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Episode 453: Chandlor Henderson, Live at Gratitude Brewing, Says ‘Focus on the Skill’
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Chandlor Henderson is the very definition of a multi-hypenate: a writer, editor, comic book writer, filmmaker, and podcaster.
This conversation was recorded live at Gratitude Brewing as part of a quarterly series between the Oregon Writers Colony and The Creative Nonfiction Podcast. In this conversation we talk about his journey to Oregon from the East Coast, to focus on skills, and how graphic novels are a great vector for storytelling.
Promotional Sponsor: The Power of Narrative Conference. Use CNF15 at checkout for a 15% discount.
Newsletter: Rage Against the Algorithm
Show notes: brendanomeara.com
Support: Patreon.com/cnfpod
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Transcript
Pre-orders and Promotions
00:00:00
Speaker
Oh, AC and Effers, the frontrunner, the life of Steve Prefontaine, I know. is available for pre-order. i say that because I say it as if I'm bored of saying it because I say it at the top of every show, but then I realize not everyone listens to every single show, so I should bring the energy.
00:00:20
Speaker
I should should approach it like this is the first time you've ever heard me say it. The Front Runner, The Life of Steve Prefontaine, is available for pre-order. I've gotten some nice notes from people who beat the shit out of that link like it owed them money.
00:00:32
Speaker
You can visit the bookseller of your choice and plunk down $32.99. Everything helps. Every author you know under the sun begs for pre-orders, and you only have so many dollars at your disposal, so I'll just say consider it.
00:00:49
Speaker
Hey, and promotional support for the podcast is brought to you by The Power of Narrative Conference. Hold on. The Power of Narrative Conference. That's better. Celebrating his 26th year on the last weekend of March. It's like a month away. Shoot.
00:01:02
Speaker
March 28th, March 29th. Hundreds of journalists from around the world are descending on Beantown, Boston. Keynote speakers include Susan Orlean, Connie Schultz, Dan Zak, Connie Chung.
00:01:15
Speaker
Yeah, listeners to this podcast can get 15% off your enrollment fee. I don't get kickbacks. CNF15 is the code. Visit combeyond.bu.edu and use that CNF15 code.
00:01:30
Speaker
That's some serious burrito money or book money for you, the literati out there. You don't focus on the speed, you focus on the skill, and eventually you're just going to get faster.
Live Event Introduction
00:01:46
Speaker
Oh, hey, CNF. This is the Creative Non-Scription Podcast, show where speak to tellers of true tales about the true tales they tell. I'm the goose you accidentally fed, and now he won't leave you alone, Brendan Amara. This was the first CNF Pod live event recorded at Gratitude Brewing in Eugene, Oregon.
00:02:04
Speaker
This was a landmark moment for the show. And a step forward in the master plan for what my pal Ruby McConnell and I plan on doing to the literary scene in Eugene with the power of the podcast.
00:02:21
Speaker
I can't even say that with a straight face. Our aim is to turn Eugene into the same kind of draw Portland is. I can't say that with a straight face. So we kick this quarterly series off with Chandler Henderson, a writer, journalist, editor, comic book writer, filmmaker, podcaster.
00:02:38
Speaker
And I bet he bakes like a really good batch of chocolate chip cookies, too, because you know what? Because I bet he can. There are some people who can do it all, damn it. And Chandler seems to be that kind of
Chandler Henderson's Background
00:02:47
Speaker
dude. He's originally from Centerville, Virginia, just outside Washington, D.C.,
00:02:53
Speaker
He was a bit of a nomad. He would get on buses and head to a city of his choice and just kind of travel about. He eventually settled in Eugene a few years ago where he met his wife and now he has three dogs, a cat, a tortoise, some fish tanks.
00:03:08
Speaker
He edits The Torch, which is the student newspaper for Lane Community College, and he's currently a student at the University of Oregon. His work has appeared in Eugene Weekly, Business Insider, and Flux Magazine, among others.
00:03:20
Speaker
He's got his irons in a lot of fires. He has many irons and many fires. Show notes through this episode more at brendanomero.com. Hey, there. You can follow my anti-social media feed, blog posts, sign up for the monthly Rage Against the Algorithm newsletter, offer a monthly happy hour to newsletter subscribers, but when attendance is one or none, hey, Lori, thanks for showing up,
00:03:45
Speaker
I begin to think that maybe it's not worth my time and clearly it's not worth it for many others, though we do have some regulars who popped in, but it has it has been a while. If nobody shows up to the party, do you keep sending out invites?
00:03:57
Speaker
It might be time to sunset it or move it to Patreon. Got a nice review here. The first one, like a million years. This from Courtney in LA. I hope your life wasn't too upended by wildfires. But then again, this could be Courtney in Louisiana or Los Alamos.
00:04:12
Speaker
I don't know. Great episode. Five stars. Just listened to your discussion with Issa Adney and thought it was fantastic. You asked her a lot of good questions. Thank you.
00:04:24
Speaker
And the challenges of being creative person with dreams or goals per your discussion. And she had such thoughtful answers. She did. I felt so grounded after listening to the conversation. Loved it.
00:04:35
Speaker
And I love that review, Courtney in L.A. Thank you so much. Okay, getting back to Chandler now.
Creative Leaps and Research Process
00:04:43
Speaker
Be sure to visit theblackamericanspring.com to learn more about Chandler and to follow his various platforms.
00:04:48
Speaker
He's all over the place. So, yes, this was recorded before a live audience at Gratitude Brewing. I will share more about our second live event, which is coming in April. But in the meantime, please enjoy this conversation with the incomparable Chandler Henderson Riff.
00:05:23
Speaker
This being the first live event that I've ever recorded and knowing that there's going to be tons of wrinkles to be ironed, it does it does is no good to wait and wait to leap. Sometimes you got to jump before you're ready.
00:05:37
Speaker
And I wonder for you Chandler, just ah in the course of your creative life, but when when have you had to jump before you were ready? In general, my life's philosophy, so let me just say, you know, before I moved to Oregon, I moved to Oregon when I was 30, and I spent 20 years working in restaurants, um and really every every part of the restaurant, server, bartender, manager, cook, chef, dishwasher, you know, and so in that industry, you have to kind of just do the thing, whatever the thing is,
00:06:12
Speaker
um And I think when I moved to Oregon and returned to school um after I got married, I kind of just, that's how I approached things with the same kind of like ah attack mode as I did.
00:06:28
Speaker
in kitchens. um So, you know, when I'm ah given an opportunity to do some kind of research or, you know, a podcast or, you know, if I'm asked to, you know, lecture to a class about my research or something, I just kind of just,
00:06:43
Speaker
i Just do it. You know, I look at like what is the what is the things that need to be done and kind of look at like what my mentors have done in relation to that thing how they prepare and I just do it, you know, and um I found if you're giving Deep thought and and attention to the thing that you're doing it tends to work out that could I could be a little bit of luck, you know sure ah or like potentially interest, you know, because You know in in media like if you have An interesting topic that tends to help, you know, if there's a little bit of wrinkles and you have an interesting topic, people might not notice the wrinkles as much.
00:07:19
Speaker
Right. So that's, you know, I don't know if that answered the question, but I kind of just, I just prepare the best that I can. and then I just do the thing. If you wait until you are ready, you might never start.
00:07:29
Speaker
And the thing is, it's oftentimes, even in when it comes to writing, you got to write before you're ready. because it's only through the unfolding of that process where maybe the potholes in the road start to expose themselves, but they you wouldn't know they existed until you started until you encroached on them.
00:07:46
Speaker
So I love this idea of he's just you just, know, you just kind of got to flub your way through it. And I think there's a lot of wisdom there. I mean, absolutely. Like the research um that I'm doing, 400-year nightmare, when i I started doing the research before I even returned to school, and I never had thought about it ever being considered academic because that's just not what I thought about. I was like, I'm doing family research.
00:08:08
Speaker
That's it. You know, it's it's for my kids. You know, when I started looking at it academically and, and you know, writing a manuscript and turning in documents and And, you know, creating the graphic novel with the research, it kind of started unfolding and becoming a much larger story than than i had expected. and you know, I had never even done research before, so I even like, it's like looking at drafts from, you know, I've always written, so looking at stuff I wrote five years ago versus now, the research has kind of taken the same kind of growth
00:08:39
Speaker
So the the way that I approach my research now is much more um detailed and organized than it would have been five years ago. So yeah, like you know when I first started it, I had no idea what I was doing. I was just like, let me just try to figure out as much as I can.
00:08:55
Speaker
But now it's it's it's becoming very organized and you know I'm able to share it. Have you gotten lost in the research to the extent that it's easy to sometimes productively procrastinate in the research? like At what point do you feel like you need to take that take that leap and actually start getting work done instead of getting lost in an archive in rabbit holes, which is a fun place to get lost?
Graphic Novels and Storytelling
00:09:18
Speaker
I think that has been really this year. um Twice over the last two summers, I've gotten funding from University of Oregon to do this research. You have to create a five-minute video of your research in the fall. So after I created that video for Cure, um i kind of took a step back and ah started looking at all the different writings. I had all the manuscripts, all the notes, photos, videos, and organizing that. um So that's kind of been, for me, the moment where I started looking at it.
00:09:45
Speaker
Like okay like you have all this research. This is good, but you really need to like create the the book You know you need to create the book so that it can become You know whatever take on whatever life. It's going to take on Yeah, what what mode of storytelling most appeals to you?
00:10:02
Speaker
um For me, it's comic books or graphic novels um for this ah particular topic because I think You know, um when you're writing something that can be tough, um especially like, you know, the Reconstruction period and the Civil Rights era, you know, a lot of people have a hard time with that content, um especially young people or people that just don't want to believe it.
00:10:26
Speaker
And so I find a graphic novel or any really any any type of um ah artistic ah way of sharing your information allows it to go further.
00:10:37
Speaker
i find this also a good entry point for for young people. A lot of this history, mean, a lot of history in general of all types of people isn't really taught in schools. You know, it's like history is told from the side of the victor, but it's never told...
00:10:52
Speaker
There's so many people that stories aren't told you know there's you know a person who You know lived and died in the the early 1900s late 1800s You know there might never even be a photo of them by doing this research and learning about them and creating graphic novel you not only you telling their story, but you're literally bringing their Their representation to life for people that have been wondering about them Yeah, and and to your point about finding other other avenues to learn about history, ah certainly history of the oppressed, you know when I spoke with Roxanne Dunbar Ortiz like in the introduction to ah and indigenous people's history of the United States,
00:11:30
Speaker
She knew that a lot of her reading and her research had to come from outside the academy. And, you know, in what way have you has some of the most robust learning and the the best lessons that you've learned come from outside the academy and not necessarily what was maybe in a textbook from when you're in junior high or high school?
00:11:46
Speaker
Oh, man. So I'm lucky that my mother's family and my father's family both have long histories the United States. And, you know, I'm able to go into onto the properties that, you know, my families have been living in since eighteen hundreds you know. um the in in florida there's a church that was built in the early eighteen hundreds and there's a graveyard where there's five generations of my family um you know current there's still people that are still using this graveyard and there you know there's houses all around it um you know there's the house of you know my great great uncle and you know my grandfather was born on this property and you know there's a
00:12:27
Speaker
Just hundreds of years of history and everybody's still there. So lot of this stuff I didn't really know when I was younger, think because my grandfather's 95. He comes from a generation of... This is a grown folks business, right? I'm not going to get all the information from him. it's still hard for me to get information from him. But as he gets older and he knows and sees what I'm doing, talks more. And bring my recorder. So just hearing stories that had never...
00:12:50
Speaker
you know um so i'm just hearing stories that like you know i never I'd never heard like, you know, I think my family, you know, they were bootleggers and I never knew that. You know, he's telling me stories about all the stuff that his his father, my great grandfather was doing to to survive and make money during those times and the interactions that they had with a the the the white community. Right. So obviously back in those days.
00:13:17
Speaker
Really, I mean, Florida, where my family is, is still segregated, right? so But these communities, they have to interact. and i And I feel like, you know, when you think about Florida, Georgia, Alabama, which is where they are right in the panhandle, you kind of assume, based upon the news that, like, these communities don't interact at all.
00:13:36
Speaker
But that's not true. Like they've they've been living there next to each other for hundreds of years. Right. And so, you know, he's telling stories about how, you know, my family would interact with, you know, the police or with the mayors and the judges. And you would assume that based upon the history that those those ah those forces were kind of like coming down on my family. But they weren't. They worked together.
00:14:00
Speaker
almost against some of the the more larger federal forces that could have been coming against a bootlegger. So it's like really interesting to kind of hear these stories and and and see the properties and kind of understand maybe why people act the way that they act, which is ultimately kind of the whole point, right? it For me, it's like looking at the reconstruction and looking at what people did to survive financially,
00:14:25
Speaker
and then looking at these communities currently to see how the communities function current today may influenced by what people were doing during the reconstruction period.
00:14:37
Speaker
And as someone who really loves the graphic novel and and that visual interpretation as a vector for storytelling, how are you starting to storyboard it in your head?
Research and Storyboarding
00:14:49
Speaker
What I've been doing is I had all these different notes and drawings. And, you know, I have, I'll obviously we draw out the storyboard, which is um the one that's, that is public. But lately I've really been using spreadsheets, taking all of the writings and documents and photos and images and whatever and putting them in a spreadsheet and organizing them by date and city and person.
00:15:10
Speaker
And through that process, I'm able to kind of look at what I have in one place and and then um kind of start storyboarding from there. Are you familiar with Watchmen?
00:15:22
Speaker
Yeah. yes So that comic book, the way that it it at it was written from a storyboard is, you know, each panel they would write like, just write literally, this is what I want in this panel.
00:15:33
Speaker
And if you do that, then you can go back in and start drawing what it is that you want. But each panel in Watchmen could be could be representing something else in in ah in time.
00:15:45
Speaker
So that's kind of how I'm doing it right now. And what would you identify as you know our particular strength that you have that you really lean on, and be it your research, your writing, just your storytelling in general, and ah and maybe in a ah weakness that you feel like you need to level up to your strengths?
00:16:01
Speaker
I have no weaknesses. I'm just kidding. I think... I think a strength that I have is, you know, I'm not really afraid, right? Like I think a lot of people are afraid of rejection or of somebody calling them stupid or whatever, but I'm not really, i have no fear of the idea of somebody not liking what I'm doing. Like I, if you don't like it, I'm just unfortunate because I feel like the work I do is good.
00:16:28
Speaker
I'm 42, which is young, but I had an interesting educational journey. You know, I didn't go straight from high school to college. Well, I did, but didn't finish And so I'm not maybe as strong in like the traditional academic sense, which might make it harder for me to sell my products. Like I'm not looking at it strictly as ah as ah as a way to make money, which is like ultimately any type of media that you make, you have to make money for a publisher. But I'm not looking at it from that standpoint. So like I might not be the most marketable person, but like I'm not going to change what I'm doing to be more marketable.
00:17:06
Speaker
Because generally, that's not who I'm writing it for anyway, you know? yeah Yeah, you talk about a somewhat atypical educational journey and often the the loudest voices in our own heads are often ourselves in our own negative talk and whatever origin story we choose for ourselves is often the one that gets repeated over and over again.
00:17:26
Speaker
And I wonder for you, like what is the what is your origin story? Oh man, that is that is a loaded question. My origin story.
00:17:38
Speaker
You know, I...
Personal Influences and Philosophy
00:17:41
Speaker
grew up in Northern Virginia. i was i always loved DC. My father was in DC. you know i grew up in a but so I grew up in a town called Centerville, Virginia.
00:17:53
Speaker
Centerville, Virginia is very, very wealthy. there's It's like pretty much picture perfect community. But my family wasn't rich. My mother had got cancer when I was 11. She'd given six months to live. she lived for 13 years.
00:18:08
Speaker
But I really kind of raised myself. I had to do everything for myself from a very, very young age. So I was always very independent. And I just always loved going to the city and listening to music and going to museums and eating food. And so, you know, my kind of origin, I guess, is just like a nerdy black D.C. kid reading Shakespeare, you know, but also...
00:18:31
Speaker
i was I was out there like any other kid, you know, in in a city. During that time, DC was, it was a wild place, man. There was lots of lots of house music, lots of parties, lots of fun.
00:18:43
Speaker
You know, it's very different. The DC that I know and the DC that a lot of people see, like, you know, the the Trump stuff, like that's not... that's not the DC that I know. Like all the the politicians, they don't live in d c you know they d DC. is a chocolate city.
00:18:59
Speaker
you know So I look at it like you know ah James Brown and and Chuck Brown and Marion Barry. and you know That's what I see. The Black Family Union and Go Go Music and Jordans.
00:19:14
Speaker
I guess that's my origin story. I just was a kid who just loved black culture, loved music and food. and museums and art. I moved to Oregon, met my wife, went back to school. And one of our promises to each other is that we'd figure out a way to make our livings as artists.
00:19:29
Speaker
And so this is kind of like the next step in that. That's great. And in you know you brought up your mother and she passed away September 27, 2007. Is that right? And and in your you know in your in your work and how you speak about it, you want your storytelling to really um honor her legacy. So in what way do you see your work honoring your late mother?
00:19:51
Speaker
I mean, just doing it. you know I remember ah when she passed away, because i've like I said, I've always written songs and poems and stories, and when she passed away, I found a notebook with stories that I'd written from like you know my really my entire life and stuff I'd crumpled up and thrown away.
00:20:06
Speaker
um So you know she always encouraged me to write and tell stories. um Both my parents were singers, so I grew up in a very artistic family in that way. but You know, for her, it's just it's just it's just doing the thing that that you love. um You know, my mother was an accountant, and I come from—her family's ah very military, very—I don't want to say conservative, but conservative is probably the best word for it. So I was the only—I'm the only person in that family who really ah is artistic.
00:20:38
Speaker
um And so, you know, and she always encouraged it and they were kind of like, what are you doing? Like, go work at a bank. So I think just like doing my own thing is is the best way to honor her. And that's that's really all that she would want me to do.
00:20:49
Speaker
Yeah. mean, you have a ah ah real nonlinear path to to where you are right now. And I think there are a lot of people who might identify as kind of late bloomer types. And its certainly certainly myself and you everything.
00:21:01
Speaker
Seems like i liken this to I always would look over my shoulder and it seemed like other people were on an escalator just walking up and I was on the opposite escalator going down and I'm walking up it and I am just spinning my tires in that mud.
00:21:18
Speaker
And meanwhile, everyone seems to be on this rocket ship. And I wanted you to just get a sense of maybe the degree to which you have looked over your shoulder or not, maybe exercise a degree of ah envy at seeing other people take a take a different take a faster path, and maybe how you how you how how you wrestle with that those feelings of comparison that I think a lot of us end up feeling.
Creative Path and Community Support
00:21:42
Speaker
You know, um I think when I was like... In my early 20s, I did because, you know, people were graduating high school or college, you know, under 21, 22. And a lot of people that I grew up with are very, very successful. So they're buying houses like right out of college.
00:21:59
Speaker
I mean, little did I know they had family help. But, you know, at the time, you don't know that you just say, hey, you know, Mike bought a house. um mike bought mercedes and so i would kind of like have a little bit of jealousy at that just because i didn't understand why i didn't have those things because you know i was always in classes i was always one of the smart ones i always got good grades like i barely with even without even trying which probably like part of the reason i i did not uh enjoy college at a young age but I think like around when I turned 30 or so, i had been traveling a lot. Like i used to just take buses. I'd take take a bus to Pittsburgh and I'd like stay there for a couple of months. I'd take a bus to New York, stay there for a couple of months, you know take a bus somewhere else. And so i kind of just like traveled around for a long time. And um when I got back to Centerville,
00:22:48
Speaker
A lot of people you know were kind of jealous of me then because I had kind of been like living a nomad life and i and I wasn't kind of tied down to to really anything. you know I was very a very free spirit, which isn't a normal thing for for DC kids. That's not how people live.
00:23:03
Speaker
And now that I've kind of embarked, went back to school and started writing, I get a lot of messages from people being like, that's awesome. Like, I'm watching you. I'm i'm supporting you. And it seems like a large amount of the people who support me are back in D.C. You never know if people, like, appreciate what you do because, it's like, you do the art first.
00:23:24
Speaker
And then, you know, you hope that people appreciate it. And and back home they do. and And so I wish I had more money, though. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I was listening to a great a conversation with ah between Debbie Millman of the Design Matters podcast and Seth Godin, who's just a brilliant author, prolific writer, speaker, entrepreneur, ah just a great thinker on creativity, and um among other things.
00:23:52
Speaker
And ah he he had this great quote. He was telling you, he was in a canoe. was paddling, and he said, you never get across the lake all at once. You get across one stroke at a time.
00:24:04
Speaker
And embedded in that is just having ah confidence to be patient, to let things unfold just at the pace that they're going. But you need to just kind of just slog through. And I wonder for you, how have you cultivated a sense of of patience in your work and letting it unfold at the pace that it's going to unfold?
00:24:24
Speaker
I think part of it is is luck almost, like the luck. Like I have anxiety, we all have anxiety, right? But not having crippling anxiety in the face of like sometimes insurmountable things is is luck.
00:24:39
Speaker
Just like my general disposition ah lot helps a lot. um But I think also, like I said, I feel like the work is is good. It's like a not comparing myself to Prince at all, right? But Prince, you know, he would take a while to put out music because he wanted it to be good.
00:24:58
Speaker
You know, it's like it takes as long as it takes. Or even when you know when I worked in kitchens, when I was training people, they'd always ask me, like, how do I get faster? You know, how do I cook faster? How do I do things faster? i'm like, you don't focus on the speed, you focus on the skill, and eventually you're just going to get faster.
00:25:14
Speaker
And so that's kind of how I look at it. I just focus on the skill and on the content. And now now it's like... Not even that, like organizing it in a way that it doesn't get lost and you know in OneDrive. And so that's kind of, I just focus on that and that's really all that matters. Plus I'm still in school, so I have to i you know i have to do that too.
00:25:35
Speaker
Yeah, and what is a ah skill ah that you've been trying to adopt that is maybe going frustratingly slow for you?
Time Management and Mentorship
00:25:45
Speaker
Time management. You know, that's that's really the, that's that's like the boogeyman. It's time management, or just time in general. I just need more time.
00:25:56
Speaker
Like I need like, you know, the day needs to be like, I don't know, 30 hours or something. That's the one. yeah you You're someone who seems to have like a lot of a lot of projects and like irons in a lot of different fires.
00:26:09
Speaker
Oftentimes, even as like as writers, there's a trap of starting one thing and then getting bored with it and moving to something else and getting bored with that. And this one's just getting really hard, and I'm like, screw that. And so there's a tendency not to finish anything. So how do you, with many irons in the fire, you know just find that that extra oomph to finish something, to see something through? Yeah.
00:26:32
Speaker
I kind of work on things and in different places, like the museum work. I try to do that at the museum. Plus, it's nice there, you know, and it's quiet. The same with ah my my research. I try to. So the McNair, we have a lounge at UL.
00:26:50
Speaker
So I try to do a lot of my research in the lounge, um in the PLC. So that's like a ah place I can go. I can sit. I can close the door. ah got a couch. I can be comfortable and put my feet up and take off my shoes and work ah you know on campus.
00:27:04
Speaker
um And there's nobody there. And so that allows me to like work in a comfortable space because i kind of work. I have three dogs. um And so i I tend to work um almost like in the dog pile, like we kind of lay down and I do my work.
00:27:16
Speaker
And then, you know, when I go home, I'll work on, um you know, my homework or like my editing if I have to edit for the torch or, you know, I'm currently doing like a lot of work on the website and we're bringing back the print, a printed newspaper. So like.
00:27:32
Speaker
That stuff I tend to do at home. When you're editing people and people who aren't as far along, they are as experienced as you are, what are the things that you're seeing in less experienced writers that is kind of like, that's helped you and strengthened your trade as a writer?
00:27:50
Speaker
Well, patience, you know, um generally an editor for a student newspaper is going to be the same age as them. um You know, I'm 20 years older than them from a completely different culture.
00:28:03
Speaker
You know, I didn't go to high school during covid, so I didn't you know lose those years of ah social socialization. And so I think I've learned to be a lot more patient by working with with Gen Z. um I think the one thing that I have to spend a lot of time not have to I'm I get to spend a lot of time Trying to pass on the the basic skills like number one proofread Twice and then maybe sleep on it wake up proofread again, you know loud read it out loud um So kind of like passing on those kind of skills and then like even then like being like hey I did this too.
00:28:49
Speaker
Let me pull up this draft that I did from you know 2015 so you can see like I'm not just you know so kind of like doing that type of of mentoring and Yeah, it really just those two things. But also, you know, you know, I remember when I was 20, 21, 22, like, and a lot of times when I'm working with um young students, they, that you know, i I am busy, don't get me wrong.
00:29:12
Speaker
But I don't think that ah I am nearly as busy as as ah as a 20 year old student, because like, you know, I go to school, I go home. You know, I'm not like trying to go out and be social and all this and that, you know, so it's like, I'm able to just kind of like focus on the thing that I'm doing.
00:29:30
Speaker
Yeah, well, it seems like you know you you really honor honor what they have on their plates, even if you 20 years removed, it feels somewhat, if not more, like trivial to you. But you realize that there's a certain social construct that they're living under that just ah it's not of your world anymore. So there's an understanding there that, like listen, you don't have the time or the bandwidth to maybe, I don't know, to to do that 58th draft on something. It's a...
00:29:57
Speaker
It's just something it sounds like there's a there's an empathy coming from your direction to theirs. Yeah. Also, you know, one thing that I try to impart on them is, you know, if first off, um if you're submitting to, you know, Eugene Weekly or Register Guard or whatever, you know, any editor, they don't want to spend all of their time on your the simple grammatical errors. And if you and if you catch those before you send them to your editor, you know,
00:30:23
Speaker
you know, we're able to help you build the story and maybe expand upon what it is that you're writing so it has a ah farther reach. And so, you know, being able to um help people do that. I'm graduating from Lane. I just submitted, I just finished my last class there last term.
00:30:40
Speaker
So I'll only be there for three more months. So it's like now it's like, it's kind of like not, not like there's no rush, really. But trying to get the people that are there to understand, like, you're going to be doing the same exact thing I'm going to be doing that I'm doing now. Maybe for, you know, they could be there for a year, two years, who knows. But you might have to make some tough decisions. You might, somebody might be upset at you for one of your decisions. But you kind of have to, you have you have to, you got to do it.
00:31:09
Speaker
And so trying to train person for that responsibility is kind of like where I'm at with it right now. Yeah, well, and a lot of it is just so not glorious, working in whatever medium it is. like When you actually start sitting down with it, it's like, this is this is ugly, boring, and you get so sick of yourself over and over again.
00:31:33
Speaker
to be able to impart that kind of ah wisdom and experience on them is you know particularly valuable. And and I wonder youre kind of extending extending that to maybe the the mentors that helped you like turn a light on for you, like you're helping them with these very critical skills.
00:31:47
Speaker
Who are some of the people that helped you know maybe turn the world from black and white into color for you and gave you those skills that you know have put you on a mentor stage and put you on the path you're on? Camilla Mortensen, Dr. Mortensen, the editor of Eugene Weekly.
00:32:01
Speaker
When I ah got the Google fellowship, Google Initiative fellowship, that kind of came about because I had a blog called the Black American Spring. I still have it. And during the 2020 protests, I was kind of going around taking photos and writing and doing interviews. And, you know,
00:32:18
Speaker
because I'm not helicoptering into a community, I was able to interact with, you know, black unity and people on a completely different level. You know, like I'm still friends with many of those people because I'm not coming in thinking I know better. Like I know, i know, and know what's going on. You know, I've been, you know, protesting for many, many years. Right. So so that blog, you know, started getting pretty popular. Like, you know, I applied for the fellowship and that blog was really my work, writing examples, plus the essays that I wrote.
00:32:47
Speaker
for that and then i you know I got that fellowship which the way that it works is ah Google pays for your Employment at the publication so I wrote for Eugene weekly. I still actually write for Eugene weekly and so Camilla was kind of like I mean, really, i wouldn't even be in journalism if it wasn't for her. you know like i had When I got to Eugene Weekly, I had never even taken college-level writing class.
00:33:12
Speaker
you know I was at Lane just taking ah media design classes. But you know, she's still my mentor. Like she's my advisor at The Torch. I've been meeting with her every week for at this point, like four years. She's one of my best friends.
00:33:27
Speaker
You know, she's a person that means a lot to me. And then Charlie Dietz, he was the advisor at The Torch when I started the first time and and he offered me the position at The Torch right when I left Eugene Weekly.
00:33:44
Speaker
And so like the same, I've been working with him for many years. You know, we go out and get coffee and dinner pretty often. And even though they both have very different styles, because, you know, Camilla is a ah solutions journalist and Charlie Dietz is kind of like a, you know, Chicago style kind of.
00:34:01
Speaker
I get maybe even a Boston-style journalist. He's a very, they're just very, very different type of people. And they edit differently and having both of them kind of pretty constantly. Like if if I write something ah and if they like it or they don't like it, they'll tell me within, they seem to they seem to see it before anybody else does.
00:34:17
Speaker
And so they've both um inspired me and kind of kept me humble a little bit. You know, there's Dr. Rasheed, who's the African-American student retention specialist at Lane. Me and him have been very close, and I've taken several of his classes, and, you know, I've gotten, you know, numerous books and lessons from him. i You know, I did, i was a mentor in the community under Griot, which is a program that works with black youth in Lane, so I've, in the black community, I've done a lot of work, a lot of the families here know me, um and it's kind of helped me become ah member in that community.
00:34:52
Speaker
The thing that that they've they've all done, is because all three of them are all very different people, and they all have a very different way of of approaching their work in writing and editing, but they all, you know, but number one thing is is is, you know, professionalism, first off, but like making sure that the thing that you're doing matters,
00:35:12
Speaker
With all the mentors that I work with, even though they're different, ah the common theme is making sure that the thing that you're doing matters to you and it's something that you care about because then you'll do the best work.
00:35:25
Speaker
yeah the Yeah, well, and speaking of you know ah ah mentors and and voice, like who were some of who are some artists that you come back to time and again?
Influences and Recommendations
00:35:37
Speaker
i mean, there's a few people that I really enjoy. I mean, when I was a kid, my grandfather used to watch Larry King every day. And so for me, like larry like Larry King was like, that was...
00:35:49
Speaker
like my That's who I watched when I was a kid. I was like a little kid reading the Washington Post and and watching Larry King. you know After that, it was Anthony Bourdain. you know to a After he passed, i you know watching him you know was very difficult for me.
00:36:06
Speaker
But these days, like, I can't really turn him off. Like, he's like my number one, i think, inspiration. Like, that that's kind of where I want to want to end up. Don Lemon was, even though he you know he made his his mistakes when I was a ah kid, i remember reading ah his autobiography, and he had mentioned how he was dyslexic, and he couldn't really read very well and until he went into high school, and he wasn't able to pass his test because he couldn't really read very well.
00:36:32
Speaker
And so i always look at him and see like the levels of success that he has, considering how difficult it was for him to get through high school. And um he's somebody that I really look up to Obviously, Jon Stewart ah and Stephen Colbert, because I think when you look at like The Daily Show and and that type of journalism, a lot of people don't.
00:36:55
Speaker
don't know that they have journalism degrees and i and I really appreciate their ability to kind of share information in ah and a non-conventional way. So I go back to them a lot. The big TV influence.
00:37:08
Speaker
Yeah, i like I like video a lot. I love Stephen King. I read a lot of Stephen King books. um I haven't read any recently, but like i hopefully I'll be able to like sit down and like read some Stephen King books again one day. Yeah.
00:37:19
Speaker
Well, speaking of Stephen King, like ah a very underrated collection of him and his, i believe it's Seasons or something. It's where ah Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption is the novella of that.
00:37:32
Speaker
The name of the collection is Different Seasons. So halfway there. The novella of but the body, which became Stand By Me and everything. it Just outstanding stories. you know That was his attempt at trying to be like, oh, you think all I do is write horror? like you know I can really light up the page and do some really great character stuff. And my gosh, I mean, the Shawshank Redemption is just such a brilliant movie. And when you read the story, you realize so much of the dialogue in that movie is lifted just right out right out of his writing. So he just has such a great year for that. And what, a you know, what a story and masterfully crafted.
00:38:14
Speaker
I remember, you know, in an interview a long time ago, and this is he's been quoted at this many times, and they were like, how are you able to put out that many books? And he's like, you know, it's my job. I wake up, I write nine to five. It's what I do.
00:38:25
Speaker
And like, I kind of always remember that. from a young person and so I've i've always written really for that reason. You know, like most of my writings, honestly, before I kind of entered this like research space was music and it'd be like silly raps about like you know hanging out or whatever, but i always tried to I've always tried to write and kind of like that keep that that creative process going.
00:38:51
Speaker
Right. well Well, Chandler, as I love to bring these conversations down for a landing, I always love to end these by asking the guests, you in this case, for a recommendation of some kind. And that's just anything you're excited about ah that brings you joy. It doesn't have to be a book or a TV show. It's just it could be a pair of socks or a brand of coffee.
00:39:08
Speaker
So it's a whatever whatever you whatever you like. i extend that to you, Chandler. obviously Anthony Bourdain. If you guys have stopped watching him, go back and watch. watch His work is incredible, especially later in his life. you know and he' um I believe when I left this morning, he was in and Lebanon, and he had to evacuate.
00:39:30
Speaker
And he just he just does such interesting work. But I read a lot of comic books. There is a series right now, um a Captain Marvel series that I actually have. It's in my backpacks, I can show you.
00:39:42
Speaker
But I really like that series because ah generally comic books have always been like, ah not always, but it's like, you know, white man superhero. ah There's not really a lot of diversity in any way, but this particular series is nice because it's,
00:39:58
Speaker
it's it's her It's really her and She-Hulk. it's not It's just not the your traditional comic book and as far as representation is concerned. And the art's incredible.
00:40:09
Speaker
The lining's incredible. it's just more It's just modern, and I really like it. nice And speaking of Bourdain, um yeah Patrick Radden Keefe has a great profile on him in The New Yorker a bunch of years ago from before he died. so that's always worth checking out.
00:40:23
Speaker
Link in the show notes. and ah And also um my buddy Bryn Jonathan Butler wrote like this 25,000 word essay We call it Giving Up the Ghost on.
00:40:36
Speaker
It is such a weird, wild essay, but Bourdain is the big jumping off point for that. And um so those are things worth worth checking out. but So well in any case, Chandler, wow, what a wonderful conversation to have. Thank you so much for the time and for sharing your brilliant insights with me and everyone here at Gratitude Brewing. So thank you so much, man.
00:40:55
Speaker
Thank you.
00:41:03
Speaker
right
00:41:07
Speaker
yeah Hey! he's a great man Thanks everybody. i hope that you see what um or hear what I hear when I listen to both of these gentlemen speak the soulfulness and the care that they take with their craft and their approach to life in general. Let's give them another round of applause.
00:41:34
Speaker
pretty great right yes we did it we did it live i was pretty terrified that it wouldn't work out i was real nervous i'm finding that i don't like being up on stage and having eyeballs on me.
00:41:49
Speaker
I don't know why. The recording actually came out pretty great, but the power out to the speakers was a bit tricky. Crackly, not great. It's also a pretty cavernous space, as you might imagine, at a brewery.
00:42:03
Speaker
And I was effectively the sound engineer on top of conducting the interview, so I just had a lot going on. i mean to I might need to pump up more gain from my recorder out to the speakers for the next one.
00:42:17
Speaker
Anyway, well, I'm going to say thanks to Jesse Springer, former guest on the show. He let me borrow his big speakers. I'm going to invest a a good sturdy thousand bucks or more.
00:42:29
Speaker
Actually, I think it'll be closer to $1,500 and a pair of those and tripods to support them. And the requisite XLR cables, beda yada, yada, yada. ah So anyway, thanks to Jesse for allowing me to borrow those speakers.
00:42:44
Speaker
and But ah thanks to Chandler for coming on the show. We did it. And thanks to the Power of Narrative Conference for a promotional support. Also, pre-order the Frontrunner.
00:42:55
Speaker
Or don't. It's up to you. Speaking of Power of Narrative, I'm hard at work on my presentation on unauthorized biography and the ethics of it. It's giving me an ulcer. Not really, but maybe.
00:43:06
Speaker
i don't have fear of public speaking, but it stresses me the fuck out. I've given a few presentations in my life, mainly at Hippocamp, and the thought of speaking in front of an audience for 45 minutes or more is daunting.
00:43:21
Speaker
ah The teachers and lecturers out there are probably like, that's nothing, bro. We do that eight times a day. I know. I realize that. which is why teaching has no appeal for me, because the thought of being in front of a group of people who, by and large, don't want to be there fills me with so much dread, I can't even begin to describe it.
00:43:40
Speaker
Also, when I got feedback from my Hippocamp talks, ah more than a few people were asked you know in their survey, you know would you attend another talk by this presenter? And they were like, fuck no.
00:43:51
Speaker
and They just said no. But I added the fuck because... That's what they said in my head. And that hurts. I might retire from this shit after this summer. I don't have the riz, as the kids say.
00:44:04
Speaker
Well, then this summer, oh speaking of this, as if 45 minutes wasn't wasn't enough, I've got a five-hour? That's a lot of 45-minute blocks. A workshop that I need to plan on podcasting for platform purposes.
00:44:20
Speaker
Five hours. Yeah. I'm actually kind of hoping not enough people sign up for it because I don't think I can make it interactive enough. It it would be interactive, of course. It wouldn't just be me talking for five hours.
00:44:32
Speaker
There'd be some tactile things to do. I'm flattered that I was invited to pitch something. That's great. like I'm not discounting that. But I'm already panicking about how the fuck to fill up that much time. you know If the numbers bear out, people don't really seem to care about podcasting that much anyway.
00:44:48
Speaker
So it's a sinking ship. So it would seem. I don't know. But we paddle our little canoe while bailing buckets of water overboard into the ocean of obscurity. Stay wild, CNFers, and if you can't do interviews.
00:45:03
Speaker
ya!