A Quote by Andrew Solomon
When I was growing up, I kept hoping that I wasn't really gay because I wanted to have children. I went through a long, tortured period, so the fact that I have been able to be true to myself and have a family has been the nicest surprise of my adulthood.
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Getting pregnant wasn't easy, and I found that devastating. I really beat myself up for waiting so long when I'd always wanted children and family had been the basis of my happiness my whole life.
I feel like I've been lucky that I've never been put in a situation where I had to keep a serious secret. But what is true of me - and has to be true of everyone who's ever been in a family - is that our idealization of reality when we're children always has to fall apart. It's the narratives we didn't know about that pop up and redraw reality. You have to be able to integrate secrets into who you are. My family does not look now like it does when I was a kid. There was divorce. There were family secrets. There was definitely a difference between what I thought was true and what was true.
Here was long period on my life when I was very disappointed by the fact I wasn't gay. Because I grew up going to gay clubs, living in New York and LA, both very gay cities.
As my father went through a really, really long and dark period of his health declining and falling deeper into the abyss, I knew I was never going to let my family and my children experience this without any long-term care.
That's what actually caused me to run for office is, you know, my family story, the experience of growing up in a family where your dad had been imprisoned, had been tortured, and came to America with nothing, washing dishes for 50 cents an hour. That was perhaps the most formative experience of my childhood, is being raised in that household where freedom had an urgency.
I don't have family members calling me and saying, "Is this rumor about you in the newspaper true?," because they know it's all bullshit. I already have that support system, and it's actually been really helpful. My parents have been in the entertainment business for so long that they really know what not to do.
I don't want to analyze myself or anything, but I think, in fact I know this to be true, that I enter the world through what I write. I grew up believing, and continue to believe, that I am a screw-up, that growing up with my family and friends, I had nothing to offer in any conversation. But when I started writing, suddenly there was something that I brought to the party that was at a high-enough level.
Listen, I've been pretty fortunate. And if I've been underrated, it's actually been something I've been able to work with; I can surprise people. It sets me up to exceed expectations, so I don't mind.
I'm feeling really grateful. I'm feeling grateful that I've been able to participate in this game for as long as I have. I'm feeling grateful that I've been able to tell my stories. I don't know that my mom and dad are that grateful, or Carey [Hart, Pink's husband], but it's been good for me. I'm grateful if I've kept one girl from feeling different or ugly or unempowered.
One thing I've always been really proud of about our band is that we've done what we wanted to do, what we enjoy doing, and we've been really lucky that people have responded to it the way that they have. As long as we continue to really enjoy what we do and make decisions with integrity, I'm hoping people continue to respond to that.
One of my best friends growing up was gay. ... It’s never been an issue for me. ... I think there was a time in my life, probably in college, that I wished every guy was gay, because it just meant more women for me! ‘I don’t know why you guys have a problem with this thing! I think it’d be great! I wish everyone was gay!’ ... That’s always the way I thought about it. ... I have no issue with it. If I have to suffer through marriage, why shouldn’t they?
The greatest lesson I have learned in life is that I am enough simply because I have been given life. Growing up, I constantly found myself trying to please others because I wanted to be included and validated. I expended myself completely.
As a kid growing up, I didn't want to tell any of my classmates I did figure-skating because I knew they'd be like, 'Oh, you're a skater, you're gay, blah blah blah.' So I kept it to myself. Once I started getting to more of an elite level, I didn't really care what people thought, though.
I've been extremely lucky in that I've been a very successful model for a long time. So now I'm an actress and a mother. I'm a theatre rat, which I always wanted to be - I've wanted to act since I was 14 - and I never get bored, ever, and I have four beautiful children. I am, in fact, so darn lucky.
I've never been able to shake the idea of family, which is to say I've never been able to shake my family. Being membered - being one limb of an immense grosser body - that's always been a fact to me.
Humor's always been the problem of my work, hasn't it? When working, I feel satisfied when I surprise myself. And when I surprise myself, I wind up laughing.
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