Alexandra Silber, WHITE HOT GRIEF PARADE
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[1:22]I'm here today with Alexandra Silver, who's the author of memoir White Hot Reef Parade,
[1:26]and after Anatefka, a novel inspired by Fiddler on the Roof.
[1:29]She is a Grammy-nominated actress and singer who has appeared on stage internationally and
[1:34]from the west end of London to esteemed venues like Carnegie Hall,
[1:37]the Kennedy Center, and on Broadway. Her most recent role on Broadway was at
[1:40]Seidel in Fiddler on the Roof. Originally from LA, Alexandra grew up in Detroit,
[1:45]Michigan. She currently lives in New York.
[1:47]So welcome, Alexandra. Thanks so much for coming on moms don't have time to read books.
[1:50]Thanks for having me. I'm so excited. I was just saying I've had this book for so long,
[1:54]and I've been so excited to talk to you, and I happen to really love this color of the
[1:58]cover. Thank you. I love it too. I love it too. It's so funny when you
[2:03]we're talking about White Hot Reef Parade, and as an author, you kind of get presentations
[2:07]of cover options, and you never even think about how other people will, you know, sort of come to
[2:14]an image of your book in one sort of image, and they were all so different, but this one jumped
[2:19]out at all of us. So yeah, really excited. It's really awesome. So can you tell everybody what
[2:24]White Hot Reef Parade is about? Of course. So White Hot Reef Parade is a memoir about
[2:32]the six months around the death of my father when I was 18 years old, and I think beyond that
[2:41]plot point, I sort of tell it in a very up to the moment blogger voice. I break all the rules,
[2:48]I think of writing memoir. There's a maze, there's a word search, there's, you know, all kinds of,
[2:56]there's things that are written as plays as well as more traditional prose, and I think that
[3:01]that's the parade, right? It's that when you're in the middle of a grief storm, it feels like one
[3:09]thing after another is hitting you, and I wanted the style of the book and the format of the book
[3:16]to reflect that bombastic experience, and it really focuses on my relationship to my father, obviously,
[3:24]my relationship to my extended family, and I think the real stars of the book are my remarkable
[3:35]18 year old friends and my mother, and this sort of point that at the sort of crossroads of childhood
[3:43]in adulthood, what does one do when they're hit with this thing that every culture fears the most?
[3:51]It doesn't matter. It doesn't even matter what animal you are, actually, every time period,
[3:57]every era, every socioeconomic class, every language spoken fears losing someone they love,
[4:04]and yet it's this thing that we don't talk about very often, and we don't talk about it very well
[4:10]when we do talk about it, and on top of all of that, there aren't a lot of resources
[4:16]for people in between childhood and adulthood, and I wanted to sort of make a point that
[4:26]young adults are remarkable, and the ones that were in my life are still in my life,
[4:31]and what is the nature, the big question of the book I hope I don't necessarily address it
[4:37]directly, but I hope it emerges that what does it mean to stand back up, and we hear so many
[4:44]books about how bad things are, chapters and chapters and chapters of describing the bad,
[4:51]and then you sort of get this fast forward moment where it's like 10 years later, here I am,
[4:55]and I'm fine, but what happens in that fast forward? What does it like to stand up? And I think this
[5:03]book hopefully is an homage to that because it's very universal. And also who are you when you
[5:09]stand back up because you're not the same? You're not the same. Like what do you look like? What
[5:13]does it mean to be upright anyway? Like the whole everything gets out of it? Yeah, totally.
[5:18]So it was an obviously extremely cathartic experience, and so much of it I started and realized I
[5:26]couldn't finish because books like this can't be written until your fully processed emotionally,
[5:37]and so I would start to write something and get to a place and go, okay, I just I might need to
[5:41]table that for for a couple of months or years. But it was an extraordinarily rewarding experience
[5:47]and feeling connected again to all of the people that were there to help me and my mom.
[5:53]Did you start it at the time? Did you write any did you record any of it? There was all from
[5:57]memory not to write, but even like just to remember. Oh sure, I don't think so. The only things
[6:03]that are direct from that time are a series of letters that I received from my then boyfriend Kent.
[6:10]And I did journal at the time, but it's funny. I look, and I've referred back to it, but it's
[6:15]just gobbledygook, you know, it's I think in a way what White Hat grief parade is is a translation.
[6:24]I put in huge quotes translation of that gobbledygook of my journals and my thoughts and my
[6:31]feelings. It's like, okay, now that we've sifted through all of this, this is what that was actually
[6:35]so I'm interested. You're so you're an actress. I am. You've taken this show on the road. You've
[6:40]like, you're amazing, Grammy nominated, international star. I mean, you've been everywhere.
[6:45]It's insane. I don't even know how you found the time to do this. You look like you're 12.
[6:48]Oh, thank you. But you wrote after Anatepka after you'd been in Fiddler on the Roof.
[6:55]Yeah. And bless your heart. You just thought about what might have happened after and you went
[6:58]ahead and wrote that book. I did. That book took nine years to write. Yeah. And I think,
[7:06]you know, it's interesting. And I think one of the many things that's like, okay, so about the
[7:11]the nature of your podcast, right? I think so often in our lives where we're told what we are
[7:18]is defined by what we do. And I have this really, I suppose, conventionally successful
[7:25]night job. I joke, you know, being a working actor. And sometimes a working actor, really at the
[7:31]height of what it means to be an actor in the theater. I've worked in the West End and on Broadway,
[7:36]which are, you know, where you aim for an English-speaking theater. And I'm honored by that.
[7:42]But I think I also knew that I had other identities that weren't just connected to my job. And I
[7:48]think everyone feels that way. You know, you're not just a mother. You're not just a finance
[7:53]person. You're not just, you know, we all have hobbies and loves. But what if we started to bring
[7:59]those things to the forefront and not necessarily have them replace the old identity, but stand
[8:04]side by side with them? For me, it was about creativity. And I realized that right around the
[8:10]same time, I was playing a huddle. I've done two productions of Fiddler on the roof. It's sort of
[8:14]crazy and bizarre and proof that there are no accidents. The first time I was, it was about
[8:22]five years after my dad passed away. It was 23 years old and starred in a regional production of
[8:29]Fiddler in Sheffield, England, a production we didn't know would transfer to the West End and eventually
[8:35]did. And it took up top to tail about two years of my life. And it was incredibly powerful.
[8:43]I think for the reason that these books, well, I should say, these books are connected.
[8:48]They're completely different genres. They're completely different voices. But they're first
[8:52]cousins because they're tied to the same experiences. And I'll say that when my father passed away,
[9:00]I felt a responsibility to table my grief and become myself, fulfill the potential that
[9:09]both of my parents and everyone around me, my teachers, my peers, had charged me to become.
[9:15]I had all this potential. I had all this training. I had all this natural talent. And what if
[9:21]in the face of this tragic event at such an awkward time in a person's development, what if that
[9:28]leveled me? I think that's a question a lot of people are faced with. Will this level me? Will I
[9:35]stand back up at all? And the way I responded to the event was, and this happens right after the
[9:41]events of White Hat grief parade, I decided to have a huge adventure. I thought, well, I have two
[9:47]choices I could curl up and die to, which, of course, isn't literal. It's collapse on myself,
[9:52]collapse on my dreams. Or in the face of this adversity, I could really live. And I...
[10:00]auditioned for a school in Glasgow, Scotland and I moved to Scotland and had a huge experience
[10:08]that was crucial to my development but I don't think I faced the feelings and the real
[10:14]experience of grief because I felt this responsibility and there I was five years later at
[10:19]rehearsing Huddle who has this probably one of the most beautiful and perfect scenes in musical
[10:26]where she stands on the train platform and says to her father alone that she's going to go pursue
[10:33]her heart and soul despite all of the adversities presented to her and sings that beautiful song
[10:40]far from the home I love and then her final words to him were words I didn't get in my life
[10:48]Papa God alone knows when we shall see each other again and his response to her is
[10:53]then we will leave it in his hands and I didn't get to say goodbye to my dad but I did through
[11:02]Huddle and it's one of the beauties of the theater as you get to live these multiple lifetimes you know
[11:08]so I think I realized that was the five-year mark and can we pause for one second you wouldn't
[11:15]sing any of that would you would you ever do that no but I can send you a clip of would you
[11:19]I have the recording for sure how do you go on because I'm like interiors I mean that's emotional
[11:25]how do you how do you go and perform that over and over and over again when it's so when it
[11:31]hits such a personal note how do you like draw the line between oh this is what I'm doing is my
[11:37]acting job with it's really interesting that's a question I get a lot and I'm sorry oh no no
[11:43]questions you get a lot no it's a question I get a lot in sort of a different form right which is
[11:47]it's not always under that lens I think it's a very fascinating question to ask
[11:53]how do you do a show eight times a week for years on end there's no other job in the world that's
[11:58]really like it you know even if you work in a factory and you literally do the same thing every
[12:03]day you talk to different people you wear different clothes you know it's theater acting is a lot
[12:10]like the kromyoga in the sense that you're doing the exact same series of movements you're wearing
[12:18]the same outfit you're saying the same lines you're telling the same story but the difference in
[12:25]bikromyoga is the same difference in the theater which is you are different every day you wake up
[12:32]and you're feeling vulnerable and therefore so is huddle you wake up and feel strong and have a day
[12:39]where you feel extraordinary resilience and hope and therefore so does huddle you might feel physically
[12:46]stuff like you're aching and suffering and therefore so does huddle and that's the distinction
[12:52]is you might be saying and doing the same identical things in the same outfits but
[12:58]we change moment to moment and that name might even be different from the evening performance
[13:01]depending on how you feel or what happened in between and I think that's a circuitous answer to
[13:08]that question is there were just days when it was work there were days when I was just so happy
[13:15]to sing there were days when I felt really connected to Judaism but not necessarily to grief
[13:22]to life purpose and being charged to do something and pursue something greater than yourself
[13:29]and not necessarily a goodbye to my dad and then there were days when it was exquisite pain
[13:35]it was touching the nerve directly and you know an exposure so white hot
[13:44]and I felt like in that way playing huddle cradled me and gave me a place to feel that grief
[13:51]and utilize those feelings and and ultimately gave me the goodbye I was robbed of therefore she
[13:57]meant so much to me and I suppose I did wonder what happened to her in a very personal way
[14:04]I did a lot of research during the run about what happened to women in her position
[14:10]what happened to people that boarded this train to meet people that they were married to
[14:17]or associated with in some way or related to but there was I what I kept discovering over over again
[14:24]was this loophole of women that were a fiance but not married they fell into this
[14:32]no man's land and the government processing didn't know what to do with them and they got trapped
[14:38]and often they would be utilized because Siberia had so few women in it they would be sent to
[14:45]sort of increase the population who know it was really hard life and so it's a beautiful song
[14:53]it's a beautiful scene but what happened next and I had to know and saw it through and
[15:00]saw it through so thoroughly I went to Siberia to no find out yeah I went to Siberia for huge
[15:06]research trip and it was one of the most profound examples of you cannot know until you experience
[15:15]something the colors the smells the people the culture the the change and how a language alters
[15:24]being in the world what beauty means in a one place versus in another I mean it it was
[15:30]mind-blowing and so you know and I think also sometimes when you're on a spiritual journey
[15:37]you have to match it with a geographic one you have to match it with a literal journey
[15:44]and as you said earlier about when you stand up you're not the same when you return
[15:51]to the point of origin you're not the same and that's the oldest story in the world that's
[15:56]Odysseus and Dorothy and Bilbo packets you know they're in back again so it was a really powerful
[16:03]experience but yeah I I I started writing during that first fiddler because I realized also
[16:12]while I was a performer of course technically performance was what was what was on my tax returns
[16:18]that I wasn't as connected to performing as I was to creativity and there's just a moment in a
[16:26]long run when creativity starts to ebb and you can't look to the night job or the theatrical
[16:35]experience to fulfill your creative needs anymore you have to fulfill them yourself
[16:40]and I didn't really know how to do that but I'd always been a big reader so we definitely have
[16:45]that in common for those of you listening I'm sitting in the middle like the most expansive
[16:51]beautiful library but not this watering so yeah that had this really bibliophilic other love story
[16:58]going on inside my theatrical career and I love that bibliophilic bibliophilic love story
[17:06]you know it was just a real love affair with books and I don't remember who said it maybe you
[17:12]can look at a you know a good book is a good friend you know and finishing a book is like losing a
[17:17]friend so I started writing a blog when I was in London and I had this unbelievable feeling of
[17:27]oh my goodness like the 200 words that I put together today in this order didn't exist
[17:34]in this order before I put them in the world I had made something and it ticked the box it
[17:39]filled me up it fueled me and then I was able to go to work at night and if you will I required
[17:45]less from work so I kind of went to it with a purer heart and I kept writing and writing and
[17:52]eventually a literary agent found my blog and contacted me about expanding essay and blog writing
[17:59]into critical essay writing into something novel length and after an atetheco was sort of born
[18:06]of these questions I'd never considered putting it into a narrative structure but once the idea
[18:13]was in my head it was pretty hard to stop the horses from running away and I just wrote it in
[18:21]between scenes backstage like if I wasn't in a scene I'd open up my computer and I'd set a
[18:27]timer so I didn't lose track of time you know if you know sometimes you're so in it that you
[18:32]just fall into that world so I would set an alarm to make sure that even if I wasn't listening
[18:36]to this loud speaker I would still make my entrances you know I did a play at the Kennedy Center
[18:42]and then on Broadway called Masterclass and my character Sophie was only in the first act so that
[18:47]was a huge joy because I would finish work and then I'd have to stay for curtain call but I had
[18:53]this big like half hour chunk where I could write exclusively in at two of that play so yeah I
[19:00]think both of my books were born in dressing rooms and on airplanes and where my loyal companions
[19:07]alongside my theatrical life and interestingly when I was doing masterclass funny that that just
[19:15]came up masterclass was the 10 year anniversary of my father passing away and white hot grief parade
[19:21]was born of a blog post that I wrote titled very simply 10 years where I think I decided to take
[19:29]the veil of author voice blogger voice I know that you know voices a big thing in writing
[19:37]and you have to feel an affinity with the narrator and the quality of the narrator changes
[19:43]book to book and of course like style etc but I think my chatty and conversational tone
[19:53]I wanted it of course my blog to feel like a friend having a conversation with the informed friend
[20:00]about things that you cared about.
[20:03]But I don't think I ever allowed the blog until 10 years
[20:06]this post to reveal what I would describe
[20:10]as the distinction of intimacy.
[20:12]I had never taken that last boundary down and said,
[20:17]let's talk about what this was really like.
[20:21]I would do what in psychology is called book reporting.
[20:26]I would say my dad died.
[20:29]I moved to Scotland.
[20:31]As I say in my book, here we are at this cocktail party.
[20:34]I would talk about and around the facts of the loss,
[20:39]but I wouldn't sit with you or anyone
[20:43]and experience the emotions surrounding the loss
[20:46]in real time, which I think is the distinction of vulnerability
[20:51]and the revelation of vulnerability
[20:55]is I think what defines intimacy.
[20:57]So I had never done that.
[20:59]And I just decided to go for one night only,
[21:01]for one post only, let's really talk about grief.
[21:04]And the response to the post was watershed insane.
[21:09]I mean, the responses, the strangers, the shares,
[21:12]the reach, the desperation of other people
[21:17]to discuss this inner ache and this universal fear
[21:21]that we will all experience at some point or another
[21:24]in different forms and unimaginable ways.
[21:27]But we'll all meet in this land of grief.
[21:31]And some people choose to totally disguise themselves
[21:35]while they're there and some people can't.
[21:39]And I think it was really surprising to me,
[21:41]again, this discovery of what I've already said of,
[21:43]wow, I guess we don't talk about grief very often
[21:45]and when we do, we talk about it very poorly.
[21:48]And my agent said, okay, stop the presses on after Anatefka.
[21:54]You have to write something more expansive about this.
[21:56]And it clearly shows that you're ready to start that process.
[22:01]And while after Anatefka took me many, many years to write,
[22:05]white hot grief parade galloped out of me in weeks.
[22:10]The first draft was done in about nine or 10 weeks.
[22:13]And it built, it grew, it evolved.
[22:18]But the structure was almost intact
[22:22]in its print form now.
[22:26]A story that was demanding to be heard,
[22:29]demanding to be expressed,
[22:30]and like wasn't gonna take no for an answer,
[22:32]but was waiting for the moment that I was prepared to write it.
[22:36]And they both sat on my computer as manuscripts essentially.
[22:40]And I was pleased with that.
[22:42]I was pleased to sort of say, I wrote some books.
[22:45]I don't know that anything will happen to them,
[22:49]but how exciting, you know, I ran the marathon.
[22:53]I don't need to tell everybody about it, but I did it.
[22:55]Whatever that may be for you as an individual.
[22:58]And two years later, really,
[23:03]by coincidence slash divine intervention,
[23:06]I was cast in the 50th anniversary production
[23:08]of Fiddler on Broadway.
[23:10]I had moved back to the States.
[23:13]And this time I was cast as a title.
[23:16]And a lot of people ask me,
[23:19]was it so hard to not play Huddle, you know?
[23:23]But it was seven or eight years later.
[23:25]And I had, first of all,
[23:27]I don't think I could possibly have told Huddle's story
[23:30]more thoroughly.
[23:31]I mean, I went to actual sites.
[23:33]You know?
[23:33]You can check that off, you can check that back.
[23:35]I had told her story and I think also Huddle is a character
[23:39]that is becoming herself, discovering who she is,
[23:43]and the nature of what matters to her
[23:46]and the order in which it matters.
[23:50]And when I played her so as I, I was in the same place.
[23:52]And by the time I was playing Cidal,
[23:54]I was a woman, not a girl.
[23:56]I knew what mattered to me, and knew what my values were.
[23:59]I was thinking about partnership and children
[24:01]and my relationship to the divine
[24:05]and to society at large,
[24:07]which I think made me ideally suited
[24:10]to serve Cidal's story.
[24:12]And this is like a little footnote.
[24:15]I was also given another iconic father-daughter moment
[24:20]that I know I will always ache for in life,
[24:27]which is being walked down the aisle by your father
[24:29]at your wedding.
[24:30]And I remember going to a wedding
[24:33]a few years before Fiddler on Broadway.
[24:36]And when my very good friend was walked on the aisle by her dad,
[24:39]I had this unbelievable ancient grief explosion
[24:46]with this knowledge that no matter what I do
[24:49]or achieve how much money I ever make,
[24:51]how successful I ever become,
[24:52]that's not a purchasable moment.
[24:56]And that that was something I would never have
[24:58]and through Cidal and through Fiddler,
[25:01]I did get that.
[25:03]No, so it's been a really important gift to me.
[25:08]And I noticed so many, so many people.
[25:11]And so I was really lucky that if there was a moment
[25:15]to sell after Natasha specifically,
[25:17]that was like a cherry, cherry, cherry on the slot machine.
[25:21]This was it.
[25:22]And I was so blessed that Pegasus actually
[25:24]bought both manuscripts at the same time.
[25:26]And here I am, an identity shifting,
[25:31]but also identity expanding moment for me as an artist.
[25:35]And it's amazing.
[25:36]It's such an honor.
[25:38]And where do you see like what's coming next?
[25:40]Every little of everything?
[25:42]A little, of course, a little of everything.
[25:44]So I continue to take,
[25:46]so after Anatevka actually turned into
[25:50]through the genius of the minds at Symphony Space,
[25:54]a couple years ago, just before the book came out,
[25:57]Symphony Space contacted me and said,
[25:59]we'd love you to identify some chapters in your book
[26:01]and we wanna give those chapters to Broadway,
[26:03]composer, lyricist teams, to have them write original music
[26:07]based on Aatevka.
[26:08]And then we performed it in what felt like a this is your life,
[26:13]but this is your character's come to life kind of a moment
[26:17]where I would read the prose of my book.
[26:20]And instead of the moment dramatically ending in prose,
[26:23]it went end in this original song,
[26:25]sung by my Broadway friends.
[26:28]It was crazy.
[26:29]And we didn't want it to be over.
[26:31]It was such a successful, wonderful evening.
[26:33]So my musical director, collaborator,
[26:36]one of my dearest friends, Ben Moss,
[26:38]and I sort of fashioned a version of that concert
[26:41]that included a few songs from Fiddler
[26:44]and five of the original songs from the Symphony Space evening.
[26:47]And we sort of took it on the road as a duo.
[26:50]And we've been touring with it literally ever since
[26:53]the last time we did it was last week,
[26:55]not even eight days ago, which is so rewarding
[26:59]because it's taken me to so many Jewish communities.
[27:01]I've gotten to meet incredible crossover audiences,
[27:06]if you will, some people that know me as an author,
[27:09]some people that know me as an actor.
[27:11]And one of the things that's so rewarding
[27:13]about those concerts is it's a celebration
[27:16]and an enacting of me doing all of the things I do
[27:21]in one evening.
[27:22]So I dramatically read and embody these characters
[27:26]that I love so much.
[27:28]I read my original text and then I use my singing voice
[27:32]to bring them to life in a different way.
[27:34]And it's sort of one of those unimaginable,
[27:38]hybrid things you could never have conceived of
[27:41]being a part of your life.
[27:42]I have to get to one of these.
[27:43]Oh, I hope you do.
[27:44]It's a real joy.
[27:45]Florida or did I make that up?
[27:46]Yeah, yeah. I wasn't Florida.
[27:48]We did a whole tour of Southwest Florida, which was a joy.
[27:51]And so definitely more of that.
[27:54]And I'm working on two new books,
[27:57]which is really exciting.
[27:59]Actually kind of a companion to each of these,
[28:01]definitely the next installment of what happens
[28:04]to this family that we know and love
[28:06]from the Shalom Alachim stories and fill in on the roof.
[28:10]And a lot of the continuations of the original characters
[28:13]that I've brought in to the book as well.
[28:16]And then I'm also writing a really interesting collection
[28:21]of critical essays about how to love the theater
[28:24]and why to love the theater.
[28:26]So hopefully we'll be seeing those in the future.
[28:30]Yeah. And then I do have some theatrical projects.
[28:33]I don't know when you're releasing this,
[28:34]but I think I can say, I am,
[28:37]I don't know that I've ever been so excited to start
[28:39]working on anything, but I'm going back to London
[28:42]in about 10 days to start rehearsing the Broadway production
[28:47]in London, England of Polyvogles in Decent,
[28:51]which is a beautiful Jewish play about a beautiful Jewish play.
[28:56]We'll be running at the Chocolate Factory
[28:57]till the beginning of May.
[28:58]So I'm so blessed to have a little bit of everything
[29:00]in my life.
[29:01]That is amazing.
[29:02]Thank you.
[29:03]I'm so happy for now.
[29:04]Oh, thank you.
[29:05]And I feel like I've gone on this journey
[29:07]with you reading your book in the queue.
[29:08]Like you end up just so rooting for you
[29:10]and before I even met you in person.
[29:12]Thank you.
[29:12]It's you rooting for you in the book.
[29:14]And now to see all this come to life.
[29:16]Thank you.
[29:17]And the way you help other young girls,
[29:19]like the scene you tell when you were helped
[29:21]as you were exiting a theater and how you helped.
[29:24]I mean, like all this full circle,
[29:26]I stuff.
[29:27]We're charging.
[29:28]Thank you.
[29:29]I hope I think the greatest gift I've been given in my life
[29:33]is this charged continuously,
[29:37]think expressed gratitude to and for the people that have helped me
[29:42]and people that even resemble the people that have helped me
[29:45]and hopefully give back to people that, if you will,
[29:48]resemble me and show them grace and show them
[29:52]that even though they think it might never, ever, ever
[29:55]get better than it can and live that.
[30:00]I hope that even that is enough,
[30:02]but I try to really meaningfully contribute
[30:05]as much as I can.
[30:07]Do you have any advice to aspiring authors?
[30:10]Oh, sure.
[30:12]A couple of things.
[30:13]One, and I actually think your podcast speaks
[30:15]to this directly, right?
[30:19]Time comes to those who make it,
[30:22]not those who try to find it.
[30:24]Ooh.
[30:26]And I think that is absolutely
[30:29]how I've gotten so many things done, if you will.
[30:33]I've been disciplined and disciplined,
[30:38]though, doesn't come from rigor.
[30:41]The best kind of discipline comes from really knowing
[30:43]what your values are and making a decision
[30:46]to do something versus simply wanting to.
[30:50]And those are really big distinctions.
[30:53]Like, you know, I often think of if you've made
[30:55]the decision to eat healthy and lose weight,
[30:57]it's a very different thing than simply wanting to.
[31:01]You make plans, you commit, you explore your soul about why.
[31:06]And I encourage everyone to do that work.
[31:08]And then additionally, once you've made the decision
[31:11]and you make the time, just sit down,
[31:16]just sit down and do it.
[31:20]I equate the just sitting down,
[31:23]speaking of which, the just sit down is an original phrase.
[31:26]It's actually, I've already mentioned to him,
[31:28]Ben Moss's phrase, my musical collaborator.
[31:31]He's been engaging in a really interesting creative action
[31:33]where he's sitting down at his piano every day
[31:35]and writing original music, no matter how silly
[31:38]or where the inspiration comes from.
[31:40]And then posting the results online,
[31:42]really for accountability, not for exposure.
[31:46]And he said, as long as I sat down at the piano,
[31:49]something always came, and the metaphor
[31:51]that I extended that to is, you know,
[31:53]if you take the trouble to put on your gym clothes
[31:56]and your shoes and go to the gym,
[31:58]if you walk into the gym, you'll probably work out.
[32:01]If you go to church or the synagogue
[32:05]or the mosque or any place of worship,
[32:07]you'll probably, once you walk in,
[32:08]you'll probably sit down and pray.
[32:11]And I think that by going to the place of creativity,
[32:16]the piano for Ben, the canvas for artists,
[32:20]the computer for me, you are basically saying,
[32:24]I've entered this Holy Space.
[32:27]I'm ready to engage with life in that way
[32:31]and made the muses move through me.
[32:34]But it can't happen if you don't do it.
[32:37]And I think all of that together is to say,
[32:40]just make things and don't worry about what they become.
[32:45]They are things that are wrapping on the window
[32:48]of your mind and heart and soul that want to be in the world
[32:52]and have asked you to be their birth canal.
[32:56]Don't deny them.
[32:58]Wow, that was beautiful and inspiring.
[33:01]Thank you.
[33:01]Thank you so much.
[33:03]Thank you for having me.
[33:03]All of that.
[33:04]I was doing it with those amazing.
[33:05]And wow, a lot of like, I have to go play this back
[33:08]and write out some of those quotes
[33:10]and put them on to this bulletin board.
[33:11]Yes, thank you.
[33:12]That was so great.
[33:13]Thank you so much.
[33:14]Thank you.
[33:15]You've been listening to Moms on Have Time to Read Books
[33:17]with Zibi Owens.
[33:19]Please make sure to sign up for my newsletter
[33:21]at Zibi Owens.com to get more updates about episodes
[33:24]like these and also lots of live events.
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[33:39]You can follow me on Instagram at Moms Don't Have Time
[33:42]to Read Books.
[33:43]Thanks so much to Steve and Ryan at Texture Sound
[33:46]for the Sound Editing.
[33:47]And thank you to Morning Moon Productions
[33:49]for providing this fantastic intro and out trim music.
[33:52]Thanks for listening.
[33:52]You can always email me at zibi at zibi Owens.com.