BARI: I was scared of you. Or rather, you were like the caricature of the person I know hates me on the internet: Gawker Media alum, probable Democratic Socialists of America member, many tattoos. That’s like my personal axis of evil.

Then we ended up at the same conference, and you asked if I wanted to hang out.

I thought there was a solid chance you were going to try to James O’Keefe me, which is why I suggested swimming — quite hard to wear a wire in a bathing suit — but it ended up being really fun. We talked almost nothing about politics, but about relationships and love and how we grew up.