Control freakery in the kitchen.

My problem with clothes. I’ve got an issue, haven’t I? I’m not a fella in a band who can turn up in his T-shirt and jeans. I’ve got the whole drama of what I’m going to wear: the hair, the makeup. All that preening and pruning that adds to the stress. I have begun to hate that perfectionist in me.

I am not studious enough. I get easily distracted.

If I had a trait that I truly deplored, I would work to erase or modify it…Probably, a lack of discipline. (Though people think that I write quickly, & don’t revise, quite the reverse is true.) To myself, I work very slowly & painstakingly, & am often frustrated by accomplishing so little. My friend Margaret Atwood has said that in the late afternoon she is likely to be overcome by a feeling of desperation that she has accomplished so little that day, & this is a feeling I share, often. It seems that I waste most of my time gazing out the window here at my (overgrown) garden; & when I am in Berkeley, where I spend about one-third of the year, I am forever gazing out the window toward the San Francisco Bay & a continually changing, always-beautiful sky.

Beyoncé/Beyoncé’s hair person.

People who can’t read my mind.

A love of laughter and a shared belief that life is a dream.

That I take this questionnaire too seriously and reveal my crimes and misdemeanors, or I treat this questionnaire too flippantly and bring shame to the House of Proust.

A good nap and a full house.