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Episode 282: Jeannine Ouellette on Wanting to be Devastated, Self-Scrutiny, and Her Memoir 'The Part That Burns'
218 Plays3 years ago
Jeannine Ouellette is the author of the memoir The Part That Burns (Split/Lip Press). She can be reached @msjeannineouellette on Instagram and @_elephantrock on Twitter.
Show notes and the monthly newsletter are at brendanomeara.com.
Social media: @CNFPod on Twitter, @creativenonfictionpodcast on IG
Patreon: patreon.com/cnfpod
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Transcript
Intro: Audio Magazine Submission Details
00:00:01
Speaker
Hey, before we dive into the interview, I want to remind you that the submission deadline for issue 3 of the audio magazine is November 1st. The theme is Heroes. Essays must be no more than 2,000 words. Bear in mind this is an audio essay, so pay attention to how the words roll out of your mouth.
00:00:21
Speaker
Email your submission with heroes in the subject line the creative nonfiction podcast at gmail.com and if you Go to Brendan Romero calm. Hey, there's a little more details for the submission guidelines. So check that out. Oh I pay writers to oh What what what a novel concept you dig? Oh?
00:00:45
Speaker
I like work that makes me feel like, you know, I have to pause and just kind of slam the book down on the table and say, oh my God, how did you do that?
Podcast Introduction: Brendan O'Meara
00:01:05
Speaker
Oh hey, this is the Creative Nonfiction podcast, a show where I speak to badass people about the art and craft of telling true stories. Brendan O'Meara. Brendan O'Meara? I'm Brendan O'Meara, how's it going? I'm feeling pretty sick. So you'll excuse me for not riffing too much. I know, boo-hoo. You're gonna get into the interview even faster.
Interview with Janine O'Lette: Memoir Insights
00:01:27
Speaker
Janine O'Lette is the author of the memoir, The Part That Burns. It's published by Split Lip Press. It's a devastating book.
00:01:35
Speaker
but also charming and uplifting. It was a book I couldn't wait to get back to every time I had to put it down and I didn't put it down that much.
00:01:46
Speaker
I think I read it over two days or something. Jeanine is Ms. Jeanine Olette on Instagram and at underscore elephant rock on Twitter. More on Jeanine in a moment, but support for the creative nonfiction podcast is brought to you by Oh my God, I'm gonna sneeze.
00:02:05
Speaker
Nope, nope, I'm good. West Virginia Wesleyan College's low residency MFA in creative writing. Now in its 10th year, this affordable program boasts a low student to faculty ratio and a strong sense of community. Recent CNF faculty include random Billings Noble, Jeremy Jones and CNF pod alums Sarah Einstein. There's also fiction and poetry tracks with faculty including Ashley Bryant Phillips and Jacinda Townsend as well as Diane Gilliam and Savannah Sipple.
00:02:35
Speaker
So no matter your discipline, if you're looking to up your craft or learn a new one, consider West Virginia Wesleyan right in the heart of Appalachia. Visit mfa.wvwc.edu for more information and dates of enrollment.
00:02:52
Speaker
I met Janine at Hippo Camp this year. Sidebar, I got some savage feedback from my Hippo Camp talk, which you can download as part of this podcast feed. And my parting shot will include some of that savage feedback also.
00:03:08
Speaker
the very very end there's a another casualty of words the writing podcast for people in a hurry if you dig it go subscribe wherever you get your podcast episodes are usually less than three minutes long and I'm not gonna keep putting a casualty of words at the end but I figure those of you who download this show and the audience for this show is bigger than that one I figure I'll give you a little a little something something if you like that well go go check it out it's usually Monday to Friday and
00:03:36
Speaker
Depending on it's usually Monday to Friday and then I do a season is anywhere from like 30 to 45 Episodes and then I take a breather and I come back to it Anyway, this is about Jeanine after all we got to talking in Lancaster, Pennsylvania And I was like I gots to talk to this kind soul of a person
00:03:56
Speaker
Her stories and essays have appeared widely, and her work has been supported with fellowships from Malay Colony for the Arts in Brush Creek Foundation. She is the recipient of a Margarita Donnelly prize, Kurt Johnson Fiction Award, Proximity Essay Award, Master's Review Emerging Writers Award, two recent Pushcart nominations, as well as awards from the Society of Professional Journalists, and the Med, Medal, I don't know, is it Medal School of Journalism or Medill?
00:04:24
Speaker
Let's go with metal. Metal, yeah. Metal School of Journalism. Her work has been praised by Joyce Carol Oates, or her, as, quote, simply beautiful, precisely imagined, poetically structured, compelling, and vivid, end quote. Jeanine teaches creative writing with the Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop and is the founder and director of Elephant Rock, an independent creative writing program in Minneapolis.
Janine's Journey: Teaching and Writing Career
00:04:49
Speaker
She earned her MFA in fiction from Vermont College of Fine Arts
00:04:53
Speaker
and is working on her first novel. But we talk about her memoir, The Part That Burns, among other things. Like I said, I'm a little sick, so let's do this. Let's riff. I'm one of those weirdos who's been doing it since I was a kid.
00:05:24
Speaker
really for as long as I can remember. And that, you know, very consciously by the age of nine, I was saying, well, when I grow up, I'll be a writer or a teacher or an astronaut. Also, possibly the president of the United States. Those were my those are my categories. And I think, you know, pretty early on, I eliminated the last two and ended up doing both of the first two.
00:05:53
Speaker
That's great. And there's still time for the next two, Janine. Yeah. Although, you know, there's kind of like some of the shine has come off of the presidential office. I'm not sure about that. But yeah, you know, astronaut, maybe.
Writing as Integration, Not Escape
00:06:08
Speaker
But but yeah, I think for me, writing as a kid and I think this is true of many people who have interesting and difficult childhoods is that writing provides
00:06:23
Speaker
You know, it's not it's not an escape. I feel like it's actually more of an integration. You know, you don't know that when you're a kid. You don't know what's going on. But yeah, that that time spent on the page is actually pretty profoundly useful. And then you get attached to it. And then for me, things started to happen. And, you know, people started to notice in particular my teachers. And I was one of those also one of those weird kids who loved school. I loved
00:06:52
Speaker
You know, I loved my teachers. And so when I would get attention for my writing, you know, I think then it was set in stone.
00:07:00
Speaker
That totally squares and makes sense. Given what you as a reader pick up from the part that burns is that getting that kind of validation and recognition from your teachers, it was something you weren't getting at home. So that makes total sense that you would gravitate towards that because that must have felt like the most safe place on earth for you. That's exactly it. It was my safe place, my happy place, at least up until middle school.
00:07:31
Speaker
But those elementary years, you know, like, I loved Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday was depressing, and Friday, you know, I despised. So that was sort of like the rhythm of my week. Yeah, I loved it. And I feel like teachers, you know, people, we talk a lot about teachers now because of COVID. But, you know, they are heroes. They really are.
00:07:54
Speaker
Yeah, it can be so influential, obviously, because teachers have that potential to put fuel in your tank or tap you on the shoulder and say, you know, this is, you know, you've got a little something here. Why don't you run with it?
00:08:09
Speaker
or they might they're just as easily say like oh this is garbage you should you know go do something else with your time even though you might just need a little more repetition so uh in what way did some teacher maybe put their hands on your shoulder and say oh Janine like this is really good you should you know try to cultivate this yeah and i just want to acknowledge what you said it's true teachers can do a lot of damage also and i
00:08:31
Speaker
actually, you know, full disclaimer worked as an elementary and middle school teacher for 10 years, you know, during the time when my kids were that age. So it's a massive amount of power to wield actually over these, you know, formative young people who are so vulnerable. But for me, I have, you know, it's a very vivid memory of being in sixth grade. And in the school that I attended in Wyoming, we had
00:08:58
Speaker
these modular classrooms where we would move around between four main teachers. So there was the English teacher, the social studies teacher, the math teacher, and then our main teacher. And I remember being in like a combined English social studies unit and we were writing poetry and I wrote a poem and my teachers, you know, read it. And when, you know, so what are you about?
00:09:27
Speaker
11 or something in sixth grade. And you're old enough like you, you have a sense of what adults are, you can read adults pretty well, or at least I could, as a very hyper vigilant kid, which is another, you know, fun trait that you get out of a traumatic childhood. So I could tell that they were talking about me. And I could tell that they were talking about my poem, and I could tell that it was good. And, you know, I kind of had this little thrilling feeling
Industry Perception and Pure Writing
00:09:55
Speaker
because I knew that
00:09:57
Speaker
You know, they were having this private conversation, but I knew exactly what was going on. And then one of them, you know, approached me and they, you know, I don't remember exactly what they said, but it was very validating and it was very encouraging. And, you know, there were meetings after that and some follow up and some testing, you know, it was probably like, you know, giftedness testing and actually nothing ever came of it. So I guess I wasn't gifted.
00:10:27
Speaker
But, you know, but it was a it was this little flurry of attention that I knew how to charge to it. And and the thing is, is that I actually thought that what I had written was pretty good, too. But then that recognition from these very trusted, respected adults, you know, I feel like that was that was the moment where I knew that this was more than just something that I liked to do
00:10:57
Speaker
But this was actually something that I could do. And what was the, you know, as you're starting to progress, then, you know, what becomes a logical step for you if it's something that you that it's not just something for the anointed, that it was something that if you if you took your agency, that you could, in fact, channel your talent and rigor towards towards this thing and be be a writer, be an artist.
00:11:23
Speaker
You know, if I'm understanding the question correctly, I think that my advantage was complete naivete. I feel like I had absolutely no idea what it took to make a life out of any kind of art, let alone writing.
Education Path: Nontraditional to English Major
00:11:49
Speaker
I was wildly impractical.
00:11:52
Speaker
I had no idea or even thought of like, well, how will I actually support myself? You know, like those sort of practical thoughts or, or what does success look like? And, you know, for a writer, those things didn't really, those things didn't really cross my mind. I, you know, I entered college a year after graduating from high school with barely
00:12:21
Speaker
high school diploma. I went to an alternative high school where we didn't actually have classes credits. Well, we had classes sort of, but no credits and no grades. So I had a really bizarre and non-traditional transcript and, you know, kind of got myself somehow into the University of Minnesota, got Pell Grants, declared my English major without ever considering anything else. Like not even a second thought.
00:12:50
Speaker
But, you know, I had never had any money, like my family didn't have any money. I had always worked, you know, from the time I was 12 or 13, earlier than that, like babysitting and like cleaning people's houses and stuff. But by, you know, 12 or 13 by 15, I had my first actual like, you know, I guess, real job at Arby's. But prior to that, like I'd work at the State Fair in the summer. And so
00:13:17
Speaker
I was used to the fact that, you know, you're going to have to work and make money. And I think that I I think I saw the writing as separate from that without ever really understanding that. And I imagine that when I was in college for my undergraduate English degree, which I never completed, I imagine that without having a clear mental picture, I had a sort of some hazy idea that that would
00:13:46
Speaker
lead to teaching or, you know, what else do you do with an English degree? And, and I guess that's even naive because I would have had to get a teaching certificate on top of that. You know, if I wanted to teach, I would have had to major in education. So I really didn't know anything and I didn't have anyone, you know, guiding me or mentoring me. This was all done on my own.
Writing: A Constant Amidst Life Changes
00:14:08
Speaker
Yeah. And so then when I, when I, I got married very young and, and had stopped, you know, stopped pursuing that degree,
00:14:17
Speaker
And then I just was writing to write, you know, writing to make money also, like freelance writing, and then writing to write. And I think that too was its own kind of advantage because it became a thing that I built, you know, and it was always, it was just always there, but I wasn't asking anything of it really.
00:14:47
Speaker
you know, the technical part of it to make money. But on the art side, I was never really asking anything to happen with it other than that it be, you know, and if I could, if I could place it, if I could publish it, great, but it didn't, it didn't have to really give anything back to me. And the big disadvantage to that method was that I was writing in total isolation for a really long time. Like I didn't have a writing community. I didn't have, you know, any exposure to the literary community. So I didn't have
00:15:17
Speaker
any of the infrastructure or the support that I feel like actually, you know, could have been really awesome. But that that wasn't the path that I had back then. And what would or who would you identify as a few of those North Star writers that were always pointing you in the in the right direction, if that makes any sense? Yeah, do you mean through their work?
00:15:43
Speaker
through their work. Yeah. Primarily, especially given that you said that a lot of your early writing was largely done in isolation. So I imagine I am presupposing here that all you had were sort of like books, you know, books were your writing guides, if you will. And those were that was your community in a lot of ways. Yes, that's exactly right. And so, you know, Dorothy Allison
00:16:13
Speaker
who astonishingly blurbed my book, which is just this incredible, like, coming full circle for me. But her work was so fundamental. Bastard Out of Carolina, I think, came out in 92 or 93. And I was a young mom, and it just blew my mind. It rocked my world. In what ways? Well, in the way that she took
00:16:42
Speaker
the most horrific, repulsive experience and spun it into beautiful chapters and this luminous story that's just devastating, but also transporting. And she did it in a way that was so
00:17:09
Speaker
you know, so brave and inventive and brilliant and unapologetic. And for the person who I was at the time that her work came into my life, that felt revolutionary. And you know, I came to realize later that, you know, she wasn't necessarily the first or the only writer who had ever done that, obviously. But it was
00:17:37
Speaker
the first time that I really came face-to-face with it in quite that way.
Influential Works and Genre Shift
00:17:43
Speaker
And I felt like it proved to me that something was possible, something that I was not capable of, and I knew it. I wasn't capable then, but it made me believe I could become capable. Yeah, so that's one. And who else is someone that, you know, a mentor book, mentor writers, even if they didn't know they were mentoring you at the time?
00:18:05
Speaker
I am trying to think, you know, I had a phase during those years of reading a lot of parenting books and a lot of self-help. And it took a really long time for me to come back to fiction and poetry, I would say. But Margaret Atwood,
00:18:31
Speaker
is a writer that really stands out for me during, you know, we're talking now about being in my 20s, you know, that time when I was writing and trying to plow my way through, but, you know, in kind of an echo chamber. And Margaret Atwood, her novel Cat's Eye, I remember reading during those years and being astonished, it was breathtaking what she did.
00:18:59
Speaker
I later reread that novel about, oh, I want to say 10 or 15 years ago, I had a habit of reading while I walked to work. I would walk, I work at the university and I would, it's about 20 minute walk from my house and I would read a novel, you know, on my way to and from work. And I reread Cat's Eye and it was just as good or better as it was the first time. So,
00:19:26
Speaker
Yeah. And, you know, I think, you know, on a similar level and these may have come later, but books like Jane Hamilton's A Map of the World. I also it was a thrill to me that Marianne Winnick was the keynote speaker at Hippo Camp this past August because her book First Comes Love just blew my mind. And that was later. That was more like around the year 2000 that that came out.
00:19:55
Speaker
But there again, I guess, you know, I'm really interested in work that inspires me and makes me envious. You know, like that's, that's my rocket fuel. I, I like work that makes me feel like, you know, I have to pause and just kind of slam the book down on the table and say, Oh my God, how did you do that?
00:20:22
Speaker
You know, and then it's like, okay, I can pick it back up and start reading again. But I, you know, and when that happens, that's this magical experience that, you know, both reminds me why I'm a writer, but like makes me want to be so much better.
00:20:37
Speaker
That's a great way of processing it. I think for a long time I would read something of that nature that made me deeply envious and I would close and be like, God damn it, why didn't I become an electrician? I would have had a much better go of it through life and here I am trying to just knock my head against this stupid wall.
00:21:00
Speaker
But instead, I have since learned to process it and realize that things that make you envious are actually a way of opening doors. They'll be like, oh, they did it. So now I just need to kind of figure out my own way through it. So I love hearing you say that. So how did you arrive at that? Because that's a very, I would say, an evolved way of framing envy that it puts fuel in your tank instead of makes you feel like all toxic and ugly inside.
00:21:30
Speaker
Right. Exactly. Yeah. How did I arrive at that? Again, I think, you know, even though it disadvantaged me in a lot of ways to be writing in isolation for such a long stretch of years, it wasn't really until I hit my forties that I began to connect actively with other writers. And that happened actually first through teaching.
00:21:58
Speaker
I started my independent writing program. And then I questioned myself because I was teaching these writing workshops and retreats really having never attended one. And I, you know, I was fairly well published by then, but it still felt a little bit, you know, like just a little bit strange that I was encouraging asking and charging other people to do something that I hadn't really asked myself to do. So I, I came home after like my first,
00:22:28
Speaker
big week-long, you know, summer workshop retreat that I conducted. And I said, I have to, I need to ask this of myself. And so I applied to Tin House. They were having a winter workshop and I went and I actually went a couple of times and that's how I ended up working with Dorothy Allison. And then I also around that time decided that I did need to do the MFA, that
00:22:54
Speaker
there were a lot of reasons that it felt like the right choice, including the fact that I do work at a university. And so, you know, it counts for something. But also, I really wanted to get my book completed. And I felt like with my temperament and my relationship to money, that if I put that kind of investment in, there was 0% chance that I was going to come out of that program without a book.
00:23:24
Speaker
So I so I did that being protected as long as I was, you know, there was no reason to be have toxic envy over, you know, a book that I loved. Right. What I don't I don't think most readers feel that way. You just you just feel odd and inspired. And the fact that I also happen to be writing and want to be a writer didn't really factor into that equation like on an envy scale.
00:23:51
Speaker
The envy part only, you know, got added later. So the awe was always there. And then, you know, the deeper you get into the literary community. And we've talked about this particularly with how transparent or public everything is, not transparent necessarily, because we only see what I think Alexander, she calls the theater of theater of success or theater of accomplishment or something like that.
00:24:18
Speaker
But, you know, and and so then of course you're you're starting to compare because now suddenly like I feel a little bit more a part of things. And so but I think that being protected from that from a long time was helpful because by the time, you know, by the time I was in those waters, I already had a particular relationship with how I reacted to work that I saw as extraordinary.
00:24:48
Speaker
which was motivating. And so that, I think, was already so well established that it really couldn't be threatened. Yeah, that's a great way of putting it. But as you start to entrench yourself in with people who are more or less your peers, it starts to feel like their success and by extension your failures seem far more tangible.
00:25:14
Speaker
then when you're kind of alone and your naivete is shielding you from the brilliance around you, like when you're reading those first authors that really put a charge into you, you're like, oh wow, that's amazing. But then as, not even your friend, but just someone you know down the road is starting to gain some traction, you're like, what the hell are they doing? Why can't I do this? That's when it starts to get kind of ugly.
00:25:43
Speaker
Exactly. I feel like as a younger writer, I just more looked up to these people, almost like celebrities, and yeah, in that much more childlike way. And the fact that that continued, you know, for as long as it did probably also says something about my temperament, but I feel like, you know, yeah, I feel like at the end of the day it was protective.
00:26:08
Speaker
And so I'm not immune to comparing or getting or feeling envy any more than anyone else. But I think that I never feel that about the work. I might feel it like we all do. I think about an awards season or all that kind of stuff.
00:26:36
Speaker
you're waiting and you're waiting to hear and then all the announcements are coming out and you're not among the celebrating. But never about the work, never about what's on the page. For me, it's almost sacred. It just makes me want to do better.
00:26:58
Speaker
Yeah. Speaking of awards or stuff of that nature, like today, the MacArthur geniuses were or those grants were announced. And it got me thinking about, you know, it's like I'm stoked for everyone who did it. It's amazing. But what got me thinking about it was there are a lot of those awards that they pop up or grants that pop up and you're like, I didn't even know this was a thing you could apply for. And it really
00:27:28
Speaker
It kind of – I think that bothers me the most that there are these things out there. There are these pots of gold at the end of rainbows that a lot of people don't see. And so there are these opportunities that are going unnoticed by people who are probably very deserved.
00:27:46
Speaker
at least of applying if not outright getting them. And sometimes I'm like, oh my God, I didn't even know you could apply for that. And meanwhile, people are getting these nice grants that allow them to do the work. So I think that's where sometimes my frustrations turn when awards come out or people are very stoked about getting a kind of grant. That really pops to the forefront of my mind. And this is why I always mentor young writers to
00:28:14
Speaker
to get involved, to participate, so that they can benefit from the knowledge of those around them, even if they don't have, say, a dedicated mentor. Because exactly what you're saying, there are things that if you don't know, you don't know. And if no one's telling you and you don't have enough of a community around you, yeah, it's very,
00:28:44
Speaker
limiting, I think, and not, you know, that playing ground isn't level then. Yeah, yeah, I remember a few years ago, and I, you know, I write about horse racing sometimes, and there's these things called the Eclipse Awards, where our reward, there's a reward for like the best trainer, outstanding trainer, this, that, so for the actual horse racing, but then there are actually some media awards too.
00:29:11
Speaker
And if you don't know about them, you don't realize that it's – maybe you have an editor that knows you can submit it, but otherwise the writer needs to know that you have to submit your work. And I remember this one photographer, kind of an old guard guy. He might have even passed away.
00:29:28
Speaker
his entire career and he was like a brilliant photographer I don't know his name but as they were remembering him or whoever was writing about him remembering him he didn't even know that you had to submit your work to the Eclipse Awards he just thought like if you did the work and put it out there then people were like just picking it but he didn't realize that even he had to submit it for consideration so here he was probably going on like I'm doing all this great work and not getting recognition but he didn't even know that he had to submit it to get the recognition he so desired
00:29:58
Speaker
Wow. Wow. That just sucks. That just sucks. Yeah. It really does. And as creative people, we just kind of, we, as much as we want to just say that we're fueled by the work and that's ultimately where we have to try to on our darkest days, put our energy. We do want that. We do want them. We want a medal around our neck or a certificate to hang on our wall. It's just in our nature as creative people to seek that kind of validation.
00:30:26
Speaker
Absolutely. I think, you know, it tracks back to the story I told about my teachers in sixth grade. Art is an exchange. And so in the artistic life, you know, you have you for us, you have readers and that's great. But there's a there's a different level. You know, I guess the analogy there would be like my sixth grade friends could have read that work and loved it. And that would have been exciting to me. And I would have liked that.
00:30:56
Speaker
but it wouldn't have meant the same thing as those two sort of revered adults huddling, you know, talking about it, recognizing it. And I think that that's what you're pointing to is that we, you know, I think it goes deeper than ego. I don't think it's really about that. I think it's about the fact that you're in dialogue, you know, that art is a conversation and it's
00:31:23
Speaker
it really is an exchange and you're in dialogue with something larger than yourself. And so those moments of being seen in that way are really profound and because it's hard, you know, the work itself, yeah, it's true what you say, you can feel yourself that way, but it's also tiring and it's hard.
00:31:46
Speaker
Absolutely. And when you did your MFA and did the Tin House workshops, were you at that point hard at work at trying to put together what would ultimately become the part that burns? Yeah, it's a little bit complicated. I went into the MFA and that first Tin House workshop. The first Tin House workshop came before I started the MFA and then the second
00:32:14
Speaker
workshop came while I was in the MFA. But I wanted to write fiction. I put myself in the fiction track in my MFA because I had written so much nonfiction and creative nonfiction. And if I was going to invest that kind of time and money, I felt like two things. One, I wanted to learn something I really didn't know. And secondly, you know, I always had wanted to write fiction. And I tried, but I
00:32:44
Speaker
didn't feel like, you know, I didn't feel like it was any good. And so I was excited and I had a novel that I was working on at the time and it was a premise that I was excited about and the characters I was excited about. And the what what was I guess you could call what would have been the first chapter of that novel actually won second place in the narrative story contest a few years ago. It's called Family Family and I actually still really like that story.
00:33:14
Speaker
But when I got into the MFA program, I also made a commitment to myself. I told you that I said, if I do this, I'm going to come out of this with a book. I also told myself, I'm going to come out of this with some literary publications, like I'm going to come out of this program, you know, with some publications on my CV, because my aim was I wanted to come out and publish a book. And so I wanted to establish a track record.
00:33:42
Speaker
in the literary arena. And so while I was working on the fiction with my advisors, then on the side, so to speak, I was working on these essays that were about my childhood. And I was sending them out. And I was getting a lot of traction with them. They were getting published. They were winning some contests. So right in the middle of the program,
00:34:11
Speaker
I was in a workshop during, I did a low residency MFA at Vermont College of Fine Arts. And it was, you know, it was in the workshop in the two week summer residency. And there was a faculty person, his name is Richard McCann, and he passed away last year. Unexpectedly, it was very tragic. Brilliant writer, his, I think most recognized book is Mother of Sorrows. Just really brilliant man, brilliant writer.
00:34:40
Speaker
And we were talking in the workshop about why we write. One of the workshop leaders wanted to talk about, you know, why do you write? No, what do you want from a piece of writing? And Richard, he was very, very sophisticated, handsome, you know, it was stylish, really just hard to describe Richard, but extraordinary man. And Richard's sitting back in his chair and he says, I want
00:35:09
Speaker
to be devastated. And I thought, I want to work with you. But Richard, I knew that he would probably not be the right mentor for the novel I was writing, which had a child protagonist. And I had read his book, Mother of Sorrows, and I felt like my
00:35:34
Speaker
my nonfiction, my memoir material was in conversation. It was resonant with his work. And so, you know, I petitioned to work with him and did, and I just switched. I just kind of did a hard left right in the middle of the program and started working on, you know, what became the part that burns. And so I did come out of the program with a manuscript. It doesn't bear, it bears only kind of a tangential resemblance to what became the book. But, you know, I think that's typical, I think, as it should be.
00:36:03
Speaker
But I came out with the bones of what I needed.
00:36:07
Speaker
Well, you talk about this novel that you were writing about having a child protagonist and some of the, what I love about some of the voice of the part that burns are these chapters that are very much of a child protagonist.
Narrative Techniques in Memoir
00:36:25
Speaker
And I was wondering how you arrived at that in writing in a voice that is very sort of in the headspace of a very, very young Janine.
00:36:36
Speaker
Well, first of all, thank you. I'm really glad you said that because as I'm sitting here thinking about Richard, one of the things he said was that, and he loved the material in the part that burns. He was incredibly encouraging and supportive of that work, but the parts that he liked least were the part with the child narrator, which didn't surprise me. I sort of knew this about him.
00:37:03
Speaker
You know, and that's something I think that's important to note because a child narrator is a risk. And I think, you know, that that's just an unavoidable fact. But I was, you know, there was no doubt in my mind that that narrator was a part of the project. And in fact, she was really a necessary device to talk about some of the things, you know, some of the darker
00:37:34
Speaker
events in the story, I think work the way they do only because they're filtered through the very limited understanding of that young girl who can name what's happening but not really interpret it. And then we have, later in the book, the adult narrator can reflect on those experiences and see
00:38:04
Speaker
the distance between what her child self understood and what she comes to recognize as an adult. And I think that's important too. But I think that child narrator, she was the key for me in being able to get things on the page that I had just never succeeded in being able to write artfully before. Like I had written them before, but they weren't artful and they weren't beautiful. And they weren't anything that I ever
00:38:32
Speaker
sent out or tried to publish or felt proud of or was confident in. I knew that they weren't working, that they weren't, you know, that they weren't what I wanted them to be. And then I discovered her and that was the ticket. How did you discover her as the narrator and the key, as you said, that broke that open? I think she happened
00:39:01
Speaker
by accident when I was copying from Annie Dillard's An American Childhood. That's how I discovered that child narrator. I was in a memoir class at the University of Minnesota and had never, like I said, I've never had never at that point written successfully about my childhood. And the first assignment was write something about your childhood. And I went home and I gave myself
00:39:30
Speaker
this very restrictive writing constraint to copy word for word, part of speech for part of speech from something beautiful that I loved and randomly selected this chapter from Annie Dillard's in American Childhood that begins, The Boys Were Changing. And I rewrote that, it eventually became My Sister Was Changing.
00:39:59
Speaker
inadvertently put me into the mode of a child narrator because I guess because as I rolled with it, yeah, I guess it was really accidental. As I rolled with it, it just stayed in that it really stuck with the moment and it wasn't reflective. It wasn't written from the perspective of time past.
00:40:26
Speaker
It was pleading right to the moment of what was going on. And that time period, the narrator's about nine, 10 years old. And I got really excited because I could tell it was working. Yeah, it got really exciting at that point. So I kept her. And I kept her. I wrote a few more chapters with her kind of blazing the trail.
00:40:55
Speaker
And I don't think that she could have carried the whole book. I think it needed to cover the time period that it did. But I think, yeah, I think it was a pretty happy accident. I hadn't ever consciously sat down and said, I know. I'll do a child narrator. And if I had thought that, I probably would have been a little bit hesitant to try because I would have thought I didn't know how. Because I think it is very difficult.
00:41:22
Speaker
And I think I would have been intimidated. You know, I think of To Kill a Mockingbird and Scout. And, you know, like what Harper Lee did was it's incomparable. And Scout is such an interesting child narrator because she is a child narrator. And yet she, you know, she's telling us about the history of the town. You know, there's so much packed into into that narration that couldn't possibly be coming.
00:41:48
Speaker
from the perspective of a child scout's age, and yet Harper Lee pulls it off. So I think that was always intimidating to me. When I thought of child narrator, I thought of scout. And I just said, I can't do that. So yeah, I think if I had entered it intentionally, consciously with the aim of creating a child narrator, I would have felt pretty intimidated and ill-equipped. But because I stumbled on her accidentally, I followed the trail.
00:42:17
Speaker
Earlier when you were talking about Dorothy Allison's work, how she took this horrific experience and was able to spin it into something beautiful, obviously to anyone who reads the part that burns knows that you pull that off also. So how did you take this terrible experience, terrible trauma from your childhood
00:42:44
Speaker
And yeah, and spin it into something that is artful. And even though the events are horrible, it is still, at least for me, a joy to read. And in the words of your mentor there, it is devastating, but it always brought me, I couldn't wait to get back to your book every time I had to sit it down. So how did you process that and accomplish that? Well, first of all,
00:43:13
Speaker
Just thank you. That really means a lot to hear. Yeah, so thank you for saying that. And I feel like a couple of things. First of all, a lot of people don't want to read anything in which a child is harmed. And I know this. I hear it repeatedly. I hear it.
00:43:43
Speaker
from friends, I used to be in a book group and I recommended Justin Torres' We the Animals, which is, oh, have you read it? It's gorgeous. If you enjoyed my book, I think you would love, love his book. Beautiful, really short too. It's like the kind of thing you have to read it and then like kind of immediately read it again. But when I recommended it to my book group, you know, like I was kind of the only one who,
00:44:12
Speaker
who liked it because people found it so difficult to read about, you know, a child suffering. One of the people in my book group, that book group of sons kind of falling apart, but said, I, it's really difficult for me to read about a child, you know, families, you know, where children aren't, you know, tucked into bed for the night. And I thought, Oh boy, you know, you are not going to want to read my book. So,
00:44:42
Speaker
So I think, you know, understanding that, but still, so knowing that, but really this was, this was my book to write. This was, this was the book that I had to write. And I know that I'm not alone in that as a writer, you know, there's, there's, there's that one book that you have to write and this was it. And I had to get this book out of me, like no matter what happened with it. And so, yes. So my aim was like, could I at least, you know, make it,
00:45:12
Speaker
even though I wanted it to be devastating, could it also be beautiful? And I think that what I sought to do and, you know, hopefully it was, it was at least in part successful was to drill down into language. And that's where I find, you know, like that's where I find the, the joy in the process. That's where I find the,
00:45:41
Speaker
the energy like if I can get really close up to the words and and hear the sound of the words and hear like the music of the sentence and I'm not I'm not a poet I have no training in poetry but I read a lot of poetry and I have the highest respect for poets I think they
00:46:03
Speaker
They know what's going on. They're plugged into the great frequency. They are. Yeah, you said it. And Mary Carr, she came later for me, but another major inspiration. You see that in her work. You see her training and her experience as a poet in her memoir writing. And I wanted that level of
00:46:32
Speaker
effort anyway to go into the language level of the story. I didn't want to just tell what happened. I wanted to really fashion something out of it. And, and I also really wanted to do it in a way that, you know, that could well, while it could be devastating, it didn't have to repulse or offend. And so my
00:47:02
Speaker
My hope and my strategy toward that end was that if I could let really precise and specific images do most of the heavy lifting, I could impart what needed to be imparted. So there could be no misunderstanding, but do it in a way that lands a little differently, maybe a little less violently, but yeah, but leaves no room for misinterpretation.
00:47:32
Speaker
In the end, you always have to have this notion of there is going to be a reader at the end. I can't just spill everything out and hope that they're okay. Like you said, you drill down into the language, fashioned it in such a way. So how did you, I guess, not get lost in that end game where it ultimately has to be, it has to land on a reader's ear and not just be self-indulgent? That's a really good question.
00:48:02
Speaker
Yeah, I think, you know, E.B. White said, never use a fancy word when a plain one will do. And I hope I'm getting that right. But I try very hard to live by that. And so when I think of poetic language or precise imagery, I
00:48:27
Speaker
What I think about is like, what is the truest thing that I can say here right now that's going to convey the emotional truth of the situation? So it's not, so the, yeah, it is a language issue, but it's not necessarily like doing gymnastics with the language. To me it's about the patience
00:48:57
Speaker
of sitting with the image for as long as it takes and swapping it out as many times as it takes to get to the one that's just right. That's what I mean. And I know what you're asking, that question, I teach writing, you know, and that notion of, you know, can you just say the thing itself?
00:49:21
Speaker
you know, can you just say it? I think that's really important. And so that too was on my mind, but how can I just say it? If possible, can I say it with an image? And if not, then can I get in and out really quick, you know? And there are some, you know, there's some moments in the book that I think, you know, could not be,
00:49:46
Speaker
Um, could that be handled any other way than just say the thing itself, you know, like what my stepfather did, you know, it just, it just had to be said. And then, you know, we're off, you know, or I know there's a particularly, um, you know, it's just a really unfortunate and graphic scene where my mother who, you know, was
00:50:17
Speaker
mentally unstable in the scene where she loses her temper and when my sister and I ordered the pizza and my mom starts throwing things and really was out for blood in that moment. And there wasn't really any other way to write that than to say it. But I felt and still do like it really was a crucial scene
00:50:44
Speaker
to have in the book, even though it was really hard to write. And I tried to use a technique where I zoomed out because I think that one of the things that helped with this book and this narrator is that that's how dissociation works. You know, when you're in trauma and you're leaving your body, your attention is actually on
00:51:10
Speaker
what's the periphery. And that was such a survival skill for me growing up. I used to actually recite the Star Spangled Banner in my mind, you know, when things, really terrible, violent things might be happening in the moment. And I would just be running those lyrics through my mind over and over again. And so that was actually really helpful in the writing was to
00:51:36
Speaker
because it was authentic, it was honest. I could kind of take the camera and direct it away from the violence of whatever was happening in the moment and then bring it back, but then redirect it outward again.
00:51:55
Speaker
when I was talking a long time ago with Andre Dubuis III when he was, it was about his memoir, Townie, and I guess when he was writing it, he had a hard, he was struggling with what to tell, what not to tell, and he's able to call up his friend Richard Russo and talk to him, be like, I don't know how to handle this, and I guess Russo said, well, do you have a bone to pick?
Memoir's Truth Over Revenge
00:52:19
Speaker
He's like, no, I don't have a bone to pick.
00:52:20
Speaker
He's like, well, then you can then write it, but you shouldn't write a memoir if you have a bone to pick. And I think you could have easily have many bones to pick, but you wrote it in such a way that it doesn't come across like that. So how did you arrive at that in telling the story that it wasn't Jeanine out for revenge? This is Jeanine, the writer, just telling her truth in her story.
00:52:48
Speaker
I love that anecdote. That's so great. It's such a great rubric to apply when you're figuring out what to put in and what to leave out. At least it's one very helpful lens to apply. I knew that my mom was going to read this book. Well, actually, I don't know if she's read it, but she definitely knows all about it.
00:53:18
Speaker
that my dad probably would and absolutely that my ex-husband would. And so I felt like, you know, one of the things that I've always read and been told and heard and I think we all have over time is you have to treat yourself with the same level of scrutiny, you know, that you would any other character.
00:53:47
Speaker
in the book or in your life and be more generous to the other characters. And I tried really hard to do that. I think that the narrator is imperfect because I was imperfect. And I really sought to make sure that that came through.
00:54:14
Speaker
Yeah, and to be generous wherever I could, to be as generous as I possibly could without obscuring the central truth of what happened, or the central truth of the story. That was what was important to me, but generosity really mattered. And I was really anxious. I was really erect.
00:54:42
Speaker
before the book came out. I didn't think I would be because I had published, you know, several, you know, previous versions of chapters. But it's really different when it's a book. And so I, yeah, I had, I just asked my publisher, I had a lot of anxiety. And, you know, I made last minute changes. I changed names at the last minute.
00:55:10
Speaker
of minor characters, you know, who probably will never read the book. But I, you know, I was just sort of in an irrational panic. And, you know, I'm glad, though, that I that I took those extra steps to be as careful as I could, because because at the end of the day, you know, my mom has been actually really gracious about it. She has, you know, when when the book first came out,
00:55:41
Speaker
or it was about to come out. I posted something on Facebook and I had like a PR mentor who was helping me because, you know, split lip is a really small press. So I was responsible for all of my launch stuff. And I put something on Facebook and my mentor messaged me and she said, you need to make that post public, you know, it's not shareable. And I said, well, but then my mom might see it, you know, because I had my mom like unlimited so that,
00:56:09
Speaker
if I just posted something to friends, then it would be friends accept. And she was in the accept category. Yeah. And, and it was a real conundrum, Brendan. I was like, what do I do? What do I do? You know, um, and so every time I would post something, you know, this, this mentor who's wonderful, by the way, would you need to make that post public, you know, it's not doing any good. And so finally, I just thought, okay, whatever. I'm the, she's gonna, she knows about the book. It's, I, it's not a secret. I'm just gonna,
00:56:40
Speaker
do the right thing by the book and make these posts public. And as soon as I did, the very first one I made public, my mom shared and was like, I don't know, I think she said something celebratory or something about it. And so I immediately emailed her and said, mom, you should know what the book is about. And I just said, I just hope this doesn't lead to another
00:57:09
Speaker
It doesn't need to lead to renewed conflict. These things happened. They happened a long time ago. And these are like former versions of ourselves. But this, this is, you know, the reality is that this is, you know, that these things shaped my life. And this book was my way of transforming those things. And I hope that you can just I hope we can just be at peace about that.
00:57:35
Speaker
And, um, she didn't answer the email. I didn't get a reply. So I thought, okay, I don't know what's going to happen. Um, but, but she continued to share and, um, you know, comment on and heart, you know, social media posts. So, so at the end of the day, whether she read the book or not, I, you know, I hope to think that, you know,
00:58:01
Speaker
The effort that I took, I absolutely did not want to make a villain out of anyone. And anyway, it's not true. No one is one dimensional.
00:58:14
Speaker
I love hearing you talk about how you're a wreck about putting this when the book is starting to come out and you're dealing with that anxiety that this thing is going to go out into the world for consumption of people that you know and also people you don't know who are going to cast their own judgments based on
00:58:34
Speaker
based on what you've written with this source material for them. We don't often hear people going through that degree or being as frank about that anxiety.
00:58:49
Speaker
This is my weird sort of convoluted way of saying that. I'm just glad to hear you talk about how it was, you know, very anxiety-laden there. You're like, oh, shoot, I've been working on this thing for a while, and it was a great idea in theory that I wanted to have this book published, but now it's gonna be published, and I'm like, oh, shit, now what? Oh, in theory is exactly the right way to say it. You know, my husband has a...
00:59:19
Speaker
is from Wisconsin and his family is pretty conservative. And I like his, his aunt and his great aunt and his cousins and all of a sudden, you know, are all
00:59:31
Speaker
saying, posted on Facebook, you know, I just ordered it. And I was like, No, no, don't order it. You know, you know, my the panic was real, like, I lost some real sleep around that time, you know, and I, and I said to my husband, you need to talk to your sister, you need to tell her what's in this book, and you need to tell her, you know, that it's tender. And, you know, basically, put out the, the
00:59:57
Speaker
the word, like, be nice, everybody, you know. And I think that, you know, one thing that I haven't talked about a lot, but that I think is important to mention is that, I guess Gina Frangelo and I talked about this a little bit in an event that we did together recently.
Vulnerability and External Validation in Writing
01:00:16
Speaker
And that is that, you know, there is a way in which outing yourself as a
01:00:27
Speaker
childhood sexual abuse survivor is a really vulnerable thing to do. And I had not really thoroughly considered that. And again, because I had published some of this material and I just felt pretty insulated and all of the people who I'm really close to in life know the basics of my history. And this seems to be a
01:00:54
Speaker
recurring theme in my life where I, you know, and it happens in the book, the narrator is like, oh, you know, I think I'm all good, you know, and then you get to the next milestone and you discover that, you know, it's not quite, everything isn't quite as resolved as you thought. And I had very much that kind of moment. And I think that, you know, there's a scene in the book where the narrator is like 13, 14 years old in, yeah, in middle school, and that's where
01:01:22
Speaker
you know, that in health class, there was that film strip about good touch and bad touch, you know, and that was like the moment of awakening to think, Oh, wait a minute, you know, like, my stepfather's behavior was not okay. But when she tells, you know, her mother, who tells her father about this, and it's later comes out that everybody already knew anyway, but at the time, you know, it
01:01:51
Speaker
was supposedly a revelation. And the stepmother, for me, both in the lived experience and in the book, the most devastating moment is when my stepmother reacts to that by disallowing me to be alone with my younger sister. And that moment
01:02:18
Speaker
you know, like I really feel like to be to to to reveal something like what I revealed and have the response be to be treated like somebody who's dangerous was so profoundly destructive that I think that it absolutely resurfaced, you know, when this book was about to go out in the world, that feeling of like,
01:02:46
Speaker
that bodily memory of, oh, what happened last time I told about this? Yeah, so yeah, lots of anxiety around the book coming into the world. And then it kind of like, once it was out there, you know, it gradually became clear like, okay, okay, I think it's gonna be okay. You know, like, I think I'm gonna live through this. I think I'm gonna survive it. But certainly in a situation like this with a book as,
01:03:15
Speaker
sensitive as this one is. I think that tracks us back to, you know, one of your early comments in our conversation about the external validation that we receive for our art and why it matters. And I think, you know, that for me, some of the early reviews, you know, particularly The Kirkus Star, because I just, I thought,
01:03:41
Speaker
that I really actually thought it was a mistake. I didn't, I thought that what they, I don't think that can be true. I don't, I don't think that that, you know, I've really actually, even though the email had my name on it and you know, the name of my book, I still somehow thought, no, you, this is a slipped through. It can't be because it's, it's through the indie, you know, department. So that, I think they just actually made a mistake. So that kind of validation, I think, you know, there's, there's a lot of reasons why,
01:04:12
Speaker
when we make our, we're vulnerable and the validation goes a really long way. Absolutely. Yeah, but totally puts it. This is often a profession or a vocation where the refueling stations can be very far away and you'll be puttering along and then you see a gas station. It's like a hundred miles off like, shit, can I get there?
01:04:37
Speaker
And then, and then sure enough, sometimes you get to that fuel station and you get that validation and puts just enough in your tank so you can get to the next mile marker somewhere off in an indefinite future. That is exactly the way it feels. Now Janine, I don't know, I forgot to prime the pump a while ago or maybe I did. I had sent you an email about a little before our conversation. I don't know if you saw it.
01:05:04
Speaker
But I always like to ask writers for a recommendation of sorts as we sort of bring these conversations to a close. And if it catches you a little flat-footed, I'm sorry. But I always like to extend that, just a recommendation of any kind. It could be a new album from Taylor Swift or a new pair of socks or the book you can't stop talking about. So I'd extend that to you if you have anything you'd like to recommend to the listeners out there.
01:05:31
Speaker
Yeah, I do actually have something. I am I'm reading a real page turner right now. I have to admit it is called Once There Were Wolves. It's by Charlotte McConaughey. I think I'm saying her name correctly. She also wrote a book called Migrations. And OK, so I'm just going to give a tiny bit of context. How I ended up reading this book is that I teach to the Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop and the women
01:05:59
Speaker
at Shakopee Prison, who are my students right now, requested a class on writing about animals. And that's not my wheelhouse. I don't really know anything about it. But actually, the novel I'm working on right now, that's part of the premise. So I thought, this is perfect. And in putting feelers out for readings and things I should be thinking about and looking at for prepping and teaching this class, this book came across the transom.
01:06:29
Speaker
Fabulous, I would call it like upmarket, you know, I don't know if you remember the book like water for elephants But it's one of these kind of you know, ambitious novels that that where there's a lot of things happening but her meticulous Observation of the natural world and of animals is So incredible. Yeah, even though it's kind of like a murder mystery page turner and I think
01:06:59
Speaker
that it has a lot to offer in terms of, you know, I, I said, Oh, you know, I really wanted to drill down into the language and I really, you know, wanted to put the, the focus on the sound of the words in the music. And, and I, I'm not backtracking from that, that that's real. And, you know, I stand by that, but there's also the idea of like, how do you tell a really fucking good story? And, uh,
01:07:29
Speaker
you know, she's doing it. And so, yeah, that's my recommendation once there were wolves. Awesome. Fantastic. Well, what a pleasure to get to speak to you on the mics here, Janine. And so thank you so much for carving out the time to do this and for the work that you've been doing and the work that will no doubt be forthcoming down the pipeline, which I know I for one can't wait to read. So thank you again and have a wonderful rest of your day.
01:07:57
Speaker
Brendan, thanks so much for having me. It was such a pleasure. I've been looking forward to this, you know, ever since Hippocampus. So thank you. And I love your show. Oh, I like that. Oh, I especially enjoyed that one. That's from kind of a hat tip to the offspring smash with that voiceover guy that comes over like
01:08:27
Speaker
Ah, it's time to relax, and you know what that means. Anyway, that was great, right? Had a swell time with that one. Hope you did too. Anyway, thank you for listening, CNFers. Means the world.
01:08:40
Speaker
when you're a middling writer and podcaster like me, and I suspect there's a chunklet of you out there. You know that we live and die by reviews, so I always read new ones on the podcast, so if you have a few moments, heck, wobble water's boiling. Leave a review on Apple Podcasts, and uh...
01:08:58
Speaker
It'll help with the way we're seeing effort. You can also head over to brenthedomare.com for show notes and to sign up for my up to 11 newsletter. 11 cool things from my brain to your inbox. Fuck the algorithm, man. Been doing it for about a decade. I put in a link for an exclusive happy hour too. Just had a nice time with Andrew, Lori, and Betsy. And we had a nice little happy hour where we had a nice chat about
01:09:27
Speaker
what we're working on, how we're getting through the grind, reading, stuff like that. It's good times. It's really nice. It's nice to see some back and forth. I kind of mediate the thing, but it was kind of nice to see engagement between the other people that were there. That was great, because that's the idea. It's just like, okay, this is our bar, and we're just going to hang out for 40 minutes, because that's what my Zoom account allows. Good times. Keep the conversation going on Instagram at creative.
01:09:55
Speaker
Geez, I am sorry. I am not on top of my game at Creative Nonfiction Podcast. That's Instagram. Twitter's at cnfpod and at Brendan O'Mara. Whoopie!
01:10:10
Speaker
Also, thanks to West Virginia Wesleyan Colleges, MFA in Creative Writing for the support, and go take a look at Casualty of Words, a writing podcast for people in a hurry. Like I said, at the very end of the show, you'll get a nice little taste of that. Subscribe wherever you podcast.
01:10:26
Speaker
So I said I would share some savage Hippocam feedback. This from a gaggle of soft-spoken memoir writers by and large. So here's one. Not always clear and he did not seem to be tuning into the audience, grabbing our attention, but more lost in his thoughts, not an engaging teacher. If the speaker presented another time, I would be hoping for a new topic.
01:10:55
Speaker
I really didn't get this one. Not what I was expecting. My score was also well below average compared to other speakers, which was a kick and yield nuts. I put so much into this talking. Like I said, you can download the Talking to Feed, and it's basically what I say word for word. Maybe a little more polished because I got to read from a script for the actual podcast production of it instead of going more off the
01:11:24
Speaker
off the cuff or going from loose notes. In any case, I know we're connected with some people. I'm only sharing the negative comments because that's what we do. We can get 10 amazing five-star reviews from strangers, not even people that we know that would otherwise feel guilty if they didn't give you a five-star review. But strangers,
01:11:50
Speaker
and give you 10 great reviews, then we zero in on that jerk with the one-star review who didn't get the joke. I was trying my best to summon my inner Seth Godin, who famously says, the best reply to bad reviews, if you're gonna review them or read them at all, is this. You just go, that's okay, it's not for you.
01:12:10
Speaker
Hurts like hell because I rehearsed and rehearsed and rehearsed with such attention to how it would actually serve the audience and land on their ear. But to be fair to me in the end, they did connect with more people than it didn't. There were 10 people who submitted the survey and there might have been 20 in the room. It was pretty sparsely attended, but so half the room.
01:12:36
Speaker
But 10 people took the time, 70% of the time it was good, so a good solid C. They dug it. Not an engaging teacher. Fuck. Anywho, you have a good time? This show is partly made possible by the incredible cohort of members at Patreon.com. Building up the Patreon coffers, grants, you access the transcripts in the audio magazine, coaching if you need that.
01:13:01
Speaker
helps pay for the podcast coaching, which is, I'm telling you, this is a mess. I am real sorry for those who are still listening. I am sorry. Podcast hosting several hundred dollars a year to make sure the backlog doesn't get deleted as always there for you to comb through dollars going through the pockets of writers too, for the audio magazine, which is always nice. Uh, visit patreon.com slash CNF pod and shop around and help support the community.
01:13:27
Speaker
Is that it? If you can't already tell, I feel like garbage. I can't talk. I sound like shit. There's likely a reason for that, but I'll wait until next week to riff on that. So stay tuned for a little of what volume four of casualty of words has to offer. And if you can do interview, see ya.
01:13:59
Speaker
Welcome to another Casualty of Words, a writing podcast for people in a hurry. Pardon the break that I was recently on, but here we are. Try to finish up this week and get back to it next week.
01:14:13
Speaker
On the Mother podcast, the creative non-fiction podcast, the show where I talk to people about the art and craft of telling true stories, I recently had on a very prominent guest. This happens from time to time. I call them headliners as they tend to bring in new people to the fold if they come to play ball, promotional ball that is. This guest has status relative to them. I don't.
01:14:37
Speaker
So when it came time to partake in promoting the show, they have not retweeted or otherwise shared their time on the show with their myriad followers, people who would no doubt love to hear from them. Normally I wouldn't care, but it's when I see guests of this nature and it happens all the time with big name guests all the time.
01:15:00
Speaker
They share other interviews they do with people, much more prominent people on social media and elsewhere. I see the status ballet in action.
01:15:11
Speaker
Sharing their interview with, let's say, Terry Gross increases their status. Sharing their interview with me brings their status down and would elevate mine. It's my insecurity and speculation that these guests are very much aware of the status imbalance and don't want to share a slice of their pie with me. Seth Godin has an entire podcast about this, episode two of his akimbo podcast, and he has written extensively about it in his book, This is Marketing.
01:15:41
Speaker
The question becomes, how do we attain enough status on our own that it makes the other person or the people we seek to serve or the guest feel like they get a gravity assist from you and not the other way around? How can we piggyback on their status without them feeling taken advantage of?
01:16:01
Speaker
Listen, I don't have the answers to this at all, but it has everything to do with status rolls and who's up and who's down. Thanks for listening and we'll catch you next time.