quote from This Boys' Life a memoir by Tobias Wolff

In the following passage, Tobias is describing his mother. I've never read a paragraph that so closely and eloquently describes the way I remember my mother. I underlined it as soon as I read it. Anyone else who knew my mom agree?

"She made the world seem friendly. And somehow, with her, it was. She would talk to anyone, anywhere, in grocery stores or ticket lines or restaurants, drawing them out and listening to their stories with intense concentration and partisan outbursts of sympathy. My mother did not expect to find people dull or mean; she assumed they would be likeable and interesting, and they felt this assurance, and mostly lived up to it."