WEBVTT

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[APPLAUSE]

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Peter Wilson.

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Thank you.

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Well, it sounds like we're
talking about the same guy.

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It doesn't see me at a
multiple personality disorder

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or anything like that.

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In fact, he didn't seem to
me to have very much guile

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or artifice at all.

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He didn't live a tactical
or a strategic life.

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He was one authentic guy.

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So being number 19 here
is kind of challenging.

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And to meet the
time constraints,

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I'm going to have to
talk faster than I

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think, which always gets me
into trouble, so I got a script.

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Steve for me was a friend
who happened to be a poet

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rather than a poet who
happened to be a friend.

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Of course, both the poet and
the friend were the same guy,

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but I didn't really
intersect much

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with his professional
or his literary life.

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Truth of the matter is I've only
read a fraction of his poems.

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So that's something
that I will be doing.

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We first met, Steve and
I, in the summer of 1967,

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44 years ago, oh my
god, 44 years ago,

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when I was a philosophy
graduate student.

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The two of us were teaching
at a summer enrichment program

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for mostly Black
high school students

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in Greensboro, North Carolina.

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And Steve was someplace
between being a student at Iowa

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and a gainfully employed
adult here in Arizona.

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One of my students asked me if
I knew Mr. Orlen, whom he said

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was really something to see.

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He would jump up on the
desk in front of the class

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to energize them,
and he maintained

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that he could teach anybody
to write a pretty good poem.

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So I met him, and we hit it off.

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And weekends, we took to
driving down the road to Durham

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to meet up with my new
bride, formerly new bride,

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back there someplace.

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So when we get to Durham, we
would do the kinds of things

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that people in their 20s
would do in the '60s,

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and we would talk,
and talk, and talk.

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Steve was my poet.

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I was Steve's philosopher,
and Lynn was our psychologist.

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And life was good, and there it
was spread out in front of us.

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And over the next 40 years
and up until just recently,

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we only got together
about a half dozen times,

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and that's only for a
few hours each time.

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So that averages out to
about once every six years.

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Always, there was a kind
of seamless picking up

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of the conversation, based
on a fairly immediate sense

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that nobody turned into a
schmuck since we saw them last.

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But this always impressed me.

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I mean, what was
it about Steve--

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and we've all said this in a
variety of ways-- what was it

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about Steve that could
turn a few hours every now

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and then into a lifetime
friendship, one of my more

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profound lifetime friendships?

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And I don't know what he
was for you all, but here's

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what he was for me.

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Number one, he was a tough guy.

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He was a bad guy.

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He was almost an outlaw,
but he was sensitive.

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He wasn't mean, sort of
like Robin Hood, or Zorro,

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or Clint Eastwood.

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He was a friend of the
underdog as someone said.

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And he once told me that
he thought we were lucky

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and that we hadn't
screwed up our luck.

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And I took that to
mean that he felt

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he had escaped an
early unhappy fate,

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and he was forever
grateful for that.

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And I think much of Steve
flowed from that sense of self.

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Close behind, number two,
he was oh, so curious.

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He had sort of a
nothing-human-is-alien-to-me

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kind of guy.

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That's who he was.

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Now this made him
seem non-judgmental,

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but I think he was judgmental.

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He just never let
his judgments get

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in the way of hearing
what you were saying,

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of understanding,
and of accepting.

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And most importantly,
he didn't need

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to find the flaw in you in order
to feel better about himself.

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He was a generous guy.

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In fact, there's a
guy who lives out

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of a shopping cart up at
the corner of a Speedway

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and Country Club who
misses Steve quite a bit.

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It's true, absolutely true.

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He had a wide, and he had
a wonderful set of friends.

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The people I met
through Steve, sort

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of beginning with Gail
and Cozi and going

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on to several
people in this room,

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are all great souled and not
only that, but good drinking

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buddies.

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And you know, finally, he had
pretty good fashion sense.

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I mean, most amazingly
to me, he managed

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to have a bad hair day every
day, but he still looked good.

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And this probably had something
to do with the black shirts

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that he liked to wear.

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The way the mind works,
first impressions and all,

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I always saw Steve,
someplace in there,

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as a young guy jumping
up on the desk trying

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to energize the conversation,
even though lately,

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the last few years, he'd mostly
stay sitting in the chair.

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He'd envelop you when
you walked into the room.

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He sent out those big
bear hands toward you.

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He'd give you a big bear hug.

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And then you get a drink,
and then you'd sit down

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and you talk.

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And if you were me,
you'd like yourself

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because Steve would make
you be wittier, and more

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loving, and more perceptive
than you tend to be on your own.

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And I think he did that
for a lot of people.

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So Steve, it looks like you're
a generous, smart, creative,

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authentic outlaw with
pretty good taste.

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And you managed all that
while living your life

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with a lot of honor,
and a lot of integrity,

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and that's exactly
what a mensch is.

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It was a good life and
you were one sweet man,

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so thanks to you.

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So nice.

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Hear, hear.

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[APPLAUSE]

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