It shouldn't take much for the folks at Bates College to figure out I never went to school there. If any of these characters resemble real students or faculty, it would be amazing. Any likeness to actual incidents must be attributed to dumb luck. Correct details about the Bates campus and about student life there are due to minutes of intense research. Incorrect details are best explained by the first sentence of the opening paragraph above. August 7, 2002 update to disclaimer: A Bates' faculty member who read my story called it "improbable, but pleasant" and made two observations. In the description of Chase Hall I wrote that the fireplace was sometimes lighted by the gnomes, which I somehow gathered was a light-hearted way of referring to the maintenance staff. The faculty member corrected my misunderstanding about the use of "gnomes" and I immediately changed the word to "staff". The second observation was that faculty don't have secretaries, but answer their own phones. My comment to that was, "Isn't it great that in the parallel universe of this story, Bates' faculty have secretaries!" The National Federation of Piano Teachers has asked me to announce that I am a guitarist.
Disclaimer