# Familie

"On the line beside Describe your family, I wrote, 'Bad.'What is your favorite subject in school? 'None.'List three of your favorite activities. 'Soccer, ballet, and fighting.'Two of those favorite activities were lies but one of them was the truth.I am fond of fighting."

"My first paying job might have been doing a play, actually. My mom paid me to dress up as a flounder at my sister's 'Little Mermaid' - themed birthday party when I was little."

"Come on,' I said, taking his hand. Clutching the afghan with the other hand, he trailed down the hall after me, a snow white giant in tiny red underwear."

"Who were these people? Where was all this joy, and where does joy go when it leaves your family? Does it go into someone else's family, soak into the earth, or does it dissolve away like your breath in the winter? And if it doesn't leave like this, then why isn't there any left for me?"

"So I'll send my parents money, and maybe they can get a bigger place, too. They can even relax when they're older, the way they deserve to. Without having to worry about how they're going to survive. But for now, I'm the one who has to survive."

"I think that the best thing we can do for our children is to allow them to do things for themselves, allow them to be strong, allow them to experience life on their own terms, allow them to take the subway... Let them be better people, let them believe more in themselves."

"...In order to achieve improved outcomes for families at risk, a paradigm shift is required so that unequal outcomes for families and children are seen as social injustices, rather than as products of individual dysfunction or deficit."

"I came running down the stairs that morning, like it was Christmas. My parents were already up. In my family, presents never waited; they were there upon waking. Our family has a problem with what they called delayed gratification. We want what we want when we want it, and we always want it now."

"People say a mother is only as happy as her least happy child. But what if the state of that child's happiness has become a mystery? What if that child is no longer a child but a young man who has removed himself to a great distance and encased himself in silence?"

"My family always helped me. I had people around me who always pushed me to be the best: my dad, my mum. My dad used to play and coach as well. But I wasn't born with shiny things."