I have always championed the concept of administrators of color. My mother worked in advertising, and growing up, I saw my mother's community of women working behind the scenes. I had the opportunity from a young age to know that I could do this work.
My mother was in advertising and worked incredibly hard when she was bringing us up. She was a working mother and a working single parent. That instills in you a sense of determination.
My mother [was in advertising and] worked incredibly hard when she was bringing us up. She was a working mother and a working single parent.
When I was growing up, I just saw my mother as a successful businesswoman and awesome mother, so I never really thought, 'I can't do it.' I saw how she worked hard, served clients really well, was a great mum to us.
I barely saw my mother, and the mom I saw was often angry and unhappy. The mother I grew up with is not the mother I know now. It's not the mother she became after my father died, and that's been the greatest prize of my life.
When people watch me on TV they see part of my life. I wanted to let them know the real me behind the scenes. The child who was a concert violinist from the age of six. The young woman who took on the challenge to compete in the Miss America pageant. The television journalist for twenty-five years. The mother of two who, just like most women, struggles to balance work and family.
My mam worked for 41 years. She was a single working mother. I think I always had that mentality of you can do everything. You can have your kid. You can be a good mother. You can work. She was very independent.
My mother was a dominant force in our family. And I always saw her as the leader. And that was great for me as a young woman, because I never saw that women had to be dominated by men.
It's interesting to talk to Bernie [Sanders] about his life and growing up, you know, growing up in an immigrant neighborhood in Brooklyn. His mother died at a very early age. He was young then. And, you know, I think that experience really shaped him.
My mother and her plans for my future. She had it all worked out. I would attend a nice college, then get a job in advertising. "You'll be one of those smart-looking fellows in their Madison Avenue suits." And I rebelled against [my mother] and her values and her plans for my future at every opportunity.
My father is a doctor and my mother ran the local pharmacy. Growing up, I saw firsthand the difference they made to our community.
There are a lot of sacrifices a mother makes when she's raising a child by herself. I saw it when I was growing up, watching all my mother did for me. But it wasn't until recently that I fully understood the price she paid because of how we had to struggle.
My mother never criticized any idea I had. She thought anybody could have anything. Even if I was in a poor family that worked at Ford Motor Company and lived in Dagenham. I could have told my mother that I wanted to work in pantomime. And she'd have said, "Great. I can help you."
I was raised primarily by women. I had a mother who almost killed herself to survive, I had a sister who was eight years older who was like a second mother, and my mother had two sisters. In the environment I grew up in, I heard a lot of female perspectives.
When I was growing up, my family was plagued by poverty. My mother, a single parent, worked around the clock to make sure her children - me, my five brothers, and three sisters - could eat and have a safe place to sleep. We hardly saw her.
Because my parents, growing up, they worked hard. Everyone in my family woke up early in the morning. I used to see my mother and my father go off to work, and come back and, no matter what, they had time for the kids.
Growing up, we were a poor yet tightknit family. My mother worked multiple jobs and always made sure that her kids never had to want for anything.