With the Feather staff, I had the opportunity to travel to The William Soroyan Theater to attend another installment in the San Joaquin Valley Town Hall lecture series. This particular session was focused on former CIA agent and spy, Valerie Plame, Jan. 21.

Although, to my own misfortune, I had not done extensive research on the speaker beforehand, I heard a few stories about her prior to the trip. I caught phrases such as ‘retired spy’, ‘wife of a spy’ and ‘dangerous’. Due to my lack of personal analysis, I was not entirely sure what to believe, and headed to downtown Fresno a bit skeptical.

Upon arrival, I saw a book with a well-kempt woman on the cover, bearing the title ‘Fair Game: My Life as a Spy, My Betrayal by the White House’. This piqued my interest, to say the least.

Through the Honors Student Program, the handful of staffers that went were not only given free admission, but also got the priceless opportunity to speak with Plame in a smaller setting before her official lecture.

The question-and-answer session offered a more personalized look at Plame and her more raw beliefs. Topics covered varied from her view on nuclear weapons (very opposed to them) to her application process for the CIA.

Eager eyes followed her as she spoke about her life and interests. Plame even touched on the misfortune that occurred with the government, in which she lost her private identity as a CIA agent after her husband, Joe Wilson, exposed inaccuracies of the government’s assertion that Iraqi was trying to buy weapons of mass destruction in 2002.

Of course, the whole room was waiting for her to gush her perspective on the happening, but she held back major information for her actual lecture.

Once seated in the theatre’s lecture hall, we got to watch a more serious, prepped Plame tell her story. She filled the audience in on the details of her work for the CIA and her mishap with the George Bush administration which led to her resignation from the CIA, a work environment she loved.

In 2003, Plame’s husband, Joe Wilson (former U.S. ambassador), published an article challenging Bush’s reasoning for going to war with Iraq. The controversy stirred by this piece stuck a nerve with many men, particularly Robert Novak, a right-wing journalist. In response to Wilson’s writing, Novak openly identified Plame as a CIA officer in an article. This choice eventually ended her career and left her exposed in a dangerous position.

The full details of the scandal can be found in Plame’s autobiography, Fair Game, which now holds a major movie adaption. Plame has also written two novels, Burned and Blowback, featured around a female spy.

Upon questioning, Plame showcased a very humble attitude about her crisis in 2003. A man from the audience asked about the ‘tragedy’ that fell upon Plame and her family, she responded with grace.

“What happened to my family and me was very unfortunate,” Plame said. “But it was not a tragedy. A tragedy is the loss of a child or a loved one. What my family experienced was difficult, but not on the same scale as a tragedy. We went through a hard time, but we have survived. We simply experienced a great misfortune.”

For more articles, read the Jan. 23 piece, Student of the Month: Poojan Gopal strives toward profession in mechanical engineering .

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This writer can be reached via Twitter: @_chloemueller. Valerie Plame can be reached via Twitter: @ValeriePlame.