I wanted to be a songwriter.I didn't so much want to be a performer.I more grew into that just from being a songwriter.

It's a little dangerous for me to get outside myself and think about how I want people to see me.

I was sensitive to music and poetry, and it was around me growing up.

And I kind of said to myself if I get my voice back I'm not going to take back the old anxiety about it and just focus on the limitations. I'm really going to enjoy it.

I am so sick of reading about another car bomb, another suicide bomber, another 10, 20, 30, 70, 100 people dead in a day, both Americans and Iraqis.

Think about all of the families where the father is a doctor and the son is a doctor or generations of coal miners. Why did they go into that line of work? Because that's what they were taught. Or was it in their genes? It's not an either/or question. It's both. I was inclined in that way. I was sensitive to music and poetry, and it was around me growing up.

I have a real worker-bee mentality. Just show up, just do it. Even if you feel like s--t and you think you're terrible and you'll never get better and it will never go anywhere, just show up and do it. And, eventually, something happens.