When Nina Simone first sings the title of 'Feeling Good,' her voice has been alone for thirty-nine seconds. The solitary singer: there's always something fiat lux about it. Resolute, the individual moves through the void. You know the accompaniment is coming, but the voice, all by itself, makes you care about it: form turns into feeling.

If you played basketball growing up, you learn the importance of follow-through when you shoot: forming the gooseneck, waving good-bye to the ball, reaching into the far off hoop like it's a cookie jar - think Michael Jordan's last shot as a Bull.

The midpoint of the NBA season comes a little after the turn of the calendar year. As we settle into the new promises we've made to ourselves, basketball teams are busy evaluating how the promises they made to themselves over the summer are going.

You will be hard pressed to read another book that understands you as well as 'Leaves of Grass' does. It was made for you in the way that the constellations were made for you. It understands and makes space for your doubts, your love, the guilt and passions of your life and waits for you.

I'm naturally athletic. I've been involved in sports since I could walk. So, for me to be sedentary is just unacceptable. Not only is it great for your physical body, but it gives me more energy during the day if I've worked out. I feel better. I look better.

In my team, I don't want selfish players. I prefer to lose a game than have selfish players. I don't want that in my club. Never.

Jackie Robinson, as an athlete and as someone who was trying to make a stand for equality, he was exemplary.

When I was a kid in Woking, every week you went to the football dance, and every week the top kids would be wearing something different. You were constantly trying to catch up with them - which you could never do because, by the time you'd saved up enough to buy the item, they'd moved on to something else. That's the whole Mod thing, I suppose.