A Quote by Gayle Tzemach Lemmon

My mother worked at the telephone company during the day and sold Tupperware at night. Evenings, she took classes when she could at University of Maryland's University College, bringing me along to do homework while she studied to get the degree she hoped would offer her and me greater opportunities.
Over the years, she [my mother] always encouraged me in the arts. She actually worked at an art museum when we were kids. I took classes there. She was the one that, when we'd go to the store and I would have a pack of eight pastels, she'd say, "No, get the 24-pack." She was always encouraging me to get the best materials, which was really awesome.
My mom graduated from the University of Michigan, which is a great school. Then she got her Master's from NYU. She wanted to be an actress, so when she graduated, she had a dream, and she started following it. She moved to New York and took acting classes with people like Denzel Washington.
My mother was a great typist. She said she loved to type because it gave her time to think. She was a secretary for an insurance company. She was a poor girl; she'd grown up in an orphanage, and she went to a business college - and then worked to put her brothers through school.
I think it's really exciting for me to see Brandi branch out. Because when you look her up and see her pictures online and see that she was this bikini model, it doesn't tell you that she's got a degree from the University of Michigan or that she attended the master's program and the University of Miami.
It was here in L.A., before 'I Kissed a Girl' and all that. She stopped me and told me she was a huge fan and that she was a singer and that one day she hoped that I would dress her. I ended up dressing her for her record release.
After my mother died, I learned that she'd had a scholarship to the University of Nebraska, but - in kind of a tradition that females don't do things like that - her father prevented her from going. She always said that she wasn't allowed to go to college, but until she died, I never knew that she'd had this scholarship.
My mom and dad both worked when I was little... My mom, her mom died when she was 11, so she had a rough childhood as well. She put herself through college in three years at the University of Texas - while working a job to pay for it.
...fact was she knew more about them than she knew about herself, having never had the map to discover what she was like. Could she sing? (Was it nice to hear when she did?) Was she pretty? Was she a good friend? Could she have been a loving mother? A faithful wife? Have I got a sister and does she favor me? If my mother knew me would she like me? (140)
She drove me to ballet class...and she took me to every audition. She'd be proud of me if I was still sitting in that seat or if I was watching from home. She believes in me and that's why this [award] is for her. She's a wonderful mother.
One thing I did have under my belt was, my mother lost her mother when she was 11. She mourned her mother her whole life and made my grandmother seem present even though I never met her. I couldn't imagine how my mom could go on but she did, she took care of us, she worked two jobs and had four children. She was such a good example of how to conduct oneself in a time of grief. When I lost my husband, I tried to model myself as much as I could on her.
[My mother] worked at thrift stores and she didn't have a high school education. She sacrificed everything she had for me and my brothers. I never went without. She showed me that she could put food on the table, buy us Jordans, we had the best clothes and she worked two-three odd jobs.
I was used to theatre classes. I studied with my mother; she was a theatre teacher and directed, too, so it was very family-like. Then I studied with a great teacher in Paris, and she was wonderful; she pushed me, but she was a warm soul.
When my father left us, my mother went back to school immediately. She went to school in the day while we were at school, and she worked at night. She worked very hard to never let someone define her as a victim or a failure.
In 1967, my mother - then Francie Weinman - graduated from Northwestern University with a degree from the prestigious Medill School of Journalism. But because she is a woman, the only television news job she could get in her hometown of Chicago was as a secretary at a network affiliate.
I definitely get my artistry and my vocal talent from my mother and mother's side. She sang in a jazz trio band so growing up my dad would always take me to see her play and she has a beautiful voice. When I was little and started to sing, she supported me and let that fire burn. She always knew what it took as a support system.
Mum was a brilliant classical pianist. She was Canadian and studied music at McGill University. She took me to ballet when I was a little girl, and those are some of my happiest memories.
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