Quotes From "The Glass Castle" By Jeannette Walls

One time I saw a tiny Joshua tree sapling growing not too far from the old tree. I wanted to dig it up and replant it near our house. I told Mom that I would protect it from the wind and water it every day so that it could grow nice and tall and straight. Mom frowned at me. "You'd be destroying what makes it special, " she said. "It's the Joshua tree's struggle that gives it its beauty. Jeannette Walls

One benefit of Summer was that each day we had more light to read by. Jeannette Walls

She had her addictions and one of them was reading. Jeannette Walls

[Mom] said she didn't want her youngest daughter dressed in the thrift-store clothes the rest of us wore. Mom told us we would have to go shoplifting. "Isn't that a sin?" I asked Mom. "Not exactly, " Mom said. "God doesn't mind you bending the rules a little if you have good reason. It's sort of like justifiable homicide. This is justifiable pilfering. Jeannette Walls

Don't you make fun of me or my children! Some babies are premature. Mine were all postmature. That's why they're so smart. Their brains had longer to develop. Jeannette Walls

No child is born a delinquent. They only became that way if nobody loved them when they were kids. Unloved children grow up to be serial murderers or alcoholics. Jeannette Walls

People worried too much about their children. Suffering when you're young is good for you. It immunized your body and soul... Jeannette Walls

Fussing over children who cry only encourages them. That's positive reinforcement for negative behavior. Jeannette Walls

You should never hate anyone, not even your worst enemies. Everyone has something good about them. You had to find the redeeming quality and love the person for that. Jeannette Walls

As awful as he could be, I always knew he loved me in a way no one else ever had. Jeannette Walls

You'll never make a fortune working for the boss man Jeannette Walls

We climbed under the chain fence and knelt around Dad while he petted the cheetah. By then a few people had begun to gather. One man was calling to us to get back behind the chain fence. We ignored him. I knelt close to the cheetah. My heart was beating fast, but I wasn’t scared, only excited. I could feel the cheetah’s hot breath on my face. He looked right at me. His amber eyes were steady but sad, as if he knew he’d never see the plains of Africa again. Jeannette Walls (Author)

You should never hate anyone, even your worst enemies. Everyone has something good about them, ” [Jeannette's mom] said. “You have to find the redeeming quality and love the person for that.”“ Oh yeah?” I said. “How about Hitler? What was his redeeming quality?”“ Hitler loved dogs, ” Mom said without hesitation. Jeannette Walls

It's the Joshua tree's struggle that gives it its beauty. Jeannette Walls

You can't cling to the side your whole life, that one lesson every parent needs to teach a child is "If you don't want to sink, you better figure out how to swim Jeannette Walls

It's really not that hard to put food on the table if that's what you decide to do. Jeannette Walls

You're not supposed to laugh at your own father. Ever. Jeannette Walls

Life's too short to care about what other people think. Besides, they should accept us for who we are Jeannette Walls

Those shining stars, he liked to point out, were one of the special treats for people like us who lived out in the wilderness. Rich city folks, he'd say, lived in fancy apartments, but their air was so polluted they couldn't even see the stars. We'd have to be out of our minds to want to trade places with any of them. Jeannette Walls

We laughed about all the kids who believed in the Santa myth and got nothing for Christmas but a bunch of cheap plastic toys. "Years from now, when all the junk they got is broken and long forgotten, " Dad said, "you'll still have your stars. Jeannette Walls

Mom always said people worried too much about their children. Suffering when you're young is good for you, she said. It immunized your body and your soul, and that was why she ignored us kids when we cried. Fussing over children who cry only encouraged them, she told us. That's positive reinforcement for negative behavior. Jeannette Walls

If you had weak eyes, they needed exercise to get strong. Glasses were like crutches. They prevented people with feeble eyes from seeing the world on their own. Jeannette Walls

You're in a horse race but you're thinking like a sheep. Sheep don't win horse races. Jeannette Walls

You know you're down and out when Okies laugh at you, ' she said. With our garbage bag taped window, our tied down hood, and art supplies strapped to the roof, we'd out- Okied the Okies. Jeannette Walls

Once you go on welfare it changes you. Even if you get off welfare, you never escape the stigma that you were a charity case. You're scarred for life. Jeannette Walls