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" In a lot of ways, songwriting helped save my life. "

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" What I really like is this salted calamari - with jalapenos on top. "

" If somebody in a family is in service, the whole family is in service. I didn't know that. I didn't know our veterans were being deployed seven, eight, nine, 10 times. It's inhumane. "

" I haven't been in the military, but I've known my share of pain. It allows me to sit with someone who's struggling and not be afraid. "

" I feel as though I came to music with something to say. It wasn't like that when I was younger. I didn't have the ability to articulate what it was I wanted to say. "

" Recovery stabilized me; songwriting gave me a purpose. "

" Once I got my life sorted and started to get healthy, then I was able to focus on writing. "

" I'm a big fan of Lou Reed, and I do a lot of talking through songs. It's more effective with my vocal limitations and also more powerful to slightly sing sometimes. It depends on the emotion, but I'm never going to try to compete with great singers. "

" A lot of songwriters have written about soldiers and war, but very few have written with them. "

" I was in the orphanage in New Orleans until I was almost a year old. I don't think I ever got held by my mama, so that was completely and utterly traumatic. I think it was trauma from the first breath, and I think I've spent my whole life trying to heal from that trauma. So it shaped my brain. "

" A song is an emotional lightning bolt - a good one, anyway. "

" I have got my story. Adoptees rarely get our stories. We only know what we are told. I don't even have my story, really. My mother won't tell me. She won't tell me who my father is. She won't tell me the story of my birth. "

" I think if people really listened to what our families who serve go through, we could have a realistic discussion of what it means to send young people to war. "

" It is a form of arrogance to assume that other people are even thinking about you. "

" In my early years, I couldn't find a community. I couldn't find anybody like me. I felt so isolated. There was nothing but shame and loneliness. "

" I learn something every time I go to work with a veteran. Every single time. "

" The job of the artist is to go to the places where most other people are embarrassed to go to. And show it. "

" There's an ocean of misunderstanding. It's called the civilian-military divide. I had a lot to learn about our military - who they are, what burdens they carry. "

Misunderstanding

" It can take me many months to write one of my own songs. "

" When I became a songwriter, it was out of some sort of desperation. I needed to create something. I had to latch on to something, and the guitar was what I grabbed. "

" I don't play everything I write. I mean, everything I write is not that good. I bring out into the world the ones I think that are really worthy of an audience's attention. "

" I've always been drawn to the hard story, the trauma, because I think art can turn it around. "

" I'm a traveler and a vagabond and an observer, and the songs come through that. And that's just the way it's going to be. "

" I'm grateful to songwriting and recovery to bringing me to a place of peace. "

" I got interviewed by one writer who started with the line, 'Mary Gauthier is a woman who clearly doesn't care how she looks.' I do too. It's just that I'm not very good at it. "

" I knew I had that Cajun heritage, that Acadian heritage; I just feel it. And my gut says Irish on the other side. Irish and French, that's what I feel. When you're young, it doesn't matter so much, but as you get older, I would suspect part of the ageing process is to wonder about your ancestors - who were they? What were their lives like? "

" When you see validation for a life's work and dedication, it's a beautiful day. "

" What I was told is that I was born to a mother who was a Catholic, while her boyfriend was not. They couldn't get married unless they put me up for adoption. "

" They send women into combat without being prepared for women in combat. The men resented them being there, and it was just very, very difficult for them, and they had to fight for the respect they were earning. And that's all they want is the respect. "

" I'm from New Orleans, and I have a French last name - although I have no real relationship with my last name because it's not my name. I don't know my name. "

" Creating something beautiful out of pain helps ease the pain. So, that's kind of how I got to songwriting - quite honestly out of desperation. "