s future life–to function as complete adults of good character with coping skills to get the most joy out of life as they live into their 30s, 40s, and for life.

http://www.godward.org/proverbs%20archives/archives_index.htm

“Sometimes I think my papa is an accordion. When he looks at me and smiles and breathes, I hear the notes.”

― Markus Zusak, The Book Thief

It is so easy to get a lot of noise out of an accordion that it is very difficult to get music out of one. In the hands of an unfeeling person or a show-off, it can be a pain to listen to. But in the hands of a sensitive person with taste and restraint — and also with a good deal of strength and power in arms and shoulders — perhaps it can be just as beautiful as any instrument. Listen to the accordions accompanying the Piatnitsky chorus on Russian folksongs, or the Louisiana cajun accordion (“windjammers” they called them — Leadbelly could play one).

 

 Pete Seeger in his Johnny Appleseed, Jr. column in the February-March 1963 issue of Sing Out! magazine

 

http://www.pauloorts.com/Home/favorite-quotes

Our survival has been about laughter, otherwise you cry a river.

—Leah Purcell, Aboriginal director and actor

http://www.creativespirits.info/aboriginalculture/people/aboriginal-humour

“You white people are so strange. We think it is very primitive for a child to have only two parents.”

To be ill adjusted to a deranged world is not a breakdown.”

― Jeanette Winterson

When a dying man cries, it is not because of where he is going which he knows nothing about, but because of what he wishes he would have done in the world he is leaving behind.

nigeria

http://www.motherlandnigeria.com/proverbs.html

Always kiss your children goodnight – even if they’re already asleep.

~H. Jackson Brown, Jr.

“There is no such thing as a “broken family.” Family is family, and is not determined by marriage certificates, divorce papers, and adoption documents. Families are made in the heart. The only time family becomes null is when those ties in the heart are cut. If you cut those ties, those people are not your family. If you make those ties, those people are your family. And if you hate those ties, those people will still be your family because whatever you hate will always be with you.”

― C. JoyBell C.

The secret of success is constancy of purpose.

 

 

“The two of us praying like this to the Black Madonna Suddenly washes over me, and I’m filled with love for my mother. The best gift she has give me is the constancy of her belief. Whatever I become, she loves me. To her, I am enough.”

― Ann Kidd Taylor, Traveling With Pomegranates: A Mother-Daughter Story

what destiny does not do is home visits. You have to go for it”

― Carlos Ruiz Zafón, The Shadow of the Wind

Relations must be seldom visited; kitchen gardens often.

http://oaks.nvg.org/chinese-proverbs.html

 

 

He told me about his slow realization that when one person in a family was sick, the whole family was sick. In Jason’s case, the sick person was his father, who was nice enough when he was sober, but mean as a snake when he was drunk.”

― Lauren Myracle, Shine

“(Nicholas)”Am I dead?”
An odd question, but then she remembered her mourning attire. “No sir, you are not.”
He relaxed a moment, then turned his head slightly as if searching for other passengers. His brows dived in a scowl.
Am I married?”
She wasn’t sure how to answer. His kid gloves hid any evidence of his matrimonial state, but his expression of instantaneous alarm and regret suggested he was referring specifically to her.
No sir, we are not.”

― Donna MacMeans, The Education of Mrs. Brimley

Tom Waits “There ain’t no devil, only God when he’s drunk.”

― Tom Waits

Alcohol misuse has significant adverse effects on parenting including inconsistency, emotional detachment and neglect. Family life can become characterised by chaos and a lack of routine, and in some cases unpredictable behaviour associated with mental health problems and violence

http://www.12steptreatmentcentres.com/alcohol-misuse-on-children-of-drunken-parents-32.asp

A man should avoid these six evils: lust, anger, avarice pleasure, pride, and rashness, for free of these he may be happy. (Sanskrit).

I Came to buy a smile—today—But just a single smile—The smallest one upon your faceWill suit me just as well—The one that no one else would missIt shone so very small—I’m pleading at the “counter”—…

Source: A man should avoid these six evils: lust, anger, avarice pleasure, pride, and rashness, for free of these he may be happy. (Sanskrit). | THE OLD PROVERBIAL RECOVERY

Bunny’s Excuse. There was once a wicked old sinner Who fancied a rabbit for dinner, But the bunny he met Said: “Don’t kill me yet, For I really am still a beginner.”

My living problems also cease to be struggles.

Heaven designs to suit our trials to our strength.

Though the sun shines, leave not your cloak at home.

” The queen’s mocking laughter cut in. “This is your treasure, Lord Sheftu?”

“Aye. The greatest treasure in Egypt—a maid whose loyalty cannot be bought. Whatever bargain we make, Daughter of the Sun, must include her freedom.”
― Eloise Jarvis McGraw, Mara, Daughter of the Nile

RISE TOGETHER

ADAM T NA SPEAKER

IF DRINKING DON’T KILL ME

THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN ARM

SMALL TRIBUTE FOR IZZY FOREAL BY PETER CARRUTHERS

RISE TOGETHER

ADAM T NA SPEAKER

IF DRINKING DON’T KILL ME

THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN ARM

SMALL TRIBUTE FOR IZZY FOREAL BY PETER CARRUTHERS