A Quote by Dan Savage

I didn't want kids to think that to be happy, they had to be famous or rich or live in the big city. — © Dan Savage
I didn't want kids to think that to be happy, they had to be famous or rich or live in the big city.
I've often looked at the extremes as a way to shed light on the mainstream. Even though everybody says, "Money doesn't buy you happiness," I don't think that that's the principle by which people live. If you talk to kids and ask them what they want to be when they grow up, they say, "Rich and famous," but being rich and famous is not a job.
I had never really wanted to be famous. Everyone is supposed to want to be rich and famous, but as a boy I never knew what rich was, and the first view I had of famous made me leery.
I didn't live the lifestyle of the rich and famous. My diapers were nappy cloth. I didn't live in a big house.
There are few celebrities that I don't know personally. And compared to the rich, most of the famous live in the poorhouse. It's much better to be rich than famous.
Juarez had become a failed city. The mayor of Juarez lived in El Paso. Not only did he not live in his own city, he didn't live in his own country. You had all these kids out of school who didn't want to work because they saw their mothers toiling in jobs for hardly any cash.
I always want to say to people who want to be rich and famous: 'try being rich first'. See if that doesn't cover most of it. There's not much downside to being rich, other than paying taxes and having your relatives ask you for money. But when you become famous, you end up with a 24-hour job.
Madrid is not as big as London, but it is true when you are coming from a big city like Madrid, nothing is going to surprise you, and I am very happy to move to a city like London. It is a big city, and you can do everything you want with the respect that the English people always have.
I have known lots of millionaires who were not happy men; they had not got all they wanted and therefore had failed to find success in life. A Singalese proverb says: "He who is happy is rich, but it does not follow that he who is rich is happy." The really rich man is the man who has fewest wants.
So often, we blame other people when, really, the problem is right down in here. I'm not happy. I don't know what's wrong. If I just had another job, I could be happy. If I just get married, I would be happy. Well if I just wasn't married, I would be happy. Well, if I just had some kids, I'll be happy. I'll be happy when these kids finally grow up and get out of here. If I had a bigger house, I would be happy. Well, I got a big house. Now if I just had a maid to clean, I'd be happy. Well, now if I just had a maid I could get along with better, I'd be happy.
You hear horror stories about scary mothers who just want their kids to be famous. I could be waitressing in a restaurant, and my mum would be happy as long as I was happy.
I wouldn't say that a big family is for everybody, and I've brought my kids, for example, to New York City, and I can tell you it's much harder to raise that number of kids in a city like New York than it is to raise them in rural Wisconsin where I live.
One bulls-eye and you're rich and famous. The rich get more famous and the famous get rich. You're the talk of the town....The sense of so much depending on success is very hard to ignore, perhaps impossible. It leads to disproportionate anxiety and disproportionate relief or disappointment.
Kids will keep it real. If I've ever had in my life a great anchor, it's them. They get in your head, 'don't get too famous.' If you think you're really famous and think you're really hip, go hang out with your kids for an afternoon. That's about as earthbound as it's going to get.
New York has arguably become the quintessential 1 percent city, a city that has been so given over to the rich that you now have to be rich to live here. Or not live here: New York's also a preferred destination for foreign money spent on vast, lifeless apartments in the sky that are occupied a couple of weeks a year at most.
I think, at the end of the day, you have to decide what you want. Do you want to be famous? Do you want to be rich? Do you want to have a career? Those are three very different things.
You can be rich and not be famous. You can be famous and not be rich. But to be rich and famous is a special category all by itself.
This site uses cookies to ensure you get the best experience. More info...
Got it!