In the decades since my youth, I've witnessed the explosion of fatherless families and an exponential increase in illiteracy and crime.

We understood, growing up - 'cause it was taught in our family home, my mom and dad - to respect women, for instance. To respect yourself. That you respect your name. Those are the kind of things we were taught.

It was the understanding of the power of perception that allowed the Martin Luther King, Jr. generations to stay true to the strategy of non-violence, refusing to retaliate when every emotional instinct would justify them doing so.

One of these days, I'm going to stop learning through my errors.

There's a lot of players I look up to, and I hope that I can be a role model to young female guitar players. Hopefully they can believe in themselves more.

I think at one time every drummer wanted to play like Krupa or wanted to win a Gene Krupa drum contest. This is the big inspiration for drummers and naturally it has to be the same way for me.

Once Canadians no longer believe that there is any good in politics, they no longer feel we can work together to solve the challenges we're facing, and that is my fundamental motivation: how do we work together as a country to solve the big challenges we're facing.

The writer's secret is not inspiration - for it is never clear where it comes from - it is his stubbornness, his patience.