Meeting William T. Vollmann, for instance. Not all my encounters with writers have been so swell. I'm sorry to report that sometimes, even poets of extremely high standing can in reality turn out to be disgusting, lecherous drunks. Some novelists, who write tons of reviews for The New York Times Book Review, have the personalities of old furniture. Some impressions are so damning, I can't even read their books.
Some writers do turn out to be nasty, with inflated egos.
Because I worked in bookstores for so long, I got to see a lot of writers on the book tour circuit. They're the ones who recommend books. And display them. Of course, the most perfect writer love affairs to have are the ones where the author is dead. My dreams of Rilke will never be spoiled by meeting the actual article.