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Few Of Us Could Bear To Have Ourselves For Neighbors.

-Mignon McLaughlin

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Few Of Us Could

Mignon McLaughlin

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Few Of Us Could Bear To Have Ourselves For Neighbors.

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Humiliation Is A Vast Country Of Imprecise Boundaries. If You Think You're There, You Are. The Neurotic Rule: When In Doubt, Go Ahead And Feel Humiliated.

There's An Awful Lot Of Blood Around That Water Is Thicker Than.

You Can't Truthfully Explain Your Smallest Action Without Fully Revealing Your Character.

The Neurotic Lies Awake At Night, Composing Letters To Those He Hates. He Seldom Thinks Of Dropping A Line To Those He Loves.

A Woman Asks Little Of Love: Only That She Be Able To Feel Like A Heroine.

If The Pain Wanders, Do Not Waste Your Time With Doctors.

Failure Can Get To Be A Rather Comfortable Old Friend.

We Can Never Understand Other People's Motives, Nor Their Furniture.

We Always Prefer War On Our Own Terms To Peace On Someone Else's.

Hope Is The Feeling We Have That The Feeling We Have Is Not Permanent.

We Cough Because We Can't Help It, But Others Do It On Purpose.

Every American Child Should Grow Up Knowing A Second Language, Preferably English.

Nostalgia For What We Have Lost Is More Bearable Than Nostalgia For What We Have Never Had, For The First Involves Knowledge And Pleasure, The Second Only Ignorance And Pain.

When We Discuss Those We Love With Those Who Do Not Love Them, The End Of Love Is Near.

Vanity, Revenge, Loneliness, Boredom, All Apply: Lust Is One Of The Least Of The Reasons For Promiscuity.

When Their Children Fail To Charm Others, Few Parents Can Stay Neutral.

The Neurotic Thinks Himself Both Hamlet And Claudius, In A World That Belongs To Polonius.

There Are A Handful Of People Whom Money Won't Spoil, And We All Count Ourselves Among Them.

The Fear Of Being Laughed At Makes Cowards Of Us All.

It's Easy Enough To Get Along With A Loved And Loving Child - At Least Till You Try To Get Him To Do Something.

Only Where Children Gather Is There Any Real Chance Of Fun.

It's The Most Unhappy People Who Most Fear Change.

My Thoughts, I Guess, Are Bitter; Who But The Bitter Have Thoughts?

It Must Infuriate Our Children To See Us Always So Much More Forbearing With Everybody Else's.

What's For Dinner Is The Only Question Many Husbands Ask Their Wives, And The Only One To Which They Care About The Answer.

I'm Glad I Don't Have To Explain To A Man From Mars Why Each Day I Set Fire To Dozens Of Little Pieces Of Paper, And Then Put Them In My Mouth.

Few Novels Or Plays Could Exist Without At Least One Troublemaker In The Group, And Perhaps Life Couldn't Either.

It's Innocence When It Charms Us, Ignorance When It Doesn't.

Purity And Innocence

If You Must Reread Old Love Letters, Better Pick A Room Without Mirrors.

We Are Never More Self-righteous Than When Giving Up What We Should Have Shunned All Along.

Many Marriages Are Simply Working Partnerships Between Businessmen And Housekeepers.

In Life, As In Restaurants, We Swallow A Lot Of Indigestible Stuff Just Because It Comes With The Dinner.

Men Feel That Women Somehow Drag Them Down, And Women Feel That Way About Men. It's Possible That Both Are Right.

Funny Relationship

Few Of Us Could Bear To Have Ourselves For Neighbors.

Everybody Can Write; Writers Can't Do Anything Else.

The Woman Just Ahead Of You At The Supermarket Checkout Has All The Delectable Groceries You Didn't Even Know They Carried.

Nymphomaniac: A Woman As Obsessed With Sex As An Average Man.

The Trouble With Women Is Men; The Trouble With Men, Men.

Suburb: A Place That Isn't City, Isn't Country, And Isn't Tolerable.

The Neurotic's Strongest Fantasy Is That He Has No Fantasies. The Real Is Very Real To Him, The Unreal Even More So.

The Young Do Not Need God, And The Old Cannot Find Him.

Women Are Afraid Of Mice And Of Murder, And Of Very Little In Between.

After The Chills And Fever Of Love, How Nice Is The 98.6 Degrees Of Marriage.

The Soul May Sleep And The Body Still Be Happy, But Only In Youth.

We Are Seldom Happy With What We Now Have, But Would Go To Pieces If We Lost Any Part Of It.

Spiritual Sloth, Or Acedia, Was Known As The Sin Of The Middle Ages. It's The Sin Of My Middle Age, Too.

Of All Second-class Citizens, Neurotics Are The Only Ones Who Are So By Choice.

There Are Three Iron Links In The Neurotic's Chain: Unloving, Unlovable, Unloved.

Character Is What Emerges From All The Little Things You Were Too Busy To Do Yesterday, But Did Anyway.

The Way The Neurotic Sees It: Bars On His Door Mean That He's Locked In; Bars On Your Door Mean That He's Locked Out.

The Neurotic Circles Ceaselessly Above A Fogged-in Airport.

Women Who Feel Naked Without Their Lipstick Are Well Over Thirty.

The Past Is Strapped To Our Backs. We Do Not Have To See It; We Can Always Feel It.

Spring, Summer, And Fall Fill Us With Hope; Winter Alone Reminds Us Of The Human Condition.

Throughout Our Lives, We See In The Mirror The Same Innocent Trusting Face We Have Seen There Since Childhood.

It Is Always Safe To Tell People That They're Looking Wonderful.

Happiness Is Like The Penny Candy Of Our Youth: We Got A Lot More For Our Money Back When We Had No Money.

Every Now And Then You Run Across Radiantly Attractive People And You're Delighted To Find They Adore You, Till You Realize That They Adore Just About Everybody - And That's What's Made Them Radiantly Attractive.

There Are Now Electrical Appliances With The Main Unit So Sealed In That It Cannot Be Got At For Repair. There Have Always Been Human Beings Like That.

Revenge Leads To An Empty Fullness, Like Eating Dirt.

Don't Fool Yourself That Important Things Can Be Put Off Till Tomorrow; They Can Be Put Off Forever, Or Not At All

Procrastination

Don't Ask Others To Forgive In You A Sin They're Dying To Commit Themselves.

The Plague Of Government Is Senile Delinquency.

We Are Irritated By Rascals, Intolerant Of Fools, And Prepared To Love The Rest. But Where Are They?

Women Usually Love What They Buy, Yet Hate Two-thirds Of What Is In Their Closets.

The Best Work Is Done With The Heart Breaking, Or Overflowing.

A First-rate Marriage Is Like A First-rate Hotel: Expensive, But Worth It.

Neurosis Is No Worse Than A Bad Cold; You Ache All Over, And It's Made You A Mess, But You Won't Die From It.

Good-looking Girls Break Hearts, And Goodhearted Girls Mend Them.

God Doesn't Measure His Bounty, But Oh How We Do!

It's Terrifying To See Someone Inside Of Whom A Vital Spring Seems To Have Been Broken. It's Particularly Terrifying To See Him In Your Mirror.

What We Love About Love Is The Fever, Which Marriage Puts To Bed And Cures.

Flesh Goes On Pleasuring Us, And Humiliating Us, Right To The End.

If You Are Brave Too Often, People Will Come To Expect It Of You.

A Parent Who Has Never Apologized To His Children Is A Monster. If He's Always Apologizing, His Children Are Monsters.

Every Creature Stalks Some Other, Catches It, And Is Caught.

We Catch Frightful Glimpses Of Ourselves In The Hostile Eyes Of Others.

We Waste A Lot Of Time Running After People We Could Have Caught By Just Standing Still.

Women Are Good Listeners, But It's A Waste Of Time Telling Your Troubles To A Man Unless There's Something Specific You Want Him To Do.

Elegimos Aquellos Que Nos Gusta, Con Los Que Amamos, No Tenemos Voz En El Asunto.

The Hardest-learned Lesson: That People Have Only Their Kind Of Love To Give, Not Our Kind.

We All Become Great Explorers During Our First Few Days In A New City, Or A New Love Affair.

The Neurotic Longs To Touch Bottom, So At Least He Won't Have That To Worry About Anymore.

Few Of Us Write Great Novels; All Of Us Live Them.

A Husband Only Worries About A Particular Other Man; A Wife Distrusts Her Whole Species.

In Youth We Are Plagued By Desire; In Later Years, By The Desire To Feel Desire.

A Woman Ought To Look Up To Her Husband, If Only A Half-inch.

If You Can Tell Anyone About It, It's Not The Worst Thing You Ever Did.

We Welcome Passion, For The Mind Is Briefly Let Off Duty.

When Threatened, The First Thing A Democracy Gives Up Is Democracy.

Some Women Love Only What They Can Hold In Their Arms; Others, Only What They Can't.

Those Who Turn To God For Comfort May Find Comfort But I Do Not Think They Will Find God.

A Productive Marriage Requires Falling In Enjoy Numerous Occasions, Usually With The Identical Man Or Woman.

People Find It Hard To Be Both Comic And Serious, Though Life Manages It Easily Enough.

The Neurotic Feels As Though Trapped In A Gas-filled Room Where At Any Moment Someone, Probably Himself, Will Strike A Match.

If You Made A List Of Reasons Why Any Couple Got Married, And Another List Of The Reasons For Their Divorce, You'd Have A Hell Of A Lot Of Overlapping.

Men Gossip Less Than Women, But Mean It.

For The Happiest Life, Days Should Be Rigorously Planned, Nights Left Open To Chance.

Money: In Its Absence, We Are Coarse; In Its Presence, We Are Vulgar.

The Neurotic Usually Obeys His Own Golden Rule: Hate Thy Neighbor As Thyself.

Your Best Work Always Seems To Have Been Done By Someone Else.

The Neurotic Is Always Half-drowning In Anxiety, And Always Being Half-rescued.

It's Impossible To Be Loyal To Your Family, Your Friends, Your Country, And Your Principles, All At The Same Time.

We Semaphore From Ship To Ship, But They're Sinking, Too.

Beauty Often Fades, But Seldom So Swiftly As The Joy It Gives Us.

Without Enthusiasm, Virtue Functions Not At All, And Vice Only Poorly.

When The Pressures Really Mount, The Neurotic Must Choose: Shall He Have A Good Cry, Or Set Fire To His Neighbor's House?

With Each Passing Year, One Has Less To Say, And Knows Better How To Say It.

Neurotics Have Plenty Of Non-neurotic Friends, But Not For Long.

Your Children Vividly Remember Every Unkind Thing You Ever Did To Them, Plus A Few You Really Didn't.

No One Can Understand Love Who Has Not Experienced Infatuation. And No One Can Understand Infatuation, No Matter How Many Times He Has Experienced It.

If You Have To Do It Every Day, For God's Sake Learn To Do It Well.

If You're A Gifted Flirt, Talking About The Price Of Eggs Will Do As Well As Any Other Subject.

The Time To Begin Most Things Is Ten Years Ago.

Procrastination

We Have A Terror Of Seeming To Exert Ourselves, Lest It Be Noticed That We Exerted Ourselves And Did Not Succeed.

Once You Become Self-conscious, There Is No End To It; Once You Start To Doubt, There Is No Room For Anything Else.

If The Second Marriage Really Succeeds, The First One Didn't Really Fail.

The Death Of Someone We Know Always Reminds Us That We Are Still Alive - Perhaps For Some Purpose Which We Ought To Re-examine.

Desire Creates Havoc When It Is The Only Thing Between Two People, Or When It Is What's Missing.

The Fault We Admit To Is Seldom The Fault We Have, But It Has A Certain Relationship To It, A Somewhat Similar Shape, Like That Of A Sleeve To An Arm.

I Wish I'd Said It First, And I Don't Even Know Who Did: The Only Problems That Money Can Solve Are Money Problems.

The First-rate Mind Is Always Curious, Compassionate, Original, And Pessimistic.

Age Is A Slowing Down Of Everything Except Fear.

Women Polish The Silver And Water The Plants And Wait To Be Really Needed.

Men Who Don't Like Girls With Brains Don't Like Girls.

Love Is The Silent Saying And Saying Of A Single Name.

In The Arithmetic Of Love, One Plus One Equals Everything, And Two Minus One Equals Nothing.

Your Children Tell You Casually Years Later What It Would Have Killed You With Worry To Know At The Time.

One Of Life's Few Really Reliable Pleasures: To Have A Family You Love, And To Leave Them For A Week.

Philosophy Teaches A Man That He Can't Take It With Him; Taxes Teach Him He Can't Leave It Behind Either.

If I Knew Why I Worried So Much, I Wouldn't Worry.

People Will Disapprove Of You If You're Unhappy, Or If You're Happy In The Wrong Way.

The Chief Reason For Drinking Is The Desire To Behave In A Certain Way, And To Be Able To Blame It On Alcohol.

Acedia Is Not In Every Dictionary; Just In Every Heart.

There Are So Many Things That We Wish We Had Done Yesterday, So Few That We Feel Like Doing Today.

Procrastination

To Smoke Or Not To Smoke: I Can Make Of Either A Life-work.

Cigarette Smoke

Tragedy Isn't Getting Something, Or Failing To Get It; It's Losing Something You Already Have.

To Talk Easily With People, You Must Firmly Believe That Either You Or They Are Interesting. And Even Then It's Not Easy.

Money Is Much More Exciting Than Anything It Buys.

When Suffering Comes, We Yearn For Some Sign From God, Forgetting We Have Just Had One.

World Suffering

Courage Can't See Around Corners But Goes Around Them Anyway.

Not For Nothing Does The Neurotic Suffer - But Not For Anything Very Much, Either.

Love Unlocks Doors And Opens Windows That Weren't Even There Before.

No Matter How Many Christmas Presents You Give Your Child, There's Always That Terrible Moment When He's Opened The Very Last One. That's When He Expects You To Say, 'oh Yes, I Almost Forgot,' And Take Him Out And Show Him The Pony.

A Love That Lasts For Twenty Years May Be Better Than Love, But It Isn't Love.

A Perfect Marriage Is One In Which "i'm Sorry" Is Said Just Often Enough.

Says The Rude Child: "no, I Won't Do It." Says The Courteous Grown-up: "yes, I Won't Do It.

Don't Look For God Where He Is Needed Most; If You Didn't Bring Him There, He Isn't There.

It Is Important To Our Friends To Believe That We Are Unreservedly Frank With Them, And Important To Friendship That We Are Not.

If Only We Could Be Old And Sick While We're Still Young And Healthy Enough To Put Up With It!

A Bore: One Who Knows As Well As You Do What He Is Going To Say Next.

No Woman Wants To See Herself Too Clearly.

The Past Is Rich In Lessons From Which We Would Greatly Profit Except That The Present Is Always So Full Of Special Circumstances.

It Does Not Undo Harm To Acknowledge That We Have Done It; But It Undoes Us Not To Acknowledge It.

Neurotics Dream Of A Good Life, Or A Great Suicide Note.

A Car Is Useless In New York, Essential Everywhere Else. The Same With Good Manners.

Tough And Funny And A Little Bit Kind: That Is As Near To Perfection As A Human Being Can Be.

There Are Children Born To Be Children, And Others Who Must Mark Time Till They Can Take Their Natural Places As Adults.

Neurotics Think Of The Past With Resentment, And The Future With Dread; The Present Just Doesn't Exist.

Make A Habit Of Telling The Truth, Or Make A Habit Of Lying: To Decide Each Case On Its Own Merits Is Exhausting, And Hardly Ever Worth It.

Telling The Truth

All Women Are Basically In Competition With Each Other For A Handful Of Eligible Men.

Whether Or Not You Love Television, You've Got To Admit That It Certainly Loves Itself.

A Woman's Mink Coat Represents The Sacrifice Of A Lot Of Little Animals, Including Her Husband.

One Day You Are An Apprentice, And Everybody's Pet; The Next, You Are Coldly Expected To Deliver. There Is Never Sufficient Warning That The Second Day Is Coming.

With Men, As With Women, The Main Struggle Is Between Vanity And Comfort; But With Men, Comfort Often Wins.

My Religious Position: I Think That God Could Do A Lot Better, And I'm Willing To Give Him The Chance.

Things Are Never So Bad That They Can't Get Worse. But They're Sometimes So Bad They Can't Get Better.

Likely As Not, The Child You Can Do The Least With Will Do The Most To Make You Proud.

Theatre Audiences Can't Be Made To Think And Cry: At Best, They Can Be Made To Think And Laugh, Or To Feel And Cry.

If There Is Something You Must Do And You Cannot Do It, You Cannot Do Anything Else.

In Church, Sacred Music Would Make Believers Of Us All — But Preachers Can Be Counted On To Restore The Balance.

Our Strength Is Often Composed Of The Weakness That We're Damned If We're Going To Show.

Learn A Little Of Anything, And You're Ready To Proselytize.

Most Of Us Can Easily Do Two Things At Once; What's All But Impossible Is To Do One Thing At Once.

The Neurotic Listens To Weather Reports About Small Craft Warnings, And He Thinks: They're Talking About Me.

It Upsets Women To Be, Or Not To Be, Stared At Hungrily.

When A Man Falls In Love, He Wants To Go To Bed. When A Woman Falls In Love, She Wants To Talk About It.

Falling In Love

We Sometimes Feel That We Have Been Really Understood, But It Was Always Long Ago, By Someone Now Dead.

Learning Too Soon Our Limitations, We Never Learn Our Powers.

If You Hate Your Lot But Wouldn't Trade It, It's Not Your Lot You Hate.

Many Beautiful Women Have Been Made Happy By Their Own Beauty, But No Intelligent Woman Has Ever Been Made Happy By Her Own Intelligence.

True Remorse Is Never Just A Regret Over Consequences; It Is A Regret Over Motive.

If Your Children Spend Most Of Their Time In Other People's Houses, You're Lucky; If They All Congregate At Your House, You're Blessed.

We're Seldom Drawn To A Character We Admire; Only To A Personality We Like.

Pity All Newlyweds. She Cooks Something Nice For Him, And He Brings Her Flowers, And They Kiss And Think: How Easy Marriage Is.

The Ideal Home: Big Enough For You To Hear The Children, But Not Very Well.

People Are Like Birds: On The Wing, All Beautiful; Up Close, All Beady Little Eyes.

Anything You Do From The Heart Enriches You, But Sometimes Not Till Years Later.

Women Go To Beauty Parlors For The Unmussed Look Men Hate.

Minor Vices Lead To Major Ones, But Minor Virtues Stay Put.

The Excesses Of Love Soon Pass, But Its Insufficiencies Torment Us Forever.

There's Nothing Wrong With Most Men's Egos That The Kowtowing Of A Headwaiter Can't Cure.

When Hope Is Hungry, Everything Feeds It

Altruism Is A Hard Master, But So Is Opportunism.

I Know Which Side My Bread Is Buttered On: The Side Which Falls On The Carpet.

Loneliness, Insomnia, And Change: The Fear Of These Is Even Worse Than The Reality.

When First We Fall In Love, We Feel That We Know All There Is To Know About Life, And Perhaps We Are Right.

Falling In Love

Healthy Parakeets Have The Nervous Energy Of Tennis Players.

A Woman Telling Her True Age Is Like A Buyer Confiding His Final Price To An Armenian Rug Dealer.

Society Honors Its Living Conformists And Its Dead Troublemakers.

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