I'm learning a lot how to be good at what I do and also how lucky I am and take it all in and be grateful for all this late in life success I've been having and it's good to have people that have been around and successful for awhile and work with th...
A lot of people say I tried to emulate Tupac, but when I look back at my career, we're very different artists. I took pages out of Pac's book, of course, and lots of other rappers - Biggie, Nas - of course you take pages out of those books, but you e...
I think as the world changes, we have to keep up. We have to note what is happening, and I think writing has always had a powerful corrective influence and possibility. We have to write about what's good, and we also have to write about parts of our ...
Of course, there are those critics - New York critics as a rule - who say, 'Well, Maya Angelou has a new book out and of course it's good but then she's a natural writer.' Those are the ones I want to grab by the throat and wrestle to the floor becau...
The good thing is I don't put the ball in my right hand and I'm predominantly left-handed when I'm running the ball. I just have to take care of the football and even if I have two hands that are 100 percent, I still can't turn the ball over. It's ju...
My being a writer and playing Scrabble are connected. If I have a good writing day, I'll take a break and play online Scrabble. My favorite word as a child was 'carrion,' before I knew what it meant. I later created crossword puzzles, which was a lot...
To be honest, I wasn't a sci-fi geek at all. But I do love a good sci-fi film, especially one that can really take you away. And I read some reality-bending novels growing up, like stuff by Vonngeut, so I already had one part my brain open to the unn...
I have a job I'm pretty good at. I am in charge of things. I am on committees. People respect me and take my counsel. I want to be strong and professional, but I resent how hard I have to work to be taken seriously, to receive a fraction of the consi...
Before a game, I avoid having a heavy meal so that I don't feel sleepy at the board. You eat to be healthy, and that generally takes care of everything. Also, you can't be too finicky, since at tournaments you tend to eat at restaurants here and ther...
I do like the thrill of risk-taking, but it's always carefully calculated. I have done many high risk undertakings, but I have always measured the stakes. Not feeding the fear nor the doubt. But I also believe that you need to fuel passion in whateve...
We Hoosiers hold to some quaint notions. Some might say we 'cling' to them, though not out of fear or ignorance. We believe in paying our bills. We have kept our state in the black throughout the recent unpleasantness, while cutting rather than raisi...
I'm focused on the next generation, because I think it's very hard to break the habit of adults who've got salt and sugar addictions and just ways of being in this world. It's very hard even for the most enlightened people at famous universities that...
I am an Episcopalian who takes the faith of my fathers seriously, and I would, I think, be disheartened if my own young children were to turn away from the church when they grow up. I am also a critic of Christianity, if by critic one means an observ...
Let us take refuge from this world. You can do this in spirit, even if you are kept here in the body. You can at the same time be here and present to the Lord. Your soul must hold fast to him, you must follow after him in your thoughts, you must trea...
I lost my faith in God when I lost my daughter to Cancer, the beast. I begged, I cried, I offered my life for hers, and day by day, I watched that beautiful little Angel slip off. So, excuse me for not taking my seat next to you on Sunday in Church, ...
Thank God my hair is always the same. And I get dressed very quickly. I am not one of those people who spend three hours getting dressed. I never understood that. What do you do for the two and a half hours after the half hour it takes you to get rea...
I don't think anything I've written has been done in under six or eight drafts. Usually it takes me a few years to write a book. 'World's Fair' was an exception. It seemed to be a particularly fluent book as it came. I did it in seven months. I think...
I have many deep thoughts in God, but I take my own measure, lest I perish by boasting... For I myself, though I am in chains and can comprehend heavenly things, the ranks of the angels and the hierarchy of principalities, things visible and invisibl...
The things that have always been important: to be a good man, to try to live my life the way God would have me, to turn it over to Him that His will might be worked in my life, to do my work without looking back, to give it all I've got, and to take ...
I don't mind saying, you know, that I don't take a salary from the church, and God has blessed me with more money than I could imagine from my books. It's been printed all over, so I don't feel like I am hiding anything.
I have never written a book about my life, despite being offered purses of gold. I made 'Boxes' because I wanted to make a sincere depiction of a daughter who has lost her father, or the jealousy one can feel towards a daughter who has become more be...
