“It is not until much later, as the skin sags and the heart weakens, that children understand; their stories, and all their accomplishments, sit atop the stories of their mothers and fathers, stones upon stones, beneath the waters of their lives.”
Source: The Five People You Meet in Heaven (2003)
Context: Parents rarely let go of their children, so children let go of them. They move on. They move away. The moments that used to define them - a mother's approval, a father's nod - are covered by moments of their own accomplishments. It is not until much later, as the skin sags and the heart weakens, that children understand; their stories, and all their accomplishments, sit atop the stories of their mothers and fathers, stones upon stones, beneath the waters of their lives.
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Mitch Albom 289
American author 1958Related quotes
Blue Like Jazz (2003, Nelson Books)

As quoted in A Brief and True Report concerning Williamsburg in Virginia by Rutherford Goodwin (1941), p. 125

“Water and stone
Flesh and bone
Night and morn
Rose and thorn
Tree and wind
Heart and mind”
Source: Cybele's Secret