“Orpheus said the mind is a slide ruler. It can fit around anything. Show me your body, he said. It only means one thing.”

“This is what it is to love an artist: The moon is always rising above your house. The houses of your neighbors look dull and lacking in moonlight. But he is always going away from you. Inside his h...”

“I hate parties.And a wedding is the biggest party of all.All the guests arrived and Orpheus is taking a shower.He's always taking a shower when the guests arrive so he doesn't have to greet them.Th...”

“I always thought there would be more interesting people at my wedding.”

“Orpheus never liked words. He had his music. He would get a funny look on his face and I would say what are you thinking about and he would always be thinking about music.”

“If we were in a restaurant sometimes Orpheus would look sullen and wouldn't talk to me and I thought people felt sorry for me. I should have realized that women envied me. Their husbands talked too...”

“My mother... she is beautiful, softened at the edges and tempered with a spine of steel. I want to grow old and be like her.”

“As mothers and daughters, we are connected with one another. My mother is the bones of my spine, keeping me straight and true. She is my blood, making sure it runs rich and strong. She is the beati...”

“It's not always easy being her daughter.' I think,' she said, 'sometimes it's hard no matter whose daughter you are.”

“Being a dad is quite rewarding and even magical at times. It is our greatest chance to do something right in our lives that will keep making the world a brighter place even generations after we are...”

“I always wondered why God was supposed to be a father," she whispers. Fathers always want you to measure up to something. Mothers are the ones who love you unconditionally, don't you think?”

“Sigmund Freud, the father of psychiatry and an atheist, theorized that ones attitude toward ones father largely shaped ones attitude toward God.”

“Balt Van Tassel was an easy indulgent soul; he loved his daughter better even than his pipe, and, like a reasonable man and an excellent father, let her have her way in everything.”

“He had accessorized his life with everything but paternal instinct.”

“Even Dad likes it," said Caddy, and her father agreed that he did. In a way. Being a broad-minded, tolerant, artistic sort of person. Or so people told him..."Oh, yes?" said Saffron, rolling her ey...”