Gonzales made his case not through abstraction but through deeply personal experience. He shared the moment when someone opened his classroom door on a beautiful September day and informed him that his father had died. He described being mocked while learning English and being hated for the color of his skin. But it was his love for his brown skin that led him to study Brown literature, and his love of language that led him to become a writer and professor. He urged the community college graduates — many of whom had weathered traffic on I-95, unforgiving jobs, and cars that wouldn't behave — to recognize that their love, not their hatred of obstacles, was what brought them to graduation day.