May Vin

“The work of the mature person is to carry grief in one hand and gratitude in the other and to be stretched large by them. How much sorrow can I hold? That’s how much gratitude I can give. If I carry only grief, I’ll bend toward cynicism and despair. If I have only gratitude, I’ll become saccharine and won’t develop much compassion for other people’s suffering. Grief keeps the heart fluid and soft, which helps make compassion possible.”
― Francis Weller

“Watching Italians eat (especially men, I have to say) is a form of tourism the books don't tell you about. They close their eyes, raise their eyebrows into accent marks, and make sounds of acute appreciation. It's fairly sexy. Of course I don't know how these men behave at home, if they help with the cooking or are vain and boorish and mistreat their wives. I realized Mediterranean cultures have their issues. Fine, don't burst my bubble. I didn’t want to marry these guys, I just wanted to watch. (p. 247)”
― Barbara Kingsolver, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life

“The older one becomes the quicker the present fades into sepia and the past looms up in glorious technicolour”
― Beryl Bainbridge

“No one has the right to do wrong, even if wrong has been done to them.”
― Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning