It struck her how eating was a comfort during a hard time because it reminded you that there had been other days, good days, when you’d eaten the same thing. Reminded you there were good days in life, when precious little else did. (268)
Interpretation
This quote highlights how eating can serve as a source of comfort during difficult times by recalling happier moments.
In this quote, Ron Rash emphasizes the emotional connection between food and memory. During hard times, the act of eating can evoke memories of better days, reminding a person of past joys and providing solace in the present. It highlights the importance of simple pleasures, like sharing a meal, in bringing comfort and reminding us of life’s brighter moments.
In practice
This quote could be shared during a wellness seminar focused on finding comfort in everyday activities.
She realized that being starved for words was the same as being starved for food, because both left a hollow place inside you, a place you needed filled to make it through another day. Rachel remembered how growing up she’d thought living on a farm with just a father was as lonely as you could be. (130)
The woman doesn't look up. It's as if she's deaf. Maybe she is. Maybe she's like the Cambodian women I've read about, the ones who witnessed so many atrocities that they have willed themselves blind. Maybe that's what you have to do sometimes to survive. You kill off part of yourself, your hearing or eyesight, your capacity for hope.
Short fiction is the medium I love the most, because it requires that I bring everything I've learned about poetry - the concision, the ability to say something as vividly as possible - but also the ability to create a narrative that, though lacking a novel's length, satisfies the reader.
My day begins with gratitude and joy. I look forward with enthusiasm to the adventures of the day, knowing that in my life, All is good.
Happiness is a state of inner fulfillment.
Happiness is a state of mind. With physical comforts if your mind is still in a state of confusion and agitation, it is not happiness. Happiness means calmness of mind.
Our happiness is completely and utterly intertwined with other people: family and friends and neighbors and the woman you hardly notice who cleans your office. Happiness is not a noun or verb. It's a conjunction. Connective tissue.
We laughed a lot. That's one thing we forgot about for a few years - laughing. When we went through all the lawsuits, it looked as if everything was bleak, but when I think back to before that, I remember we used to laugh all the time.
The malicious have a dark happiness.
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