When a kid plays football games before he attends a class, something is wrong.
We're all self-destructive when we're young. We all rebel. If we don't, there's something wrong. But when a Chicano kid's in a rebellious state, he has nowhere to go but to put himself in jeopardy with the police. When a kid who has some class privilege rebels, he's in a beautiful room and he can buy these horrible CDs and drugs. He's buffered from being a criminal.
Every kid who plays football dreams of appearing in the Bundesliga one day.
I mean I was very shy but I was also very extroverted because I was doing plays. I'd been doing plays since I was a little kid. But, I did feel like an outsider because I went to like a 'college-prep' kind of high school that had a really big football team and was known for its program so I was like this weird boy that did plays.
Not every kid plays football, basketball. Running can be a source to vent and let things out.
Duke is in extremely competitive environment. In my high school, I think I got one B my whole four years. I was used to being the smartest kid in every class I was in, and then I went to Duke and suddenly I was the dumbest kid in every class. Everybody there is up to something.
When I was a kid I really liked the guitarist of The Doors [Robby Krieger]. He plays blues, but he plays a lot of melodic things. He plays scales that are kind of unusual, and some bent notes.
I still see myself as the kid who plays accordion and tries to keep people happy for 45 minutes. And there's nothing wrong with that.
We have always found it easier, and still do, when the opponent plays football as well, when they don't just think in defensive terms, don't just sit inside their penalty box. It's just nicer when the opponent plays football.
Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country? The answer's no. That's not America. Is there something wrong with some seven-year-old Muslim American kid believing that he or she could be president?
I remember playing hockey as a kid - I was goalie in gym class and I was pretty good at it. But basketball was my passion. As a kid I went to class, came back from school, did my homework and went straight across the street to practice.
When I was a kid, back in the days before cell phone cameras, I had disposable cameras I took a lot of pictures with and I just remember something always went wrong.
Most people don't realize that they feel something is wrong before they think something is wrong.
I was a lonely, frightened little fat kid who felt there was something deeply wrong with me because I didn't feel like I was the gender I'd been assigned. I felt there was something wrong with me, something sick and twisted inside me, something very very bad about me. And everything I read backed that up.
I was born in a mining village, and you either played football or played football. If you didn't play, there was something wrong with you.
I was a football fan, a kid who loved football and when you are a kid from Paris there are only two stadiums - the Stade de France or the Parc de Princes - and that is what makes Paris so special.