The March on Washington affirmed our values as a people: equality and opportunity for all. Forty-one years ago during a time of segregation these were an ideal.

You see people who have been very heavy in their life who have taken that body trimmed it down firmed it up through discipline exercise and being able to say no. Eating properly that all comes into it.

By and large the critics and readers gave me an affirmed sense of my identity as a writer. You might know this within yourself but to have it affirmed by others is of utmost importance. Writing is after all a form of communication.

I was confirmed at my prep school at the age of 13.