Your children make it impossible to regret your past. They're its finest fruits. Sometimes the only ones. Anna Quindlen More Quotes by Anna Quindlen More Quotes From Anna Quindlen It is so easy to waste our lives: Our days, our hours, our minutes ... it is so easy to exist instead of live. Anna Quindlen hours waste easy I'm always keeping an eye on the court. Also, when the members of Congress came to his office during the budget debacle of a year and a half back and said, "We want to de-fund Planned Parenthood," he said, "Not going to happen." Those apparently were more or less his exact words. Anna Quindlen office eye years Every story has already been told. Once you've read Anna Karenina, Bleak House, The Sound and the Fury, To Kill a Mockingbird and A Wrinkle in Time, you understand that there is really no reason to ever write another novel. Except that each writer brings to the table, if she will let herself, something that no one else in the history of time has ever had. Anna Quindlen wrinkles inspirational-life writing Americans like warm characters. It's why, no matter what he did in the early days, they kind of resonated to Bill Clinton because he seems like a guy that you could sit down and have a burger and a beer with. It's even why, despite the fact that he sometimes seemed to be not firing on all cylinders, lots of them still like George W. Bush - because he seemed like the kind of guy you could have a burger and a beer with. Anna Quindlen guy beer character I always wanted to be a fiction writer, but I couldn't figure out how you could be a novelist and make any money, which continues to be a problem for novelists the world over. Anna Quindlen novelists fiction world The unemployment rate among the young in the United States is still very disconcerting, although we all know it's nowhere near as bad as it is in some of the European countries, where in some places it approaches 50 percent. Anna Quindlen unemployment united-states country Wow, so much of the way I've transacted my life... so much of the results that I'm happy about are because of what Daddy did. Anna Quindlen wow daddy way I really feel like if you can get past your fear, if you can say, "Uh-uh, I'm afraid to do that and I'm going to do it anyhow," that that's really the way to have a satisfying life moving forward. I think I had that kind of fearlessness even as a young person. It wasn't tempered by experience or wisdom, but it took me a long way. Anna Quindlen past moving thinking A life of unremitting caution, without the carefree - or even, occasionally, the careless - may turn out to be half a life. Anna Quindlen half may inspirational I know that it's very dispiriting for people in their twenties, who expected to graduate from college, get their own apartments, get a job, and move forward with their lives, and in fact are still now living with Mom and Dad, which is challenging for all involved. Anna Quindlen dad mom jobs Writing for UrbanMoms has awarded me a multitude of amazing opportunities. I have traveled to new places; alone and with my family. I have discovered new products, new books, new trends and new restaurants, and been able to share them with my readers. I've met other wonderful writers and many incredible celebrities. Anna Quindlen writing opportunity book Trying to be perfect may be inevitable for people who are smart and ambitious and interested in the world and its good opinion...What is really hard, and really amazing, is giving up on being perfect and beginning the work of becoming yourself. Anna Quindlen smart giving-up people At the same time that you've got to open yourself up to the fact that experience is going to teach you year after year, decade after decade. I remember I very badly wanted to write a newspaper column when I was only 21 years old, and I went to my editor and told him that, and he said, "You're a really good writer, but you haven't lived long enough to be qualified to live out loud." Anna Quindlen editors writing years You realize that especially when you're writing a book like this, looking back on your life, that there's just such a depth of understanding you acquire over time with the help of the people who love you that that's when you can really get down to what you really think and believe. Anna Quindlen love-you believe book I'm just remembering myself at 22 or 23. I was all engine and no steering. (Laughter) I had the wheels but I had no steering. I do think it's true that when you're younger, you're more likely to listen to all the naysayers, and people are always telling you how you ought to behave and what kind of job you should get and how you should look. Anna Quindlen laughter jobs thinking I think the last couple of years of life for many, many people are the same as they were 50, 60, 70 years ago. They could be really tough because of infirmity. Anna Quindlen couple years thinking In the same way the Brits had to get used to the idea that the sun had set on the British Empire, I think that there's the subrosa feeling that we are at the end of the American century, and I think that's very, very hard for Americans to take. Anna Quindlen feelings ideas thinking I think there was a long period of time when we got real invested in a youth culture, and not coincidentally it was when the baby boomers, who let's face it, take up a lot of space on the planet, were young. Anna Quindlen real baby thinking Grief remains one of the few things that has the power to silence us. Anna Quindlen funeral silence grief Maybe I had three children in the first place so I wouldn't ever have to play board games. In my religion, martyrs die. Anna Quindlen games play children
