I am the woman I grew to be partly in spite of my mother, and partly because of the extraordinary love of her best friends, and my own best friends' mothers, and from surrogates, many of whom were not women at all but gay men. I have loved them my entire life, even after their passing.
The evenings grew longer; kitchen windows stayed open after dinner and peepers could be heard in the marsh. Isabelle, stepping out to sweep her porch steps, felt absolutely certain that some wonderful change was arriving in her life. The strength of this belief was puzzling; what she was feeling, she decided, was really the presence of God.
I grew up in an atmosphere where words were an integral part of culture.
Sixty percent of all Indians live in urban areas, but nobody's writing about them. They're really an underrepresented population, and the ironic thing is very, very few of those we call Native American writers actually grew up on reservations, and yet most of their work is about reservations.
I grew up with British rock.
I hated to fight all the time just to enjoy my day. Fighting wasn't the kind of thing that I enjoyed, but I grew to enjoy it because I did it so long.
I have a sister who is a dancer and dance teacher. We grew up dancing together. I wanted to become a ballerina when I was a kid, so she and I were always at ballet conservatories and going to school with our hair in buns.
Humility was an important part of the way I grew up. And I found that to be less common when I moved to California. That's not to say humble people don't exist there, but ambition seems really important.
I have never denied my background or my culture. I have taught my child to embrace her Mexican heritage, to love my first language, Spanish, to learn about Mexican history, music, folk art, food, and even the Mexican candy I grew up with.
Both my parents were migrant workers who came to the U. K. in the Fifties to better themselves. The culture I grew up in was to work hard, save hard and to look after your family.
My excuse for everything is that I grew up in Florida.
I don't really find a problem with technology or television, or anything. I'm a product of it. I grew up watching TV, and I don't think I'm too dumb or too crazy.
I grew up in New York.
I was always such a skinny kid, so I kind of grew up with an I hate skinny mentality.
Vast and deep the mountain shadows grew.
When I grew up in the church, we were praying because the Communists were going to come over and hang you upside down on a cross, and I so wanted to be a good person, and I had these rosary beads that I would sleep with every night, and I just wanted the blessed Virgin to be on my side.
Things grew and lived in constant adversity, ingenious in solving problems of existence.
The willow is my favorite tree. I grew up near one. It's the most flexible tree in nature and nothing can break it - no wind, no elements, it can bend and withstand anything.
I grew up eating street tacos and burritos on the beach, so I like people who can eat and aren't afraid to show it.
As I grew up, I was continually to suffer hardships in different realms of life - in my family, in my relationship to Japanese society and in my way of living at large in the latter half of the twentieth century.