Speaker 1: Welcome to Guys We Fucked. Guys We Guys We Book.
Speaker 1: I'm Christina, I'm Karren. We're sorry about last night, the
Speaker 1: anti slut shaming podcast I never stopped. Hey fucker's Welcome
Speaker 1: to another episode of Guys We Fucked. It's the anti
Speaker 1: slut shaming podcast. I'm Karren, I'm Christina. In Today's episode
Speaker 1: of Guys Who Fucked is sponsored by talk Space, an
Speaker 1: online therapy company. For as little thirty two bucks a week,
Speaker 1: you can work with an experience license therapist handpicked just
Speaker 1: for you on talk Space. They send me. You can
Speaker 1: send text, audio, and video messages to your therapist, make
Speaker 1: them appropriand uh and talk about your life, work through
Speaker 1: what's keeping you up at night? Or just work on
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Speaker 1: f M. And speaking of talk Space, Christina, what's keeping
Speaker 1: you up at night? You? Oh my god, I'm just
Speaker 1: plagued by fake news and the political agenda. In this
Speaker 1: goddamn country. Is that really what you want to know? No,
Speaker 1: fucking no. I was like, oh wow, no, um, Stephen
Speaker 1: and I, uh, last night celebrated our six year anniversary. Congratulations,
Speaker 1: thank you, thank Instagram story about that, and then I know,
Speaker 1: I was just like, how do I do Instagram stories?
Speaker 1: They're really fun? I don't know how to do, though.
Speaker 1: I'll teach you. I'll teach you. After this, you teach
Speaker 1: me how to do a boomerang pose? Okay, yah know that. Um,
Speaker 1: but it's really cool because I never I mean, I
Speaker 1: talked about I talked about every goddamn episode I feel like,
Speaker 1: but it really like makes me realize I never envisioned
Speaker 1: myself in a relationship for one this long. Not that
Speaker 1: I was like, I'm just gonna die alone with cats,
Speaker 1: which is fine too, I didn't think that, But I
Speaker 1: just didn't know that you could be happy with somebody
Speaker 1: that you've been with for six years. I truly didn't,
Speaker 1: because I like my example of love with my parents
Speaker 1: when my mom was like super bipolar when I was
Speaker 1: a kid, was like, oh, I guess you just get
Speaker 1: married and then you just put up with the person.
Speaker 1: But it's really not made to work. They certainly at
Speaker 1: the time. Though the example that I had I saw,
Speaker 1: which I didn't know was like medication feel that very
Speaker 1: tumultuous um. And I really realized, you know, especially like
Speaker 1: reading through all these emails and we're still working on,
Speaker 1: like you know, finishing touches on the book and really
Speaker 1: digging into people's stories with the relationships, like a lot
Speaker 1: of people settle. Oh yeah, and a relationship is not
Speaker 1: something that you should settle on. And I and I
Speaker 1: and I shouldn't settle on anything anything now, but especially that.
Speaker 1: And I just noticed, like it's kind of alarming how
Speaker 1: many people um settle. And it's like you can have
Speaker 1: a partner that you have great sex with and that
Speaker 1: your sex life, like our sex life, ebbs and flows.
Speaker 1: But like I truly I fucking love Stephen so much,
Speaker 1: and I love them more every year, and I love
Speaker 1: them more every day. And I we still get like
Speaker 1: piste off or annoyed at each other, and I sometimes
Speaker 1: still beg them to please hang out with your mother
Speaker 1: in Pennsylvania for a weekend. God damn it, um and
Speaker 1: that stuff all still happens. But I feel like I really, honestly,
Speaker 1: almost every day I like think to myself, how lucky
Speaker 1: I am to be in a really good relationship that
Speaker 1: I fucking love. And then it just makes me nuts
Speaker 1: to to to hear about so many people being with
Speaker 1: somebody who you clearly there it's either can be solved
Speaker 1: by communication or it's not the right person for you
Speaker 1: and they're clearly settling, and it's like you don't. It's
Speaker 1: to do with insecurity though, because people don't think they
Speaker 1: deserve more. They think this is the best I can do.
Speaker 1: And also they don't want to put the work in
Speaker 1: because it's like finding someone who works, so it is
Speaker 1: work like for me, Like, sometimes the work of a
Speaker 1: relationship is being in the relationship, like your example, Sometimes
Speaker 1: the work for the relationship in my example is not
Speaker 1: being in relationship. So taking four years where you say
Speaker 1: you keep batting things away and be like I'm not
Speaker 1: ready yet. I'm not ready yet. So it's just like
Speaker 1: it's and that's hard to do. It would would have
Speaker 1: been easier to just like date someone yeah, probably, yeah,
Speaker 1: but then you're working through that with self reflection. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean sometimes people, Yeah, some people are good at
Speaker 1: working through issues with a teammate. Yeah, And some people
Speaker 1: cannot work things with the teammates such as myself. You
Speaker 1: gotta work on any by yourself. But I mean, that's
Speaker 1: what it's. That's what it is. I think people though
Speaker 1: they make the excuse though that because it's from this
Speaker 1: podcast is about sex and relationships, and I think a
Speaker 1: lot of people make excuses of well, I know he's
Speaker 1: not perfect, but but they're the key things that that
Speaker 1: are part of the butt are fucking shitty things like
Speaker 1: don't don't it's like you tell people tell themselves or
Speaker 1: they lie to themselves and say, well, yeah, I can't
Speaker 1: find somebody checks off all my boxes, but you really
Speaker 1: you can. And also, uh, don't have Yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 1: It's just really people need to not sell themselves short
Speaker 1: on relationships because, uh, if you can't find a person
Speaker 1: that that really compliments you and makes you really happy
Speaker 1: and that you respect and that respects you and you
Speaker 1: push each other to be better humans and you have
Speaker 1: fun and all you do is like laugh and talk
Speaker 1: and funk, like that's so dope. But if you can't
Speaker 1: find that too, like being alone is really beautiful, people
Speaker 1: forget that's an option. Oh my god, it's such a
Speaker 1: it's a great option. It feels lonely or so many
Speaker 1: of my relationships I I mean, they all obviously didn't
Speaker 1: work out, but it feels so much worse to be
Speaker 1: with somebody that you're like, yeah, I read, I guess
Speaker 1: than to be alone. Like being alone and being cool
Speaker 1: with yourself is such a better feeling than having settling
Speaker 1: and having a shitty life with somebody else. Yeah, it
Speaker 1: makes you want to die, you know. Yeah, yeah, this
Speaker 1: is also you don't need to, especially in this day
Speaker 1: and age, especially if you live in a city. Oh
Speaker 1: my god, I know that we don't need to. Well,
Speaker 1: I mean one of the best pieces of advice I
Speaker 1: ever read as far as relationships. I actually read in
Speaker 1: like one of those ridiculous like magazines, like glossy magazines.
Speaker 1: But it was just like, yes, there's no such thing
Speaker 1: as Mr or mrs or that whatever perfect them there
Speaker 1: them mr slash, mrs slash on um defined uh, there's
Speaker 1: no such thing as Mr. Perfect. There's just Mr Perfect
Speaker 1: for you. And it's kind of like a hack you saying.
Speaker 1: But I really think of that often because it's true,
Speaker 1: and I think people perfection is by the standards of
Speaker 1: the universe. Of course, does not exists. Perfection as far
Speaker 1: as the things that you are looking for in your
Speaker 1: life does exist. Yeah, and then people you know, I
Speaker 1: don't share. I share a lot about my relationship on
Speaker 1: this podcast, but I don't do it on social media.
Speaker 1: And I feel like people people will be like, oh, man,
Speaker 1: relationship goals whenever I post a picture of Steven, and
Speaker 1: I am like, and I get nervous because I'm like,
Speaker 1: don't idolize somebody else's relationship in what you do that
Speaker 1: with me and Frank And then we see what I did. Yeah, Oh,
Speaker 1: I totally did. And uh I said you were my
Speaker 1: idol couple. Um, I mean for a while we were,
Speaker 1: we were doing great totally then crash and burg. But like,
Speaker 1: I think it's so important to talk about, like, relationships
Speaker 1: can be exhausting. That could be a lot of work,
Speaker 1: and you could you could find yourself like thinking like,
Speaker 1: oh God, this is so annoying or it's a lot
Speaker 1: of work whatever. But it's not all fucking butterflies and rainbows. No,
Speaker 1: it is a lot of work. And I mean I've
Speaker 1: put in an exorbitant amount of work into my relationship
Speaker 1: in the past year, a lot, and it feels I
Speaker 1: I personally, like it feels good to put work in
Speaker 1: when it's going towards a relationship that's sucking, that's that's good.
Speaker 1: It depends you have to ask, like why am I
Speaker 1: putting in this in this work? Like in our case,
Speaker 1: it was like, I'm putting in this work because this
Speaker 1: I'm dating someone who hasn't been in a relationship in
Speaker 1: eight years, and I'm someone who hasn't been in a
Speaker 1: relationship in four years. So there was a reason why
Speaker 1: there is work. But then sometimes there's work where it's
Speaker 1: just like this person is just a fucking mess and
Speaker 1: they need to work on themselves. They yeah, they need
Speaker 1: to work on themselves. Or we like each other, but
Speaker 1: we don't complement each other, and we're just going to
Speaker 1: continue butting heads and that's the work. There are different
Speaker 1: types of work, yeah, and and and then the other
Speaker 1: thing like too, that I think is so it's unique
Speaker 1: from my previous relationships apart from Steven, is like telling
Speaker 1: this first relationship that I've been in where I could
Speaker 1: I actively tell him what I want sexually, emotionally anything,
Speaker 1: what kind of food I want to eat, Like just
Speaker 1: I'm so not shy about communicating that, and I used
Speaker 1: to be and it's so it's so much bad that's
Speaker 1: also your absolutely, But I think he forced that out
Speaker 1: of me because with the with the soty of thing
Speaker 1: that like plagued my head for so many years. At
Speaker 1: the beginning of relationship, I wouldn't tell him why I
Speaker 1: was like acting standoffice or mean or short tempered or something.
Speaker 1: And I just it's like, once you break that barrier
Speaker 1: of like I'm gonna show being vulnerable in front of person,
Speaker 1: even for me because I'm very honest with a lot
Speaker 1: of people and I share a lot of things, it's
Speaker 1: still scary, Like it's still scary, but it's so it's
Speaker 1: just worth it. That's war. I thank you guys, do
Speaker 1: right for a love We'll do for yourself, love yourself,
Speaker 1: speaking of love in yourself. If you are in New
Speaker 1: York City on April which is a Friday, come to
Speaker 1: Glamorous at seven thirty pm, Zinc Bar eighty two s
Speaker 1: third Street, hosted by myself and Wendy Starlink tickets or
Speaker 1: fifteen bucks. Link for the tickets can be found in
Speaker 1: the description of this podcast. And then the following night
Speaker 1: we're doing in Nacho Bitches on a Saturday this month.
Speaker 1: So it's Saturday, April fifteen pm at New York Comedy Club.
Speaker 1: Tickets are ten dollars with the code at Nacho And
Speaker 1: that's co hosted us always by Blair Saki and myself.
Speaker 1: Uh And if you're not New York, come see us
Speaker 1: live when we're on the road. Austin will be in
Speaker 1: your Thursday April thirteenth at the Wilburg Chickapee, Massachusetts. Friday
Speaker 1: April fourteenth at the Hookie Lab, Austin, Texas. April twenty
Speaker 1: two for Moontower Comedy Festival. There are now links available
Speaker 1: and up on our website for individual tickets. Houston, Texas, Sunday,
Speaker 1: April twenty three at Warehouse Live. There are tickets still
Speaker 1: available for that. Yes, Las Vegas, Nevada, Thursday eighteenth to Saturday,
Speaker 1: we're gonna be a Crapshoot comedy festival. Y'all. Minneapolis, Minnesota, Thursday,
Speaker 1: June one, We're at the Women's Club. Tickets will be
Speaker 1: available for that soon. A lot of people are like,
Speaker 1: do we have to be a member of the Women's
Speaker 1: Club now? I don't think you do. I hope people
Speaker 1: sign X. I think the problem that you can't get
Speaker 1: tickets because they're not available yet, So just ex that
Speaker 1: off in your little calendar the day and we'll get
Speaker 1: you those tickets. Milwaukee, how you doing Friday June second,
Speaker 1: Come hang out with us at the PEPs Theater. And
Speaker 1: then Chicago, Illinois, Saturday June three, we are doing the
Speaker 1: fourth annual Annual Comedy Festival. Two shows. There's a seven
Speaker 1: pm and eight ten pm at Talia Hall and uh
Speaker 1: that is like an the Onion a V Club festival.
Speaker 1: So it's gonna be really fun and hopefully really well run.
Speaker 1: Looking forward to it. Thanks so much to today's sponsor,
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Speaker 1: better way. Wasn't that great? I only wanted to kill
Speaker 1: myself a couple of times. Okay, that's not bad, said,
Speaker 1: it was kind of what I was hoping for it.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna piss everybody off by reading an ad sexy voice,
Speaker 1: but like the generic voice or sexy voice that's not
Speaker 1: actually sexy, okay, kind of is that's the thing that
Speaker 1: you ner voice kind of works, fuck joy, it kind
Speaker 1: of works to stress see Who's how are Nate? I
Speaker 1: met a lot of people, I hope, so God damn it.
Speaker 1: I try, you know, I have so many options in
Speaker 1: a in a toolbox. This is the part where we're
Speaker 1: going to read some book, babes. Oh my going first?
Speaker 1: Oh do you want to know? I didn't know because
Speaker 1: they said Corina it did. But rules are to be broken.
Speaker 1: Uh uh. And if you don't want to listen to
Speaker 1: this part, fast forward. All right, guys, we are really
Speaker 1: appreciate you purchasing this book. Yeah we can't get shoutous anymore,
Speaker 1: but they'll be a new price, or just buy the
Speaker 1: book because you like us and we appreciate it. So anyway,
Speaker 1: thank you so much to Emily Riggle, Libby Hagga, Eleanor
Speaker 1: lotts Felt, Chanda Caldwell, Abigail Falcon, Brad Olson, Fane King,
Speaker 1: gen Carman, Ashley Conrad, Alexis, Harri Tak, Nicole Saint Hilaire, Kate.
Speaker 1: I love you guys so fucking much. Summers. Is that
Speaker 1: your given name? All? Donnie Diaz, Amy in Vernizi, Chelsea Polk,
Speaker 1: Sarah McCullough, Claire Lavender, Nicole Glenn, Caitlin Guiss Gillian Flett,
Speaker 1: Kim Maarra, Teresa Jansen, Heather Giardina Brennan McCallum, Kristen Graham, Taller,
Speaker 1: Tail Organzollas, Jesus christ I just can't read. Um, I know,
Speaker 1: Marissa Gomez, Andrew Slatta, Marley Liebrick, Stryker, Alexis Laire, Emma Couzio,
Speaker 1: Etterlyn fear Pole, Grace McDonald, Leanne Pruitt, Stacy Cabin, Emily Kelly,
Speaker 1: Tanya cop cop Choppage. Oh yeah, that was way simpler, Uh,
Speaker 1: Sophie Bishop, Kayleie, Alexander Kyleeen Willit, Alanna Beckerton, Yasmine Omar,
Speaker 1: Jess Parsons, Caitlin Davidson, Caitlyn Martin, Uh, Caitlin Leary, Jillian
Speaker 1: sit Jar, Kayla Smolinski and bron Wyn Lamondo, Than Keldy
Speaker 1: Lundbergh too. All more people. I'm gonna read fifty more names. Okay,
Speaker 1: thank you guys so much for preordering our book. It
Speaker 1: means a lot to us and we're really excited for
Speaker 1: you to read this. Um Angelica, Gal Gala, Ghost, Carissa Vell,
Speaker 1: Shawna Green, Sidney Lampka, Megan Dwyn and god dammit, Christina
Speaker 1: Katie Ivey, Ashley Olson, Oh my god, we're really hoping.
Speaker 1: Jessica Manzo Our, Shan Sandre, I love you watch on,
Speaker 1: Stacy Vasquez, Nicole Moraglia, Kpe Brown, Alas Austin, Thank you,
Speaker 1: Jenna Galic, Carolin, Burt Soey, Rector, Asher, Roe, Simmons, Joni Martinez,
Speaker 1: Fannie La Chapelle, Nielson, Dannise. Are some good names. Erica Murray,
Speaker 1: Angela mckelski, Adam William, Zeela Cabello, Elaine Roman Kiandra Brady,
Speaker 1: thank you for writing out the actual pronunciation. Appreciate it.
Speaker 1: Brady Johnson, Laurence Scarborough, Amy Clusterman, Christie schilperut put perut. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's how you say it when you're me. Shannon Davidson,
Speaker 1: Amber mclead, Kenzie Abbott, Sarah Applebaum, Alice Nomura, Shannon Berstee,
Speaker 1: Fritzie Hernandez Delaney Carr, Kathleen Segna, Melissa Dietrich, Kathe Side.
Speaker 1: Now I work with her. Oh cool, Hi, Kathleen, Kayla Wagner,
Speaker 1: Megan Megan, maybe it's a interesting Megan spelling. I know
Speaker 1: how I feel, Girl Rock Effort, Elizabeth Randolph, Christie Lynn
Speaker 1: Stephanie Kickerson, Elizabeth's King, Cassie Across, Kelly Spence, Ashton Focher,
Speaker 1: Libby Haga, and Dan Yale Santiago and then just two
Speaker 1: more who emails us and I'm gonna forget Hillary Maltz
Speaker 1: and Jackie Doll. You tried really hard to put it
Speaker 1: on there and it didn't work, so thank you very much.
Speaker 1: We appreciate it. And I saw those emails. Okay, that's over, guys,
Speaker 1: the most nerve wrecking part of my days reading the names,
Speaker 1: but I just don't want to, like, suck it out. Bad.
Speaker 1: Part is over, uh, and now we're going to read
Speaker 1: some listener male. This is always a fun part, so
Speaker 1: that this one says my identity is constantly being ignored,
Speaker 1: and I'm angry. I hear you, Dear Christina and Krin.
Speaker 1: I've watched your show for over two years now. Well
Speaker 1: that's scary because it's not available to watch. And I
Speaker 1: think your book is watching us, God damnit. And I
Speaker 1: think you are both the best for this question. My
Speaker 1: sexuality is consistently being ignored and at moments even downtrodden.
Speaker 1: This happens, uh when with people I consider acquaintances, family
Speaker 1: and even close friends. I consider myself a romantic and
Speaker 1: that within itself is not a well known term if
Speaker 1: you are unaware, which you are probably not as a
Speaker 1: sexual identity, wherein someone is not romantically attracted to others
Speaker 1: and it has a spectrum similar to the way a
Speaker 1: sexuality has a spectrum. I happen to be at the
Speaker 1: furthest end of a romanticism. Uh. I Not only I'm
Speaker 1: never romantically attracted to others, but I am made extremely
Speaker 1: uncomfortable by romantic plots in a movie E. P. D.
Speaker 1: A or the like. I am not repulsed by romantic
Speaker 1: displays like some a sexuals are repulsed by sex or
Speaker 1: similar acts. But I made uncomfortable and uneasy. Yet I
Speaker 1: find myself intrigued and curious as well. Up until the
Speaker 1: age of eleven, I thought romantic movies were jokes, and
Speaker 1: girls told each other their crushes as a joke as well.
Speaker 1: I never dreamed my wedding like most young girls did,
Speaker 1: and I've never had a quote crush or romantic feelings
Speaker 1: towards someone. I'd say I fit the romantic stereotype if
Speaker 1: there is one. There are like thirteen of us in
Speaker 1: the world. A bit of a neighborhood whore. Oh okay.
Speaker 1: Up until the summer of two thousand sixteen, I hadn't
Speaker 1: even known that this was a sexuality, and I thought
Speaker 1: I was alone in watching rom coms as documentaries and
Speaker 1: leaving paneras when couples started smooching? Does that happened? Uh?
Speaker 1: Yet this, and yet this, and explaining this to people,
Speaker 1: I'm still disregarded. Now. I recognize I sound whiny. I've
Speaker 1: lived a good life and this honestly isn't a big
Speaker 1: deal could be, But I'd like to shed some light
Speaker 1: into it. Uh, And I'd hope your podcast could open
Speaker 1: people to it. I've been told by people who are straight, gay,
Speaker 1: by pan polyamorous and monogamous, friend and foe, older, younger
Speaker 1: and my age, international and from back home people who
Speaker 1: are ace and deal with this ship on the regular,
Speaker 1: that I'll fall in love one day, I'll develop feelings
Speaker 1: for another. That I'm young, which I am. I'm sixteen.
Speaker 1: I can recognize that it's frustrating beyond belief, as I
Speaker 1: have spent a decade and a half figuring this stuff out,
Speaker 1: only to have the piss taken out of me. A
Speaker 1: sexuality had to fight to gain a grain of recognition
Speaker 1: within the lgbt Q I a community, but those same
Speaker 1: people do not respect me. I hate that I have
Speaker 1: to validate validate myself, yet I do with the knowledge
Speaker 1: that I'm still a tiny baby. You too, may both
Speaker 1: be saying that I'm sure and I have time to change,
Speaker 1: but I would know by now I have a very
Speaker 1: high libido and I've slept with twelve people. You're okay,
Speaker 1: I'm not going to judge, but wow, uh song, I've
Speaker 1: known that's a lot for six. I mean, I gotta
Speaker 1: say some I've known for years upon years, and my
Speaker 1: feelings towards them may have not changed pre hook up
Speaker 1: to post hook up. I refuse to engage in post
Speaker 1: coital cuddling as it feels too close to romantic relationship
Speaker 1: ideals and I become uncomfortable. Though platonic cuddling is okay.
Speaker 1: Making out as fine with me, but a peck on
Speaker 1: the lips I can't stand it. You'd think by now
Speaker 1: i'd have developed something, but I'm still the same as
Speaker 1: I was. So here's the question this email was intended
Speaker 1: for in the first place. Do you believe our romanticism exists?
Speaker 1: And do you think it can be present in someone
Speaker 1: as young as I. I request an honest answer, not
Speaker 1: some bullshit to spare my feelings like insensitive. That's why
Speaker 1: I came to you. Thanks. Okay, Well, there's some parts
Speaker 1: of this that make me feel like someone wrote this
Speaker 1: as a joke only because it seems like a like
Speaker 1: someone writing kind of like overly fancy. But I think
Speaker 1: that's just being sixteen. Um oh yeah, I try to
Speaker 1: write real fans will so number one, I am totally
Speaker 1: alarmed by you having supped with twelve people at age sixteen. However,
Speaker 1: I'm guessing that has something to do with probably all
Speaker 1: these people kind of saying that you can't be a
Speaker 1: romantic mantic and then but you are not, and so
Speaker 1: you keep trying to feel feelings by fucking, and that's
Speaker 1: not gonna work. That's not gonna work for anyone, and
Speaker 1: especially not someone who seems to be uh in your position.
Speaker 1: I don't know, Yeah, because if you're fucking people, if
Speaker 1: you're having sexual intercourse with somebody to like either prove
Speaker 1: yourself wrong about something or prove other people wrong like
Speaker 1: those aren't you know? We always say, like, funk as
Speaker 1: many people as you want, as long as you feel
Speaker 1: good about it, so you feel good about it. I
Speaker 1: got nothing to say. Honestly, it is alarming. But also
Speaker 1: I don't know, Uh, I don't know. Yeah, no, I mean,
Speaker 1: I mean I think you feel good. I'm guessing that's
Speaker 1: where it's coming from. No matter how good you feel, like, well,
Speaker 1: at sixteen, you just gotta put the brakes on. I
Speaker 1: gotta say, put the brakes on a little bit. That's
Speaker 1: just a lot, because it's like it's none of it's
Speaker 1: good at sex that young, or like know as much
Speaker 1: about sex. So it's like and also you knowing yourself
Speaker 1: first and knowing your own body, which I don't know.
Speaker 1: You might and you might not. I have no idea.
Speaker 1: You said you have high lobetos, but I'm wondering, like,
Speaker 1: do you master rate a lot? I have no idea,
Speaker 1: but that is so important to having good sex. Um. Well,
Speaker 1: it's also about I was talking to my mom, you know,
Speaker 1: my mom's a teacher, and it was more like about
Speaker 1: like putting the kids today, like they can't pump the brakes,
Speaker 1: Like there's there's there's so much on the internet, there's
Speaker 1: so much TV, there's so much movies to watch with sexuality, sexuality, sexuality,
Speaker 1: and it's like, then you get you find yourself getting
Speaker 1: more bored younger, and I think that is dangerous, very dangerous.
Speaker 1: It's also dangerous, you know, you know thirty years ago
Speaker 1: when people had no information, that's dangerous too. But there
Speaker 1: is some kind of a happy medium that you need
Speaker 1: to reach, even if it's you just being like, hey,
Speaker 1: I'm sixteen, I haven't like, I haven't experienced enough feelings
Speaker 1: for me to be watching like this crazy ass porn
Speaker 1: I'm watching right right, and That'll fuck somebody up and
Speaker 1: then I'll suck up their intentions or how they conduct
Speaker 1: themselves sexually. And no one, look, no one likes being
Speaker 1: told something that they know isn't true the whole One
Speaker 1: day you'll get married and one day, okay, you know
Speaker 1: that's not true, and it's making you nuts. And I
Speaker 1: totally get that that's making you fucking insane, Like it's
Speaker 1: it's awful to hear. But the one thing that I've
Speaker 1: learned as I got older is, oh, you know what,
Speaker 1: people are always gonna throw ship on me that I
Speaker 1: know isn't true. And if I if I exhaust myself
Speaker 1: emotionally every time somebody does it it's gonna take too
Speaker 1: much out of me. Then then it deserves right. So
Speaker 1: it's like you know yourself, you're confident in yourself and
Speaker 1: right now, whether that stays the same for the rest
Speaker 1: of your life or it changes, who knows. You have
Speaker 1: no fucking idea. But when when these things get thrown
Speaker 1: at you, maybe don't try and see if you can't,
Speaker 1: if you cannot internalize it and go okay, because they're
Speaker 1: because it's like I feel like people get so you know,
Speaker 1: the first if if a friend comes over and it's like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, I just got dumped you, people's first inclinations,
Speaker 1: even as a friend, like it's okay, fuck him. You'll
Speaker 1: find somebody like that's not what I want to do
Speaker 1: right now. Like they're always they're sad that you got
Speaker 1: dumped and they want to project a happy story onto
Speaker 1: your narrative and that's what they're doing. And I feel
Speaker 1: like that's might be either people think you're so young
Speaker 1: you don't know what you want. Yet you do know
Speaker 1: what you want right now, so no, take comfort in
Speaker 1: knowing that you got this, Like you're comfortable with with
Speaker 1: being a romantic. Yeah, I think that's the key what
Speaker 1: what you said, knowing what you want right now. So
Speaker 1: it's like people are so focused only what you might
Speaker 1: want in the future and just know, yes, what you
Speaker 1: want in the future might change, and that's okay, but
Speaker 1: that doesn't make what you are feeling right now incorrect
Speaker 1: because it's like, you know, everyone's so worried about the future,
Speaker 1: what's happening in the future, prepare for your future? Well,
Speaker 1: how about you just make yourself happy right now, especially
Speaker 1: when it comes to romantic relationships. The bottom line is
Speaker 1: at sixteen, romantic relationships just don't fucking matter. They're gonna
Speaker 1: it's just gonna eat up a bunch of time that
Speaker 1: you could spend bettering yourself, educating yourself, and preparing, like
Speaker 1: for a future where maybe you are just you and
Speaker 1: I've been reading up. I mean, just because you are
Speaker 1: a romantic doesn't mean that you're not gonna at one
Speaker 1: time want a primary part ner. And it doesn't mean
Speaker 1: that you don't experience, uh, the like physical pleasures of sex.
Speaker 1: It just means that you don't have this like romantic
Speaker 1: fairy tale going on that most of us have. And honestly,
Speaker 1: it sounds like you're gonna save a lot of time
Speaker 1: and have a very productive lot of ship. So let
Speaker 1: people think what they want to think. And maybe if
Speaker 1: they don't get it, if they're not ready, you know,
Speaker 1: just think of you know, people coming out of the closet,
Speaker 1: you know, thirty years ago, people didn't get that they're
Speaker 1: coming out. Yeah, people don't get it, so it's like fine,
Speaker 1: let them they don't. People don't need to get it
Speaker 1: for it to be true. And that's frustrating. But honestly, like,
Speaker 1: just funk those people like that. You don't owe them
Speaker 1: any explanation. Just do what you need to do anyway
Speaker 1: it does, it doesn't matter. I agree. Oh, it's like
Speaker 1: always because people just ruining, trying to ruin your good time.
Speaker 1: That's that's in that life, you know. And then everyone's like,
Speaker 1: don't and you just gotta be you gotta protect your
Speaker 1: goodass time. Girl. Yeah. No, I don't think it's crazy.
Speaker 1: I think some people, I mean, like you've I've definitely
Speaker 1: met people a home like, oh they've never felt a
Speaker 1: romantic feeling in their life? Oh yeah, h percent. I
Speaker 1: don't think it's a made up thing. I don't think
Speaker 1: it's super common up. And also I just think you know, right,
Speaker 1: now at sixteen, it was a totally fine way to be. Yeah.
Speaker 1: This next email, the subject line is how do I
Speaker 1: address paraplegia with weekend hookup? Hey, Christina and Karen love
Speaker 1: the podcast. So I met a guy off tender and
Speaker 1: he greeted me in a wheelchair. He wasn't standing in
Speaker 1: any of his photos, but I totally didn't expect it.
Speaker 1: He implied he had broken his leg in a skiing
Speaker 1: accident earlier and it was temporary. But when we Yeah,
Speaker 1: but when we got to his apartment, I started to
Speaker 1: notice there were accessibility accommodations, a ton of physical therapy equipment,
Speaker 1: a coffee table on wheels, bathroom adjustments and lower people
Speaker 1: we hooked up, there were there were erection issues. Uh,
Speaker 1: and I was on top the whole time. Honestly, not
Speaker 1: sure that he ever came either, But it wasn't bad.
Speaker 1: At the end, we exchanged numbers I saw, and I
Speaker 1: saw a piece of mail with his surname and immediately
Speaker 1: googled him when I got home. As it turns out,
Speaker 1: he had a spinal cord injury from a fraternity hazing
Speaker 1: event in college. He is paralyzed from the waist down
Speaker 1: Since then, we have met up twice more, once when
Speaker 1: once when we didn't fuck, and this past weekend when
Speaker 1: we did. We'll talk briefly about sports, family, work, etcetera
Speaker 1: before boning. But I don't know how to address the paraplegia,
Speaker 1: or if I even should. I'm not confrontational enough to
Speaker 1: call him out, and it seems rude to just flat
Speaker 1: out ask, uh, we would We wouldn't ever date, so
Speaker 1: we're just hooking up. Should I say anything or let
Speaker 1: it go? Am I making this more awkward? I assume
Speaker 1: he's either a probably knows that I know, or be
Speaker 1: thinks I'm incredibly dense. Is it too late to say anything? Thanks? Um? I?
Speaker 1: When I read this email, I was in as Mary
Speaker 1: Park with Stephen eating pizza, and I kinda I read
Speaker 1: it to him because his dad's in a wheelchair, and uh,
Speaker 1: you know, I I would feel no one likes to
Speaker 1: be lied to. Clearly he was lying about the injury
Speaker 1: and the extent of which it affects his life if
Speaker 1: his people has even adjusted to be lower so he
Speaker 1: can suck see out his door. Um, but Stephen, I
Speaker 1: mean that would piss me out. I think I think
Speaker 1: if you are a paraplegic. I think that is something
Speaker 1: I would like to have in a tender profile. If
Speaker 1: I'm dating somebody, I would I personally would not not
Speaker 1: go on a date with somebody if they were in
Speaker 1: a real charm fuck. Um. And but one of the
Speaker 1: things that Steven had pointed out his dad for his
Speaker 1: dad got him into his accident. I was hit by
Speaker 1: a car when Steven and Stevens sister were little kids,
Speaker 1: and they just bought a house. Um. And he was
Speaker 1: in a wheelchair for the rest of his life after that,
Speaker 1: and he had a hard hard time mentally coping with
Speaker 1: this for five about five years. I mean, I think
Speaker 1: now he's good, but uh, the first five years after
Speaker 1: the accident were really bad for him emotionally. It was
Speaker 1: hard to come to terms with with that. I can't
Speaker 1: even own O God, that's I mean, oh yeah, So
Speaker 1: I totally get why he lied, And I think that
Speaker 1: what you want to confront him about is I don't
Speaker 1: think it doesn't have to be confrontational. And even if
Speaker 1: you're just hooking up and you don't think you're gonna
Speaker 1: date him, I still would talk about it, just because
Speaker 1: he doesn't have to lie to girls like this. I
Speaker 1: truly don't think. And if some girl sees a picture
Speaker 1: of him in a wheelchair on Tinder and they passed
Speaker 1: by him, that's they're they're fucking lost, or they just
Speaker 1: aren't into that. That's fine. They know not every girl
Speaker 1: has to want to date a man in a wheelchair,
Speaker 1: and you're not a bad person if you don't, because
Speaker 1: I mean, like you're allowed to kind of like say,
Speaker 1: this is something I can handle, this is something I can't.
Speaker 1: And I don't think it's rude to just flat out ask.
Speaker 1: I think if you approached it with an honest uh,
Speaker 1: this is how I would ask, I'd be like, dude,
Speaker 1: uh so you told you kind of have been alluding
Speaker 1: that this uh your injury with your legs is uh
Speaker 1: not permanent, but it is, Like I think you'll just
Speaker 1: say it, even in less words, like in in a
Speaker 1: in a cute like moment, a tender moment, you just like,
Speaker 1: so what really happened? Or or you know, a comment
Speaker 1: like that's more encouraging, like you know, no matter what,
Speaker 1: I would have I like you anyway, I like, yeah,
Speaker 1: you like something like you could you can there's a
Speaker 1: way to make it, uh like like a rom com
Speaker 1: almost like there is you know, sometimes it's you know,
Speaker 1: I think you're gonna be spared, but you But in
Speaker 1: this case, I think it's it's good to have like
Speaker 1: kind of a line prepared or to stay at the
Speaker 1: appropriate moment um because I think be kind about it.
Speaker 1: I think he I don't think he thinks you're any
Speaker 1: No one's not. I And I think story Spelling would
Speaker 1: know that he was permanently totally everywhere no um. But
Speaker 1: I also think too, I don't know how old you
Speaker 1: guys are, but if this happened in a fraternity hazing
Speaker 1: incident and then he just lost his ability to walk
Speaker 1: for the rest of his life, I mean, that's gotta
Speaker 1: be a hard fucking thing to grapple with, Like, that's
Speaker 1: just gotta be a hard thing to accept because it
Speaker 1: was something so stupid unfortunately, like such a meaningless yeah,
Speaker 1: and that I mean, I don't know if he's angry
Speaker 1: about it or not. Whatever however he's feeling about it,
Speaker 1: he's probably not alluding to because he doesn't want to
Speaker 1: talk about it. But I would, I would approach it
Speaker 1: gently and kindly and and talk about it even if
Speaker 1: you don't want to date the guy. I still I
Speaker 1: highly recommend approaching it in a kind way, just a
Speaker 1: little bit, only because I think, yeah, it will. It's
Speaker 1: like kind of an act of kindness really on you
Speaker 1: on your part, because it will then set him up
Speaker 1: for success with whoever he does decide to truly date
Speaker 1: in the future. And that's the reason. It's not. The
Speaker 1: reason is not to like seek justice or truth for yourself.
Speaker 1: The reason is to be like, I think a couple
Speaker 1: instances of human decency in this person's life could really
Speaker 1: be the difference between him going and down or up. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: And that's that. And Yeah, Dan Savage has this thing
Speaker 1: that he talks about a lot. He coined the campsite roll.
Speaker 1: Leave somebody better than you found them, even if you're
Speaker 1: waking up, if you're just sucking um, he's still up
Speaker 1: from the Girl Scouts. Girl Scouts leave places well, right,
Speaker 1: but they don't. They don't mean it about towards fucking
Speaker 1: the girl Scout saying towards a girl Scouts talking. I mean,
Speaker 1: I think I think he calls it the campfire will
Speaker 1: probably inspired by the Scouts, got it, I mean camp site, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think. But I was a girl Scout for many years.
Speaker 1: I really do think of that often, Like honestly, just
Speaker 1: in little places. It really did have a good effect
Speaker 1: on Like, for instance, I was at the gym yesterday
Speaker 1: and someone's dirty ass like sweat rag was on the thing,
Speaker 1: and I was like, do I And I was taking
Speaker 1: my town. I was like, I really don't want to
Speaker 1: touch that, and I was like her, and you were
Speaker 1: a girl's cat, what should you do? And I fucking
Speaker 1: threw up this dirty ass person's fucking snot rag in
Speaker 1: the garbage for them, because I shouldn't left it there
Speaker 1: in the first place. And it's like, did I want
Speaker 1: to do that? No? But you know, and I think
Speaker 1: showing the kindness and decency towards other people, that's kinda
Speaker 1: that will make someone's day, their life, their months, their
Speaker 1: year or whatever. I just think that, uh, let's be
Speaker 1: kind of especially like, yeah, since we don't know the
Speaker 1: age he doesn't he might this might still be like
Speaker 1: something pretty fresh that he's dealing with if you're in
Speaker 1: your early twenties. Um, okay, great. So we have a
Speaker 1: really interesting guest on today. She is a journalist. She's
Speaker 1: an author. She wrote a book that was turned into
Speaker 1: a movie and is actually out today called Carrie Pilby
Speaker 1: looks excellent. I highly recommend you see it only in
Speaker 1: a couple of cities right now, but it'll be wider
Speaker 1: release or Amazon and online accessible very soon. Ladies and gentlemen,
Speaker 1: please welcome Karen Listener tossing up to me, begging you,
Speaker 1: I'm spend my nights a week. Ain't no giving ty
Speaker 1: fire sooner. I guess I'm just kind o famy you
Speaker 1: so look you to feel you're sorry you s are
Speaker 1: here with Karen Listener. I need to I'm great. How
Speaker 1: are you good? Go ahead to meet you and wet. Yeah,
Speaker 1: not in the you know, it's sexually charged way in
Speaker 1: the it's horrible, like two and a half seconds for
Speaker 1: you to get there. That's amazing. Hey, I know good
Speaker 1: at what you do. Yeah, I start right off the bat,
Speaker 1: I'm like, when the last time you masturbated? Uh? You know? Hot? What? Anyway?
Speaker 1: Right along, I google myself all day long. I think
Speaker 1: that's how that's that's not healthy sick soul for me. Anyway,
Speaker 1: it's not wait my mind off reality, googling yourself I masturbate. Yeah,
Speaker 1: because but as a people must be saying really great
Speaker 1: things about you and well I'm I'm hoping they are.
Speaker 1: That's why I google. Sometimes Google and you sign the
Speaker 1: masturbates of the compliments. That sounds great, Actually sounds very narcissistic. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I am a writer. I needed to get my words
Speaker 1: out there. But no, I don't get so excited by
Speaker 1: what people are saying on the internet. Well, what kind
Speaker 1: of say we've had something said, I know what that
Speaker 1: life is like A little Well, I did write a
Speaker 1: book and a novel many years ago, and so sometimes
Speaker 1: people review it, and most of them have been nice reviews.
Speaker 1: It's nice when someone gets what you're trying to do.
Speaker 1: So that's what I That's a lot of what I
Speaker 1: google for. And then there's a movie version coming out,
Speaker 1: but which will probably be out um by the time
Speaker 1: people listen to this. So that's what I google to
Speaker 1: see what people are saying. And most of them get it,
Speaker 1: and they come from different walks of life. Yeah. Something
Speaker 1: Once in a while, it's a guy, uh who says,
Speaker 1: I know you're a girl and I'm not your demographic,
Speaker 1: but I really got it. Every guy always said whenever
Speaker 1: like or a person over the age of forty five, like,
Speaker 1: I know I'm not your demographic, but we get a
Speaker 1: lot of emails from the space. I'm glad that people
Speaker 1: branch out. Yeah, it's awesome. It's good to like get
Speaker 1: have your rb uh be valued by people all different
Speaker 1: groups and ages and and races and genders and all
Speaker 1: that stuff. That is wonderful. Um So, do you grew
Speaker 1: up in Jersey? I did grow up in New Jersey,
Speaker 1: and um I thought it was beautiful. Um I don't
Speaker 1: care what anyone says, No it is. I grew up
Speaker 1: in central New Jersey. I grew up lived first and
Speaker 1: Freehold and then an old Bridge, which wasn't far away.
Speaker 1: Um My mom liked to move around, but only like
Speaker 1: apparently four blocks from the other place. You know, start
Speaker 1: We're gonna start over down the street. So I make
Speaker 1: new friends and lose all your old ones because there's
Speaker 1: no internet. So it was like, you might as well
Speaker 1: move to Alaska if you moved in the eighties to
Speaker 1: another neighborhood. Yeah, and then uh a friend, you want
Speaker 1: a friend from the old place to visit you, they'd
Speaker 1: be like, my mom will draw even the snow, so whatever.
Speaker 1: So um so maybe it was me, I don't know,
Speaker 1: so yeah, So, um so I grew up in Freehold,
Speaker 1: which is in Central Jersey, and it's still kind of
Speaker 1: far me, but it was more far me than there
Speaker 1: were some new developments. It's an hour south of New York,
Speaker 1: so there was some development the further you get from
Speaker 1: New York that when you were a teenager, would you
Speaker 1: like come to the city and like have like crazy
Speaker 1: wild nights. That's so what I would do if I
Speaker 1: live that close to New York. In my head, I did, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: I should have. UM, but you know, I'm very nerdy,
Speaker 1: which is a lot of what the book is about. Um.
Speaker 1: I wasn't cool enough actually. And also when I was
Speaker 1: growing up, New York was like people would talk about
Speaker 1: the Son of Sam and that was what it was
Speaker 1: famous for, and and so um and mugging and nobody
Speaker 1: even uses the term mugging anymore. I'd like to go
Speaker 1: actually interview people and say, do you know what it
Speaker 1: means to get mugged? Maybe maybe the young people for it.
Speaker 1: Now I got I don't know what the word is.
Speaker 1: Probably people say jumped at, jumped maso, stole my wallet.
Speaker 1: And they don't have mass murders now it's serial killers.
Speaker 1: It's like kind of there's a whole psychology before it.
Speaker 1: But back then it was mad. New York had mass
Speaker 1: murderers and uh and muggings. So no, I haven't. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so I was in So I lived in Freehold and
Speaker 1: it was quiet and and you couldn't even walk to
Speaker 1: uh play a store where I lived. It was there
Speaker 1: were houses, but there was nothing. It was so far
Speaker 1: you couldn't. It was far away from everything. So I
Speaker 1: I got a lot of ideas in my head. I
Speaker 1: mean I I just always liked to write and think
Speaker 1: up stories, and that's what I would do. I would
Speaker 1: ride around on my bike a lot and look for
Speaker 1: things and creative ventures. And uh, Freehold was very historic.
Speaker 1: It was near the Battle of Monmouth and everything, so
Speaker 1: there was a lot of history and I would um
Speaker 1: so I would just think a lot about that and
Speaker 1: put a lot of elements together. I always wanted to write,
Speaker 1: and I read all my Judy Bloom books. I wanted
Speaker 1: to write one like that. Those were the big I
Speaker 1: mean they're still big, but those are the big young
Speaker 1: adult books back then. So I always had a lot
Speaker 1: of ideas in my head and I still do. And
Speaker 1: and maybe it was some people say the suburbs are boring,
Speaker 1: but I just thought they were rich with possibilities and
Speaker 1: um so I I lived at free Hold until around
Speaker 1: high school and the night we moved the five blocks
Speaker 1: away and I went to school in Old Bridge, which
Speaker 1: was not as far me and the head um was diverse.
Speaker 1: Actually went to school with you know ideas. Um. He
Speaker 1: pronounces his name a little differently. Now, who's who's a
Speaker 1: great fiction writer? So um so New Jersey so uh so,
Speaker 1: I had a rich high school experience with different kinds
Speaker 1: of people. Um, it was a little more heterogeneous and
Speaker 1: Old Bridge than New Jersey. It was. There was a
Speaker 1: little more diverse city there in high school. So so,
Speaker 1: I guess I was inspired by New Jersey. And it's
Speaker 1: a place with a lot of different things going on.
Speaker 1: A lot of interesting people, like people people should on
Speaker 1: New Jersey all the time, but a lot of interesting
Speaker 1: talented people come out of there. I mean, like we
Speaker 1: have a roster Whitney Houston. Yeah, I mean there's a
Speaker 1: lot of people. If I'm from Jersey, yeah, I'm from
Speaker 1: The parents are both New Jersey. Awesome, Madison. I think,
Speaker 1: then why don't you have a New Jersey accent? That's
Speaker 1: what people but there isn't no I'm saying, why do you?
Speaker 1: But people think there is a New Jersey accent that's
Speaker 1: really a New York accident, and people to New Jersey.
Speaker 1: I went to school for acting, so I had all
Speaker 1: these voice and speech professors who just pounded any inkling
Speaker 1: of an act. Else. Did your professor's pouncy? Now, my pussy?
Speaker 1: I don't mean so. I meant probably they were working
Speaker 1: very hard on the typewriters and whatever, and you brought
Speaker 1: pussy into it. Yeah, well, what happened with the election everything?
Speaker 1: I like the word pussy. Do you like the word pussy? Um? No,
Speaker 1: I never said it. You just said it down. I
Speaker 1: never said like the pussy. Thank god this isn't on tape,
Speaker 1: because I will deny that I said. This is an exclusive.
Speaker 1: What was my first time saying pussy? Really? Yes? And
Speaker 1: I don't really, Yes, I'm honored. I don't see the
Speaker 1: C word except around Easter? Do you not? Because you did?
Speaker 1: It's a little harship, it feels, you know, sometimes it's
Speaker 1: the harshness of the word. Well, when I've heard it
Speaker 1: a few I I like that word a lot, but
Speaker 1: I usually hear it and used in a positive connotation,
Speaker 1: but very few times is where I hear. Usually it's
Speaker 1: a dude or something like she was being a real gunt.
Speaker 1: I'm like growth because it's harsh. It's I mean, it's
Speaker 1: it's okay. I think it's okay to not feel comfortable
Speaker 1: with profanity and not feel like everything's exactly the same.
Speaker 1: If you want to use it, there's nothing wrong with it.
Speaker 1: But if you feel like you know it's it's it's
Speaker 1: harsh and you're right. Do you do you purposely you're
Speaker 1: clear of profanity or do you bally? But I guess
Speaker 1: I'm personally I sort of save it for when I
Speaker 1: dropped something on my foot or whatever. I'm right, i'd
Speaker 1: have to be really really angry. But I also think
Speaker 1: it's funny. I mean, I I um, I like when
Speaker 1: people can express themselves whichever way they do, and I
Speaker 1: like when they don't judge others for it. It's about choices.
Speaker 1: If you don't feel like saying that pe word that
Speaker 1: I've never seen in my life. Um, what were you
Speaker 1: like as a like a as a teenager? Like in
Speaker 1: terms of like were you into boy? Were like boy obsessed?
Speaker 1: Were you like Well, I don't give a crap. I
Speaker 1: just want to really little. This is gonna be a
Speaker 1: little shocking. I was a little bit of a nerd,
Speaker 1: I I gather, Yeah, that's great. So it wasn't so great.
Speaker 1: I mean the nerd in my high school were the
Speaker 1: most sexually active. Yeah, it was a different generation, I
Speaker 1: think with each other. Well that's that's that's the interesting thing.
Speaker 1: I mean now you look back and you say, oh,
Speaker 1: the nerds, like you know, if you were in the
Speaker 1: band or you were in your subculture, you had each other.
Speaker 1: But back then, um, not even necessarily because it was
Speaker 1: the internet. Maybe we were a generation removed from the
Speaker 1: fifties um as it was, and we weren't very good
Speaker 1: at expressing ourselves. And it wasn't cool or fun to
Speaker 1: be a nerd. It was I'm a nerd, and I
Speaker 1: see those other nerds over there, and if we talk
Speaker 1: to each other, ever, we want to make fun of us.
Speaker 1: So you couldn't have like two nerds dating. It would
Speaker 1: be like exposing. It would be like two nerds dating.
Speaker 1: It would be like exposing. Uh, it would be like
Speaker 1: instead of two sides that could be made fun of,
Speaker 1: it's like, uh, what's the word for like square squaring?
Speaker 1: Things like this is getting very nerdy. As I say, exponentially,
Speaker 1: it's like exponentially it's like instead of uh, one person
Speaker 1: to make fun of, it's almost like your two people
Speaker 1: and you've got all these different things. You're magnifying it
Speaker 1: because instead of just one nerd that may can maybe
Speaker 1: slip through the cracks, right, you can't not see two exactly.
Speaker 1: I guess there was a god. I speak your language,
Speaker 1: I understand YEA. So it wasn't cool to be a
Speaker 1: nerd in the eighties, and now everyone wants to say
Speaker 1: I was. When people like, yeah, I forget where what
Speaker 1: like it was a video interview. I remember someone was
Speaker 1: asking Kate up in something like years and years ago
Speaker 1: and Scott, I'm not I'm such a nerd and I
Speaker 1: got out on behalf of the nerds because you wasn't girl. Yeah, no,
Speaker 1: I always remember. And I'm actually working on kind of
Speaker 1: a nerdy high school New Jersey memoir, and I was
Speaker 1: just writing this one thing. I remembered where I was.
Speaker 1: I got very into in the eighties. I finally I
Speaker 1: had never had a cool cousin to tell me what
Speaker 1: to do or cool friends, so um, so I never
Speaker 1: heard all the cutting edge music. I was listening to
Speaker 1: the same thing at the top forty everyone else was
Speaker 1: where it's like every three songs they repeat the song.
Speaker 1: That was what was going on for the eighties because
Speaker 1: everyone hated disco and there was a backlash and the
Speaker 1: music where that was all our parents, so we only
Speaker 1: had eighties music. So then I finally started discovering um,
Speaker 1: discovering that there was music other than that, like punk
Speaker 1: and the last twenty years of music that I hadn't
Speaker 1: heard on the top forty stations. So I got into
Speaker 1: different groups. So one day I was after school taking
Speaker 1: a test or whatever, and I heard a guy playing
Speaker 1: a song by The Who that wasn't one of the
Speaker 1: most popular songs, but I knew it because I was
Speaker 1: starting to hear other stuff and look for other stuff
Speaker 1: on the radio. And I went and I kind of
Speaker 1: stood in the doorway, and I saw this guy playing
Speaker 1: the song on the piano, and I thought, you know,
Speaker 1: I should tell him I really like I liked that
Speaker 1: song and talk about The Who. And I stood there
Speaker 1: and just let I mean, you could it was there, yes,
Speaker 1: wronging Lee. I wanted to but I wanted to connect.
Speaker 1: But you know, you sit there and you think, well,
Speaker 1: I'm scrawny and nobody. I don't know how to talk
Speaker 1: to people. It's gonna make it worse. So it's not.
Speaker 1: It wasn't It wasn't cool to be a nerd. It
Speaker 1: wasn't like, Hey, I found all my other nerds and
Speaker 1: we nerded together. Right. So you never told that guy
Speaker 1: who was playing the piano, I liked his this song, No,
Speaker 1: and I would have. I mean, I think there are
Speaker 1: a lot of people I would have gotten. People are
Speaker 1: fascinating to me. There's so much in them, and sometimes
Speaker 1: you have to press but you know, there are risks
Speaker 1: in that. And I think the older you get, the
Speaker 1: more willing you are, I guess, to take a little risks.
Speaker 1: And sometimes people also perceive you as standoffish if you're
Speaker 1: afraid to take the risks. But it's more like you're
Speaker 1: you're down on yourself than down on everyone else. But
Speaker 1: I think that people kind of know that now. I
Speaker 1: think we've sort of had a bit of revenge of
Speaker 1: the nerds a little bit, where people understand that sometimes
Speaker 1: we were kind of marginalized in our own way, but
Speaker 1: sometimes we did it to ourselves a little bit too.
Speaker 1: I mean, there was there was also more there wasn't
Speaker 1: any bullying awareness, and there wasn't it was before when
Speaker 1: I was in school, was before the movie Mean Girls,
Speaker 1: So nobody really understood that the ways girls bullied you,
Speaker 1: it's it's sort of like in Mean Girls, where they
Speaker 1: say we don't beat each other up, we just harass
Speaker 1: you until you have an eating disorder. Well before that,
Speaker 1: before that line was spoken, it was hard to articulate
Speaker 1: exactly the girls who would who would ostracize you, or
Speaker 1: then the next day they'd be your friend and ostrac
Speaker 1: size someone else. So so there was a lot of
Speaker 1: bullying in the eighties, but it wasn't punch you in
Speaker 1: the face like and get it over with. But it
Speaker 1: was almost worse though. I would imagine, like like emotional
Speaker 1: bullying is exactly that seeps deep. I mean, you start
Speaker 1: bringing it on yourself a little bit too, you sort of,
Speaker 1: I sort of. I mean I didn't know how to
Speaker 1: fit in, so I'm sure I did and said silly
Speaker 1: things or nerdy things to try to to try to
Speaker 1: find my own I guess, maybe to separate myself, to
Speaker 1: sort of make myself feel a little good because I
Speaker 1: didn't I mean, I didn't look in the mirror, and
Speaker 1: I wasn't happy with who I who I was as
Speaker 1: I do you think that's because of that social construct
Speaker 1: of like you're a nerd and that's not so I
Speaker 1: think in I think in sort of, junior high was
Speaker 1: the rock bottom. We moved again down the street to
Speaker 1: Home Delawich. I don't know if you know. Home Delta
Speaker 1: very wealthy community. Um, and I had great school, so
Speaker 1: that's why my mom moved us there. But um, but
Speaker 1: it was like if you didn't wear the right jeans
Speaker 1: one day, people would say where did you get those clothes?
Speaker 1: And even we I had a math teacher. One day,
Speaker 1: there was a horror rumor going around in eighth grade
Speaker 1: in Home Dell that he bought his tie at Kmart.
Speaker 1: I don't know if they saw, like for days I
Speaker 1: heard this and Mr such and such bought his tie
Speaker 1: at kmart. And so I had a friend some good ship,
Speaker 1: Yeah exactly. So, I mean I remember a friend's mom
Speaker 1: saying to my mom, my daughter won't even let me
Speaker 1: go into Kmart for paper because she doesn't want to
Speaker 1: be seen in Kmart. So so there is like so
Speaker 1: all these things. Uh, so you could get very easily
Speaker 1: tagged it's easy to get swooped up in that idea
Speaker 1: of like I can imagine like you witnessing that conversation
Speaker 1: of like, oh my god, I hurt so and so
Speaker 1: got their tie from Kmart, and you're like, okay, so
Speaker 1: I can never I guess Kmart's bad. Won't talk about
Speaker 1: Kmart noted. So it becomes like you can't. You have
Speaker 1: to figure out what can I say that's okay and
Speaker 1: and that's and some people naturally know that, and obviously
Speaker 1: there's there's a different there's a difference between not saying
Speaker 1: things because it's not cool and not saying things because
Speaker 1: you just don't have any social grace or ideas. And
Speaker 1: somewhere in the middle with me, so, do you have
Speaker 1: any like specific memories of getting bullied girls that have
Speaker 1: haunted you by boys because girls would would use boys
Speaker 1: to do it, like girls with oh yeah that happened,
Speaker 1: or like they'd say throw There was one boy in
Speaker 1: eighth grade and he used to throw me kisses in
Speaker 1: the hall, and you just don't know how to react.
Speaker 1: I mean, now he teasing you or was he interested
Speaker 1: in you? Well, I think he was teasing. Now, I
Speaker 1: don't think he would I would I would I fall
Speaker 1: in for that the guy's teasing me, And I didn't
Speaker 1: know when I was like eighth ninth grade. And that's
Speaker 1: also I mean, there's also a spectrum to there's a
Speaker 1: difference between somebody just kind of teasing you or not
Speaker 1: knowing how to talk to you. In someone but he
Speaker 1: would do it to make his friends laugh and stuff
Speaker 1: like that, and you don't never really know what to say,
Speaker 1: and that's you can't really say anything. You can't say
Speaker 1: stop making fun of me. I mean that I would
Speaker 1: be like, why are you so mean to me? Right now?
Speaker 1: And in doing anything, I was very emotional child. Whenever
Speaker 1: anyone would make fun of me, I'd be like, but
Speaker 1: why would you do that? Let's all be nice to
Speaker 1: each other, guys. No one wanted to do that, so
Speaker 1: I just gave up. So I just stopped talking for
Speaker 1: a while. But I was writing, so I kept talking,
Speaker 1: like in like in class, or just just just trying
Speaker 1: not to end. I mean, if somebody said something that
Speaker 1: could be mean or maybe it wasn't me and I
Speaker 1: was by the end of eighth grade, I was I
Speaker 1: just assumed the less I said, the better. I didn't
Speaker 1: know what to say you sound like you're like that
Speaker 1: girl from the Breakfast Club. Yeah, well I wasn't let Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: a little bit. I love that she did talk one.
Speaker 1: She was like the smartest one. Yeah, but because it
Speaker 1: hurt not talking game from where like a disdain for
Speaker 1: others than like I don't have anything to say. She
Speaker 1: had a lot to say and she's silence. Did you
Speaker 1: date in high school or college? Hell? No? Yeah, even
Speaker 1: not in college. You know there was what college did
Speaker 1: you go to? I went to the college of people
Speaker 1: who don't date know, I went to the I went
Speaker 1: to the University of Pennsylvania and it was a place.
Speaker 1: It there are a lot of people there. It said, yeah,
Speaker 1: thank you. It was in Philly. I was thinking, like
Speaker 1: you went to an ivy league or of the similar No,
Speaker 1: because I mean that goes along with being nerdy. There
Speaker 1: are rewards that wasn't ready and I look like I
Speaker 1: find all to types there. There were um nerdy types,
Speaker 1: and there were frat types, and there were people in between,
Speaker 1: and you know, you're not always ready developmentally. And I
Speaker 1: came out of high school not knowing how to talk
Speaker 1: to people really except close friends who I really felt
Speaker 1: comfortable with. So I had to, so I you know,
Speaker 1: there was I just remember the first alcohol incident where
Speaker 1: also the thing is if you don't have a car
Speaker 1: in high school or whatever, you just don't. I mean
Speaker 1: I was kind of sheltered. I didn't. Yeah, so I
Speaker 1: didn't really, I mean there was no alcohol in my house.
Speaker 1: I never really so the first I even like, see
Speaker 1: didn't drink its. You got to college, right, so um
Speaker 1: so I remember like the first we I and my
Speaker 1: roommate was a girl from Fort Lee who used the valedictorian,
Speaker 1: so we were both kind of nerds. So um so,
Speaker 1: I remember there was this guy on our floor who
Speaker 1: was who was a sophomore and of course who says
Speaker 1: so he was like he was, you know, yes, So
Speaker 1: I remember we went to some freshman mixer and and
Speaker 1: the two of us ended up walking home with him.
Speaker 1: And we trusted him because he knew how to get
Speaker 1: back to the dorm. And he was like, should we
Speaker 1: go buy some alcoholic beverages? And he went right into
Speaker 1: a story. Wasn't twenty one? He got him and then
Speaker 1: we were sitting We went into his room and sat
Speaker 1: in his bed and we're sort of it. I felt
Speaker 1: I felt like kind of funny because it was my
Speaker 1: first you know, kind of I wanted to drink and
Speaker 1: show that I knew what it was. It was just
Speaker 1: wine cooler as it wasn't anything weird, but I still
Speaker 1: felt like, how am I doing it? Are they going
Speaker 1: to tell I've never really like I had sat in
Speaker 1: any you've ever done in your life drink? Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: So it's so it's sort of so it's it's a
Speaker 1: slow kind of process of feeling comfortable. So I didn't
Speaker 1: do that much in college except maybe the occasional trying
Speaker 1: to fit in and or whatever. Did you hope with
Speaker 1: anybody in college? Well, it seems like you didn't want it.
Speaker 1: That just wasn't your priority or did you want to
Speaker 1: but you didn't have like the tools too. I was,
Speaker 1: I was the Queen of impossible crushes, but I wasn't.
Speaker 1: Oh I've had so many of those. Yeah, and I
Speaker 1: wasn't alone. Actually for some reason, I found I mean
Speaker 1: maybe in the eighties also there was no internet, and
Speaker 1: a lot of times you didn't mean any kids except
Speaker 1: on why in your own school? When who did you
Speaker 1: have on that was so impossible? There was a boy, yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean that's all about him. Was impossible is he
Speaker 1: was a boy and uh, and I didn't know what
Speaker 1: to say to him. Also, I think there's there's h
Speaker 1: I mean, what do I say? Hi? Boy? I don't
Speaker 1: well know, but like the quarterback football team or something
Speaker 1: or I don't know, what is it with all those
Speaker 1: movies where the damn quarterback? Yeah, they're really sensitive inside
Speaker 1: every tea that that only forces you more inside, Like
Speaker 1: why is Carol on growing Pains and uh and Becca
Speaker 1: on Life goes on? Why do they both end up
Speaker 1: with the sensitive quarterback? That person is not in my
Speaker 1: high school? Why do they make me feel like I'm
Speaker 1: not what's wrong with me? Didn't look deep enough? It's
Speaker 1: always my fault and my last stuff is my fault.
Speaker 1: But I don't know, you don't know. I mean, I mean, actually,
Speaker 1: the one of our football stars did sign my yearbook,
Speaker 1: and one of my friends looked at and said, did
Speaker 1: you pay him? Shut up? Whoa? He was a nice guy,
Speaker 1: no but anyway, but no, I didn't. I didn't bribe
Speaker 1: him to sign his name in my yearbook. Geez, what
Speaker 1: somebody accused you of paying a friend? She was she
Speaker 1: was kind of joking, but it was one of those jokes.
Speaker 1: That was like, I don't think you're kidding. I think
Speaker 1: you're actually being a bit okay, yes, but yes, oh yes,
Speaker 1: so so I had impossible crushes and actually I had
Speaker 1: I don't know. The thing is, if you're a quiet
Speaker 1: girl and you like someone but there's not a lot.
Speaker 1: If you like them but you don't end up in
Speaker 1: their presence a lot. Maybe it's someone in a class
Speaker 1: um and you've sort of gotten to know them a
Speaker 1: little bit um and nothing happens. But you're shy, you can't.
Speaker 1: I mean, theoretically, okay, equality, we're supposed to tell someone,
Speaker 1: but then their first vision of you is really being
Speaker 1: the opposite of who you are. So I think kind
Speaker 1: of quiet or somewhat shy girls are in a position where, um,
Speaker 1: we can't do the things guys do. A quiet or
Speaker 1: a shy guy can still be quiet and shy and
Speaker 1: asked something out yeah, or charm someone. I always think of, um,
Speaker 1: what's the movie with John Qusack, Oh say anything? Yeah,
Speaker 1: all the cute nerdy stuff he does. Like if I
Speaker 1: liked someone and I went outside their window and I
Speaker 1: held boom box back, there is a creepy young woman
Speaker 1: about to murder me. I think, yeah, that's something. I
Speaker 1: think we've talked about that once like before, because that
Speaker 1: is like no one romantic over the top romantic gestures
Speaker 1: from women are always like categorizing crazy. It creates pressure too.
Speaker 1: I think, well, we were I when I was watching
Speaker 1: the trailer for your movie, Stephen. My boyfriend was on
Speaker 1: the steps when you came in. He was here and
Speaker 1: we were watching it, and it's like, man, you don't
Speaker 1: what movies surround, what movies are about? Men that are
Speaker 1: wrong comms? Okay, say anything, it's one of them? And um, uh,
Speaker 1: what's that Zach something versus the World? The comic book
Speaker 1: movie one of my favorite movies. That just was talking
Speaker 1: about it. We all know what you mean. I can't
Speaker 1: think of either, but yeah, um and uh that the
Speaker 1: main guy. It was a guy and he was kind
Speaker 1: of it was kind of like a wrong com about him.
Speaker 1: It was like also action comic book movie. That was
Speaker 1: amazing movie. But it's so annoying that when a girl
Speaker 1: but all these well I sent down off so which
Speaker 1: is one of my favorite films again, Yeah, that's that
Speaker 1: was an Indian Which one did you say? Igby Goes Down,
Speaker 1: Goes Down? I think one of the people involved in
Speaker 1: Actually my movie is a big fan of that movie.
Speaker 1: I think it's got some That is why I liked
Speaker 1: because there was something about it because it's like, I know,
Speaker 1: it's a coming of age kind of a story, but
Speaker 1: it had that like indie film field that I do love.
Speaker 1: So I was like, that's why I was like, I'm
Speaker 1: really going to go see this this weekend. But when
Speaker 1: I think of male centric rom comes, I'm like, Oh,
Speaker 1: that man is charming and sweet and adorable and I'm
Speaker 1: rooting for him. But then when it's a female centric
Speaker 1: rom comme, I'm like, get if you're ask girls stop crying,
Speaker 1: I'm bitching, you don't tell you. All you do is
Speaker 1: worry about men. And I criticized, like she's mass yeah,
Speaker 1: and and I don't know. I don't know if it's
Speaker 1: me being unfair or if when women are portrayed in
Speaker 1: these types of situations they can't handle themselves. I don't
Speaker 1: know what it is. Yeah, I mean I think that's
Speaker 1: sort of the double bind of you know, if you're
Speaker 1: not in someone's orbit constantly, if you're not working with them,
Speaker 1: or you're out of school and you like someone, how
Speaker 1: could you tell them without becoming the exact opposite, or
Speaker 1: if you are if you want someone to get to
Speaker 1: know you, Um, let's say you do say hey, do
Speaker 1: you want to go out for coffee? Then what do
Speaker 1: you do? Then you say go out for coffee and say,
Speaker 1: you know what, I'm not going to take the next
Speaker 1: step because I'm I'm really shy, and then it's it's weird.
Speaker 1: I don't know, it's awkward. Yeah, I guess I never
Speaker 1: really thought about that. Like, but shy people dating, that's
Speaker 1: a that's kind of hard. And you think the Internet.
Speaker 1: I guess the Internet technically can make it a little
Speaker 1: bit easier for for shy people to connect. But then
Speaker 1: that then you're then then the only situations you're meeting
Speaker 1: each other is on a date, and that creates its
Speaker 1: own pressure. So I don't know, So meet someone when
Speaker 1: you're fourteen. Don't be like me. Don't be afraid to
Speaker 1: change in jim because I don't even want women to
Speaker 1: see my body. I the same way I would change
Speaker 1: in the bathroom. Now that's I like that because people
Speaker 1: wouldn't comment on it, and I'd be like, I don't
Speaker 1: I don't want anything. I don't feel like you look
Speaker 1: like everyone else. So um, so I perfected this whole
Speaker 1: two seconds where I put my T shirt down and
Speaker 1: I was able to sad ow get everything out in
Speaker 1: like under two second. But ye didn't you feel like
Speaker 1: that drew more attention because like for me, like I
Speaker 1: think the people who were changing in like a weird
Speaker 1: manner I was, I would just be like, why are
Speaker 1: you changing like that? But that's also because then you say,
Speaker 1: what are you looking? There's so many types of what
Speaker 1: are you looking at? Me changing? So many types of
Speaker 1: naked girls in a locker room, Because there's the girl
Speaker 1: who just is like naked and just running around and
Speaker 1: you're like some dancing around like a reindeer, a little creepy.
Speaker 1: I'm so comfortably with and that's great, but I always
Speaker 1: was creeped out by that person. And they're still in
Speaker 1: the gym, tips in my face. I don't know. I
Speaker 1: don't get it. And then they're in the gym and
Speaker 1: they started asking your questions. You're like, oh, just in
Speaker 1: your head back so you don't get Yeah, you know
Speaker 1: what this is weird? Right? I think this is weird.
Speaker 1: Do you think that's weird? I don't know. And then
Speaker 1: there's a girl like yeah, like I would have the
Speaker 1: towel wrapped around my chest and then I put the
Speaker 1: shirt on, put my underwear on, put the pants on,
Speaker 1: then I take the towel off. And I was so
Speaker 1: it's not just me. I feel friend getting made fun
Speaker 1: of because I just changed normally, and no one ever
Speaker 1: said anything that a regular regular and gym experience, because
Speaker 1: I was always one girl who took her ship to
Speaker 1: the closed bathroom and I was like, oh my god,
Speaker 1: she never did that. I never did that because also
Speaker 1: a bathroom floor is gross. Someone want my stuff for
Speaker 1: people like accidentally drop. Yeah, you gotta put everything on
Speaker 1: the bolt toilet bowl if there's not, and they're not
Speaker 1: like yeah, on the ground. I walked around barefoot. I
Speaker 1: took all the I changed for a photo shoot this
Speaker 1: last time, and I took my shirt off in front
Speaker 1: of you, Andy, and I didn't even know actually have
Speaker 1: no recollection of it. That's how much like no one
Speaker 1: always told me, she goes krint, no one's paying attention
Speaker 1: to you, and I was like, you know what, but
Speaker 1: sometimes they were, but no, because they needed to pay
Speaker 1: most someone else. No one is paying attention to you. Yeah, Well,
Speaker 1: the reason why it made me do that. Well, though,
Speaker 1: is because people did pay attention to my tits and
Speaker 1: I was like, I don't want like they boys would
Speaker 1: say things all though, Yeah, but no boys are in
Speaker 1: the locker room, and girls would say things. Two girls
Speaker 1: would hate me. They would say, I stick out my
Speaker 1: boobs to get boys. But in reality, just have big boobs.
Speaker 1: That sucks when you have big wish. I knew that
Speaker 1: then it does. Hey, Karen co heay, fine whatever, I'm
Speaker 1: sorry for your privilege. Oh I thought this was an
Speaker 1: intersectional space. But if you're gonna complain that you had
Speaker 1: developed breasts, I know. I'm only kids obviously, I know
Speaker 1: you could have too much. And that is that that
Speaker 1: is weird. And it was probably the gym teacher. Gym
Speaker 1: was such a source of problems in school and they
Speaker 1: didn't even be there. M. You shouldn't make kids have
Speaker 1: to do a swim class, supid. Well we didn't have
Speaker 1: to do that. But what was up with a New
Speaker 1: Jersey having this square dancing unit? Even though we kept moving,
Speaker 1: that square dancing unit kept following us around. Why are
Speaker 1: we square dancing a New Jersey? Who needs this? Where
Speaker 1: did this come from? I want to answer? You got
Speaker 1: to keep the kids from treating scared square. I didn't.
Speaker 1: It was part of the dance. Did you have a
Speaker 1: dance portion of your gym class? We did. It was
Speaker 1: just it was not just square dancing. It was multiple
Speaker 1: types of dance, but square was incorporated. And well, the
Speaker 1: thing is you had to touch boys. So it was
Speaker 1: just another egg. There was being picked last and gym
Speaker 1: there was now we're square dancing and boyser's supposed to
Speaker 1: pick partners. I mean, what a nice way to have
Speaker 1: the little short, little mousie girls hate themselves even more.
Speaker 1: I was thinking about this so and I was like,
Speaker 1: because I totally agree with you, I hate Jim And
Speaker 1: it made me feel and it made me feel awkward
Speaker 1: and uncomfortable. But then I was like, you know what
Speaker 1: everyone I think in school at one point or another,
Speaker 1: and this is like kind of the great thing about
Speaker 1: public school, Like you do need to feel bad or awkward,
Speaker 1: because like for smart people, those kids who did well
Speaker 1: in Jim, a lot of times we're feeling awkward when
Speaker 1: we knew all the answers in class. Don't you think
Speaker 1: that's true? That's true. Second ship builds character to go
Speaker 1: through school, and that's part of what it is and
Speaker 1: and I mean you are there to be socialized, but
Speaker 1: it's discomp putting any way to be a teenager. Like
Speaker 1: it's uncomfortable, like rates, everyone's completely different, and you feel
Speaker 1: like certain people are supposed to be the ones you're like,
Speaker 1: but everyone's really What was your first um, if you
Speaker 1: don't mind me asking sexual experience? Well, I haven't had
Speaker 1: one yet and I'm thinking I want to have one
Speaker 1: before I'm fifty. You could do it. Yeah, I'm thinking
Speaker 1: maybe the person to go see her or watch the
Speaker 1: Carry Pillby movie. Maybe it would be with that person.
Speaker 1: I don't know if that's stilia of y'all yeah, or
Speaker 1: is it? Is it going to drive people away? I
Speaker 1: don't know. Maybe that should be second prize, trying not
Speaker 1: to be them? Yes, the persson to watch the Carry
Speaker 1: Pillby movie. That's cr I P I L B Y.
Speaker 1: You could google it, um and there's a book um
Speaker 1: some day at TV show maybe so um. Yes, if
Speaker 1: you're the nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety nine person
Speaker 1: or the square root of that because because we're nerds,
Speaker 1: um you, I'll give you just ten thousand dollars out
Speaker 1: of my own pocket. And and the person promises you
Speaker 1: can't keep me senses some sarcasm though with the sexual
Speaker 1: experience thing. Oh well wait wait or is there time
Speaker 1: up already? No? Do you not do? Not like talking
Speaker 1: about that? I thought those guys who we hugged. No,
Speaker 1: it's something I want to tell my about it. That's
Speaker 1: what I told my mom. I was, yeah, that's what
Speaker 1: I told my mom to Um. I bumped into an
Speaker 1: X on the way here, though I would have from
Speaker 1: long ago. Did you really? Yeah? I haven't seen this
Speaker 1: person in ten years, so I kind of feel like
Speaker 1: you have weird around you. Well not in this case.
Speaker 1: How do you mean him? How did I? I had
Speaker 1: a writing group before the internet, and now it wasn't
Speaker 1: that guy. I don't know what happened to him. Um No,
Speaker 1: In like in my early twenties, I had a writing
Speaker 1: group and he came to the writing group, and so
Speaker 1: we became friends. Have you ever had that experience where
Speaker 1: somebody you're like them a lot, and you think maybe
Speaker 1: something had happened, but it doesn't happen in the in
Speaker 1: the right timeline, and they get fed up. I mean
Speaker 1: that happens all meaning that, and then suddenly there's pressure
Speaker 1: and whatever he was someone I really got along with
Speaker 1: in my early twenties. But um, you want to move
Speaker 1: things physically faster than you? Yeah, I think so and
Speaker 1: and so I used their friends the friends line, which
Speaker 1: is now, I guess I'm supposed to be some kind
Speaker 1: of curse. But and you're right, there isn't And I
Speaker 1: mean there isn't. Don't. I could see being frustrated as
Speaker 1: a boy, because what if it takes ten years, I
Speaker 1: don't know, I mean it years. I mean, it's it's
Speaker 1: it's what is that It's frustrating when a guy is
Speaker 1: impatient with the place that you want to in which
Speaker 1: you would like things to go, specifically with the physical stuff,
Speaker 1: because I feel like that's mostly what those uh disagreements
Speaker 1: are over right, I mean so, I think he's maybe
Speaker 1: a little angry at me because I hadn't seen him
Speaker 1: in ten years. And I bumped into him on the
Speaker 1: train across the river and he said, um, and I
Speaker 1: told him I was going to do an interview about
Speaker 1: this my novel that after many years, is being turned
Speaker 1: into a movie. And he said, yeah, I've been following
Speaker 1: you on Twitter and he said, I think the reason
Speaker 1: he's the reason. I think he's angry at me, and
Speaker 1: he said, I've followed you on Twitter, and I consider
Speaker 1: it opposition research. So I'm kind of thinking there's something
Speaker 1: by the way up here, if you're if you're listening,
Speaker 1: I'm just kidding, buddy, I'm just kidding. But was he
Speaker 1: a boyfriend of yours? Well? Yeah, I mean and almost.
Speaker 1: I mean we did a lot of things together and
Speaker 1: it just never progressed sexually. Not a lot of sexual things, okay,
Speaker 1: like writing, like hand jobs. I don't know if there's
Speaker 1: somewhere between writing and it is somewhere in the middle
Speaker 1: of Yes. Do you know we live in the overly
Speaker 1: hyper sexualized society? Yeah, I do, And that's one of
Speaker 1: my characters big things, and I don't. She thinks everyone's
Speaker 1: sex obsessed, and of course when you're not there yet,
Speaker 1: it can seem like that. I don't think we're sex obsessed.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's you know, we're not food obsessed or whatever.
Speaker 1: But yeah, I think we are. And I think a
Speaker 1: lot of it people disagree with me, and a lot
Speaker 1: of it started I think, um, I think actually it
Speaker 1: started with with the Clinton scandal. When you could you
Speaker 1: could talk about quote unquote or love or whatever you
Speaker 1: whther b J. Yes, when um, when it was the news,
Speaker 1: so you could be like, oh, I could talk about it,
Speaker 1: it's on the news. And then suddenly the next thing,
Speaker 1: we had eighth graders who are who are like, I'm
Speaker 1: not having I'm not having sex. We're just sucking on
Speaker 1: each other or with And I was a camp counselor
Speaker 1: at the time, and this girl who was fourteen, I
Speaker 1: mean in the late nineties, and it was completely different
Speaker 1: than my uh growing up because this girl is fourteen
Speaker 1: on in summer camp when I was a counselor, and
Speaker 1: she said to me, my boyfriend says that in her
Speaker 1: sleepway all the girls are giving employed blowed jobs. And
Speaker 1: I said, oh, don't worry, that's not happening he and
Speaker 1: she said why because it's not happening to you. I
Speaker 1: was like, oh, yes, that's true, but why would you
Speaker 1: have to talk about really your fourteen It always was Courtney.
Speaker 1: Actually that name. I don't want to get a suit. Oh,
Speaker 1: I mean her name wasn't Courtney whatsoever. I know great
Speaker 1: people named Courtney, so it's a cute name. There was
Speaker 1: a girl across the street from me, um, and she
Speaker 1: was one of those people whose parents were from New York.
Speaker 1: So we'd hear every night we'd hear Katney, and every
Speaker 1: time I hear Quatney or something, I kind of get
Speaker 1: nostalgic for my youth Baughtney, Um, do you not want
Speaker 1: to talk about your first sexual experience? Because okay, do
Speaker 1: you what about dating? Like when you was there a
Speaker 1: point where after college where you were like dating? Are you?
Speaker 1: We Usually it's part of me, like, I don't want
Speaker 1: to focus on just asking about sex stuff because you've
Speaker 1: done so much more. But a sex themed podcast. I
Speaker 1: realized that I don't. I'm very curious, don't want to
Speaker 1: bring down or up the tone or whatever I think
Speaker 1: most important. And there's so many types of women in
Speaker 1: the world. It's about choices. If you if if you
Speaker 1: want to have sex with five people tonight, you should.
Speaker 1: If you don't want to talk about it, you're absolutely
Speaker 1: It's all about choice, and I get frustrated right here lately.
Speaker 1: I hear like, you're not a feminist if you so
Speaker 1: and so, if you stay at home or whatever, if
Speaker 1: you go into this profession, if you're secretary and not
Speaker 1: a secretary of state. It's about being able to make
Speaker 1: whatever choice you're coming you're not a feminist if you
Speaker 1: tell other people to do Yeah. Yeah, it's comforting for
Speaker 1: people who listen to this podcast. And I can't believe
Speaker 1: that how comfortable some people are when they come on
Speaker 1: and talk about sex. I think it's comforting to other
Speaker 1: people to hear someone who doesn't really want to talk sex.
Speaker 1: It's like a different thing. How is your sexuality influenced
Speaker 1: your writing though? Can you talk about that a little
Speaker 1: bit sure? Or your how you or how your characters
Speaker 1: think about sex, because I mean, it seems like they're
Speaker 1: based on you. Well this is we'll just ask your characters,
Speaker 1: not at all. And I don't understand why people say
Speaker 1: carries like Karen not the same name everyone I did.
Speaker 1: I wasn't actually thinking about that, but nobody believes me,
Speaker 1: so whatever, right, I never I've never had a nickname.
Speaker 1: I've never I never thought they were the same name.
Speaker 1: But I can um oh. I think that's actually a
Speaker 1: lot about the book is about. It's about expectations of people,
Speaker 1: specifically women at different ages, and if you don't feel
Speaker 1: like you can form to that, maybe you get pushed
Speaker 1: a little bit more into a corner. And the only
Speaker 1: thing you can really do is kind of act out
Speaker 1: and put up walls. And it's about a character who's
Speaker 1: been doing that so long. She's now she's graduated from college,
Speaker 1: and she doesn't have the structure of oh, well, at
Speaker 1: least I know the next thing I'm supposed to do.
Speaker 1: I'm supposed to study and graduate. Once you graduate, there's
Speaker 1: not all this structure. So this character feels like, well,
Speaker 1: I'm in society. I see people are getting drunk every night.
Speaker 1: Everyone else has a boyfriend, but me, there are people
Speaker 1: making out in the window. If I don't have all that,
Speaker 1: should I feel bad about myself? Um? Or if I'm
Speaker 1: not ready for that? If I feel like, um, I
Speaker 1: want to take some time and just kind of figure
Speaker 1: out who I am or whatever? So um, I think
Speaker 1: that's some kind I don't remember what the question was.
Speaker 1: I think so, but I think, do you ever have
Speaker 1: any experience where like I feel like, if you're not
Speaker 1: like a hyper sexual woman, A lot of times, oh
Speaker 1: are you a lesbian? I don't really think people think
Speaker 1: that anymore. For me, they certainly did. I mean, I
Speaker 1: wasn't or even a strong woman. I wear one damn blazer.
Speaker 1: People think I'm a lesbian all the time. Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: if you're a strong woman, people sometimes think that. I mean,
Speaker 1: I think if you're strong exactly and I and this
Speaker 1: character is a is a very smart person who runs
Speaker 1: off at the mouth a lot because she doesn't know
Speaker 1: where her filters are. Yet I want people to think
Speaker 1: it's a boring movie where this girl sits at her
Speaker 1: house and judges. She actually ends up kissing three different
Speaker 1: guys and there is she and she was seduced by
Speaker 1: her college professor played by Colin O'Donohue, who has a
Speaker 1: lot of fans and they very nice fan Have you
Speaker 1: reduced by college? That's like my fantasy, thought to the
Speaker 1: max t A once a little and it was the
Speaker 1: best night never what a t A? So I counted
Speaker 1: that as a college professor. That's closed of the you've
Speaker 1: had relations with a bus. Oh it's our time up again. No,
Speaker 1: I did not, but yeah, that is something that you're
Speaker 1: sitting at class and what else you're gonna think? Fantasy? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I was in love with my seventh grade teacher and
Speaker 1: just recently found my diary from middle school, and I
Speaker 1: if I would have if I were him, and I
Speaker 1: read that I'd be like this girl's gonna kill me
Speaker 1: in my sleep and like, take off, my diaries are
Speaker 1: pretty wearing. Yeah, so this so this girl. She she
Speaker 1: actually was seduced by her college professor in the movie.
Speaker 1: She has flashbacks to it, and that's kind of also
Speaker 1: what makes her a little suspicious of men. But there's
Speaker 1: a lot of sex in the movie. Actually. Yeah, she
Speaker 1: kisses Colin O'Donoghue. Jason Ritter, he is my husband. He
Speaker 1: doesn't know it. I did in love with Jason Ritter.
Speaker 1: He's such a nice guy and he's so to Everyone
Speaker 1: in the movie is really talented, so is. I met
Speaker 1: at them and they were all so nice and they
Speaker 1: put up with my silly questions and conversation and whatever.
Speaker 1: Sos is the most amazing. He's sweet, he's funny. He'sa
Speaker 1: did they Hollywood up your book? Though? I feel like
Speaker 1: to be a writer and to kind of let something
Speaker 1: that you created grow into the hands. But I know
Speaker 1: it's like a female director, correct it is. It's uh,
Speaker 1: it's some really passionate people. Susan Johnson is the director
Speaker 1: of the movie, and it's her first feature film. She
Speaker 1: had directed Shorter Things and had been producing, so she
Speaker 1: was looking for something to direct, so it is female directed.
Speaker 1: Susanne Farwell is the is the is one of the
Speaker 1: main producers who who found the book and uh first
Speaker 1: contacted me and she's she uh she did The Intern
Speaker 1: and uh many other great movies. So um so they
Speaker 1: were because it's a I think more, not because it's
Speaker 1: female or I'll be driven, but because it's an indie film. Uh.
Speaker 1: They were kind enough. They liked the book. That's what
Speaker 1: got them started on this. They always wanted to make
Speaker 1: a movie together and they finally got to do it.
Speaker 1: A lot of people talk about writing a book or
Speaker 1: making a movie and can never get there, and they
Speaker 1: always wanted to do something together. They had met working
Speaker 1: um working together in Hollywood, so um so, they really
Speaker 1: liked the movie. And I was really lucky for two
Speaker 1: people that liked it and got it and wanted to
Speaker 1: keep the themes. But of course it is Hollywood, and
Speaker 1: this girl has a lot of opinions that are in
Speaker 1: the book. Granted it's a four hundred page book and
Speaker 1: it's not gonna be a four hundred minute movie. Um So,
Speaker 1: not everything is going to go in anyway, but they
Speaker 1: had to find a way, so they didn't They didn't
Speaker 1: do anything completely wacky. They didn't throw in a car
Speaker 1: chase or whatever. But I think there is a lot
Speaker 1: of plot in the book. It's just that it's there
Speaker 1: a lot of pages to where she's thinking. So they
Speaker 1: didn't want to lose the quirkiness of the character who
Speaker 1: kind of says whatever's in her head, and she's kind
Speaker 1: of angry, and gradually she has to loosen up and
Speaker 1: become less judgmental. So they got all that and uh,
Speaker 1: so I I was confident with the material in their hands. UM,
Speaker 1: and they were Uh. Carol Holden, who was who did
Speaker 1: the adaptation, UM really liked the book also, and she
Speaker 1: I got to see the script. It was funny, it
Speaker 1: was great it Um. It took some of the things
Speaker 1: I was subtle about in the book and and gave
Speaker 1: them more of a more of a completion of the plot,
Speaker 1: or at least you get to see more of the resolution,
Speaker 1: which is great because I left a lot of things hanging.
Speaker 1: Because in my in my college, all the professor English
Speaker 1: professors said to be subtle, but sometimes you want to
Speaker 1: see what what what happened? What happened now that she
Speaker 1: was seduced by this professor, what is the what It's
Speaker 1: the what happens to the professor when she goes back
Speaker 1: to see him later in life. You get to find
Speaker 1: that out of the movie. So um, so I so
Speaker 1: for so not only did I trust them and I
Speaker 1: saw their passion and how badly they wanted to do this,
Speaker 1: and so many people can't get creative projects done, and
Speaker 1: they just did whatever they could. They were always thinking
Speaker 1: about it. Uh. But also, um the book came out
Speaker 1: in two thousand three, and I was contacted by them
Speaker 1: in two thousand twelve. The book had been optioned by
Speaker 1: two big studios that had the rights for a while,
Speaker 1: and then, for whatever reasons, sometimes you just don't You
Speaker 1: can't finish it, you can't get the right There are
Speaker 1: a lot of projects out there. Um, but so it
Speaker 1: took a long time. So by that time I was
Speaker 1: involved enough in the arts to to be able to
Speaker 1: let it go and have distance. There's so many other
Speaker 1: projects I'm working on, journalistic and uh, this silly New
Speaker 1: Jersey memoir and another novel that I'm really in love with.
Speaker 1: So you know, when it's a while, you're a little
Speaker 1: bit more distant from the material, you can handle saying okay,
Speaker 1: take it to the next step. Um, and it was
Speaker 1: pretty amazing to see them bring it to life and
Speaker 1: see what stayed out and what stayed in. But I
Speaker 1: think it's too true to the themes. But I think
Speaker 1: actually the movie is better than the book. It maybe be.
Speaker 1: I may think that because I've read the book a
Speaker 1: hundred million times and it doesn't surprise me. The jokes
Speaker 1: A lad. The film is great. Yeah, they were, and
Speaker 1: it's it's yeah. I love him. I was so and
Speaker 1: he was so nice when I met him. He's I
Speaker 1: don't know if everyone read the book, And that's fine
Speaker 1: because if you're an actor, I think you have to
Speaker 1: make a choice about do I want to be influenced
Speaker 1: by the book or just read the screenplay. But he
Speaker 1: read the book. He had a dog eared he um,
Speaker 1: he told me. So. I met him only really briefly,
Speaker 1: which is great because I would have said something sillier. Yes,
Speaker 1: I probably he would have so, um. I. But I've
Speaker 1: loved him and everything he's done. He's very funny. Luckily,
Speaker 1: we had a cast that's not only talented but act
Speaker 1: and in acting, but they're also they all have a
Speaker 1: sense of humor. So I met him very, very briefly.
Speaker 1: He's he plays the main character is played by Bell Pally,
Speaker 1: who's amazingly talented, but he plays her her therapist. UM
Speaker 1: So I met him very briefly in a in a
Speaker 1: little tiny New York brownstone that was his therapy office
Speaker 1: in the movie. Um And he said, in his dramatic voice, well,
Speaker 1: it's a beautiful book, and I think it's going to
Speaker 1: be a beautiful movie. And I said, I know it is,
Speaker 1: thank you, so it's going to be a good movie.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much. And then I was whisked away,
Speaker 1: and I was glad because I didn't see something stupid.
Speaker 1: But it was so nice that he that he really
Speaker 1: liked the book and that he was that he was
Speaker 1: willing to do it because it's not I mean, it's
Speaker 1: an indie film. It's it's not a lot of money.
Speaker 1: Best though, they really are. Everyone's there because they have
Speaker 1: heart and they really liked the material and they're all me.
Speaker 1: I finally have gotten to meet everyone in the cast
Speaker 1: because we had a red carpet event last week. What's
Speaker 1: that like. I've never I've always especial really for a writer,
Speaker 1: especially as a writer, and me, I mean, it's it's
Speaker 1: it's exciting. I I hope it happens again in my life,
Speaker 1: that something like this is made from my material, and
Speaker 1: I certainly think it should happen. But you know it, yes,
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, if anyone's listening, here's my phone number.
Speaker 1: I have lots of stories to tell, but so do
Speaker 1: a lot of people in New York and around the world,
Speaker 1: especially right probably on this block, some of five people
Speaker 1: are probably writing their screenplays and googling themselves afterward and
Speaker 1: then masturbating. Do it yeah, which is that's I was
Speaker 1: getting um so I thought before, even before masturbation came up,
Speaker 1: I had a point. Now, oh, well, what carpets like?
Speaker 1: What do you like carpets? Did you like? Did you
Speaker 1: dress up? Or I did? I mean, I you know,
Speaker 1: you seem really excited, but I feel like you don't
Speaker 1: like dressing up because you're like, I just feel like
Speaker 1: there's a lot of superficial things that come along with
Speaker 1: being a woman, and then men have those things. You're like,
Speaker 1: this is much institutional things, so many institutional things that
Speaker 1: make it harder, and you don't want to complain about
Speaker 1: it because then you're just being a winey bitch. But
Speaker 1: one of them is though you're just explaining how you
Speaker 1: feel towards exactly. But I mean sometimes you have to
Speaker 1: point out when you're in a different situation than someone else,
Speaker 1: whether it's your your some kind of minority or racial
Speaker 1: minority or whatever. There are things other people just don't
Speaker 1: understand because of their privilege that if you point them out,
Speaker 1: you feel foolish. But otherwise we're gonna understand it. I mean,
Speaker 1: I've never I've lived a life in Central Jersey where
Speaker 1: I haven't walked into a room and felt that everyone
Speaker 1: was going to make judgments about me because of my
Speaker 1: skin color usually and that you know, and I don't
Speaker 1: go around thinking about that all day. But I've got
Speaker 1: a lot of privilege because of that, And a man
Speaker 1: has some things aren't that they don't have certain privileges,
Speaker 1: but they do have the privilege of that when they're
Speaker 1: supposed to be strong, when they go to work, when
Speaker 1: they just upper an event, their clothes are covering themselves.
Speaker 1: Our clothes are supposed it well, yeah exactly, so I
Speaker 1: mean they go from jeans to right. I mean they're not,
Speaker 1: but our our clothes are show as much of yourself
Speaker 1: as possible in our bodies are also different than a
Speaker 1: man that you could I got to dress is actually
Speaker 1: our movie was. We were lucky enough. It was selected
Speaker 1: to be in the Toronto Film Festival last summer, which yeah,
Speaker 1: a lot of prestigious films, uh debuted. So I went
Speaker 1: there and there was an event and I got two
Speaker 1: different dresses for it, and I ended up not having
Speaker 1: to dress up as much because it was a small thing. Um,
Speaker 1: so I wear a skirt in the blouse. But um
Speaker 1: but I had these dresses, so I thought, you know,
Speaker 1: maybe I'll wear them to the red carpet. So it's
Speaker 1: six months later and they don't. They don't look good
Speaker 1: on me anyway. It's it's like everyone's body is so different.
Speaker 1: So it's well, and when you're a woman, I think
Speaker 1: in an event like that, you're a spectacle. You're walking
Speaker 1: spectacle when you're a woman on the red carpet. But
Speaker 1: I also felt like I realized one thing I learned
Speaker 1: in Toronto is luckily nobody's it's not eighth grade. Nobody
Speaker 1: cares right well, especially like when it's an independent film festival,
Speaker 1: like people are amped on the work and they're looking
Speaker 1: at Bell Pally, who's the lead, who's this is this talented,
Speaker 1: gorgeous actress, and they're looking at William Moseley, and how
Speaker 1: can I not look at some of these guys. I mean,
Speaker 1: I feel a little creepy because he's like twenty something.
Speaker 1: So I'm not sad. I'm just saying, you know, he's
Speaker 1: not it's it's he's not hard to look at. Only
Speaker 1: it's not fifteen, so you don't have to be that's
Speaker 1: a you can legally sexualize him. Well I prefer not
Speaker 1: to because I might maybe I'll meet him some day again.
Speaker 1: But anyway, but I mean, I just say, it's a
Speaker 1: good looking cast. So people are looking at them. They
Speaker 1: weren't looking. Let's let's let's see what Karen's wearing and
Speaker 1: cut her down like an eighth grader and make her
Speaker 1: feel like she's never progressed in life. So um so
Speaker 1: what else. It's a little different. I think there is
Speaker 1: a little bit more respect when you are like the
Speaker 1: writer or the director as opposed to be address. Yeah,
Speaker 1: thank god I didn't trip, so so you know, I
Speaker 1: wore the standard uniform. I had a black it wasn't gowns.
Speaker 1: It was a small event. Uh. It was an indie
Speaker 1: film and most people did just wear you know, something
Speaker 1: a little nicer, but people were wearing prom gowns or whatever.
Speaker 1: So and how old were I know that the book
Speaker 1: came out in two thousand and three, but like when
Speaker 1: how old were you when you started that your first novel?
Speaker 1: Actually I was see this is now I'm already having
Speaker 1: these like well, what should should I say something that
Speaker 1: makes me sound obnoxious? And I still have I still
Speaker 1: have these things from momentary school. Am I going to
Speaker 1: sound like a nerder, obnoxious or a snob? I was
Speaker 1: always writing books. Well it's not. I mean they weren't
Speaker 1: great books, but I always liked to write from the
Speaker 1: time I was little when it started reading. So but
Speaker 1: the first real novel was after I read a Judy
Speaker 1: Boom book when I was about twelve. I really, um,
Speaker 1: I said, I really want to write one like this.
Speaker 1: So I wrote. I basically ripped off. It was tells
Speaker 1: it was super fudge, and I bear and I wrote
Speaker 1: something that was called how would you like it If
Speaker 1: You had a little brother, which is really super fudge?
Speaker 1: But I like, yeah, it's a little complicated. I wrote
Speaker 1: it hand wrote it, I mean back in the day.
Speaker 1: And I actually think eventually I might have said I
Speaker 1: didn't send that one. But I started handwriting novels and
Speaker 1: sending them to publishing companies with a wow. And I
Speaker 1: used to write, I remember I wrote, even if this
Speaker 1: book stinks, people will be interested that a twelve year
Speaker 1: old wrote a book. So I had a publicity thing
Speaker 1: all in there, that you were branding yourself. And I
Speaker 1: used to call on the on the lag because we
Speaker 1: only had landlines, and I would say, Mom, can you
Speaker 1: go into the room. That I would quality be like,
Speaker 1: I'm calling to enquire about a manuscript. Oh my god,
Speaker 1: that's bad ass awful, that's amazing, And then and I
Speaker 1: think they're like, oh, we're in the process or whatever.
Speaker 1: But I guess it's interesting because before the Internet, probably
Speaker 1: a fewer people were writers and there was less competition
Speaker 1: because nobody wanted to sit and copy their book and
Speaker 1: send it out. And now now I think probably you
Speaker 1: don't have that that that filter of having to Anyone
Speaker 1: can just get on their computer and right something. So yeah, well, yeah,
Speaker 1: with technology, everyone a writer. Everyone's I'm saying they're not.
Speaker 1: I'm just saying the competition is probably more because sometimes
Speaker 1: I mean, the thing I've learned and I think a
Speaker 1: good takeaway from waiting from your when your book, when
Speaker 1: you write your book around your two thousand and having
Speaker 1: it made into a movie went in two thousands seventeen,
Speaker 1: And everyone feels like this, I think at one point
Speaker 1: when they're in the arts or when they're doing anything
Speaker 1: on their own, starting business or whatever. Um, you hear
Speaker 1: overnight success stories. But nine percent of the time, it's
Speaker 1: always kind of steadily struggling and moving forward. And I'm
Speaker 1: happy that. Um. Then I'm getting it that things like
Speaker 1: this are happening, But it's not. It's most success in
Speaker 1: the arts or anything else. Isn't you wake up one
Speaker 1: morning and everyone wants you And and even now there
Speaker 1: I think there are people who are surprised because actually
Speaker 1: I have a full time job in journalism and I'm
Speaker 1: doing I'm writing a screenplay and I'm doing so many
Speaker 1: different things, and they all think, oh, well, when's it
Speaker 1: coming out or whatever. But you know, just because I
Speaker 1: had a book that a lot of people like and
Speaker 1: made it into a movie and I got lucky for
Speaker 1: that or it found its audience, it doesn't mean that
Speaker 1: every working since you were twelve. Well, I guess on
Speaker 1: this craft and um, but still a lot of times
Speaker 1: what I write sucks, and I revised it a lot,
Speaker 1: and eventually some of the stuff I think, hopefully is
Speaker 1: good and people like it. I think I have some
Speaker 1: good stuff I'm working on now, but I've been but
Speaker 1: there's no magic wand that touched me and all of
Speaker 1: a sudden everything people are interested in everything that comes
Speaker 1: out because it takes work, it takes revision. Even the
Speaker 1: carry Pilby did take a lot of revisions. And what's
Speaker 1: the difference between being, uh, between journalism and just writing
Speaker 1: a novel or being an author. Well, there is a
Speaker 1: lot of difference except um uh um certain politicians. I
Speaker 1: think journalism is fiction. It's not, but um, and we
Speaker 1: need journalists. Um. Samantha b did a great piece about
Speaker 1: a local journalist. Um actually subscribed to the local newspaper.
Speaker 1: What the state was, It might have been New Jersey
Speaker 1: or something, but basically he was the only journalist like
Speaker 1: in the and that's happening. He reported on so much
Speaker 1: corruption in the town that that town wouldn't have any
Speaker 1: clue about the water. It's like their water. There was
Speaker 1: all this corruption surrounding the chemicals in the town's water.
Speaker 1: And then he uncovered it. And it's like journalism is well,
Speaker 1: that sounds actually very familiar to the work that you've done. Yes,
Speaker 1: I I The newspaper I work at is in Hudson County,
Speaker 1: New Jersey, and it's Hoboken, Joursey City, places like that.
Speaker 1: And I've been there practically since college. And it's a
Speaker 1: very good job because I get to be creative sometimes.
Speaker 1: But I also I wasn't able. I was very I
Speaker 1: mean I was involved in a lot politically in college,
Speaker 1: just the usual you know, debates and whatever. And um,
Speaker 1: I could never be at a job where I wasn't
Speaker 1: having some effect. And I think, um, I couldn't have
Speaker 1: lived my life only writing fiction life. I feel like
Speaker 1: we do a lot of the stories we do in journalism,
Speaker 1: they have a small impact. Maybe we're highlighting the student
Speaker 1: of the month and it's a kid who feels good
Speaker 1: and provides inspiration to the peers. Or maybe we uncover
Speaker 1: corruption or whatever. Um, and you've uncovered corruption. Our newspaper
Speaker 1: has had some different some and and that takes a
Speaker 1: lot of work. I mean that takes If you've seen
Speaker 1: the movie Spotlight for about the Boston Globe, it could
Speaker 1: take a year and five people working on one story.
Speaker 1: And I think people right after the election, they were
Speaker 1: they were blaming journalists for everything. Why aren't you writing
Speaker 1: headlines saying this person is a Nazi or whatever? Um. Meanwhile,
Speaker 1: the politicians were even the ones that the Democrats were
Speaker 1: all getting their inauguration app outfits and everyone wanted the
Speaker 1: twenty tho dollar a year journalists to save them and
Speaker 1: we're blaming them. Well, um. My point is kind of
Speaker 1: that people get into journalism for the right reasons. Not
Speaker 1: everyone is perfect in it, but journalism can save your
Speaker 1: if it can find the it can find the hazard
Speaker 1: in your water. And there I think there are times, um,
Speaker 1: when journalists get too cocky too early. I also a
Speaker 1: big problem I have, and this is my kind of
Speaker 1: crusade in journalism, is that articles should always be used
Speaker 1: or friendly, and sometimes journalists get into their bubble, not
Speaker 1: even a liberal or conservative bubble, a bubble of knowledge
Speaker 1: where they know so much about a topic they forget
Speaker 1: that they're writing for people that don't um. And I
Speaker 1: think this is why a lot of the news, why
Speaker 1: people ended up following memes and things they could already understand.
Speaker 1: Its suggestible for them. Yes, it is and it's fast
Speaker 1: and people. It's not people who don't have time to
Speaker 1: read a newspaper every day. It's not because they're not smart.
Speaker 1: It's because they're got a lot. It's sometimes they've got
Speaker 1: a million things they're dealing with. So don't write an
Speaker 1: article that hits someone with a sledge hammer. Um. I
Speaker 1: think one thing that last month New York Times ran
Speaker 1: an article saying that thirties thirty about third if people
Speaker 1: don't know that the Affordable Health Act is the same
Speaker 1: thing as a quoquial colloquially called Obamacare. Now, this is
Speaker 1: something that's going to affect a lot of lives. Why
Speaker 1: don't they know it? Well, sometimes they're just busy and
Speaker 1: they haven't read enough. But sometimes I went and so
Speaker 1: I started reading through articles in major publications. Um, an
Speaker 1: awful lot of them would say the Affordable Healthcare Act
Speaker 1: and not in the leads say cuoqui coloquially. It's hard
Speaker 1: wre to say, yeah, it was either referred to as
Speaker 1: Obamacare or affordable care. And I get, I do get,
Speaker 1: how as judging as I am about you didn't know that?
Speaker 1: But why didn't you know? You know, when you take
Speaker 1: something literally and if they're talking about Obamacare, or they
Speaker 1: only refer to it as one of the two names, right,
Speaker 1: And I think that's because journalists, I mean, they know
Speaker 1: so much they forget how to how to write for
Speaker 1: the average person. And that's what Now. I'm an editor,
Speaker 1: so that's that's what I do. I say to a reporter,
Speaker 1: hands me this, um, uh, why did you use this
Speaker 1: government term? Instead of talking like like a normal person,
Speaker 1: I keep yelling at the journalists of my paper, tell
Speaker 1: it to me, like it's your friend. They come, they'll
Speaker 1: come out of a uh like, we cover a lot
Speaker 1: of meetings. Obviously we're chained local papers. So they come
Speaker 1: out of meeting and they say, you know what, the meeting, Um,
Speaker 1: it was so crowded that people were sitting on each
Speaker 1: other's laps. And then they rate this meeting story about
Speaker 1: how at the meeting and the council stood up and
Speaker 1: said allegiance, pledge allegiance to the flag, and they were
Speaker 1: visited by all the council people and then tendor pariographs down.
Speaker 1: I say, if you're trying to get our attention with
Speaker 1: something weird or quirky in the meeting, or if it
Speaker 1: affects people's lives. If they passed, their taxes are going up.
Speaker 1: Don't say that in the end of this story, and
Speaker 1: don't make journalism complicated. So I think, I don't know
Speaker 1: if it's that they're there are clearly less fewer resources.
Speaker 1: There are fewer journalists around than maybe there isn't enough
Speaker 1: journalistic training around. I think people mistake, uh journalize some
Speaker 1: of the when journalism fails. I think it's just it's
Speaker 1: not because people are failing. I think it's because there
Speaker 1: maybe sometimes they're um just not thinking about I guess
Speaker 1: basic standard journalistic things. What what dictates m stories getting
Speaker 1: coverage and not coverage? Because I've been reading about the
Speaker 1: young women uh of color that have been kidnapped in Washington,
Speaker 1: d C. And no one's talking about it, And so
Speaker 1: now I'm here, I'm seeing all I'm seeing all these
Speaker 1: headlines about why ISN'TE talking about this? Why is no
Speaker 1: one talking about this? So then I read into it
Speaker 1: and I'm like, holy fuck, Well, all these young girls
Speaker 1: getting kidnapped. Yeah, but there was also some of that
Speaker 1: was not true because some of those girls included in
Speaker 1: that number had been missing for over a year and
Speaker 1: some of them came back. Well, that's what. And that's
Speaker 1: why I fucking it's so irritating with because I know
Speaker 1: that the so much media is not our news is
Speaker 1: not fake, but then we still have we're sharing things, right,
Speaker 1: and and so I'm like, okay, let me read and
Speaker 1: I still haven't read everything that there is to read
Speaker 1: up on it, but like I'm retweeting ship of the
Speaker 1: posters of the girls because I haven't heard rule. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: because I have a new rule. Where before I was
Speaker 1: about to literally post it on my Instagram and then
Speaker 1: I go, let me read into this, and just you're
Speaker 1: doing that right? People have to text outs and I was,
Speaker 1: and I was just then then you see people that
Speaker 1: you love and respect just posting it and you're like,
Speaker 1: that drives me crazy. And there are terrible things happening,
Speaker 1: and I ever want to say that there aren't. That
Speaker 1: it wasn't. That's the danger of fake news. What the
Speaker 1: angle is completely misleading? How do we find out? What's
Speaker 1: how does a person today? And we always encourage people
Speaker 1: to read, read, read, educate yourself, But okay, so say
Speaker 1: I see that in my Twitter feed, Oh my god,
Speaker 1: can you please retweet this? This is crazy? Well, look,
Speaker 1: how do I coming from. Look where it's coming from,
Speaker 1: and don't say, well, I didn't like some of the
Speaker 1: articles from this publication, or it's biased or whatever. Look
Speaker 1: at if it is it a publication that is well
Speaker 1: like New York Times. Also, my standard is is, and
Speaker 1: I actually wrote an essay about this that I'm gonna
Speaker 1: start trying to send out, is that a real news organization,
Speaker 1: even if it's on the web, will correct itself right
Speaker 1: away if it screws up and and there, and they'll
Speaker 1: leave the correction like they'll say at the end of
Speaker 1: someone might not see it. And in print, knowing because
Speaker 1: I work in print full time, we have a much
Speaker 1: higher threshold of what we have to be careful about.
Speaker 1: We can't go and delete our print the newspapers out there.
Speaker 1: So there are a lot of there are There are
Speaker 1: a lot of standards we have to follow. We can't
Speaker 1: take risks. We can't if somebody has only a website,
Speaker 1: they can say so and was blinking somebody and then
Speaker 1: and then go and change it to uh, breaking bread
Speaker 1: with somebody. You can tract it right away, right so.
Speaker 1: And if you're if you're sharing a news story and
Speaker 1: it's from Joe Bob's opinion from the basement dot us. Right,
Speaker 1: So look at the link, right, Joe Bob. And it's
Speaker 1: been found that some of the some of the most
Speaker 1: spread news stories, like there was one about Hillary Clinton,
Speaker 1: or all the in a warehouse in Chicago, all these votes,
Speaker 1: all these absentee votes for Hillary Clinton were found and
Speaker 1: it was ten thousand of them. Some kid in Macedonia
Speaker 1: allegedly was on the road and he wrote all these
Speaker 1: different things and he found that was the one people
Speaker 1: were spreading, and it would it would come back to
Speaker 1: his website. He's got advertising. So so if the link
Speaker 1: is not a trusted story, like you could get all.
Speaker 1: I don't want to. I don't want to start someone
Speaker 1: who might really have journalistic standards and understand what they are.
Speaker 1: But but a lot of I mean, you could put
Speaker 1: anything on the web, um and without calling anyone. If
Speaker 1: you're writing for a newspaper, you've gotta call all the sides.
Speaker 1: You've got to. I think real journalists suspend their judgments,
Speaker 1: and they should and some don't, but they should until
Speaker 1: they've got all the facts, they've looked at all the uh,
Speaker 1: they've talked to all the sides. But you can put
Speaker 1: something on the web and not talk to anyone and
Speaker 1: then once in a while you're gonna be right. It's
Speaker 1: like throwing poop at the wall. Sometimes the poop is
Speaker 1: gonna stick, but the other poop is going to land
Speaker 1: on someone's face. And do you really want to take
Speaker 1: that chance? I don't want poor on my face. That
Speaker 1: was beautiful than you. I do have one duty. I think,
Speaker 1: oh pooh jokes, you know, poops and barts and all
Speaker 1: there are you talk about duty? Um? Do you what?
Speaker 1: What would be your advice? You kind of talked about
Speaker 1: it a little bit to like girls who are don't
Speaker 1: fit that hyper sexualized vision that society has of women
Speaker 1: in the you know, like being that like girls who
Speaker 1: are nerdy and girls were shy and girls who are
Speaker 1: um like just life advice. Well, I think I think
Speaker 1: almost the same. But I was like, oh god, go ahead,
Speaker 1: probably were I think the best advice. The best thing
Speaker 1: I can say is it never gets better. And I'm
Speaker 1: just kidding. Um, yeah, totally get that. Well, it does
Speaker 1: get better than high school. Um, I guess. I guess
Speaker 1: the best device is to find what you find what
Speaker 1: you dig and and work at that. And I can't say,
Speaker 1: don't care about when anyone thinks, because you're gonna care,
Speaker 1: you've got to eat lunch with them. You're a high
Speaker 1: school is like a prison. You can't get out of it.
Speaker 1: You can't. You can't just when you're an adult. You
Speaker 1: could go to the next lunch table or head down
Speaker 1: the road. If you don't like people. UM, And I
Speaker 1: guess don't judge so much, um, because you know somebody
Speaker 1: everyone's in a different situation. I only found out when
Speaker 1: I got out of high school that half the kids
Speaker 1: I was walking around the halls, I was envying all
Speaker 1: their lives. Their parents were a mess, some of them.
Speaker 1: You know, my mom has some mental health issues. I
Speaker 1: thought I was the only one. You know. It turns
Speaker 1: out half the kids, you know, we're dealing with that.
Speaker 1: But you walk around the halls and you think, oh,
Speaker 1: that person is popular, that person is lucky either. And
Speaker 1: that's kind of what the Breakfast Club was about. I think,
Speaker 1: right that the sport Oh what was his name, Emilio Esteves. Yeah,
Speaker 1: his dad was abusive. Yeah, his dad was abusive, and
Speaker 1: and uh, and that's that's what I mean. None, no
Speaker 1: one was talking about any of that in the eighties,
Speaker 1: and abusive parent or any of that stuff and manifests
Speaker 1: itself in in a way of child acts like in
Speaker 1: different ways. And sometimes that's by like being super popular
Speaker 1: and loved by people around you, and sometimes it's by
Speaker 1: not talking to anyone and shutting down exactly. And now
Speaker 1: we have the Internet and there's there's also that outlet
Speaker 1: where people can connect. But so I guess, you know,
Speaker 1: just just have faith in yourself and it's um nerdiness
Speaker 1: is certainly not the worst thing obviously that can happen
Speaker 1: to a teenager. I don't want to sound privileged and
Speaker 1: think I make it sound. I mean, there are a
Speaker 1: million worse things. So I guess the best thing is
Speaker 1: that it really does get better. I mean, eventually you
Speaker 1: can get away from your situation. I Um, I dealt
Speaker 1: with a lot of things with my mom descending into
Speaker 1: the illness she had, and you know, be I mean,
Speaker 1: when somebody moves every every every year, what did she have? Um?
Speaker 1: You know what they people get that was one of
Speaker 1: the diagnoses. Um, Am, I gonna get nobody listens to this, right,
Speaker 1: Am I gonna get I've got documents I could prove it,
Speaker 1: but anyway, but but yeah, there are reasons people are
Speaker 1: acting the way they are, UM, and they're not always
Speaker 1: comfortable talking about them, so give them a little slack.
Speaker 1: And and and I never know anything everything. You don't
Speaker 1: really know what's going on in someone's life. I mean,
Speaker 1: there could be all kinds of different things that are happening.
Speaker 1: So so I guess the best advice is just don't
Speaker 1: feel like you're on a schedule, is one thing. Don't
Speaker 1: feel like by this age, I have to do this
Speaker 1: and by this age, I have to do this just
Speaker 1: because everyone else is just because you turn on the
Speaker 1: TV and on dawson that I don't want to say
Speaker 1: Dawson's Creek, that really is dating myself. Um, whoever is
Speaker 1: on now, whoever, whatever show is on now, don't feel
Speaker 1: like because those characters are thirteen and they're in lifelong relationships,
Speaker 1: and some of them are in relationship with their teachers,
Speaker 1: there's something wrong with you because you don't want to
Speaker 1: take your clothes off in Jim in front of everyone else.
Speaker 1: You're you and you might have that town right, I mean,
Speaker 1: if if if you've got a boyfriend or you're having
Speaker 1: lots of sex when you're in high school of age
Speaker 1: of course, uh with someone of similar of age. Um
Speaker 1: great if if you don't feel comfortable joking like that,
Speaker 1: being like that, because that was also one of the
Speaker 1: things boys would like try to say things, not just
Speaker 1: to me, but friends who are shy. They would come
Speaker 1: up and like say pussy and see what you I
Speaker 1: mean that's you know, I don't know what sexual harash
Speaker 1: well now, but they didn't say that, And you don't
Speaker 1: want to be the tattletell either, So it's kind of
Speaker 1: like a personal there's you know, so so you try, well,
Speaker 1: we all try to be cool and show we're cool
Speaker 1: with everything, but you don't have to be cool with everything.
Speaker 1: You don't judge other people. Other people shouldn't judge you.
Speaker 1: And that's one of the things I should say about
Speaker 1: the movie. By the way, it's carry pill be C
Speaker 1: A R I E P I L B Y, it's
Speaker 1: character's name, it's um. It's gonna be in theaters the
Speaker 1: day I think that this comes out, but by the
Speaker 1: time people hear it, um, it's it's gonna be probably
Speaker 1: available on Amazon on iTunes. If you do a quick
Speaker 1: cool if you google yourself, which I love to do
Speaker 1: all the time, all day long. If you google it,
Speaker 1: you will you will find it. Um, and there was
Speaker 1: a there was a point. Oh yeah. The nicest thing
Speaker 1: about it is that people have contacted me throughout the
Speaker 1: years who read the book and hopefully if they see
Speaker 1: the movie and they say I felt less alone when
Speaker 1: I read about this character, and that kind of shows.
Speaker 1: I mean, sometimes it's it's not just that I'm writing
Speaker 1: silly things or things to make people laugh, because I've
Speaker 1: write a lot of comedy to um, but it's if
Speaker 1: it helps people feel better about themselves or less alone,
Speaker 1: there is a there is a positive thing. It's not
Speaker 1: it's not just something. I mean, that's why art. Different
Speaker 1: kinds of creative arts matter. They matter in different ways.
Speaker 1: Maybe it just takes your mind off your problems or whatever.
Speaker 1: So um so I think that's so. Yeah, I hope that.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's been the most rewarding part about some
Speaker 1: of the writing I do, is that if someone feels
Speaker 1: they relate to it and they feel a little better
Speaker 1: about themselves because of it, then that's right. That's great.
Speaker 1: And you're on Twitter to where what's your Twitter hand?
Speaker 1: Karen with a see Karen listener. Uh, that's it's basically
Speaker 1: my name on Twitter. Um. Yeah, that's probably the easiest.
Speaker 1: Waifind nl I s s n R yep. That's on Twitter,
Speaker 1: Come follow me. Say hi if you're a writer too,
Speaker 1: I like talking to other writers who are struggling whatever.
Speaker 1: I love that. Thank you so much for sitting. Thank
Speaker 1: you for putting up with me. I appreciate you're both
Speaker 1: funny and hilarious. Thank you for listening. Guys, this has
Speaker 1: been Guys. We fucked the anti spot chimming podcast. You
Speaker 1: knew it, you don't know. I really thought it was
Speaker 1: a marion. It was a metaphor. I won't talk to
Speaker 1: you guys next week. Tell myself, tell myself constantly, compare
Speaker 1: you and to everybody else, feeling unappreciated, manipulated, having fine
Speaker 1: strength just to stand still? Is it too much to
Speaker 1: has to be enough someone else when I'm not enough
Speaker 1: and me? Is it too much to has to been
Speaker 1: enough someone else when I'm not enough and me? Acting
Speaker 1: and sick cure stress. It's gonna say, it's gonna say chet,
Speaker 1: it's gone, says too breaking down and breaking down. Should
Speaker 1: shoot myself and for anyone who will kill you around
Speaker 1: hailing underestimated. I'm sick in time over the cavy, my way.
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