I'm a single parent and it just wouldn't have been possible for me to carry on in 'Primeval' once filming of the show switched to Dublin for ten months.
I went from basically filming in my bedroom by myself, filming some funny videos, and then overnight, I switched into filming in some studios and some warehouses and family homes. I started filming with directors and producers and editors, and there were so many people in the room, so it was definitely weird.
I was a solo parent. Not a single parent as far as I was concerned. Single parent implies that the other parent is around somewhere.
I'll carry on, carry over, carry forward, Cary Grant, cash and carry, carry me back to Old Virginia, I'll even 'hari-kari' if you show me how, but I will not carry a gun!
Don't help me or serve me, but let me see it once, because I need it. Don't work for my happiness, my brothers — show me yours — show me that it is possible — show me your achievement — and the knowledge will give me courage for mine.
A conscious parent is not one who seeks to fix her child or seek to produce or create the 'perfect' child. This is not about perfection. The conscious parent understands that is journey has been undertaken, this child has been called forth to 'raise the parent' itself. To show the parent where the parent has yet to grow. This is why we call our children into our lives.
Once you're a parent, male or female, every single thing that happens in your life is seen through the prism of being a parent.
One time, when I was filming 'Strong Woman Do Bong Soon,' I had to ask my little sister to bring me something. I was filming a scene where I had to carry Park Hyung Sik and Ji Soo on my back, and my sister just had her eyes on them the whole time. She had no interest in me whatsoever.
The fact is I've been the kind of parent who has been there at every single sports day, my kids are achievers at school, scoring fantastic grades, they're part of the football and hockey team. In that aspect, people always saw me as a parent whose children have always gone from strength to strength.
My daughter is, of course, perfect. Everyone's child is, but mine really is perfect. But I could not have raised her without my parents. From the time she was seven months until now, I have been a single parent.
In 1980, when I graduated from high school, my goal was to be on 'The Tonight Show' with Johnny Carson at least once before our ten-year class reunion. Our class reunion was in June of 1990, and I was on 'The Tonight Show' in April 1990, so I made it by a few months.
I can't imagine being a single parent or a single parent that doesn't have a lot of money. That's a big, huge impact on your life and your dynamic and everything - I mean, that's huge. It affects how much you have a break from just concentrating on just one other person in your life. It becomes so myopic that way, and more intense, probably.
I've been in New York for 15 months. Winning two stars in the Zagat number one best newcomer within ten months of opening in New York has taught me a big lesson.
Today I am so at home in Dublin, more than in any other city, that I feel it has always been familiar to me. But, as with Belfast it took me years to penetrate its outer ugliness and dourness, so with Dublin it took me years to see through its soft charm to its bitter prickly kernel - which I quite like too.
I have a fall-back fund for the quiet months. I am a single working parent and it gets lonely when things are insecure.
I knew going in that being a single parent would be one of the toughest jobs I'd ever have. I'd been a talk-show host, actor, comic, and on and on, but this gig was going to be my defining moment.
Until 1914 I loved to travel; I often went to Italy and once spent a few months in India. Since then I have almost entirely abandoned travelling, and I have not been outside of Switzerland for over ten years.