I don't want clever conversation, I never want to work that hard, I just want someone I can talk to, I want you just the way you are.

I don't belong in limos or private jets or on stage with people cheering me but that's what's kept me grounded because I know it's not right.

Call me a joker, call me a fool, right at this moment I'm totally cool.

I didn't graduate high school, so I never got a teacher's education, I'm mostly self-read, self-taught. I always loved music, so I would probably either be in a band with another group of people, or an arranger, a producer, a musicologist, a music history guy, something to do with music. Either that, or I would probably be in jail. Or dead.

I have been both praised and criticized. The criticism stung, but the praise sometimes bothered me even more. To have received such praise and honors has always been puzzling to me.

When I see an entire community disenfranchised, it disturbs me. Not that I'm a message guy, per se. I write about people. I like to write about human beings, not crap political rhetoric. I've tried to avoid that all my life. When I wrote about soldiers in Vietnam, I wasn't trying to make a political statement. I was trying to write about how screwed things were for soldiers, and how they still are.

Some people stay away from the door for the chance of it opening up.