Working as a solo artist has given me a confidence that I didn't have with Blondie.
It's everything for me. Without figure skating, I am nothing.
What worries me though, is that after all those victories people don't see me as a human being anymore. I am not a machine, I have a heart beating in my chest -not an engine, there's blood in my veins- not oil. I know pain and fatigue. I can lose but I will strive to win everything.
I skate for the fans. It's not as fun without them there supporting me. I get energy from them and I want to skate well for them. They relax me. They make me happy when I skate for them. I feel the Americans like me more and more each time I tour.
My main competitor is myself.
Viktor Petrenko and I met at a competition, where I beat him completely accidentally. I felt so embarrassed in front of my idol.
I think I was born to be a figure skater, I think it was fate, and I thank God for letting it happen.
Although both sides of my family were religious, I was never forced to practice the Jewish faith. I did not really rebel against it, but then, as today, I disliked organized religion. I have a strange inhibition about praying with others.
It's the pool where we all go down to drink, to swim, to catch a little fish from the edge of the shore; it's also the pool where some hardy souls go out in their flimsy wooden boats after the big ones. It is the pool of life, the cup of imagination, and she has an idea that different people see different versions of it, but with two things ever in common: it's always about a mile deep in the Fairy Forest, and it's always sad. Because imagination isn't the only thing this place is about.
As an entrepreneur, don't follow the crowd; let them follow you.
For me a paragraph in a novel is a bit like a line in a poem. It has its own shape, its own music, its own integrity.