My mom had a heart attack, and it came out of nowhere - she was 54. My dad had leukemia for about 3 months. He was 80 when he passed. My dad had me later in life, and so he had leukemia and was alive for about 3 months between diagnosis and passing away.
You can't pick up the telephone and say, 'Connect me with someone else who has a kid with leukemia.'
One of the things that upset me was some of the criticism leveled at Simon and Garfunkel. I always took exception to it, but actually I agree with a lot of it.
As a young girl, there were the obvious messages about what girls could and couldn't achieve. And to compound the limitations I felt being leveled upon me, I realized at the age of nine, that I was gay.
When grave allegations of corruption and criminal charges were leveled against me, BJP leaders chose to take it lightly.
I went through the immigration thing. But when I got to New York it wasn't so tough for me. I went to school. I went to P.S. 57, then I went to the Lighthouse for the Blind on 59th St. I guess being blind is a great leveler.
Changing diapers is one of the most leveling things that has ever happened to me.
By having a little bit of knowledge about many different things, it enables me to talk to people about a subject that they would not ordinarily think I could talk about. It's a lever for me, I suppose.
The higher the unemployment rate, the more leverage I have to 'encourage' you to 'do what it takes' to keep your job. And so you work even more hours, pushing unemployment up and wages down. And that, my friends, is one of the little tricks that keeps you poor and me rich.
Soros has taught me that when you have tremendous conviction on a trade, you have to go for the jugular. It takes courage to be a pig. It takes courage to ride a profit with huge leverage.
My mom passed down to me her old Levi's denim jacket. When I left it on a plane, I was devastated. I've never been able to find anything with quite the same cool, faded look.
Randy Newman seemed like an even worse singer than me. I liked Ray Charles, Levi Stubbs, Jack Jones, Joe Tex, Wilson Pickett.
The tax on being different is largely implicit. People need not act maliciously for it to be levied. In fact, at its heart is a laudable sentiment: 'prove it to me.' The problem is that we are requiring different levels of proof without realising it.
I make 98% of my collection in New York City and am generating jobs, so fashion isn't just frivolous for me. I understand levity about it. I also understand the depth of it.
I have always gravitated toward levity and my parents; I'm sure they have a VHS tape of me when I'm making jokes and trying to make faces when the family was taking a picture.
I still think about the first time I met Lennox Lewis, and he took the time out to talk to me, and he showed me different techniques. I'll never forget. Lennox was one of those guys that set the standard. He's a hard act to follow. But I love a challenge.
I don't know if any single book made me want to write. C.S. Lewis was the first writer to make me aware that somebody was writing the book I was reading - these wonderful parenthetical asides to the reader.
I was working in Lexington when I recognized this actor, Michael Shannon, and I was like, 'What do you do?' He told me to get into a theater company, so I got into a theater company near my hometown. I was a carpenter there. And then I slowly got some work.
I grew up on a farm in Lexington, Oklahoma, a rural community south of Norman. My family moved to Enid, Oklahoma, in 1962, when I was a junior in high school. This cast me into a totally different environment. Enid was a company town for Champlin Petroleum, and there was an oil boom going on.
I'm too much of a Libra. I too often see the other person's point of view and capitulate, even though I have strong political convictions. It's just my liability. Maybe I'm too empathetic. That's the actor in me.
