as interest in his family's story grew triston partnered with many major outlets including cnn and buzz feed. triston is us educator and speaker focusing on diversity, equity and inclusion in the founder of his consulting firm collaborate consulting or triston provides customized training and solutions for individuals, organizations and communities interested in social justice. when triston was a year into his relationship the couple learn that the niece and nephew were about to be removed from the home from child protective services interested in took in 1-year-old haley and 3-year-old lucas becoming caregivers overnight to two tiny survivors of abuse and neglect. from this surprising start they bill of loving marriage and happy home learning to pair on the job they adopted haley and lucas and decided to grow their family biologically with the child that triston was transgender would carry. triston's groundbreaking pregnancy attracted media fans there in the family welcome leo in 2017 in his book how do we family from adoption to trans pregnancy, what we learned about love and lbgtq parenthood triston shares a unique story and what he's learned about the best parent and partner in person you can be. joining triston in conversation is andrew solomon he's a professor of clinical psychology at columbia university medical center and past president of pan-american center and a writer and lecturer on psychology, politics and arts and activist and lgbtq rights and mental health in the arts, his 2012 book parents, children in the book the search for identity run the award for nonfiction and it was chosen as the new york times ten best books of 2012, how travel can change the world was published in 2016 and named a new york times notable book he previously wrote atlas of depression which won the 2001 national book award and a poet sometimes finalist. most recently he made an award-winning film. this evening's event will include an audience q&a, please use a q&a button at the bottom of the screen if you would like to ask a question as well as if someone has a question you'd like to have a question to and that question by clicking the forms a button the most important, please consider supporting triston and powell's by purchasing a book from us along with andrew's book will be shared in the chat a couple times this evening. they released a was moved to june 29 so the order you placed tonight will be shipped at the end of the month. triston and andrew were thrilled to have you here tonight, thank you for being here. >> what a pleasure and an honor to be here. triston and i have known each other for many years and have been friends and i followed each man interest. i would like to say even if you think you know when triston's attorney entails and you think you understand what the story is you have to buy and read this book because it's so moving, it's so funny, it is so warm and it is so profound about what family is and about what love is and how against all odds you can manage to find the glories of intimacy in places where they weren't necessarily to be assumed. it is a wonderful lead you will cancel everything else is by the afternoon with it in a million things you didn't know before. >> of my goodness is so scary and to be exciting to release my fourth baby into the world. [laughter] >> i'm not sure even done it as many times as you have, is more terrifying than i would've expected. >> it is terrifying and you'll notice i wrote a book about depression, that's perhaps the answer to your question. >> i think you said you're going to read a little passion why don't we do that so they can know your voice before we get going with the rest of it. >> i did not know i was going to do that first but i'm ready. my copy came from the publisher today so here it is in my hand, i've been in denial. i'm going to tell i believe it's an unknown story in terms of me doing podcast or whatever. and it takes as to the summer of 2012. about a quarter of the way in. it was the summer of 2012 and there was a concert at the mexican restaurant in performance from the east end of l.a. i'd e-mailed, called and text to let them know about the proposal. at my request kimberly came down when it happened and watch lucas for the evening. in my pocket i feel the heavyweight and titanium ring and custom-made for the occasion the jeweler agreed to let me purchase and i've been sending checks every month. we parked the car and held hands as we walked in as he sat down he noticed how many of our friends were at the audience and he said dang everybody knows her lady today. >> soi agreed. my boss that watched our relationship blossomed from the very beginning as were half a dozen of his friends from a social group. the lights went out in the show started. our lady j emerged into the spotlight on the stage and began her usual stories about her life and childhood along with dolly parton covers in original songs. her feet pounded the petals and i began to sweat. then she said the phrase i had been waiting for. love, love, love is there any lovers in the audience that they love a hand went up she stated her highs pretending to notice me, is that triston, come and appear you guys. >> exactly as planned, i grabbed biff's hand and we made our way down the aisle and up onto the stage. jay handed me that a phone and i took a deep breath and a hush over the audience as they waited a question as strangers try to figure what was happening. biff as you know i love you very much and i never want to be without two children overnight completely unprepared and that's the biggest difference that is more straightforward it was counterintuitive to be a man who had a baby and not be a straightforward, it really was, as was i think with the passion and the love that i have for them in the journeys, it is different to really form love over a longer period of time and because things are hard to be closer to lucas and haley that would have otherwise it would've been part of a longer situation and it caught me by surprise, i remember the first time in lucas when a car came on really allowed in without even thinking about it i snatched him up in arms, it was a little moments for me that i was like i threw myself in front of a bus for this kid. i would do anything for him, there are parts that my brain are at work when we lived in new york city and the doors opened up and he stepped off the subway and without even realizing he's done it before i can say anything, my hand goes out and grabs his hoodie and pulls him back in. these are the tribal parts, though not any part of our conscious thinking, it was in those moments that i am a parent and i love him as a passion and fury that is scary. as opposed to leo who showed up in the world, all innocence and purity and it was easy. it was much easier than this other situation. the doubts did not different. but the pathway i guess is there. >> tell me about your decisions to be open and public about your pregnancy and about the structure of your family, it earned you a lot of love and also earned you a lot of hate but you had to deal with, i think you must've known ahead of time whether you would've known how much or how it would feel. tell me about that decision which is great at florescent which you finally speak entirely in your own voice without being mediated by the forces on your story. >> it's funny the conversations sometimes a moment in your life i was even thinking, you're talking about giving the device, i literally remember the airplane and the ci was sitting in when i was far from the tree and you were there for that, you were in my life and that we had even met, it's like those places in this room that i literally came upstairs having watched on facebook or youtube somewhere and interviewed with janet into really incredible, brilliant, bold, brave black man's woman being unknowingly, unconsciously eviscerated by some well-meaning journalist. and being so patient and kind and loving and gracious, i'm just going to put up to you why that isn't the best question to ask giving them far more grace than everyone deserves grace of course but more than i would think that they deserved outside of the room, although transgender and i had a lightbulb go off in my head and i walked up the stairs and i said i think we have to talk. and biff was like why would we ever do that. look what happens of people do that. and i just explained i watch this interview and i don't think it's fair, i don't think it's fair for myself as a white binary trans person living in portland, oregon who has every privilege that anyone could ever hope for as a trans person i think there's one thing of a hollywood couple that has a trans, maybe that trans person is more provisioned me but other than that i was grounded by layers of safety and i just said i don't think it's right to put all of that work on them and it was done intentionally for many years and you know this injury because you come from the movement it's intentional, transgender men agrees verbally outlaw the conferences that we agreed if we get handed the microphone, and a black trans woman you handed to her, we did not and then it just felt like at this point we may have overcorrected into much responsibility on them and now that this part of a conversation maybe there's a chance to take the weight off of them and my question is when people say how could you ever possibly no, was it worth it? that's a question i may never have the answer to. i don't think i will ever get back as a result and that was not something i wanted to answer. >> my situation was somewhat rests under less radical than yours, the story of my family in the world for many of the same reasons with a sense that an obligation and if i would tell the story then who went and i ended up with so many people that said your work help me decide to have a family. when you think of these relationships in a very grateful being parents. your book is so courageous and so straightforward and so generous and i think it will give people inability, a wish, and understanding of capacity to be parents who'd otherwise had all that and i change people's lives and i'm sure you did around what happened even though i'm sure some was traumatic and ultimately it will survive that's what i think but maybe i'm wrong. >> i think it's a back-and-forth even if it was a gift that is serve the world, what cost it, for and for what i have left and when he says i love you no way more than ever did before you as a more realistic or new wants mature view of people who truly are is preferable, i missed it when other people were inherently good and if you told your story with enough love and compassion and intentionality people would say this is awesome, i miss that version of me and i like that version of me. [laughter] >> 20 years ago who was an activist who became an activist and he said to me i prefer and i thought that was a mistake but but there is an element that is definitely something to come. tell the story since were talking about this since it's a bad pr, tell me the story or tell her viewers a story of the experience when he asked you whether anyone had mean things to say to you. >> i think that was part of the book that came back at that point it was like nope it was in the moment as it was happening unlike there it is. pre-covid i was traveling so much for work and i felt bad traveling with three kids with biff when i was gone and i was missing chunks of their childhood so i started to arrange it that i can bring one child with me on each trip that i went on so i got to have the one-on-one time and they got to spend whatever city i was in and i would put a few days on the work trip or i'm in l.a. with haley or chicago or any of those places so i took haley to l.a. and we got stuck in traffic and we were in the rental car and under leaving a, he turned to me and asked did people say mean things when you told her story when we're in the newsroom, i feel really hard to be honest and be the kids and mindful of what's appropriate for them to carry and they will correctly would've gone too far in the honesty realm i think that's a bit much and i'm usually defensive in the moment "after words", at the time i decided i would be honest and i knew she was going to ask what they said, and i said yes they said things about me and i said no i'm knocking to tell you, you're too little, it's not appropriate to you to hear the worst things even though i did not tell her what those things were she just started crying because like me her emotions are this close to the surface all the time it doesn't take much for them to double over so she starts crying and asked if i ever cried and that cracked open a space between us were a kid new entre nous i could ask whatever i wanted and i asked her you ever wish you were different and you wish you were like other families and she said no never in a million billion years what i want any other kind of family business. in the book is my little magical moment start in this topic. >> you never know when the magic is going to come. >> you don't. >> i heard male feminist maybe 20 years ago give a speech at a university or something and he said you know a lot of people talk about quality time but there's something to be said for quantity time and that's why i like to travel with the kids, you don't have to be doing something that somebody else sees is important you could just sit in traffic and commit to being in the moment. >> for me with my kids i felt like quantity time was a great gift of the pandemic, the pandemic is very hard on kids for a lot of reasons and my kids are 12 and 13 and they each have challenges in this regard but the time that we spent together was better for me and in ways for them that maybe are entirely at the time but will be in time. >> something that struck me a lot when i was reading the book my experience of you i saw you when you weren't smiling and you always are happy-go-lucky and the first time we met i think it was on a task force party in l.a. and i remember talking to you and i think it was either shortly before or shortly after lucas and haley came into your household, anyway but you've had that approach and yet from the book you describe all of these moments with anxiety and your uncertainty about whether biff would possibly be interested to you or return your calls in your uncertainty about whether you should do away of proposal and he suggested using a hot air balloon to propose and all of those other things in the feeling that you had doubled this whole thing up and you're worried about whether you were doing at the right way, then especially the scene which i think is most point in the book when you're at a camp, i can't quite remember that you are getting ready to say what would you think of having a baby and you begin by suggesting what if we repurpose our guest room and tell me about those moments and tell me about the ways in which you think they represent anything that is pinned a make to clear life or whether you think the same for everybody in all kinds of ways. >> as usual is a complicated question. i remember that terrorist in l.a. and that's something i miss about being in the nonprofit movement is getting to see some of the truly beautiful ways that clear people in particular are able to fashion the homes in their lives mark is on this colonnade been on a similar terrorist with mark downtown portland and i miss those moments. i think a lot of people often have a misconception about me that i'm always happy. and the thing that comes to mind is one of the best things about having kids is to introduce them to the world. especially leo who is almost four he just asked why about everything, why do flowers bloom, why does that one we'd stick to you when you walk by it so i talked to him often about how things have evolved to survive and some things are pretty and that's how they survive, people like them and want to have them around and to keep people waiting to protect them it's all different ways of surviving and i'm not sure how or when or why or if it's natural radio that it's just how i made it to the world is to be someone that is alike. it's got me out of a lot of tough situations and into a lot of good situations so i think that is how i found people to navigate it which i think is not unlike the best of the gay troops, were like your best friend from theater, that's how we stay alive, we meet people like us, they felt bad force when something bad happen, they wanted to come to our aid and we told them they should do something differently, they wanted to follow and that's where i sit in the gay multi-verse and i don't know if other people have the same levels of doubt or discomfort or anxiety or fear and is probably two sides of the same coin if i have stakes so much on people liking me then the fear is what if they don't and what if this is all just been a grand performance or something. there is still moments and we've been together 11 years, there is still moments that there is a person of biff's life that he spending a lot of time with for work things and i had to say i need a little bit of reassurance that there's not something there, he's a very attractive person and i think their tractor root then meet in the younger the man never had a baby. at all this time i think i'm better at saying and feeling insecure i need a little reassurance instead of a passive-aggressive thing. . . . in effect it is something that is mostly associated with at least primarily. how did that all balance out? how did you get it to balance out? and how much of all you went through, and your mind difficulties you experience in transitioning. maybe there weren't any but i doubt it. >> my editor is here with us. that is how it got all balanced out. i wrote of this chapters i really did. [laughter] i wrote the coming out story, realizing for myself, plant finding place in contingency but not. and i'm really, really lucky, they helped me figure out what is the story. this does not have to be all of the stories. what is the story. there's other places for those other stories like i have a dream of an actual memoir, that can be booked to you, fine. but to have that narrow focus that is less teaching, last pass and more this was really the focus she brought i feel is such a gift. of course it's hard in the beginning to have someone cutting that, cutting that, cutting that, cutting that but looking at it now, this is fine, this is good. it was nice to focus on a couple of hard things in the thing you can get anywhere. anyone can say we hard coming out story whether it is a 13-year-old award trends or those exists. this does not exist as much. that is how that happened. i like this on here and that's what you can expect. >> host: talk about leo because of the publicity you've done. in your own life encounter people either trends or other queer people who felt betrayed by your division to feel pregnant or people on the streets who gave you strange looks? how did that go down? >> i expected women to be mad at me because i am the one who stormed out of the lady party 20 years ago, slammed the door in their faces and swore i would never be back. i get it. now i'm inching my way back in, that i totally get. and for me truly the biggest fear i had i was worried about the backlash within the trans community. i expect other people to do, but for me me telling my story was my own way of getting a gift to my community. both past, present, and future. that was the goal of it. they are not the audience for the book might book is not exciting to most trans people. and happened for 20 years who cares for the goal of the book is for other people. but the present, the reason i did it was to service the community. and so to worry, which i did, that people weren't going to say look it's you making it harder for people to expect us. new just got them to see us as men neither going and they're messing things up. that was my worst fear. and i think maybe i saw that once in a comment thread before i stopped reading comments. but every other time, we were trans pride and i was eight and a half months pregnant. i miss the labor and delivery class because i chose to go to trans pride instead of going to labor. they're like old transit dude that came up to me and said this is awesome i could never do that. it's so cool you're doing that. and it nearly universally that was the response. but thank you for showing people there isn't one way to do this. and for continuing to broaden what's possible in a trans community. for being another possibility model is not a competition to see who can do trans rights. it's a competition to see how many cool ways we can do it. that was the thing for me this is a great trip made it easier to whether some of the other harder pieces. but in person virtually nothing, virtually nothing. almost completely go into the coffee shop and the staff is like oh we saw your story. i'm connected to hundreds of trans people all over the world going through these processes. i know this is part of the bubble. or even like going to school when her story went public. one that people in that neighborhood sent a gift home to give to her son to get to us and wrote a card that said thank you for telling your story publicly. he gave me a great reason to help me talk to my kids about all the different ways families can show it but that's what we got in person. i am very grateful for it could have gone a different way. i'm talking to my own kids and i have a trans godchild for a field that a short describing is so attractive and when a richards said god intended for them to be men or women he did not to be in this in between place. and i thought okay the idea it's okay to beat tran that you were trans but not bitter clear in these other ways of the closer with god on your part. there is a lot of this is the way to be trans, this is a way to be gay, this is the way to be clear, this is the way to look. did you always see not what was possible to buck the idea it was a process for me the same way it is for most people it's like an actual psychological process for their many years and wanted nothing more than to not be trans. i was working at every single day and drinking protein shakes and paying a personal trainer into beer like any other man who just did not happen to be tran and it was not until, it wasn't until i found this that i found a new sense of yes i am different and that's not just okay it's great. again that is another joke i make. how could you love somebody else until you love yourself. for me that was totally the opposite. i could not love myself until someone else loved me. it wasn't an until i sell saw myself reflected in him i was like he is great. and if he thanks i'm worthy of love, maybe he's on to something. [laughter] i don't think i got that level of confidence until then. >> tell just for a moment or that an part tells a moment about the way it all began. >> this is our 10-year-old favorite story. like once a week shall be like remember when, that fateful brunch we have these two lovely queer/trans friends who live in l.a. i meant them on the proposition eight campaign for it moments an attorney and hard-core volunteer. and so we are all spending a lot of time. they had a community brunch at their house. still wearing my clothes from the night before. i had not gone to bed until three or 4:00 a.m. i woke up, brush my teeth, ate a snack and headed to brunch. i saw him cross the street clearly going to the same thing i was. was smitten right away. for me it was like you put on that shirt that feels really comfy. that feeling of home and comfort that's what i felt when i saw him. is it great we can walk together so we walked in, did a whole brunch or i was trying to flirt just giving it everything i had. really in that with the hubris of a 26-year-old, completely shameless. he was not in any way shape or form interested. there is no interest at all. and that i went to the restroom and wash my hands. i realize at the salad that i'd had as a snack had lodged itself right under my front teeth. my entire front tooth was covered with spinach. i later found out he had in fact thought i had a dead tooth. a whole black tooth in front. i left in shame and called my best friend on the way home. i said i met the man of my dreams had something in my teeth when i did it. and she's like there is no coming back from this. you have to let this go. you cannot dwell on this. the bridge hasn't burned, find someone new. i did not listen to her thank goodness. but yes that is what they never show you. [laughter] >> totally humiliated for a moment and yet here we are however many years later it is. and it all turned out just fine. [laughter] i'm going to keep asking you questions. i wanted to say to the folks at home that we are really happy to take your questions for you can put them in a q&a tab which is on the bottom of your screen. on minus one tab from the right. we love to hear from you if there are things you want to ask about his life love book experience, identity or anything else. >> or questions you would like to ask andrew and i will answer them. and i mean that is my question for you, how have you survived there's been comments about your depression aside, how have you built up your resilience against the inevitable onslaught that happens any time one of your ted talks hits over a million viewers or whatever it happens to be. what is your castle, your moat? >> thank you for asking that. >> i need to know. >> i feel like not to silicate copycat are i feel it was not until i met john that i was ready to be an activist. i remember john and i said my mid 30s 20 years ago next month. i remember it three or years before that they were organizing celebration of gayness at my high school. my high school is a very loaded i have been i had been closeted there had been extremely closeted there et cetera. i thought i don't have a feeling of this being joyful and wonderful. i have a feeling this is i'm coping with. not going to get in front of high school students say if you're gay in 15 years will find you will cope with it. i didn't feel like i belonged on that stage. and then within a few years of my meeting john without drawing the connection initially i found myself joining the task force in getting involved in activism. i had already written a novel that is partly about being gay. so it already covered some of the questions that came up. the confidence that i have which is of course in consistence but the confidence i have in the resilience i have really came with the stability of that relationship. i don't want to suggest that's the way to get there. think they're plenty of people have great confidence before they get into relationships. went to people who don't want to be in relationships have great confidence in meeting and other hindsight. but for me, i think it was also the revelation we could have a family. i've spent years thinking if you were clear that mejia could not have a family. and that really wanted to be true to myself and i wanted to have kids. i felt like it was impossible choice. i would say that was the next of resilience is always been my subjects. my first is about soviet artists and how they were resilient living into a regime which they were being sent to prison camps. my next book adults in part with my mother's illness in death and how she had dignity with having cancer. i feel like i circled back to what people say to me i do circle back to that. but tell me, for you when you were pregnant with leo did you worry at any point that your relationship to him what upstaged your relationship to luke and haley? >> certainly worried about that. i can't imagine anything happening that could get in the way of this powerful connection that i feel i hoped another part in my heart would open up and it did. whatever you think you've got to depths of the love you're capable of the floor drops out there's another floor below that. they all had to switch into limited space. i wasn't worried about that but they were. what i was worried about this would not build the same relationship with leo that i would had because i asked for the relationship of growing him in my body there's a lot of things to help out that i did to help with that. i wasn't worried. spew what we have a first question from the audience out there. someone wants to know how did the medical community to reach you when pregnant? >> the medical community, that is very broad. and so what i can say specifically, the providers i worked with, it was a real mix. they were already pretty ready which doesn't happen by magic trick someone must've done a lot of work and kaiser oregon and southwest washington to get them ready to receive someone like me. i think they were pretty ready already. and then for my own years of advocacy it was like second nature for me too advocate for myself to call ahead and say i am transgender, i want to work with a certified wife midwest is accomplished has worked with trans people before and is excited to work with me. take all the time you need to figure out who that person is. and then come back when you know who it is. that kind of approach i took over, and over, and over. if that something happened i didn't like the think this is what happened i didn't like it here's why don't like it here's what i expect moving forward can you do that? if you can't do that by me someone who can treat using the canadian politeness/passive aggressive that it is of how i did both. it's both really strongly saying what i expect from you, i know you can do it. and someone putting in a chat shout aired getting them ready for their multiple people at kaiser but account and when i could possibly find who did work for her to save thank you. happen by accident. on what the podcasts and doing some work with the american something something obstetric 's and gynecology. didn't quite a bit of work with the medical community because they just care about the data and the science for the data and the science of very clear they want to know how do we show up in support of that. things are okay for me. when the things that connects that you done a lot of community building something you did we put together for the world of friends that you describe. the ones that were there that day when you've got up on the stage and proposed. it took a lot of focus and energy and determination and skill not only on your side but on your side and un- intimidated by it. he reported he go from here. some of it was unconscious the stenographer of the that does the ultrasound thing, she used the wrong down for me i had just been having those kinds of corrective conversations. whether i like work of the group of white people and someone racist had a similar conversation. those were done a little bit unconsciously. but since it then can i teach that other trans people? but the calling ahead, self advocating all that was very, very conscious. and so much harder to correct them. and in the culture there is very much quite a bit about right and wrong. who is right in telling someone i don't like that language is what i need from you. can you do it? if not you can? it wasn't intentional, it was conscious. if i found anyone you mentioned canada who travel all over the world to strange places with my kids. he went to >> the person at passport control where is his child's mother and i said he doesn't have a mother has two fathers bears to parents we are both here. and she said every child has a mother. any symbol actually he really doesn't have a mother. it turned into a big discussion i was horrified and upset for myself. i felt like it was an affront to our parenthood. it's also horrified and upset it was going on in front of my child. in into candidate we go. in jordan and brazil did not have this problem. feel we can very easily paddock coming through u.s. customs. even in the places they still encounter these sudden moments. your sense of dignity and selfhood are being challenged. you need resilience to get through them. it's much more painful that wish to protect them from the anger prior to now have been written your own book is media cap next try to sensationalize you enjoy family. if so, what are you? >> the wordless struggle of feeling ownership. you know, very early on in the process i decided really clearly i only wanted to work with outlets would not sensationalize for they were willing to tell the truth. i have a lot of experience in storytelling and persuasion. how do we tell complicated stories and really accessible ways. how can we proactively to most of the most common questions. and how can we use the media to do it. until very early on i realize guess what, those media outlets really wanted an interview with me. it was very easy for me too say it sure, if you disable comments when you shared on social media. if you include i'm working with the medical team. if you do not call me the first anything ever, never do that. and i was able to say very clearly i work with my friend nick adams who is it transit messaging director just say what are my talking points? what are people coming in with that i can make cnn, i can say if don't include these things i will not give a get a good review. every single one of them to persons in a probably will do it. i don't know if we do that it's a great let me know when you know. and that i will decide if i can give you an interview. this and we can disable comments to sit okay let me know when you find out. for me that is how i asserted control. and whenever people try to come to me like you won't believe what the daily mail is saying is i will believe what they're saying and i don't want to believe that they are saying. so do not show me that. do not send me the most a worse awful things, don't send that to me and say don't worry i said something to them but don't send it to me at all. so that is the other way it's being really clear, why would i want to see that? i do not care about that keep it away. that is how i try to manage it. >> do you think your work for activist organizations or have to wrap up in a minute, working for activist organization was barely deeply informed by the need to figure out your own identity how do the two things play it back and forth with each other. >> it was about very specifically i chose to become an activist because i started hating gay people very, very clearly. i was acting professionally and i was bartending and gay bars at night. being exposed to that many people who were drunk and insecure and mean and petty, nothing against gay people, straight people that when bars do. bars bring out the worst in people. i felt my love and connection to them for the community started to curdle pretty went to a friend of mine and said you do something gay how to get in on that. was it field staff for the task force but he said sure come and volunteer. it's not about necessarily about who i was it was i wanted to fall back in love with the things that made me proud to be clear. >> that is beautifully said. i am very sadly now supposed to wrap things up and bring an end to but it's been a fantastic and stimulating and inspiring and wonderful conversation. i just want to emphasize again to all of you out there who have not yet had a chance to read this book that you have a great joy ahead of you. i emphasize to you, as i was reading this book thought if i had been able to read this book if i would've come up just as gate not in a complicated way at least at that time. it would give me so much hope. it's a delight be your friend and colleague. thanks to everyone who joined in tonight. please consider purchasing a copy by visiting us. while you're there be sure to upcoming virtual events. we look forward to seeing on one another at other events. so tristen thank you so much for joining us tonightgood evenk you for joining us here tonight in the american writers museum those of you who are here live and also those of you are here online for this author talk with catherine schweight author of stop the killing how to end the mass shooting crisis. this event is hosted by the chicago council and my name is chad reilly. i mean former president and current member of the american writers museum chicago council. and for those of you are unaware, the chicago council is essentially a board of established professionals whose