Speaker 1: Welcome to Pose America. I'm John Lovett. I just wrapped
Speaker 1: a great conversation with the writer David Sedaris, who's out
Speaker 1: with a new collection of essays called The Land and
Speaker 1: Its People. We talked about his father's support for Trump,
Speaker 1: why no one cared when David was bit by a dog,
Speaker 1: what you can't talk about in a healthy relationship, Moby dick,
Speaker 1: international McDonald's the word queer, punching down, why he avoids
Speaker 1: Pride parades, and what he fears most about getting old
Speaker 1: and speaking of pride over on the Loved or Leave
Speaker 1: A channel. This week we are doing a Pride special
Speaker 1: with markin Delcado from Hacks, Drag Race winner Mikey Meeks,
Speaker 1: Osco Kotska, and the legend himself, Bruce Falanche, plus many
Speaker 1: more guests. Check out Love It or Leave It every
Speaker 1: Wednesday and Friday on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 1: All right, now, let's go to my conversation with David Adairs.
Speaker 1: David saidares so nice to meet you, So nice to
Speaker 1: have you here. Oh, thanks so much for having me.
Speaker 1: Ten years ago, after Trump won the first time, you
Speaker 1: wrote an essay for the Paris Review about arguing with
Speaker 1: your father over whether Trump is an asshole, and then
Speaker 1: the next day your dad says to you, so, are
Speaker 1: you still talking to me? And I thought that was
Speaker 1: interesting because he didn't say I'm not talking to you,
Speaker 1: he said are you still talking to me? And I
Speaker 1: often feel like with especially inside of a family, when
Speaker 1: you're arguing about Trump, there's this understanding that, whether it's
Speaker 1: admitted or not, you know, he's a bad person and
Speaker 1: there's something a little bit wrong with voting for him,
Speaker 1: and people are looking for some kind of forgiveness or
Speaker 1: lack of judgment even though they know they did something wrong.
Speaker 1: And I'm wondering if you felt that when you were
Speaker 1: talking to your father other people in your life that
Speaker 1: voted for Trump.
Speaker 2: Well, with my dad it started really he was like
Speaker 2: a Republican, like just wanted to keep more.
Speaker 1: Of his own money.
Speaker 2: And then he voted for Jesse Hilmes, which was a
Speaker 2: thing because Jesse Helms grew up in Raleigh and he
Speaker 2: was on the he was did editorials on the news,
Speaker 2: and even as a kid, you were like, wow, that
Speaker 2: guy's really severe, you know, and then he ran for
Speaker 2: office and it really it really when he voted for
Speaker 2: Jesse Hilms, it just became a different thing. And then
Speaker 2: the conservative radio came along, and then he started listening
Speaker 2: to Russe Limbaugh, and then he Fox News came along,
Speaker 2: and so then he was just in it all the time.
Speaker 2: He was in it in his car, and he was
Speaker 2: in it at home, and it was on all the
Speaker 2: time like a rage machine, you know. And then when
Speaker 2: he moved into an assisted living when he was like
Speaker 2: ninety five, and he didn't know how to work the TV,
Speaker 2: and for the first time he he he wasn't up,
Speaker 2: he wasn't being agitated every minute, and toward the end
Speaker 2: of his life he regretted. He's told me he regretted
Speaker 2: voting for Trump, which was interesting to me.
Speaker 1: But I like, I have.
Speaker 2: A friend who in England who is a politician and
Speaker 2: he and I pick up trash together. Right when I
Speaker 2: first moved to the countryside in England, my boyfriend Hugh
Speaker 2: wrote a letter to the council saying, like, what's going
Speaker 2: on with all this trash on the side of the road,
Speaker 2: And they invited us to the Clean and Tidy Advisory
Speaker 2: Board right to a meeting. So we met this guy
Speaker 2: who's a local politician and he goes and picks up
Speaker 2: trash himself, and so I do it myself every day
Speaker 2: between four and six hours, and sometimes he comes with me. Right,
Speaker 2: and he was a Tory, but now he's reform right
Speaker 2: now he's Nigel Frage. And he said, you're not going
Speaker 2: to want to talk to me anymore, and I said, oh, no,
Speaker 2: that's not the case at all. You know, like I
Speaker 2: would never stop talking to him over that. He answers
Speaker 2: any question I ask him. You know, we don't, and
Speaker 2: I appreciate that.
Speaker 1: I'd like to.
Speaker 2: I'd like to know why he feels the way that
Speaker 2: he does. We've never raised our voices to each other.
Speaker 2: It's a I think it's a great relationship. And when
Speaker 2: my dad was like, you're not gonna you're right, he well,
Speaker 2: I think part of it too. I mean my dad
Speaker 2: North Carolina. You know, gay marriage was illegal in North Carolina,
Speaker 2: and then they they introduced like a resolution that would
Speaker 2: make it extra, extra, extra extra illegal. And my dad
Speaker 2: was so happy to tell me he voted for that,
Speaker 2: so happy to tell me that. And I happened to
Speaker 2: be in North Carolina at that time. And you know,
Speaker 2: my sister in law, her sister is gay.
Speaker 1: And I said, why, why why shouldn't.
Speaker 2: She be allowed to marry her girlfriend? It sends the
Speaker 2: wrong message? And I said what message is that? He
Speaker 2: and then he couldn't really answer. He'd he'd heard the
Speaker 2: answer on on the radio or on TV, but he
Speaker 2: couldn't quite remember what the what was wrong with it? Right,
Speaker 2: He couldn't quite recall those words. Anyway, He's a dick,
Speaker 2: you know, just a complete dick. But and that was
Speaker 2: like the least of it, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: It wasn't like he was a dick because of that.
Speaker 2: He was like a massive dick anyway.
Speaker 1: And then there was that right right, No, for sure,
Speaker 1: But even like what you're saying about this, this the
Speaker 1: person who said he went and reformed, like, oh, you're
Speaker 1: probably you're probably not gonna want to talk to me.
Speaker 1: Like I've never heard a liberal say I voted for mom, Donnie,
Speaker 1: you're probably not going to want to talk to me,
Speaker 1: Like there's some kind of acknowledgement inside of it, that
Speaker 1: it's an act of like not sabotage, but like of
Speaker 1: I'm so mad about everything, I'm going to do this.
Speaker 1: I'm going to vote for this these terrible people, or
Speaker 1: I'm going to become extreme. My reasons are legitimate, which
Speaker 1: you don't appreciate, but I know on some level I'm
Speaker 1: doing something wrong, right Like I that that, to me
Speaker 1: is what I often hear from and I feel that
Speaker 1: inside of when families are having these kinds of arguments.
Speaker 1: And I'm wondering if that's what you felt from your dad,
Speaker 1: even though even though you felt like you was also I.
Speaker 2: Felt it was more like that me being gay had
Speaker 2: something to do with it. It would be like saying
Speaker 2: to a Jewish friend, I voted for the Nazi Party,
Speaker 2: You're probably not going to want to talk to me,
Speaker 2: whereas you would say to somebody who wasn't Jewish, you
Speaker 2: would say, yeah, I voted for the Nazi Party, and
Speaker 2: you wouldn't add You're probably not going to want to
Speaker 2: talk to me because you can see how your vote
Speaker 2: is going to make this person's life more miserable.
Speaker 1: But did you know, I know, towards the very end
Speaker 1: of his life, your father did say really acknowledge how
Speaker 1: much success you had and what kind of uh like
Speaker 1: what you had built. But at the same time, like
Speaker 1: he's looking you in the eye and being like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm just voting for the thing that is going to
Speaker 1: make your life worse. And I'm just doing because I
Speaker 1: have some of my friends from the radio like what
Speaker 1: is that? Like, is there any acknowledgement? Like what? What
Speaker 1: do you think that was?
Speaker 3: Like? What?
Speaker 1: Why couldn't he Why did he care more about what
Speaker 1: he was seeing on the television than he did about you?
Speaker 4: Oh?
Speaker 2: Be because it was all about money, just money, I
Speaker 2: mean yeah, Ultimately it all came down to money. I mean,
Speaker 2: if oh my goodness, if you know, if a candidate
Speaker 2: said I'm going to bring back concentration camps, but I'm
Speaker 2: going to knock two dollars off your taxes, my father
Speaker 2: would have voted for that person because it would save
Speaker 2: two dollars.
Speaker 1: I mean two.
Speaker 2: Dollars was that important to him. It's not like he
Speaker 2: didn't have two dollars. He was just it was just ultimately,
Speaker 2: it was all about money, about keeping more of his money.
Speaker 1: So in nineteen I was looking at one of your
Speaker 1: older diaries, and in nineteen ninety, you and your dad
Speaker 1: and your brother Paul spent eighteen hours in a pickup
Speaker 1: truck together driving from Illinois to North Carolina. And for
Speaker 1: someone who's now saying your father was a Dick, you
Speaker 1: also spent a lot of time together. Like I look,
Speaker 1: my father and I don't know what we would talk
Speaker 1: about if we were in a car together for eighteen hours.
Speaker 1: Do you remember that drive? I remember it clearly.
Speaker 2: Yeah, But if my father and I were in a
Speaker 2: car for eighteen hours, then he just would have criticized
Speaker 2: me for eighteen hours. But my brother was there, and
Speaker 2: so that made it fun that my brother was there.
Speaker 2: But yeah, there was nine. I often think of that.
Speaker 2: I was moving to New York City.
Speaker 1: So I was leaving.
Speaker 2: Chicago, and then I had some stuff I was going
Speaker 2: to bring to North Carolina, and then I was going
Speaker 2: to go I was going to paint a house. My
Speaker 2: father had rental property and I was going to paint
Speaker 2: a house and then use that money to move to
Speaker 2: New York with. So we drove from from Chicago to
Speaker 2: North Carolina and I painted the house, and I don't
Speaker 2: mount the deal was maybe that I was going to
Speaker 2: get two thousand dollars from painting the house, right, And
Speaker 2: I painted the house and he said, I'll give you
Speaker 2: five hundred. I mean everything about my father prepared me
Speaker 2: for Trump. You know, you someone works for you and
Speaker 2: then you don't pay them, or then you say I'll
Speaker 2: pay you a quarter of what you're going to pay me.
Speaker 2: You get you get a quarter, or you get nothing.
Speaker 2: So he was always a dick, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: He might have driven driven me. You know, that was
Speaker 2: nice of him, But I mean it wasn't like you're
Speaker 2: just taking like a day's vacation from being a dick,
Speaker 2: you know.
Speaker 1: So now it's all these years later and you're telling
Speaker 1: the Wall Street Journal that you bought a twenty five
Speaker 1: hundred dollars coat for your tour. So things have changed,
Speaker 1: things have picked up for you. You're traveling around the world.
Speaker 1: Talk to me about what international McDonald's has taught you
Speaker 1: seeing McDonald's in other countries and what it it teaches
Speaker 1: you about the world and about America. I don't I
Speaker 1: don't like.
Speaker 2: I eat McDonald's once a year and the Dallas Airport
Speaker 2: because I find myself at lunchtime in the Dallas Airport
Speaker 2: at least once a year and there's really no other
Speaker 2: place to eat, right. But when I go to other countries,
Speaker 2: I just love to see what McDonald's is. Often like
Speaker 2: the Grand Canyon Burger. We don't have the Grand Canyon
Speaker 2: Burger here, you know the Brooklyn Burger. I don't even
Speaker 2: know what beyond a Brooklyn Burger. But you go to
Speaker 2: other countries and you see billboards and it's so I
Speaker 2: always write it down.
Speaker 1: I don't know, I'm just but you don't eat them,
Speaker 1: you just go through. You don't know. I don't buy them.
Speaker 1: I just no.
Speaker 2: I just write them down and have them on my
Speaker 2: list of things that McDonald's offers in other countries, like
Speaker 2: I don't I don't necessarily know what they've what they've
Speaker 2: got here, but I think if they had a Grand
Speaker 2: Canyon Burger, I would have heard about it, or I
Speaker 2: would have seen an ad for it.
Speaker 1: They don't have that. I go there all the time
Speaker 1: when I was in Japan. When I was in Japan,
Speaker 1: I spose being a friend in Japan just twenty years ago,
Speaker 1: and he was He spoke Japanese, so that was going
Speaker 1: to be helpful, and I don't speak any Japanese. But
Speaker 1: by the time I had landed, he'd gotten quite sick,
Speaker 1: and so I was alone in Japan, and every once
Speaker 1: in a while, and a kind of feeling of overwhelming panic,
Speaker 1: I would go to the McDonald's. But you don't even
Speaker 1: eat the McDonald's in the other countries. So for me
Speaker 1: it's occasionally like a respite to be abroad and be like,
Speaker 1: you know what I need to go into. I just
Speaker 1: need I need ten minutes to be inside of the
Speaker 1: comfort and warm blanket of McDonald's, including eating it. But
Speaker 1: for you, it's more just sort of observing it, almost
Speaker 1: like a like David Attenborough on the Serengetti as supposed
Speaker 1: to sort of consuming the McDonald's.
Speaker 2: Yeah, in Tokyo, I observe it, and then I go
Speaker 2: to Horishia nas Berga freshness burger and that's how it's
Speaker 2: pronounced Horeshia Nasberga or moss Burger, and they're great. They're
Speaker 2: Japanese changed and they're great.
Speaker 1: So you seem to be a little bit annoyed by
Speaker 1: the language of the left these days, and you acknowledge
Speaker 1: that part of this is the you're getting older and
Speaker 1: everything is starting to annoy you more and more, which
Speaker 1: I appreciate. Though I feel like maybe you've always had
Speaker 1: a little bit of like there's You've always had a
Speaker 1: kind of I don't know, persnickety old man inside of you,
Speaker 1: and maybe now it's coming out. But you do have
Speaker 1: an essay to book about punching down? Is there anyone
Speaker 1: beneath you that you'd like to take a shot at
Speaker 1: right now? Is there anyone you'd like to punch down?
Speaker 2: That essay came from when I first moved to New
Speaker 2: York City. I didn't know anybody, and so there was
Speaker 2: a class at the Y called Writing Funny, and it
Speaker 2: was taught by this woman named Frida Garmetz, who used
Speaker 2: to be a Saturday commentator on All Things Considered and
Speaker 2: really funny, this British woman. And I thought, oh gosh,
Speaker 2: there's not going to be any places left in the
Speaker 2: class because she's teaching. And so I signed up for
Speaker 2: this class and I was the only one who knew
Speaker 2: who she was. And the first day she said, what
Speaker 2: are the rules for comedy writing? And I said, you
Speaker 2: should never make fun of anyone who has less power
Speaker 2: than you. And she said, where on earth did you
Speaker 2: get that idea from? She said, no, the only rule
Speaker 2: of comedy writing is that you should be as tasteless
Speaker 2: as possible, and so I've stuck by that every since
Speaker 2: she told me. I thought, that's a good rule, but
Speaker 2: you don't.
Speaker 1: But who are we punching down at Who are you
Speaker 1: punching down at these days? Who's annoying? Oh? You know?
Speaker 4: No?
Speaker 2: Like I had something on CBS Sunday morning, right not
Speaker 2: long ago, and I was in Minneapolis Airport and I
Speaker 2: went for lunch and it was this place where you
Speaker 2: had to seat yourself, order yourself on the screen, pay,
Speaker 2: enter all your credit card information, and then it asked
Speaker 2: how much you wanted to tip. And I thought, I've
Speaker 2: done everything here, what would I be tipping? And then
Speaker 2: I saw this woman calm and set food in front
Speaker 2: of somebody, and I wrote, Then I saw that she
Speaker 2: was an immigrant, and I thought, how my parents, my
Speaker 2: grandparents were immigrants, right? And then it went on from
Speaker 2: there and the Board of Race and Culture at CBS
Speaker 2: said I was using my privilege to punch down and
Speaker 2: call someone an immigrant. And I said, and then they
Speaker 2: gave me an opportunity to defend myself and I said,
Speaker 2: immigrant is like a pharmacists. That's the word for it.
Speaker 2: You know, I'm an immigrant in the United Kingdom. I
Speaker 2: didn't say filthy immigrant. I didn't say I just said immigrant.
Speaker 2: And how did I know she was an immigrant?
Speaker 3: Oh?
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 2: I mean she was Ethiopian, you know, and she had
Speaker 2: an accent, so I figured she must have immigranted to
Speaker 2: But I wasn't criticizing her in any way. And there's
Speaker 2: nothing wrong with the word immigrant, you know. And it
Speaker 2: sat on the shelf there for a year and a
Speaker 2: half before they aired it, And so to me, that's
Speaker 2: I didn't understand. And even the charge like that's not
Speaker 2: punching down on anybody, I just didn't I anyway. I
Speaker 2: was just completely mystified by that. And I feeling that
Speaker 2: that happens quite often with with writing lately, you know,
Speaker 2: like another circumstance, like we flag this because you use
Speaker 2: the word nanny, and it's like, yeah, I know people
Speaker 2: who are nannies and they identify as nanny's and it's
Speaker 2: not I'm not criticize, I'm not making fun of anyone. Again,
Speaker 2: it would be like if I said that Peter was
Speaker 2: a pharmacist.
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Speaker 1: Like there's you know that there are people that will say, like,
Speaker 1: you know, it may be the case that one reason
Speaker 1: Trump is president because people find the left annoying and
Speaker 1: people say that's glib. And also we have a lot
Speaker 1: of bigger problems in the world than people being worried
Speaker 1: about words we use, right, and that this is focusing
Speaker 1: on the wrong thing and the right is hyping this
Speaker 1: all up. At the same time, though, there does seem
Speaker 1: to be something where, you know, you have a story
Speaker 1: in the book about what happened when you got a
Speaker 1: bit by a dog and you felt like the audience
Speaker 1: wasn't on your side because of who owned the dog.
Speaker 1: And what you say in the essay is that people
Speaker 1: are worried that they will be perceived as not being
Speaker 1: empathetic enough. They'll be worried that they'll be perceived as
Speaker 1: being kind of republican. You just talk about that and
Speaker 1: what happened there.
Speaker 2: I was bitten by a dog. And I was in Portland,
Speaker 2: organ and there were these three people smoking fentanyl and
Speaker 2: they had two dogs, and I was walking on the
Speaker 2: street and one of the dogs that both the dogs
Speaker 2: rushed forward and one of them bit me. And when
Speaker 2: I told people about it, I had a show that
Speaker 2: show that night and I talked about it and a
Speaker 2: woman said, well, you know, people with an opioid use
Speaker 2: disorder read incredibly difficult lives, you know, and they're in
Speaker 2: no position to take care of their animals.
Speaker 1: That's the sad part. And I'm like, is that the sad?
Speaker 2: And then other people were like what kind of a
Speaker 2: dog was it? But everybody acted. If I had said
Speaker 2: this tech bro had this dog that bit me, they'd
Speaker 2: be like, oh those people. I've had it up to
Speaker 2: hear with those people. But because they were smoking fentanyl,
Speaker 2: people felt like if they said like, oh, that's awful,
Speaker 2: then they were being then people might mistake them for
Speaker 2: a Republican. But since Wayne did allowing dogs to bite
Speaker 2: people become a Democrat point of principle, I just don't
Speaker 2: understand that.
Speaker 1: Well, it's and it's the kind of thing. And the
Speaker 1: reason I think is like this gets it something because
Speaker 1: it's of course not a democratic point of principle. And
Speaker 1: I am sure there's a subset of people who genuinely
Speaker 1: feel when you tell that story, like oh, you're this
Speaker 1: is not the issue you're punching down, or you're not
Speaker 1: being respected enough of the challenges, etc. But I would
Speaker 1: think most people would say, well, that's terrible and we
Speaker 1: have a real problem here and that shouldn't have happened,
Speaker 1: and we need to address the ways in which people
Speaker 1: don't feel safe on the streets whatever, and I sometimes feel,
Speaker 1: but I do think a lot of people are afraid
Speaker 1: to say, they're afraid to voice, like you know, right
Speaker 1: now in Los Angeles about to have a mayor's race, right,
Speaker 1: and a lot of what the issue is is around
Speaker 1: how LA has a big, unhoused homeless population. And at
Speaker 1: the same time there's a lot of people that will
Speaker 1: get angry at a Democratic politician for being say, too
Speaker 1: aggressive at trying to clear homeless encampments right when. I
Speaker 1: bet if you pold people, even Democrats would be a
Speaker 1: seventy thirty eighty twenty issue. But a LOWD vocal group
Speaker 1: of people online are there to tell you that you're
Speaker 1: being a fascist. And I wonder how many of the
Speaker 1: people telling you people being afraid to tell you that
Speaker 1: they think it's terrible that that dog bit you are
Speaker 1: not saying what they really feel. They're afraid of some
Speaker 1: sort of like online mob or something. You need to
Speaker 1: get bitten by a dog.
Speaker 2: I mean it's shocking because, like I told a guy
Speaker 2: in my New York building, I got bitten by dog?
Speaker 1: What did you do?
Speaker 2: And then other on your side, Oh no, no, no, no,
Speaker 2: I'm saying I'm saying, you would be amazed if you
Speaker 2: get bitten by a dog at how people react.
Speaker 1: What kind of a dog?
Speaker 2: Was it? Like?
Speaker 1: People?
Speaker 2: I was shocked. Nobody said nobody said, oh, that's awful,
Speaker 2: you've bitten by a dog. Well, like like two people did.
Speaker 2: But if you talk to fifteen people, two of them
Speaker 2: would say, oh, that's awful.
Speaker 1: Was it like a stitchy situation? How bad of a
Speaker 1: how deep did this woundca it broke? The skin broke this.
Speaker 2: I went to the pharmacy and she told me to
Speaker 2: go to the emergency room.
Speaker 1: And then I just thought.
Speaker 2: That the people who were who whose dog it was,
Speaker 2: they were just going to carry on with their day.
Speaker 2: And I was like, and then I'm going to spend
Speaker 2: all in the emergency room. I decided I would rather
Speaker 2: die than do that that. I would literally rather die
Speaker 2: than go to the emergency room. Another I got a
Speaker 2: lot of letters about people who've been bitten by dogs
Speaker 2: like this. One woman she was sitting on sofa at
Speaker 2: a friend's house and she got up and the dog
Speaker 2: bit the back of her neck and the owner had
Speaker 2: to come and pry its jaws open and said, I
Speaker 2: told you not to make any sudden movements. You scared
Speaker 2: him like it's a it's a it's a dog thing,
Speaker 2: and it's a.
Speaker 1: Drug addicts dog thing. It's both.
Speaker 2: And then I uh, I got a lot of letters
Speaker 2: from people. And this woman was walking after dark and
Speaker 2: a man was following her, close behind her, and she
Speaker 2: stopped and turned around and said can I help you?
Speaker 2: And you said, I'm homeless. I want money and she
Speaker 2: said I don't have any money on me, and she
Speaker 2: kept walking and he kept following her, and she turned
Speaker 2: around and said, look, this is making me really uncomfortable.
Speaker 2: And he said, I also take cash app and she
Speaker 2: said I don't have cash app. And when she told
Speaker 2: people about it, they all said, you don't have cash app,
Speaker 2: as if that was the point of the story, right
Speaker 2: where again, if she had said if she had said
Speaker 2: it was a fraternity brother following her, they'd be that's
Speaker 2: outrageous to be following somebody after dork, But instead they
Speaker 2: acted like the whole point of the story was that
Speaker 2: she didn't have cash app.
Speaker 1: It is my job to notice this. No, No, I'm
Speaker 1: glad you. Well, it's the thing about it that I'm
Speaker 1: interested in this in part because you know, whatever people's
Speaker 1: morals are out this are and there'll be people that'll say, like, oh,
Speaker 1: you know, uh, David Saidaris, David sitaris becoming old. He's
Speaker 1: becoming an old conservative. He's getting you know, conservative in
Speaker 1: his old age. But if a political movement is not
Speaker 1: honest about how people actually feel, it's doomed to fail. Right,
Speaker 1: Like we have like how do how do people like
Speaker 1: Spencer Pratt in LA or Donald Trump get purchased? They
Speaker 1: get purchased because if you tell a bunch of people
Speaker 1: that that that they're wrong to feel a certain way
Speaker 1: and that the Democrats don't have a good answer for
Speaker 1: their legitimate frustrations, then they'll go to people with bad answers.
Speaker 1: And so I do think sometimes like it's like acknowledging that, hey,
Speaker 1: like there's something where we're not we're being a little
Speaker 1: bit disrespectful for how people feel when they say, get
Speaker 1: bitten by a dog or or feel like things in
Speaker 1: their community don't feel safe. Now, it is pride, happy pride?
Speaker 1: Are you a pride guy? You going to the parades?
Speaker 1: Not not a pride guy? That's surprising to me. Never
Speaker 1: I'm not a parade person, right, strike me as a
Speaker 1: period person. You're a walker, though, you could walk a parade.
Speaker 1: That's a nice that's a nice way to get in
Speaker 1: your steps. No, no, it's too slow. Too slow.
Speaker 2: I mean I went to that, I went to a march,
Speaker 2: the what was that? The New York the No King. Okay,
Speaker 2: but yeah, you're walking like you know, you're walking like
Speaker 2: a thirty a mile per hour. So it's not the
Speaker 2: place to get steps in.
Speaker 1: Ah. Is there anything gay you've done for pride? To
Speaker 1: celebrate pride? What's the gayest thing you think you've done
Speaker 1: this month? The gayest thing I've done this month? My
Speaker 1: luggage got lost and so I had to go to
Speaker 1: the airport United desk in in Denver, Colorado, and the
Speaker 1: guy said, if we open your suitcase, we find your
Speaker 1: suitcase and we open it, what is in there that
Speaker 1: we'll know it's yours? And I said it's a Burbery
Speaker 1: dop kit. I said plaid, but it's not their iconic plaid.
Speaker 1: That's the gayest that I've done in years. What are
Speaker 1: you doing with a burberydop kit? Why do you need
Speaker 1: a Burbery brand? What is that doing?
Speaker 2: So?
Speaker 1: What happened to you? It is very Oh, it's so
Speaker 1: pretty Oh.
Speaker 2: My gosh, it's so pretty because it doesn't I don't
Speaker 2: really like their signature plaid.
Speaker 1: But this was supranded, so brand.
Speaker 2: It's just so pretty. And I saw it in the
Speaker 2: window of the store in London and then I went
Speaker 2: in and I said, oh, I love that dop kit
Speaker 2: in the window and they said what And then I said, okay,
Speaker 2: shaving kit in the window and they said, that's not
Speaker 2: a shaving kit. That's just to carry things around in.
Speaker 2: But it's a shaving kit. I mean, you know, it
Speaker 2: has a handle along the side, it's it's waterproof on
Speaker 2: the inside. It's a shaving kit anyway, and I love it.
Speaker 2: And you know what if I lost it, that was
Speaker 2: when I thought about if I never got my luggage back, That's.
Speaker 1: What I thought. I thought, my shaving kid. Do you
Speaker 1: remember when a Biden administration official who is non binary
Speaker 1: was stealing luggage and then putting on the dresses they
Speaker 1: found inside of the luggage and then taking photographs of
Speaker 1: themselves in public places with the stolen clothes. Oh, you
Speaker 1: should read that story. It was pretty exciting, just sort
Speaker 1: of the first non binary Biden administration executive was stealing
Speaker 1: suitcases and then wearing the clothes from inside of the suitcases,
Speaker 1: and it was not a good look. It was fantastic.
Speaker 1: Speaking of now, you struggle with the word queer and
Speaker 1: how the language around being gay has evolved. Have you
Speaker 1: heard about from people on the road about this that
Speaker 1: that call themselves queer, from sort of gen z that
Speaker 1: that that that use different terms like where are you
Speaker 1: at now? Because that's a backlash for what you said.
Speaker 2: I love asking people about it. I love it, and
Speaker 2: I find that generally it's a generational thing, right, Like
Speaker 2: a lot of times when I meet young women, I
Speaker 2: say where do you stand on the word lesbian? And
Speaker 2: a lot of them are just so insulted I even
Speaker 2: used that word. They reject the word lesbian and they
Speaker 2: don't want to be put in a box. And I said, well,
Speaker 2: I'm still putting you in a box, but this one
Speaker 2: has irritating person written on the side of.
Speaker 4: It, you know.
Speaker 1: And I find my problem with the word queer. I
Speaker 1: have two problems, right.
Speaker 2: One it doesn't tell me anything right, and two it's
Speaker 2: the third time in my life I've been rebranded. And
Speaker 2: it just it'll happen to you too when you get older,
Speaker 2: Like people keep changing your name, and nobody ever asks you,
Speaker 2: no one ever asks your opinion. It's like, oh, you're
Speaker 2: this now. And then when people come up to me
Speaker 2: and say, oh, you're a queer writer, and it's like, no,
Speaker 2: I'm no, I don't. And again, it doesn't have anything
Speaker 2: to do with the word formally being an insult. I
Speaker 2: appreciate that it's short, you know, but that's all that
Speaker 2: I really appreciate about it. But I love asking people
Speaker 2: about it. And usually the people, you know, younger people,
Speaker 2: they like having their own word. You know, this is
Speaker 2: a young word, and so they feel like it reflects.
Speaker 2: But I feel I guess, I don't know.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: A woman came up to me and said, oh, you're
Speaker 2: a queer writer, said my daughter's queer. My twelve year
Speaker 2: old daughter is queer. And I said, oh how and
Speaker 2: she said she's asexual. I said, isn't that what you
Speaker 2: want in a twelve year old? No, I mean maybe
Speaker 2: she's just twelve.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well that's in the sort of edge case. Well,
Speaker 1: I remember when I was a speech writer, and I
Speaker 1: struggled with this because I you know, when I was
Speaker 1: growing up, there was gay and there was straight, and
Speaker 1: we all kind of bisexual was a joke, right. If
Speaker 1: a girl was bisexual, she was really straight. If a
Speaker 1: guy was bisexual, he was really gay. And we didn't
Speaker 1: really talk about trans. We didn't know about we didn't
Speaker 1: talk about nonlin or gender wasn't really as much a
Speaker 1: part of it. And when I became a speech writer,
Speaker 1: I remember watching as we would say, like, you know,
Speaker 1: we're proud to celebrate gay rights, and then well, you
Speaker 1: can't just say gay rights, you have to say if
Speaker 1: there's also trans people. And then we started including in
Speaker 1: speeches LGBT, and I remember as a writer feeling offended
Speaker 1: by LGBT because it felt so mechanical, It felt so
Speaker 1: it felt like it was from a manual about gay rights.
Speaker 1: It felt technical, as opposed to you know, we're so
Speaker 1: proud to have achieved so much for gays and lesbians
Speaker 1: or the gay community. Saying LGBT felt just lyrics. Just
Speaker 1: felt it had a bad sound right, and that to me.
Speaker 1: So then you go to queer and that's meant to
Speaker 1: be a catch all. But I had the same feeling
Speaker 1: that I think you have, like, wait, this word doesn't
Speaker 1: feel exactly right. But I wonder how much of that,
Speaker 1: like what is it about the word that doesn't feel
Speaker 1: that it's not just that it was a slur, right,
Speaker 1: there's something where it like it. It doesn't feel like
Speaker 1: it is who I am, and I wouldn't use it,
Speaker 1: but it is a useful word to have a catch on.
Speaker 1: I'm wondering if you've thought about, like, what is that
Speaker 1: feeling that kind of because if it was just that
Speaker 1: it wasn't you have a bad feeling about the word.
Speaker 1: It's not just that it's not as good as gay.
Speaker 1: There's a you don't want it, so why well.
Speaker 2: Again, part of it, too, is that I just feel
Speaker 2: that it's unspecific. It doesn't tell me. Often when I
Speaker 2: think of queer, I think of somebody who is in
Speaker 2: a heterosexual relationship but is open to the idea of
Speaker 2: a three way and has the septim ring, you know,
Speaker 2: and so and that's that's a thing, right, And so
Speaker 2: if that's your identity, you can be that's your queer.
Speaker 1: Have it, please, and I'll call you queer and everything.
Speaker 1: But I'm not. I'm not clear.
Speaker 2: So I'm gay and you can be queer and and
Speaker 2: that's fine, But I don't when the word queer is
Speaker 2: used on me by well meaning people who think, well,
Speaker 2: that's the word. Now, that's a word they like us
Speaker 2: to use. You know, that person, I cringe, you know,
Speaker 2: and I don't. And but again, when you said something
Speaker 2: earlier as a writer, okay, I mean as a writer, Yeah,
Speaker 2: language is what I deal was what the tools that
Speaker 2: I work with. So when people say it's just a
Speaker 2: language thing, well yeah, it's it's what I'm working with, right,
Speaker 2: Like the New Yorker, Like I can't say prostitute in
Speaker 2: the New Yorker, I have to say sex worker. To me,
Speaker 2: a sex worker, Like if you lost both your arms
Speaker 2: in an accident, a sex worker would come to your
Speaker 2: house and teach you how to pleasure yourself by rubbing
Speaker 2: aginst the doorframe. That's a sex worker, right, yeah, But
Speaker 2: then there's a prostitute, you know. So I will never
Speaker 2: write about a prostitute in The New Yorker because I
Speaker 2: don't want to use the word sex worker.
Speaker 1: I don't like the word, right, you know.
Speaker 2: And and the same way, if I was in a
Speaker 2: situation they said, well you have to use the word queer,
Speaker 2: I would say, okay, well I won't write anything for you,
Speaker 2: or I won't write about that. If I know I
Speaker 2: have to use that word. I don't want the word.
Speaker 2: I don't want to use it. I don't like the
Speaker 2: way it sounds. I don't like I don't want to
Speaker 2: see it on paper, you know, I don't want to
Speaker 2: type it. So and that's I don't know that that
Speaker 2: has I don't know if that's an old thing, you know,
Speaker 2: just from being old or I mean there are It's
Speaker 2: not like I any new word I don't want anything
Speaker 2: to do with. I mean sometimes well there are a
Speaker 2: lot of them. Well they I don't want anything to
Speaker 2: do with.
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Speaker 1: In terms of condition supply. The sex worker thing is
Speaker 1: interesting because here's what I worry about for like, why
Speaker 1: am I reluctant? And is it because it's because I
Speaker 1: don't want to be associated with the style of writing
Speaker 1: that uses words like clear and sex worker. Right that
Speaker 1: if you're describing as sex worker, it is a kind
Speaker 1: of there's a kind of performative obtuseness and kind of
Speaker 1: a perform normative progressivism that feels artificial. And so I
Speaker 1: am am I rebelling against that artificiality, not because the
Speaker 1: word itself, but because I don't like the way other
Speaker 1: people use it and the kind of writing and thinking
Speaker 1: it's associated with. You know, what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly, Yeah, a sex worker took one college course, Okay,
Speaker 2: as a prostitute who took one course in college. Like
Speaker 2: I think if you went to the streets and you
Speaker 2: and someone was offering blow jobs, and you say, what
Speaker 2: do you learn be called?
Speaker 1: I think I don't. I don't know how many people
Speaker 1: would say sex worker? Yeah, sort of like how I
Speaker 1: would Normally the.
Speaker 2: Thing to do would be to say to them, what
Speaker 2: would you like to be addressing? What would you like
Speaker 2: to be called?
Speaker 1: Yeah? You know, well, because we went through around of
Speaker 1: this one, people were saying kind of LATINX and it
Speaker 1: turned out, you know that that that's sort of a
Speaker 1: sort of an artificially producer of activism based word that
Speaker 1: wasn't really used outside of those spaces, And then kind
Speaker 1: of went through a cycle of how people were using
Speaker 1: that word, and then eventually sort of we're not using
Speaker 1: that word anymore, and it's okay, great, we're back to
Speaker 1: Latino Latina. Well, I think about it sort of for me, right,
Speaker 1: because I identify I'm gay, But at the same time,
Speaker 1: I became comfortable with that at a time when I
Speaker 1: didn't have another option, right, and I'm now forty three,
Speaker 1: I am married to a trans person. I like, I
Speaker 1: choose to call myself gay, even though truthfully I am.
Speaker 1: The word queer probably more appropriately defines what I am.
Speaker 1: But I choose to be gay because I think being
Speaker 1: gay as a choice. Nobody's gonna take that away from me.
Speaker 2: Well, I like, when I was I remember the word
Speaker 2: gay coming into use, right, the term was homosexual, and
Speaker 2: so I a member of the term gay, and maybe
Speaker 2: because I was eighteen years old, I thought great because
Speaker 2: it fit, you know. And so maybe there were people
Speaker 2: who felt like gay was unspecific or you know, they
Speaker 2: just didn't like the sound of it.
Speaker 1: I mean, homosexual. I'm fine with.
Speaker 2: It's just longer, you know, Like for some reason, we
Speaker 2: just keep making words longer. Uh So again, anything one
Speaker 2: syllable but an LGBTQ, and then it became qqya and
Speaker 2: then it was a plus was added, and I agree
Speaker 2: it was a lot.
Speaker 1: Well, this is where it's like, it's about persuasion too,
Speaker 1: which is hey, like if nobody who's not paying very
Speaker 1: close attention is going to master LGBTQ two I A plus,
Speaker 1: Like it's stupid. It's just like, at some point we're
Speaker 1: allowed to have sort of esthetic judgments like, I'm sorry,
Speaker 1: but that's that's stupid. It is stupid to go around
Speaker 1: saying so many letters in a row, and to keep
Speaker 1: adding new letters to it. It's just esthetically unpleasing. We're
Speaker 1: allowed to have taste, right.
Speaker 2: To You couldn't blame people from making fun of lgbtqqia plus.
Speaker 1: You, oh it's funny them, Yeah, it's funny. Yeah. Now,
Speaker 1: I mean you've also been advocating for wearing skirts people
Speaker 1: about how comfortable skirts are. We are both people that
Speaker 1: have worn skirts at our live show and have become
Speaker 1: proponents of skirts. What do you think men are afraid
Speaker 1: of with these skirts?
Speaker 2: You know, I don't want to be stared at, and
Speaker 2: I don't want to be a woman, and I don't
Speaker 2: want to have breasts, and I don't want to wear makeup.
Speaker 1: But a skirt just looks good.
Speaker 2: I don't know, half the world wears skirts and they
Speaker 2: don't make any big deal about it. I mean, I
Speaker 2: went to Fiji and you know, all the guys are
Speaker 2: wearing skirts, and you go g I mean again, you
Speaker 2: go to the Middle East and you see people and
Speaker 2: basically dresses. I remember I went to Morocco when I
Speaker 2: was in high school with my Spanish class, and I
Speaker 2: bought I don't know what it's called, but it's like
Speaker 2: a floor length rope, you know, And I wore it
Speaker 2: to high school when I got back, and I remember
Speaker 2: thinking I look good and and just being made fun
Speaker 2: of like so roundly, and just remember I just remember thinking,
Speaker 2: like why is it a big deal?
Speaker 1: Like why it's.
Speaker 2: Got one hole instead of too really, and you're going
Speaker 2: to get that upset about it. But yeah, I have
Speaker 2: a bunch of skirts and I'm happy to uh, you know,
Speaker 2: I don't have mini skirts and stuff I have. You know,
Speaker 2: usually they go you know to the floor or you know,
Speaker 2: almost to the floor, and I just I just think
Speaker 2: they look great.
Speaker 1: I do think that that when you know, conservatives get
Speaker 1: upset about trans people on some level, what they're upset
Speaker 1: about is the ways in which they're holding on to
Speaker 1: these sort of traditional definitions of like the right way
Speaker 1: to be a man, and how small a definition they
Speaker 1: want for that. And I think, as someone that has
Speaker 1: been publicly gay since you were writing so long, like
Speaker 1: you never really came out. You're just gay. From the
Speaker 1: first moment I've heard of you. You were gay the
Speaker 1: whole time. You never came out. You never you never
Speaker 1: had your moment of going on television being like, I'm gay.
Speaker 2: But at the same time, I was lucky enough to
Speaker 2: come around at a time I can write about my
Speaker 2: relationship and people just it's about trying to make a
Speaker 2: life with another person, right that the world could could
Speaker 2: see that. The world wasn't like, oh, it's gay. Never mind,
Speaker 2: it's not for me because he's gay, And that was
Speaker 2: you know, if I'd done it ten years earlier, then
Speaker 2: that would have been a completely different story. So I
Speaker 2: was just fortunate to come along, you know, to that
Speaker 2: so much had happened before I got I arrived, I suppose.
Speaker 1: But the reason I bring it up is because it
Speaker 1: does seem like what's happening now. So being gay as
Speaker 1: a sort of an abstract identity, right, like I'm a
Speaker 1: gay person. That means I date and want to marry
Speaker 1: someone of the same gender, whatever, it seems like. The
Speaker 1: part that we're now grappling with is everything around it,
Speaker 1: like wanting to wear skirts, being more feminine, right, and
Speaker 1: defying other aspects of what it means to be a
Speaker 1: true like sort of masculine man. And I know, as
Speaker 1: I think about what when I was made fun of
Speaker 1: when I was a kid, right like, I was called
Speaker 1: gay a million times. I was a little bit of feminine,
Speaker 1: but it was it was becoming okay to be gay,
Speaker 1: but it wasn't okay to be a mincing little queen,
Speaker 1: right like. And it does seem like right now there's
Speaker 1: a real kind of pushback from the right about defying
Speaker 1: the gender norms. Like they're okay with a Scott Best
Speaker 1: it's being the secretary of the Treasury, but they worry
Speaker 1: a lot about what happens if if a man shows
Speaker 1: up in makeup in a skirt, And I wonder how
Speaker 1: you think about that as somebody that has like sort
Speaker 1: of been publicly identified as gay for so long.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, I feel I remember when I was young,
Speaker 2: and like I moved, I lived in San Francisco for
Speaker 2: one summer, right and I remember it was like a
Speaker 2: pride parade there in San Francisco, And it must have
Speaker 2: been it was like summer of nineteen seventy six or something, right,
Speaker 2: But I remember there were drag queens at the beginning
Speaker 2: of the parade, and I remember being embarrassed, you know,
Speaker 2: and thinking, oh, I don't want people to think that
Speaker 2: that's what gay people are like, right, And now I
Speaker 2: just now I think the opposite. When I see somebody
Speaker 2: being like a massive like sissy or something, it just
Speaker 2: warms my heart, you know, and I'm just so happy
Speaker 2: that they just be in themselves. And I can see how,
Speaker 2: you know, it can make someone uncomfortable because you're not sure,
Speaker 2: you know, like when I'm signing books, like you don't
Speaker 2: know sometimes you know how you maybe should address somebody,
Speaker 2: or if somebody gives you a book and then it's
Speaker 2: got well, especially like a name like Zia on it,
Speaker 2: you know, and then is that Zia is zea somebody else?
Speaker 1: You know?
Speaker 2: So I always say, uh, who's Zia? And then sometimes
Speaker 2: people like I am and I say, well, I'm asking
Speaker 2: because it could be your cousin, it could be you know,
Speaker 2: it could be anyone. So I have a nice out
Speaker 2: that way that you don't necessarily have in day to
Speaker 2: day life. But I think it just makes people uncomfortable.
Speaker 2: Like if I'm wearing a skirt, I don't see any
Speaker 2: reason for anyone to call me ma'am. Or it's just
Speaker 2: a skirt. I don't have any makeup on it. Wort
Speaker 2: code on and you know, I guess I don't care
Speaker 2: if they're uncomfortable. I suppose that's a difference.
Speaker 1: Right, But I do think part like I'm interested in,
Speaker 1: like what is that discomfort?
Speaker 3: Right?
Speaker 1: Like You'll turn on Fox News and there'll be somebody saying, like,
Speaker 1: you know, real men don't sing Happy Birthday, Real men
Speaker 1: don't drink soup, Real men don't have straws, right, like
Speaker 1: constraining constraining what it means to be a man to
Speaker 1: this really really narrow box. And I wonder how much
Speaker 1: of that discomfort people feel is in the same way
Speaker 1: someone you know is understands that voting for Trump might
Speaker 1: be wrong in some way that like they're like I
Speaker 1: spend a long time building this prison, Like how dare you?
Speaker 1: How dare you try to escape? Like this is where
Speaker 1: I live. I feel safe here well in a lot
Speaker 1: of ways.
Speaker 2: And I think a lot of people would be surprised
Speaker 2: by that. But I feel sorry for straight guys, you know,
Speaker 2: I feel sorry that they're in their prison, and I
Speaker 2: feel sorry that sometimes I feel like they don't know
Speaker 2: how to talk people, you know, like if you're listening
Speaker 2: in conversation on a plane and there are two guys
Speaker 2: in front of you who you know, strangers who were talking.
Speaker 2: I just I just feel bad. I feel bad that
Speaker 2: they don't again, that their confines are so narrow.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I had this. I remember realizing that I was
Speaker 1: that I was a worse friend to my straight friends,
Speaker 1: my straight male friends, because I was less effeminate. And
Speaker 1: what came with being effeminate was being thoughtful, you know,
Speaker 1: like asking people about their dad. You know, like there's
Speaker 1: a there's a way you are with with with, there's
Speaker 1: a way gay men are that is more feminine, and
Speaker 1: part of it is just being i don't know, thoughtful, considerate, sweet, right,
Speaker 1: And I was, And I remember realizing like, oh, when
Speaker 1: I'm with my straight male friends, I act more like them,
Speaker 1: and I'm much worse in basically every respects right, Like
Speaker 1: I would never think to be like be like if
Speaker 1: I'm in my kind of in that straight oh you're
Speaker 1: kind of like you would never be like, so how's
Speaker 1: your mother doing? Like, you know, is she getting better
Speaker 1: from her fall? Like you wouldn't say anything like that,
Speaker 1: which just doesn't come up in straight world.
Speaker 2: I was in an elevator and I was in Atlanta
Speaker 2: a few weeks ago. And I'm going down for breakfast
Speaker 2: and this guy gets on the elevator and I said, oh,
Speaker 2: I saw you on my plane last night. I said,
Speaker 2: I I noticed your shoes. You know, that's such a
Speaker 2: thing that would be so scary, like to a straight
Speaker 2: guy A remembered them and be that you were looking
Speaker 2: at his shoes.
Speaker 1: You know what was the reaction? How did it go?
Speaker 2: Well, he was wearing shoes without a back to them,
Speaker 2: so of course he.
Speaker 1: Was gay, right, So it all borked out. Yeah, sorry,
Speaker 1: I just ended up for making sure you're talking to
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Speaker 1: You referred to Hugh as your boyfriend. He's your husband? Yeah? Right, yeah,
Speaker 1: uh huh, still uncomfortable. I don't like the word. I yeah,
Speaker 1: he's a man. I'm married, right, What what's the problem.
Speaker 1: He's your husband and I don't like the word. Do
Speaker 1: You got married?
Speaker 2: Yeah, just for financial reasons, right. It was a shotgun
Speaker 2: wedding arranged by my banker, and I don't want to
Speaker 2: marry anybody else.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: I didn't mean anything to be mean to be married.
Speaker 2: I didn't choke up. I didn't, I don't. It was
Speaker 2: It was just a legal thing to me.
Speaker 1: I just got married. Any advice for a long and
Speaker 1: successful relationship.
Speaker 2: I do. Hugh and I have been together for thirty
Speaker 2: six years. Never talk about your relationship to that other
Speaker 2: person ever.
Speaker 1: Never talk about it.
Speaker 2: Never talk about it, because that just it doesn't bear.
Speaker 2: It doesn't bear that the harsh light of scrutiny. You
Speaker 2: can talk about it with other people, right, You can
Speaker 2: complain about them, but don't talk about it with that person, Right.
Speaker 1: It's sort of like talking about happiness. If you're talking
Speaker 1: about it, you aren't it. Don't talk about your relationship.
Speaker 1: That's pretty good. Now I noticed something else in one
Speaker 1: of these essays. You also are deeply uncomfortable talking about
Speaker 1: your bowel movements in front of you.
Speaker 2: Oh my god, No, I've never had one, and he's
Speaker 2: never had one.
Speaker 1: What is that? What is what? So that's the way
Speaker 1: you're talking about, But so what is it about feminine mists?
Speaker 1: I don't know what you're talking but so, I like
Speaker 1: I noticed, I definitely feel like there's two kinds of relationships,
Speaker 1: and I don't think there's a middle ground. There are
Speaker 1: couples for whom the bathroom is just a room with
Speaker 1: a sink and a shower, yeah, and that's it. And
Speaker 1: then there are couples that are just fully in it
Speaker 1: about every detail. I'm in that category. We talk about everything,
Speaker 1: We go into great detail, and it brings us closer together.
Speaker 1: Don't you want to what your leave? Like?
Speaker 4: How do you know?
Speaker 1: But how can you know a person? A big part
Speaker 1: of every day, David, is the part of the day
Speaker 1: where you had either a good shit or a bad shit.
Speaker 1: It's a big right, No, come on, you know, I
Speaker 1: have no idea what you're talking about. So you come
Speaker 1: home from a long trip and Hugh is in a
Speaker 1: bad mood. He's just a bit upset, and you don't
Speaker 1: know why. It might be because he's having stomach trouble.
Speaker 1: But you'll just never know that. You'll never know that
Speaker 1: he's been he's been, Oh, I was sorry, And he's
Speaker 1: never known that about me. But then it's it's but
Speaker 1: then you're strangers to me. No, there's plenty of other stuff.
Speaker 1: We know this.
Speaker 2: It's nice to have a little window of mystery, you know,
Speaker 2: Like I know people couples who like fart in front
Speaker 2: of each other and do things you're not in.
Speaker 1: Front of each other. What are you getting up and
Speaker 1: going to happen? Come on, what are you talking about?
Speaker 2: If somebody has an accident every now and then, it's
Speaker 2: never acknowledged, never mentioned, never ever ever ever. And you
Speaker 2: know what, I'm really glad because both of us are
Speaker 2: like that. So if just one person was like that,
Speaker 2: then it would be pretty hard.
Speaker 1: Well, I don't think those people make it. I don't
Speaker 1: think I think that's what divorces. I think it's people
Speaker 1: finding out that they're that they're they're with the wrong
Speaker 1: person because they want to they want to talk about it,
Speaker 1: and the other person doesn't. It's like he can't build
Speaker 1: the life with something like that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, Hugh and I Nope, never been discussed. I
Speaker 2: don't know what it would be now if if uh,
Speaker 2: like if I get colon, colon cancer, rectal cancer, sure
Speaker 2: he will never know.
Speaker 1: I will go see I will say.
Speaker 2: I have to go to the hospital for a few weeks.
Speaker 1: I will say, uh, why even tell him that I'm going.
Speaker 1: I have a little trip I need to take. So well,
Speaker 1: you know you're getting You went right to the right
Speaker 1: you went. Your mind went to correctly. I know where
Speaker 1: your mind went, which is to the fact that you
Speaker 1: have an aging body, as we all do, and you're
Speaker 1: in one of the stories. You basically are repulsed by
Speaker 1: the fact that he needs, for a time after a
Speaker 1: hip surgery to have one of those cushy, higher toilet seats,
Speaker 1: which you compare to a coffin. You both have human
Speaker 1: bodies that will slowly fail over time, and the best
Speaker 1: case scenario is that you're holding someone's hand as they
Speaker 1: lose control of their body. Uh, but you're together in
Speaker 1: the end, Like, there's no avoiding the fact that that
Speaker 1: you have a corpus and it will decay before each other. Right,
Speaker 1: isn't that the goal? But I don't.
Speaker 2: I don't the needs to put him on the toilet
Speaker 2: now to prepare for putt him on the toilet twenty
Speaker 2: years from now, twenty years from now.
Speaker 1: If I have to do it, I'll do it. But
Speaker 1: I doubt that. But now, all of a sudden, at
Speaker 1: the very end of your relationship, you're going to finally
Speaker 1: have to talk about this thing that you've been avoiding.
Speaker 1: Your will never talk about it. We'll never talk about it.
Speaker 2: I'll never talk about it never. If if hughes like
Speaker 2: in his nineties and he soils himself, we will never
Speaker 2: talk about it ever, ever, ever talk about it.
Speaker 1: Are you thinking about what these look your document? You
Speaker 1: know you've been writing in your diary. Did you write
Speaker 1: in your diary today? Ends, Yeah, you've been writing in
Speaker 1: your diary day. Do you think about what those last
Speaker 1: entries are going to be?
Speaker 2: Like, I think it's easier to conceive of our death
Speaker 2: than it is of our decrepitude, you know, and the
Speaker 2: thought of being in an assisted living center in one room,
Speaker 2: your life reduced to one room like my dad's was,
Speaker 2: and all your friends are dead and you're defcating in
Speaker 2: your pants maybe or you're you're unable to get up
Speaker 2: from your bed. I being dead, I can think, sure, yeah,
Speaker 2: but that is just to know that that's coming, or
Speaker 2: to think, so, Hugh and I we were going to
Speaker 2: throw ourselves off the terrace, you know, of our apartment building,
Speaker 2: but then he didn't want to make a mess, and
Speaker 2: so we're going to put ourselves in body bags first
Speaker 2: and then throw ourselves.
Speaker 1: That is considerate. That is considerate. You know you got
Speaker 1: to I would say double rapid, because who knows what
Speaker 1: kind of splat that You know, you're gonna make a
Speaker 1: lot of impact and then boom, you're coming out the sides.
Speaker 2: I spent ten days at the Medical Examiner's office in Phoenix,
Speaker 2: so I know, I know what it looks like, and
Speaker 2: I know that's why you're right, double body bags is
Speaker 2: a really good idea.
Speaker 1: All right, So if something good came out of this conversation, well,
Speaker 1: here's the thing I would say, too, But like, isn't
Speaker 1: a part of you like ready, like you will have
Speaker 1: an interesting perspective on what it's like to slowly, uh
Speaker 1: decline in one room as all your friends die. Isn't
Speaker 1: that the final isn't Aren't those the stories you sort
Speaker 1: of need, we need you to write because it'll be
Speaker 1: helpful to other people that are going through it. Isn't
Speaker 1: there something beautiful like about getting getting that last experience
Speaker 1: which is so common for people? Yeah?
Speaker 2: I think the thing is though Calvin Tompkins died recently,
Speaker 2: the art critic for The New Yorker, and he was
Speaker 2: was he a hundred or was he? But the thing
Speaker 2: too is that you can his eyes were really failing
Speaker 2: him at the end. So you could be in a
Speaker 2: situation where you couldn't write, you know, when you're really sick,
Speaker 2: you can't sit up, you know, like if you were
Speaker 2: so you look, it's a nice idea that you could
Speaker 2: write until the day you die, but you have no
Speaker 2: control over it, you know. So maybe if gee, if
Speaker 2: Hugh's mother right, huge, I've never known anyone who reads
Speaker 2: more than her, And now she can't read, and she's
Speaker 2: ninety five and she's just sort of parked in front
Speaker 2: of a TV her worst nightmare, and she can't read
Speaker 2: a book, and even if you gave her an audio book,
Speaker 2: she can't focus on anything. So again, I don't necessarily
Speaker 2: have control. I'd like to be able to write until
Speaker 2: the end of my life, even I don't mean that
Speaker 2: to write in order to put a book out, but
Speaker 2: just you know, I've done it every single day of
Speaker 2: my life for the last fifty years. So I don't
Speaker 2: know who I would be without it, regardless of it
Speaker 2: being published or not. I just don't know.
Speaker 1: How I would how I would know who I am.
Speaker 1: I suppose, so I said, maybe it's the kind of
Speaker 1: thing where you wait for the the kind of double
Speaker 1: wrapped phase you can you can age into decrepitude, but
Speaker 1: then when you finally can't write, then you do the
Speaker 1: double backing. Right, maybe sort of, let's just hold off,
Speaker 1: let's put a pin in the double bagging until But
Speaker 1: I think.
Speaker 2: It's unfair, And I think it's unfair that you can't.
Speaker 2: You know, your insurance policy, your life insurance won't pay.
Speaker 1: Off you if you kill yourself.
Speaker 2: I mean, I understand the problems with changing that, but
Speaker 2: I just don't think it's fair to expect people to
Speaker 2: put up with that amount of misery and and you know,
Speaker 2: like if you're defecating in your pants and somebody's clean
Speaker 2: you up and then you're just like, oh, I'm sorry,
Speaker 2: I'm sorry, I'm sorry, and you're not even having a
Speaker 2: good time, you know, like the like the rest of
Speaker 2: your days and not going to be any better than that.
Speaker 2: I don't see why you shouldn't be able to kill yourself.
Speaker 2: I I have this idea for Canyon Day, and it's
Speaker 2: you put logs.
Speaker 4: You you put logs around the Grand Canyon, right just along
Speaker 4: the lip of the Grand Pan, and you take people
Speaker 4: there at night and then so if they trip over.
Speaker 1: A log and fall into the Grand Canyon, so it's
Speaker 1: like a little loophole, yeah, where it's it's called like
Speaker 1: the so it's to get to get the insurance to
Speaker 1: pay out that it's just a lot of people tripping
Speaker 1: on the Grand Canyon.
Speaker 2: It would be called Canyon Day. And then if you
Speaker 2: wanted to participate in Canyon Day, you would be allowed to.
Speaker 1: Well. I think that's a great idea. I'm not sure
Speaker 1: the insurance companies aren't going to catch wise to it
Speaker 1: pretty quickly. Suddenly, Hey, we've seen a huge uptake in
Speaker 1: accidental deaths on the Arizona side of the Grand Canyon.
Speaker 1: But hey, it's a great it's a great thought.
Speaker 2: Before you know, I shared it with somebody and they said,
Speaker 2: what if you don't die, don't you hate people like that?
Speaker 1: Never? I mean, it's a pretty long fall. I know what.
Speaker 2: There's no way you're plus you're going to be decrapit
Speaker 2: to begin with, Like you know, even saying that what
Speaker 2: if you don't die, you can die.
Speaker 1: You're gonna die. That's not the problem with it. Listen,
Speaker 1: I want you to know something. There's a lot of
Speaker 1: problems with that plan, all right, that's not one. That's
Speaker 1: not one of them. It's a big fall down there.
Speaker 1: It's a big hangar. It's grant, it's grand. That's why
Speaker 1: they named the burger after it. Before we let you go,
Speaker 1: I want to get just a rapid fire a few things.
Speaker 1: See where your head's at. People saying no problem instead
Speaker 1: of you're welcome. That doesn't bother me. Really, Yeah, But
Speaker 1: you don't like perfect when people say, oh, perfect, perfect, perfect.
Speaker 2: I was at a hotel the other day and I
Speaker 2: and I and the woman said perfect five times before
Speaker 2: I even sat down at the table. And they're told
Speaker 2: in hotels like if you say wonderful or terrific, that's
Speaker 2: not positive enough. See you have to say perfect.
Speaker 1: But no problem. I know people who are bothered by
Speaker 1: no problem.
Speaker 2: It doesn't I know people too who are bothered by
Speaker 2: of course, could I have another coffee?
Speaker 1: Of course? And there are people who don't like of course.
Speaker 1: I have no problem with it. Okay, emojis.
Speaker 2: I used one one time, just an egg plant. No
Speaker 2: it was it was a huge sister, and I don't
Speaker 2: remember what it was.
Speaker 1: I don't like to text. Okay. College professors are signing
Speaker 1: fewer books and more excerpts because their students have lower
Speaker 1: attention spans.
Speaker 2: Gosh, that makes me sad, you know. But that said,
Speaker 2: if I were in college and then I had to
Speaker 2: read Moby Dick by tomorrow, I'd be like, fuck, I
Speaker 2: got to read Mumby Dick by tomorrow.
Speaker 1: You can skip the whaling chapters. Yeah, that's the key
Speaker 1: thing with reading Mobi Dick. People need to know that
Speaker 1: there's a lot of whaling chapters in there with detailed
Speaker 1: information about the technique. You don't need those chapters.
Speaker 2: Well, I wrote something one time about I was writing
Speaker 2: for Esquire and they did an issue what every man
Speaker 2: should do before the age of whatever, and so I said,
Speaker 2: read Moby Dick. So I started reading it, and I
Speaker 2: was like, oh no, this is really boring.
Speaker 1: It's so boring.
Speaker 2: So I told myself so boring. I could not shave,
Speaker 2: brush my teeth, to take a shower, or wash my
Speaker 2: hair until I finished it. And then on the second day,
Speaker 2: I helped the neighbor clean out her chicken coop, and
Speaker 2: so you know, I had those little mites all over me,
Speaker 2: and but I couldn't take a shower, I couldn't do anything.
Speaker 2: I had to read Moby Dick first.
Speaker 1: There's a audiobook version of Moby Dick read by Burt Reynolds.
Speaker 1: It seems like he was done. He had to do
Speaker 1: it at gun points or something and really read. It's atrocious.
Speaker 1: It's I highly recommend go find it. He does a
Speaker 1: sailor's accents, but he can't maintain us. So it like
Speaker 1: you hit plan this thing, and it's Burt Reynolds being like,
Speaker 1: call me a shmeel. But but by the end of
Speaker 1: every chapter he's kind of back into classic Burt Reynolds.
Speaker 1: And then the next chapter begins and it's back with
Speaker 1: the whale was out there you know he does a voice.
Speaker 1: It's crazy. It's crazy, and he doesn't do any of
Speaker 1: the whaling chapters, so you can just it's it's a breeze.
Speaker 1: He's right, that's good that we've got a lot of
Speaker 1: good ideas out of this session. Really happy about that
Speaker 1: last thing. Do you hold grudges? Yeah? I do, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I do.
Speaker 2: I don't necessarily act on them, But my brother said.
Speaker 2: A couple of weeks ago, I saw my brother and
Speaker 2: we were talking about cleaning, and he said, man, you
Speaker 2: gotta be you know, I got to be mad to clean.
Speaker 2: And whenever I start cleaning, I go back to my
Speaker 2: grudge drawer and I pull something out and it just
Speaker 2: fuels me when I clean. It's like feeding the steam
Speaker 2: engine while I clean, and then I finish, and I'm fine.
Speaker 1: What's your oldest grudge right now?
Speaker 2: Missus Arsenow nineteen sixty eight, ice Cream Creations. After a christening,
Speaker 2: we went to ice cream Creations people from the church
Speaker 2: greg Orthodox Church in Raleigh, North Carolina. And I was
Speaker 2: sitting there with my mom having a lovely time, and
Speaker 2: Missus arsanu came and said, you go over there and
Speaker 2: sit with the boys. No, twelve year old boys should
Speaker 2: be sitting with his mother. And I was having such
Speaker 2: a nice time my mother, and and I thought, what
Speaker 2: business is it of yours where I sit?
Speaker 1: Do you know what I mean?
Speaker 2: Like my mother wasn't complaining about having me there, and
Speaker 2: my you know, my mother's dead, and I think she
Speaker 2: robbed me. Missus Arson, you robbed me of like an
Speaker 2: extra half hour with my mother. And no one back
Speaker 2: there said, bitch, are you telling me where to sit?
Speaker 2: Like nobody would have done that.
Speaker 1: You just did what she said.
Speaker 2: I just did what she said. And I think about it.
Speaker 2: I've held a grudge since then. And she's long dead,
Speaker 2: you know, yeah for sure, but I I yeah, that's
Speaker 2: probably my oldest grudge.
Speaker 1: And see, now the kids would talk back, something that
Speaker 1: you find repulsive because the kids aren't listening to their
Speaker 1: parents anymore. But that was a case where had you
Speaker 1: talked back to your teacher, you might have had more
Speaker 1: time with your mother.
Speaker 2: There was a guy in my high school who are
Speaker 2: We had a math teacher and he was he was
Speaker 2: also a coach, and he was a dick, and he
Speaker 2: was chewing out this student, this female student, and she
Speaker 2: started crying and he kept at it, and this guy
Speaker 2: in the class stood up and said you need to
Speaker 2: back off to the teacher. And nobody did things like that,
Speaker 2: and he got in so much trouble, but it was
Speaker 2: somebody needed to do it, you know. And I'm so
Speaker 2: proud because he was gay.
Speaker 1: There's no way.
Speaker 2: I mean, it wasn't talked about back then, but there's
Speaker 2: no way this guy wasn't gay. And I thought about
Speaker 2: it over the years and I thought, wow, it was
Speaker 2: a gay person. I mean, it wasn't this gay person,
Speaker 2: but it was a gay person who and he wasn't
Speaker 2: He didn't threaten the teacher or anything. He did it
Speaker 2: in really the perfect way. And I think about that.
Speaker 2: He's probably forgotten about it, this guy, but gee, it
Speaker 2: was such a it was huge to me.
Speaker 1: I think about it quite often. David Sedaris, thank you
Speaker 1: so much for being here, everybody. Collection of essays David Sidaris,
Speaker 1: the Land and It's people. Thanks for coming by. Good
Speaker 1: to meet you, good to talk to you. Oh you too,
Speaker 1: Thanks so much. Thank you David Sidares for joining us. John,
Speaker 1: Tommy and I will be back in your feeds on
Speaker 1: Tuesday morning.
Speaker 3: And that's a positive.
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