A Tight Web in Silicon Valley

If our tribe had an origin myth, it would begin with a place called Dabney House at Caltech. Realistically, though, some of us didn't meet until a decade after graduation. As people swarmed, drifted, or fled to Silicon Valley, they met up with old friends, and with friends of old friends, until they became a vast, and ever-expanding, confederation. Over time, a more cohesive tribe formed with ten adults (and now five children) who gathered en masse for meals and conversation two or three times a week. Several of us bought houses near each other and organized with part of our tribe and members of the larger confederation for weekly role-playing games or dessert groups, a bi-weekly quilting or craft group, and random excursions to plays, movies, or whatever. We've shared group vacations to Disneyland and Tahoe. We also draw each other into adventures, like learning flying trapeze, cluster ballooning, or something as simple as tie-dying (which should explain our picture, in case anyone was wondering).
--Susan Mittmann