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David Sedaris is Mostly Bark, Some Bite · Pod Save America

• 0:20
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm John Lovett. I just
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: wrapped a great conversation with the writer David Sedaris, who's
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: out with a new collection of essays called The Land
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: and Its People. We talked about his father's support for Trump,
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: why no one cared when David was bit by a dog,
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: what you can't talk about in a healthy relationship, Moby Dick,
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: International McDonald's, the word queer punching down, why he avoids
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: pride parades, and what he fears most about getting old.
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: And speaking of pride, over on the Love It or
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: Leave It channel, this week we are doing a pride
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: special with Marcin Delicato from Hacks, Drag Race winner Mikey Meeks, Osco, Kotzka,
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: and the legend himself, Bruce Valanche, plus many more guests.
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: Check out Love It or Leave It every Wednesday and
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: Friday on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts. All right,
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: now let's go to my conversation with David Sedaris. David Sedaris,
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: so nice to meet you, so nice to have you here.
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: Well, thanks so much for having me.
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: Ten years ago, after Trump won the first time, you
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: wrote an essay for the Paris Review about arguing with
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: your father over whether Trump is an asshole. And then
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: the next day, your dad says to you, so are
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: you still talking to me? And I thought that was
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: interesting because... He didn't say, I'm not talking to you.
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: He said, are you still talking to me? And I
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: often feel like with, especially inside of a family, when
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: you're arguing about Trump, there's this understanding that whether it's
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: admitted or not, you know he's a bad person and
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: there's something a little bit wrong with voting for him.
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: And people are looking for some kind of forgiveness or
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: lack of judgment, even though they know they did something wrong.
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: And I'm wondering if you felt that when you were
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: talking to your father, other people in your life that
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: voted for Trump?
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: Well, with my dad, it started really, he was like
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: a Republican, like just wanted to keep more of his
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: own money. And then he voted for Jesse Helms, which
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: was a thing because Jesse Helms would grow up in
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: Raleigh and he was on the, he was, he was,
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: did editorials on the news. And even as a kid,
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: you were like, wow, that guy's really severe, you know?
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: And then he ran for office and, And it really,
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: when he voted for Jesse Helms, it just became a
• 2:33
  Speaker 2: different thing. And then conservative radio came along and then
• 2:37
  Speaker 2: he started listening to Rush Limbaugh and then Fox News
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: came along. And so then he was just in it
• 2:43
  Speaker 2: all the time. He was in it in his car
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: and he was in it at home. And it was
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: on all the time like a rage machine, you know.
• 2:50
  Speaker 2: And then when he moved into an assisted living when
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: he was like 95 and he didn't know how to
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: work the TV and For the first time, he wasn't
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: being agitated every minute. And toward the end of his life,
• 3:04
  Speaker 2: he regretted. He told me he regretted voting for Trump,
• 3:09
  Speaker 2: which was interesting to me. But I have a friend
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: in England who is a politician, and he and I
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: pick up trash together. When I first moved to the
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: countryside in England, my boyfriend Hugh wrote a letter to
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: the council saying like, what's going on with all this
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: trash on the side of the road? And they invited
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: us to the clean and tidy advisory board, right? To
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: a meeting. So we met this guy who's a local
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: politician and he goes and picks up trash himself. And
• 3:38
  Speaker 2: so I do it myself every day between four and
• 3:41
  Speaker 2: six hours. And sometimes he comes with me, right? And
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: he was a Tory, but now he's reform, right? Now
• 3:49
  Speaker 2: he's Nigel Farage. And he said, you're not going to
• 3:52
  Speaker 2: want to talk to me anymore. And I said, oh, no,
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: that's not the case at all. You know, like I
• 3:57
  Speaker 2: would never stop talking to him over that. He answers
• 4:02
  Speaker 2: any question I ask him. You know, we don't, and
• 4:05
  Speaker 2: I appreciate that. I'd like to know why he feels
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: the way that he does. We've never raised our voices
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: to each other. It's, I think it's a great relationship.
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: And when my dad was like, you're not going to,
• 4:19
  Speaker 2: you're right. He Well, I think part of it too,
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: I mean, my dad, North Carolina, you know, gay marriage
• 4:27
  Speaker 2: was illegal in North Carolina. And then they introduced like
• 4:31
  Speaker 2: a resolution that would make it extra, extra, extra, extra illegal.
• 4:35
  Speaker 2: And my dad was so happy to tell me he
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: voted for that. So happy to tell me that.
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: And I.
• 4:44
  Speaker 2: Happened to be in North Carolina at that time.
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: And, you know, my.
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: sister-in-law, her sister is gay. And I said, why shouldn't
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: she be allowed to marry her girlfriend? It sends the
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: wrong message. And I said, what message is that? And
• 5:04
  Speaker 2: then he couldn't really answer. He'd heard the answer on
• 5:10
  Speaker 2: the radio or on TV, but he couldn't quite remember
• 5:15
  Speaker 2: what was wrong with it, right? He couldn't quite recall
• 5:18
  Speaker 2: those words. Anyway, he was a dick, you know, just
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: a complete dick. And that was like the least of it.
• 5:26
  Speaker 2: Do you know what I mean? It wasn't like he
• 5:28
  Speaker 2: was a dick because of that. He was like a
• 5:30
  Speaker 2: massive dick anyway. And then there was that.
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: Right, right. No, for sure. But even like what you're
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: saying about this, the person who said he went reform, like, oh,
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: you're probably not going to want to talk to me. Like,
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: I've never heard a liberal say, I voted for Mamdani,
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: but you're probably not going to want to talk to me. Like,
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: there's some kind of acknowledgement inside of it. that it's
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: an act of like, not sabotage, but like of, of
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: I'm so mad about everything. I'm going to do this.
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: I'm going to vote for this, these terrible people, or
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: I'm going to become extreme. My reasons are legitimate, which
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: you don't appreciate, but I know on some level I'm
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: doing something wrong, right? Like I, that, that to me
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: is what I often hear from. And I, and I
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: feel that inside of when families are having these kinds
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: of arguments. And I'm wondering if that's, what you felt
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: from your dad, even though, even though you felt like
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: he was also.
• 6:22
  Speaker 2: I felt it was more like that me being gay
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: had something to do with it. It would be like
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: saying to a Jewish friend, I voted for the Nazi party.
• 6:30
  Speaker 2: You're probably not going to want to talk to me.
• 6:32
  Speaker 2: Whereas you would say to somebody who wasn't Jewish, you
• 6:35
  Speaker 2: would say, yeah, I voted for the Nazi party. And
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: you wouldn't add, you're probably not going to want to
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: talk to me because you can see how your vote
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: is going to make this person's life more miserable.
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: But did you, I know towards the very end of
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: his life, your father did say, really acknowledge how much
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: success you had and what you had built. But at
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: the same time, he's looking you in the eye and
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: being like, yeah, I'm just voting for the thing that
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: is going to make your life worse. And I'm just
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: doing it because I have some of my friends from
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: the radio. What is that? Is there any acknowledgement? What
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: do you think that was? Why did he care more
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: about what he was seeing on the television than he
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: did about you.
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: Oh, because it was all about money.
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: Just money.
• 7:25
  Speaker 2: I mean, yeah, ultimately it all came down to money.
• 7:28
  Speaker 2: I mean, if, oh my goodness, if a candidate said,
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: I'm going to bring back concentration camps, but I'm going
• 7:39
  Speaker 2: to knock $ 2 off your taxes, my father would have
• 7:42
  Speaker 2: voted for that person because it would save $ 2. I mean,
• 7:44
  Speaker 2: $ 2 was that important to It's not like he didn't
• 7:48
  Speaker 2: have $ 2. Ultimately, it was all about money, about keeping
• 7:57
  Speaker 2: more of his money.
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: I was looking at one of your older diaries. In 1990,
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: you and your dad and your brother Paul spent 18
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: hours in a pickup truck together driving from Illinois to
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: North Carolina. For someone who's now saying your father was
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: a dick... You also spent a lot of time together.
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: My father and I, I don't know what we would
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: talk about if we were in a car together for
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: 18 hours. Do you remember that drive? I remember it clearly.
• 8:27
  Speaker 2: Yeah. But if my father and I were in a
• 8:29
  Speaker 2: car for 18 hours, then he just would have criticized
• 8:32
  Speaker 2: me for 18 hours. But my brother was there. And
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: so that made it fun that my brother was there.
• 8:38
  Speaker 2: But yeah, I often think of that. I was moving
• 8:41
  Speaker 2: to New York City. So I was leaving Chicago. And
• 8:43
  Speaker 2: then I had some stuff I was going to bring
• 8:45
  Speaker 2: to North Carolina. And then I was going to go,
• 8:49
  Speaker 2: I was going to paint a house. My father had
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: rental property and I was going to paint a house
• 8:54
  Speaker 2: and then use that money to move to New York with.
• 8:58
  Speaker 2: So we drove from Chicago to North Carolina and I
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: painted the house. And I don't know what the deal was,
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: maybe that I was going to get $ 2, 000 for painting
• 9:07
  Speaker 2: the house, right? And I painted the house and he said,
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: I'll give you 500. I mean, everything about my father
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: prepared me for Trump. You know, someone works for you
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: and then you don't pay them. Or then you say,
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: I'll pay you a quarter of what you're going to
• 9:21
  Speaker 2: pay me. You get a quarter or you get nothing. So,
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: he was always a dick.
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean?
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: He might have driven me. You know, that was nice
• 9:32
  Speaker 2: of him. But, I mean, it wasn't like... He was
• 9:35
  Speaker 2: just taking like a day's vacation from being a dick.
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: You know?
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: So.
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: Now it's all these years later and you're telling the
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: Wall Street Journal that you bought a $ 2, 500 coat for
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: your tour. So things have changed. Things have picked up
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: for you. You're traveling around the world. Talk to me
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: about what international McDonald's has taught you, seeing McDonald's in
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: other countries and what it is. it teaches you about
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: the world and about America.
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: I eat McDonald's once a year in the Dallas airport
• 10:07
  Speaker 2: because I find myself at lunchtime in the Dallas airport
• 10:10
  Speaker 2: at least once a year and there's really no other
• 10:12
  Speaker 2: place to eat, right? But when I go to other countries,
• 10:15
  Speaker 2: I just love to see what McDonald's is offering. Like
• 10:18
  Speaker 2: the Grand Canyon Burger. We don't have the Grand Canyon
• 10:20
  Speaker 2: Burger here. You know, the Brooklyn Burger. I don't even
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: know what would be on a Brooklyn Burger. But you
• 10:26
  Speaker 2: go to other countries and you see billboards. And so
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: I always write it down. I don't know.
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: But you don't eat them. You just go through.
• 10:32
  Speaker 2: No, I don't eat them. No, I just write them
• 10:34
  Speaker 2: down and have them on my list of things that
• 10:37
  Speaker 2: McDonald's offers in other countries. Like I don't necessarily know
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: what they've. what they've got here. But I think if
• 10:49
  Speaker 2: they had a Grand Canyon burger, I would have heard
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: about it, or I would have seen an ad for it.
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah, they don't have that. I go there all the time.
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: When I was in Japan, when I was in Japan,
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: I was visiting a friend in Japan. It was 20
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: years ago. And he spoke Japanese, so that was going
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: to be helpful. And I don't speak any Japanese, but
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: by the time I had landed, he'd gotten quite sick.
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: And so I was alone in Japan. And every once
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: in a while in a kind of feeling of overwhelm
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: and panic, I would go to the McDonald's. But you
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: don't even eat the McDonald's in the other countries. So
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: for me, it's occasionally like a respite to be abroad
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: and be like, you know what, I need to go into,
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: I just need, I need 10 minutes to be inside
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: of the comfort and warm blanket of McDonald's, including eating it.
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: But for you, it's more just sort of observing it
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: almost like a, like David Attenborough on the Serengeti as
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: opposed to sort of consuming the McDonald's.
• 11:36
  Speaker 2: Yeah. In Tokyo, I observe it. And then I go
• 11:39
  Speaker 2: to Horeshanas Burger, Freshness Burgers. And that's how it's pronounced,
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: Horeshanasbaga or Mossberger. And they're great. They're Japanese chains and
• 11:50
  Speaker 2: they're great.
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: So you seem to be a little bit annoyed by
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: the language of the left these days. And you acknowledge
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: that part of this is that you're getting older and
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: everything is starting to annoy you more and more, which
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: I appreciate, though. I feel like maybe you've always had
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: a little bit of like there's you've always had a
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: kind of, I don't know, persnickety old man inside of you.
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: And maybe now it's coming out. Sure. But you do
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: have an essay in the book about punching down. Is
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: there anyone beneath you that you'd like to take a
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: shot at right now? Is there anyone you'd like to
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: punch down, Ash?
• 12:22
  Speaker 2: That essay came from when I first moved to New
• 12:24
  Speaker 2: York City, I didn't know anybody. And so there was
• 12:27
  Speaker 2: a class at the Y called Writing Funny. And it
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: was taught by this woman named Frida Garmes, who used
• 12:32
  Speaker 2: to be a Saturday commentator on All Things Considered. And
• 12:38
  Speaker 2: really funny, this British woman. And I thought, oh gosh,
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: there's not going to be any places left in the
• 12:43
  Speaker 2: class because she's teaching. And so I signed up for
• 12:45
  Speaker 2: this class and I was the only one who knew
• 12:48
  Speaker 2: who she was. And the first day she said, what
• 12:50
  Speaker 2: are the rules for comedy writing? And I said, you
• 12:53
  Speaker 2: should never make fun of anyone who has less power
• 12:56
  Speaker 2: than you. And she said, where on earth did you
• 12:58
  Speaker 2: get that idea from? She said, no, the only rule
• 13:01
  Speaker 2: of comedy writing is that you should be as tasteless
• 13:04
  Speaker 2: as possible. And so I've stuck by that ever since
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: she told me. I thought that's a good rule.
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: But you don't But who are we punching down at?
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: Who are you punching down at these days? Who's annoying you?
• 13:15
  Speaker 2: Oh, you know, no. Like, I had something on CBS
• 13:21
  Speaker 2: Sunday Morning, right? Not long ago. And I was in
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: Minneapolis Airport. And I went for lunch. And it was
• 13:31
  Speaker 2: this place where you had to seat yourself, order yourself
• 13:35
  Speaker 2: on the screen, pay, enter all your credit card information.
• 13:39
  Speaker 2: And then it asked how much you wanted to tip.
• 13:41
  Speaker 2: And I thought, I've done everything here. What would I
• 13:44
  Speaker 2: be tipping? And then I saw this woman come and
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: set food in front of somebody. And I wrote, then
• 13:50
  Speaker 2: I saw that she was an immigrant. And I thought
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: how my parents or my grandparents were immigrants, right? And
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: then it went on from there. And the Board of
• 14:00
  Speaker 2: Race and Culture at CBS said I was using my
• 14:06
  Speaker 2: privilege to punch down and call someone an immigrant. And
• 14:12
  Speaker 2: then they gave me an opportunity to defend myself. And
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: I said, immigrant is like a pharmacist. That's the word
• 14:20
  Speaker 2: for it. You know, I'm an immigrant in the United Kingdom.
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: I didn't say filthy immigrant. I didn't say, I just
• 14:28
  Speaker 2: said immigrant. And how did I know she was an immigrant? Oh,
• 14:32
  Speaker 2: I don't know. I mean, she was Ethiopian, you know,
• 14:36
  Speaker 2: and she had an accent. So I figured she must
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: have immigrated to, but I wasn't criticizing her in any way.
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: And there's nothing wrong with the word immigrant, you know,
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: and it sat on the shelf there for a year
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: and a half before they aired it. And so to me, that's,
• 14:58
  Speaker 2: I don't, I didn't understand even the charge. Like that's
• 15:02
  Speaker 2: not punching down on anybody. I just didn't, I, anyway,
• 15:08
  Speaker 2: I was just completely, mystified by that and I find
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: that that happens quite often with um with writing lately
• 15:20
  Speaker 2: you know like another circumstance like we flag this because
• 15:24
  Speaker 2: you use the word nanny and it's like yeah I
• 15:28
  Speaker 2: know people who are nannies and they identify as nannies
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: and it's not I'm not criticizing I'm not making fun
• 15:36
  Speaker 2: of anyone again it would be like if I said
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: that Peter was a pharmacist.
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  Speaker 1: Those meat people, their faces are bright red. You can
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: see every vein in their body. Like, I've never felt better.
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: I don't know that you know what feeling better is.
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: Back to your cat. And the point is, your cat,
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: gotta keep that cat healthy. And that means meat. Most
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: cat food out there uses meat byproducts and cuts their
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: food with cheap grain, filler, artificial ingredients. Basically, it's full
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: of stuff that isn't great for your cat. just so
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: the big pet food companies can save a couple of dollars.
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: Smalls is different. Their fresh recipes are over 80% animal protein,
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: and they never use fillers or artificial ingredients. Their food
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: is so healthy that 88% of cat parents say that
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: after feeding Smalls, they notice that their cat has better digestion,
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: softer and shinier, coats I spoon, and have more energy
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: to play because it's actually good for cats. If you
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: want to invest in your cat's health, Smalls has given
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: you 60% off your cat's first order, plus free shipping
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: and free treats for life. When you go to smalls.com
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: slash crooked, your life or the cat's life? You know? Honestly,
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: good question. Smalls.com slash crooked. That's 60% out of your
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: first order plus free shipping and free treats for life.
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: When you head to smalls.com slash crooked. It's clearly what
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: you're getting at, right? Like there's, you know, that there
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: are people that will say like, you know, it may
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: be the case that one reason Trump is president is
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: because people find the left annoying. And people will say
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: that's glib. And they'll say we have a lot bigger
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: problems in the world than and people being worried about
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: words we use, right? And that this is focusing on
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: the wrong thing and the right is hyping this all up.
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: At the same time though, there does seem to be
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: something where, you know, you have a story in the
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: book about what happened when you got bit by a
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: dog and you felt like the audience wasn't on your
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: side because of who owned the dog. And what you
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: say in the essay is that people are worried that
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: they will be perceived as not being empathetic enough. They'll
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: be worried that they'll be perceived as being kind of Republican.
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: Can you just talk about that and what happened there?
• 19:22
  Speaker 2: I was bitten by a dog, and I was in Portland, Oregon,
• 19:26
  Speaker 2: and there were these three people smoking fentanyl, and they
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: had two dogs, and I was walking down the street,
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: and both the dogs rushed forward, and one of them
• 19:35
  Speaker 2: bit me. And when I told people about it, I
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: had a show that night, and I talked about it,
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: and a woman said, well, you know, people with an
• 19:47
  Speaker 2: opioid use disorder lead incredibly difficult lives, you know, and
• 19:52
  Speaker 2: they're in no position to take care of their animals.
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: That's the sad part. And I'm like, is it? Is
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: that the sad part? And then other people were like,
• 20:03
  Speaker 2: what kind of a dog was it? But everybody acted.
• 20:06
  Speaker 2: If I had said this tech bro had this that
• 20:11
  Speaker 2: bit me, they'd be like, oh, those people, I've had
• 20:13
  Speaker 2: it up to here with those people. But because they
• 20:17
  Speaker 2: were smoking fentanyl, people felt like if they said like, oh,
• 20:21
  Speaker 2: that's awful, then they were being, then people might mistake
• 20:28
  Speaker 2: them for a Republican. Yeah. But since when did allowing
• 20:31
  Speaker 2: dogs to bite people become a Democrat point of principle?
• 20:35
  Speaker 2: I just don't understand that.
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: Well, it's, and it's the kind of thing, and the
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: reason I think it's like, this gets at something because
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: it's of course not a democratic point of principle. And
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: I'm sure there's a subset of people who genuinely feel
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: when you tell that story, like, oh, you're, this is
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: not the issue you're, you're punching down or, uh, you're
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: not being respectful enough of the challenges, et cetera. But
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: I would think most people would say, well, that's terrible.
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: And we have a real problem here and that shouldn't
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: have happened. And, We need to address the ways in
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: which people don't feel safe on the streets, whatever. And
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: I sometimes feel, but I do think a lot of
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: people are afraid to say, they're afraid to voice like,
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: you know, right now in Los Angeles, we're about to
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: have a mayor's race, right? And a lot of what
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: the issue is, is around how LA has a big
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: unhoused homeless population. And at the same time, there's a
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: lot of people that will get angry at a democratic
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: politician for being say, too aggressive at trying to clear
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: homeless encampments, right? When I bet if you polled people,
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: even Democrats, it would be a 70-30, 80-20 issue. But
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: a loud, vocal group of people online are there to
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: tell you that you're being a fascist. And I wonder
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: how many of the people telling you, people being afraid
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: to tell you that they think it's terrible that that
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: dog bit you are not saying what they really feel.
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: They're afraid of some sort of online mob or something.
• 22:03
  Speaker 2: You need to get bitten by a dog. I mean,
• 22:05
  Speaker 2: it's shocking because like I told a guy in my
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: New York building, I got bitten by a dog. What
• 22:11
  Speaker 2: did you do? I'm on your side. Am I not
• 22:14
  Speaker 2: coming across as being on your side? I'm saying you
• 22:16
  Speaker 2: would be amazed if you get bitten by a dog
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: at how people react. What kind of a dog was it?
• 22:26
  Speaker 2: I was shocked. Nobody said, nobody said, oh, that's awful.
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: You've been bitten by a dog. Well, like two people dead.
• 22:37
  Speaker 2: But if you talk to 15 people, two of them
• 22:40
  Speaker 2: would say, oh, that's awful.
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: Was it like a stitches situation? How deep did this
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: wound go?
• 22:45
  Speaker 2: It broke the skin.
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: Broke the skin.
• 22:47
  Speaker 2: I went to the pharmacy and she told me to
• 22:49
  Speaker 2: go to the emergency room. And then I just thought
• 22:52
  Speaker 2: that the people whose dog it was, they were just
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: going to carry on with their day. And I was like,
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: and then I'm going to spend all day in the
• 23:00
  Speaker 2: emergency room. I decided I would rather die than do that.
• 23:04
  Speaker 2: That I would literally rather die than go to the
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: emergency room. I got a lot of letters about people
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: who've been bitten by dogs. Like this one woman, she
• 23:14
  Speaker 2: was sitting on the sofa at a friend's house. And
• 23:16
  Speaker 2: she got up and the dog bit the back of
• 23:19
  Speaker 2: her neck. And the owner had to come and pry
• 23:21
  Speaker 2: its jaws open and said, I told you not to
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: make any sudden movements. You scared him. Like, it's a
• 23:29
  Speaker 2: dog thing. And it's a.
• 23:34
  Speaker 2: Drug addicts, dog thing. It's both. And then I got
• 23:39
  Speaker 2: a lot of letters from people. And this woman was
• 23:41
  Speaker 2: walking after dark. And a man was following her, close
• 23:46
  Speaker 2: behind her. And she stopped and turned around and said,
• 23:50
  Speaker 2: can I help you? And he said, I'm homeless.
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: I want money.
• 23:54
  Speaker 2: And she said, I don't have any money on me.
• 23:57
  Speaker 2: And she kept walking. And he kept following her. And
• 24:00
  Speaker 2: she turned around and said, look, this is making me
• 24:02
  Speaker 2: really uncomfortable. And he said, I also take Cash App.
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: And she said, I don't have Cash App. And when
• 24:07
  Speaker 2: she told people about it, they all said, you don't
• 24:10
  Speaker 2: have Cash App? As if that was the point of
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: the story, right? Where again, if she had said it
• 24:17
  Speaker 2: was a fraternity brother following her, that's outrageous to be
• 24:22
  Speaker 2: following somebody after dark. But instead, they acted like the
• 24:26
  Speaker 2: whole point of the story was that she didn't have
• 24:28
  Speaker 2: Cash App.
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 24:30
  Speaker 2: It is my job to notice.
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: Things like this. No, no, I'm glad you... Well, it's...
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: The thing about it... I'm interested in this in part because,
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: you know, whatever people's morals about this are, and there'll
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: be people that'll say, like, oh, you know, David Sedaris,
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: David Sedaris is becoming an old... He's becoming an old conservative.
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: He's getting, you know, conservative in his old age. But
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: if a political movement... is not honest about how people
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: actually feel. It's doomed to fail, right? How do people
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: like Spencer Pratt in LA or Donald Trump get purchased?
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: They get purchased because if you tell a bunch of
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: people that they're wrong to feel a certain way and
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: that the Democrats don't have a good answer for their
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: legitimate frustrations, then they'll go to people with bad answers.
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: And so I do think sometimes it's acknowledging that, hey,
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: there's something where we're not We're being a little bit
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: disrespectful for how people feel when they, say, get bitten
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: by a dog or feel like things in their community
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: don't feel safe. Now, it is pride. Happy pride. Are
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: you a pride guy? You go to the parades?
• 25:40
  Speaker 2: Not a pride guy.
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: Not a pride guy. That's surprising to me.
• 25:42
  Speaker 2: I'm not a parade person. Right.
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: Don't strike me as a parade person. You're a walker, though.
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: You could walk a parade. That's a nice way to
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: get in your steps, no?
• 25:51
  Speaker 2: No, it's too slow.
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: Too slow.
• 25:53
  Speaker 2: I mean, I went to that... I went to a
• 25:56
  Speaker 2: march in New York, the No Kings thing. But you're
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: walking like a third of a mile per hour. So
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: it's not the place to get steps in.
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: Is there anything gay you've done for pride, to celebrate pride?
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: What's the gayest thing you think you've done this month?
• 26:21
  Speaker 2: The gayest thing I've done this month? My luggage got lost.
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: Uh-huh.
• 26:25
  Speaker 2: And so I had to go to the airport United
• 26:30
  Speaker 2: desk in Denver, Colorado. And the guy said, if we
• 26:36
  Speaker 2: open your suitcase, we find your suitcase and we open it.
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: What is in there that we'll know what's yours? And
• 26:41
  Speaker 2: I said, it's a Burberry dop kit. I said plaid,
• 26:45
  Speaker 2: but it's not their iconic plaid. That was the gayest
• 26:49
  Speaker 2: thing that I've done in years.
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: What do you do with a Burberry dop kit? Why
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: do you need a Burberry brand docket?
• 26:56
  Speaker 2: What is that doing for you?
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: What happened to you?
• 26:59
  Speaker 2: It is so pretty.
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: Burberry docket? Oh, it's so pretty.
• 27:01
  Speaker 2: Oh, my gosh. It's so pretty. Because it doesn't, I
• 27:03
  Speaker 2: don't really like their signature plaid. No, it's too branded.
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: It's too branded.
• 27:09
  Speaker 2: It's just so pretty. And I saw it in the
• 27:10
  Speaker 2: window of the store in London. And then I went
• 27:13
  Speaker 2: in and I said, oh, I love that docket in
• 27:15
  Speaker 2: the window. And they said, what? And then I said, okay,
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: shaving kit in the window. And they said, that's not
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: a shaving kit. That's just to carry things around in.
• 27:24
  Speaker 2: But it's a shaving kit. I mean, you know, it
• 27:26
  Speaker 2: has a handle on the side. It's waterproof on the inside.
• 27:31
  Speaker 2: It's a shaving kit. Anyway, and I love it. And
• 27:36
  Speaker 2: you know what? If I lost it, that was when
• 27:38
  Speaker 2: I thought about if I never got my luggage back.
• 27:40
  Speaker 2: That's what I thought. I thought my shaving kit.
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: Do you remember when a Biden administration official who is
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: non-binary was stealing luggage and then putting on the dresses
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: they found inside of the luggage and then taking photographs
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: of themselves in public places with the stolen clothes? Oh,
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: you should read that story. It was pretty exciting. The
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: first non-binary Biden administration executive was stealing suitcases and then
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: wearing the clothes from inside of the suitcases. And it
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: was amazing. It was fantastic. It was fantastic. Speaking of,
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: now you struggle with the word queer and how the
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: language around being gay has evolved. Have you heard from
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: people on the road about this that call themselves queer
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: from Gen Z that that use different terms? Where are
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: you at now? Because you got some backlash for what
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: you said.
• 28:31
  Speaker 2: I love asking people about it. I love it. And
• 28:34
  Speaker 2: I find that generally it's a generational thing. Like a
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: lot of times when I meet young women, I say,
• 28:39
  Speaker 2: where do you stand on the word lesbian? And a
• 28:42
  Speaker 2: lot of them are just so insulted I even use
• 28:45
  Speaker 2: that word. They reject the word lesbian and they don't
• 28:49
  Speaker 2: want to be put in a box. And I said, well,
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: I'm still putting you in a box, but this one
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: has irritating person written on the side of it, you know?
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: And I find my problem with the word queer, I
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: have two problems, right? One, it doesn't tell me anything, right?
• 29:09
  Speaker 2: And two, it's the third time in my life I've
• 29:13
  Speaker 2: been rebranded. And it just, it'll happen to you too
• 29:17
  Speaker 2: when you get older. Like, People keep changing your name,
• 29:20
  Speaker 2: and nobody ever asks you. No one ever asks your opinion.
• 29:23
  Speaker 2: It's like, oh, you're this now. And then when people
• 29:26
  Speaker 2: come up to me and say, oh, you're a queer writer,
• 29:28
  Speaker 2: and it's like, no. No, I don't. And again, it
• 29:35
  Speaker 2: doesn't have anything to do with the word formally being...
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: an insult. I appreciate that it's short, you know, but
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: that's all that I really appreciate about it. But I
• 29:47
  Speaker 2: love asking people about it. And usually the people, you know,
• 29:53
  Speaker 2: younger people, they like having their own word. You know,
• 29:57
  Speaker 2: this is a young word. And so they feel like
• 29:59
  Speaker 2: it reflects them. but I feel, I guess I don't know.
• 30:03
  Speaker 2: You know, a woman came up to me and said, Oh,
• 30:07
  Speaker 2: you're a queer writer. She said, my, my daughter's queer.
• 30:10
  Speaker 2: My 12 year old daughter is queer. And I said, how?
• 30:13
  Speaker 2: And she said, she's asexual. I said, isn't that what
• 30:16
  Speaker 2: you want in a 12 year old?
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 30:19
  Speaker 2: I mean, maybe she's just 12. Yeah.
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: Well, that's in this sort of edge case. Well, I
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: remember when I was, I was a speech writer and
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: I struggled with this because, uh, I, you know, when
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: I was growing up, there was gay and there was straight.
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: And we all kind of, bisexual was a joke, right?
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: If a girl was bisexual, she was really straight. If
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: a guy was bisexual, he was really gay. And we
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: didn't really talk about trans. We didn't know about, we
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: didn't talk about non-binary. Gender wasn't really as much a
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: part of it. And when I became a speechwriter, I
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: remember watching as we would say, like, you know, we're
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: proud to celebrate gay rights. And then... well, you can't
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: just say gay rights. You have to say there's also
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: trans people. And then we started including in speeches LGBT.
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: And I remember as a writer feeling offended by LGBT
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: because it felt so mechanical. It felt like it was
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: from a manual about gay rights. It felt technical as
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: opposed to you know, we're so proud to have achieved
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: so much for gays and lesbians or the gay community,
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: saying LGBT felt just had a bad sound, right? And
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: that to me, so then you go to queer and
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: that's meant to be a catch-all. But I had the
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: same feeling that I think you have, like, wait, this
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: word doesn't feel exactly right. But I wonder how much
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: of that, like, what is it about the word that
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: doesn't feel like, it's not just that it was a slur, right?
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: There's something where it doesn't feel like it captures who
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: I am and I wouldn't use it, but it is
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: a useful word to have a catch-all. And I'm wondering
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: if you've thought about what is that feeling? Because if
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: it was just that it wasn't, you have a bad
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: feeling about the word. It's not just that it's not
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: as good as gay. You don't want it. So why?
• 32:17
  Speaker 2: Well, again, part of it too is that I just
• 32:20
  Speaker 2: feel that it's unspecific. It doesn't, tell me often when
• 32:24
  Speaker 2: I think of queer, I think of somebody who is
• 32:28
  Speaker 2: in a heterosexual relationship, but is open to the idea
• 32:33
  Speaker 2: of a three way and has a septum ring, you know?
• 32:36
  Speaker 2: And so, and that's a, that's a thing, right? And
• 32:40
  Speaker 2: so if that's your identity, you can be, that's your
• 32:43
  Speaker 2: queer habit, please. And I'll call you queer and everything,
• 32:48
  Speaker 2: but I'm not, I'm not queer. So I'm gay. And
• 32:54
  Speaker 2: you can be queer and that's fine. But I don't,
• 32:57
  Speaker 2: when the word queer is used on me by well-meaning
• 33:00
  Speaker 2: people who think, well, that's the word now. That's a
• 33:03
  Speaker 2: word they like us to use. You know that person.
• 33:07
  Speaker 2: I cringe, you know, and I don't. But again, when
• 33:11
  Speaker 2: you said something earlier as a writer, okay. I mean,
• 33:15
  Speaker 2: as a writer, yeah, language is what I deal, the
• 33:19
  Speaker 2: tools that I work with. So when people say it's
• 33:24
  Speaker 2: just a language thing, well, yeah, it's what I'm working with, right?
• 33:30
  Speaker 2: Like the New Yorker. Like I can't say prostitute and
• 33:34
  Speaker 2: the New Yorker. I have to say sex worker. To me,
• 33:38
  Speaker 2: a sex worker, like if you lost both your arms
• 33:40
  Speaker 2: in an accident, a sex worker would come to your
• 33:43
  Speaker 2: house and teach you how to pleasure yourself by rubbing
• 33:45
  Speaker 2: against a doorframe. That's a sex worker, right?
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: For sure. Yeah, yeah.
• 33:48
  Speaker 2: But then there's a prostitute, you know? So I will
• 33:53
  Speaker 2: never write about a prostitute and the New Yorker because
• 33:56
  Speaker 2: I don't want to use the word sex worker. I
• 33:58
  Speaker 2: don't like the word.
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: Right. You know?
• 34:00
  Speaker 2: And, and the same way, if I was in a
• 34:04
  Speaker 2: situation and they said, well, you have to use the
• 34:06
  Speaker 2: word queer, I would say, okay, well, I won't write
• 34:08
  Speaker 2: anything for you or I won't write about that. If
• 34:11
  Speaker 2: I know I have to use that word, I don't
• 34:13
  Speaker 2: want the word. I don't want to use it. I
• 34:14
  Speaker 2: don't like the way it sounds. I don't like, I
• 34:17
  Speaker 2: don't want to see it on paper. You know, I
• 34:18
  Speaker 2: don't want to type it. So, And that's, I don't
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: know that that has, I don't know if that's an
• 34:26
  Speaker 2: old thing, you know, just from being old or, I mean,
• 34:30
  Speaker 2: there are, it's not like I, any new word, I
• 34:36
  Speaker 2: don't want anything to do with. I mean, sometimes, well,
• 34:39
  Speaker 2: there are a lot of them that I don't want
• 34:41
  Speaker 2: anything to do with.
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: Pod Save America is brought to you by Fast Growing Trees.
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• 36:35
  Speaker 1: The sex worker thing is interesting because here's what I
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: worry about. Why am I reluctant? And is it because
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: it's because I don't want to be associated with the
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: style of writing that uses words like queer and sex worker?
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: That if you're describing a sex worker, there's a kind
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: of performative obtuseness and kind of a performative progressivism that
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: feels artificial. And so am I rebelling against that artificiality?
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: Not because of the word itself, but because I don't
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: like the way other people use it and the kind
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: of writing and thinking it's associated with. You know what
• 37:16
  Speaker 1: I'm saying? Yeah, exactly.
• 37:17
  Speaker 2: Yeah. A sex worker... took one college course, okay, is
• 37:23
  Speaker 2: a prostitute who took one course in college. Like, I
• 37:27
  Speaker 2: think if you went to the streets and you, and
• 37:30
  Speaker 2: someone was offering blowjobs and you say, what do you
• 37:33
  Speaker 2: want to be called? I think, I don't, I don't
• 37:37
  Speaker 2: know how many people would say sex worker.
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Sort of like how I would never make an early.
• 37:41
  Speaker 2: Maybe the thing to do would be to say to them,
• 37:43
  Speaker 2: what would you like to be addressing? What would you
• 37:45
  Speaker 2: like to be called?
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah. You know, Well, because we went through a round
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: of this when people were saying kind of Latinx.
• 37:50
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: And it turned out, you know, that that's sort of
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: an artificially produced sort of activism-based word that wasn't really
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: used outside of those spaces. And then kind of went
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: through a cycle of how people were using that word.
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: And then eventually we're not using that word anymore. And
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: it's like, okay, great. We're back to Latino, Latina. Well,
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: I think about it sort of for me, right? Because
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: I identify, I'm gay. But at the same time, I'm
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: I became comfortable with that at a time when I
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: didn't have another option, right? And I'm now 43. I
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: am married to a trans person. I choose to call
• 38:29
  Speaker 1: myself gay, even though, truthfully, the word queer probably more
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: appropriately defines what I am. But I choose to be
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: gay because I think being gay is a choice. Nobody's
• 38:40
  Speaker 1: going to take that away from me.
• 38:42
  Speaker 2: Well, I, like, when I was... I remember the word
• 38:47
  Speaker 2: gay coming into use, right? The term was homosexual. And
• 38:52
  Speaker 2: so I remember the term gay. And maybe because I
• 38:55
  Speaker 2: was 18 years old, I thought, great, because it fit.
• 39:01
  Speaker 2: And so maybe there were people who felt like gay
• 39:05
  Speaker 2: was unspecific or they just didn't like the sound of it.
• 39:08
  Speaker 2: I mean, homosexual, I'm fine with. It's just longer. For
• 39:13
  Speaker 2: some reason, we just keep making words longer. Um, uh,
• 39:20
  Speaker 2: so again, anything one syllable, but an LGBTQ, and then
• 39:24
  Speaker 2: it became QQIA, and then it was a plus was added,
• 39:27
  Speaker 2: and I agree, it was a lot.
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: Well, this is where it's like, it's about persuasion too,
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: which is like, hey, like if nobody who's not paying
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: very close attention is going to master LGBTQ to IA plus,
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: like it's stupid. It's just like at some point we're
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: allowed to have sort of aesthetic judgments. Like, I'm sorry,
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: but that's stupid. It is stupid to go around saying
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: so many letters in a row and to keep adding
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: new letters to it. It's just aesthetically unpleasing. We're allowed
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: to have taste, right? To IA +.
• 40:01
  Speaker 2: Well, you couldn't blame people for making fun of LGBTQQIA +. No,
• 40:04
  Speaker 2: it's funny.
• 40:05
  Speaker 1: You know, you couldn't blame them.
• 40:06
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: It's funny.
• 40:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 40:08
  Speaker 1: Now, you've also been advocating for wearing skirts, people about
• 40:13
  Speaker 1: how comfortable skirts are. We are both people that have
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: worn skirts at our live show and, uh, uh, become
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: proponents of skirts. What do you think men are afraid
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: of with these skirts?
• 40:23
  Speaker 2: You know, I don't want to be stared at and
• 40:26
  Speaker 2: I don't want to be a woman and I don't
• 40:29
  Speaker 2: want to have breasts and I don't want to wear makeup, but, uh,
• 40:33
  Speaker 2: a skirt just looks good. I don't know. Half the
• 40:36
  Speaker 2: world wears skirts and they don't make any big deal
• 40:38
  Speaker 2: about it. I mean, I went to Fiji and, you know,
• 40:42
  Speaker 2: all the guys are wearing skirts and you go, uh, Gee,
• 40:47
  Speaker 2: I mean, again, you go to the Middle East and
• 40:51
  Speaker 2: you see people in basically dresses. I remember I went
• 40:55
  Speaker 2: to Morocco when I was in high school with my
• 40:58
  Speaker 2: Spanish class. And I bought, I don't know what it's called,
• 41:01
  Speaker 2: but it's like a floor-length robe, you know. And I
• 41:05
  Speaker 2: wore it to high school when I got back. And
• 41:07
  Speaker 2: I remember thinking, I look good. And just being made
• 41:12
  Speaker 2: fun of like so roundly. And I just remember thinking like,
• 41:17
  Speaker 2: Why is it a big deal? Like, why? It's got
• 41:21
  Speaker 2: one hole instead of two. Really? And you're going to
• 41:23
  Speaker 2: get that upset about it? But, yeah, I have a
• 41:27
  Speaker 2: bunch of skirts, and I'm happy to, you know, I
• 41:32
  Speaker 2: don't have many skirts and stuff, but I have, you know,
• 41:36
  Speaker 2: usually they go, you know, to the floor or, you know,
• 41:39
  Speaker 2: almost to the floor, and I just think they look great.
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: I do think that when... you know, conservatives get upset
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: about trans people, on some level, what they're upset about
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: is the ways in which they're holding on to these
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: sort of traditional definitions of like the right way to
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: be a man and how small a definition they want
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: for that. And I think as someone that has been
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: publicly gay since you were writing You never really came out.
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: You were just gay from the first moment I've heard
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: of you. You were gay the whole time. You never
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: came out. You never had your moment of going on
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: television being like, I'm gay.
• 42:25
  Speaker 2: But at the same time, I was lucky enough to
• 42:28
  Speaker 2: come around at a time. I can write about my
• 42:29
  Speaker 2: relationship and people just, it's about trying to make a
• 42:34
  Speaker 2: life with another person, right? That the world could see that.
• 42:39
  Speaker 2: The world wasn't like, oh, it's gay. Never mind. It's
• 42:42
  Speaker 2: not for me because he's gay. And that was, you know,
• 42:47
  Speaker 2: if I'd done it 10 years earlier, then that would
• 42:50
  Speaker 2: have been a completely different story. So I was just
• 42:54
  Speaker 2: fortunate to come along, you know, that so much had
• 42:57
  Speaker 2: happened before I arrived, I suppose.
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: But the reason I bring it up is because it
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: does seem like what's happening now. being gay as a
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: sort of an abstract identity, right? Like I'm a gay person,
• 43:12
  Speaker 1: that means I date and want to marry someone of
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: the same gender, whatever. It seems like the part that
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: we're now grappling with is everything around it, like wanting
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: to wear skirts, being more feminine, right? And defying other
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: aspects of what it means to be a true, like
• 43:29
  Speaker 1: sort of masculine man. And I know as I think
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: about what when I was made fun of when I
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: was a kid, right? Like I was called gay a
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: million times. I was a little bit effeminate, but it was,
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: it was, it was becoming okay to be gay, but
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: it wasn't okay to be a mincing little queen, right? Like,
• 43:49
  Speaker 1: and it does seem like right now there's a real
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: kind of pushback from the right about defying the gender norms.
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: Like they're okay with a Scott Besant being the secretary
• 44:01
  Speaker 1: of the treasury and But they worry a lot about
• 44:03
  Speaker 1: what happens if, say, if a man shows up in
• 44:05
  Speaker 1: makeup and a skirt. And I wonder how you think
• 44:09
  Speaker 1: about that as somebody that has like sort of been
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: publicly identified as gay for so long.
• 44:18
  Speaker 2: Well, I mean, I feel, I remember when I was
• 44:24
  Speaker 2: young and like I moved, I lived in San Francisco
• 44:27
  Speaker 2: for one summer, right? And I remember it was like
• 44:31
  Speaker 2: a pride parade there in San Francisco. And it must
• 44:33
  Speaker 2: have been. It was like summer of 1976 or something, right?
• 44:38
  Speaker 2: But I remember there were drag queens at the beginning
• 44:41
  Speaker 2: of the parade. And I remember being embarrassed, you know,
• 44:44
  Speaker 2: and thinking, oh, I don't want people to think that
• 44:48
  Speaker 2: that's what gay people are like, right? And now I just,
• 44:54
  Speaker 2: now I think the opposite. When I see somebody being
• 44:57
  Speaker 2: like a massive, like, sissy or something it just warms
• 45:01
  Speaker 2: my heart you know and I'm just so happy that
• 45:04
  Speaker 2: they just be in themselves and I can see how
• 45:09
  Speaker 2: you know it can make someone uncomfortable because you're not
• 45:11
  Speaker 2: sure you know like when I'm signing books like you
• 45:15
  Speaker 2: don't know sometimes you know how you maybe should address
• 45:20
  Speaker 2: somebody or if somebody gives you a book and then
• 45:22
  Speaker 2: it's got especially like a name like Zia on it
• 45:27
  Speaker 2: you know and then is that Zia? Is Zia somebody else?
• 45:32
  Speaker 2: So I always say, who's Zia? And then sometimes people
• 45:37
  Speaker 2: are like, I am. And I say, well, I'm asking
• 45:39
  Speaker 2: because it could be your cousin. It could be anyone.
• 45:42
  Speaker 2: So I have a nice out that way that you
• 45:44
  Speaker 2: don't necessarily have in day-to-day life. But I think it
• 45:48
  Speaker 2: just makes people uncomfortable. If I'm wearing a skirt, I
• 45:52
  Speaker 2: don't see any reason for anyone to call me ma'am
• 45:56
  Speaker 2: or she it's just a skirt i don't have any
• 45:58
  Speaker 2: makeup on i have a sport coat on and you
• 46:01
  Speaker 2: know i guess i don't care if they're uncomfortable i
• 46:06
  Speaker 2: suppose that's a difference.
• 46:07
  Speaker 1: Right but i do think part like i'm interested in
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: like what is that discomfort right like you know you'll
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: turn on fox news and there'll be somebody saying like
• 46:15
  Speaker 1: you know real men don't sing happy birthday real men
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: don't drink soup real men don't have straws right like
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: constraining constraining what it means to be a man to
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: this really, really narrow box. And I, I wonder how
• 46:26
  Speaker 1: much of that discomfort people feel is in the same
• 46:30
  Speaker 1: way someone, you know, is, understands that voting for Trump
• 46:33
  Speaker 1: might be wrong in some way that like, they're like,
• 46:37
  Speaker 1: I spent a long time building this prison. Like, how
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: dare you, how dare you try to escape? Like, this
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: is where I live. I feel safe here.
• 46:44
  Speaker 2: Well, in, in a lot of ways, and I think
• 46:46
  Speaker 2: a lot of people would, be surprised by that but
• 46:50
  Speaker 2: I feel sorry for straight guys you know I feel
• 46:53
  Speaker 2: sorry that they're in their prison and I feel sorry
• 46:56
  Speaker 2: that sometimes I feel like they don't know how to
• 46:59
  Speaker 2: talk to people you know like if you're listening in
• 47:02
  Speaker 2: on conversation on a plane and there are two guys
• 47:04
  Speaker 2: in front of you who you know strangers who are
• 47:06
  Speaker 2: talking I just I just feel bad I feel bad
• 47:10
  Speaker 2: that they don't again that their confines are so narrow yeah.
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: I had this I remember realizing that I was a
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: worse friend to my straight male friends because I was
• 47:26
  Speaker 1: less effeminate. And what came with being effeminate was being thoughtful,
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: like asking people about their day. There's a way gay
• 47:39
  Speaker 1: men are that is more feminine. And part of it
• 47:42
  Speaker 1: is just being, I don't know, thoughtful, considerate, sweet. And
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: I remember realizing, oh, when I'm with my straight male friends,
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: I act more like them. And I'm much worse in
• 47:53
  Speaker 1: basically every respect. I would never think to be like,
• 47:57
  Speaker 1: if I'm in that straight mode, you're kind of like,
• 48:01
  Speaker 1: you would never be like, so how's your mother doing?
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: Is she getting better from her fall? You wouldn't say
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: anything like that. It just doesn't come up in straight world.
• 48:09
  Speaker 2: I was in an elevator and I was in Atlanta
• 48:12
  Speaker 2: a few weeks ago. And I'm going down for breakfast
• 48:15
  Speaker 2: and this guy gets on the elevator. And I said, oh,
• 48:17
  Speaker 2: I saw you on my plane last night. I said,
• 48:19
  Speaker 2: I noticed your shoes, you know. And that's such a
• 48:23
  Speaker 2: thing that would be so scary, like to a straight guy. Right.
• 48:27
  Speaker 2: That you, A, you remembered them. And B, that you
• 48:30
  Speaker 2: were looking at his shoes, you know.
• 48:31
  Speaker 1: What was the reaction? How did it go?
• 48:33
  Speaker 2: Well, he was wearing shoes without a back to them. So,
• 48:36
  Speaker 2: of course, he was gay. Oh, right.
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: So it all worked out.
• 48:38
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: Sorry. I just ended up making sure you were talking
• 48:41
  Speaker 1: to another gay man.
• 48:49
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  Speaker 1: and travel perks, go to chime.com slash disclosures. You referred
• 50:14
  Speaker 1: to Hugh as your boyfriend. He's your husband. Yeah. Right?
• 50:17
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Uh-huh.
• 50:19
  Speaker 1: Still uncomfortable.
• 50:20
  Speaker 2: I don't like the word. I, I, I, yeah, he's
• 50:24
  Speaker 2: a man I married.
• 50:26
  Speaker 1: Right. What, what's the problem? He's your husband.
• 50:30
  Speaker 2: I don't, I don't like the word. I don't like
• 50:33
  Speaker 2: the word.
• 50:33
  Speaker 1: But you got married.
• 50:34
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: Mm-hmm.
• 50:36
  Speaker 2: Just for financial reasons.
• 50:37
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 50:38
  Speaker 2: It was a shotgun wedding arranged by my banker. Mm-hmm.
• 50:42
  Speaker 2: And I don't want to marry anybody else. It didn't
• 50:44
  Speaker 2: mean anything to me to be married. I didn't choke up.
• 50:50
  Speaker 2: It was just a legal thing to me.
• 50:56
  Speaker 1: I just got married. Mm-hmm. Any advice for a long
• 51:00
  Speaker 1: and successful marriage?
• 51:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I do. Hugh and I have been together for
• 51:04
  Speaker 2: 36 years. Never talk about your relationship to that other person. Ever.
• 51:12
  Speaker 1: Never talk about it.
• 51:12
  Speaker 2: Never talk about it. Because that just, it doesn't bear,
• 51:17
  Speaker 2: it doesn't bear the harsh light of scrutiny. You can
• 51:22
  Speaker 2: talk about it with other people.
• 51:23
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 51:24
  Speaker 2: You can complain about them. But don't talk about it
• 51:27
  Speaker 2: with that person.
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: Right. It's sort of like talking about happiness. If you're
• 51:30
  Speaker 1: talking about it, you aren't it. Don't talk about your relationship.
• 51:35
  Speaker 1: That's pretty good. Now, I noticed something else in one
• 51:38
  Speaker 1: of these essays. You also are deeply uncomfortable talking about
• 51:40
  Speaker 1: your bowel movements in front of Hugh.
• 51:41
  Speaker 2: Oh, my God. No, I've never had one, and he's
• 51:44
  Speaker 2: never had one.
• 51:45
  Speaker 1: What is that?
• 51:46
  Speaker 2: I don't know what you're talking about.
• 51:50
  Speaker 1: Is it about feminine mystique?
• 51:51
  Speaker 2: I don't know what you're talking about.
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: So I like, I noticed, I definitely feel like there's
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: two kinds of relationships and I don't think there's a
• 51:58
  Speaker 1: middle ground. There are couples for whom the bathroom is
• 52:01
  Speaker 1: just a room with a sink and a shower and
• 52:03
  Speaker 1: that's it. And then there are couples that are just
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: fully in it about every detail. I'm in that category.
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: We talk about everything. We go into great detail and
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: it brings us closer together. Don't you want to, what
• 52:17
  Speaker 1: your leap? Like, how do you know, but how can
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: you know a person? A big part of every day, David,
• 52:24
  Speaker 1: Is the part of the day where you had either
• 52:26
  Speaker 1: a good shit or a bad shit. It's a big, right?
• 52:28
  Speaker 1: I wouldn't know. Come on. You know.
• 52:31
  Speaker 2: I have no idea what you're talking about.
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: So you come home from a long trip and Hugh
• 52:36
  Speaker 1: is in a bad mood. He's just a bit upset
• 52:39
  Speaker 1: and you don't know why. It might be because he's
• 52:43
  Speaker 1: having stomach trouble, but you'll just never know that. You'll
• 52:47
  Speaker 1: never know that he's been, he's been, oh, I was sorry.
• 52:49
  Speaker 2: He'd never know that about me.
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: But then you're strangers to me. No.
• 52:56
  Speaker 2: There's plenty of other stuff we know. It's nice to
• 52:59
  Speaker 2: have a little window of mystery. You know, like I
• 53:02
  Speaker 2: know people, couples who like fart in front of each
• 53:05
  Speaker 2: other and do things. No.
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: You're not farting in front of each other? What are you,
• 53:08
  Speaker 1: getting up and going to the room?
• 53:09
  Speaker 2: That has never happened.
• 53:10
  Speaker 1: Come on. What are you talking about?
• 53:13
  Speaker 2: If somebody has an accident every now and then, it's
• 53:15
  Speaker 2: never acknowledged, never mentioned. Never, ever, ever, ever. And you
• 53:21
  Speaker 2: know what? I'm really glad... Because both of us are
• 53:24
  Speaker 2: like that. So if just one person was like that,
• 53:27
  Speaker 2: then it would be pretty hard.
• 53:28
  Speaker 1: Well, I don't think those people make it. I think
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: that's what divorce is. I think it's people finding out
• 53:33
  Speaker 1: that they're with the wrong person because they want to
• 53:35
  Speaker 1: talk about it and the other person doesn't. It's like
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: you can't build a life with someone like that. Yeah, no.
• 53:39
  Speaker 2: Hugh and I, nope, never been discussed. I don't know
• 53:43
  Speaker 2: what it would be. Now, if I get colon cancer, cancer,
• 53:52
  Speaker 2: rectal cancer. Sure. He will never know. I will go see,
• 53:58
  Speaker 2: I will say I have to go to the hospital
• 54:01
  Speaker 2: for a few weeks.
• 54:03
  Speaker 1: Um, I will say, uh, why even tell him that just,
• 54:06
  Speaker 1: I'm going, I'm, I have, I have a little trip
• 54:07
  Speaker 1: I need to take. So, well, you know, you're getting,
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: you went right to the right. You went, your mind
• 54:13
  Speaker 1: went to correct. I know where your mind went, which
• 54:15
  Speaker 1: is to the fact that you have an aging body
• 54:17
  Speaker 1: as we all do. And you're, in one of the stories,
• 54:20
  Speaker 1: you basically are repulsed by the fact that he needs
• 54:22
  Speaker 1: for a time after a hip surgery to have one
• 54:25
  Speaker 1: of those cushy higher toilet seats, which you compare to
• 54:28
  Speaker 1: a coffin. You both have human bodies that will slowly
• 54:33
  Speaker 1: fail over time. And the best case scenario is that
• 54:36
  Speaker 1: you're holding someone's hand as they lose control of their body,
• 54:41
  Speaker 1: but you're together in the end. There's no avoiding the
• 54:45
  Speaker 1: fact that That you have a corpus and it will
• 54:47
  Speaker 1: decay before each other, right? Isn't that the goal?
• 54:49
  Speaker 2: Yeah, but I don't see the need to put him
• 54:52
  Speaker 2: on the toilet now to prepare for putting him on
• 54:56
  Speaker 2: the toilet 20 years from now. 20 years from now,
• 54:58
  Speaker 2: if I have to do it, I'll do it. But
• 55:00
  Speaker 2: I doubt that.
• 55:00
  Speaker 1: But now all of a sudden at the very end
• 55:02
  Speaker 1: of your relationship, you're going to finally have to talk
• 55:04
  Speaker 1: about this thing that you've been avoiding your whole life.
• 55:05
  Speaker 2: We'll never talk about it.
• 55:06
  Speaker 1: We'll never talk about it.
• 55:07
  Speaker 2: We'll never talk about it.
• 55:10
  Speaker 1: Never.
• 55:10
  Speaker 2: If he was like in his 90s and he soils
• 55:14
  Speaker 2: himself- we will never talk about it ever, ever, ever
• 55:20
  Speaker 2: talk about it.
• 55:21
  Speaker 1: Are you thinking about what these, look, your document, you know,
• 55:24
  Speaker 1: you've been writing in your diary. Did you write in
• 55:26
  Speaker 1: your diary today yet?
• 55:27
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 55:28
  Speaker 1: You've been writing in your diary every day. Do you
• 55:30
  Speaker 1: think about what those last entries are going to be like?
• 55:32
  Speaker 2: I think it's easier to, to conceive of our death
• 55:37
  Speaker 2: than it is of our decrepitude, you know, and the
• 55:40
  Speaker 2: thought of being in an assisted living center in one room, um,
• 55:46
  Speaker 2: your life reduced to one room like my dad's was
• 55:49
  Speaker 2: and all your friends are dead and you're defecating in
• 55:53
  Speaker 2: your pants maybe or you're unable to get up from
• 55:59
  Speaker 2: your bed. Being dead, I can think, sure, yeah, but
• 56:06
  Speaker 2: that is just to know that that's coming or to think.
• 56:12
  Speaker 2: So Hugh and I, we were going to throw ourselves
• 56:14
  Speaker 2: off the terrace and you know, of our apartment building,
• 56:17
  Speaker 2: but then he didn't want to make a mess. And
• 56:19
  Speaker 2: so we're going to put ourselves in body bags first
• 56:22
  Speaker 2: and then throw ourselves.
• 56:23
  Speaker 1: Well, that is considerate. That is considerate. You know, you
• 56:26
  Speaker 1: got to, I would say double wrap it. Cause who
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: knows what kind of splat that, you know, you're going
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: to make a lot of impact and then boom, you're
• 56:31
  Speaker 1: coming out the sides.
• 56:32
  Speaker 2: I spent 10 days at the medical examiner's office in Phoenix.
• 56:36
  Speaker 2: So I know, I know what it looks like. And
• 56:39
  Speaker 2: I know that's why you're right. Double body bags is
• 56:42
  Speaker 2: a really good idea.
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: All right. So something good came out of this conversation. Well,
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: here's the thing I would say too, but like, isn't
• 56:49
  Speaker 1: a part of you like ready? Like you will have
• 56:51
  Speaker 1: an interesting perspective on what it's like to slowly decline
• 56:58
  Speaker 1: in one room as all your friends die. Isn't that
• 57:00
  Speaker 1: the final, isn't, aren't those the stories you're sort of need,
• 57:03
  Speaker 1: we need you to write because it'll be helpful to
• 57:04
  Speaker 1: other people that are going through it. Isn't there something
• 57:06
  Speaker 1: beautiful about getting getting that last experience, which is so
• 57:11
  Speaker 1: common for people.
• 57:12
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I think the thing is, so Calvin Tompkins died recently,
• 57:17
  Speaker 2: the art critic for the New Yorker. And he was,
• 57:20
  Speaker 2: was he a hundred or was he, but the thing
• 57:23
  Speaker 2: too is that you can, his eyes were really failing
• 57:27
  Speaker 2: him at the end. So you could be in a
• 57:28
  Speaker 2: situation where you couldn't write, you know, when you're really sick, you,
• 57:33
  Speaker 2: you can't sit up, you know, like if you were,
• 57:37
  Speaker 2: So it's a nice idea that you could write until
• 57:41
  Speaker 2: the day you die, but you have no control over it.
• 57:45
  Speaker 2: So maybe, gee, if Hugh's mother, right, huge reader. I've
• 57:52
  Speaker 2: never known anyone who reads more than her. And now
• 57:57
  Speaker 2: she can't read, and she's 95. And she's just sort
• 58:01
  Speaker 2: of parked in front of a TV, her worst nightmare.
• 58:04
  Speaker 2: And she can't. read a book. And even if you
• 58:07
  Speaker 2: gave her an audio book, she can't focus on anything.
• 58:10
  Speaker 2: So again, I don't necessarily have control. I'd like to
• 58:14
  Speaker 2: be able to write until the end of my life.
• 58:18
  Speaker 2: And I don't mean to write in order to put
• 58:23
  Speaker 2: a book out, but I've done it every single day
• 58:27
  Speaker 2: of my life for the last 50 years. So I
• 58:29
  Speaker 2: don't know who I would be without it, regardless of
• 58:32
  Speaker 2: it being published or not. I just don't know How
• 58:40
  Speaker 2: I would know who I am, I suppose.
• 58:48
  Speaker 1: So I said maybe it's the kind of thing where
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: you wait for the kind of double-wrapped phase. You can
• 58:54
  Speaker 1: age into decrepitude, but then when you finally can't write,
• 58:57
  Speaker 1: then you do the double-bagging, right? Maybe sort of let's
• 58:59
  Speaker 1: just hold off. Let's put a pin in the double-bagging
• 59:01
  Speaker 1: until we've made it.
• 59:02
  Speaker 2: But I think it's unfair. And I think it's unfair
• 59:05
  Speaker 2: that you can't. you know, your insurance policy, your life
• 59:08
  Speaker 2: insurance won't pay off. if you if you kill yourself
• 59:11
  Speaker 2: i don't i mean i understand the problems with changing
• 59:14
  Speaker 2: that but i just don't think it's fair to expect
• 59:18
  Speaker 2: people to put up with that amount of misery and
• 59:22
  Speaker 2: and uh you know like if you're defecating in your
• 59:27
  Speaker 2: pants and somebody's cleaning you up and then you're just like, oh,
• 59:31
  Speaker 2: I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. And you're not even
• 59:33
  Speaker 2: having a good time. You know, like the rest of
• 59:37
  Speaker 2: your day is not going to be any better than that.
• 59:41
  Speaker 2: I don't see why you shouldn't be able to kill yourself.
• 59:43
  Speaker 2: I have this idea for Canyon Day. And you put
• 59:49
  Speaker 2: logs around the Grand Canyon. just along the lip of
• 59:57
  Speaker 2: the Grand Canyon, and you take people there at night.
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 2: So if they trip over a log and fall into
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 2: the Grand Canyon.
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 1: That's just the way it goes. So it's like a
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 1: little loophole you developed. So to get the insurance to
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 1: pay out, that it's just a lot of people tripping
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 1: on the Grand Canyon.
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it would be called Canyon Day. And then if
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 2: you wanted to participate in Canyon Day, you would be
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 2: allowed to.
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 1: Well, I think that's a great idea. I'm not sure
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 1: the insurance companies are going to catch wise to it
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 1: pretty quickly. Suddenly, hey, we've seen a huge uptake in
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 1: accidental deaths on the Arizona side of the Grand Canyon. But, hey,
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 1: it's a great thought.
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 2: You know, I shared it with somebody and they said,
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 2: what if you don't die? Don't you hate people like that?
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 1: Never. I mean, it's a pretty long fall.
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 2: I know it. There's no way you're, plus you're going
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 2: to be decrepit to begin with. Like, why are you
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 2: even saying that? What if you don't die? You're going
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 2: to die.
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 1: You're going to die. That's not the problem with it. Listen,
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 1: I want you to know something. There's a lot of
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 1: problems with that plan. All right?
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 2: That's not one of them.
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 1: That's not one of them. It's a big fall down there.
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 1: It's a big canyon. It's Grant. It's Grant. That's why
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 1: they named the burger after it. Before we let you go,
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 1: I want to get just a rapid fire, a few things,
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 1: see where your head's at. People saying no problem instead
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 1: of you're welcome.
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 2: That doesn't bother me.
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 1: Really? Yeah. But you don't like perfect when people say perfect.
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 2: Oh, I hate perfect.
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 1: Perfect.
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 2: I was at a hotel the other day and I...
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 2: And the woman said perfect five times before I even
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 2: sat down at the table. And they're told in hotels, like,
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 2: if you say wonderful or terrific, that's not positive enough.
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 2: So you have to say perfect. But no problem. I
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 2: know people who are bothered by no problem. It doesn't.
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 2: I know people, too, who are bothered by, of course.
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 2: Could I have another coffee? Of course. And there are
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 2: people who don't like, of course. I have no problem
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 2: with it. Okay. Emojis. Emojis. I used one one time.
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 1: Just an eggplant?
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 2: No, it was a Hughes sister, and I don't remember
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 2: what it was. I don't like to text. Okay.
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 1: College professors are signing fewer books and more excerpts because
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 1: their students have lower attention spans.
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 2: Gosh, that makes me sad, you know. Yeah. But that said,
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 2: if I were in college and then I had to
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 2: read Moby Dick by tomorrow, I'd be like, fuck, I
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 2: got to read Moby Dick by tomorrow.
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 1: You can skip the whaling chapters. That's the key thing
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 1: with reading Moby Dick. People need to know that. There's
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 1: a lot of whaling chapters in there with detailed information
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 1: about the technique. You don't need those chapters.
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 2: Well, I wrote something one time about, I was writing
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 2: for Esquire and they did an issue, what every man
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 2: should do before the age of whatever. And so I said,
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 2: read Moby Dick. So I started reading it and I
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 2: was like, oh no, this is really boring.
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 1: It's so boring.
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 2: So I told myself I could not shave, brush my teeth,
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 2: take a shower, or wash my hair until I finished it.
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 2: And then on the second day, I helped a neighbor
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 2: clean out her chicken coop. And so, you know, I
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 2: had those little mites all over me. But I couldn't
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 2: take a shower. I couldn't do anything. I had to
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 2: read Moby Dick first.
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 1: There's an audiobook version of Moby Dick read by Burt Reynolds.
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 1: It seems like he was done. He had to do
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 1: it at gunpoint or something. And it's atrocious. I highly
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 1: recommend go find it. He does a sailor's accent, but
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 1: he can't maintain it. So like you hit play on
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 1: this thing and it's Burt Reynolds being like, call me Ishmael.
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 1: But by the end of every chapter, he's kind of
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 1: back into classic. Burt Reynolds. And then the next chapter
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 1: begins and it's back with, ah, the whale was out there.
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 1: You know, he does a voice. It's crazy. It's crazy.
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 1: And he doesn't do any of the whaling chapters. So
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 1: you can just, it's a breeze. It's a breeze. He's
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 1: writing it down. That's good. That's it. We've got a
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 1: lot of good ideas out of this session. Really happy
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 1: about that. Last thing. Do you hold grudges?
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I do.
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I do.
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 2: I don't necessarily act on them, but my brother said
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 2: a couple of weeks ago, I saw my brother and
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 2: we were talking about cleaning. And he said, man, you
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 2: got to be, you know, I got to be mad
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 2: to clean. And whenever I start cleaning, I go back
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 2: to my grudge drawer and I pull something out and
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 2: it just fuels me when I clean. It's like feeding
• 1:04:22
  Speaker 2: the steam engine while I clean. And then I finish
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 2: and I'm fine.
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 1: What's your oldest grudge right now?
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 2: Mrs. Arsenu, 1968. Ice cream creations. After a christening, we
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 2: went to ice cream creations, people from the church, Greek
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 2: Orthodox Church in Raleigh, North Carolina. And I was sitting
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 2: there with my mom, having a lovely time.
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 1: And Mrs.
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 2: Arseneau came and said, you go over there and sit
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 2: with the boys. No 12-year-old boy should be sitting with
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 2: his mother. And I was having such a nice time
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 2: with my mother. And I thought, what business is it
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 2: of yours where I sit?
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 1: Do you know what I mean?
• 1:04:58
  Speaker 2: Like my mother wasn't complaining about having me there. And my,
• 1:05:01
  Speaker 2: you know, my mother's dead. And I think she robbed me.
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 1: Mrs.
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 2: Arseneau robbed me of like an extra half hour with
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 2: my mother. And no one back there said, bitch, are
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 2: you telling me where to sit? Like nobody would have
• 1:05:15
  Speaker 2: done that.
• 1:05:15
  Speaker 1: You just did what she said.
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 2: I just did what she said. And I think about it.
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 2: I've held a grudge since then. And she's long dead,
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 2: you know.
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure.
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 2: But I, yeah, that's probably my oldest grudge.
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 1: And see, now the kids would talk back. something that
• 1:05:32
  Speaker 1: you find repulsive because the kids aren't listening to their
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 1: parents anymore, but that was a case where had you
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 1: talked back to your teacher, you might have had more
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 1: time with your mother.
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 2: There was a guy in my high school who, we
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 2: had a math teacher, and he was also a coach,
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 2: and he was a dick, and he was chewing out
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 2: this student, this female student, and she started crying, and
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 2: he kept at it, and this guy in the class
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 2: stood up, and said, you need to back off to
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 2: the teacher. And nobody did things like that. And he
• 1:06:06
  Speaker 2: got in so much trouble. But it was somebody needed
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 2: to do it. And I'm so proud because he was gay.
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 2: I mean, it wasn't talked about back then, but there's
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 2: no way this guy wasn't gay. And I thought about
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 2: it over the years. And I thought, wow, it's a
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 2: gay person. I mean, it wasn't this gay person, but
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 2: it was a gay person. And he wasn't, he didn't
• 1:06:30
  Speaker 2: threaten the teacher or anything. He did it in really
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 2: the perfect way. And when I think about that, he's
• 1:06:37
  Speaker 2: probably forgotten about it, this guy. But gee, it was
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 2: such a, it was huge to me. I think about
• 1:06:45
  Speaker 2: it quite often.
• 1:06:47
  Speaker 1: David Sedaris, thank you so much for being here. Everybody,
• 1:06:51
  Speaker 1: latest collection of essays, David Sedaris, The Land and Its People.
• 1:06:54
  Speaker 1: Thanks for coming by. Good to meet you. Good to
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 1: talk to you.
• 1:06:56
  Speaker 2: Oh, you too. Thanks so much.
• 1:07:04
  Speaker 1: Thank you, David Sedaris, for joining us. John, Tommy, and
• 1:07:07
  Speaker 1: I will be back in your feeds on Tuesday morning.
• 1:07:10
  Speaker 1: And that's it.