I remember when I was growing up. My great wish was to understand who I was and how I fit in the world.

I think one of the great things about being a musician is that you never stop learning.

Mastering music is more than learning technical skills. Practicing is about quality, not quantity. Some days I practice for hours; other days it will be just a few minutes.

Children, in a way, are constant learners. Certainly sponge-like. Absorbing everything without careful analysis, even though, at the same time, they are certainly capable of incredible insights.

Gradually I find that my whole soul is merging itself into this business of writing, and especially of writing poetry. I am going to try it; and am going to test, in the most rigid way I know, the awful question whether it is my vocation.

Imagination - that's the future for us.

Sometimes good television doesn't depend on money, it depends on imagination and good people directing, casting and doing the job with talented people.

Common Core reminds us what testing can do right. Modeled on standards of the world's education superpowers, questions demand critical thinking and creativity. Students are asked to write at length, show their work, and explain their reasoning.