Rose: Whatever happened to her?
Dorothy: She colonized life on Venus. Rose, she was 94 when I was six. She died, you idiot.
Rose: How did she die?
Dorothy: You know, we're not sure. One night she left in her wheelchair and she never came back. The next day the neighborhood kids had a go-kart with two really big back wheels.

Blanche: Well, I just hate myself for feeling this way, but I don't want to be a mother again. I mean, it was a wonderful experience at the time, but I always thought this part of my life was supposed to be for me.
Dorothy: Honey, I understand exactly how you feel. I feel the same way. You know, at our age we should be grandmothers, not mothers. Once a week, the grandchildren come over for a visit. You cook them dinner, they spill it on the furniture. They hide under your bed. You hurt yourself looking for them. They ask you what those spots on your hands are. They tell you they love you and then just before total exhaustion sets in, they go home and become their mother's problems.

Rose: Boy, life sure has a way of throwing you curve balls. When I was younger, I never would have imagined that I'd be worrying about money at this stage of my life.
Dorothy: I used to think Stan would take care of me. I mean, we didn't have much saved, but he was a darn good novelty salesman. Sounds naive now to think that I placed my hopes for the future on a bald pinhead with the morals of a maggot who made his living selling plastic dog-doo. Well, at least I'm not bitter.

Dorothy: Oh, come on, Ma. That's superstitious nonsense. You know, step on a crack, break your mother's back.
It doesn't work. I know. I tried.

Dorothy: You walked out on me and you didn't have the decency to tell me you were leaving. I heard it from some lawyer over the telephone. A stranger, Stanley, a total stranger, told me that my marriage was over.
Stan: Dorothy, look, things happened.
Dorothy: Things happened? You're damn right things happened. Thirty-eight years happened. Thirty-eight years of sharing and crying and dreaming and fighting and loving and children and diapers and school plays and Little League. And worrying if you'd get through your gallbladder surgery. And wondering if I'd get through another Sunday dinner at your mother's house. And the lean years, when the business failed. And the good years, and the happy Christmases. All those things happened, Stanley. And because they happened, I deserved better than a stinking phone call from my husband's legal representative. You had a choice, Stanley, and you took the easy way out. And it was a rotten thing to do! But now you're here in front of me and you can't run away. And I finally get to have what you tried to cheat me out of. I finally get to say goodbye, Stanley.
Stan: Look, Dorothy, we-
Dorothy: I said goodbye, Stanley.

Dorothy: Oh, it was a terrible time for me. You know, I'd gone on an eating binge when Stan left and I put on quite a bit of weight. Plus, I was not a 20-year-old. You know, when you're 20, no matter what you do, everything stays where it's supposed to. Now, when you lean over, it looks like somebody's let the air out of your face.

Dorothy: Oh. It doesn't matter what your parents want. Rose, you're never gonna make them happy. They're just gonna nag you and nag you until you want to grab their throats and choke 'em, but you don't, because you're in a hospital with resuscitating equipment!

Father Salerno: Folks, to begin this part of the service, Phil's sister, Dorothy, will say a few words. Dorothy. Please don't take this wrong, but I've got to know. You are a girl, aren't you?
Dorothy: Seems like I'm always mad at my brother Phil. I was mad the day my parents brought him back from the hospital. I thought he'd take their love away from me, and instead, their love expanded and we felt more like a family. I was mad at him when I was ten and he was four and we moved to a new neighborhood. I was mad because he always made new friends more easily than I did. And I'm mad today, because I never wanted to give the eulogy at my kid brother's funeral. I'm mad because he died. He didn't have the wisdom to know that family members shouldn't allow themselves to grow apart. Because when this day comes, they can no longer tell each other how they care. If he'd had that wisdom, he could have shared it with me and I would have known the hundreds of memories I have of just the two of us. Eating ice cream on the stoop of our building, or going through the drawers at Grandma's house, or dressing up like the Bronte sisters. How those memories fill me with joy. Why didn't you have that wisdom, Phil? Why didn't you give us a chance to tell you how much we loved you?

Blanche: Hey! Anyway, Dorothy, these new hearing aids just fit right in the ear canal. Nobody can even see 'em, so what does it matter?
Dorothy: It matters because it's a step I don't want to take. Look, I don't mind being divorced or having to struggle to pay my bills or having to eat my weight in supplements every morning, but I will not do this. I will not become an old person. [holding her shoulder] Ooh, rain's coming.

Dorothy: Tell me, how is Blanche?
Rose: She didn't go to work again today. It's been three weeks and she just sits in her room. The museum's gonna fire her.
Dorothy: Well, we've tried everything: golf, the movies, theater tickets. She wouldn't even budge for Julio Iglesias.
Rose: I know grief. It takes time.
Dorothy: Please, Rose. Listen, if you're Irish, you have a wake. You eat, you cry, you drink, you vomit, and you're done. If you're Jewish, you cry, you sit, you eat for seven days, you put on ten pounds, and it's over. We Italians scream, dress up a donkey, hire a band, and that's that. It's these southern Protestants who make it a way of life.