Tales From The Crib Quotes

“My mother owns the Drama Queen bookstore in the theatre district and has the Midas touch when it comes to producing off-Broadway gay theatre. Her most recent success was with the all-male musical Oklahomo! The entire cast was clad in tight leather overalls or fringed chaps.”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“Okay,” Jack said. “I’m not really sure what you want from me.” “I want you to stop trying to deny every feeling I ever have, Jack.  I want you to stop telling me not to feel bad when I already do. I want you to stop telling me I look fine when it’s so patently obvious that I don’t. I want you to stop being so uncomfortable when things aren’t perfect that you immediately start trying to pretend they are.” Even as the words were coming out of my mouth, I realized how unfair I was being. Yes, I wanted for him to accept my emotional reality. But only when it suited me. I also wanted him to tell me that the baby would be fine when it was what I needed to hear. At least Jack was consistent. I was a nut job.”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“Of course, as in all religions and cultures, there is contradiction, such as the lavish bagel and lox spreads brought in by Sheppy’s. We Jews believe in a lovely catered meal for the grieving family—as long as their asses go numb from sitting on crates. Suffer but eat well!”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“What Jews do you know who don’t make comedy of their lives? It’s part of the religion. I’ll bet you think all that Hebrew at bar mitzvahs is prayers, don’t you? Fooled you, didn’t we? It’s stand-up.”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“I felt in Ann Arbor the same way I did in the city—like everything was happening and I was missing it all when I wasn’t there. I suppose there are several spots on earth where each one of us feels completely at home. For me, they are Ann Arbor,”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“A longevity cocktail is a patented weight-loss formula consisting of ...” Olivia said, pausing for us to take notes, “hot purified water with lemon juice and psyllium husks. Stirred briskly.” Randy added, “You’ve got to stir briskly.” Zoe leaned in and asked, “Isn’t that Metamucil?” The chubby gangster girl heard Zoe and demanded to know if this was accurate. “Metamucil is a brand name,” Olivia said. “It’s a kind of psyllium husk,” Randy said, adding her usual nothing to the discussion.”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“I am so excited to be here with you ladies tonight,” Olivia continued with the enthusiasm of a mortician on Prozac. “We are going to flush blubber right off your body and you are going to love looking in the mirror.”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“At first I thought Jack was full of shit. I mean, who hasn’t heard the married guy telling her that he and his wife have an arrangement, right?” she said. I haven’t. No married guys have ever hit on me, even when I was single. “Oh my God, tell me about it,” I rolled my eyes in disgusted solidarity. “Men are such pigs.” “Jack wasn’t, though. He kept asking if I wanted to talk to you, or get a note or whatnot.” He what?! He offered to have me sign an infidelity permission slip?   To Whom It May Concern: I, Lucy Klein, being of questionable mind and body, give my blessing to any woman of consenting age to engage in romantic and/or sexual relations with my estranged husband who just so happens to live with our infant son and me.”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“One semester, I was busted for reverse plagiarism, which basically meant I was too lazy to research a paper for my psychology class so cited false references to support my own theories on deviant behavior.”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“Rita switched gears to her favorite topic—sex. Her philosophy: What a mess, but so pleasurable. “Speaking of confessions, tell us, have you and Jack been intimate again?” I cringed. “When I had your cousins, the doctahs told us not to have relations with our husbands for six weeks!” “So we had to call our boyfriends!” Bernice quipped. “You stole my punch line!” Rita exploded.”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“Rita could find fault with a twenty-one-gun salute in her honor. “Too noisy,” she’d complain. “All that gun powdah makes me cough.” Bernice, on the other hand, was overjoyed when a salesman from the cremation place informed her that her ashes would weigh about six pounds. “Thin at last!” she shrieked.”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“You haven’t heard music until you’ve experienced what this man can do with his instrument,” Anjoli smiled. Oh now she’s just being cruel. “Okay, off to the bedroom, you two! And don’t you come out until Lucy’s off in dreamland.” Bitch! As we walked up two flights of stairs, Henri asked if it was “deefeecult” to climb stairs with my cane.”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“Even the men were better groomed than I was. Kimmy’s queer brigade wears purposefully sloppy hair and uses special shavers that leave rugged day-old stubble.”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“With my distorted face and cane, I’d look like the Hunchbelly of St. Pat’s.”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“I think you’re permanently disqualified from the lucky category after four miscarriages, a virtual divorce, and a face that could scare small children.”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“You know I’m mad about you and you’re the most fabulous daughter a mother could want. When you call me Mommy, it pushes my buttons and makes me feel older than I really am. Plus, you’re a precocious child. Why don’t you call me Anjoli?” We weren’t like mother and daughter. It was more like two single women sharing an apartment in Greenwich Village in the seventies. Except I was five.”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“For ten-on-the-table nights, I memorized the take-out menus of every restaurant within a ten-block radius of West Eleventh Street, which was no small task.”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“By seventh grade, the notes stopped and it was assumed that I’d know how to fend for myself for dinner if there was a ten-dollar bill on the table. There were three dinner options at my house. In reverse order of preference: Number three—broiled chicken dusted with paprika. Number two—ten on the table. And number one—dinner with Mom and her boyfriend, David, at a five-star restaurant.”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“In fifth grade, I remember my best friend, Vicki DeMattia, opening her lunch box and finding a note from her mother. I love you, Vicki! Sometimes Mrs. DeMattia included more, like what they would do together after school or how many kisses Vicki owed her from their Monopoly game the previous night. I got notes from Anjoli, too. They were typed and left on the dining room table. They went something like this: Lucy: I’m at the theatre tonight and won’t be home till after you’re asleep. On the table, please find ten dollars for dinner. Be sure to include a vegetable and a green salad. Rinse lettuce thoroughly. Pesticides can kill you. Anjoli.”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“It certainly wasn’t as though I was left completely on my own. I knew that if I ever really needed help, my mother would be happy to outsource it to the most qualified consultants.”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“Challenging, darling,” Anjoli corrected. “Release the struggle consciousness. Challenges can be overcome. One can rise to a challenge. Difficulty sounds so hopeless. Words are affirmations. Affirmations are manifestations. Manifestations—” “All right already! Eating will be challenging, are you happy?” “In general or at the moment?” “Good God, Mother!”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“All right already! Eating will be challenging, are you happy?” “In general or at the moment?” “Good God, Mother!”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“Ask any single parent whether they’d like an extra set of hands around the house and they’d take it.” They’d take it if it weren’t the set of hands belonging to the rat bastard who asked for a divorce the same day the pregnancy test read positive.”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“Other couples are living separately ever after,”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“MFA program at the University of Michigan when we met.”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“Timing is a wonderful thing sometimes. It can save us from ourselves.”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“The next morning, the thrush had cleared up almost completely. No pain. No swearing. No gnashing my teeth. I was fit for my own page in the nursing book. I was so proud of my new skill, I wanted to share it with everyone. I told my letter carrier about how my nipples were in top form again. He was thrilled for me, really. That day, I was such a show-off I had to resist the urge to lie down on the supermarket floor and squirt my milk into the air like fountains. I thought I had such a choice piece of entertainment, I imagined spending my spring afternoons in the park collecting tips in a cup for my milk-producing excellence.”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib

“I remember the call came through on my cell phone just as the Wendy’s near my house was mounting a thirty-foot inflated chocolate frosty cone on its roof. No cookies or cake. No rice or pasta. No bread. A bite of fruit and maybe three beans were acceptable. The nurse assured me there were foods I was able to eat—cheese, meat, and all the leafy vegetables I could pile on my plate. Oh joy.”
― Jennifer Coburn, Tales From The Crib