Dreams were all they gave for free to ugly duckling girls like me.

The best thing you can learn from the worst times of your life is that it always gets better. It may take a month, a year, a decade, but it will get better if you leave yourself open to it.

I started 'Society's Child' on a bus in East Orange as I was going home from school. I saw a black and white couple sitting there and started thinking about it.

I think these last 10 years have seen just a huge shift in the psyche of this country as regards gay people. I think AIDS had a lot to do with it. So many families who really believed they'd 'never met one' were suddenly confronted with their sons becoming ill, and friends of sons. I think that brought a lot of it into the open.

Some people would rather stay ignorant and self-satisfied.

When you’re young, the goal is to have a hit. You get a little older and the goal becomes to get to make another record.

Artists are taught to be humble about their impact, especially in folk music. It's so ingrained that I have a hard time even thinking I had any impact other than what a normal hit song would have.