I am the woman I grew to be partly in spite of my mother and partly because of the extraordinary love of her best friends and my own best friends' mothers and from surrogates many of whom were not women at all but gay men. I have loved them my entire life even after their passing.

All my friends' mothers were appalling women.

In their 30s women really start to live... they're not children anymore and they're not just mothers.

For any of us in this room today let's start out by admitting we're lucky. We don't live in the world our mothers lived in our grandmothers lived in where career choices for women were so limited.

All women become like their mothers. That is their tragedy. No man does. That's his.

A professional soldier understands that war means killing people war means maiming people war means families left without fathers and mothers.

Both my grandmothers had upright pianos and I just knew how to play since I was a child. Nobody taught me. I sounded like a grown-up and then I learned how to read music. I played so well by ear I could fool the teacher to believe I could play the notes. She'd make the mistake of playing the song once and I could play it.

I didn't know my mother had it. I think a lot of women don't know their mothers had it that's the sad thing about depression. You know you don't function anymore. You shut down. You feel like you are in a void.

They say geniuses mostly have great mothers. They mostly have sad fates.

I want to say a little something that's long overdue the disrespect to women has got to be through. To all the mothers and the sisters and the wives and friends I wanna offer my love and respect till the end.