Tom Hanks gets serious

Tom Hanks became famous for his romantic comedies, so it’s surprising to get a glimpse into his serious side—as these quotes from him reveal:

The most accurate representation of how I feel (about this issue) is that I’m incredibly lucky to be working in an industry where people get paid millions to read the news on TV. And, yes, it’s insane. There’s nothing I can say beyond being aware that I’m blessed—and that it isn’t going to last forever.

There isn’t any great mystery about me. What I do is glamorous and has an awful lot of white-hot attention placed on it. But, the actual work requires the same discipline and passion as any job you love doing.

There’s something basic about protecting land by taking it off the market. People should be able to enjoy where they live while, at the same time, protecting the plants and animals within and around them.

My kid could get a bad X-ray result, and I could get a call from the doctor saying I have something growing on my bum—and that would change my perspective on everything instantaneously, on what is and isn’t important!

People always think that there’s a dark side to everyone—a closet with skeletons, demons under the bed, etc. They think all kinds of things about one another. They feel compelled to make up fears and false assumptions about everything.

As a boy, I would often spend my days biking on riverbeds and come home exhausted. Now, I realize how much I took for granted having the natural world so close at hand. It wasn’t until I moved away from it, first to New York, then to Los Angeles, that I realized how much I missed the outdoors!

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