#memoir

Lieux de memoire . . . 'exist because there are no longer any milieux de memoire, settings in which memory is a real part of everyday experience.' And what are lieux de memoire? [They] are . . . vestiges . . . the rituals of a ritual-less society. ↗

— Tony Judt

#memory #milieux-de-memoire #rituals #vestiges #experience

In the English language, it all comes down to this: Twenty-six letters, when combined correctly, can create magic. Twenty -six letters form the foundation of a free, informed society. ↗

— John Grogan

#inspirational #journalism #memoir #family

Write about small, self-contained incidents that are still vivid in your memory. If you remember them, it's because they contain a larger truth that your readers will recognize in their own lives. Think small and you'll wind up finding the big themes in your family saga. ↗

— William Knowlton Zinsser

#writing #family

My father has the proper degrees and framed pictures on the walls, though they're mostly taped over with photos of children, family and friends. Images from the past and present and trips and experiences combined with files on the floor – it's a happening or collage in progress. ↗

— Alex McKeithen

#experience

We're human. We all occasionally wet ourselves. No one is really better than anyone else. We're just all trying to make it through the year as best we can. We screw up sometimes. We succeed sometimes. We laugh. We cry. We go on. Those are the things we should really share with each other this holiday season, right, if we dare send a letter? We should share the truth. We should share the insanity. ↗

— Wade Rouse

#family

The Brit's face shares a heritage with a junkyard butt-sniffing mutt. It's a hard-earned moonshine mug, dotted with a hairy mole that looks like a rat's been gnawing on it. His beard looks like a white sneeze. The teeth are jagged and out of alignment, having opened quarts at Jiffy Quick Lube for half a decade. ↗

— Brett Tate

#funny #humor #humour #memoir #sex

When I was five and Sarah seven, my mother went on a trip. She was gone from our home in Rochester, New York, for several days. But she was often gone — not always from the house but missing from our lives nonetheless. Then one day Sarah and I returned from school to find her standing at the door, a piñata in her hand, smiling her spellbinding, I-am-overjoyed-at-the-sight-of-you smile. Now when I imagine that scene, my mind’s eye puts a sombrero on her head, but I doubt she was wearing one. She had just come home from a trip to Juarez, Mexico, where she had obtained a quickie divorce. She told us she was taking us to live in Florida. We had no idea where – or what – Florida was. “There will be oranges there,” she said. “They’re everywhere. You can reach up and pull them off the trees. ↗

— Katie Hafner

#memoir #mothers-and-daughters #home

So this needs to be said, and so I will try to say it ↗

— Jason Najum

#culture-critique #inspirational #memoir #philosophy #pop-culture

That night I slept like a baby. When I woke the next morning I knew I was going to smoke heroin again. Everything that day was enjoyable: sitting on the bus, working all day – it all felt good. It was the best day of my life. ↗

— Christine Lewry

#memoir #true-stories #true-stories-drugs #life

The interior life expands and fills; it approaches the edge of skin; it thickens with its own vivid story; it even begins to hear rumors, from beyond the horizon skin’s rim, of nations and wars. You wake one day and discover your grandmother; you wake another day and notice, like any curious naturalist, the boys. ↗

— Annie Dillard

#boys #connection #memoir #sexuality #life