 I'm Naomi of the African-American Center at the San Francisco Public Library. The Center is a collection of in-library use materials that serves as an introduction to African-American and African history and culture throughout the Black Diaspora. Before the author of Sapphire's 1996 work Push was adapted into a motion picture, she did a reading at the San Francisco Public Library. Sapphire read extensively from Push when she read at the main library, but in this short clip she remembers the city of San Francisco. I haven't seen her in 10, 11 years. I'm 24, 25 years old. My grandmother and aunt have heard I moved to San Francisco. They call all the L's in the book. The conversation is simple. Working where? Going to school where? Chemistry. Yeah, chemistry. I want to be a doctor. I remember them heavy coffee cream colored women, doilies, food, church. I don't remember passion or being loved. There are hills in San Francisco steep stairways of cement trolley cars 1975. The city, is it nice there? Nice. How can I say nice doesn't describe the way my blood gushes, how I bead my hair with tiny red beads, hundreds of them beauty bleeding? Yeah, it's nice here I answer. What do they want now after the rubber hose, the tenderloin tube down my nose and throat? What do they want with me now? What do I need a grandmother and aunt for now? After him, after my father, but I am polite, launder my life, promise to call.