Time is so old and love so brief, love is pure gold and time a thief. We're late, darling, we're late, The curtain descends, everything ends, too soon, too soon.
Ogden NashRead
Oh, what a tangled web do parents weave, when they think that their children are naive.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Parents often complicate their lives and relationships through deception, assuming their children are unaware.
This quote by Ogden Nash suggests that when parents underestimate their children's intelligence and awareness, they may resort to deceitful behavior to manipulate or control them. Nash humorously points out the irony that these efforts can result in complicated situations and relationships, highlighting that children might be more perceptive than parents realize.
Themes
ParentsChildrenDeceptionNaivetyRelationships
In practice
Example use cases
During a parenting workshop discussing effective communication.
More from Ogden Nash
All quotes βI'm like a backward berry, Unripened on the vine, For all my friends are fifty, And I'm only forty-nine.
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I do not like to get the news, because there has never been an era when so many things were going so right for so many of the wrong persons.
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Here's a good rule of thumb; too clever is dumb.
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Middle-age is when you're sitting at home on a Saturday night and the telephone rings and you hope it isn't for you.
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Here's a toast to the roast that good fellowship lends, with the sparkle of beer and wine; May its sentiment always be deeper, my friends, than the foam at the top of the stein. Then here's to the heartening wassail, wherever good fellows are found; Be its master instead of its vassal, and order the glasses around.
Ogden NashRead
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This is how I learn most of what I know about my children and their friends: by sitting in the driver's seat and keeping quiet.
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Like many people of my generation, I feel like I survived my adolescent mischief only by a miracle, and it seems too much to hope for that the same miracle would befall my children - therefore, I want to make sure they take fewer chances than I did.
Jennifer EganRead