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I used to have terrible tantrums. I was temperamental when I was younger. Actually, what I needed was a swift kick in the pants. What a brat!
Dorothy Hamill -
In my teen years leading up to the Olympics, I loved having the excuse to skip out on parties because of skating. Partying wasn't my thing anyway. Mostly I hung out with other skaters. We were all buddies, so it's not like I missed out on socializing. I was really enjoying myself.
Dorothy Hamill
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In group lesson number six I think we learned how to turn backwards and then just kind of wiggle. That wasn't really skating backward, but I guess I was going in the right direction.
Dorothy Hamill -
People think skating would translate very easily to dancing, but it really doesn't. Dancing is a lot of fun and not as dangerous as being on the ice.
Dorothy Hamill -
I was just ice skating. I had no concept of that. In those days you couldn't see the judges. I was this little person on the ice and they were just people that would stand around the boards.
Dorothy Hamill -
It took me two years to get an appointment with Mr. Suga who cut my hair for the Olympics. Who knew? I had no idea that it would be popular.
Dorothy Hamill -
If you don't know a lot about figure skating, it's easy to fall in love with ice dancing because it's so romantic and so theatrical.
Dorothy Hamill -
My mother stopped working when she had my brother. She was a full time mom until I started getting heavily into ice skating lessons, and it got to the point where they really needed my mom to earn an income.
Dorothy Hamill
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My family had a membership to the Riverside Yacht Club where my brother, Sandy, learned to sail, and I competed in local swim races. My sister, Marcia, became a competitive springboard diver, and my brother excelled in water polo.
Dorothy Hamill -
When I was growing up, there were very few women athletes. I remember watching Olga Corbett, but Peggy Fleming and Janet Lynn were my role models. I never dreamt that I could be at that level. I remember thinking they seemed so elegant and regal and powerful and feminine.
Dorothy Hamill -
I was passionate. I found something that I loved. I could be all alone in a big old skating rink and nobody could get near me and I didn't have to talk to anybody because of my shyness. It was great. I was in my fantasy world.
Dorothy Hamill -
I've made a commitment to concentrate on my career as an entertainer.
Dorothy Hamill -
Luckily, I discovered ice skating when I was eight and a half years old. There were two wonderful ponds within walking distance of my house. After all the physical activity the summer provided, I craved movement in the cold of winter. I had no skates, so Mom stuffed socks into my brother's old ones.
Dorothy Hamill -
One naively thinks that by winning the Olympics, it's going to be this switch, and then your life is going to be perfect, and that's not reality.
Dorothy Hamill
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I was a bratty little sister. I was the youngest of three, and I often felt as though I didn't fit in.
Dorothy Hamill -
I'm really very glad that I had skating to be my love and my escape. I think that it always gave me something that made me feel good, and it was music, and it was peaceful, and not a lot of the other stresses of life.
Dorothy Hamill -
Every time you go out on the ice, there are slight flaws. You can always think of something you should have done better. These are the things you must work on.
Dorothy Hamill -
My coach was a great politician, so he did most of the work. He was good.
Dorothy Hamill -
Everybody has to deal with tough times. A gold medal doesn't make you immune to that. A skater is used to falling down and getting up again.
Dorothy Hamill -
I never really liked my short hair; it never occurred to me that people would want it.
Dorothy Hamill
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I always had short hair, and I hated my short hair. I was always mistaken for a boy, but my mom wouldn't let me change my hair because she was always chasing me around with a hairbrush, and it was always tangled, so she just would cut it off, and she's right: short hair did suit me.
Dorothy Hamill -
I wouldn't say that there's ever been an Olympic champion that didn't deserve to win an Olympic Gold Medal.
Dorothy Hamill -
You see the fairy tale - four minutes of glory at the Olympics. I thought my life would be cake after that.
Dorothy Hamill -
I always had the sense that nothing was never good enough - striving for perfection. My mother and I had a sort of typical mother-daughter relationship.
Dorothy Hamill