I deliberately did not read anything about the Vietnam War because I felt the politics of the war eclipsed what happened to the veterans. The politics were irrelevant to what this memorial was.

To fly, we must have resistance.

We were unusually brought up; there was no gender differentiation. I was never thought of as any less than my brother.

I was probably the first kid in my high school to go to Yale. I applied almost as a lark. Then, when I got there, I was the dumbest person in your class.

I think I needed to really move past my first public work as memorialist, and be equally balanced. It's a bit unusual, to be working between the architecture, the art, and what I would say is a synthesis, the memorials - they're problem solving, but it's very symbolic. You get this triangle; I need to be balanced with those three. They're all equally a part of who I am. I love how different they are, and yet they're coming out the same thing, whatever it is.

I also wanted remembering the past relevant to the present. Some people wanted me to put the names in alphabetical order. I wanted them in chronological order so that a veteran could find his time within the panel. It's like a thread of life.

How we are using up our home, how we are living and polluting the planet is frightening. It was evident when I was a child. It's more evident now.