Me: I'm smiling because you're smiling. So what are you smiling about?
Mibes: Several reasons. It's good to see you. I really do look forward to this. Another reason is location. This place. Who has been here. And what they've said.
Me: Milk? Harvey Milk? Harvey Milk on hope?
Mibes: Yes! Exactly. How did you know?
Me: I'm clearly thinking more like you do. And you actually have a kind of Harvey-Milk look on your face, at least the way Sean Penn portrayed him.
Mibes: He was talking about young isolated gays when he said (Mibes, now reading from his phone) "you have to give them hope. Hope for a better world, hope for a better tomorrow, hope for a better place to come to if the pressures at home are too great. Hope that all will be all right. Without hope, not only gays, but the blacks, the seniors, the handicapped, the us'es, the us'es will give up."
Me: I know what that's like when you lose hope. And when you claim it back again.
Mibes: I know you do.
Me: So I can see why you're smiling when you talk about hope. It's really one of the most powerful things in the universe.
Mibes: So here's to hope and Harvey Milk.
Me: (giving Mibes a hug) Thanks giving me hope, Mibes.
Mibes: Thanks to you, too, and Harvey Milk and Dustin Lance Black and so many others.
Me: Good luck with the rest of your day.
Mibes: You, too!
