I think this is something that is naturally built in in people, a need for attention and a need to be special and we are always trying to find a balance.

You don't feel like smiling? Then what? Force yourself to smile. Act as if you were already happy, and that will tend to make you happy.

What made something precious? Losing it and finding it.

When you mention to people growing up in Cleveland they bring up the river catching on fire, or LeBron James leaving, they have these references, but no one imagines ending up there.

I would never tell myself, you have to write 20 pages today or something. But I do try to show up. Read what I wrote, fix things.

If you told people you were moving to Ohio, they wouldn't congratulate you. They'd say "OH WHY would you move there?" as if that was something that happened to you and you had to deal with.

They never discussed it, but both came to understand it as a promise: he would always make sure there was a place for her. She would always be able to say, Someone is coming. I am not alone.

I am in a mixed race marriage myself, and I have a mixed race son....The racial perception interest is probably always going to be there to some extent.

After a while, the fear became a habit, too.

Being asked, "Where are you REALLY from?" It makes one feel OTHERED.

There is something about Midwest in general, that has kind of an underdog quality.

Some say one thing and do another. Others say one thing and do it just for spite. I say far too much and do whatever the hell I want.

Don't wait for people to dress your bed for you, do it yourself and you'll be glad to sleep and feel relaxed.

Anything added can be subtracted

Never fret for an only son, the idea of failure will never occur to him.

Life is about having a good time, and it was a good time. We did some things well and some things poorly, but that was always the case.

Don't do or say things you would not like to see on the front page of The Washington Post.

One of the most striking signs of the decay of art is the intermixing of different genres.

We must restore the sacredness of the family as a bedrock of humane values everywhere, in peace as well as in war.

Sometimes it seems safer to hold it all in, where the only person who can judge is yourself.

It's a romantic notion that you're going to have one brilliant idea and then everything is going to be great... but the execution and delivery are what's key.