Born in Paddington Hospital in Marble Arch in London, England, where my parents escaped to and lived.
They went through the war there, through the Blitz and now it was after that, a couple of years later, and my mother fell in love with a handsome muscleman, my father. And my mother got pregnant by accident and decided, this time, to keep the baby who turned out to be a girl and that was me.
And my story began as my mother didn't know what to do with this little thing, so she stuffed cotton into my clothes, between me and my clothes, so that I wouldn't be cold in that damp, gray climate in London with no central heating.
So I imagine I was sweltering, hot, uncomfortable, couldn't breathe, suffocating, couldn't move, claustrophobic as my mother tried to gently protect me from the elements. I can see her pushing cotton into every crevice like I was a China doll, my arms outstretched, ready to begin my life.
Maybe that's why I wear so many layers.
Or else my story began in New York City, in Flushing, Queens, where we ended up after coming across the ocean, after passing through Ellis Island to this strange new land where we were always outsiders and immigrants. That's how I felt all through my childhood. I was a misfit in Flushing, Queens, shy and afraid, and that's how my story began.
Or, maybe, when I finally got to college, to Queens College, across the street from where we lived. I never thought I would get in but I did by the grace of God, or someone, and it was at the exact time when the world was changing in astounding new ways and I was able to emerge, to change along with the new values.
This was the awakening time of sex and drugs and rock and roll and revolution and protest and Ram Das and yoga and SDS and theater and one play after another and love and exploration and a haze of twinkling stardust everywhere I looked and me in the middle of it and, maybe, that's where my story really began.
No more cotton stuffing me up. I threw it off and I was free.
