Ani DiFranco Quotes

I've never had a very closely connected family. My parents split up when I was young and I was living with my mom for a little while, then I was kind of just on my own really young. It wasn't some kind of global tragedy, it was just never really a very close-knit family. So there was support in the sense that they didn't stand in my way.

Womenfolk raised me, and I was full-grown before I knew I came from a broken home.

I basically raised myself.

When you're in a single-parent home, they try to give you a good foundation, but by the time you're 4 or 5 years old, from that point on you're pretty much on your own.

My mom, you know, took off when I was about 6. What ended up happening is I ended up being with my grandparents.

I was a latchkey kid from the time I was 7 years old.

My parents didn't care very much what I did, and that was probably a blessing.

I guess when you are left on your own, you find your true potential. I remember my father never came to our school even once.

My parents got divorced when I was nine months old, and my father would only pop in and see me once a year, if that. I don't have much contact with him.

When I was about eight, my mom started disappearing for days at a time, probably with one of the guys she was dating. There would be no food.

I do think my old fella wasn't much of a... I don't remember him ever being a 'dad' dad. He was too busy working. It was a hard life, man.

I never experienced any feelings of closeness and caring from my parents.

I don't think in my family anyone looked after anyone. It didn't matter how old they were.

I never knew my father. He was never married to my mother; he was never a part of my life. It was just my mom, my brother and me.

My dad was a surgeon, my mom a nurse, and they were always out working. I had five sisters and a brother. They didn't care what I got up to.

I didn't spend much time with my parents when I was growing up.

Is it not evident that the Canadas, as well as the other colonies, have been left in a great measure to grope their way as they could through the darkness which surrounds them, almost totally unaided by the parent state?

My childhood was bittersweet in many ways. We moved around a lot. By the time I was 10, I had travelled thousands of miles, often on my own. My parents were like my friends, so it felt like I didn't really have parents at all. But in a crazy way that was very liberating. It forced me to be independent, maybe a leader, and certainly a survivor.

I grew up with just my mom. She and I were like best friends. She's a very independent woman and I admire that about her. In my life, I've tried to be like that. To be okay with being on my own and being independent.

No, like I said, my dad was never really part of the tennis. His involvement around what I did with the tennis and with my mom and my grandparents was really not a part of my life.

I've been estranged from my father since I was eight.

My dad is a civil engineer, and my mom is a stay-at-home mom. The fact that my parents weren't really involved in music was kind of good, because it meant that I had something that was private and personal.

We were living in the Slad Road when my father left us. I was about three.

I am sure that, had I grown up with both parents, had I grown up in a safe environment, had I grown up with a feeling of safety rather than danger, I would not be the way I am.

I didn't grow up in a regular upbringing. I ended up at my grandmother's house past a certain age, so I took care of things myself. I moved out of home when I was 16.