Quotations

"I remember talking with a friend who has worked for many years at the catholic worker, a ministry to the poor in New York City. Daily she tries to respond to waves of human misery that are as ceaseless as surf in that community. Out of my deep not-knowing, I asked her how she could keep doing a work that never showed any results, work in which the problem keep getting worse instead of better. I will never forget her enigmatic answer: The thing you don't understand, Parker, is that just because something is impossible doesn't mean you shouldn't do it."

— Parker j. Palmer, American activist, born February 28, 1939

"My playground was the theater. I'd sit and watch my mother pretend for a living. As a young girl, that's pretty seductive."

— Gwyneth Paltrow, American actress, born September 27, 1972

"If I make my kids something delicious and we sit down to eat it, and I put my phone away and I really listen, that is such money in the bank."

— Gwyneth Paltrow, American actress, born September 27, 1972

"I asked my dad once, 'How did you and Mom stay married for 33 years?' And he said, 'Well, we never wanted to get divorced at the same time."

— Gwyneth Paltrow, American actress, born September 27, 1972

"I'll probably get kicked out of our school for admitting this, but I let Apple stay home yesterday. I just needed to be with her. We went out to lunch, we went to the beauty salon, we were together."

— Gwyneth Paltrow, American actress, born September 27, 1972

"I don't want to be a tree; I want to be its meaning."

— Orhan Pamuk, Turkish-American author, born June 7, 1952

"Those who can laugh without cause have either found the true meaning of happiness or have gone stark raving mad."

— Norm Papernick

"Whenever a song is born and wherever it is sung, it belongs to everyone. That, really, is the reason why music exists: so that it cannot be fenced in by frontiers."

— Yiannis Parios, Greek singer, born March 8, 1946

"I realized by using the high notes of the chords as a melodic line, and by the right harmonic progression, I could play what I heard inside me. That's when I was born."

— Charlie Parker, American saxophonist, born 1920

"If you don't live it, it won't come out your horn."

— Charlie Parker, American saxophonist, born 1920

"Of course I talk to myself. I like a good speaker, and I appreciate an intelligent audience."

— Dorothy Parker, American poet, born 1893

"Time may be a great healer, but it's a lousy beautician."

— Dorothy Parker, American poet, born 1893

"Don't look at me in that tone of voice."

— Dorothy Parker, American poet, born 1893

"If you wear a short enough skirt, the party will come to you."

— Dorothy Parker, American poet, born 1893