Patchwork Quotes

• We are all patchwork, and so shapeless and diverse in composition that each bit, each moment, plays its own game.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Games, Play, Moments

  Michel de Montaigne (1958). “Complete Essays”, p.244, Stanford University Press

  70 Copy quote

  Show source

• We do not live an equal life, but one of contrasts and patchwork; now a little joy, then a sorrow, now a sin, then a generous or brave action.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Life, Change, Joy

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (1960). “The Journals”

  28 Copy quote

  Show source

• For we know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness.

  Barack Obama

  Heritage, Weakness, Inauguration

  First Presidential Inaugural Address, Delivered 20 January 2009

  22 Copy quote

  Show source

• Much like a patchwork quilt, inspiration that stirs and motivates me is made of many things.

  Robert Reynolds

  Quilts, Inspiration, Made

  26 Copy quote

• When we are young, we think life will be like a supo: one fabric, one weave, one grand design. But in truth, life turns out to be more like the patchwork cloths-bits and pieces, odds and ends-people, places, things we never expected, never wanted, perhaps.

  Alan Brennert

  Thinking, Odds, People

  Alan Brennert (2009). “Honolulu”, p.11, Macmillan

  46 Copy quote

  Show source

• Each member of the family in his own cell of consciousness, each making his own patchwork quilt of reality - collecting fragments of experience here, pieces of information there. From the tiny impressions gleaned from one another, they created a sense of belonging and tried to make do with the way they found each other.

  Toni Morrison

  Quilts, Reality, Cells

  19 Copy quote

• The lives of most men are patchwork quilts. Or at best one matching outfit with a closet and laundry bag full of incongruous accumulations. A lifetime of training for just ten seconds.

  Jesse Owens

  Quilts, Men, African American

  54 Copy quote

• We are all patchwork, and so shapeless and diverse in composition that each bit, each moment, plays its own game. And there is as much difference between us and ourselves as between us and others

  Pascal Mercier

  Games, Play, Differences

  Pascal Mercier (2009). “Night Train To Lisbon”, p.8, Atlantic Books Ltd

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• Use a make-up table with everything close at hand and don't rush; otherwise you'll look like a patchwork quilt.

  Lucille Ball

  Quilts, Hands, Looks

  18 Copy quote

• Memory is the great deceiver. Perhaps there are some individuals whose memories act like tape recordings, daily records of their lives complete in every detail, but I am not one of them. My memory is a patchwork of occurrences, of discontinuous events roughly sewn together: The parts I remember, I remember precisely, whilst other sections seemed to have vanished completely.

  Neil Gaiman

  Memories, Together, Events

  "Smoke and Mirrors". Book by Neil Gaiman, October, 1998.

  12 Copy quote

  Show source

• It's actually kind of nice to have a 'patchwork family.'

  Heidi

  Nice, Kind

  9 Copy quote

• There is one kind of charity common enough among us... It is that patchwork philanthropy which clothes the ragged, feeds the poor, and heals the sick. I am far from decrying the noble spirit which seeks to help a poor or suffering fellow being... [However] what advances a nation or a community is not so much to prop up its weakest and most helpless members, but to lift up the best and the most gifted, so as to make them of the greatest service to the country.

  Jamsetji Tata

  Country, Clothes, Sick

  79 Copy quote

• To build a better world we need to replace the patchwork of lucky breaks and arbitrary advantages today that determine success--the fortunate birth dates and the happy accidents of history--with a society that provides opportunities for all.

  Malcolm Gladwell

  Opportunity, Today, Happy Accidents

  12 Copy quote

• My adult life has been a patchwork of projects, most of which were fleeting fancies of overreaching vision. I tend to seize on things, only to abandon them due to a lack of time, talent or inclination.

  Susan Wiggs

  Vision, Fancy, Adults

  Susan Wiggs (2011). “The Goodbye Quilt”, p.9, MIRA

  11 Copy quote

  Show source

• So there are cakes and pillows and colors galore, but underneath this more obvious patchwork quilt are places like a quiet room where you can go and hold someone's hand and not have to say anything.

  Alice Sebold

  Quilts, Hands, Color

  Alice Sebold (2014). “The Lovely Bones: Picador Classic”, p.229, Pan Macmillan

  9 Copy quote

  Show source

• There is as much difference between us and ourselves as there is between us and others.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Differences

  Michel De Montaigne, James B Atkinson, David Sices (2012). “Selected Essays: With La Boetie's Discourse on Voluntary Servitude”, p.12, Hackett Publishing

  13 Copy quote

  Show source

• London, with its monotonous and melancholy houses, seems like an inharmonious patchwork, as if pieced together without design. Yet it is lovable in its sprawling confusion.

  Joseph Fort Newton

  Confusion, House, Design

  Joseph Fort Newton (1922). “Preaching in London: A Diary of Anglo-American Friendship”

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• In brief, we have no explicit family policy but instead have a haphazard patchwork of institutions and programs designed mostly under crisis conditions, whether the crisis is national in scope (such as a recession ) or personal (such as a break-up of a particular family).

  Kenneth Keniston

  Family, Broken, Program

  Kenneth Keniston, Carnegie Council on Children (1977). “All our children: the American family under pressure”, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt P

  8 Copy quote

  Show source

• A lifetime of training for just ten seconds.

  Jesse Owens

  Motivational, Sports, Quilts

  Biography/Personal Quotes, www.imdb.com.

  107 Copy quote

  Show source

• You know, I'm really starting to think the whole world is just a patchwork quilt of crazy little cults, all with their own secret spaces, their own records, their own rules.

  Robin Sloan

  Quilts, Crazy, Thinking

  Robin Sloan (2012). “Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore: A Novel”, p.253, Macmillan

  6 Copy quote

  Show source

• Now I am in the place I call this wide wide Heaven because it includes all my simplest desires but also the most humble and grand. The word my grandfather uses is comfort. So there are cakes and pillows and colors galore, but underneath this more obvious patchwork quilt are places like a quiet room where you can go and hold someone's hand and not have to say anything. Give no story. Make no claim. Where you can live at the edge of your skin for as long as you wish.

  Alice Sebold

  Quilts, Humble, Hands

  Alice Sebold (2014). “The Lovely Bones: Picador Classic”, p.229, Pan Macmillan

  11 Copy quote

  Show source

• It is foolish to be afraid of death. Just think. No more repaired tires on the body vehicle, no more patchwork living.

  Paramahansa Yogananda

  Death, Thinking, Body

  11 Copy quote

• If you look globally you see a patchwork of jurisdictions (nations, states, provinces, cities) that have taken aggressive action on climate change, and a patchwork of jurisdictions that have not. These various policies reflect the politics of each jurisdiction and the values of its citizens.

  Dale Jamieson

  Taken, Cities, Citizens

  Source: www.3ammagazine.com

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• We continue to go from crisis to crisis, whether it is electricity or whether it is gas prices. We need comprehensive solutions, not patchwork crisis management. We wouldn't be in this situation today if Senate Democrats weren't holding up the national energy plan that the president proposed back in May of 2001.

  Scott McClellan

  President, May, Today

  "White House: Bush 'disappointed' in OPEC" by Dana Bash and Jennifer Yuille, www.cnn.com. May 6, 2004.

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• Mine was a patchwork God, sewn together from bits of rag and ribbon, Eastern and Western, pagan and Hebrew, everything but the kitchen sink and Jesus.

  Anne Lamott

  Jesus, Kitchen, Together

  Anne Lamott (2000). “Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith”, p.41, Anchor

  5 Copy quote

  Show source