My late 20s, writing my third record.
When were you happiest?
Question
What is your idea of perfect happiness?
Identity & self
Question
What is your greatest fear?
Identity & self
Question
Which living person do you most admire, and why?
Values & belief
Question
Which trait do you most dislike in yourself?
Identity & self
Originally asked
The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A
Asked in 52 of the 131 consecutive instalments of The Guardian's The Q&A harvested on 2026-08-29.
You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.
The night my daughter was born, New York, December 29, 1997. After she emerged and I held her in the palm of my hand, I walked around Manhattan in a stupor of happiness.
Vanity Fair, The Proust Questionnaire, Vanity Fair, September 2009 source ↗
Others on this question
View all 577 →
Kim Wilde
English pop singer
These are the happiest days. I love the process of getting older and, sometimes, wiser.
Sally Phillips
British actress
At the birth of each of my children. Drugs were involved.
Ed Harris
American actor and director
The day our daughter was born, or maybe fishing on the Colorado river with my wife and brother and his buddy Earl.
More from Garrison Keillor
View profile →To be wildly, desperately, carelessly, nakedly in love, of course. Crazy, obsessive love: brooding, baying at the moon, writing daily missives to the adored. Who wouldn’t want this? Even though the crash is painful.
That this is all there is, and there is no more.
My president, a heroic figure—also good- humored, pretty smart, elegant; and if the rest of the world thinks he typifies America, I don’t mind at all.
Self-denigration, an old strategy for extorting praise from people. (“I am a terrible person.” “No, you’re a wonderful person and we all love you.”)
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