Kelly McMasters, THE LEAVING SEASON
[0:02]Hi, I'm Zippy Owens, and you're listening to moms don't have time to read books.
[0:06]This 30-minute podcast features a new author interviewed by me every single day, 365 days
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[1:03]Kelly McMaster's is the author of the leaving season, a memoir and essays.
[1:07]And by the way, I love to this book so much that I have chosen it for Zippy's book club.
[1:12]So you can join Zippy's book club by going to zippy's book club.com and signing up.
[1:17]And you can join our 30-minute conversation followed by 30-minute Q&A with Kelly McMaster's
[1:23]herself.
[1:24]Kelly is an essayist, professor, mother, and former book shop owner.
[1:28]She is the author of the leaving season, a memoir and essays, and co-editor of the ABA National
[1:32]Bestseller Wanting, Women Writing About Desire.
[1:35]Her first book, Welcome to Shirley, a memoir from an atomic town, was listed as one of Oprah's
[1:41]top five summer memoirs.
[1:43]And is the basis for the documentary film, The Atomic States of America, a 2012 Sundance
[1:47]Selection.
[1:48]The anthology she co-edited with Mark O'Con, this is the place Women Writing About Home,
[1:52]was in New York Times editor's choice.
[1:54]Her essays, reviews, and articles have appeared in The New York Times, The Washington
[1:57]Post Magazine, The Paris Review, The American Scholar, River Teeth, a Journal of Narrative
[2:01]Nonfiction, Tinhouse, News Day, Time Out, Columbia Magazine, and Mr. Bellers, Neighborhood
[2:06]Among Others.
[2:07]She holds a BA from Vassar College, and an MFA in Nonfiction Writing from Columbia's
[2:11]School of the Arts, and is the recipient of a push-cart nomination and an Orion Book Award
[2:16]nomination.
[2:17]Kelly has spoken about creative nonfiction at TEDx, authors at Google, and more.
[2:21]She is also taught at mediabeaster.com, Franklin and Marshall College, and in the undergraduate
[2:26]writing programs and journalism graduate school at Columbia University, among others.
[2:30]She is currently an associate professor of English and director of publishing studies at
[2:34]Hofstra University in New York.
[2:36]Welcome, Kelly.
[2:37]Thank you so much for coming on Mom's Don't Have Time to Read books to discuss your memoir,
[2:40]The Leaving Season, and memoir in essays.
[2:43]Thank you so much, Debbie.
[2:44]I'm thrilled to be here.
[2:45]It's really exciting.
[2:47]As I was just saying to you before we started, I am like 100% obsessed with this book.
[2:52]It's the best book I've read in so long.
[2:54]It's so good.
[2:55]And I just talked.
[2:56]It'll be the September book club for Zippy's book club.
[3:00]So that's great.
[3:01]And also, we've started all these local chapters.
[3:02]So now people can read, not just like, virtually, but all over, and hoping to grow that
[3:06]even more by September.
[3:08]So in fact, if anyone listening wants to start a book club chapter, you can email info
[3:12]at Zippy'sbookclub.com and start your own chapter, and we'll give you all the tools you
[3:15]need.
[3:16]But this book is so good, and everyone has to read it.
[3:20]Thanks, Debbie.
[3:22]That means the world, especially as somebody who has traveled some similar roads.
[3:30]I also really love Maggie Smith's book, and I was on Instagram and watch it.
[3:34]Obviously, you were at her event and supporting her and loved her book, and as did everybody.
[3:38]But I do feel like the two of them go hand in hand, those two books.
[3:43]And in fact, if anyone is ever getting into worse, this should be the gift package.
[3:48]Like, OK, here you go.
[3:49]It's like, read these two books, end of story.
[3:53]I love that.
[3:54]And yes, Maggie's book is amazing.
[3:57]I was so thrilled when she read mine and wrote her beautiful blurb for the leaving season.
[4:04]And I think I hope maybe what you're talking about is that both books, even though they
[4:12]are covering some really difficult terrain, ultimately, they are stories of hope and renewal.
[4:19]So that's what I think I needed when I was going through the divorce, especially what
[4:24]I still need every day, even though I'm way past it.
[4:28]And that's what I hope that this book can ultimately be.
[4:30]Yes.
[4:31]Well, it's about sort of reinvention, and it doesn't have to be divorced.
[4:36]It could be anything you're going through that sort of didn't go the way you thought.
[4:40]Or for anyone who's felt like there was a time in their life when they were kind of losing
[4:44]themselves a little bit in whatever, for whatever the reason, career, loss, relationships,
[4:50]there's so many reasons how we, so many ways we like lose touch with ourselves.
[4:56]And this is all about like getting back to it and hers, I think, in a way.
[5:01]But anyway, maybe I should back up.
[5:03]OK, Kelly, why don't you tell listeners what the leaving season is about?
[5:07]All right.
[5:08]Well, the leaving season is about just that.
[5:11]The fact that leaving takes a very long time.
[5:15]And there are so many different types of leaving, which is what you were just talking about.
[5:19]There's leaving, you know, jobs, leaving places, leaving homes, leaving a self behind.
[5:27]And of course, leaving marriages.
[5:30]And I think what I, when I was putting these essays together, and they are essays, individual
[5:36]essays, although they can be read altogether as one cohesive story.
[5:40]I think that is really what I realized was it was a collection of moments when I should have
[5:49]left, didn't leave, left when I shouldn't have all of these different types of leavings.
[5:55]And I think when I was going through the divorce and people would hear that I was divorced
[6:00]or going through a divorce, their number one question was always, you know, they would
[6:04]pull me to the side of either a wedding or a PTA event and say, how did you know it was
[6:09]the right thing to do?
[6:10]How did you know you had to leave?
[6:12]And I think that's the, the other point of the book is, A, there's no one answer.
[6:17]And B, that answer is always changing.
[6:20]And so I think that's true for every type of leaving.
[6:23]Well, you also made a good point when people were asking you, which I personally found as
[6:28]well, that it's mostly about their needing to figure out what they should do about their
[6:32]own relationships.
[6:33]In fact, I'm almost positive.
[6:34]I dog your this page because I love what you wrote about it.
[6:36]I'm just going to read this.
[6:38]Is there a moment you knew you wanted to end your marriage?
[6:40]This is the question everyone always asks the still married ones after one too many glasses
[6:44]of wine at the PTA fundraiser at the ladies lunch after shap-roading the first grade aquarium
[6:49]trip in the corner of the patio at the neighborhood 4th of July party alongside the
[6:53]dance floor at weddings.
[6:54]After a while, I came to understand that they were really asking about themselves, matching
[6:58]their experience with mine, pulling a measuring tape around my ribcage and then circling
[7:03]their own to see how close the numbers fell.
[7:06]I mean, it's like poetry, how you I mean, it's so true.
[7:10]I've tried to explain the same thing, but I like the way you wrote that I would never
[7:14]have thought to compare it to a measuring tape around my ribcage.
[7:17]Beautiful.
[7:18]So beautiful.
[7:19]Thank you so much.
[7:20]I think people both wanted the numbers to match up and not, right?
[7:26]I think that's because if you know, you know, you don't need somebody else to tell you.
[7:31]And yet you don't want it to be true.
[7:32]If you know you have to leave, the hardest thing is admitting that to yourself, I think,
[7:38]because once you do, there's no turning back.
[7:43]And that's the hardest part is actually moving through it and making that choice and
[7:49]saying it aloud, that's terrible.
[7:52]And I think there's this very close to that section I talk about feeling like I'm in
[7:57]a divorce bill, this sort of one horse town that is just the same.
[8:02]And my amazing editor Jill, she loved that section and for a period this book was called
[8:06]divorce bill.
[8:09]But I think ultimately the book is, like you said, it's for somebody who's going through
[8:14]has been through a divorce, but also it extends beyond that.
[8:19]Yes, far beyond it.
[8:21]That's something that you do so well is just like take the ordinary and just make it
[8:25]so beautiful.
[8:26]And what you said about debating leaving or when you're trying to decide, there's that
[8:29]one moment when you saw the house for sale in your town and you were like, what would my
[8:33]life be like, if I lived there and I think you wrote down the number and just kept it
[8:38]for a little bit?
[8:39]Yes.
[8:40]I don't know.
[8:41]That moment of you, like looking at the house and how we all imagine these other lives,
[8:46]like what ish?
[8:48]Right.
[8:49]My life would be perfect if I could only, but then of course.
[8:54]And that's, you know, the book takes place across three particular landscapes.
[8:58]We start in the city.
[8:59]We move to the country and then we end up in suburbia for I still am.
[9:06]And I think that also happens with the excitement and possibility of moving.
[9:13]It feels like the big I'm a professor as well and the beginning of school, right?
[9:17]Every the end of every August, whether it's for my kids when we go school school supply
[9:21]shopping or for myself.
[9:24]This year, this semester, I will be organized and I will not get behind and I'm going
[9:28]to be great.
[9:29]I'm going to be a different person.
[9:30]And you would think after 47 years that would know myself by now, but no, the right pen
[9:36]is going to change everything.
[9:38]And I think similarly we play tricks like that within our relationships, right.
[9:42]The problem isn't us.
[9:44]It's where we're living.
[9:46]It's the, the damn house renovation.
[9:48]It's the dog, right?
[9:50]No, it's, it's you.
[9:51]And so that's really difficult to come to terms with.
[9:56]And then think, all right, what part of it is me?
[10:00]and not the other person.
[10:01]And what do I need to do about that?
[10:03]Well, it's amazing.
[10:04]Why did you decide to name your ex like our period?
[10:09]Like it's similar to the Danny Shapiro technique
[10:11]of naming.
[10:14]Yeah, that's a really good question.
[10:16]I think for me, this book,
[10:20]and I hope readers will feel this too,
[10:23]is about me.
[10:26]My children are present, he is present,
[10:30]plenty of other people are present,
[10:32]but ultimately, while this is a divorce story.
[10:38]And I actually like to call it a love story.
[10:40]I mean, every divorce story begins as a love story, right?
[10:43]It ultimately turns into a love story with myself
[10:49]in a strange way, right?
[10:51]I fall out of love with my husband,
[10:53]but I fall in love with this possibility of motherhood
[10:58]in a way that I did not understand could be possible.
[11:03]And for me, again, this is a personal story.
[11:08]This will not be the same for everyone,
[11:09]but in my experience, I was only able to become the mother
[11:13]that I think I had the potential to become
[11:16]once I left my marriage, once I became a single mother.
[11:19]And I was so afraid of becoming a single mom.
[11:22]I didn't think I could handle the kids on a normal day
[11:25]on my own, you know, much less every day on my own.
[11:31]And yet, once that happened,
[11:35]and I was able to really interrogate
[11:38]and ask the questions, what kind of mother do I want to be
[11:42]rather than just responding and reacting all the time?
[11:46]That turned into a really beautiful relationship.
[11:49]And I think in that way, I wanted to keep the spotlight
[11:53]in that area.
[11:55]And, you know, I do think that I give the reader a sense
[12:00]of who are is and was.
[12:03]And so it's not that he's a face on the page
[12:06]or a ghost or anything like that,
[12:09]but he's not the point.
[12:11]It's not about him ultimately.
[12:14]It's about the changes that I went through,
[12:16]the new observations that I was making
[12:20]and the way that those came to play.
[12:22]And even, you know, we owned a bookshop,
[12:24]which I'm so excited for you.
[12:25]Yes, I was going to mention that.
[12:26]I couldn't wait to talk about it.
[12:29]And, you know, that bookshop was amazing
[12:31]for so many reasons.
[12:32]And that was perhaps the most heartbreaking part
[12:35]having to leave that bookshop.
[12:38]But that bookshop showed me who we were
[12:42]and who we could never be.
[12:43]And so in that respect, I did feel like it was best
[12:48]to leave him with an initial, he has presents,
[12:55]but also make sure, you know, my children are also not named
[12:59]and that was intentional.
[13:01]But that way, the story is trained on my narrator
[13:06]as a chronicler, which is sort of how I wrote my first book
[13:10]as well.
[13:11]And I think that that's an important point of view
[13:15]in nonfiction that I feel comfortable in.
[13:19]It's not necessarily that the spotlight is on me,
[13:22]but that the observations come through me and only me.
[13:25]And so it is observed.
[13:27]It is, you know, first person in every way.
[13:30]Interesting.
[13:31]All right, that's good.
[13:33]I know some people like have a different name,
[13:35]you know, the change the name or don't have a name.
[13:38]I don't know, but it was very literary, beautiful convention.
[13:41]I liked it.
[13:42]It was great.
[13:43]And of course, the spotlight is on you.
[13:45]And it's so immersive that you even give us like just
[13:51]like every sound and feeling.
[13:53]And I feel like I went into nature, which of course I didn't.
[13:55]I was like, you know, it's side reading this most of the time.
[13:58]And even like your musings and why suburban trees don't smell.
[14:04]And like when you're in a playground,
[14:06]like why are you not smelling trees?
[14:07]But when you go out into nature, that's like all you smell.
[14:10]And she's all these little thoughts,
[14:12]which like changed the way you see the world.
[14:15]I know, wait, go back to the bookstore
[14:16]because I love that section of the book.
[14:19]And I wanted to talk to you about it
[14:21]and all the relationships you made with the people there
[14:24]and the ones you've lost and like, I don't like want to give
[14:28]things away, but that was an amazing part of the book.
[14:31]Tell me a little more about that experience
[14:33]and looking back on it how you feel.
[14:35]I mean, I read it, but sure, sure.
[14:37]So it was like many things in my life at that point
[14:41]a very sort of last minute decision.
[14:44]A friend had a space.
[14:45]We were in rural Pennsylvania.
[14:47]And so I imagine the cost analysis was very different
[14:51]than for example, when you had to put your books
[14:53]or together, it was a dollar square foot.
[14:55]So we had 250 square feet, 200 bucks a month.
[14:58]I mean, $250 a month.
[15:00]So it was not a terrifying venture in that way.
[15:03]Although then I had to learn, okay, how do I make an LLC?
[15:07]How do I have a relationship with Ingram?
[15:09]All of those crazy questions.
[15:11]Now, of course, I had a life in books for many years before that.
[15:20]Never as a bookstore owner, which is very different.
[15:24]But I ran a lot of readings around KGB reading series
[15:28]and reviewed and wrote books and all of that.
[15:31]So I knew that this was a dream that I maybe thought might
[15:38]occur when I was, I don't know, 80, right?
[15:41]But never actually be a business that I could have.
[15:47]And I think what really cinched it for me
[15:50]was I grew up in a town without a bookstore.
[15:52]And so I just lived in the library essentially.
[15:55]It was where I had my first job, you know.
[15:57]And in my children, then we're going to grow up
[16:02]in a town without a bookstore.
[16:04]And I realized not only with this feed me,
[16:07]but it would feed them.
[16:08]I had this sort of idealized image in my head of them,
[16:12]you know, walking to the bookstore after school
[16:15]with their backpacks and coming in.
[16:16]And so, you know, obviously they were very little
[16:20]when this began.
[16:21]And I think in the opening scene, I'm shelving books
[16:24]and I still have my youngest in, you know,
[16:27]in a baby bjorn, basically.
[16:29]And I'm trying to like figure out, okay.
[16:31]So if he naps this long, what can I do
[16:33]when he's attached to me?
[16:34]What can I do when he's not?
[16:36]And it was beautiful and improvised.
[16:38]And I would, you know, childcare in the country
[16:41]is as difficult as it is anywhere else, right?
[16:44]But that bookstore became such a community in a way
[16:48]that I didn't know that I needed.
[16:51]And I know exactly what you mean about the people we lost.
[16:54]I mean, that was, gosh, 10 years ago almost.
[16:59]And I just completed the audiobook a few weeks ago.
[17:04]And when I read that section, I just wept.
[17:08]And I mean, I wrote it.
[17:09]I knew what was coming,
[17:10]but it still gets me every time.
[17:13]And I think, you know, that came out of a column
[17:18]that I wrote for the Paris Review Daily called,
[17:21]notes from a bookshop.
[17:23]And I started this little monthly missive
[17:27]about what it was like.
[17:29]And I think when I came to the end of that,
[17:33]I never wrote the last one because it was too heartbreaking
[17:36]to say we're closing.
[17:38]And so it always felt unfinished.
[17:40]And when I came to this book,
[17:43]I knew that that was going to be the center.
[17:45]And I knew that I would have to write the end.
[17:47]And that was probably one of the hardest parts.
[17:49]Another, another leaving.
[17:51]Yeah.
[17:52]Oh, well, it was, and by the way,
[17:55]my store is only 823 square feet.
[17:57]So, and we have a great deal on the space.
[18:00]Not as great as that,
[18:01]but the owner really wanted a book store.
[18:03]So we have it far below market, which is wonderful.
[18:06]But already having the community spot is so huge
[18:11]and the gratitude from the community is out of this world.
[18:15]And this is like part of a giant city.
[18:17]It is like a section of LA, you know,
[18:19]as opposed to like a tiny town that like would crave a book store.
[18:25]I take it so for granted,
[18:26]growing up in big cities that they're bookstores.
[18:28]Same.
[18:29]I did too.
[18:30]And that was when I realized I had to drive,
[18:33]I mean, nearly 100 miles to get to the Golden Notebook,
[18:37]which is one of my favorite bookstores in Woodstock.
[18:39]Yeah.
[18:40]But that's a really long drive.
[18:42]So, and it does it affect the culture.
[18:45]And so when the only, I realized the only books
[18:47]that I was finding were from the library
[18:50]or the old church book sales.
[18:52]And so every book that came into the house had that like funk
[18:56]with all of other people.
[18:58]And still, I have a whole section in my bookcase
[19:02]of those books and the idea of having choosing
[19:09]and then having a new book and being able to support
[19:12]a writer whose books are coming out right now.
[19:15]And then just walking into a room
[19:17]and knowing that you're going to find someone
[19:19]who wants to talk about books with you
[19:22]is just incredible.
[19:24]And likely you're going to find other things in common too.
[19:27]Yes, book lovers have something in common.
[19:31]It's like a whole subset of people, which is great.
[19:34]You wrote a lot also about struggling financially
[19:38]to make all this work.
[19:39]And you wrote about it in detail
[19:42]and with such compassion for yourself
[19:46]and for anyone in the same situation
[19:48]where even if you're working three jobs
[19:50]and even if you're doing everything right,
[19:52]it's like impossible.
[19:54]It's like a tsunami heading your way
[19:55]and you just feel powerless.
[19:58]Talk a little bit about that and how it felt to.
[20:00]write about it and if you're, you know, just how you feel about it, the whole thing.
[20:04]Sure. Thanks. Thanks for giving me the opportunity to talk about that. I think that is something
[20:09]that is really important to me in terms of my life as a writer, as well as the economics
[20:15]of a bookshop, as well as the economics of being a single parent. I think people are terrified
[20:21]to talk about money and the realities and the secrecy that shrouded in that just I felt
[20:29]drowned me in shame. And then when I did start talking to people, I realized, oh my gosh,
[20:35]not only is this not abnormal. Am I not doing something wrong? Other people are feeling the same thing
[20:41]and oh, they might have some suggestions that can help me. And so that I think is really important
[20:48]just being open about that kind of stuff. I think, you know, in my writing life, I've tracked
[20:54]ideas about poverty and shame and, you know, working class, that's when I grew up in
[21:00]surely that was my first book and that relationship between working class shame and the feeling
[21:06]of powerlessness really felt familiar when we moved to the country. And so in the city, it's a
[21:14]little easier to pretend, right? Because, and I write about this, we would, you know, we were
[21:21]living in an artist's loft with no hot water and so with no shower or anything like that. And so
[21:29]I'm, you know, showering at the gym around the corner, then we would go to a really fancy dinner
[21:36]with a collector. And so in New York, it's a little easier to pretend because you can do a lot
[21:42]with a little. And the magic is on every block. And so you can sort of figure things out and improvise
[21:49]in a way that you can't in the country. In the country, the beauty is all around you naturally,
[21:55]right? So I felt so rich just walking out into this tangle of raspberry bushes and these little
[22:03]nukes and, you know, being able to see and smell and feel this gift of the wild that I didn't have
[22:11]in the city. But people there were struggling in a way that did remind me of when I was
[22:17]growing up in my hometown. And it was a similar, it affected people similarly in their hearts,
[22:24]right? And their brains. And so feeling less than. And I think really it was, you know, I don't
[22:32]want to attach shame to it. But for me, when and I still have those damn yellow cards. Oh my gosh.
[22:38]When we had to go on assistance. And that was, you know, I was the first in my family to go to
[22:43]college. My parents were so supportive. We had a beautiful home and upbringing and full of love.
[22:50]And, you know, my dad said, you know, you don't have to get married. You are enough on your own.
[22:57]You are going to college. Education is the number one thing. And so I had, I really did at a point
[23:03]feel like I would just float off after college on this sort of golden cloud. But everything is good
[23:09]now. I did it. I made it. And that's not what happened. So when I suddenly was handed these yellow
[23:14]cards. And I realized, oh my gosh, I'm back where I started in a way when, yes, I had three jobs.
[23:23]I opened a bookshop. You know, all of these things were going so well. Really, I have this beautiful
[23:28]home. And I thought, okay, something needs to change. And, and I think that was a really important
[23:35]moment for me to sort of not just change financially, but change, just look at everything and
[23:45]everything did change from then on. And I think the idea that, I mean, I still have, well,
[23:50]I have probably four jobs now. And, you know, I think that's just, that's just the nature of what
[23:55]I've chosen to do, right? I'm a professor. I'm a writer. I run, you know, all these little things,
[23:59]these half jobs. Wait, what are your other half jobs? Oh, gosh. Because after the book, I was like,
[24:03]I want to know every single thing about her. I want to know what she's doing now. Like, you know,
[24:08]like, I want the full post script of the book. Oh my gosh. Well, yeah, I mean, I, so I direct a
[24:15]program in publishing studies. And I'm a teacher. I'm a professor of English of creative writing,
[24:21]mostly nonfiction. And then I also am a freelance writer. And I also am a book writer. And I
[24:29]also am part of this educational nonprofit that's run in my town. I'm a mom, you know, all the
[24:36]stuff. And I also edit and, you know, do private editing clients and things like that that most
[24:42]writers do to to make it work. And do edit anthologies. And I edit anthologies. Oh my gosh, I forgot
[24:49]about that. Yes. I love doing that work. And that's the thing. I love it all. I wouldn't change it.
[24:54]And some of that, again, goes back to community. And, you know, the education community here
[25:01]is incredible. The community of women writers through the anthologies is incredible. And so I feel
[25:07]so fortunate. I would love to own a bookstore again at some point. I can't add that right now. But
[25:12]yeah, that of course is also still on my list of dream jobs. I want to figure out a way so that
[25:18]anybody who wants to like open a zippies bookshop in their town, they just like franchise it. And
[25:24]I like have a kit or something so that it's easy for people. And I don't know. That's like my
[25:30]big dream. Maybe I'd love that idea. Oh my gosh. So, wow, I could just like put the wallpaper I
[25:37]use. I don't know. Like, you know, they all kind of look the same ish, not exactly. But you get to
[25:43]curate the books, but it has to be like, you know, in a new way in an interesting way. So,
[25:48]I don't know. Anyway, oh, that's a great idea. I think books are just a way to talk about life
[25:53]and feelings and each other and connect. And it's all just a shorthand really. So, having a space
[25:59]to do that. Help. I don't know. Are you writing another book? What's going on with that?
[26:05]I am waiting to hear about a few grants that will help me write the book that I think I want to
[26:10]write. Okay. But yes, so I will just say yes. My great grandmother was in Baudville. And so about,
[26:20]you know, 100 years ago when we like to think women had it much worse. You know, we couldn't vote
[26:26]yet. We had all this, all of these, you know, difficult circumstances. And she was such a modern
[26:33]woman and really wild and incredible and, you know, performed with my west. And she was the kind
[26:39]of Baudville where she was funny and not sexy. So, she was smart, funny. And she went on and I have
[26:47]journal of hers. But she made some decisions that wound up erasing her from our family tree. And so,
[26:58]yes. And it had to do with the choice between work and her children. And so I'm trying to
[27:05]first find the real story because I'm not 100% certain that it is what I think it is. But I think
[27:12]it's really interesting in this sort of, you know, 2023 where we think we've kind of busted
[27:19]through all of this, all of these ways that women were historically held down. And in many ways,
[27:28]what I'm finding, looking back at her history is how free she was and how not unlike me.
[27:35]We have, we made different decisions. But, but the sort of the cost of ambition, female ambition,
[27:42]choices in motherhood, they all are still the same in some surprising ways.
[27:47]That sounds great. Thank you. Yeah. I have to go back. I was with Joanna Rakeoff this weekend
[27:53]at the street that we did. I know. And I was like, raving about your book. And she of course was like,
[27:57]well, have you gotten to this part? And I was like, I'll let you know. And I kept going. But she was
[28:01]saying, oh, well, you have to go back and read her first book. It was so good. And I was like, okay,
[28:05]okay, okay, I'll go back. Okay. Anyway, I'm almost out of time here. I can't believe this. I feel like
[28:09]I've been wondering in this podcast because I want to talk to you about so much in this book. But
[28:13]I just hope that listeners can get the sense that I'm just so excited about your book. And thank
[28:18]you are so talented and amazing. And I'm like, so rooting for you and everything now that we've
[28:24]gone through this whole journey with you. Like, I can't even explain it. So Zibi, thank you. And I
[28:29]just want to say that I really appreciate you sharing your journey, especially, you know, the
[28:34]single mom heart that you have been so open about on places in places like Instagram that I really
[28:42]helped me. And I hope that in in many ways this book would be, for example, you know, a perfect
[28:50]mother's day gift because it celebrate a motherhood that isn't often freely celebrated and talked
[28:59]about. And so I, you know, I just want to thank you for being a part of normalizing that of making
[29:05]that not something scary to divulge and talk about. And thank you for sharing.
[29:09]Sure. I don't know if my husband would like me being called a single mother. You feel like
[29:14]it's such a part of things, but it's a great alone. That's, you know, I get it. Anyway, congratulations. And
[29:23]I saw you're doing your event with Lee Newman at Foxer Magic. So I'm going to try to come if I can,
[29:28]but oh my gosh, I really want to come. Anyway, have so much fun. And I hope this gets all the
[29:33]success in the world. Thank you. And thank you so much for the news. I'm so excited. I'll see you
[29:38]once again. Okay. Bye. Thanks for listening to this episode of moms. Don't have time to read books.
[29:45]Don't forget to follow me on Instagram at Zibi Owens and at moms. Don't have time to read books.
[29:51]Also sign up for my newsletter at Zibi Owens.com and sign up for my virtual book club and meet
[29:55]lots of authors on Zoom every other week. Thanks so much to Steve and Ryan. Thanks for
[30:00]It's your sound for the sound editing and thank you to Morning Moon Productions for providing
[30:04]this fantastic intro and out trim music.