Without leaps of imagination, or dreaming, we lose the excitement of possibilities. Dreaming, after all, is a form of planning.

Women must have seats at the table because peace is too crucial to be left only to the politicians or only to the male half of our world.

The first problem for all of us, men and women, is not to learn, but to unlearn.

Think about the pressure to "pass" by lying about one's agethat familiar temptation to falsify a condition of one's birth oridentity and pretend to be part of a more favored group. Fair-skinned blacks invented "passing" as a term, Jews escaping anti-Semitism perfected the art, and the sexual closet continues the punishment, but pretending to be a younger age is probably the most encouraged form of "passing," with the least organized support for "coming out" as one's true generational self.

Whoever has power takes over the noun - and the norm - while the less powerful get an adjective.

I'm still the same person who grew up mostly in a Midwestern, factory-working neighborhood where talk about "self-esteem" would have seemed like a luxury.

I don't want to die saying but, you know? There's so much I want to do, so I want more time.