A Quote by Hugh Leonard

My grandmother made dying her life's work. — © Hugh Leonard
My grandmother made dying her life's work.
It's right around this time that her Grandmother Hall dies. And Eleanor Roosevelt is responsible for making all the funeral arrangements. And there are a couple of things that she really understands, as she contemplates her grandmother's life and makes the funeral arrangements. One, she's really talented, an organizational woman. She knows how to do things. She begins to compare her life to her grandmother's life. And it's very clear to her that being a devoted wife and a devoted mother is not enough.
I heard a story about a woman who grew up in Texas. When she was having trouble in her life, she would visit her grandmother, who lived nearby and always had a kind word and some wisdom to pass on. One day she was complaining to her grandmother about some situation and her grandmother just turned to her, smiled sadly, and said, "Sometimes, darlin', you've just got to rise above yourself in this life." I've remembered that wise advice many times as I've faced trouble in my life.
She [Eleanor Roosevelt]wants a life of her own. Her grandmother could have been a painter. Her grandmother could have done so much more than she did with her life. And Eleanor Roosevelt decides she is going to do everything possible with her life. She's going to live a full life.
My grandmother's house - she ran it just like her grandmother and her great-grandmother. They didn't have electricity. They had wood stoves that never got cold.
You made her apologize for sickness. For her courage. You made her feel sorry for dying.
My own faith was nurtured by my grandmother and her clinging deeply to her faith when she was dying a painful and slow death from cancer.
What was so moving for [Diane Wilson], and also for me, is that she felt the Bay itself was like her grandmother. She said, "I don't think there's a woman alive who would give up fighting for her child, or her mother, or her grandmother."
I remember a specific moment, watching my grandmother hang the clothes on the line, and her saying to me, 'you are going to have to learn to do this,' and me being in that space of awareness and knowing that my life would not be the same as my grandmother's life.
Then she saw a star fall, leaving behind it a bright streak of fire. “Someone is dying,” thought the little girl, for her old grandmother, the only one who had ever loved her, and who was now dead, had told her that when a star falls, a soul was going up to God.
Through my grandmother's stories always life moved, moved heroically toward an end. Nobody ever cried in my grandmother's stories. They worked, or schemed, or fought. But no crying. When my grandmother died, I didn't cry, either. Something about my grandmother's stories (without her ever having said so) taught me the uselessness of crying about anything."
My grandmother is one of the biggest inspirations of my life. She was my biggest fan, and she made sure everybody knew it. Her never-ending joy was infectious, and there wasn't anyone who could beat her at partying and having fun.
I was raised by my grandmother. She had a very difficult time, raised all her kids, my father and everybody. Listening to those stories and finding her so strong, poised. Anybody who came close to her was made to feel blessed. And at the same time, it didn't matter how strong a person was, in front of her, their head would go down. She carried through her life raising everybody. That is my model.
My grandmother used to get her shoes made in Paris in the '30s, and they would be shipped to her in Singapore.
Having seen my mom in community volunteer work my whole life and in Congress for 25 years, it is true as she often says that she sees her service as an extension of her role as a mother and a grandmother.
I asked my grandmother how a Hungarian Jewish person can experience being Jewish. My grandmother answered was the only choice was to "keep quiet." I can understand her because she was a Holocaust survivor, and for her survival, she had to keep quiet. But I didn't obey my grandmother when I was a child, and in this case, I don't obey her either.
Her [Eleanor Roosevelt] father was the love of her life. Her father always made her feel wanted, made her feel loved, where her mother made her feel, you know, unloved, judged harshly, never up to par. And she was her father's favorite, and her mother's unfavorite. So her father was the man that she went to for comfort in her imaginings.
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