Kelly Corrigan, TELL ME MORE
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[0:47]I am just so beyond thrilled to be sitting here today with Kelly Corrigan,
[0:52]who is the author of four consecutive New York Times best sellers,
[0:55]including tell me more stories about the 12 hardest things I'm learning to say,
[1:00]glitter and glue, the middle place, and lift.
[1:02]She has been called The Poet Laureate of the Ordinary,
[1:05]I Have Post, and The Voice of a Generation by O Magazine.
[1:09]Kelly is currently the host of the Nantucket Project,
[1:11]a live event series, and podcast.
[1:14]She is also the host of exactly at KQED radio station.
[1:18]She is an accomplished columnist with essays
[1:20]in O The Oprah Magazine, Glamour, and Goodhouse Keeping.
[1:23]A graduate of the University of Richmond in San Francisco State University
[1:26]where she received her Masters in Literature.
[1:28]She currently lives with her husband and two daughters.
[1:31]Welcome Kelly. Thanks so much for coming on Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books.
[1:33]Oh, thanks. It's like to be here.
[1:35]This is a killer room we're sitting in.
[1:37]If you guys could see it, it has, I'm going to say there are 700 to 1,000 books
[1:43]in my eyesight right now, and they're all arranged by color,
[1:46]which is how I have my books at home, so I feel really, really comfortable in this space.
[1:51]Oh, I'm so happy.
[1:53]As I was telling you, I've been following you.
[1:55]I feel like for years, because I've been reading all of your memoirs forever,
[1:58]so I don't know. This is such a treat for me.
[2:00]Oh, thanks. Thanks for having me.
[2:02]Where I have sat and read all your books. It's very cool.
[2:05]So tell me more is your most recent book, Stories about the 12 hardest things
[2:08]I'm learning to say.
[2:09]Yeah.
[2:10]Can you tell listeners what this is about?
[2:11]Sure.
[2:12]What made you write this particular book?
[2:13]Sure. So I was, I had written my first book, The Middle Place,
[2:17]which brought my father and I both having cancer at the same time.
[2:20]I think it came out in 2008.
[2:22]And then since then I had written lift and glittering glue,
[2:25]and then this new editor that I was working with,
[2:28]the same as Andy Ward, and I went out first sushi,
[2:31]a blue ribbon sushi, and I was telling him about this argument
[2:36]that I got in with my husband about the difference between saying,
[2:39]I'm sorry and saying I was wrong.
[2:42]And it was my contention that saying I was wrong
[2:45]involves a level of humility that I'm sorry just doesn't somehow have.
[2:52]And maybe it's because as parents, we force like our three
[2:56]year olds and four year olds to say I'm sorry like four times a day,
[2:59]that by the time they become adults, it can be a really kind of a cheap
[3:03]perfunctory statement.
[3:05]And I was wrong is kind of a big bold, incredible thing to say.
[3:11]And so at this dinner table, I was saying to Edward, like if you were really,
[3:15]if you were really in a tense situation with somebody that you're in a permanent
[3:19]relationship with, they could stop everything if they were just to say,
[3:24]you're right, I was wrong.
[3:26]There's nowhere to go from there, there's no, the fight's over.
[3:29]And that got us wondering like what else do you have to be able to say
[3:36]if you want to be in, you know, big juicy satisfying relationships that last for decades
[3:41]and decades. And so we started to sort of work out this list.
[3:45]And then right around that same time, so my father died,
[3:49]it'd be five years in February. And then after my father died, not long after my friend died,
[3:56]her name was Liz Watts. And she had three kids and I gave the eulogy at her service.
[4:01]I gave my father's eulogy. And in the process of writing those and thinking about
[4:07]what it is that it all comes down to, it became crystal clear that it's just about
[4:13]these relationships. And so that combined with this funny conversation I had with Edward,
[4:19]made me think like, oh, this is actually a really worthwhile undertaking because
[4:24]if it's all about relationships, which I'm entirely convinced it is,
[4:29]then how do we do them? And I'm not a self-help kind of gal. I don't have that background
[4:35]or the expertise. So then I just went looking for stories that I thought totally underlined
[4:41]these big ahas that I have had over the course of being married and being a mother.
[4:47]At one point I had 17 different things that I was learning to say and then I had kind of whittle it
[4:52]down to six and then we ended up with 12. What got left on the cutting arm floor? Like what
[4:57]something you learned to say that didn't make it in? A huge, huge thing that was left aside
[5:04]because it was too big for the book was you can go, which is what I said to my dad when he was dying.
[5:10]And telling that story in the way that it deserves to be told was running at like 70 pages
[5:20]and some of these chapters are eight pages. So at some point it was starting to become obvious to
[5:26]me and then Andy Ward, my editor said this really deserves its own space. And once you get to it,
[5:34]that's all anybody's going to remember. This is going to be the book about your father dying.
[5:37]And he said, and I just don't I don't want to overshadow everything that comes before because
[5:42]it's so useful and it's so fun to read. And so let's just set that aside. And so we did and I
[5:51]have this now it's 200 pages of that story in great detail of what it felt like to be in that
[5:58]three week stretch. So is that your next book? I'm not really sure. I sort of when I write a book,
[6:05]I'm also committing to two fairly significant book tours. So there's a hardcover tour in a
[6:10]paper back tour. And the last time I tell me more they were each 20 cities. So it's a huge undertaking
[6:18]and reading even just a little bit about my dad and Liz that's in tell me more. Like I can never
[6:26]get through it without choking up and it gets heavy. So it's sort of hard for me to imagine,
[6:34]it's very easy for me to imagine sharing the pages somehow. Like I don't know through an email
[6:41]to subscribers is really the way I've thought about doing it. You know, I have this
[6:45]6,000 people who asked me to send them emails every so often. And I thought maybe I'll just share
[6:50]it with you guys. Maybe I'll just send it to you in little pieces because that way I don't have to
[6:55]tour with it which feels excruciating to me. I don't know quite what will happen to it. I'll definitely
[7:02]find a way to share it but I'm not sure which and I'm definitely not. I can't imagine really
[7:07]just like plopping it up on Facebook. You know, I was sort of imagining that this email thing
[7:12]might be an interesting way to do it because these are people that are super feel super connected
[7:19]to my work. And so maybe that's the most personal way to share it. Like it feels funny to try
[7:27]to commercialize it. I don't know. Like I can't imagine being in a meeting at Random House talking
[7:31]about what the cover should be. What if you did an audiobook? I thought about an audiobook. I thought
[7:36]about a podcast where I could read some and then talk some about what it feels like now to look
[7:44]at those pages because it's been almost five years and grief is such an animated force. I mean,
[7:49]it's not stable. It's not static. So anyway, I'm really right in the middle of trying to figure
[7:55]out how to share that stuff in a way that's helpful to people because it would definitely
[8:01]definitely definitely be helpful. Like if I had had something, I mean, I was just starving for
[8:07]people's stories, detailed stories of letting somebody go when that was happening to me. And
[8:13]after it happened, I read Ages for Hawk and I read a grief observed and I couldn't get enough
[8:19]of really intimate, thorough telling of that story of like what is it to lose somebody that you
[8:28]just don't know that you can be in the world without. So well, I would hate to think that
[8:34]the stumbling block of the tour and the travel is going to prevent this beautiful book from coming
[8:39]out. You know, there's got to be a way. I know. I mean, this is not for me to figure out what
[8:45]you figured out. But I feel like, you know, maybe there's some of you who work out with publisher
[8:49]or something. I mean, people are going to buy it anyway. Yeah. Maybe you've got to a point and
[8:54]like maybe have to tour as much or something. I know. Okay. Maybe we'll just do it on this podcast.
[8:59]That would be great. Yes. At the beginning of every episode, it wasn't a
[9:04]called mom. Don't read like, yeah, mom's don't have time to read books. It's perfect.
[9:07]Yeah. So we'll just we'll just read it to you. Done. Done. Perfect. You can come in. We can just hang
[9:12]out every week and you can just read a little bit. I would have to buy your own microphone.
[9:15]This room is pretty gorgeous. I gotta say, if you ever get invited to come to this room, you should
[9:20]come to this room. It's very sweet. It's probably why I can't motivate to leave it.
[9:26]Well, let's talk a little more about what's in this particular book. It shows to the next one
[9:31]that want to help market. Yeah. Because I was really, I mean, as you said, you wrote beautifully
[9:36]about, I mean, you didn't say you wrote beautifully, but I'll say you wrote beautifully about
[9:40]your dad and your friend, Liz's loss. Yeah. And one of the things was how you almost made part of
[9:46]the book. As if you were talking to her, right? Like, here's what happened after. Like, here's
[9:50]how it was with your kids. Like, yes, I told you I'd watch out for them and here I'm watching
[9:54]it and here's what happened. Yeah. It was like heartbreaking, but so moving. That was a very, very
[10:00]So that chapter is called onward, which is definitely a thing you have to be able to say as an adult in the world that there is a time to accept things and keep moving.
[10:10]And it is not always as easy as we wish it was.
[10:14]And so I had written this completely different story for that.
[10:18]And I had what I thought was that I had already told you enough, you, the reader, enough about Liz and that there was a sense of completion there.
[10:29]And then I had this other story and the other story was too excruciating.
[10:33]So I have this great friend, his name is Jim Morrison and his wife and children are all killed in a plane crash.
[10:39]And he has found a way to stay in the world and to be just a lovely person to sit next to.
[10:45]And it's astonishing to me and all of the people who know him that he's able to be so giving and to receive other people's lives which are so easy.
[10:58]Compared to his and somehow he can still have compassion for your by comparison, quite small problem.
[11:05]And so I had written a lot about him, like 30 pages about him.
[11:09]And that at some point a friend of mine, Ariel, who's mentioned a lot in the book.
[11:14]She's a therapist and her daughter and my daughter are great friends and she and I walk together once a week.
[11:20]And she's really very wise.
[11:23]And to the extent that there's anything in this book that you feel as wise, you should attribute it to Dr. Ariel Tross in Oakland, California.
[11:32]Because she really helps me understand what is universally true about what I'm saying, what's particular to me.
[11:39]Like she's an early reader of mine and we talk a lot and she really grounds it in a much larger body of understanding and research than I have access to.
[11:49]So at any rate, I took the Jim Morrison and what she said about the Jim Morrison story is, this stands out for several reasons.
[11:58]One is because it's utterly horrifying.
[12:01]It's beyond what most people don't know someone that that's happened to.
[12:05]Everything else in the book people know someone is that that's happened to.
[12:08]And the second thing is that it's the only chapter that's reported, like you didn't live through that with him, you met him after.
[12:14]And so everything you're telling us is almost as if you're writing an article about him.
[12:19]And it just doesn't, it stands out for that reason.
[12:22]And if you want to keep it and keep it in, but if you, but to me, I feel like it also deserves its own place that it's a separate thing.
[12:30]And I thought that was pretty, pretty good observation honestly, the idea that it was the only part that was reported.
[12:36]And so I said it aside, I was afraid to tell Jim that I was setting it aside.
[12:41]I didn't know how he'd feel about that.
[12:43]And we still feel like we're going to do something with it.
[12:46]So I think he feels good.
[12:47]We can talk about that media plan next.
[12:49]Yeah, exactly.
[12:50]And I'm not that amazing human being.
[12:53]So then I had this hole and I wanted to get to this point about onward.
[12:59]And then I said to Edward, like I think I solved my problem today.
[13:04]Like I basically had spent, I had just recently spent time with Andy and the three kids.
[13:10]And I had just observed so many things that I thought Liz would love to see.
[13:17]Like for instance, they have this very enormous juicing machine.
[13:22]Like it's this giant metal thing that you, you know, you use this hand crank to juice, beats and carrots.
[13:30]And you put all the herbs in there.
[13:32]And it really does make an incredible glass of juice.
[13:35]But it also makes an incredible mess.
[13:37]Like the juice to mess ratio for me is way out of whack.
[13:41]So I would never, also just the sheer size of it.
[13:43]Like you need its own cabinet to live in.
[13:46]So anyway, Andy and I sort of saw that the same way.
[13:49]Like that this is just a whole lot of drama for not that much juice.
[13:52]But to Liz, it was this great joy.
[13:55]Like she really took pleasure in making the juice.
[13:58]And I think that she had a very thoughtful opinion of it that she was showing her kids.
[14:04]Like this is where juice comes from.
[14:06]This is what it, so when you go to Joe's juice and you get some beat juice.
[14:10]Like this is what happened before that.
[14:12]Here's how many oranges it takes to make the glass of orange juice.
[14:15]Like she was really hopeful that she could somehow show her children how much work went into the things that we might be enjoying too casually.
[14:25]And also she was a believer in food as medicine.
[14:28]And medicine in and of itself was a topic that she'd spent a lot of cycles thinking about.
[14:34]She was six or seven years with ovarian cancer.
[14:37]And she tried a lot of things Western and Eastern.
[14:40]I mean, she did 88 rounds of chemotherapy.
[14:42]So she tried all the things that you're supposed to try on this side of the Atlantic.
[14:47]But she also talked to nutritionists and she did a lot of reading.
[14:51]And she's a very smart woman and really well informed.
[14:54]So anyway, sure enough, when I was there, Andy was making this juice with the kids.
[14:59]And he and I shared a look across the table.
[15:02]And I knew he knew what I was thinking.
[15:05]And so when I went home, I just wrote her this letter and I said,
[15:09]like, look, you're never not going to be here.
[15:12]And that is going to keep hurting.
[15:14]Like you're not going to be there when they get pregnant.
[15:16]You're not going to be there when they get engaged.
[15:18]You're not going to be there the day they get married.
[15:20]You're not going to be there the day their husband loses his job and they freak out.
[15:23]Like, there's a lot of loss ahead that's unavoidable.
[15:26]And I am not minimizing this.
[15:28]But I want you to know that these people are doing as well as these people could be doing.
[15:33]There's a lot of love in that house.
[15:35]There's a lot of joy.
[15:36]They still laugh.
[15:37]They still run around.
[15:38]They still like to play the same games.
[15:40]Like, nothing's been destroyed in the wake of your loss.
[15:45]Like, because you just don't know, you know, you just wonder, like,
[15:49]if we all played you go together when you were alive,
[15:53]do you never want to play you go again?
[15:55]Or do you want to play you go every day?
[15:57]Or do some of you want to play it?
[15:59]And others of you can't believe that you would play that game,
[16:03]even though she's not here.
[16:05]Like everybody's, there's four people living under one roof.
[16:09]And they're all doing this grief thing.
[16:11]And their own right and their own style.
[16:14]And like the potential for conflict there is terrible.
[16:18]It seemed to me.
[16:19]But my observation of them as a forsome is that it couldn't be going better,
[16:26]which is to say it is excruciating.
[16:29]And yet, there is joy.
[16:32]And there is connection.
[16:34]And Andy, you know, a thing that Luz and I talked about a lot.
[16:39]And we talked about things that I've never talked to anybody about,
[16:42]because nothing will make you more honest and more of a straight shooter
[16:46]than the potential of death.
[16:49]But what she said about Andy was,
[16:52]I'm really afraid that he's not going to know how to do this.
[16:55]Like he's not particularly patient.
[16:58]And that's like a really high requirement for parenting.
[17:01]And if you need, you know, she was the patient one.
[17:04]Like there were things that she did that she did not,
[17:07]she was not sure he would be able to do.
[17:10]And I agreed with her.
[17:11]I did not talk her out of that feeling.
[17:13]I did not reject it out of hand.
[17:16]I accepted it.
[17:17]I internalized it.
[17:19]And I mirrored it back to her.
[17:21]And sincerely.
[17:22]Like I said, he's a big, big career.
[17:25]He started a company and the company went well.
[17:27]He's the center of attention in every room.
[17:29]He's a great storyteller, big personality.
[17:31]Like he's not the guy who notices that one of his kids,
[17:37]you know, is starting to get a stye in their left eye.
[17:40]That would not be his nature.
[17:41]And he's definitely not noticing that someone's not eating their dinner
[17:44]or that they someone went to bed earlier.
[17:47]You know, like there's a lot that you have to be scanning for as a parent.
[17:51]Somebody's got to be scanning for it.
[17:53]And the way they worked out their relationship is she said,
[17:56]I got it.
[17:57]And she was very good at it, very capable, very tuned in, very sensitive.
[18:01]So anyway, the thing I really, really wanted her to know was he's doing it.
[18:08]He's doing the thing that we didn't, we weren't sure he could do.
[18:11]Like he is such a good student.
[18:13]And he always was, he was like, he went to great schools
[18:17]and he was a great athlete.
[18:19]He was a college swimmer.
[18:20]And he was a great business person.
[18:23]And he is not a person who's going to get beat by something.
[18:27]And in fact, I think probably that's why his wife having incurable cancer
[18:33]was so maddening for him was that it was the first thing that he couldn't
[18:39]like learn his way out of or strategize his way out of or build a team
[18:43]to get his way out of.
[18:45]But he did it.
[18:46]He is like mother and father.
[18:48]And he's really quite good at it.
[18:50]And he, he calls like, I mean, he's really honest feet now.
[18:55]It's been four, it'll be four years very soon.
[18:58]But for at least a year and a half, he didn't call out what he called me.
[19:02]And he said, just tell Edward, like, I don't really need to talk to dads right now.
[19:07]Like I'm trying to learn how to be a mom.
[19:09]And those dads, they don't really know.
[19:11]Like, yeah, no shit.
[19:12]And then he said something like the dads keep calling me and saying,
[19:16]like, come on, let's go out for a guy's night.
[19:18]And he's like, and I can't afford to be a hungover.
[19:20]I'm a mom now.
[19:21]And I was like, there we go.
[19:23]Now this is like, you should like go on tour.
[19:26]And just say, 10 things I learned trying to be a mom.
[19:29]Because there is a difference.
[19:31]And it's so gratifying to hear it.
[19:35]And so anyway, in that letter, so there's just a letter to Liz
[19:40]and tell me more.
[19:41]And it's the chapter called onward.
[19:43]And it's just, here's what's happening.
[19:46]And it's working to the extent that it can work.
[19:48]Do you believe that she knows?
[19:51]Like, just do you believe that she in some way
[19:54]could like, knows the content of letter
[19:56]can look like, do you believe in that?
[19:58]No.
[20:00]I don't, I wish I did.
[20:01]The thing I believe though very strongly
[20:05]is that there's a lot of her that's still here.
[20:08]Like to be with her children is to be with her.
[20:12]And it's like, it's all been sprinkled
[20:15]like all over all of them.
[20:16]Like her youngest son looks so much like her,
[20:19]it's, it'll give you the shivers.
[20:22]And he's very kinetic, constant motion.
[20:26]And every now and then he'll this let me stare at him.
[20:29]And I am convinced that he knows what I'm doing.
[20:33]So I think we are, I mean, of course my dad's still here.
[20:37]Like so much so, like there's so many things I do every day
[20:40]that are part of greenie.
[20:43]And so all that, there is a distribution
[20:48]after a person dies for sure.
[20:50]I think it's their loss.
[20:51]And I think it's her loss, what she doesn't get to be with us.
[20:56]We get to be with her in a weird way
[20:59]that's insufficient, but is what it is.
[21:02]But she doesn't get to be here.
[21:05]And I don't think that she knows I don't, yeah, I don't.
[21:09]But, you know, I would be thrilled to be wrong.
[21:12]You know, I'd be thrilled to discover
[21:14]that I'm short-sighted and sorry, that was so personal.
[21:17]I didn't mean to ask her just, I wonder, you know,
[21:19]people have all these different beliefs and feelings.
[21:22]Sometimes, you know, I feel like I try to convince myself
[21:26]that people are still around.
[21:28]All these people who are high-flossed, who I love.
[21:30]Because I know maybe it's not true,
[21:32]but intellectually it makes me feel better
[21:35]and then what else do I have other than I'm feeling better
[21:38]in a way?
[21:39]Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[21:40]It's only my mind, so I can trick myself maybe.
[21:43]That's right.
[21:44]It almost seems unfair, though,
[21:46]the people who pass away without having children
[21:48]because then are they still as sprinkled around?
[21:51]Do you know what I mean?
[21:52]I don't know.
[21:53]Yeah, I mean, it depends in their faith.
[21:54]Any connection, certainly it's a parent-child relationship
[21:58]is singular.
[21:59]But, I mean, I think they're probably people
[22:01]in the world who had deep relationship with my dad
[22:04]who every now and then might pass the police officer
[22:08]manning the, you know, the crosswalk and say,
[22:11]hey, how are you doing?
[22:13]I have a great day, you know, and that's really straight
[22:17]from him, you know, that you would have that urge
[22:20]to splash around some positivity.
[22:23]Wow.
[22:24]So when you're writing this book, like,
[22:26]how do you get into this headspace where you're like going
[22:28]back through the losses and all the pain and everything else?
[22:31]Like, and then like, you know, stand up
[22:33]and go pick your kids up from school or something.
[22:35]Like, when do you do your best writing?
[22:38]Where do you like to do it?
[22:40]How do you manage those transitions?
[22:42]Not very well.
[22:44]Like, I'm not, there's nothing about my process
[22:47]that anyone else should ever try to adopt.
[22:51]It's very sporadic and there are long periods
[22:56]of very low production.
[22:59]And also it's kind of hard to see yourself.
[23:01]Like, I don't necessarily know how I'm getting things done.
[23:05]It never feels to me like it's happening
[23:07]and then all of a sudden, you know, like I'll say to Edward,
[23:11]like, I think I'm finished and have you like,
[23:13]what, like when?
[23:15]And it's like, I don't know, like I have a little burst.
[23:17]And you know, so something will be like,
[23:20]kind of more or less the same for eight or nine months.
[23:25]And then all of a sudden, for three weeks straight,
[23:28]like I'll just start going around tightening all the screws
[23:30]and like filling things out and seeing where this thing should go
[23:33]and figuring out why it's even there in the first place.
[23:36]And therefore I can write a transition
[23:38]that's like makes the whole thing like click together.
[23:41]And so it's like that.
[23:44]But I do, one thing that I'm starting to understand about me
[23:47]is that I think a lot of times
[23:49]when I'm in a really deep conversation,
[23:52]I'm collecting and testing.
[23:56]So like I do this thing called the neighborhood project,
[23:59]which is this, it's like the best part of my life right now.
[24:04]So it's small groups of people, friends,
[24:06]and someone raised their hand and says,
[24:07]you can come to my house and we'll watch a short film.
[24:11]So it's like 20, 25 minutes.
[24:13]And then we talk for an hour and a half.
[24:14]And there's no cell phones
[24:16]and it's totally confidential.
[24:17]And then we come back the next month and do it again.
[24:19]And I'm in two of these groups.
[24:21]I'm in one in Southern California of a friend of mine.
[24:24]I don't get to go very often,
[24:25]but when I go, I learn so much.
[24:27]And then I'm in one in my little town.
[24:29]And like we just had it.
[24:29]We have ours on the third Saturday of every month.
[24:32]We all go somewhere at nine o'clock.
[24:33]You're not allowed to like put out a whole bunch of food
[24:36]or whatever, because we don't want any burden for anybody.
[24:38]So it's just like a box of coffee.
[24:40]Nine a.m.
[24:41]Nine a.m.
[24:42]And a p.m.
[24:43]I'm a bed bed.
[24:45]I was about to be so impressed.
[24:46]But anyway, wow, that would be amazing.
[24:48]I didn't even know what nine p.m. is.
[24:50]Last night, the Democratic nation,
[24:52]the debate was at nine p.m.
[24:54]I'm like nine p.m.
[24:55]I can't stand for that.
[24:58]So anyway, so we watch these short films.
[25:01]And they're seven minute documentaries or whatever
[25:05]about all sorts of different things.
[25:06]Like after the genocide in Rwanda,
[25:08]there were these slaw of Guchatcha took over,
[25:12]which is the law of the Grass Hill
[25:13]where a person who had perpetrated
[25:16]set of crimes against a family
[25:18]would say in front of the community,
[25:21]eyeball to eyeball to the remaining family members.
[25:24]I killed your brother.
[25:25]I killed your mother.
[25:25]I put their body in this real dream.
[25:27]I raped your daughter.
[25:28]The whole thing.
[25:29]They come completely clean.
[25:31]And then that person decides whether they want to
[25:33]forgive them or not.
[25:34]So we watch.
[25:35]So one of these films was like,
[25:36]so nice and light.
[25:37]Some of them are really light and funny.
[25:39]Like there's just one about this guy, Wayne White,
[25:41]who makes this hilarious art.
[25:42]And it was just a story of how did he come to make this art.
[25:45]Because it's really extraordinary in the literal,
[25:49]like extraordinary.
[25:51]And so he tells his story.
[25:53]And it's kind of a gas.
[25:54]And he worked for PE's Playhouse and made puppets and stuff.
[25:57]So anyway, it could be about just about anything.
[26:00]But then when we're having these conversations,
[26:02]and the people on my group, I just have such high regard for,
[26:05]there's such interesting, my group in Oakland
[26:09]is just all women.
[26:09]The one in LA is co-ed.
[26:11]And when you're listening to their stories,
[26:15]the more you listen, the more you realize
[26:16]like where are the points of intersection are?
[26:19]And that helps me understand what ideas I want to lean into
[26:26]on the page.
[26:27]Like it helps give me the confidence
[26:30]that this isn't going to completely miss
[26:34]when I put it out there.
[26:36]Because I kind of put things out there in these groups.
[26:39]And then it will resonate.
[26:40]And people will talk about it.
[26:41]And they'll add something interesting to it
[26:44]as people do in great conversations.
[26:45]So just the problem is, the whole reason
[26:47]the neighborhood project exists
[26:48]is because it's not that many great conversations
[26:50]happening right now.
[26:51]Because people start making the time.
[26:53]And they're also responding to like current events.
[26:58]And this is more like universal.
[26:59]Like these are themes about forgiveness or humility
[27:02]or curiosity.
[27:04]Like stuff you could have been talking about 500 years ago
[27:07]on a completely different society.
[27:09]And that's a relief.
[27:11]And that really helps me understand like what it's like
[27:16]like the nicest thing people ever say to me about my books
[27:19]is or if I give a talk or something they say like exactly.
[27:23]That's exactly how I was feeling.
[27:24]I could never have put it that way.
[27:26]Never been able to put words on it.
[27:28]But that's exactly how I felt.
[27:30]And I feel like I get to exactly in conversation first.
[27:35]And then I can write more confidently
[27:38]because all it's doing is some kind of validation
[27:43]conversationally gives me the confidence
[27:46]to even bother trying to write it.
[27:49]I think if I'm toying with something,
[27:53]then I'll discover myself kind of floating it
[27:57]conversationally.
[27:58]And if it generates interesting conversation,
[28:03]then I think, oh yeah, that's good.
[28:05]Oh, definitely.
[28:06]It definitely keep going on that.
[28:07]Like I'm working on a novel right now.
[28:09]And it's a little bit like particular activation
[28:13]like once you buy a red jetta, then all you see
[28:15]on the street are red jettas.
[28:17]But everything that comes up in conversation
[28:20]like this is such validation for this novel.
[28:22]Like this is exactly what I'm talking about.
[28:24]Can you say what the novel's about?
[28:26]No.
[28:26]Nothing.
[28:27]No.
[28:28]OK.
[28:29]Do you know when it's coming out?
[28:30]Do you have it like is it already scheduled?
[28:33]I think it will come out in early 2021.
[28:36]That's soon.
[28:37]That's not so far.
[28:38]Yeah.
[28:38]Are you from next year?
[28:40]That's exciting.
[28:41]It is.
[28:42]It is.
[28:42]It's the most comfortable I've ever
[28:46]been in a creative project.
[28:47]Like I'm so confident that this is worth doing,
[28:52]that it's worth reading, that it's worth talking about,
[28:55]that it's this is core enough to everybody,
[28:58]that everyone should have an opinion about this question
[29:01]I'm putting out there through this story.
[29:02]Can't wait to read this.
[29:03]Yeah.
[29:04]What a teaser.
[29:05]I know, I know, I know.
[29:06]Do you have any parting advice to aspiring authors?
[29:09]I know you've already said a lot of it.
[29:11]You know, I just did a thing.
[29:13]I don't know if anyone's ever heard of this thing.
[29:14]It's called She Rights University.
[29:16]Yeah, it's sponsored.
[29:17]Oh, you did.
[29:18]It's sponsored your class, yes.
[29:20]So I think it's available, and you can just get it.
[29:23]And it's an hour and a half of me sharing everything
[29:26]I know about writing nonfiction.
[29:28]So that's available to you.
[29:30]But I mean, I do think that being in your document every day,
[29:35]has a certain unappreciated value,
[29:39]which is like every time you open it,
[29:41]you're making this tiny commitment,
[29:44]not opening it.
[29:45]It's like not getting on the scale.
[29:46]It's like you're afraid of something.
[29:48]And so you should really make yourself open it.
[29:51]I think it keeps it alive in your subconscious,
[29:54]which is super valuable.
[29:56]Like there's a lot that we know, that we don't know we know.
[29:59]And there's a lot.
[30:00]of weird odds and ends of conversations and observations and feelings and life experiences that
[30:09]can all kind of swirl together if we just keep that activated. Like keep the question open
[30:17]in our minds and to do that, it helps just to read a chapter every day. And most people,
[30:23]like once you open the document, you're not going to be able to resist. You're going to noodle
[30:26]around in there and do something. I think there's always a little activity that can match
[30:33]your mood. Like there's like writing on a blank page is one kind of mood that you might be in.
[30:40]And now there might be like really fine tuning, some editing and other might be
[30:46]like this thing I'm doing right now for this novel is so fun. I've made this little paper book
[30:51]and that I sewed the spine of. And it's my- Now you're just bragging. I know.
[30:57]I know. That's enough now. Thank you. So fun. I shot it right through the sewing machine,
[31:02]which I set up in our house. And now I have like this little sewing paper book. And it's a reference
[31:07]guide. So the girl in this novel is born in 1994. And so it's just every page is a different year.
[31:17]So sometimes I'm in the mood to remind myself, like what was the number one song? What one
[31:22]the Oscar? Who was president? What was the biggest scandal? Who won the World Cup? What were the
[31:27]Olympics? What was like the cultural catchphrase that year? And kind of mapped that against the
[31:34]life of this character. And so that's a kind of activity that's actually moving me forward
[31:40]in the process. Like it's all work that has to be done. So even if I'm not in the mood to create
[31:46]from scratch, make right the next chapter, I can find something to do that will move me forward.
[31:54]So that's another reason why I think it's really valuable to be in the document every day. And
[32:00]I think every day means Saturdays and Sundays too. Because I- The other, the last thing I'll say
[32:04]that I think is really encouraging is that even at 30 minutes can be really effective.
[32:11]Like I know from reading books out loud at readings for 10 years that, you know, there are these
[32:17]million dollar lines that it's like the best line you've got in a whole chapter. And that might
[32:23]easily come to you in one of these quickie sessions. Like you could be in a document for 20 minutes
[32:30]and find the line. Like the words might come to you just right. And it's the whole punchline of
[32:36]this whole passage that you wrote. And you can live off that for years. Like, you know, I know
[32:42]when I'm reading out loud to people, I know when I've got one of those lines coming. And it's
[32:47]so fun to see it there and think like, I can't believe I'm still like getting the hit off of that
[32:55]little line that was like one of those 20 minute drop-ins where I was like, oh, I know, I'm going
[33:00]to say it. This is so funny. And so that's another gift is that you can, like small little pockets
[33:08]of time can actually be very high yield. Love it. Well, thank you so much for sharing all of
[33:14]this with your mom's time to read books. I really appreciate it by ladies. Thanks for listening
[33:19]to mom's don't have time to read books. The award winning podcast. This episode has been
[33:23]sponsored by book of the month club, book of the month club.com and your code Zibi to get your
[33:28]first book for just $5. You can follow me on Instagram at mom's don't have time to read books.
[33:34]Thanks so much to Steve and Ryan at Texture Sound for the Sound Editing. And thank you to
[33:39]Morning Moon Productions for providing this fantastic intro and out trim music. Thanks for listening.
[33:43]You could always email me at Zibi at Zibi Owens.com.