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Book Club: Just As Long As We're Together · Stuff Mom Never Told You

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Hey, this is Sandy and Samantha, and welcome to stuff.
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: I've never told you protection I heard you.
• 0:18
  Speaker 2: And for this month's book club, I guess just in general,
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: I kind of our theme as we're choosing things out,
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: we are running with childhood favorites. Yeah, I'm really excited.
• 0:30
  Speaker 2: So I picked for this month's book club. It's one
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: of my favorites. Actually, I've talked about it before and
• 0:36
  Speaker 2: I've referenced it many times. I've got a copy of
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: it here somewhere. It is the nineteen eighty seven Judy
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: Bloom book. Just as long as we're together. I love
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: this book and rereading it, or actually I was listening
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: to it threw back so many thoughts. I was like,
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: oh my god, there's so many food memories in this.
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: By the way, also that jumped out. But any have
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: you read many Judy Bloom books? It's my first, this
• 0:59
  Speaker 2: is your it was my first.
• 1:01
  Speaker 3: Wow.
• 1:03
  Speaker 2: You never watched like Tales of the fourth Grade nothing?
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: Or was the fourth grade? Fifth grade? Nothing? Or are
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: you there, God, it's me Margaret, None of those.
• 1:11
  Speaker 4: No.
• 1:11
  Speaker 3: Wow.
• 1:13
  Speaker 2: I guess I was a little bit out of your generation.
• 1:15
  Speaker 4: I would say, I'm not sure how I missed it
• 1:19
  Speaker 4: because I was a very vociferous reader.
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: I've read like everything in the library.
• 1:23
  Speaker 4: So I'm not entirely sure how dismissed my purview, but
• 1:29
  Speaker 4: I think I was just I was thinking about this
• 1:31
  Speaker 4: when we were picking our childhood favorites, and I was like,
• 1:34
  Speaker 4: I was just so into like sci fi and fantasy,
• 1:36
  Speaker 4: and yeah, I think I really went hard in that
• 1:40
  Speaker 4: area and missed a lot of us.
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: What were you reading like in seventh grade?
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: I was reading like Ursula, le Gwynn, Tamorrow, Pierce, Nobody.
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: Who those people are.
• 1:50
  Speaker 4: Yeah, they're like big sci fi fantasy authors, and they
• 1:55
  Speaker 4: would have like long series of you like your four
• 1:58
  Speaker 4: friends and you're fighting evil and stuff like that.
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: So we did I like when I was not reading
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: things like this I've talked about because we almost chose
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: a Babysitters Club books. I love the Babysitters Club. I
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: love Nancy Drew, both the old and the new editions.
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: Also loved the Hardy Boys, but I also was really competitive.
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: We talked about our accelerated reader and there's a section
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: in this book and we'll talk about We're not gonna
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: talk about it, but just so you know that they
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: read Gone with the Wind, and I don't know. They
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: may have been the influence for me to read Gone
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: with Wind, because I did, and I got like fifty points,
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: which is a huge amount for the Accelerated Reader, which,
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: by the way, a great book for middle schools to read.
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: It really hyped up a bad era, really Roman manticized enslavement,
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: and I'm like, oh, eh, that's actually kind of gross
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: now that I look back on it.
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: But you know, you were in that ar you one
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: of those points I needed big books.
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: I got that. I read le miss I read it.
• 2:58
  Speaker 2: I read they read a toll Stoy. I did not
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: do well, but I think I got points. That's all
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: I cared about.
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: America tragedy, did you go Lord of the Rings books?
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: I did not read that. I was out of college.
• 3:12
  Speaker 4: They were There were some solid points about the missed
• 3:15
  Speaker 4: out and.
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: You know what, if you followed the movie, you kind
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: of unless they had the characters they missed, the movie
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: goes pretty cool. Well anyway, anyway, man childhood Memories of
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: Accelerated Reader. I got those points. I was first. Shalan
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: Shalen was my uh my nemesis. I guess we're friends,
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: but at the same time of our friend of mees
• 3:36
  Speaker 2: because we were always competing in band and accelerated reader. Man,
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: it was the whole thing. Yeah, yeah, so any hold essay.
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: I guess for me, the one thing you have probably
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: figured out is that I am a sucker for tales
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: of friendships and coming of age like I loved them,
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: and being in this timeframe for this book, it was
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: a hit for me. Judy Bloom, who is a household
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: name I know for so many including myself, has written
• 4:07
  Speaker 2: a lot of classics, as we already talked about Ramona,
• 4:11
  Speaker 2: all of those like classics. And I only read one
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: Ramona book, and in that book, I just remember her
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: description and again I know I've talked about this before
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: about pot roast, her being so excited about the fact
• 4:26
  Speaker 2: that a croc pot was cooking her pot roast, and
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: when they opened the door that they would have that smell,
• 4:31
  Speaker 2: that that would just infiltrate her whole body should be
• 4:34
  Speaker 2: so and when they came home, it was cold, there
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: was no smell because they forgot to plug it up.
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: I turn it on, but that was so visceral. I
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: don't even remember which book that was.
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: There was a lot of food You're right in this.
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: It got me the turkey sandwich, the glove of peanut butter.
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: One thing Judy Bloom can do is make your imagination
• 4:58
  Speaker 2: go wild with that. But there you go again. For me,
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: this book was meant so much more for me. There
• 5:05
  Speaker 2: was so much to it. It had a book that
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: has somewhat of my representation. And I've told you all before,
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: as a child, I cling to anything. I clung to
• 5:13
  Speaker 2: anything like watching a Brandy being Cinderella meant so much
• 5:17
  Speaker 2: to me as a person of color. It had nothing
• 5:21
  Speaker 2: to do with the fact, obviously she is a black
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: woman with talent that I would never have, but for
• 5:25
  Speaker 2: some reason, it felt so much more real just to
• 5:28
  Speaker 2: see someone that was not white, the standard beauty of
• 5:31
  Speaker 2: white also Asian. Dude, come on, come on, all those
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: to say that this book had that representation and adopted
• 5:38
  Speaker 2: Vietnamese character and it didn't matter that she was Vietnamese.
• 5:41
  Speaker 2: I knew she was an Asian girl that was adopted
• 5:43
  Speaker 2: and I was like, yes, what what? And she was
• 5:47
  Speaker 2: seen as like a fun character and I love that.
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: So I feel like there are so many of us
• 5:55
  Speaker 2: who really went through it in all of this trying
• 5:58
  Speaker 2: to find that kind of representation, but also like about
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: that friendship, about growing in friendship or losing friendships. We
• 6:05
  Speaker 2: had a lot of fills. Am I right? Did you
• 6:08
  Speaker 2: have did you have this drama?
• 6:10
  Speaker 4: Oh? Yeah, I definitely brought me back to these kinds
• 6:13
  Speaker 4: of fights you would have with your friends, the misunderstanding
• 6:19
  Speaker 4: we have when do you make a new friend, and
• 6:21
  Speaker 4: the jealousies kind of form.
• 6:24
  Speaker 2: And then the two changes. Yes, whispring and you wonder
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: if they're talking about.
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: You, why didn't they invite me?
• 6:32
  Speaker 2: This is Jessica, I'm talking to you. I don't feel
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: a lot of fills. But anyway, yes, this had so
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: much to it. I feel like Judy Bloom did an
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: amazing job and really speaking to young girls. So let's
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: go ahead and just jump into this, uh with a plot.
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: So obviously this is very like squished in because there's
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: a lot of things happening, and we'll probably talk a
• 6:57
  Speaker 2: lot of the details in some of the themes or
• 7:00
  Speaker 2: thoughts that we're having about it. So and by the way,
• 7:03
  Speaker 2: there is another part of the book. Here's to you Rachel,
• 7:07
  Speaker 2: I believe is the book and it's about Rachel, like
• 7:10
  Speaker 2: she's the protagonist in that one. I can't remember if
• 7:13
  Speaker 2: that was before after, because this is the only one
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: I read. I love this one so much that it
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: had my heart. Also believe was a Netflix show or
• 7:20
  Speaker 2: a movie or something they did They turned it into
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: a film somehow, huh. Anyway, so with that we have
• 7:28
  Speaker 2: Stephanie Sephanie Hirst, the protagonist for this specific stories. Stephanie
• 7:32
  Speaker 2: is about to enter her seventh grade and y'all, I
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: hated the seventh grade. Did you like seventh grade? No?
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: It's literally the worst grade.
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: Yes, it really is. I feel like it's universal anyway,
• 7:43
  Speaker 2: back too. So she's excited to start, but nervous. She
• 7:47
  Speaker 2: and her best friend Rachel are ready to tackle this year.
• 7:51
  Speaker 2: And at the same time, we were getting introduced to Alison,
• 7:54
  Speaker 2: a cute adoptee from Vietnam who just moved to the
• 7:56
  Speaker 2: area from California. So she moved to Connecticut with her family.
• 8:00
  Speaker 2: Stephanie is on a journey of love, friendship, growth, all
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: the things. Also, we have a funny insert about Richard
• 8:08
  Speaker 2: gear Poster, who she has named Benjamin Moore Yes, the
• 8:13
  Speaker 2: paint and her world at large, which I think is
• 8:16
  Speaker 2: hysterical because you and I have talked about the fact
• 8:18
  Speaker 2: that people did grow up with like all these punks
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: as they imply, and having posters and I've never had posters,
• 8:28
  Speaker 2: but you did.
• 8:29
  Speaker 4: Oh yeah, my whole walls, my ceiling coverage in posters.
• 8:34
  Speaker 4: And I also want to say I connected to her,
• 8:37
  Speaker 4: being like I'm not attracted to Richard gear I'm attracted
• 8:40
  Speaker 4: to Benjamin Moore exactly.
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: Who is my boyfriend right.
• 8:44
  Speaker 2: Has nothing to do with Richard Gere as the person
• 8:47
  Speaker 2: he is Benjamin Moore, I don't care. I don't know
• 8:50
  Speaker 2: where he's from. I don't know who he is. I
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: just know he's good looking, and he's my boyfriend named
• 8:54
  Speaker 2: Benjamin Moore.
• 8:55
  Speaker 4: Yes, you know it was a younger picture of Richard
• 8:57
  Speaker 4: gear by the way, Yes.
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: I'm wondering if I younger listeners, if we have any
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: younger listeners know who Rigard Geary is and why he
• 9:04
  Speaker 2: was soil back.
• 9:05
  Speaker 4: And then yeah, I recently encountered with a gen Z
• 9:09
  Speaker 4: where I was like, oh wow, you don't know who Oh.
• 9:13
  Speaker 2: I really because he hasn't been relevant for a long time.
• 9:18
  Speaker 2: I don't know since Chicago. I don't know if he's
• 9:21
  Speaker 2: been anything else.
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: I'm sure he has been, but I'm sure.
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: He's gonna come in as a grandpa with some series. Anyway,
• 9:29
  Speaker 2: moving on, so she has entered the world of what
• 9:31
  Speaker 2: is known as junior high school. Which is that still
• 9:33
  Speaker 2: a thing because now it would be middle school.
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 9:37
  Speaker 4: I don't think I ever knew a junior high school.
• 9:39
  Speaker 4: It was always middle school for us.
• 9:40
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah, this is nineteen eighty seven, y'all. Ill just so
• 9:43
  Speaker 2: you know. And she has hopes and dreams of our future.
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: Her mother is a travel agent. Her father travels for
• 9:48
  Speaker 2: Morgan's currently in Hawaii and then goes on to California.
• 9:51
  Speaker 2: But at this beginning, and her younger brother Bruce, who
• 9:54
  Speaker 2: is annoying but lovable and wants to save the world
• 9:56
  Speaker 2: his character, I did not appreciate it him enough in
• 10:01
  Speaker 2: my youth because wow. And they have actually recently moved
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: into a different house in the same little area, so
• 10:08
  Speaker 2: it's kind of to note. She Stephanie navigates school where
• 10:13
  Speaker 2: she and Allison are in similar classes, are the same classes.
• 10:16
  Speaker 2: Rachel is more advanced and it's not in as many
• 10:20
  Speaker 2: classes that they have gym and lunch together, but she
• 10:22
  Speaker 2: seems to be doing okay. Stephanie and her friends get
• 10:26
  Speaker 2: a crush on an older boy who they name as
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: Jeremy Dragon because he wears a dragon jacket, which I
• 10:31
  Speaker 2: think is hysterical because I'm pretty sure we had a
• 10:34
  Speaker 2: kid named Jeremy that I was really into when I
• 10:37
  Speaker 2: was in middle school or I was in ninth grade,
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: and I think he was like eleventh grade, and I'll
• 10:40
  Speaker 2: be like, oh, he's so cute.
• 10:42
  Speaker 4: We had a Jeremy too. I accidentally tripped him once
• 10:46
  Speaker 4: and he busted his nose. Oh my god, I didn't
• 10:51
  Speaker 4: mean to do it.
• 10:52
  Speaker 2: That's a different lore, that is a different law on
• 10:55
  Speaker 2: that one, anyway. But yes, they have all these future
• 10:59
  Speaker 2: hopes and plans. As it's going about, they try to
• 11:02
  Speaker 2: navigate the friendship as a trio. Alison says something about,
• 11:06
  Speaker 2: you know, you're my best friend, and Stephanie's stock gonna
• 11:09
  Speaker 2: be like, but Rachel's my best friend. She's like, you
• 11:11
  Speaker 2: can have more than one, which I think you can
• 11:12
  Speaker 2: have more than one. But it isn't always that smooth.
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: Rachel and Stephanie seem to drift a bit due to
• 11:19
  Speaker 2: their different personalities. Rachel is very organized and very gifted
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: as where Stephanie, you know, is just this average there's
• 11:27
  Speaker 2: nothing wrong with her life. But she's not that level
• 11:29
  Speaker 2: like that. She learns a lot of words from Rachel. Also,
• 11:32
  Speaker 2: Rachel is very like focused on getting accomplished and winning
• 11:37
  Speaker 2: and being the best. That's the whole thing. It's hard
• 11:39
  Speaker 2: to compete with. And though everything seems to be okay,
• 11:42
  Speaker 2: we find out that Stephanie's dad has actually been requesting
• 11:45
  Speaker 2: to be relocated to the other side of the country
• 11:49
  Speaker 2: due to him and her mom being separated. Trial separation,
• 11:53
  Speaker 2: which I feel like is such an outdated word a
• 11:58
  Speaker 2: lot of things.
• 12:00
  Speaker 4: A trial separation is just yeah, I don't know it is.
• 12:06
  Speaker 4: It's a lot for a kid in middle school to
• 12:08
  Speaker 4: be like, cause that implies you might get back together.
• 12:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah, especially the way she navigates it, because the entire
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: time until she like this breaks her mind is they're
• 12:17
  Speaker 2: so in love it is gross, but they obviously they
• 12:20
  Speaker 2: miss each other to be like slapped in the face
• 12:22
  Speaker 2: with that like wait, what when did this happen? So
• 12:26
  Speaker 2: all that goes down and start a lot of teenage
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: feelings here for Stephanie, who is in both the nile
• 12:31
  Speaker 2: and anger stages. She decides not to tell her friends,
• 12:34
  Speaker 2: thinking this would pass, which only makes her angrier because
• 12:37
  Speaker 2: she keeps taking in and lie, having to lie and
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: make up all these scenarios making her angrier also meaning
• 12:43
  Speaker 2: like she is taking it out on food, which, by
• 12:45
  Speaker 2: the way, this is when you know how outdated this
• 12:47
  Speaker 2: is when she talks about the way that up for
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: this teenager and I'm like, oh no, why are we
• 12:53
  Speaker 2: causing such eating disorders? Anyway, her and Stephanie seemed to
• 12:58
  Speaker 2: be drifting, her being Rachel apart and her Stephanie and
• 13:04
  Speaker 2: Allison seem to be getting closer as we see from
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: this point after a while, we also have the dealing
• 13:10
  Speaker 2: with boys. Eric, a class clown is obviously Alison's type.
• 13:14
  Speaker 2: They Floriday giggle. We have Peter, who is a shy,
• 13:17
  Speaker 2: shy like skinny boy, but the like the son of
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: a doctor, which I love that imagination of hers be
• 13:23
  Speaker 2: like they talk about me, they talk about all the things,
• 13:28
  Speaker 2: Oh my god, and he seems to have taken interest
• 13:31
  Speaker 2: in her. And then we have the entrance of the
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: new kid, Max, who has caught Rachel's eye. He's tall
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: and all these things like, oh okay, from Kansas City, Missouri,
• 13:41
  Speaker 2: not Kansas. But as things go, Stephanie and Rachel have
• 13:45
  Speaker 2: an epic friend fight all about betrayal and her feelings,
• 13:49
  Speaker 2: and it finally comes out that Stephanie's parents are separated
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: and she's lied to our friends about it Before that though,
• 13:55
  Speaker 2: it turned out that Rachel had lied about being an
• 13:58
  Speaker 2: advanced math class would you army Dragon by the way,
• 14:02
  Speaker 2: And Alison had light about her dog, who she has
• 14:05
  Speaker 2: previously said could talk so she could make friends. I
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: get it. He takes some some tales and then you
• 14:10
  Speaker 2: hope everybody's okay. It turns out also her mother is
• 14:12
  Speaker 2: a celebrity, and they're like, okay, cool, cool cool. Having
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: to figure that part out and with all that, everything
• 14:20
  Speaker 2: goes so great. Also, at the same time, Stephanie's very
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: upset with her father because her father seems so nonchal launched.
• 14:26
  Speaker 2: She goes to see him at Christmas and then he
• 14:28
  Speaker 2: intro do a girlfriend, which I have to say the
• 14:31
  Speaker 2: dad was for that, begs him to come see him,
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: and then just brings this girl along that they don't know,
• 14:37
  Speaker 2: freshly understanding that they've just separated. Like that's yeah, no warning,
• 14:43
  Speaker 2: that is yeah, that was all on him. Stephanie was
• 14:46
  Speaker 2: right to be upset. Good on her Ah. So all
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: the while, Stephanie's birthday comes about coincidentally on the day
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: of the seventh grade dance, which they had raised money
• 14:55
  Speaker 2: for Sadie's Brownie. Sadie is a grandmother of Allison, another
• 14:58
  Speaker 2: side character. Also, she starts her period that same day,
• 15:03
  Speaker 2: and she gets her first kiss big day, for her
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: big big day. Oh and by the way, Allison also
• 15:08
  Speaker 2: gets her first kiss because Eric planned out this whole
• 15:11
  Speaker 2: thing where all the three dudes would get with the
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: three girls, and they all did the Hey look at
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: Ryan's when I'm a I have a feeling they didn't
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: know what that was because I barely knew you what
• 15:19
  Speaker 2: that was Ryan's belt.
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: Oh no, I mean maybe I don't even know.
• 15:24
  Speaker 2: I could hear. The only thing I can ever see
• 15:26
  Speaker 2: is the big dipper.
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a little dipper. I feel like I.
• 15:30
  Speaker 2: Don't even know. I think can only see one of them.
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: I don't know which one, but just the one.
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 15:35
  Speaker 2: But again, after some drama and life happenings, Rachel and
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: Stephanie makeup. Also Alison. Oh before that though, I forgot
• 15:44
  Speaker 2: this during a bad spell of a flu which knocks
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: out half the attendance at school. We also find out
• 15:50
  Speaker 2: that Alison's mother is pregnant who could not get pregnant previously,
• 15:55
  Speaker 2: which shakes Alison to her course, saying that she's not
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: gonna be wanted anymore. They're gonna have a little boy
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: and all these things. She talks about running away to
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: Paris to find her a biological family. Unfortunately, Alison has
• 16:06
  Speaker 2: the flu and is knocked out for like the next
• 16:09
  Speaker 2: two weeks. But it's okay because everything works out. As
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: I said, some big conversations happen. Rachel and Stephanie finally
• 16:18
  Speaker 2: make up after talking through the fact that they felt
• 16:20
  Speaker 2: like they were losing each other. They decided to call
• 16:23
  Speaker 2: everybody close friends instead of best friends, which I still
• 16:26
  Speaker 2: think is odd because even the necklaces, have you seen
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: you can put them in three parts. Those little heart
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: necklace is his best friends. You can get them in threes.
• 16:33
  Speaker 2: I've seen them. They're wonderful. Well does that do people
• 16:38
  Speaker 2: use those anymore? The little best friend necklaces? You know
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: I'm talking about?
• 16:41
  Speaker 4: I don't know. This was straight in and I actually
• 16:43
  Speaker 4: recently got one, but it was Star Wars, So I
• 16:46
  Speaker 4: feel like.
• 16:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that makes sense. That makes a lot of sense. Yeah,
• 16:51
  Speaker 2: So with all of that, uh, drifting and having different
• 16:54
  Speaker 2: interests adding a third Uh. They finally do makeup. They
• 16:58
  Speaker 2: kind of talk through some things, apology about things, and
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: decided to all come together for a little bit. And
• 17:05
  Speaker 2: at the same time, Stephanie's father decides that he misses
• 17:08
  Speaker 2: everybody and does want to come back to the East Coast,
• 17:10
  Speaker 2: not to move in with them, and they don't know
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: where this is gonna go, but he's coming back, and
• 17:16
  Speaker 2: that's how we ended. Oh. By the way, Bruce, who
• 17:19
  Speaker 2: again is one of the younger brother wins a contest
• 17:22
  Speaker 2: because he does about talks about like no war, about
• 17:26
  Speaker 2: peace and such because he had constant nightmares about nuclear war.
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: Yeah, a little boy.
• 17:33
  Speaker 4: He kind of becomes a celebrity for me.
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: He goes to the White House, gets interviewed.
• 17:41
  Speaker 3: Yeah, so that is the entire story.
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: Again, there's so many things in here that brought my
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: memories about the book. I was like, oh, oh my god,
• 18:00
  Speaker 2: I forgot this part. Oh my god, I forgot this part.
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, this is interesting. So they talk about different themes,
• 18:08
  Speaker 2: which of course, obviously friendship is number one, and how
• 18:12
  Speaker 2: it feels to grow together. I will say like middle
• 18:15
  Speaker 2: school is hard. I feel like middle school was the
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: hardest for me, seventh grade was even harder. I want
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: to say, that's like a hard blank purity hits hard.
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah.
• 18:29
  Speaker 4: And when I was thinking back on like why some
• 18:33
  Speaker 4: of this resonated so much with me, it is those
• 18:37
  Speaker 4: kind of you don't have the words to express necessarily
• 18:42
  Speaker 4: the emotions you're feeling, and you're kind of talking about
• 18:45
  Speaker 4: these things with your girlfriends, like periods or are guys
• 18:49
  Speaker 4: being attracted to you?
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: But I don't know. At least for me, it felt
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: like I had to keep up because I was actually
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: not really interested in the guy.
• 19:00
  Speaker 4: So it was like I've got to I don't want
• 19:02
  Speaker 4: to be on cool, so here we go. So it
• 19:05
  Speaker 4: felt like a lot of pressure, Like that adolescent stage
• 19:07
  Speaker 4: felt like a stage where I was still holding onto
• 19:10
  Speaker 4: something that I really loved, but there was a lot
• 19:13
  Speaker 4: of change and I wasn't necessarily I didn't feel very stable,
• 19:17
  Speaker 4: and I didn't really know what to do, and I
• 19:19
  Speaker 4: was just trying to blend in right.
• 19:23
  Speaker 2: My best friend at the time, and I want to
• 19:26
  Speaker 2: say elementary school and then first in middle school, was
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: two years older than me. We were friends because of church,
• 19:33
  Speaker 2: and we drifted real hard because her like desires for
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: boys were completely different from mine. Again, I had a
• 19:39
  Speaker 2: very religious like I have to behave There was no
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: rebellion in my body except for cursing. I loved cursing.
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: That was my only form of rebellion. And people really
• 19:47
  Speaker 2: thought I was bad because I cursed. But I did
• 19:49
  Speaker 2: nothing else. I never did like drugs. I didn't go party.
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: I couldn't sneak out. I was petrified of being caught.
• 19:54
  Speaker 2: Like there was something of all. It may be the
• 19:57
  Speaker 2: adopted thing, being like I have to be perfect because
• 19:59
  Speaker 2: I was too miserable not to be and I saw
• 20:01
  Speaker 2: too many bad things to be anything else. So for me,
• 20:04
  Speaker 2: like we drifted apart because of those reasons. And then
• 20:08
  Speaker 2: she actually I remember her telling me that I needed
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: to grow up, which is a sentence that Rachel says,
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: but not because of uh boy, oh it was because
• 20:18
  Speaker 2: of boys, but because she was maturing, like talking about
• 20:20
  Speaker 2: having sex. I was like eh with that, dude, like yeah,
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: and I was like in middle school, I was like
• 20:25
  Speaker 2: why would I why? Why not? You know, people have
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: different experiences, but I would stand on that that's too
• 20:31
  Speaker 2: young for me. Didn't acknowledge what this was happening. I
• 20:36
  Speaker 2: don't even know if I fully hit puberty. Oh I did.
• 20:38
  Speaker 2: I hit puberty pretty young? Uh, I think you did too, right.
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: Fourth grade is when I got my period.
• 20:44
  Speaker 2: Oh, you were way younger than me. I was two
• 20:46
  Speaker 2: years later. I was in sixth grade. So that was
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: a whole lot of like try to think through and
• 20:50
  Speaker 2: my parents, I don't know why, books did you have
• 20:55
  Speaker 2: this whole level of like, oh my god, you're a
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: woman now, welcome to the world thing when you got
• 21:01
  Speaker 2: your period or just yeah, and when you got your period,
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: when you started your period.
• 21:06
  Speaker 4: I didn't really And it's probably because I was so young.
• 21:09
  Speaker 4: Maybe I honestly, I've told this story before, but I
• 21:15
  Speaker 4: got my period and I thought you only got it once,
• 21:18
  Speaker 4: and when it happened again, I subbed so clearly. My
• 21:21
  Speaker 4: parents didn't even tell me about that. Yeah, And I
• 21:25
  Speaker 4: told other people that too, and they loved to bring
• 21:28
  Speaker 4: it up to this day and I'm like, yeah, well
• 21:30
  Speaker 4: I believed it too.
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: Now I didn't really.
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: Get it right, Well, were jumping into the next name.
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: But yeah, with the friendships, the fact that we outgrew
• 21:42
  Speaker 2: and did things. When I got into the sixth grade,
• 21:45
  Speaker 2: I finally established a great friend group and there was
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: three of us actually that happened like something eighth great
• 21:50
  Speaker 2: and because my other friend brought her in. Oh Man
• 21:54
  Speaker 2: really was the same anyway, that we all became friends,
• 21:58
  Speaker 2: and weird stuff happened in high school, other weird things,
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: but like in middle school, we were pretty thick of sleeves.
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: I felt like they had a little more expenditure than
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: I did, so I didn't get to join as many things.
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: I started working in the seventh grade while they were
• 22:13
  Speaker 2: doing tennis in track I was doing. I did do
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: cheerleading for.
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: Like a year.
• 22:18
  Speaker 2: I did not do great definitely anyway, but friendships grew.
• 22:23
  Speaker 2: I will say I'm not friends with any of them.
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: I am good friends with one guy. He and I
• 22:28
  Speaker 2: are really still like good friends and have talked and
• 22:30
  Speaker 2: I've known him since the third grade, so I do
• 22:33
  Speaker 2: hold on to that friendship. That is nice. I know
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: you and Katie as well as Marissa. Were you all
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: the way back into middle school.
• 22:41
  Speaker 4: Yes, I have a group of five friends that we've
• 22:45
  Speaker 4: been friends since middle school and some of us since
• 22:47
  Speaker 4: elementary school. No, we did lose a friend, did drift
• 22:52
  Speaker 4: apart friend friend arguments, But you know, reading this, I
• 22:57
  Speaker 4: maybe one of them will disagree with me. But I
• 22:59
  Speaker 4: remember I always felt so empathetic for people new kids. Yeah,
• 23:06
  Speaker 4: that I always go up and introduce myself and I
• 23:09
  Speaker 4: was like, this is our table at lunch and you
• 23:12
  Speaker 4: can sit here. And a lot of times people would
• 23:13
  Speaker 4: move on that they would find their friend group after
• 23:16
  Speaker 4: a while.
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: But that's how I met a lot of them, where I.
• 23:19
  Speaker 4: Would just be like, hey, hang with me, you seem cool,
• 23:23
  Speaker 4: let's hang out. And that's kind of what happens in
• 23:25
  Speaker 4: here with Alison in Stephanie, where Stephanie's just like new
• 23:28
  Speaker 4: kid in the neighborhood. Let me go talk to her.
• 23:31
  Speaker 2: Hello, you seem interesting.
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: Your dog, dog dog. Okay, we're leaving that.
• 23:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think I can't remember because we did grow
• 23:40
  Speaker 2: into a pretty big group, but there would be like
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: moments of like us against them, and I can't remember.
• 23:46
  Speaker 2: I feel like that happened for both sides, where I
• 23:48
  Speaker 2: would be on the OUs and they would be on
• 23:50
  Speaker 2: the ouse. It was weird. It was an odd click thing.
• 23:54
  Speaker 2: We would never bullies bullies each other. That was never
• 23:57
  Speaker 2: a thing. I don't think. I don't remember that bang happening,
• 24:00
  Speaker 2: especially one of the girl groups. But but you had
• 24:04
  Speaker 2: like a big friend group and then you had.
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: A smaller you know, like the cluster.
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: Like and it was like, Okay, this is a big group.
• 24:11
  Speaker 2: But then you have your intimate friend group and it
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: was very obvious, and then you were nice to each
• 24:15
  Speaker 2: other all the other ways.
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah, we definitely had Like.
• 24:20
  Speaker 4: I'll admit I had two of my friends got another
• 24:24
  Speaker 4: friend group and I was still a friend group, but
• 24:27
  Speaker 4: they had another friend whip. Yeah, and I was really
• 24:29
  Speaker 4: jealous of that friend group. I also wanted nothing to
• 24:31
  Speaker 4: do with that friend group, so there was like nothing
• 24:33
  Speaker 4: to do about it but be like annoyed.
• 24:37
  Speaker 2: Right. We definitely, like my closest friends. I would go
• 24:41
  Speaker 2: to drama and they went to do sports. It was
• 24:43
  Speaker 2: definitely interesting level of like differences, Oh friendships, like going
• 24:49
  Speaker 2: this is what we were talking about with growing up,
• 24:50
  Speaker 2: this is the next thing. But like things like periods
• 24:53
  Speaker 2: as we were already brought up, Like it was the
• 24:56
  Speaker 2: way She's like, please don't announce this, please don't do
• 25:00
  Speaker 2: the good because she thought the teacher was gonna announce it.
• 25:02
  Speaker 2: But they made it a big deal about like Rachel
• 25:05
  Speaker 2: already starting her period and being womanly and having breasts.
• 25:09
  Speaker 2: Also the fact that the dude who had Harry Legs
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: obviously means he had sexual experience, which I have never
• 25:14
  Speaker 2: heard that as a thing. I don't think I've never
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: heard of that outside of this book. So I feel
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: like Judy Bloom was like this must be a thing.
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: I love you, Judy Bloom, but like like there was
• 25:24
  Speaker 2: that was that conversation about sexuality and such, which I
• 25:29
  Speaker 2: did think was funny, but like the whole like celebrating
• 25:33
  Speaker 2: her mom coming in crying, being like you're a woman
• 25:35
  Speaker 2: now again, that's never been a thing. My mother came
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: in with like this is what you're gonna need. Your's
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: a pad. Good luck. That was it, Like there was
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: not anything sabilatory. And also I immediately started hurting.
• 25:49
  Speaker 4: Yeah, that's pretty much what my mom did. She was like,
• 25:51
  Speaker 4: drink some water, I'll get you some food. Just you're
• 25:56
  Speaker 4: not dying, right because I was like, what's happening, and
• 26:02
  Speaker 4: uh yeah, just rested in pain for a while.
• 26:05
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I remember my experience with a tampon was on
• 26:09
  Speaker 2: a trip in the seventh grade because I was like,
• 26:12
  Speaker 2: I can't wear a pad in the ocean. I cannot
• 26:14
  Speaker 2: wear a pad and we had swimsuits on. So that
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: was the most painful things and when it was so hurting,
• 26:19
  Speaker 2: so bad, which was at that time's best friend's mom
• 26:22
  Speaker 2: who was helped telling me about it or should telling
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: me how to use one. She was like, if it
• 26:28
  Speaker 2: hurts that bad, you're not doing this right, take it out.
• 26:32
  Speaker 2: I was like, oh, okay, I finally did get used
• 26:36
  Speaker 2: to them. Well the fact I don't have to have
• 26:38
  Speaker 2: them now, but like it is, it was a whole thing.
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: It's a whole process, and we don't talk enough about them.
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: No.
• 26:44
  Speaker 4: I asked my mom my door to help me, like,
• 26:49
  Speaker 4: just tell me how to put in a tampon, and
• 26:51
  Speaker 4: she was like sure.
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: Never heard from her again.
• 26:55
  Speaker 2: Never to this day.
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: Don't talk about camping. We've never come back to that.
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: We've never acknowledged that that never happened.
• 27:04
  Speaker 2: I don't know what did tampons come through, because I
• 27:08
  Speaker 2: don't feel like it was popular during my mother's time
• 27:10
  Speaker 2: nor my sister's time. It was more popularized in my time.
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: That could be true, Uh, I don't know.
• 27:19
  Speaker 4: I know that there was a stereotype because I never
• 27:22
  Speaker 4: really got I would use tampons if I absolutely had to,
• 27:25
  Speaker 4: but otherwise I would use pads. And there was a
• 27:28
  Speaker 4: stereotype that that meant that you were like a prude.
• 27:30
  Speaker 4: I remember that.
• 27:31
  Speaker 2: Oh really, I remember saying people were scared because they
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: thought that you were no longer a virgin. That was
• 27:37
  Speaker 2: a stereotype.
• 27:38
  Speaker 4: I feel like I was getting the opposite where it
• 27:40
  Speaker 4: was like a bad thing, you're not a virgin.
• 27:43
  Speaker 2: And because I came from a very like church ball,
• 27:46
  Speaker 2: it was like, oh, it's a bad thing if.
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: You Yeah, well try the way. None of this is, I.
• 27:52
  Speaker 2: Hope, nobsolutely absurd in itself. Yeah, So apparently the popularity
• 27:58
  Speaker 2: really began in the sixties seventies, which is interesting because
• 28:02
  Speaker 2: I thought it wouldn't because my parents. I don't think
• 28:04
  Speaker 2: my family used that much. They have and I didn't
• 28:07
  Speaker 2: realize in the nineteen eighties is when they had the toxics,
• 28:11
  Speaker 2: the TSS, the toxic shock syndrome. The people were backing away,
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: So maybe that's what it was around that time. But interestingly,
• 28:19
  Speaker 2: again like and that was from go aunt flow dot com,
• 28:25
  Speaker 2: which I think is a tampon.
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: Probably company that would make sense.
• 28:31
  Speaker 2: But you know that is it is very interesting in
• 28:34
  Speaker 2: itself because like trying to figure out all that and
• 28:36
  Speaker 2: navigate that. But I was soon we know what I
• 28:38
  Speaker 2: was really mad in that scene about the fact that
• 28:40
  Speaker 2: she had to pay for a damn pad and because
• 28:44
  Speaker 2: she didn't have money on her she couldn't have to
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: get asked somebody to go pay for I'm like, what
• 28:48
  Speaker 2: the I will say, I did go to a nurse
• 28:50
  Speaker 2: because I did start at school. I have vivid memories
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: of that, and they gave me a pennyliners there, like
• 28:54
  Speaker 2: the nurse gave it to me for free, which like
• 28:57
  Speaker 2: she was at a dance so she couldn't they weren't access.
• 29:00
  Speaker 2: But I'm like, that really makes me angry for her.
• 29:04
  Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, And luckily, like one of the teachers was like,
• 29:09
  Speaker 4: I got you.
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I'll be here if you have any questions.
• 29:14
  Speaker 4: But it was that was such a different experience than
• 29:18
  Speaker 4: mine because they also in their friend group had this
• 29:20
  Speaker 4: promise like when you get your period, we'll all tell
• 29:23
  Speaker 4: each other. And I had gotten my period first in
• 29:28
  Speaker 4: my friend group and we didn't have any such promise.
• 29:31
  Speaker 4: But I have to say, after people got their period,
• 29:34
  Speaker 4: they would call me and they would be like, what.
• 29:36
  Speaker 2: What do well. So funny is because I was at school,
• 29:41
  Speaker 2: they I knew I told them immediately got just thought
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: of my.
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: What do I do I was wearing white pants.
• 29:47
  Speaker 2: Oh, that's the fear. I remember having a pad in
• 29:50
  Speaker 2: my cool full leather jacket that was in style the
• 29:54
  Speaker 2: color you know what on the diet I had the
• 29:56
  Speaker 2: dark hunter of green one and I had a pad
• 29:57
  Speaker 2: in one and a boy that like me took my
• 29:59
  Speaker 2: coat and put his hand in that pocket.
• 30:02
  Speaker 4: Yep. Oh tragedies. These are the tragedies of school's face.
• 30:11
  Speaker 2: Oh Christopher. Going back to some of the things with
• 30:23
  Speaker 2: the growing up, the weird fat shaming, I was like, oh,
• 30:28
  Speaker 2: this is this is this is where I think it
• 30:30
  Speaker 2: has not dated. Well, there's so many things, but this
• 30:32
  Speaker 2: was one of the worst parts that I was like,
• 30:35
  Speaker 2: the way they are going after her. The mom's like
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: I'm taking you to a doctor, all these things that
• 30:40
  Speaker 2: don't get me wrong, obviously she had a lot of
• 30:44
  Speaker 2: like stress and emotions, and what she was doing was
• 30:48
  Speaker 2: making trying to make herself sick, Like she kind of
• 30:50
  Speaker 2: says the point that I just wanted to think it's
• 30:52
  Speaker 2: not bad. So that's a whole different conversation itself. But
• 30:56
  Speaker 2: the way they are handling this is so not cute
• 31:00
  Speaker 2: and it was so alarming that I'm like, wow, I
• 31:03
  Speaker 2: really thought this chapter was not a big deal growing up,
• 31:06
  Speaker 2: but reading it as an adult, like, h, No, diet
• 31:10
  Speaker 2: culture in the eighties were so bad, No wonder we
• 31:14
  Speaker 2: all had so many body shaming issues.
• 31:17
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I feel like we run into this so often
• 31:22
  Speaker 4: in our kind of picks, our book clubs, our movie picks,
• 31:27
  Speaker 4: because it was such a big thing. It was just
• 31:29
  Speaker 4: I have plenty of examples I'm sure you do too
• 31:31
  Speaker 4: in my family where they'd be like, you should shop
• 31:33
  Speaker 4: the maternity ward or just like these things that they
• 31:36
  Speaker 4: just felt was totally normal to say to a child. Yeah,
• 31:41
  Speaker 4: it was probably already insecure and stressed about things, and
• 31:45
  Speaker 4: just like.
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: Her whole.
• 31:48
  Speaker 4: I felt a lot for her when she was shopping
• 31:52
  Speaker 4: for the dress and then when she was having issues
• 31:56
  Speaker 4: with like her panteose and like the bathings. Yeah, I
• 32:01
  Speaker 4: just related to that so much because I remember being
• 32:03
  Speaker 4: in like the dressing room and thinking it looked terrible.
• 32:08
  Speaker 2: The safety pin that might have been a few years ago,
• 32:11
  Speaker 2: come on now, yes, Yeah, at Dragon Con sometimes just
• 32:15
  Speaker 2: get that safety pin and hope for the best. I mean,
• 32:18
  Speaker 2: I was definitely one of those things where, like him,
• 32:23
  Speaker 2: the boy calling her el Chunko, I was like, yeah,
• 32:26
  Speaker 2: what point is that funny? And Allison, you drop the ball.
• 32:29
  Speaker 2: You should be defending your friend. How dare you say
• 32:34
  Speaker 2: such a thing, because that is rude. Also, the jazzer size,
• 32:38
  Speaker 2: which apparently is still around.
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: I believe it that's still around.
• 32:42
  Speaker 2: I think there's a whole studio somewhere in Atlanta. I
• 32:45
  Speaker 2: think I passed it on to long Ago. It's a
• 32:47
  Speaker 2: jazzer size studio. And I was like wow, And I say,
• 32:50
  Speaker 2: this is a person who loves zumba, but I zooma
• 32:52
  Speaker 2: classes are a little different. But just saying I was like,
• 32:56
  Speaker 2: oh my gosh, I wonder what that's like.
• 32:58
  Speaker 4: Is it Stephanie didn't she she was going to do
• 33:01
  Speaker 4: a report on Jane Fonders, yes, which.
• 33:03
  Speaker 2: By the way, I was like, oh, this is also
• 33:06
  Speaker 2: I don't know what to think about this, because like
• 33:07
  Speaker 2: now we know Jane Fonda as an icon and she
• 33:10
  Speaker 2: should be noted as a revolutionary, Like she wasn't activist,
• 33:13
  Speaker 2: she was a protester. She is a protester. She's been
• 33:16
  Speaker 2: arrested for speaking up for the people like just exercise, which,
• 33:21
  Speaker 2: by the way, yes, she was the queen yeah of
• 33:26
  Speaker 2: aerobics at that point in time, and looked good doing
• 33:28
  Speaker 2: and also did cause a lot of eating disorders as well,
• 33:30
  Speaker 2: because everybody thought she had they had like her or
• 33:32
  Speaker 2: like Suzanne Summers, which is a complete lie. But I
• 33:37
  Speaker 2: was like, oh, everybody saying that she's not significant enough.
• 33:39
  Speaker 2: I'm like, what do you know? This woman is what
• 33:43
  Speaker 2: she has done and how her and her family really
• 33:46
  Speaker 2: were revolutionaries and icons to this day, and we'll go
• 33:49
  Speaker 2: in history as such.
• 33:51
  Speaker 4: Yeah, but she was talking about her celebrity and her exercise.
• 33:57
  Speaker 2: I loved it. There's so many good And then I
• 33:59
  Speaker 2: was also with this because I got just to throw
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: it in here with the technology with the phone. Oh,
• 34:06
  Speaker 2: I know, you youngins don't understand. And we're talking about
• 34:08
  Speaker 2: how we would hide, and she talked about she wanted
• 34:10
  Speaker 2: a very long cord associate that she can stretch and
• 34:13
  Speaker 2: walk about. You don't know. This was before cordless.
• 34:17
  Speaker 3: I believe.
• 34:19
  Speaker 2: You did have cordless. You couldn't stray either A you
• 34:22
  Speaker 2: couldn't stray too far away or get too staticy or B.
• 34:25
  Speaker 2: Those were expensive.
• 34:27
  Speaker 4: Yeah, And it's so she Stephanie would go into a
• 34:31
  Speaker 4: pantry and stretch her legs out and have some privacy.
• 34:33
  Speaker 4: And when I was a kid, I didn't have something
• 34:35
  Speaker 4: like that, and it was really awkward because she'd be
• 34:37
  Speaker 4: in the living room based on where the cord could go.
• 34:41
  Speaker 4: You've got your parents there, you've got a guy.
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: That's called you. They're listening in on everything you can say, right,
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: So that was a very I was like, oh, yeah,
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: I forgot about that.
• 34:51
  Speaker 2: I went to my upstairs avocado and orange wallpapered avocado sinc.
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: Sat in the bathroom while put the phone on the
• 34:59
  Speaker 2: ironing as I sat on the toilet, telling my little
• 35:02
  Speaker 2: boyfriend Matt at the time that I loved him, and
• 35:04
  Speaker 2: hung up, like I knew what that meant. Not that
• 35:07
  Speaker 2: that was like the third grade. But to be fair,
• 35:10
  Speaker 2: I think I read this in the third grade. I
• 35:12
  Speaker 2: don't think I was actually in middle school when I
• 35:13
  Speaker 2: was reading this book specifically. But all that is is
• 35:17
  Speaker 2: like I remember that stretching that cord in getting under
• 35:20
  Speaker 2: the phone, my brother getting on the phone and telling
• 35:22
  Speaker 2: me to get off. Yeah, oh who you talking to
• 35:25
  Speaker 2: your boyfriend?
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: And that's not even to mention the awkwardness of going
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: through the person's parents when you would call him. And
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: I had a friend who went to bed. They had
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: like a strict like nine PM bedtime and I could
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: stay up till pm. So sometimes I would call at
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: nine and they'd be like, oh, they're asleep. Who's calling?
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: And it was just so awkward.
• 35:47
  Speaker 2: Yes, who's this? Yes speaking?
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: Yes? How did you go into the parents? Yeah?
• 35:54
  Speaker 2: Did you just answer hey, hello? Or did you say hey,
• 35:57
  Speaker 2: this is Samantha or this whatever?
• 35:59
  Speaker 4: I think I'm say, hey this is Annie. Okay, I
• 36:02
  Speaker 4: think so, but could have been anything.
• 36:06
  Speaker 2: Again, I think it's hilarious because we talked to this
• 36:08
  Speaker 2: e I've talked to Eve's about this, specifically about phone etiquette,
• 36:11
  Speaker 2: and she loves talking on the phone, and I despise it.
• 36:14
  Speaker 2: I'm like, if you're talking to me on the phone,
• 36:16
  Speaker 2: and I feel like it might be a millennial thing.
• 36:17
  Speaker 2: Maybe we've been really traumatized by the whole trying to
• 36:20
  Speaker 2: get this, guessing who it is and not wanting to
• 36:22
  Speaker 2: do this. Yeah, but okay, bye.
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: I'll just hang up. This was not work. That's stressed.
• 36:32
  Speaker 2: I don't want to do this anymore. But I love talking.
• 36:34
  Speaker 2: I love talking on the phone. I feel like growing up, yeah,
• 36:38
  Speaker 2: like it was definitely something that we would do. I
• 36:40
  Speaker 2: remember three numbers and one of them was my good
• 36:43
  Speaker 2: friend Cassie, who she now would talk on the phone
• 36:47
  Speaker 2: to six eight eight. I still remember her number, her
• 36:50
  Speaker 2: parents number. I say this, but also she I think
• 36:53
  Speaker 2: was one of the ones that was spoiled. And I
• 36:55
  Speaker 2: say this in the loving manner because I was very
• 36:57
  Speaker 2: jealous of her because she got her own profit line.
• 37:02
  Speaker 4: Yeah that's nice, that's nice. Yeah, And I mean the
• 37:06
  Speaker 4: thing is like I had a best friend who was
• 37:09
  Speaker 4: my neighbor. I actually had two best friends who were
• 37:11
  Speaker 4: my neighbor, but one of us drifted apart. And at
• 37:16
  Speaker 4: the time, you didn't have cell phones, so no, wouldn't
• 37:18
  Speaker 4: pick up your your landline and hope that you could
• 37:21
  Speaker 4: get a hold of them or just walk over. But
• 37:24
  Speaker 4: it was yeah, that's a new new thing for a
• 37:28
  Speaker 4: lot of young listeners.
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: I take it.
• 37:34
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I guess I didn't understand what like when we
• 37:36
  Speaker 2: were grounded from the phone, we were literally like not able.
• 37:40
  Speaker 2: Not that you could literally take the cell phone away. No, no, no,
• 37:42
  Speaker 2: like you were not allowed on the phone and if
• 37:44
  Speaker 2: you got in trouble, which our friends would. I never did,
• 37:48
  Speaker 2: but my friends would be parents be like, I'm sorry,
• 37:50
  Speaker 2: she's grounded on the phone right now. This is she
• 37:52
  Speaker 2: won't be able to talk to you for a week
• 37:53
  Speaker 2: like it. Yeah, I got those messages. Oh, the eighties, nineties,
• 38:00
  Speaker 2: you heard the nineties, shut up, don't talk. And of
• 38:13
  Speaker 2: course another big factor is family. For Stephanie, it was
• 38:16
  Speaker 2: kind of a whole new level of family. I think
• 38:18
  Speaker 2: it was an important conversation because this is when the
• 38:21
  Speaker 2: divorce rates started going up, separations, trial separation, which was
• 38:24
  Speaker 2: kind of a newer term at that point in time,
• 38:27
  Speaker 2: Saturday happening, and children having to learn about what divorce was.
• 38:31
  Speaker 2: So this again was fairly fairly new. It was huge.
• 38:34
  Speaker 2: I know in the eighties, even in the early nineties,
• 38:37
  Speaker 2: divorces were taboo for a lot of these neighborhoods. And
• 38:42
  Speaker 2: talking about it and seeing it and then having other
• 38:45
  Speaker 2: people talk about it, it seemed fairly normal the way
• 38:48
  Speaker 2: that Stephanie's like parents' friends or people her parents' age
• 38:53
  Speaker 2: seemed to be handling it. But it wasn't. And for
• 38:56
  Speaker 2: Stephanie to deal with that, not knowing how to understand
• 38:59
  Speaker 2: who was that fault. There's so many things that I
• 39:02
  Speaker 2: was like, Wow, she really tried to hit on a
• 39:04
  Speaker 2: subject that was really new.
• 39:07
  Speaker 4: Kind of yeah, and it touches on a lot of
• 39:11
  Speaker 4: things that you know as a kid, you don't you
• 39:16
  Speaker 4: have these allegiances and the who's right, who's wrong? Who
• 39:19
  Speaker 4: is like she because she was still living with her mom,
• 39:22
  Speaker 4: so I felt like she still had a pretty clear
• 39:24
  Speaker 4: allegiance to her mom, even though she was angry her
• 39:27
  Speaker 4: mom for not telling her.
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: And it was a big deal.
• 39:29
  Speaker 4: I remember I had a friend whose parents got divorced
• 39:32
  Speaker 4: in high school and and she was so upset, and
• 39:37
  Speaker 4: you know, we had our friend group gather and try
• 39:39
  Speaker 4: to comfort her, but it was such like a big deal.
• 39:43
  Speaker 4: It was like what's going to happen now? And what
• 39:45
  Speaker 4: does this mean? And then talking about do they have
• 39:48
  Speaker 4: a girlfriend now or a boyfriend now?
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: Like what what does that mean?
• 39:52
  Speaker 2: Who's faults?
• 39:54
  Speaker 4: Why is this happening? I thought everything was fine and
• 39:57
  Speaker 4: they seemed like they were in love and all of
• 39:59
  Speaker 4: those things, And I remember how difficult it was to
• 40:04
  Speaker 4: navigate even as her friend.
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: I was like, really tough.
• 40:10
  Speaker 2: I don't know, like I'm trying to remember if I
• 40:12
  Speaker 2: had friends who had gone through divorces. I feel like
• 40:16
  Speaker 2: a lot of the times, I don't even think I
• 40:19
  Speaker 2: have friends that had divorced. I think it was much
• 40:21
  Speaker 2: later when that would go down like we were not
• 40:24
  Speaker 2: in middle school. I think this was the rise of
• 40:27
  Speaker 2: like the empty nest syndrome, because they would wait till
• 40:31
  Speaker 2: the kids left home before they would actually initiate divorce,
• 40:34
  Speaker 2: if I remember correctly, because I don't remember. I'm like
• 40:39
  Speaker 2: going through my head of like all the people that
• 40:41
  Speaker 2: all my little friends and if they ever I don't
• 40:44
  Speaker 2: think so, and who they would have been, or they
• 40:48
  Speaker 2: were already divorced, and they were always already kind of
• 40:51
  Speaker 2: like an outcast, like they were like, oh you know
• 40:53
  Speaker 2: what I mean, like it was already a thing. It's
• 40:56
  Speaker 2: such a weird thing to think about now that it
• 40:58
  Speaker 2: is kind of normalized, like yeah, happens. Yeah, well it's
• 41:03
  Speaker 2: still tragic and traumatic.
• 41:05
  Speaker 4: Yeah yeah, And relating to that is sort of the
• 41:08
  Speaker 4: I feel like a lot of the US and our
• 41:10
  Speaker 4: friend group, well maybe like half did end up having
• 41:15
  Speaker 4: parents who got separated or who got divorced, or just
• 41:18
  Speaker 4: who didn't have really good relationships and we found out
• 41:21
  Speaker 4: about it later after we'd gone to college or something.
• 41:25
  Speaker 4: Hers was just it was kind of shocking in middle
• 41:29
  Speaker 4: school to be like, oh, whoa, I've stayed at your house.
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: I like know your parents, right, mind, blowing to me.
• 41:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and then also the way like again the dad
• 41:43
  Speaker 2: having a girlfriend, so although I don't know how quicklyst was,
• 41:47
  Speaker 2: but this seems quick, and then introducing the kids without
• 41:50
  Speaker 2: even hello, and I was like, yeah, this this is gross,
• 41:54
  Speaker 2: especially because it's a trial separation. I'm like, that's not divorce.
• 41:59
  Speaker 2: That's weird.
• 42:00
  Speaker 4: And also clearly Stephanie at least was very unhappy unsettled.
• 42:08
  Speaker 4: I completely understand why, and he knew that right and
• 42:12
  Speaker 4: to like have someone there that she didn't know was
• 42:15
  Speaker 4: going to be there that he didn't introduce to her
• 42:17
  Speaker 4: and then left her alone with like a whole day.
• 42:20
  Speaker 4: I mean, admittedly Stephanie was like, I'm not going anywhere,
• 42:22
  Speaker 4: but still he was like, so you'll stay with her.
• 42:25
  Speaker 2: Right, And maybe that's just where we because I would
• 42:29
  Speaker 2: have been that child in that situation obviously in that timeframe.
• 42:32
  Speaker 2: So as as adults have become a little more aware
• 42:35
  Speaker 2: of that and we like very cautious about you don't
• 42:38
  Speaker 2: introduce anybody until you have this and this and this,
• 42:40
  Speaker 2: and make sure your child is priority in that level
• 42:43
  Speaker 2: of like I don't want people coming in and out
• 42:45
  Speaker 2: my life in her getting attached or not attached or
• 42:48
  Speaker 2: all these things are being cautious, caring about the co parenting,
• 42:51
  Speaker 2: like that's being a big deal. Like maybe we learn
• 42:53
  Speaker 2: from that, And maybe it was that generation really being like, yeah,
• 42:56
  Speaker 2: he's their kid. They don't get to say which we did?
• 42:59
  Speaker 2: We did? We grew up that way. Yeah.
• 43:02
  Speaker 4: Yeah. Maybe I kind of felt like he and I've
• 43:06
  Speaker 4: gotten this vibe from other people in my life, but
• 43:08
  Speaker 4: I kind of felt like he thought it would just
• 43:10
  Speaker 4: work out, like if you just left Stephanie and didn't
• 43:14
  Speaker 4: it was like with iris was the girl's the girlfriend's name,
• 43:18
  Speaker 4: that they would work it out and it would be fine.
• 43:21
  Speaker 4: So I kind of felt like he was sort of
• 43:23
  Speaker 4: skirting his he didn't want to have like a big fight,
• 43:29
  Speaker 4: and he was hoping that she, Stephanie, would come around. Yeah,
• 43:33
  Speaker 4: and it didn't. That she's very stubborn. I have to
• 43:36
  Speaker 4: say again, I understand why, but she is very like
• 43:40
  Speaker 4: I am mad, this is it.
• 43:44
  Speaker 2: I shall never talk to you again, none of you,
• 43:47
  Speaker 2: none of you. So also again that turkey sandwich that
• 43:51
  Speaker 2: she eats because she's so upset everybody, it was very
• 43:55
  Speaker 2: like I could see it, and I wanted a turkey sandwich.
• 43:58
  Speaker 2: Do I like turkey sandwich is not necessarily but I
• 44:00
  Speaker 2: wanted one. At that point, It's like, oh, okay, grandbarray'sall
• 44:02
  Speaker 2: or you're making a hell of a sandwich. Let me
• 44:04
  Speaker 2: have one of those. Let me have one of those.
• 44:07
  Speaker 2: That's good. And with the family, of course, I have
• 44:11
  Speaker 2: to bring in the whole adoption bit, because again it
• 44:14
  Speaker 2: was interesting because I feel like maybe I also had
• 44:17
  Speaker 2: this mind frame I did I did as a kid
• 44:19
  Speaker 2: about like I'm not interested in finding my biological parents
• 44:24
  Speaker 2: and they are my family and they're great, you know
• 44:27
  Speaker 2: all these things and that level like we're a perfect family.
• 44:29
  Speaker 2: There's nothing wrong with us, and this is exactly what
• 44:31
  Speaker 2: it should be. And then not kind of really kind
• 44:34
  Speaker 2: of like away from like being that conversation like how
• 44:38
  Speaker 2: do you feel about this? Do you remember anything? Do
• 44:40
  Speaker 2: you miss your you know, like your biological farmer, or
• 44:43
  Speaker 2: do you want to find them? And her being and
• 44:44
  Speaker 2: flippant like no whatever, and then that kind of being
• 44:47
  Speaker 2: the end of the conversation about how you're so loved.
• 44:49
  Speaker 2: I've never seen anyone more love than you, and I'm like,
• 44:52
  Speaker 2: that's very glossy, uh outlook, And it kind of was. Again,
• 44:58
  Speaker 2: it was a pretty big trend in the eighties nineties
• 45:00
  Speaker 2: to adopt Asian kids or kids of other races. Internationally,
• 45:06
  Speaker 2: it became a kind of a fad and no hope
• 45:10
  Speaker 2: for all this intents and purposes. But with that like
• 45:15
  Speaker 2: not glamorizing it but also seeing it as like a
• 45:18
  Speaker 2: charity thing. Also, this was a famous like movie star
• 45:22
  Speaker 2: or actress who had done this, and so obviously they're
• 45:25
  Speaker 2: gonna be fine, and she's gonna be so spoiled all
• 45:26
  Speaker 2: these things. It was an interesting take because it definitely
• 45:30
  Speaker 2: was It did mirror what I felt like I should
• 45:33
  Speaker 2: have been, you know. But then at the same time,
• 45:35
  Speaker 2: I was also the youngest of four and the three
• 45:38
  Speaker 2: older ones were biological so I did not have that
• 45:41
  Speaker 2: interaction of like I was chosen because it couldn't have
• 45:43
  Speaker 2: kids type of conversation. But I did find that interesting
• 45:47
  Speaker 2: as well as the pregnancy bit, you know, her being like,
• 45:50
  Speaker 2: this is a miracle, baby. What are you gonna do.
• 45:52
  Speaker 2: You're gonna be in your fifties when this kid is
• 45:54
  Speaker 2: my age, all these things, and I'm like, oh, recently,
• 45:58
  Speaker 2: we just had more pores about the divate. More and
• 46:01
  Speaker 2: more people are having kids later and later in life,
• 46:04
  Speaker 2: and that's kind of getting to be the norm interesting take.
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I have to say.
• 46:15
  Speaker 4: The like last twenty pages of book packs and so
• 46:19
  Speaker 4: much I remember looking at like there's.
• 46:22
  Speaker 1: A lot to be resolved here and this much love,
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: so you.
• 46:28
  Speaker 4: Get this this panicked Allison showing up at Stephanie's house
• 46:35
  Speaker 4: and being like, I'm gonna go find my biological parents.
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: They're gonna have this kid.
• 46:39
  Speaker 4: It's going to be their biological kid, and they're not
• 46:43
  Speaker 4: going to love me anymore, and having those deep conversations
• 46:46
  Speaker 4: and going to your friends for it.
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: Uh, I really appreciated. But then gets really sick.
• 46:56
  Speaker 4: With the flu, and so I'm kind of like she says, oh,
• 47:00
  Speaker 4: it's gonna be fine, which I'm gonna be fine. But
• 47:03
  Speaker 4: it was a very quick resolution, I suppose. And then
• 47:08
  Speaker 4: the same thing kind of happened with Rachel and Stephanie's fight,
• 47:12
  Speaker 4: which I thought was very sweet because it mirrored where
• 47:15
  Speaker 4: they would walk each other back home over and over
• 47:17
  Speaker 4: jokingly that happened in the beginning, but it was also
• 47:21
  Speaker 4: kind of like, oh, it's over, and then the dad's
• 47:24
  Speaker 4: moving back. This all happened very it does.
• 47:27
  Speaker 2: It happens they it squishes together, which I feel like
• 47:30
  Speaker 2: happens is a lot of stories. I will say once again,
• 47:34
  Speaker 2: this is a part of a best friends series. But
• 47:36
  Speaker 2: there's only two books, the ones I already mentioned just
• 47:38
  Speaker 2: as long as We're Together, and Here's to You Rachel Robinson,
• 47:42
  Speaker 2: which I guess. Oh, that was published in nineteen ninety three,
• 47:44
  Speaker 2: so it was good like six seven years after the
• 47:47
  Speaker 2: first book, so maybe they have a better resolution on
• 47:50
  Speaker 2: that one.
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: I don't think.
• 47:53
  Speaker 4: I'm not upset at the resolution. I'm just saying it like,
• 47:56
  Speaker 4: there's a lot that happens in the life. I asked,
• 48:00
  Speaker 4: like twenty pages.
• 48:02
  Speaker 2: It wraps up. You're not wrong, Yeah, but yeah, yeah, yeah,
• 48:07
  Speaker 2: I think it's funny because it is, uh, it is
• 48:09
  Speaker 2: those two. I'm not really sure what happens with Rachel Robinson.
• 48:13
  Speaker 2: Like I said, I never read that. If this was
• 48:14
  Speaker 2: published in nineteen ninety three, I don't know why I
• 48:17
  Speaker 2: didn't read it. It feels like I would have read it,
• 48:20
  Speaker 2: but I didn't. I was going on to win at
• 48:24
  Speaker 2: this point. Lamas Lama's actually was what became one of
• 48:27
  Speaker 2: my favorite books in the sixth seventh grade. So I'm
• 48:30
  Speaker 2: an oddball.
• 48:31
  Speaker 1: You needed those points.
• 48:33
  Speaker 2: I got to have them points. Y'all, don't understand. I
• 48:36
  Speaker 2: cannot believe I have read Tolstoy. Did it make sense
• 48:39
  Speaker 2: to me?
• 48:39
  Speaker 4: No?
• 48:39
  Speaker 2: And Akarnina scarred me, and I was like, why why
• 48:42
  Speaker 2: did I just read this?
• 48:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah, there are plenty of books that I was like
• 48:45
  Speaker 1: taking the test and just like I don't know. I
• 48:48
  Speaker 1: read it, but I couldn't understand it. So I'm taking
• 48:50
  Speaker 1: my best guess.
• 48:51
  Speaker 2: I couldn't even pronounce Lama's. I was like lame miserable,
• 48:54
  Speaker 2: and they're like Lama's Well, I was like, yeah, that
• 48:56
  Speaker 2: Lema's whatever. I remember when I when I was trying
• 48:59
  Speaker 2: to talk about it, I would fight you anyway. But yes,
• 49:03
  Speaker 2: that is all. Like, there's so much more again, Like
• 49:07
  Speaker 2: I said, this is one of those books that really
• 49:09
  Speaker 2: left a huge impact. I forgot a lot about it
• 49:12
  Speaker 2: because it's been years since I've read it, But I
• 49:14
  Speaker 2: loved I loved loved the book. I felt for the
• 49:17
  Speaker 2: first time there was a little bit of representation for
• 49:19
  Speaker 2: me to cling to, even though she wasn't the protagonist,
• 49:22
  Speaker 2: she wasn't necessarily the main character, but she was a
• 49:25
  Speaker 2: friend a friend group that was normalized, that wasn't seen
• 49:29
  Speaker 2: as a caricature of anything. Maybe the gigly bit. I
• 49:32
  Speaker 2: feel like it was very stereotypical, but whatever. All that
• 49:36
  Speaker 2: to say, like it felt nice to have this as
• 49:38
  Speaker 2: well as like the friends coming through and understanding like
• 49:41
  Speaker 2: the growth of friendship were the loss of friendship and
• 49:44
  Speaker 2: it being what it is, and understanding you can have
• 49:47
  Speaker 2: more than one best friend. You could have more than
• 49:48
  Speaker 2: one best friend.
• 49:50
  Speaker 4: You can and I recommend it.
• 49:53
  Speaker 2: Yes, yes, agreed, Annie, thank you for coming on this
• 49:57
  Speaker 2: memory lane.
• 49:58
  Speaker 3: For me, it was.
• 50:02
  Speaker 2: It was nostalgic, it was nice.
• 50:05
  Speaker 4: I enjoyed it. I'm loving that August tends to be
• 50:09
  Speaker 4: the month where we do something.
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: Kind of whier. Yeah, you do.
• 50:14
  Speaker 4: Childhood favorites, or we do kind of geeky brom coms
• 50:18
  Speaker 4: or something like that.
• 50:20
  Speaker 1: I'm enjoying this trend. Should keep it up.
• 50:23
  Speaker 2: We got to keep it with it around your birthday
• 50:25
  Speaker 2: and then also with the five and Dragon cons coming,
• 50:28
  Speaker 2: we have no choice but to keep it a little
• 50:30
  Speaker 2: lighter too much.
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: That's true, because I have to take some days off. Listeners.
• 50:35
  Speaker 2: If you don't, yeah, obviously yes, and then you know
• 50:38
  Speaker 2: Labor Day you should yeah, of.
• 50:42
  Speaker 1: Course, of course.
• 50:43
  Speaker 4: Well, listeners, we would love to hear from you if
• 50:45
  Speaker 4: you have any thoughts on this. If you've never read
• 50:48
  Speaker 4: it and are from a younger generation, I would love
• 50:51
  Speaker 4: for you to go read it and.
• 50:52
  Speaker 2: Then report back and talk to us about it.
• 50:55
  Speaker 4: That would be amazing and any recommendations are always welcome.
• 51:00
  Speaker 4: You can email us at Hello at stuff Onenever Told
• 51:02
  Speaker 4: You dot com. You can find us on Blue Sky
• 51:05
  Speaker 4: at mamsa podcast or on Instagram and TikTok at stuff
• 51:07
  Speaker 4: one Never Told You for us on YouTube, and we
• 51:09
  Speaker 4: have a book you can get where you get your books.
• 51:11
  Speaker 4: Thanks as always to our super roduc pre Senior Executive
• 51:13
  Speaker 4: Prius Maya and a conturbtor Joey.
• 51:15
  Speaker 2: Thank you.
• 51:16
  Speaker 4: Thanks to you for listening.
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: Stuff Never Told You is pushed by her Radio.
• 51:19
  Speaker 4: For more podcast from my Heart Radio, you can check
• 51:20
  Speaker 4: out the Heart Radio, a Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
• 51:22
  Speaker 4: listen to your favorite shows.