Courtney Zoffness, SPILT MILK
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[1:22]Courtney's Offness is the author of Spilt Milk.
[1:26]Courtney writes fiction and nonfiction, and won the 2018 Sunday Times Short Story Award,
[1:31]the most valuable international prize for short fiction, amid entries from 38 countries.
[1:37]She joins a winner's list that includes Juneau Diaz, Anthony Dore, and Hehoon Lee.
[1:42]I'm sorry if I'm as pronounced any of that.
[1:44]Other honors include an emerging writer's fellowship from the Center for Fiction,
[1:48]the Arts and Letters Creative Nonfiction Prize, the American Literary Review Fiction Prize,
[1:53]and residency fellowships from McDowell.
[1:55]Her writing has appeared in various outlets, including the Paris Review Daily, The New York Times,
[2:00]The Southern Review, The Rumpus, and The Los Angeles Review of Books.
[2:04]She's also had notable essays in Best American Essays 2018 and 19.
[2:09]Her literary debut is Spilt Milk, which was fantastic.
[2:12]Courtney holds graduate degrees from Johns Hopkins University and the University of Arizona,
[2:17]and a BA from the University of Pennsylvania.
[2:19]She has taught at nearly a dozen institutions, including Yale University, which, by the way,
[2:24]I went to, and the University of Freiburg, which I did not go to.
[2:28]Currently, she directs the creative writing program at Drew University and is a faculty member
[2:32]at Writing Workshops in Greece, which I would like to go to.
[2:35]She lives with her family in Brooklyn, New York.
[2:37]Welcome, Courtney.
[2:38]Thank you so much for coming on Monster and have time to read books.
[2:41]Thank you for having me.
[2:43]Spilt Milk, first of all, love that you call it memoirs instead of just a memoir,
[2:48]which is so clever because you haven't broken up into little sections.
[2:53]Tell listeners what this book is about and what inspired you to write it.
[2:57]Yeah, it's true.
[2:58]The book is about what we inherit from generations past and what we pass on to our children.
[3:03]And I mean that not just biologically, but culturally, historically, spiritually.
[3:08]And I take that understanding of passing on, you know, from various angles.
[3:15]And insofar as what inspired me to write it, it came about kind of organically and also kind
[3:21]of by accident.
[3:22]I didn't set out to write this as a book.
[3:25]I found after becoming a mom that I was responding to various experiences or happenings
[3:31]in really particular ways that being a mom just gave me a new eyes truly.
[3:37]And that I was processing it through that things that were happening through that lens.
[3:43]And so when I started to look at the various pieces,
[3:46]I noticed this thread in common and the book sort of organically came together.
[3:50]I love that.
[3:51]It's great.
[3:52]Take me back to like when did you start writing?
[3:54]Like how did you even begin this and let's end up where the book is?
[3:58]Yeah, so I've had a long gestation as a writer.
[4:01]I mean, I can take you back to early, early days, but I go all the way.
[4:06]Just for a glance, even.
[4:08]Yeah, sure.
[4:09]That really bad poem that I wrote in junior high that was published in my local newspaper.
[4:14]Is that what you're in?
[4:15]Cool.
[4:15]Yeah, that's amazing.
[4:17]That's exactly the type of stuff I love here.
[4:18]My grandma talking about it with her friends and they wanted me to like interpret it for them,
[4:22]but I didn't even really know what I had written.
[4:25]And I was like, yeah, I meant I meant all of that.
[4:28]I've always loved words and language and stories.
[4:31]I think you probably have to.
[4:33]But I would say my my real sort of first stab at becoming a professional writer or whatever
[4:40]that might mean was going to graduate school at the young age of 23.
[4:45]And it took me almost two decades for this book to emerge.
[4:50]So that's okay.
[4:53]This is and it never occurred to me to stop doing this thing that I love to do.
[4:58]That's the most important thing.
[4:59]I mean, the love of the craft and the love of just producing it because whether or not it
[5:04]becomes a book is one thing.
[5:05]But it's if what it does for you getting it out is the most important part.
[5:10]I couldn't agree more.
[5:12]So last night I had the book as I was finishing it up and I always read as my kids are falling asleep.
[5:17]So I brought it into my daughter's room.
[5:18]She's seven and she loved the cover.
[5:20]And she's like, well, why don't you read me that book tonight instead of like that the
[5:24]children's book and I was like, okay.
[5:26]So I went back to the beginning and read about your son who was afraid of going to school or had
[5:31]anxiety about it, which could not be more relevant to my life today.
[5:34]Anyway, and so I read it to her and she was like, okay, well, can we go back to my book?
[5:39]But just tell her that I really liked it.
[5:42]Anyway, I had to share that.
[5:45]And it's such a funny thing to imagine this being read is like a bedtime story.
[5:48]Yes.
[5:49]Like, I didn't, I didn't read or anything about, you know, like surrogate pregnancy or
[5:58]I didn't, but I caught my nine-year-old who's now a pretty proficient and prolific reader,
[6:05]you know, with it on the couch and I'm like, not sure I'm ready for you to do that.
[6:12]Oh my gosh.
[6:13]So tell me like what parts of motherhood as you were going through it inspired you to like sit
[6:18]down and record like, for instance, that just even at the beginning when you're like,
[6:23]your son is afraid in school and you're waiting there and the bathroom scene and like,
[6:28]all this stuff, like, would you go and then record, would you take notes?
[6:31]Like, I feel like I lose half the stuff that happens to my children.
[6:34]Oh, yeah, for sure.
[6:35]I mean, it depends on the what.
[6:37]I think that was left a pretty, and I have a terrible memory.
[6:41]So I do often write things down.
[6:44]I mean, I wasn't experiencing that with an eye toward, you know, making it concrete on the page,
[6:50]but it left an indelible impression because it was so setting to me as someone who had suffered
[6:56]from anxiety and childhood and maybe or maybe not still in adulthood.
[7:01]And, you know, I feel like those sorts of things, I mean, I came home and started quickly looking
[7:06]up like, what can I be doing? What do I do? And so I think the narrative of what had happened
[7:12]sort of cemented in that process and made it just an easier transference into an essay.
[7:19]And tell me more about your own experience with anxiety.
[7:23]Sure.
[7:23]So when I was a child, it manifested in a variety of ways, mostly through hyperventilation,
[7:29]which, you know, my parents didn't understand nor did I.
[7:33]They took me to pulmonologists and, you know, my pediatrician and I wound up
[7:37]at a pediatric therapist who was not especially helpful.
[7:41]I had bloody noses. I wore mouth guard because I kept cleansing my teeth. I, you know,
[7:47]over on me of symptoms. And, you know, it wasn't treated in any sort of holistic way.
[7:53]I'm not sure if it could have been. I think even still those symptoms in isolation can be,
[8:00]you know, attributed to any number of things. And it's really hard for parents and medical professionals
[8:06]often to aggregate the right things to create an appropriate diagnosis.
[8:12]I don't know what would have been helpful, but I do know that it sort of stalked me
[8:18]through adolescence where, you know, I panic attacks and finally sought some professional help
[8:24]in my young adulthood and that has proved to be, you know, a reliable source of relief.
[8:30]I just feel like anxiety wasn't even a thing when we were growing up and I feel like I'm 44,
[8:36]I guess, a similar generation. Like, it just wasn't a thing. Like, I didn't even realize still
[8:41]and like, wait, should I even be embarrassed? Like, it just is what it is. Like, everybody worries
[8:46]all the time, don't they? Right. So I think figuring out what the threshold is of what constitutes
[8:51]something diagnostic. Right. It's really mysterious. And it is person by person. Some people want
[8:58]power through and have various tools within themselves to change their mindset, change their behavior
[9:04]and others don't. Well, it's also you have to be in a certain, you have to be on solid enough
[9:10]ground to be able to avail yourself of the tools that are there. Right. Right. Like, if you're
[9:14]drowning, you're not going to be dusting off your cognitive behavioral tools kit. If you can't
[9:22]even like, you know, grab a branch at that point. So that's right. But I think it's great for,
[9:26]I mean, today, at least there's so much more attention on anxiety and childhood. And even
[9:31]what happens when it goes untreated and how so often anxiety becomes depression, you know, when you're
[9:35]a teenager, if it goes untreated for too long and how you can sort of cut that off at the past now.
[9:42]But before I feel like nobody knew anything about that. So you end up with lots of great books.
[9:48]Thanks. I mean, I also think that spectrum can dip too far in the direction too, right? It's like
[9:54]suddenly I'm a college professor and I feel like I have so many students with so many things I've
[9:59]never gotten so much.
[10:00]me letters of accommodation before.
[10:02]And this is certainly new.
[10:04]Yeah.
[10:05]Tell me about speaking of your students
[10:07]and just reminded me of the scene with your student
[10:09]who professed his, not even loved,
[10:11]so we lost lots of stuff after you.
[10:13]And how you had to handle that
[10:14]and you kind of tie in a lot of the current,
[10:17]not me too, per se, but just women's sexualization
[10:21]and in multiple contexts.
[10:23]Tell me a little more about that.
[10:24]So that's in a section called Hot For Teacher
[10:27]about my college student who read aloud a story
[10:31]about taking his writing profess or a top for desk
[10:34]and having his way with her in front of the class.
[10:37]And I mean, even still, this was years ago,
[10:41]still don't exactly understand what the aim there was,
[10:45]whether he thought I would immediately comply
[10:48]or he was removed from my class.
[10:51]Those seemed really perplexed that he would get in trouble
[10:54]since he changed the color of my hair
[10:56]and the day the class met, which are endless.
[10:59]But he kept like your same outfit, right?
[11:01]Sir, did, yeah.
[11:03]Yeah.
[11:03]So that part laid into my meditating on,
[11:09]even after that happened, I thought maybe it wasn't as bad
[11:12]as I remembered writing the train home with his essay
[11:16]in my lap, I thought maybe I was overreacting,
[11:20]which I feel like women often position themselves
[11:24]as doing.
[11:25]I think we're so used to, sadly,
[11:28]I feel so used to having to encounter and respond
[11:31]to a range of misogynistic slash inappropriate behavior.
[11:37]So that experience parlayed into my revisiting
[11:40]a variety of sexually inappropriate or misogynistic experiences.
[11:44]And then thinking about being the mother of two boys
[11:47]and how I can, if I can, run interference
[11:52]and prevent them from being the kinds of boys,
[11:55]turned men, who will do these sorts of things to women.
[11:58]And what, I mean, I have two boys also.
[12:00]What do you do?
[12:01]Like what's your, what can I take away from myself
[12:05]from this conversation?
[12:06]How do you do this successfully?
[12:07]Like how do you do it?
[12:09]Is it through modeling mostly?
[12:10]I mean, they're still young, juries out, you know?
[12:13]But yes, I just try to have this conversation all the time.
[12:17]So it's like when I see something,
[12:20]or when I hear them talking about something
[12:22]that I feel like is reflective of these enormous cultural forces,
[12:27]I address it.
[12:30]You know, I'm thinking about the fact
[12:32]that I live next door to a police precinct station
[12:35]and how my youngest son likes to dress as a cop
[12:38]and how problematic I find that to be
[12:41]in part because of the ways he plays that role
[12:44]and how we've talked about that in terms of gender
[12:47]and manhood and masculinity and, you know,
[12:51]what this, that sort of culture perpetuates
[12:54]and how it ties in to this.
[12:56]So when we're talking about why mommy prefers,
[12:59]he dress in other costumes.
[13:01]This is something that comes up.
[13:02]On the other hand, if no little boys are dressing up
[13:05]as policemen, we're not gonna have any policemen
[13:08]in like 40 years or something.
[13:10]Right?
[13:11]His approach now is dressing like a kind police officer.
[13:14]Well, that's great.
[13:15]That's really the best thing.
[13:17]And through this sort of role play,
[13:19]push him to those places of responding kindly.
[13:24]I don't like that.
[13:26]Role play is so key with kids.
[13:27]I feel like that's my go-to if I'm feeling,
[13:31]if I've had enough sleep to even remember
[13:33]what my strategies are, then it's always good.
[13:36]Like, do you think we should behave this way
[13:39]at this event we're about to go to?
[13:40]Or should we do the exact opposite, you know?
[13:43]And then they get so into the game of it
[13:45]that they finally wanna think about things
[13:47]before they have it.
[13:48]We've got plenty of strategies.
[13:50]Oh, yeah.
[13:51]And, you know, another interesting part of the book
[13:55]was thinking about how your older son,
[13:58]who had more anxiety related to your younger son
[14:01]and how the interplay of that works,
[14:03]even as simple as waking up the other child,
[14:06]what do you do with kids who have totally different
[14:10]sort of needs within your own family
[14:12]and how do you balance that as a parent?
[14:14]Is that something he's still?
[14:16]Yeah, my sons are very different humans.
[14:19]So I think one of the questions I poke at in this book
[14:22]is how much influence parents have on their children
[14:26]and how identifiable is it?
[14:28]You know, in terms of our own parents' influences on us,
[14:32]it's convenient to have this sort of cause
[14:34]and effect narrative, this sort of blame game,
[14:37]but I think it's very hard to actually tease out the truth
[14:40]of what influences who and how.
[14:44]So in having these two children,
[14:46]two years apart, two and a half years in the same house,
[14:50]with the same parent, you know,
[14:51]and seeing just how different they are,
[14:53]and they do love each other even if, you know,
[14:55]they're fighting often.
[14:57]It has me really thinking about what effect,
[15:00]if any, I can have as a mom.
[15:04]Yes, I've decided I have very little effect.
[15:07]I think that probably true.
[15:09]Like, I think that the parents can do mostly,
[15:12]they can hurt their kids more than improve them.
[15:15]Jim, I'd be like, as long as you love your kids
[15:18]and you do a pretty good job,
[15:20]your kids are all gonna turn out the way
[15:21]they were born to be.
[15:22]It's only if you, as a parent or negligent or awful
[15:27]or to them or something where they're gonna develop
[15:29]often a different way.
[15:30]This is my theory.
[15:32]Yeah, you know, it's funny when you said,
[15:35]you can do more hurt.
[15:36]I thought you said, heard.
[15:37]And that seems also true to me that like,
[15:39]they are already these for me.
[15:41]Just sort of like, ushred them may be closer to this side
[15:44]instead of this side.
[15:45]I do feel like like little boat pee over here.
[15:48]Yes.
[15:49]I think you don't realize that maybe until you've had
[15:51]more than one child.
[15:52]Right.
[15:53]You feel like you're in charge of every piece
[15:56]of their development when it's your first kid
[15:58]and like everything you do is so laden with meaning
[16:00]and future ramifications that like,
[16:04]yes.
[16:05]And even though I don't actually think that anymore,
[16:07]I still find myself going to those places, right?
[16:10]It's like, yeah, no.
[16:11]That's a great choice.
[16:12]Was that, you know, even though if you try to take sort
[16:16]of the birds I view, it's like,
[16:18]does this even really matter so much?
[16:20]And it's very hard to not play the self-doubt cars.
[16:26]I totally agree.
[16:27]Nor did I mean to suggest I was confident
[16:29]in all my fairening decisions because I'm so, I'm not.
[16:32]But I just feel like they're so clearly who they are.
[16:37]And now I'm more like sitting back like,
[16:39]oh, okay, let's see this side of your personality
[16:42]come into the world.
[16:43]Exactly, it's so quickly too.
[16:46]Yes.
[16:47]Okay, so this book, yes, you've been writing it for 20 years.
[16:51]But not, I haven't been writing this book for it.
[16:52]Okay, okay, okay, writing.
[16:54]Tell me a little more about this particular book.
[16:56]And when you even found time to do it,
[16:58]like what your process and where you like to write
[17:01]and how it became a book.
[17:03]So, you know, as a mother of small humans,
[17:06]I am not precious about, you know,
[17:09]being at the right desk with the right pen,
[17:11]with just the right sunlight.
[17:12]You know, I don't have that luxury.
[17:15]So, you know, have a full-time job as a professor.
[17:18]And I would write on the train.
[17:20]I would write in my office if nobody visited me
[17:22]for office hours or in the evenings, you know,
[17:26]I have my dear friends who are regimented
[17:28]about getting up early, but my oldest son,
[17:30]all of her wakes at five 30.
[17:32]So like, what is early?
[17:33]Am I getting up in the middle of the night?
[17:34]That's just not happening.
[17:36]And I also live in a modest Brooklyn apartment.
[17:39]So there's not even like a place to go to do this work.
[17:43]So it came about in fits and starts.
[17:46]I was often working on multiple pieces at once
[17:48]because something would happen.
[17:50]And I, you know, would have to sort of commit it
[17:52]to the page in some form and then return to it.
[17:55]But hopefully that process helped create
[17:57]a more cohesive sense in the book
[17:59]because a lot of them were being written simultaneously.
[18:02]Interesting.
[18:03]Yeah, the idea of like a writer's retreat
[18:06]where you can like sit in a cabin.
[18:08]And he did it.
[18:08]Well, you know what?
[18:09]I should say I did get to do that.
[18:11]I went to the McPowell colony.
[18:12]But like two weeks that were among the highlights
[18:16]of my life truly, where I did no dishes, cooked no food,
[18:21]wiped no tushes, like multiple ways in which like,
[18:25]I mean, you even have good cell service.
[18:27]I was just like, goodbye world.
[18:29]And that was the ultimate gift from the literary gods truly.
[18:34]So I did really deep thinking,
[18:36]deep reading, deep work there.
[18:38]And when was that?
[18:39]It was weeks, it was in 2018.
[18:43]Oh, God, it feels like a year,
[18:45]universe ago.
[18:46]Wow.
[18:47]So I was midway into writing it.
[18:49]There were some parts that I couldn't just write
[18:52]and fits in starts like the police officer piece
[18:54]called Boy and Blue, where I like read the whole history
[18:58]of policing.
[18:58]And I had stacks of books about racial justice.
[19:01]And I just, I couldn't do this sort of deep reading
[19:04]thinking and meditating, you know, spasticly.
[19:08]Yeah.
[19:08]Wow.
[19:09]And how do you feel now with it coming out?
[19:11]Relieved and proud, I think, you know,
[19:15]one of the benefits of being like later to bloom
[19:18]is that I spent a lot of time honing my chops
[19:22]and also deciding what I most cared about.
[19:25]And so this is not just like, hello world, you know,
[19:29]here's something.
[19:30]It's really a product I care a lot about.
[19:34]Well, it's really good.
[19:35]It's really, really good and beautifully written
[19:39]and the pacing and the content and all of it.
[19:43]It's so nice when the humdrum of life becomes like
[19:48]literary fodder, Jamie, instead of just stress.
[19:54]So it's almost like, you know, seeing your life
[19:56]elevated to art is something that sort of validates what
[20:00]we're all doing on a daily basis.
[20:02]And that's of course only one piece of the book,
[20:04]but yeah, so it's lovely.
[20:06]What next from here?
[20:07]Where are you doing next?
[20:08]You used to writing on another collection of stuff
[20:11]or what are you doing?
[20:11]You know, I think of myself as a fiction writer
[20:15]with how I started and where I got some attention earlier
[20:19]on and it's sort of my first love.
[20:22]So since this book sort of came out by accident,
[20:25]like I was writing these pieces that coalesced,
[20:27]I'm back to fiction, which is such a relief.
[20:30]I'm so sick of myself.
[20:31]Gotcha.
[20:34]So it's really nice to imagine my way into other people's lives
[20:37]and heads.
[20:37]Can you say anything about that plot or not?
[20:40]I'm not sure what shape the project is taking yet.
[20:42]So I'm just playing and really enjoying being able to play.
[20:47]Excellent.
[20:49]Well, I'm sure you have tons of advice
[20:51]given that you're a professor,
[20:52]but if you could distill some advice
[20:55]for aspiring authors down,
[20:57]what are some tidbits that you could share?
[21:01]Well, my biggest one is tenacity and persistence
[21:04]because truly this was a long period for me during which
[21:10]I wasn't always getting over the finish line
[21:12]with things I was writing or getting into the publications
[21:15]that I most aspire to appear in.
[21:17]And I do feel like there is a lot to be said
[21:20]for stick with itness and grit.
[21:23]And I think maybe some writers,
[21:26]like I think about my first grad school program
[21:28]when I was 23 and how only two of us stuck with it,
[21:32]not because the others weren't talented enough, right?
[21:36]But you have to make a living.
[21:37]You have to, whatever, there are so many reasons
[21:40]or maybe you like other things equally as much.
[21:43]But I think there is something to be said for holding fast.
[21:50]Excellent.
[21:51]Great.
[21:52]Well, Courtney, thank you.
[21:53]Thanks for coming on my podcast.
[21:55]Thanks for your beautiful book, especially right now.
[21:58]I read it like the perfect time.
[21:59]And it's...
[22:00]I have to say to your post,
[22:03]I also have like all the milks represented in my house.
[22:06]I have like four people drinking four milks.
[22:08]That is just crazy.
[22:10]So I love the idea of like all the milks.
[22:13]All the milks.
[22:15]I was just like, how can I not?
[22:16]I'm like reading this book surrounded by milk cartons.
[22:18]Like I have to post about this.
[22:20]Oh, right.
[22:23]Thanks for all you do for literature
[22:25]and for writers.
[22:26]Oh, no problem.
[22:27]It's a really important service.
[22:29]I appreciate it.
[22:30]I love it.
[22:30]I have so much fun doing it.
[22:31]So really benefits me.
[22:34]Anyway, well, I hope I get to meet you in person.
[22:36]It's important.
[22:37]Yes, likewise.
[22:38]And thank you so much for doing this.
[22:40]Is it me?
[22:41]Bye.
[22:43]Thanks again to Wine, Women and Words, the podcast
[22:46]for sponsoring this episode.
[22:48]Thanks for listening to this episode
[22:49]of Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books.
[22:51]Don't forget to follow me on Instagram,
[22:53]at ZB-O-N's and at Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books.
[22:56]Also sign up for my newsletter at ZB-O-N's.com
[22:59]and sign up for my virtual book club
[23:00]and meet lots of authors on Zoom every other week.
[23:03]Thanks so much to Steve and Ryan at Textures Sound
[23:06]for the Sound Editing.
[23:07]And thank you to Morning Moon Productions
[23:09]for providing this fantastic intro and now trim music.