My ma is an economist. My dad is a software engineer.
Makes a diff'rence, havin' a decent family,' he said. 'Me dad was decent. An' your mum an' dad were decent. If they'd lived, life woulda bin diff'rent, eh?' 'Yeah, I s'pose,' said Harry cautiously. Hagrid seemed to be in a very strange mood. 'Family,...
Having a religion doesn’t make a person love or not love others. It doesn’t make a person accept or not accept others. It doesn’t make a person befriend or not befriend others. Being without a religion doesn’t make somebody do or be any of th...
If there is one thing I have come to believe over the years, it’s the notion that there really is somebody for everybody. Every single person is going to look at beauty from a different angle. Every single person is going to be attracted to certain...
Do you love yourself? The test is simple. Do you look at others and see anything besides another beautiful human being? Do you see somebody who is more beautiful or less beautiful than you? If so, look down a little deeper and ask yourself why. It ma...
Don't hate the bullies. Experience tells me that hating them, or being angry with them, will always make it worse. Instead, put your arm around them. Love them. Tell them that they are valuable. Tell them that you expect great things from them. They ...
I think it doesn’t matter if you or I or anybody else thinks homosexuality is a sin. It doesn’t matter if you or I think anything is a sin. It doesn’t matter if homosexuality is a sin or not. In fact, it doesn’t matter if anything anybody els...
Smile at people everywhere you go. Don’t just give them one of those half-smirk/head nod things. Raise your eyebrows, show those teeth, and chuckle while you smile. Next time you’re at the store, give a full-hearted smile to at least three comple...
Why did you marry Dad, Mom?" My mother sniffled through her nose, looked at me, then smiled. "I wanted something more and he was it. We both had big dreams." "That must have taken a lot of courage," I said. "To marry Dad. He was so different from you...
So you want to be famous? You want to inspire large groups of people? You want to be recognized and appreciated by thousands or even millions? Stop trying to do it by speaking to the masses. Do it by speaking to individuals. If what you have is truly...
I am, for some reason, actually happy with who I am and the muscle, the bones, and the flub that exist beneath these clothes. I don’t need to lose 20 lbs. to be attractive. I don’t need to starve myself of the good things of life to be healthy. A...
If there is a Creator-God, it has used methods of creation that are indistinguishable from nature, it has declined to make itself known for all of recorded history, it doesn't intervene in affairs on earth, and has made itself impossible to observe. ...
We are all born free from all religious affiliations and only come to believe in such things after being introduced to it ― so, atheism is the default position. Although some children are not indoctrinated with a specific religion before the age of...
Regardless of your religious beliefs, you should never tell a mourning mother that it was "God's plan." For some people, that can be worse than saying nothing at all. For a non-believer, the words that are meant to console a religious person can do q...
If in some radical miracle, the Abrahamic God revealed his existence to the world, I’d accept the belief in the deity — but I still wouldn't worship it. The jealous and angry God that justified the killings of millions, sent plagues upon first bo...
The world is so obsessed with defining sexuality for everyone and attaching labels to it. Any time any person openly leaves the sexual norm, their sexuality becomes, more often than not, the absolute defining characteristic of that person. It becomes...
but my dad said it was no excuse. "But I love him!" I had never seen my sister cry that much. "No, you don't." "I hate you!" "No, you don't." My dad can be very calm sometimes. "He's my whole world." "Don't ever say that about anyone again. Not even ...
In middle school I used to draw letters of the alphabet out of contorted torsos, bodies, arms, legs. A rigid torso with one arm and one leg extended at straight angles out would form a “K,” for example. But then I realized how silly that was. Peo...
When I date women now, I have learned to simply not care what they think about it. I’m the same person I always have been. Faithful. Dependable. Kind. Sweet. Funny. Awesome. And if they want to discount me because of something as insignificant and ...
Dad wouldn't let me fool with his guitar much, because I'm left-handed, and I'd pick it up upside down. But I remember learning to sing 'Paper Doll,' the Mills Brothers song - this was during the war - and I remember my dad taking me down to one of t...
I am the first one to go to university in my family. I am the first writer as well. My dad is a retired policeman, and my mom works for a glass-processing company. She is health-and-safety manager, and my stepfather is a plumber. I have four half sib...
