Tyka Nelson Quotes

I've written just about everything for the sake of putting shoes on the children's feet - and a bottle of gin in the cupboard.

When I was a kid out here in L.A., I was homeless, I didn't have any money and I was living in my car. I wasn't averse to going down to Santa Monica Boulevard and letting a guy buy me a sandwich. Know what I mean?

I had spent many days hungry; had slept on railway stations at times because I did not have money to pay for a hotel room... there were moments when I felt I had compromised my dignity as a human being and as an actor.

Yeah, I'll basically do anything to make money for food.

I used to walk to the Washington Monument from North L Street Northwest. And I was so hungry at times, I would stop and look into the trash cans, and if there was a half a sandwich, I would take that sandwich and eat it. It was just a matter of survival. I didn't think much of it, but it was just the way things were.

I know exactly what it's like to not have a penny. I know exactly what it's like trying to get a job. I know exactly what it's like having bloody one tin of Ambrosia left in the cupboard. But I know I can survive.

I became married at a young age and had two daughters and divorced at 26. I had to go on welfare to make ends meet. I had no way to support myself.

But what is the use of preaching the Gospel to men whose whole attention is concentrated upon a mad, desperate struggle to keep themselves alive?

Things were so bad we ate rabbits that neighbours had run over and gave to us because they knew we were broke.

For a long time, I couldn't even afford food and clothing. I climbed from the very bottom of the society.

The rocky time came right after I left school. I spent a lot of time at night navigating the streets of Paris trying to find something to eat.

The truth is that at age 19, I was a teenage mother living alone with my daughter in a trailer and struggling to keep us afloat on my way to a divorce. And I knew then that I was going to have to work my way up and out of that life if I was going to give my daughter a better life and a better future, and that's what I've done.

I used to sit in front of McDonald's and ask people for dollars to get me a cheeseburger. It was bad.

It was a real hand-to-mouth existence in those early days - I'd have whatever dry cereal there was in the house for breakfast, 30 cents to spend on lunch and a hot dog for dinner. I did that for years. So there was definitely a hunger in me, of various kinds, to succeed.

I started writing lyrics out of desperation. I was broke and wondering where my next job, my next meal was coming from, although I had had several successful revue songs on Broadway.

My mother, we were a very poor family. When I was a kid, we would be in our little room, and there would be a knock on the door almost every night with a hobo begging for food. Even though we didn't even have enough to eat, my mother always found something to give them.

A lot of mothers want to be with their children. They can't afford it for this reason or that reason.

The depths of the Depression. You didn't ask what the job was, what the pay was, you didn't ask about stock options, or - you said yes.

I am a struggling writer. A middle-aged man with two little kids and I'm just trying to earn a living. So buy this book - or my kids will have to go to foster care.

At my lowest I was making nothing, of course.

Proletarian language is dictated by hunger. The poor chew words to fill their bellies.

I was broke for more than 10 years. I remember staying up all night one night at my first company and looking in couch cushions the next morning for some change to buy coffee.

My mom was a hairstylist, but she quit doing that to raise the kids - there were four of us. There was no money.

It would be nice if we redefined what we meant by 'war story.' If you're making $15,000 a year living in a certain area of Portland, trying to make it with three kids and no husband, that's a kind of war.

Nobody wants to sell their child, but what they wind up doing is selling their child to be able to support their family.