I was an English major in college, and then I went to graduate school in English at the University of North Carolina for three years.

My job as the mother of daughters is to make sure my children see that every opportunity is available to them.

Resilience is accepting your new reality, even if it's less good than the one you had before.

This diagnosis is a reminder that this is the life you've got. And you're not getting another one. Whatever has happened, you have to take this life and treasure and protect it.

It's just a part of our nature to hope.

... all things are possible if you are willing to put yourself on the line. You cannot stand back and hope for the best. You have to act.

You recognize a survivor when you see one. You recognize a fighter when you see one.

A lot of people have great hope, and a lot of people who have great hope live. And, some of them who have great hope die. So it's not that hope is going to save you.

Tabloid news is tabloid news.

We were never a family that had a lot. We had enough, but not a lot.

We have a middle class that lives on a razor blade. So sometimes when you say poverty, you neglect a large portion of the population.

One of the fundamental aspects of leadership, I realized more and more, is the ability to instill confidence in others when you yourself are feeling insecure

But he was sixty-two when I was, born, and the novelty of daughters had worn away long before.

I take photographs with love, so I try to make them art objects. But I make them for myself first and foremost - that is important.

I forgot he [Barack Obama] was black tonight for an hour.

I'd like to write a history, maybe of the Reformation.

As a governor and senator, John Chafee set the standard for honesty and decency that the rest of us on our best days could only dream to emulate.

If I were to just focus on stand-up, I could actually, paradoxically enough, be home way more, because I would leave on a Friday, go do a couple theaters Friday, Saturday, maybe Sunday, come home.

The philosophy of the rich and the poor is this: the rich invest their money and spend what is left. The poor spend their money and invest what is left.

hope is not a plan of action.

I wake up sometimes with an idea and then I write it down. It's not necessarily easy, but when you focus on something it comes.