A Tiny Bit Marvellous Quotes
"When, in argument, you feel like taking the wind out of her sails, it is a better idea to take your sails out of her wind." – Mo (49 yrs)
"I have no sense of anchorage at the moment. I feel frumpy and unbeautiful, and cross, all the time." – Mo
"I am, indeed, big. I fancy I carry off my bigness with a certain élan, with the aplomb of someone easily twenty years my elder." – Oscar (16 yrs)
"I must find a suitable tailor. I must. I am not well pleased with the pathetically paltry style offerings of Pangbourne." – Oscar
"You pass or you fail each exam. If you were previously 'failing' spectacularly but now you are 'failing' by only a little bit, it doesn't matter. You are failing. That's all." – Mo
"The value of dress in relation to good taste is obvious to me." – Oscar
"The irony, of course, is that Dora is beautiful... She loathes her reflection." – Mo
"Families are a frightful inconvenience, true, but nowadays we are too hasty to dismiss them." – Oscar
"I offered her the benefit of my company... I can’t stress enough the importance of being Oscar." – Oscar
"She predicted failure. Even of something so obviously good."
"A short lifetime, but an entire lifetime nevertheless."
"The teachers were pulling their hair out and called us to various excruciating meetings to discuss it."
"She is fit and healthy. She is not a drug addict. She is not an alcoholic. She is not pregnant. She is beautiful. You are beautiful. Everything’s beautiful. Shut up."
"I am just her mum, and that's what renders me helpless with emotion."
"The labyrinthine complicatedness of deciding which subject to do only ’til AS level, and which to continue on with totally baffles me."
"Admittedly the song is a tiny bit … how should I put it folks? … erm … bland."
"I think it’s taking out her eggs or something so she can’t get pregnant."
"ME: OK. How long does sex actually take to do?"
"The cuddling and stuff can take ages but the in and out and done stuff is about five minutes usually. If you’re lucky."
"No, never do that. And conversely, don’t ever keep your sandwiches in a condom either."
"I was on the verge of acute melancholia when, as if by magic, Monday was upon us heralding the glorious and imminent advent of Tuesday."
"The Pater’s sports deodorant would help to staunch the underarm flow, and if not, at least perfume the offending area."
"Each twenty-four hours has meandered past, a snail-like sluggard, mocking me with its retarded impertinence."
"I splashed some of Pamela’s lavender water about my neck and face and tugged some Brylcreem through my unruly shock."
"I am a kid-shrink. They teach kids. It goes one of two ways."
"She goes to school willingly every day. Unheard of."
"The kids are delighted of course, even Husband thinks it is ‘cute’ for Poo to get the chance to be a mother."
"The least you could do would be to invent a malady with the merest modicum of originality."
"What despicable bad manners – to bore your therapist into a torpid oblivion."
"It was nearly time to leave when the conversation turned to our own families."
"I am not a drug addict. I am not an alcoholic. I am not pregnant. I am beautiful."
"He is on target for all A stars and he is their champion chess boy, public-speaking hero and quiz king."
"A lot is NOT. When it comes to Dora and Parents’ Evenings, I am just her mum."
"I don’t want to talk, I want to press on with my book."
"Why is she my mother? Why couldn’t I have one like Lottie’s who just, like listens and doesn’t say stupid untrue stuff all the time just to bloody hurt you?"
"One time, I just went all out and blatantly invented an entire character I named "Quim". Not one person questioned it! Bloody idiots …"
"They listen to me and they hear me but they don’t really look at me – is that it? Have I become invisible?"
"I should heap adorations upon him and drown him in valentines."
"The irony is all too apparent because, of course, she cares very much, certainly about what others make of her."
"I’ve noticed the surrendering of my face, but when did the entire person give up?"
"And anyway, my Psycho. Ed. Report said that I’m a kinaesthetic learner, so the bloody teachers aren’t supposed to give me notes, I have to do mind maps."
"I can't bring myself to put it on. The purple dress is gorgeous. I know it looks better on the bed than it does on me though."
"I can’t believe she doesn’t sense anything is up. Nearly twenty-seven years of marriage. Might he not have learned to notice and evaluate my behavior by now?"
"I don’t want to write. I hate writing this bloody book. It’s like an albatross around my neck."
"I have the most precarious hold on reality at the moment. Reason and logic, two familiar friends, have deserted me."
"I am bafflingly helpless to resist. I don’t stop thinking about him. I am exhilarated. I am alive."
"I am programmed to be professional at work, especially in my room, where so many secrets are told, where so much is entrusted to me."
"We are a good team. I relish the organizing, the action, the busy forward motion, and he enjoys the hiccups, the difficult stuff, the stopping."
"I suppose I ought to think about the difference between a caprice and a lifelong passion."
"How could she do this to me? She said he was a twat. She said he gave her the creeps. And now she’s like going out with him, he’s her bloody actual boyfriend."
"The Pater located a tuxedo for me and a dark business suit for himself, complete with his father’s own RAF service dress cap. Very fine he looked, too."
"A rented space for countless people to taint with their various and sundry base needs."
"I am leaving my old life. I won’t be that wife, that mother any more."
"The gap between my memory, full desire and fantasy, and this rather inferior reality, was beginning to widen."
"They are the point of me. They are where I start and end."
"I felt completely dismissed and unbelievably foolish."
"Best way to fend off a shark attack? – Punch them right in the nose."
"I know, Mum. Thanks. For everything. For … you know … the cake … and everything."
"That house, containing all those beloved flawed people."