I can get motivated seeing a kid at my son's school overcome a learning disability.
The only thing I learnt in high school is that people are very violent and territorial.
My mum wouldn't let me go outside. Coming back from school, the gang men sometimes would say things, but I would walk by, never answer, and my mum would go tell them leave me alone.
I went to college and graduate school, studying philosophy. I really did think I was going to wind up being a lecturer or professor of some sort.
Our approach to education has remained largely unchanged since the Renaissance: From middle school through college, most teaching is done by an instructor lecturing to a room full of students, only some of them paying attention.
I went to university in Leeds, and I graduated in 2016 and moved to London with the intention of applying to drama school. I was living at my friend's house; then, I was working as a live-in nanny for a couple of months because I had nowhere else to live.
Our quarterbacks were getting hurt; a couple got kicked out of school. The coach asked who wanted to try out for QB. I went and tried out, and from there on, I was a quarterback. I was ineligible in 10th grade until spring, so I did baseball. I started in left field and pitched.
At school, I always wanted to belong to a gang, and no one would have me. So I'd have make my own gang, but with everybody else's leftovers.
I used to be teased for the way I wore my hair at school. I used to do things like wear a different-colored sock on each leg.
I've led a school whose faculty and students examine and discuss and debate every aspect of our law and legal system. And what I've learned most is that no one has a monopoly on truth or wisdom. I've learned that we make progress by listening to each other, across every apparent political or ideological divide.
It is common sense that in our immigration courts, where children fleeing devastating violence abroad often find themselves, kids need lawyers to advocate on their behalf. After all, lawyers go to school for years to understand the nuances of our legal system.
I wasn't terribly sociable. I had two or three friends at school. I drew things, played with Lego. My parents left me free to do whatever made me happy.
I think if I had come out of drama school and been an instant Hollywood superstar, I would be taking long, leisurely holidays.
It depends how lenient you are with your definition of artist. If you're going to include those who tap dance at the high school recital, then maybe I am.
When I'm not the Tiger Mom, I'm a professor at Yale Law School, and if one thing is clear to me from years of teaching, it's that there are many ways to produce fabulous kids. I have amazing students; some of them have strict parents, others have lenient parents, and many come from family situations that defy easy description.
I remember when I was about 15 and still listened to Pet Shop Boys and Chas And Dave, some lad at school lent me a Blur tape, and it had on it a song called 'Bank Holiday.' I said, 'What's this? I liked that tape, but that one song is a bit fast'. He said, 'Yeah, it's punk. It depends what mood you're in.' And then something sort of clicked in me.
I went to a performing arts school. I went to an audition for a musical, 'Les Miserables,' in the West End, and I got in, and my parents were like, 'Oh, you can sing?' So I kind of started singing properly when I was, like, seven.
None of the standard high school science courses made much of an impression on me, but I did enjoy the Advanced Placement Chemistry course I took in my senior year. This course had only eleven students and was taught by a rarity for our school, an exchange teacher from England, Mr. Leslie Sturges.
Nobody in my school knew who Bill Monroe was, or Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs, and barely Johnny Cash. Nobody spoke that language. I proceeded to get myself kicked out.
My mum died of leukemia when I was in high school - she lost her life at 40. It was very hard, and I didn't do that much in Chicago after that. I actually sat around and didn't do anything for three years. I didn't know what I wanted to do anymore because my everything was gone. I was a mama's boy, and I had to turn into a man real quick.
