In the summer of 1952, when I was 30, the Army assigned me to an infantry unit fighting in Korea. Meanwhile, though, there was other news in my family: My father had become the Republican presidential nominee. As an ambitious young major, I refused any offers for other assignments.
My grandfather was in World War II and fought in Europe in Army Infantry, so I have such a huge respect for him, and he's shared some personal experiences with me.
Even as a little girl, my mom never wanted me to watch BET, but when I was at my grandparents' house, and my older cousins were there and I could watch it, I was infatuated with the idea that I could one day be a DJ or the host of a show.
I admired and wanted to be a lot like Angie Martinez. As I got older, I realized that I had a soft monotone voice and that being a DJ may not be the career for me. However, I was so in love and infatuated with hip-hop that I still wanted to be a part and give back the community, so I decided to carve my own path and make my own lane.
Breakups just hit you harder when you're younger. When I was a teenager, it felt like the most depressing thing in the world if a boy I was infatuated with didn't like me back!
I don't know if love exists, not the kind that keeps. I think love's an infatuation that turns into a habit, because you can't keep that passion going. You get used to people, and that's death for me - I like to be surprised.
I was super brainy and a proper geek at school, but there would always be a boy. But that sort of obsession did turn me into a songwriter. My writing has always come from that feeling of infatuation.
For lack of a better word, I've let love and infatuation emasculate me.
All my friends from my past would know me as Scott Diggs. Taye Diggs comes from Scott-taye. When I went to college I liked it because it was so different and I have an infatuation with nicknames.
My father never liked me or my sister, and he never liked our mother either, after an initial infatuation, and in fact, he never liked anyone at all after an hour or two, no, no one except a stooge.
Writing on assignment, with lots of money handed to you before you even began, got very scary for me. My dread of not being perfect, something I got from a childhood surrounded by powerful, successful people, began to infect everything I wrote.
I thank God that I'm a product of my parents. That they infected me with their intelligence and energy for life, with their thirst for knowledge and their love. I'm grateful that I know where I come from.
My mother is the reason I'm in fashion. She worshiped it. Unfortunately, she infected me.
Jesus Christ came for me, and he came for each person that is infected with HIV/AIDS. God loves that person. He doesn't hate them. They've made mistakes. We've all made mistakes. But God loves them, God cares for them, and Jesus Christ died for their sins.
I cut my hand swimming in the Caribbean, it gets infected, and Channel 9 is calling me saying they heard rumors I cut my fingers off.
To me, the blues is an infection. I don't think it's necessarily a melancholy thing; the blues can be really positive and I think I think anyone and everyone can have a place for the blues. It need not always a woeful, sorrowful thing. It's more reflective; it reminds you to feel.
When I was doing 'Executive Orders,' I talked about Ebola to people who know about infectious diseases and their use as weapons of war, and guys told me that these weapons are more psychological than physical.
The thing that probably frustrated me and hurt me the most was when there were inaccurate stories written about me or stories that were written that were trying to imply or infer things that weren't true.
So I developed very early a massive inferiority complex, and I've told the story often about how that inspired me later in life to get involved in other things, because I couldn't out-do my brothers in sports, and it's a very competitive relationship.
It's always at the back of my mind that acting might come to an end for me when Harry Potter finishes. I don't know if I'm good enough to have a long career. I've got a bit of an inferiority complex about my acting. My self-esteem is quite low in that sense.
