Sometimes you can get excited about something and you can't remember why. I didn't think I'd ever published anything. He was very practical. He did give me good advice. It was only two years after that I said I really want to do a book on John Coltrane.
Life is mysterious.
I can tell you this. When I applied to Ph.D. programs in the fall of '78 and spring of '79, I told each school that I applied to that I wanted to do my Ph.D. dissertation on Coltrane because I eventually wanted to do a book on him. I knew already that is what I wanted do. I made it a point that I wouldn't go anywhere unless they would let me do that. But that's not a surprise because it is Coltrane's most famous record.