When we had to choose our colleges, the staff would give us talks about ‘the East.’ ‘The East’ was where they wanted us to go—it was simple snobbery, and my school was very old-fashioned in that way, but the school would look better if a big proportion of its seniors went on to Harvard or Princeton or Cornell—or even a state university on the East Coast. Everybody pronounced the word the way a Muslim must pronounce the word Mecca. And that’s where we are now.” “Did you go East?” Ricky asked. “I don’t know if Edward ever mentioned it.” “No. I went to California, where they believed in
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