“Who is Katharine Hepburn? Well, I worked hard to create that creature on the screen, to make her fascinating and endurable. You were right Dad, I'm still showing off, still enjoying it - but I agree, acting really is a minor accomplishment, certainly compared with being a doctor or a scientist. I've been around so long, though, that people treat me as some sort of oracle or grandmother of the world, maybe - wanting to know what I think about the important things in life. Well, I think that just being alive is a tremendous opportunity - it's what you do with it that matters. And I know that work never hurt anyone, it's the lack of work that destroys people. In some ways, I've lived my life as a man; made my own decisions, I've been as terrified as the next person, but you've got to keep going. You've got to dream. Now, I don't know if there's an almighty, but I do know you can't expect him to do all your work. We have to take matters into our own hands and use plain old common sense as our guide. My mother fought for women's rights and birth control, she believed that having children was a personal decision - so do I; there are already too many of us, why make people have children they don't want? That's just not logical, is it? And love - well I'm lucky, I've been loved and I've also been in love, there's a big difference. But people who want fame have to be loners, I always knew that I couldn't have it all. Marriage and a career, to my mind, do not go together easily. Now to squash a rumor: no, I don't have Parkinson's. I inherited my shaking head from my grandfather Hepburn. My head just shakes, but I promise you, it ain't gonna fall off. And old age - what's the point of worrying about something you can't control? Just make the best of it, and hope your body doesn't let you down. And I have no fear of death; must be wonderful, like a long sleep. But let's face it: it's how you live that really counts. There's been a motto with my family for as long as I can remember, my parents lived by it and so do I, and it says, 'Listen to the song of life.'”
Katharine Houghton Hepburn || 12 May 1907 - 29 June 2003
