Sometimes it takes years to really grasp what has happened to your life.

'I can't' are two words that have never been in my vocabulary. I believe in me more than anything in this world.

What do you do after you are world-famous and nineteen or twenty and you have sat with prime ministers, kings and queens, the Pope? Do you go back home and take a job? What do you do to keep your sanity? You come back to the real world.

Black women . . . work because their husbands can't make enough money at their jobs to keep everything going. . . . They don't go to work to find fulfillment, or adventure, or glamour and romance, like so many white women think they are doing. Black women work out of necessity.

I had a series of childhood illnesses... scarlet fever.... pneumonia.... Polio. I walked with braces until I was at least nine years old. My life wasn't like the average person who grew up and decided to enter the world of sports.

Winning is great, sure, but if you are really going to do something in life, the secret is learning how to lose.

I would be disappointed if I were remembered as a runner because I feelthat my contribution to the youth of America has far exceeded the woman who was the Olympic champion.