I never did say that you can't be a nice guy and win. I said that if I was playing third base and my mother rounded third with the winning run, I'd trip her up.
I believe that always, or almost always, in all childhoods and in all the lives that follow them, the mother represents madness. Our mothers always remain the strangest, craziest people we've ever met.
My father knew the charming side of my mother, and my mother thought that he was attentive and pleasant and was an architect, which was a respectable profession, but I don't think that they actually got to know one another deeply.
But it's also because of something personal. My mother and father met while playing chess, so I've always had a fondness for the game. If it weren't for chess, I might not be here.
When I was a kid, I'd kneel down at the side of my bed every night before I went to sleep, and my mother and I would say a Greek prayer to the Virgin Mary.
When my children were born, I didn't have them baptized because I felt baptism was about erasing Original Sin - something the Church said children got from their mother - and I absolutely refused to believe women carry Original Sin.
I'd love to do some bedtime stories for kids or that kind of thing. But with the demands of the shooting schedule and balancing the demands of being a single mother, it's a wonder you can squeeze in anything.
My father is a chemist, my mother was a homemaker. My parents instilled in us the feeling that learning was the most exciting thing that could happen to you, and it never ends.
My mother gave me a push. If I hadn't had her, maybe I wouldn't have had the push. If I hadn't gone to military school, maybe I wouldn't have decided to get with the program. Maybe I'd be running a bulldozer, rather than going on and doing something more.
