Quotes & Jokes by Bill Cosby / page 10
In spite of the six thousand manuals on child raising in the bookstores, child raising is still a dark continent and no one really knows anything. You just need a lot of love and luck - and, of course, courage.
I recently turned fifty, which is young for a tree, midlife for an elephant, and ancient for a quarter miler, who's son now says, "Dad, I just can't run the quarter with you anymore unless I bring something to read."
You can turn painful situations around through laughter. If you can find humor in anything, even poverty, you can survive it.
Fatherhood is asking your son to make up a name rather than tell anybody who he is.
Repeat after me. I promise not to run outside of the house. I promise not to run inside of the house. I promise not to touch, pick up, step on, anything that looks interesting.
It isn't a matter of black is beautiful as much as it is white is not all that's beautiful.
It's painful, but we can't heal ourselves unless we cleanse the wounds.
The childless experts on child raising also bring tears of laughter to my eyes when they say, "I love children because they're so honest." There is not an agent in the CIA or the KGB who knows how to conceal the theft of food, how to fake being asleep, or how to forge a parent's signature like a child.
We go out of our way to make people so different,... to punish them because of color, because of sex, because of size, and the game starts.
The only thing that you can get into without a lot of trouble is a lot of trouble.
I love it when mothers get so mad they can't remember your name. "Come here, Roy, er, Rupert, er, Rutabaga... what is your name, boy? And don't lie to me, because you live here, and I'll find out who you are.'
Suddenly, this romantic agony was enriched by a less romantic one: I had to go to the bathroom. Needless to say, I couldn't let her know about this urge, for great lovers never did such things. The answer to "Romeo Romeo, wherefore art thou, Romeo?" was not "In the men's room, Julie.”