Hi, I'm Anna Marie Cox.

Welcome to With Friends Like These.

Brian Brum's dad used to threaten to hit Brian so hard he'd fly into the atmosphere,

if Brian didn't conform to his father's ideal of black masculinity.

Brian is with us today to talk about the memoir that takes its title from that threat

and turns it into something closer to a post.

It's called Punch Me Up to the Gods.

He's here to talk about, among other things, growing up gay and black, the pressure society

puts on young black men, getting sober and following in the literal footsteps of James

Baldwin.

And then we have a wonderful way of closing the episode, a conversation with Judge John

Hodgman about his gloriously empty-headed kitty, Lolo.

Brian Brum, coming right up.

Brian, welcome to the show.

Hi, thank you for having me.

I was wondering if we could start off with a reading from the book.

Sure.

This is the very beginning of the book.

It's a story about a little boy called the initiation of Tuan, and this is just a few

paragraphs from that.

I'm standing at the bus stop in McKee's Port, Pennsylvania, on the black end of town.

It's a hot but overcast summer day.

...