I love and adore being a mother. It's the greatest gift I've ever been given.

I spent the first fourteen years of my life convinced that my looks were hideous. Adolescence is painful for everyone, I know, but mine was plain weird.

On a fundamental level - I know so many women in their 30s who didn't get married, or they did and it didn't work out, or they didn't have children because they were trying to get their careers going, or because they were expected to be independent, plus have a family. They didn't feel secure enough.

One feels so despairing on some levels about what's going on in our culture, in regards to things like gender inequality. But there is progress. There is enhanced empathy and respect for others, we are fighting the tide, even though it seems like a tug of war sometimes.

And I haven't read a lot of blogs but if someone writes about what they care about I'm sure it's interesting.

I think that life force is invaluable.

You know what daring really is to me? It's maybe much more simple: the willingness to get up and try it again. It's not about whether or not you fall down, it's how you get back up. And I've taken quite a few tumbles, myself.