Growing up in the middle of nowhere, there was a lot of twangy music around, but it didn't really connect with me then.

I toured a lot in the U.K. and Europe solo for a lack of funds, really. I left people I'd been playing with for years at home, just because I couldn't afford it.

Success will be when I can have a real swimming pool instead of the fifty-dollar one I buy at Kmart every year. But I don't want to get robbed of any authenticity to try and make money.

There's this element of surprise when you're writing songs, like it's something outside of you that you get to be part of. And it's just exciting. And that's why I keep writing - because I like that feeling.

I've always been a creative person since I was young. I enjoyed art, museums, plays, but it wasn't until I was about 10 that my mother encouraged me to choose a career, and it was acting.

The most important lesson I've learned is how rich and rewarding life is when one can engage in meaningful work, whether on the job or outside of work.

The only way that you can ever continue to have a career and have success and have hits is if you are honest to yourself in the same way that you were in the beginning.

Any way that I can use my career or my platform to push along transgender visibility in the mainstream and society serves me on a personal level in that it will make day-to-day existence when I'm not doing this that much easier.