I hate writing. I almost never write. I write against deadlines. And when I'm teaching, I'm focused on that.

I never liked my father. He really was a dullard and misanthrope. My mother and he were married for 22, years and it was an ill match. She encouraged me to be a writer. She opened her home to black friends, and this was the 1950s. She didn't care later when I write about her.

I never listen to music when I write.

A straight writer can write a gay novel and not worry about it, and a gay novelist can write about straight people.

And so I write. I write my life. I write to escape real life. I write to live moments over again. I write to rewrite the moments I’ve lived over in a way that makes more sense to me. I write the moments to heal. I write the moments I hope never happen. And I write the moments I hope will happen.

I have never sought the reason why I write.