In the city so much of your life is lived for you by others; you are required to fill so small a space. But here, as it were, the spirit has play in a more spacious body, and that is better, if the spirit is rich and strong.

They subordinate the whole to the part. It is no longer life they are celebrating, nor nature, but some crude, fanatical party creed. I am afraid that doing things for their own sake will soon be a luxury for children and perhaps for freaks like you and me.

When I was growing up, there were very few women athletes. I remember watching Olga Corbett, but Peggy Fleming and Janet Lynn were my role models. I never dreamt that I could be at that level. I remember thinking they seemed so elegant and regal and powerful and feminine.

I didn't know about competition or the Olympics until Peggy Fleming won in 1968. My mother looked after all of the competition stuff. I just skated. I didn't really love competition, but that was the only way to get better. You'd see more talent.

There were no competitions on television. The first skating competition I ever remember seeing on television was the 1968 Olympics when Peggy Fleming won.

I didn't study dance. I had some ballet lessons because I needed it for posture and for my arms, mostly. My skating coach said I really needed it, from the belly button up, as opposed to the footwork. In skating, the shoes don't move.