Mary Gauthier

I'm sort of stuck in adolescence in many ways, like most artists, and march to my own beat.

I've got lots of problems. Being gay isn't one of them.

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

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.

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.

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've learned our soldiers are so much like everybody else. They're just put into an extreme situation.

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.

People who have been through trauma, their souls are hurting.

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

Being in recovery for a lot of years now, I've worked with a lot of people who've gotten sober and sat with a lot of folks who are suffering. Bearing witness is a really underrated thing; it's a big damn deal.

I think music is the highest form of healing.