Transcript

#37 John · Heavyweight

0:04
Speaker 1: I really appreciate your inquiring after my health. It means
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Speaker 1: a lot. Where are you right now? You're on your chair?
0:11
Speaker 1: What does that mean Paris? Oh excuse me, madame. There
0:16
Speaker 1: was a time when you were to have referred to
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Speaker 1: it as a balcony. Falcony la la, Okay, listen, I
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Speaker 1: have to I just have to say one thing, just
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Speaker 1: one thing. One can I tell you you're my wonder
0:38
Speaker 1: From Gimblet Media. I'm Jonathan Goldstein and this is Heavyweight
0:44
Speaker 1: Today's episode. John right after the break.
1:00
Speaker 2: I'm happy to do a three two one start if
1:02
Speaker 2: it'll be helpful, but I also don't need to.
1:04
Speaker 1: Let's do a three two one start.
1:06
Speaker 2: I'll do it, and then you just do the work.
1:07
Speaker 1: This is John Green, the author of some of the
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Speaker 1: most popular and beloved YA novels of the twenty first century,
1:14
Speaker 1: books like The Fault in Our Stars three two one start.
1:21
Speaker 1: We were so in sync it was like we were
1:23
Speaker 1: singing do wa. But there's a version of John's life
1:27
Speaker 1: in which none of his books exist. Because as a
1:30
Speaker 1: young man in his twenties, John wanted to dedicate his
1:33
Speaker 1: life to the church.
1:35
Speaker 2: I wanted to become an ordained minister. I wanted to
1:38
Speaker 2: go to Divinity School.
1:43
Speaker 1: At the time, John was struggling with feelings of dread
1:46
Speaker 1: and depression. He was searching for meaning and purpose. He
1:50
Speaker 1: thought a life in the ministry might offer a way forward.
1:54
Speaker 1: So that was the road that you were on. You
1:56
Speaker 1: were going to go to Divinity school.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean I got in and then
2:02
Speaker 2: I didn't go because why because of my time as
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Speaker 2: a chaplain.
2:11
Speaker 1: In anticipation of Divinity school, John began an apprenticeship as
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Speaker 1: a chaplain and an Ohio children's hospital. Up until then,
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Speaker 1: John's relationship to his faith had been mostly philosophical. He
2:23
Speaker 1: do a lot of thinking about God in the abstract,
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Speaker 1: but at the hospital his faith would be put to
2:28
Speaker 1: the test as he dealt with actual people experiencing actual tragedy.
2:33
Speaker 1: John was assigned to the children's cardiac and neurology units.
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Speaker 2: But I was twenty one years old. I mean it
2:41
Speaker 2: was my first job. Like, it was my first job
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Speaker 2: other than working at Stake and Shake, and like I
2:47
Speaker 2: was a shitty chaplain.
2:49
Speaker 1: Why do you feel that way?
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Speaker 2: Oh? I mean I fainted, which is like you don't.
2:56
Speaker 2: It's bad. You can't faint. You can't, you can't you
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Speaker 2: can't faint.
3:06
Speaker 1: John Hope that with time he'd grown too the job,
3:10
Speaker 1: but then came a night that made him question whether
3:12
Speaker 1: he was suited for the job at all. A quick
3:16
Speaker 1: word of warning, some of John's descriptions here are pretty graphic.
3:21
Speaker 2: I think it was my third night on call, so
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Speaker 2: I was still really new at being a chaplain, and
3:30
Speaker 2: I was reading a grief Observed by C. S. Lewis,
3:34
Speaker 2: which is about the death of his wife, and the
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Speaker 2: trauma pager went off and it was a burn injury
3:45
Speaker 2: three year old boy. I went downstairs to the emergency
3:51
Speaker 2: department and there was this social worker who was like
3:55
Speaker 2: a character out of a noir mystery novel. She was
3:58
Speaker 2: just hard as fuck, and she handed me a mask
4:03
Speaker 2: and a piece of gum. Why gum, because this the
4:11
Speaker 2: smell of burns is so is so terrible. And then
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Speaker 2: this kid. They wheeled this kid in, you know, paramedics
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Speaker 2: on either side of him, and the kid was screaming,
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Speaker 2: scream just screaming, like just in obvious agony, and was
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Speaker 2: very very small. It was a brushfire, and my understanding
4:43
Speaker 2: is that his dad had been like burning leaves and
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Speaker 2: like it it had like just gotten a little bit
4:52
Speaker 2: out of it had just spread a little bit, and
4:57
Speaker 2: then he went inside you down nine on when he
4:59
Speaker 2: came back and the fire had like surrounded the kid.
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Speaker 2: There was this like staff room and I'd gone in
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Speaker 2: there to just have a cup of coffee, and this
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Speaker 2: young doctor was throwing up in the trash can and
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Speaker 2: really upset, and she said that that kid's gonna die.
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Speaker 2: And I remember his pediatrician came in. She went in
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Speaker 2: to the to the ICU and she came out and
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Speaker 2: she was just sobbing, and that freak. It just freaked
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Speaker 2: me out so badly because I'd never seen a doctor
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Speaker 2: react like that, you know. And so that that night
6:00
Speaker 2: was a very long night. Took the parents into this
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Speaker 2: this windowless family room. After after a while, I stayed
6:11
Speaker 2: up all night with the with his parents, And the
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Speaker 2: next morning, at eight a m. I handed over the
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Speaker 2: pager and I drove. I drove home and I got
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Speaker 2: in the shower and I was in the shower for
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Speaker 2: like an hour and a half and I couldn't I
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Speaker 2: couldn't stop smelling the burn, and I I just couldn't
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Speaker 2: stop thinking about this kid and his parents, and I
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Speaker 2: also was I I was also frankly really relieved. Not
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Speaker 2: you know that, I got to go home, I got
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Speaker 2: to hand off the pager, and I knew that they wouldn't.
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Speaker 1: When John went back to work the next day, the
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Speaker 1: little boy, whose name was Nick was no longer there,
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Speaker 1: and that was the last John heard about him.
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Speaker 2: I couldn't see I couldn't see God within those experiences.
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Speaker 2: I just couldn't. And I thought, you know, if how
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Speaker 2: can you do this as a job if part of
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Speaker 2: you is sitting there thinking, you know, the God I
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Speaker 2: am calling to be present in this moment. I don't
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Speaker 2: feel present in this moment.
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Speaker 1: John was losing his faith.
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Speaker 2: Spent the last months of my period as a chaplain
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Speaker 2: knowing full well that I wasn't going to go to
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Speaker 2: Divinity School and I wasn't going to become a minister. Well,
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Speaker 2: I was never I wasn't going to be a minister.
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Speaker 1: Without Divinity School, John had to rethink his whole life.
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Speaker 1: He'd always seen his writing in service to the sermons
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Speaker 1: he planned to give, but now there would be no sermons.
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Speaker 1: In fact, John had stopped going to church entirely, yet
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Speaker 1: his love of writing remained, so he got temp work
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Speaker 1: at a magazine and eventually found his footing as a writer,
8:29
Speaker 1: but his time as a chaplain at the children's hospital,
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Speaker 1: and specifically that night with Nick, kept finding its way
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Speaker 1: into his books. In Looking for Alaska, the death of
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Speaker 1: a young boy's friend raises questions about the meaning of life.
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Speaker 1: In the Fault in Our Stars, two teenagers with cancer
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Speaker 1: fall in love.
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Speaker 2: There are versions of me trying to make sense of
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Speaker 2: that time in my life.
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Speaker 1: Throughout the years of trying to make sense through writing,
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Speaker 1: through therapy, John still couldn't get Nick off his mind.
9:00
Speaker 2: I knew I could google him, you know. I knew
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Speaker 2: I could google the family. I remembered the parents' names.
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Speaker 2: They have an unusual surname. I knew it would not
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Speaker 2: be hard. I would think, I should just know, I
9:13
Speaker 2: should just it would be better to know if he died,
9:16
Speaker 2: And then I would go back and I would say, like, no,
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Speaker 2: you don't. You don't want to know. You don't like,
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Speaker 2: you don't want to know that he's dead. You definitely don't.
9:26
Speaker 2: I mean, there were a few times when I literally
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Speaker 2: typed his name into the Google search bar and then
9:31
Speaker 2: didn't hit search. And now I have, you know, and
9:40
Speaker 2: now I have kids of my own and when my
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Speaker 2: kids were that age. I saw them both on that
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Speaker 2: on that gurney again and again. I'd still think about
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Speaker 2: him and his parents every single day, and I have
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Speaker 2: for twenty years now, so half my life.
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Speaker 1: But it was more than just John thinking about Even
10:01
Speaker 1: after he'd stopped going to church, had told himself that
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Speaker 1: he no longer believed. Every night during those twenty years,
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Speaker 1: John prayed for Nick and his family.
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Speaker 2: I've prayed for them, even in periods when I didn't
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Speaker 2: really believe in prayer. I don't think I literally don't
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Speaker 2: think I've prayed for anyone every day, excep this one kid,
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Speaker 2: Like I don't know that I've prayed for my children.
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Speaker 1: Then one day, after years of obsessing over Nick's fate,
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Speaker 1: John had a new thought.
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Speaker 2: You know, maybe he is maybe he is alive. You
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Speaker 2: don't know, how do you know? Like you're basing this
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Speaker 2: decade plus of worry on one thing that one distraught
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Speaker 2: doctor said to you, like while heaving into a trash can,
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Speaker 2: Like you don't know.
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Speaker 1: So once again John type Nick's name into the search bar,
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Speaker 1: but this time he hit search.
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Speaker 2: And it was quite easy. You know, I was the
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Speaker 2: thirty seconds between when I googled him, and when I
11:15
Speaker 2: was at his Facebook and he was alive, alive, and
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Speaker 2: his parents were married, and I I just just sobbed.
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Speaker 2: I just felt like I was just so glad that
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Speaker 2: he was alive. And I also felt like it reminded
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Speaker 2: me of how glad I am that everyone is alive,
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Speaker 2: if that makes any sense.
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Speaker 1: What do you mean?
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Speaker 2: That is just just an absolute fucking miracle that any
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Speaker 2: of us is here. And I just I was just
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Speaker 2: so I was relieved, but I was also like just
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Speaker 2: overjoyed and and and so sad. I I can't I
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Speaker 2: can't describe how it felt. I just remember like going
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Speaker 2: into his like Facebook likes at just like laughing and
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Speaker 2: crying and being like this kid and I have nothing,
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Speaker 2: nothing in coffee and I and I'm so glad that
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Speaker 2: he is here.
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Speaker 1: You know, with the relief of knowing that Nick's out
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Speaker 1: there living alife, John has begun considering a new question,
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Speaker 1: is it a good life?
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Speaker 2: I want to I want to know that. I want
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Speaker 2: to know that he's he's he's okay, that he's doing that,
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Speaker 2: he's doing okay.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, and what what what does that? What does that
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Speaker 1: mean for you? Because like you've seen his Facebook.
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Speaker 2: Yeah. Do you know anybody with a Facebook who's unhappy though,
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Speaker 2: or like who has like a tough I don't know.
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Speaker 1: So John wants to talk with Nick, but at the
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Speaker 1: same time, he's plagued by worry what would be the
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Speaker 1: outcome of his reaching out? What did be in it
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Speaker 1: for Nick? John tries to answer those questions by putting
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Speaker 1: himself in nick shoes.
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Speaker 2: I can see how maybe it's helpful to him to
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Speaker 2: know that there's this person out there who, you know,
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Speaker 2: thinks about him every day and and and hopes that
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Speaker 2: he's well every day, and you know, like I know,
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Speaker 2: it means something to me to hear that there was
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Speaker 2: someone out there who was who was wishing me well,
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Speaker 2: even from a great distance.
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Speaker 1: After the break, reaching out from a great distance.
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Speaker 2: I think I can hear you now, Can you hear me? Yeah?
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Speaker 1: I can hear you?
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Speaker 2: All right? Hi, here's a clap just in case that's useful.
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Speaker 1: Later John had written Nick a letter and Nick was
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Speaker 1: up for talking. It's the middle of the pandemic, so
14:02
Speaker 1: a video call is arranged.
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Speaker 2: I feel nervous, really nervous. I didn't sleep well last night,
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Speaker 2: and I just boy.
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Speaker 1: John is seated in his Indianapolis basement and I'm in
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Speaker 1: my Minneapolis recording closet. We both stare anxiously at our
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Speaker 1: laptops waiting for Nick to appear on screen.
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Speaker 2: I mean, I'm excited. I want to talk to him,
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Speaker 2: you know, It's just I just have no idea how
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Speaker 2: it's going to go.
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Speaker 1: You interviewed Obama, did you not? I did, so this
14:38
Speaker 1: is more nerve racking. Less nerve racking.
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Speaker 2: Oh no, this is much more nerve racking.
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Speaker 1: In a bid to distract John from his nerves, I
14:49
Speaker 1: regale him with episode recaps of a TV show that
14:52
Speaker 1: went off the air in two thousand and six, Deadwood.
14:56
Speaker 1: It was like the scariest town in the world. If
14:58
Speaker 1: I lived in the Old West, I would just like
15:00
Speaker 1: slither on my belly, like just staring at the ground
15:03
Speaker 1: and apologizing, like just to stay out of trouble, like
15:07
Speaker 1: no pride. And I'd get a family, teach them to
15:10
Speaker 1: slither on their bellies and stare at out.
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Speaker 2: Here we go.
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Speaker 1: It's in this moment that Nick enters the video call Nick, Hello.
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Speaker 2: Hi.
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Speaker 1: Nick is now in his early twenties. He has brown,
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Speaker 1: tussled hair and big eyes. His face is contemplative, as
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Speaker 1: he studies John carefully seeing Nick from the shoulders up.
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Speaker 1: There aren't any scars or burns.
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Speaker 2: Can I can I start by just asking like, how
15:37
Speaker 2: how you're doing? Are you? Are you at home right now?
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Speaker 3: I am school online, finish my undergraduate last year, and
15:47
Speaker 3: I'm in graduate school. So everything's going well.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, that's great. Wow. So you're so school's all online?
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Speaker 2: What are you studying?
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Speaker 3: Masters in Business administration at the moment?
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Speaker 2: Oh that's great, congratulations, thank you.
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Speaker 1: Unlike John, Nick seems very much at ease. He's calm
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Speaker 1: and attentive, waiting to see where the conversation will go.
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Speaker 1: John asks some questions about himself, and Nick answers. He
16:17
Speaker 1: lives in a small rural town, he's enrolled in Bible College,
16:21
Speaker 1: and in fact, Nick is a devout Baptist.
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Speaker 2: I wanted to ask what you thought when you got
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Speaker 2: the letter.
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Speaker 3: When I initially got your letter, I called one of
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Speaker 3: my friends from school and asked who this person was.
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Speaker 3: So he said, oh, yeah, they made a movie from
16:42
Speaker 3: a book. He wrote, Well, oh okay, Well after.
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Speaker 1: Google that, Nick never got around to googling that. So
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Speaker 1: to Nick, John is a stranger. Well to John, Nick's
16:54
Speaker 1: a presence he's lived with for the past twenty years.
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Speaker 2: So I was the chaplain at the hospital that you
17:02
Speaker 2: came into, and I don't do you remember anything about
17:12
Speaker 2: that day?
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Speaker 3: Well, you know, I can remember being burned. Where my
17:19
Speaker 3: memories of that day start were at the back door
17:22
Speaker 3: of the garage and my mother's going to the store.
17:26
Speaker 3: I was going to stay with my father, and my
17:28
Speaker 3: father was going to clean up some stuff, you know,
17:30
Speaker 3: burning boxes and trash and other things like that. I
17:34
Speaker 3: can remember being in the field and the flames and
17:37
Speaker 3: my father carrying me to the house. I can remember
17:40
Speaker 3: my father trying to put out the fire and putting
17:43
Speaker 3: water on me in the garage, and flashes of being
17:47
Speaker 3: on the helicopter. One of the things that stands out
17:51
Speaker 3: to me is is a memory of how cold the
17:53
Speaker 3: scissors were that they cut my clothes off with. The
17:58
Speaker 3: day I was burned, I was wearing the small lace
18:02
Speaker 3: up cowboy boots you know that you see at rural supplies.
18:05
Speaker 3: They are more of a novelty than anything. I remember that,
18:09
Speaker 3: But because I had leather shoes on, you know, you
18:13
Speaker 3: can actually see where the fire stopped melting my leg
18:18
Speaker 3: right at the line of those boots on my right foot,
18:21
Speaker 3: and if it hadn't been for those, it would have
18:23
Speaker 3: been much, much worse.
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Speaker 1: After the night of the fire, Nick was sent to
18:28
Speaker 1: recover at a hospital for burn victims, and in the
18:31
Speaker 1: years afterwards, tissue was always getting infected. Throughout his childhood,
18:36
Speaker 1: Nick was constantly in and out of the hospital. There
18:39
Speaker 1: was always the fear that he might not survive. To
18:42
Speaker 1: this day, Nick's right hand is so stitched together that
18:45
Speaker 1: there were parts of it he can't feel.
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Speaker 3: It is what it is this point, This is.
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Speaker 1: Nick's refrain when talking about the fire and its effect.
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Speaker 1: It is what it is.
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Speaker 2: Are you still in pain?
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Speaker 3: It's one of those things where anybody else would probably
19:02
Speaker 3: say yes, And I don't mean to sound that way.
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Speaker 3: They've never been burned. They don't understand what that constant
19:11
Speaker 3: background noise of pain is like. But at a certain
19:16
Speaker 3: point you just ignore it or it's just a constant
19:20
Speaker 3: so it's normal. It is what it is. I would
19:29
Speaker 3: definitely like to not have been burned and to not
19:32
Speaker 3: deal with the daily things that come with that, but
19:35
Speaker 3: it brought my family to Christ in a way that
19:38
Speaker 3: it would not have otherwise.
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Speaker 1: It was only after the accident that a friend invited
19:46
Speaker 1: Nick's family to a local church. They began attending with regularity.
19:51
Speaker 1: Before that, they've been Christian in name only. So to Nick,
19:55
Speaker 1: the fire brought him to the most important thing in
19:57
Speaker 1: his life. It brought him to God. Because of that
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Speaker 1: day in the er, Nick and his family's faith was
20:07
Speaker 1: made stronger. Well, John's was made weaker.
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Speaker 2: One of the things I wanted to ask you is
20:13
Speaker 2: how you knowing that terrible things can happen to kids,
20:18
Speaker 2: to innocent kids, having experienced that yourself, how you how
20:22
Speaker 2: you square that with your faith?
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Speaker 3: It took quite a long time for me to reconcile
20:30
Speaker 3: that with God, and I spent a while quite angry.
20:36
Speaker 3: I guess the way I look at it, it was
20:39
Speaker 3: a harsh mercy. Theologically speaking, for those who love God,
20:46
Speaker 3: everything is supposed to work for their good, and if
20:50
Speaker 3: you look at it in that light, the world definitely
20:54
Speaker 3: makes more sense. The Lord does allow some evil, but
21:00
Speaker 3: in the end, the evil works for.
21:03
Speaker 1: Good, and Nixy's a lot of good in his life.
21:06
Speaker 1: He's grateful for his parents, who stood by him all
21:09
Speaker 1: throughout his recovery, his grandfather, who tirelessly combed through stores
21:13
Speaker 1: searching for a lotion that might offer relief, the teachers
21:17
Speaker 1: who helped him in and out of his pressure garments.
21:20
Speaker 3: You know, the Lord put certain people in my life
21:22
Speaker 3: for a reason. I grew up in public schools, and yeah,
21:27
Speaker 3: there were some people there that didn't quite understand why
21:30
Speaker 3: I looked the way I looked. But the community did
21:34
Speaker 3: everything they could to educate the kids around me as
21:38
Speaker 3: to why I had scar tissue, why I had plastic
21:41
Speaker 3: face mask on.
21:43
Speaker 2: I think that it's so easy to be merely angry
21:50
Speaker 2: after that, And I think I might be merely angry,
21:55
Speaker 2: to be honest, I might be merely angry if it
21:58
Speaker 2: happened to my kid. I might be mere angry if
22:00
Speaker 2: it happened to me.
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Speaker 3: You know. It's just, you know, the Devil's always trying
22:08
Speaker 3: to tempt you and draw you astray, and and I
22:12
Speaker 3: think that's one of the things he uses against me, is, oh,
22:16
Speaker 3: how could this happen to you? You know, why would
22:20
Speaker 3: such a merciful and loving god let this happen to you?
22:24
Speaker 3: You know? And if you look at it like that,
22:26
Speaker 3: then you know the Devil's won.
22:35
Speaker 2: You know, I don't. I don't usually think about it
22:37
Speaker 2: in in uh terms of good and evil really, but
22:42
Speaker 2: a lot of life is a battle against despair because
22:45
Speaker 2: I have serious mental health problems. Nick despair, nihilism, hopelessness,
22:53
Speaker 2: there forms of this this why that my brain sometimes
22:58
Speaker 2: tries to tell me about out being a person, being alive, consciousness,
23:05
Speaker 2: that it's all empty, it's all meaningless, and I have
23:09
Speaker 2: to find ways of holding on to hope.
23:16
Speaker 3: Good the sadness and the you know, the desperation about it.
23:21
Speaker 3: I don't know that that'll ever go away entirely. I
23:25
Speaker 3: struggle with, you know, feeling down sometimes. But then again,
23:30
Speaker 3: I don't want to be that lonely person sequestered in
23:34
Speaker 3: a house somewhere. So you know, I'm going to move
23:37
Speaker 3: on and I'm going to just be the person I
23:39
Speaker 3: want to be.
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Speaker 1: So an answer to John's question, has it been a
23:44
Speaker 1: good life, the answer is yes, because Nick is determined
23:48
Speaker 1: to make it one.
24:01
Speaker 2: From what the doctor said, I thought, I thought that
24:05
Speaker 2: that you were likely to die, and h most of
24:14
Speaker 2: the last you know, eighteen years, I thought that I
24:18
Speaker 2: thought that you had died, and and and so I would,
24:24
Speaker 2: I would. I would pray for you every night and
24:28
Speaker 2: for your family, and I wanted to get I wanted
24:34
Speaker 2: to get in touch with you. If I could to
24:35
Speaker 2: say that I think of you often and I and
24:39
Speaker 2: I hope that's okay. I hope it's I hope it's
24:41
Speaker 2: okay that I pray for you and your family. If
24:44
Speaker 2: it's not, I'll stop.
24:47
Speaker 3: You know, I'm just I'm glad that somebody was always
24:50
Speaker 3: praying for me. Is there Definitely, We're definitely times where
24:54
Speaker 3: it was necessary.
24:57
Speaker 1: Without doubt, Nick is grateful for John's prayer, but overall,
25:01
Speaker 1: I get the feeling that some things, some crucial things,
25:05
Speaker 1: are in place in Nick's life. His family is close knit,
25:09
Speaker 1: his life has purpose, He's secure in his faith, but
25:12
Speaker 1: he can tell John is struggling. To him, John's not
25:16
Speaker 1: this famous writer, but someone who came to him heavy hearted.
25:20
Speaker 1: So as to John's prayers, Nick points out someone else
25:23
Speaker 1: who might have benefited from them.
25:25
Speaker 3: John praying for me, I really hope that's helped keep
25:30
Speaker 3: the dialogue between you and the Lord fluid and going.
25:36
Speaker 2: You know, I never thought of it that way, Nick,
25:41
Speaker 2: But it is true that on the days when I
25:51
Speaker 2: prayed for nothing else and felt no real meaning in prayer,
25:58
Speaker 2: that I still prayed for you and for your family,
26:02
Speaker 2: and that that was a point of connection.
26:07
Speaker 1: At a time when religion stopped making sense to John,
26:10
Speaker 1: at a time when he felt like he couldn't reasonably
26:12
Speaker 1: pray for himself or his family, he still hungered for
26:15
Speaker 1: something that went beyond reason, And in those moments there
26:19
Speaker 1: was Nick. As we near the end of the call,
26:29
Speaker 1: that moment when hands would be shaken or hugs exchanged,
26:33
Speaker 1: John and Nick instead stare at each other through their
26:35
Speaker 1: computer screens.
26:38
Speaker 3: It's definitely remarkable to see, you know, an individual that
26:42
Speaker 3: came into my life at such a dramatic event and
26:46
Speaker 3: for such a short amount of time, and to have
26:49
Speaker 3: made such an impact in this I can definitely see
26:52
Speaker 3: the Lord working.
26:54
Speaker 2: Part of what's wild is that you, you know, you
26:58
Speaker 2: don't look like you did when you are three years
27:01
Speaker 2: old or whatever, but like you look, I recognize you.
27:06
Speaker 2: I recognize you. But at the same time there's the
27:09
Speaker 2: shock of looking at you and seeing an adult, and
27:13
Speaker 2: so it's just it's really great to see you grown up.
27:17
Speaker 2: Thank you. How old are you now? Twenty four? God,
27:24
Speaker 2: it's crazy to think that I was younger then than
27:26
Speaker 2: you are now. I was just a kid.
27:36
Speaker 1: What is the rest of your day looking like Nick?
27:41
Speaker 3: Well, I have some schoolwork to do, and I'm gonna
27:44
Speaker 3: go get a cup of coffee, bring my grandmother's horse
27:47
Speaker 3: in for the evening, and feed the chickens and just
27:52
Speaker 3: hang out with the family and you, John.
27:56
Speaker 2: I also need to feed the chickens this afternoon. I'm
28:00
Speaker 2: going to pick up my kids from school and then
28:03
Speaker 2: we're going to go over and I'll probably I'll probably
28:07
Speaker 2: tell them about this, to be honest with you, Nick Good.
28:17
Speaker 1: After getting off the call, John picks up his son
28:19
Speaker 1: Henry from school. He tells Henry about talking to Nick,
28:23
Speaker 1: and Henry has questions like where does Nick live and
28:27
Speaker 1: how is Nick doing. John thinks back to when we
28:30
Speaker 1: first spoke, how all he wanted was to know that
28:33
Speaker 1: Nick was doing okay. I'd asked what that meant and
28:37
Speaker 1: he couldn't say for sure, But in retrospect, he realizes
28:41
Speaker 1: he wanted to know that Nick was loved, and now
28:45
Speaker 1: he knows he is by his family and through his
28:48
Speaker 1: faith by God. John struggles for a way to share
28:53
Speaker 1: all this with Henry, but he doesn't quite know how
28:55
Speaker 1: to say it, so instead he tells Henry that it's
29:00
Speaker 1: like Nack is doing okay.
29:42
Speaker 3: Now that the fernentures returned into.
29:46
Speaker 2: Its goodwill home.
29:51
Speaker 3: Now that the last month's rant is scheming with.
29:55
Speaker 2: The damaged bottle, take this moment to decide if we
30:02
Speaker 2: imagine flee to Felder from the last accident. Please.
30:18
Speaker 1: This episode of Heavyweight was produced by Senior producer Khalila
30:21
Speaker 1: Holt along with Stevie Lane, Moheeny mcgouker, and me Jonathan Goldstein.
30:25
Speaker 1: Special thanks to Emily Condon, Reverend Patricia Sheldon, Alex Bloomberg,
30:29
Speaker 1: Caitlin Kenny, Gabby Bulgarelli, and Jackie Cohen. Bobby Lord mixed
30:34
Speaker 1: the episode with original music by Christine Fellows, John K.
30:37
Speaker 1: Sampson and Bobby Lord. Additional music credits can be found
30:40
Speaker 1: on our website, Gimbletmedia dot com slash Heavyweight. Our theme
30:44
Speaker 1: song is by the Weaker Dance courtesy of Epidaph Records.
30:47
Speaker 1: Follow us on Twitter at Heavyweight or email us at
30:49
Speaker 1: Heavyweight at Gimletmedia dot com. And if you're looking for
30:53
Speaker 1: something new to listen to, I would heartily encourage you
30:56
Speaker 1: to check out John's podcast. It is called The Anthropristine
30:59
Speaker 1: Review and it's a personal favorite of mine. I really
31:02
Speaker 1: love it. As for us, we'll be back with a
31:05
Speaker 1: new episode in two weeks.