Order, cleanliness, seemliness make a structure that is half support, half ritual, and - if it does not create it - maintains decency. Florida Scott-Maxwell More Quotes by Florida Scott-Maxwell More Quotes From Florida Scott-Maxwell She [a mother] never outgrows the burden of love, and to the end she carries the weight of hope for those she bore. Oddly, very oddly, she is forever surprised and even faintly wronged that her sons and daughters are just people, for many mothers hope and half expect that their new-born child will make the world better, will somehow be a redeemer. Perhaps they are right, and they can believe that the rare quality they glimpsed in the child is active in the burdened adult. Florida Scott-Maxwell daughtermotherchildren I want to tell people approaching and perhaps fearing old age that it is a time of discovery. If they say "Of what?" I can only answer "We must find out for ourselves, otherwise it wouldn't be discovery." Florida Scott-Maxwell agediscoverypeople To know another, and to be known by another--that is everything. Florida Scott-Maxwell knownknows Anger must be the energy that has not yet found its fight channel. Florida Scott-Maxwell atheismfightingfear Our age is so gregarious that there is at present a marked prejudice against anyone being alone. It is looked down on, and a need to be alone is almost considered a fault, a weakness, as though if one cannot endure - more - enjoy being with other people every minute one is aloof, unreal, and somehow to be pitied. Florida Scott-Maxwell solitudeagepeople Making those we love happy sounds innocent as a dove, but it can be as destructive as a lion. Florida Scott-Maxwell innocentlionssound as we age we are more alive than seems likely, convenient, or even bearble. Too often our problem is the fervor of life within us. My dear fellow octogenarians, how are we to carry so much life, and what are we to do with it? Florida Scott-Maxwell aliveproblemage Another secret we carry is that though drab outside - wreckage to the eye, mirrors a mortification - inside we flame with a wild life that is almost incommunicable. Florida Scott-Maxwell flamesmirrorseye As I do not live in an age when rustling black skirts billow about me, and I do not carry an ebony stick to strike the floor in sharp rebuke, as this is denied me, I rap out a sentence in my note book and feel better. If a grandmother wants to put her foot down, the only safe place to do it these days is in a note book. Florida Scott-Maxwell grandmotherrapbook love at any age takes everything you've got. Florida Scott-Maxwell age Difference of opinion has never been sufficiently appreciated. It is the unexpected, the unknowable, the divine irrationality of life that saves us. Florida Scott-Maxwell opiniondifferencesserious Is there any stab as deep as wondering where and how much you failed those you loved. Florida Scott-Maxwell familypainwonder I feel most real when alone, even most alive when alone. Better to say that the liveliness of companionship and the liveliness of solitude differ, and the latter is never as exhausting as the former. Florida Scott-Maxwell alivesolitudereal Admiration is one of the chief delights of living. Florida Scott-Maxwell chiefsadmirationdelight One hardly dares to say that love is the core of the relationship, though love is sought for and created in relationship; love is rather the marvel when it is there, but it is not always there, and to know another and to be known by another - that is everything. Florida Scott-Maxwell love-relationshipdarelove-is In very truth the days are almost free, and if it is another way of saying that our lives are empty, well -- there are days when emptiness is spacious, and non-existence elevating . . . Florida Scott-Maxwell emptyemptinessway You need only claim the event of your life to make yourself yours. When you truly possess all you have been and done, which may take some time, you are fierce with reality. Florida Scott-Maxwell Life does not accommodate you, it shatters you. It is meant to, and it couldn't do it better. Every seed destroys its container or else there would be no fruition. Florida Scott-Maxwell seedbetteryoulife It is not easy to be sure that being yourself is worth the trouble, but we do know it is our sacred duty. Florida Scott-Maxwell yourselfknowdutyeasy
