Dad looked at me, waiting for me to give an opinion, but I felt alienated
from myself. I didn’t know who to be. On the mountain I slipped
thoughtlessly into the voice of their daughter and acolyte. But here, I couldn’t
seem to find the voice that, in the shadow of Buck’s Peak, came easily.
We walked to my apartment and I showed them my room. Mother shut the
door, revealing a poster of Martin Luther King Jr. that I’d put up four years
before, when I’d learned of the civil rights movement.
“Is that Martin Luther King?” Dad said. “Don’t you know he had ties to
communism?” He chewed the waxy tissue where his lips had been.
They departed soon after to drive through the night. I watched them go,
then took out my journal. It’s astonishing that I used to believe all this
without the slightest suspicion, I wrote. The whole world was wrong; only
Dad was right.
I thought of something Tyler’s wife, Stefanie, had told me over the phone a
few days before. She said it had taken her years to convince Tyler to let her
immunize their children, because some part of him still believed vaccines are
a conspiracy by the Medical Establishment. Remembering that now, with
Dad’s voice still ringing in my ears, I sneered at my brother. He’s a scientist!
I wrote. How can he not see beyond their paranoia! I reread what I had
written, and as I did so my scorn gave way to a sense of irony. Then again, I
wrote. Perhaps I could mock Tyler with more credibility if I had not
remembered, as I did just now, that to this day I have never been immunized.
My interview for the Gates scholarship took place at St. John’s College in
Annapolis. The campus was intimidating, with its immaculate lawns and
crisp colonial architecture. I sat nervously in the corridor, waiting to be called
in for my interview; I felt stiff in the pantsuit and clung awkwardly to
Robin’s handbag. But in the end, Professor Steinberg had written such a
powerful letter of recommendation that there was little left for me to do.
I received confirmation the next day: I’d won the scholarship.
The phone calls began—from BYU’s student paper and the local news. I
did half a dozen interviews. I was on TV. I awoke one morning to find my
picture plastered on BYU’s homepage. I was the third BYU student ever to
win a Gates scholarship, and the university was taking full advantage of the
press. I was asked about my high school experience, and which of my grade
school teachers had prepared me for my success. I dodged, I parried, I lied
when I had to. I didn’t tell a single reporter that I’d never gone to school.