I didn't go out looking for fights as a kid, but if it was necessary, I'd fight. Fighting was a daily thing where we lived.

So you eat, you sleep, and then this wonderful child comes out, but you don't feel like you have any control over that process, over her, over her character and who she is.

It's striking how commercially viable that impulse for instant intimacy is right now, especially in songs and writing.

Yes I think I'm okay, walked into the door again.

I loved the atmosphere of the dance studios - the wooden floors, the big mirrors, everyone dressed in pink or black tights, the musicians accompanying us - and the feeling of ritual the classes had.

A lot of my writing is not terribly civilized. Sometimes I listen to songs by very smart writers who assume that the world is a civil place with certain formalities that people follow, but I don't see things that way. My own experience tells me that life is not like that. That's why I write the way I do.

You have to defend your honor. And your family.