I was good at keeping my mother from crying.
I'm always fascinated by the theme of children who parent the adults.
When I was in school, I was too short to erase the blackboard. It was my job to put away the chairs.
The dutifulness of children is the foundation of all virtues.
I had to start being aware of what I ate, what I'm planning to eat and take my twice-daily medication accordingly. That's not so difficult now, but when you're 10 years old, it's tough, let me tell you.
Being raised Catholic in a pressure-cooker household besieged by alcohol and bill collectors enforced and heightened a sense of sentry duty in me, the oldest of five children and the one most responsible for keeping everything from capsizing. Wild indulgence was for other people, the non-worriers.
It's as if God gave you something-all those stories- and said, "Here you are. Try not to lose it." But children lose everything unless somebody is there to help them, and if your parents are too stupid to do it, maybe i ought to.
A wretched child Is he who does not return his parents' care.
The death of Mrs. Lincoln was a serious loss to her husband and children. Abraham's sister Sarah was only eleven years old, and the tasks and cares of the little household were altogether too heavy for her years and experience.
I was a latchkey kid from the time I was 7 years old.
Since my parents both worked, they hired me when I was 11 to make dinner every night. I got a quarter a day. But I was always making things like duck a l'orange and baked Alaska. I was a little bit nutty.
I was my mother's translator until I was probably 12 years old, and I remember how people looked at her.
I was raised to work for my father when I was four.
