Guion asked me what I had studied when I was at Berkeley and I told him that originally I was into cognitive science. (I explained for him that cognitive science was an interdisciplinary study centered around computer science, linguistics, psychology, and neurology, largely concerned with Artificial Intelligence.) That I had been going strong with that for two years when I got heavily involved in the performance poetry community and then I ended up doing a lot of travelling and performing and whatnot and I needed (wanted) a course of study that would be more congruent with what was going on in my career, so I changed my major to an Independent Studies Field major with a concentration in "Cross-Cultural Approaches to Creative Writing as Political Action." I told him that I then ended up taking a lot of creative writing courses as well as courses centered around culture and social issues.

He was very interested in the performance poetry subplot, so I told him how that had come about, how I went to my first two poetry slams, met the community, ended up on the San Francisco poetry slam team which ended up winning the National Poetry Slam in my first year of participation and how that catapulted me into a bit of national attention, how my writing appeared in the New York Times and I was on the McNeill News Hour, stuff like that. The poems that I was performing in all of these publicized areas captivated the attention of certain people at colleges, universities, and major organizations and they would pay me to come and perform for their students and employees.

Guion asked me about the nature of performance poetry and I explained how it might differ from any other kind of poetry. It was very exciting to go from listener to story-teller, myself. I think I became kind of grand as I talked of my life and travels. I grew animated and articulate. I forget what it feels like to be the vessel of story, even if it's just the modest story of my own small life. Guion leaned in, as he listened, an interested smile on his face. He and his wife laughed at the amusing bits. I was having a marvelous time.

He said that he could tell (from the retelling or from what I was saying—I was not sure) that I had a facility with languages. "With this language," I interjected, "with English. Not necessarily with all of the other ones." He pressed on, speaking of my strength in languages, comparing me to Eugene and to my father. Not like him—he hated to read and had great difficulty with languages. I wondered if he was pleased. With my supposed facility with languages. I find it odd that I so wanted to please this man. I really really did. Want to please him.

What's the word? Like commiserate, but without the misery part of it. When you agree on something, maybe based on mutual experience. Not quite empathize, but when you understand and can converse based on mutual understanding of a given situation. Maybe something about being on the same wavelength. Surely there must be a one-word verb describing that activity. And if there isn't, there ought to be. Anyway, we were [insert perfect verb here]ing on the subject of travel. Moving. Getting out of the place that you live and seeing what else is out there. Both Linda and Guy were sort of repulsed by the notion of staying in one spot all your life. I told them that I had been afraid when I was applying for college that if I didn’t leave then, I never would.

I told them that my mother forbade me to go to Berkeley, but that it was the only college that did not require a parental signature on the application, so I sent it off, anyway. (And that she hasn't stopped talking to me, not for a minute.) I had never been west of Ohio when I agreed to come to Berkeley. I had never seen the campus but I was passionately driven to get to California. Guy supplied the impetus. He understood perfectly the desire to put three-thousand miles between oneself and the town one grew up in, three-thousand miles between oneself and one's family. All of that was true. It was also true that I was in love with San Francisco. I told him that I had read books and watched movies and television shows about San Francisco (I laughed as I pointed out to them how potentially unreliable were my information sources). And that everything I had heard or read pointed me in the direction of Cali. That people would tell me I must go there, that that would be the place for me. I did not talk to him of growing up bisexual in Lansdale, Pennsylvania. Of seeing San Francisco as Mecca, of a safe place in the world to be queer. Of wanting to be far enough away from everyone who knew who I had been so that I could reinvent myself with ease and with freedom.

Instead I told them my standard line—that folks had told me I should go to Berkeley early on in high school and I didn't know where Berkeley was. I thought it was someplace in Michigan. And I thought, "Why on Earth would I want to go there?" They laughed. I spoke to them of the diversity of the students, of the beauty of the campus. Easy stuff to digest. The subject of my bisexuality never came up. Nor any details about my personal life. There were no questions that I felt really uncomfortable answering. There was some truth I did not share, but I did not have to tell any lies. I don't know if they would have liked my deviant ways. They expressed some disaffection for the radical Berkeley of the sixties. I was glad that my personal life never came up. Because I didn't want to give them a reason not to like me. It is so strong, isn't it? The desire to be liked. Especially the desire to have major figures in our family like us. Even ones like this that we don't even know, nor do we have to be concerned with on a regular basis. It is so strong. The desire to be loved, to be approved of, to be accepted. I so wanted to please them. It all felt so important.