Mark Lovett

Ryan Roe at The Moth in Philadelphia

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All too often I will hear people say their personal stories aren’t good enough to share. Nothing dramatic happened. Nothing very shocking. Nothing that other people would care much about. But some of the best stories are those with a simple narrative, but that also contain great meaning.

Such are the stories that recall childhood memories — those special times spent with family members. In this case, Ryan Roe’s story at The Moth takes us back to the time when he was learning to play the trombone. The story which unfolds is, at first, one of discomfort, but it turns into a father-son bonding experience that Ryan holds onto throughout life.

It’s heartfelt, as you’ll come to find out when you watch Ryan on stage, but it’s also filled with many funny moments. Listen to how he uses the technique of self-deprecating humor that also serves to enhance the visual experience.

You can still smell the remnants of Taco Tuesday. And if you look close enough at the floor, you can see the remnants of Taco Tuesday.

Without that humor his story would still be meaningful, but it wouldn’t have connected to the audience in the same way. It involves an effort to be near someone we like (we’ve all done that) and also being put into a potentially embarrassing situation (who hasn’t been there), so we’re rooting for Ryan.

Transcript

When I was in fourth grade, that’s when we as students could pick an instrument to take lessons in and play in the school band. And I chose the trombone for two reasons.

The first one was that there’s this cute girl named Jessica who told me that she was going to play the saxophone. And I had heard that the saxophone players and the trombone players took lessons together. Now, the reason I didn’t just also play the saxophone was that the buttons scared me.

And the second reason I chose trombone was that my dad is a phenomenal trombone player. For many years, he played in the Marine Corps Band, and he traveled around the country playing with them. He was based in New Orleans, and he played in a lot of the jazz clubs there. And then after that, he became an instrument repairman.

So, a lot of my memories as a child were of hearing him test the instruments in our house, playing his favorite songs. And I just loved the sound of the trombone. So I felt like if I played trombone, that would make him proud.

Now, the only other trombone player in the school was a fifth grader named Gina. And for months, Gina and I took lessons with our music teacher, and after all this time spent practicing, I just sounded terrible. The noise that came out of my trombone sounded like a hive of angry bees, yet somehow more alarming.

And, you know, it’s a really hard instrument to play for a fourth grader because you have these little fourth-grade arms, and you can’t even reach far enough to hit a C note. And what’s more embarrassing is that when you have an instrument that has a lot of valves and reeds and keys, if it sounds bad, you can sort of blame it on the instrument.

But when it’s just one long horn, if it sounds bad, it’s 100% your fault. I even came to my dad at one point and I was like, “This thing’s busted.” And he’s like, “Here’s the thing, no, it’s not.”

But the only consolation I had in all this was that Gina was also terrible. So as long as she was embarrassing herself, I felt fine embarrassing myself. Until two weeks before our first concert, Gina decides to quit. Up and leaving me as the only trombone player in the whole school, and my music teacher is worried.

But that week, my dad came in for a parent-teacher conference and he met with my music teacher and mentioned to her that he played trombone, and she goes, “Wait. Would you like to play in the winter concert with the fourth graders?” And he’s like, “I don’t know, this is their thing. I don’t want to take anything away from it.” And she’s like, “Please. Will you play in the winter concert?”

So he accepts and when he comes home and he tells me about it, he actually seems really excited about it. And I had to be like, “That’s awesome, Dad. I’m excited too.”

Because at this age, my biggest fear was being the center of attention. I just wanted to blend into the background. I did not want to be sitting in the front row with Jessica on my left and an adult man on my right.

But the concert comes around and we’re holding it in our dimly lit elementary school cafeteria. It was one of those cafeterias that weirdly has a full stage and curtains as if they’re trying to make the students think, “Will there be dinner and a show?” Who knows.

And the families are all there in their metal folding chairs. Suburban moms have their 30-pound camcorders armed and ready. You can still smell the remnants of Taco Tuesday. And if you look close enough at the floor, you can see the remnants of Taco Tuesday. And the drummers, they were lucky. They got to sit all the way in the back, along with this kid named Evan who had a triangle because he wasn’t really to be trusted.

And every family that walked into the room instantly looked in my direction and had a confused look because it was exactly as I had predicted. Me in the front row, Jessica on my left, and my adult father on my right.

And we begin playing the first song and immediately my dad and I are in a competition to see who can play the quietest. I’m playing quietly because I don’t want people to hear the noises coming out of my trombone. My dad is playing quietly because he doesn’t want to upstage a bunch of nine-year-olds. We’re both playing so quietly that the music teacher is waving her baton at us and mouthing, “Get louder! Now!”

But we get through the Blue Danube. The Carnival of the Animals goes a little better. And by the time we get to the Funeral March, I can finally relax. But the last song that we played was What a Wonderful World by Louis Armstrong. And you guys know it, it’s a very soft and slow song. It’s a bit easier to play on an instrument.

And as I’m playing, I start to listen to my dad playing next to me. And I’m hearing him hit every note perfectly and smoothly transition to the next. And then I look out into the crowd and I can see everyone else’s dad sitting there. And then I look over at my dad, and he’s smiling because he’s having the time of his life playing the instrument that he loves with his son that he loves.

And I felt really lucky to be playing next to my dad. I finally felt like this is a really special thing, I should cherish it.

And he ended up playing in every concert we did for the next five years. We had zero new trombone players every year for five years. So we just kept inviting him back. And it was awesome. I loved it. Every single time. I was never embarrassed about it, I always looked forward to it, and it was always a special moment.

So much so that when I got to high school and there were some upperclassmen that played trombone, I was no longer the only trombone player, so he didn’t need to play with us anymore. And I only ended up playing one more semester before I decided to quit because it just wasn’t as fun anymore. Something felt missing. So I moved on.

Fast forward to just a few years ago, I was taking a road trip through the South and I stopped for a day in New Orleans. And I was really excited because my dad had told me so many things about New Orleans and the whole experience just felt magical walking around the city because I kept thinking to myself, “This was my dad’s home when he was my age.”

And I ended the day by going to a jazz club called Preservation Hall. And it’s a really small club with these guys that play Dixieland jazz. And they sat me right next to the trombone player. And I’m having a great time listening to these guys, they’re so talented.

And then right before they ended the show, a guy came up from the back of the room and handed the lead man a five-dollar bill and asked him to play What a Wonderful World by Louis Armstrong.

And as I’m listening to the trombone player hit every note perfectly and smoothly transition to the next, I become overwhelmed with emotion because I was being transformed back into being fourth-grade Ryan. And I felt so lucky that I got to have those special moments with my dad.

And so when I got back home, I went to my parents’ house and I told my dad all about it and I thanked him for what he had done all those years ago. And then I went up to the attic and we had kept my trombone this whole time. So every now and then, my dad and I will still get that musical itch and we’ll go up to the attic and we’ll break out our trombones.

And I open up the case and I smell that sweet brass smell. And I put the horn and the slide together and you just hear all the familiar sounds. And when I begin playing, I’m immediately reminded of how terrible I am. But he hits every note perfectly, and that’s the fun part for me.

Thank you.

Now back to you…

Take a moment to think about similar experiences from your youth — from your childhood, to adolescence, to your teenage years. Is there some event (or series of events) that defined your relationship to one or both of your parents? Music, sports, nature, travel, food, etc.

Consider the sweet aspects, the humorous ones, as well as the meaningful ones. What memories have you carried with you throughout your life? As you recall an event, try to go deeper. What did it feel like, sound like, look like? As adults, we’ll too often push those memories into a corner, when the truth is, they are often well worth revisiting and sharing.

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Mark Lovett

Muneesh Jain Storytelling at The Moth in Traverse City

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You may remember Peter Aguero’s Moth story of how the simple suggestion of taking a pottery class altered his outlook on life. Different circumstances in this case, but Muneesh Jain’s Moth story told in Traverse City also happens to hinge on a moment in time that revised the trajectory his life was on.

But there’s always a backstory to such moments, and Muneesh talks about his parent’s expectations that he could never meet, no matter how hard he tried.

My parents are from India. So, in our house, that meant we had a high bar set for academic achievement, and a specific type of professional success: doctor, lawyer, engineer.

And he did try, to the point that his heath was at risk. But walking away from success resulted in his disconnecting from his family, as well as society itself. Rather than a short brief, Muneesh was out of sorts for five full years.

The delivery guy would just leave the food outside my apartment because I couldn’t even make eye contact with him. I was a failure.

And then… Something unexpected happens. Something that reignites is passion, and a lifelong dream. The journey he embarks upon connects him to new people in ways he couldn’t predict, and the process seems to resurrect him. (no spoilers here — you’ll have to hear his story to learn the details of his journey)

As these articles are fueled by java, you can always…
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And I realized we weren’t really even talking about baseball anymore. We were talking about family connection.

While staying with friends in Seattle, a scene unfolds we can’t possibly expect.

The next day, I hear a knock at the door. Nobody’s home, so I walk upstairs and through the glass door, I see the silhouette of a 4 foot 10, 90 pound little woman. I open the door and just say, “What are you doing here, Mother?”

As the saying goes, “It’s never too late.” For Muneesh, the subtext is that it wasn’t too late to reconnect to his mother, and in doing so, come to understand her in a way that wasn’t possible while growing up.

Transcript

My parents are from India. So, in our house, that meant we had a high bar set for academic achievement, and a specific type of professional success: doctor, lawyer, engineer. By the time my sister was 12, she knew she was going to be a doctor, just like my dad.

When I was nine, I called a family meeting to let everyone know I was never going to be a doctor, or a lawyer, or an engineer. I was going to be a gymnast. My parents, they tolerated it, but told me that one day I was going to have to grow out of it. But I went to the gym six days a week, five hours a night. And by the time I was a teenager, I was training for the Olympics. Then multiple injuries ended my career. My folks, they said, “Alright, you got that out of your system. Now it’s time to focus on your education.”

I needed them to be impressed with me, the way they were my sister. I just, I couldn’t wrap my head around doing it their way. So I came up with a bigger idea. When I was 19, I got a job with ESPN. I was producing live segments for Sportscenter, ESPN news, hanging out with my sports idols. My folks, they kept reminding me, “Don’t let this get in the way of your schoolwork.”

Alright, fine. If that wasn’t good enough, I came up with a bigger idea. I left the network and moved to Detroit, Michigan, a city that I love, and I started a sports magazine. I sold ads, I found distributors, I built a staff with grown-ass people who had kids older than me. And we were killing it. We were up to 50,000 subscribers. People were recognizing me on the street. Hell, Muhammad Ali said he liked my magazine.

But every time I’d see my parents, they’d just ask me, “When are you going back to college? Get that degree.”

This time, there was no bigger idea. I had to make this work. I doubled down, worked twice as hard, which also meant that I pretty much stopped sleeping entirely and started drinking and drugging the nights away to manage my stress levels. And when I was 24, my doctor told me that I was six months away from a heart attack.

I either had to get rid of the magazine or die. So I gave up. And something broke inside of me. And I couldn’t face my parents. I took the money I’d saved from ESPN and the magazine, and I ran away. I moved to New York into a tiny 160-square-foot studio apartment where the windows didn’t even open, and it was there that my self-imposed exile began. Slowly losing contact with every human I’d ever met.

The delivery guy would just leave the food outside my apartment because I couldn’t even make eye contact with him. I was a failure.

My parents would call and I never knew what to say. My dad would lecture me that I wasn’t even a part of the family anymore. My mom would yell at me that I needed to get my life together. And every conversation just ended in tears. So I stopped answering their calls. Then they started sending me money to keep me alive, and I took it, and that made me hate myself so much more. And so I just stopped leaving my apartment entirely.

The TV would be on 24 hours a day. I wasn’t watching at all. I just needed flashing images and noise to block out the constant stream of shame, regret, self-loathing that was clanging around the inside of my skull.

And that became my life. Every day, all day, living in near isolation for five years.

One day, a baseball game just happened to be on. Now, I hadn’t watched a sporting event of any kind since the death of my magazine. It was always just too hard. But on this day, I was so broken, I just stared motionlessly at the screen in front of me. And within a couple of innings, something strange was happening. I felt myself sitting up in my bed, engaging with something outside of my own head. I was smiling. I mean, actually smiling, for the first time in five years.

By the time the game ended, I’d already ordered the MLB TV package and just started mainlining baseball. I was watching every game, reading every article, going back over the last five years to see everything that I’d missed. And in the middle of it all, I remembered a dream I had when I was six.

You know, “One day, I’m gonna see a baseball game at all 30 MLB stadiums.” It’s one of those silly things that a lot of baseball fans want to do, but few actually get a chance to do it. And the ones who do it, do it over the course of a lifetime, like a normal human person.

But in this moment, nobody even knew that I existed. I could disappear off the planet and no one would notice. So I said, “Screw it. I’m going to do it. And I’m gonna do it in one season.” I’m going to drive 17,000 miles in 95 days and go to a baseball game at all 30 ballparks. I started obsessively poring over maps and schedules, planning out my route.

Every time I’d go down to the bodega to buy another pack of cigarettes, instead, I would take that money out of the ATM, go back up to my apartment, shove it underneath my mattress. By the time the next baseball season came around, I’d saved $6,000 and quit smoking.

I was ready to go. I called my parents to let them know what I was doing, and they really didn’t know what to say. They were just happy that I was alive. And I hit the road. Every 48 hours I was in a new city. But I didn’t want to just sit in the ballpark alone. I needed a way to reintegrate myself into society. The problem was, I had completely forgotten how to even have a conversation with somebody else.

So I invented a podcast. I couldn’t have cared less if anybody actually listened to this thing. I just needed an excuse to go talk to strangers. And it was working. People were talking to me about the stats of their favorite ball players, the histories of their ballparks. One kid at Citi Field at a Mets game spent 20 minutes meticulously breaking down why it was that the Yankees sucked.

And I bounced from ballpark to ballpark. I noticed that my conversations, they were evolving. I talked to a father and son in Baltimore, where after our official interview, the father pulled me aside to quietly confide in me that he didn’t really have a relationship with his eldest son, but his youngest, his youngest loved baseball, so he knew that at least they’d be able to talk about that.

I talked to a mother and daughter in San Francisco who had been going to games together for 20 years. Three generations of women in Texas. The grandmother proudly shoving Little Laney, her nine-year-old granddaughter, in front of my microphone, saying, “Little Laney, tell the nice man what you do all your school reports on.” And Little Laney excitedly screams out, “The Texas Rangers!”

And I realized we weren’t really even talking about baseball anymore. We were talking about family connection.

By the time I got to LA, I’d already driven 8,000 miles on my own. I was halfway done with my tour. But this was my hell week, because the Angels and the Dodgers rarely play at home at the same time. I had to catch a game in Anaheim, drive 17 hours up to Seattle, turn back around, drive 17 hours back to LA, then 30 hours to Minnesota. That’s 4,000 miles in 10 days. But I was a man possessed, nothing was going to stop me.

After my Angels game, I hopped in the car and headed up north. But about halfway into the drive, my vision starts to get blurry and my body starts to uncontrollably shake. I pull over just in time to open the door and projectile vomit all over the side of the highway. I didn’t know what to do, so I called my dad. He just sighed into the phone and said, “You have food poisoning.” What am I supposed to do from here? “Gatorade and Pepto Bismol.”

My mom gets on the phone and starts screaming at me. This is ridiculous. You need to take better care of yourself and I hung up. I wasn’t in the mood for another lecture. I made it to Seattle in time for my game by double fisting Gatorade and Pepto Bismol. I was staying with some family friends so I knew they’d be able to take care of me.

The next day, I hear a knock at the door. Nobody’s home, so I walk upstairs and through the glass door, I see the silhouette of a 4 foot 10, 90 pound little woman. I open the door and just say, “What are you doing here, Mother?”

And she says, “I’m here to help you drive.” Now, she must have seen the panic on my face, because she followed that up with, “And I’ve been listening to your podcast. I know you don’t take bathroom or food breaks when you’re on the road, so I’m not going to take any breaks either. We’re going to stay on your schedule.” I didn’t know she was listening to the podcast.

And then she said one more thing. “I’m driving the whole way, so you’ve got two options. You sit next to me and you can sleep or we can talk.” Now, I honestly can’t remember the last time my mom and I had been in the same room together without it devolving into tears. So I said, “Okay, Mama.” I got in the car and I immediately went to sleep.

I slept the entire way to LA and when we got there, she said, “I’m not going to go to the baseball game with you.” I said, “Why not?” She said, “Because you’ve got work to do. And if people see you there with your mother, they’re not going to want to talk to you.” I said, “You’re being ridiculous, of course you’re going to come,” and I got her a ticket.

We’re at Dodger Stadium and I start interviewing the gentleman sitting next to me as I’d done at every ballpark before. My mom, she moves to the seat behind us to give us some space to chat. And after the interview is over, I can hear her talking to her new seatmate. And her new seatmate’s asking, “Wow, you must be a huge baseball fan to do this type of road trip.” And my mom just answers, “No. I really don’t like baseball. I like watching my son watch baseball.” I pretended like I didn’t hear that.

After the game was over, we’re walking back to the car and she stops me. She wants to show me a picture she had taken during the game. And I looked down on her phone and it’s actually, it’s a picture of me and the guy that I had been interviewing. And she just says, “Look. You’re smiling.”

I said, “When are you going home, Mama?” And she said, “No, no, no, no. I’m going to drive with you to Minnesota too.” This time, there was no panic on my face. I said, “Okay, we’re going to split the drive and let’s talk.”

As we made our way out east, I started talking to my mom the way that I had been talking to these strangers at the ballpark these last couple of months, asking her stories about her life. You know, this woman, she survived three wars between India and Pakistan. I didn’t know that.

She told me the story of how her and my dad’s arranged marriage came to be. I knew they were arranged, I just never knew how or why it happened. I don’t know why I never bothered to ask her that.

Right before we got to Minnesota, we made a quick pit stop in South Dakota at Mount Rushmore. And as we’re walking up to the monument, my mom peeled off to call my dad and I was eavesdropping and I could hear her say, “As immigrants to this country, we’d always wanted to see Mount Rushmore. We just never found a reason to make the trip. This is all so exciting. I can’t wait for you to be able to see… our son… is just so happy.”

Thank you.

Back to you…

As unique as the details of Muneesh’s story are, the themes are all too common. Expectations. Failure. Shame. And also being open to those times when a simple circumstance serves as inspiration to reclaim the life that’s been waiting for you. Yes, the first few steps require initiative, but success manifests when others are influential elements in your narrative.

If you have a story to tell of getting lost, then finding yourself, don’t forget the cast of characters that accompanied you on the road to recovery. With them, you would still be lost.

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Mark Lovett

The Moth – Live from New York – Give me Five – Stories of the Senses

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Every episode of The Moth Radio Hour contains storytelling gold, and this one recorded in New York — Give me Five – Stories of the Senses — was a perfect example of diversity in storytelling. Give it a listen, and think about how each story was constructed, and how each scene was portrayed.

The Moth Storytellers:

  • Peter Aguero’s life takes an unexpected turn in a pottery class.
  • Tighisti Amahazion finds creature comfort during an escape with her family.
  • Julian Goldhagen gets trapped in a walk-in closet.
  • Bryan Kett gets a chance to see in color for the first time.

While I encourage you to hear them all, this article focuses on Peter Aguero.

Peter Aguero is quite the storyteller, with his rapid fire delivery that jumps from scene to scene, keeping the narrative, as well as audience interest, going along. Peter’s a masterful writer that offers up a combination of personal insights and humor. Check out this description of the woman he meets at the pottery studio. If there’s an unusual character in your story, think of how you can describe the essence of their appearance, both visually and metaphorically.

This woman comes up to me and she’s wearing mismatched six shades of pink somehow. And two different colored socks and sandals. It’s October. She looks like she’s been happily cutting her own hair for the last 50 years.

It’s one thing to describe how you feel, but in this exchange with his pottery teacher: “And the second rule is today we’re just going to have fun. And I tell him, I’m not so sure I remember how that even feels.” We’re left to consider Peter’s frame of mind, that he has forgotten what fun feels like. Sometimes meaning only requires a few words, and the audience empathizes with you.

So, what I realize then is now I can make anything. I can make anything for who I am today. I can make things to honor who I had been. I can make things for what is. And all I have to do is joyfully, mindfully, with intent and with compassion for myself, is to sit still and take a breath and make a move and the shape changes. And I take a breath and I make a move and the shape changes. And I take a breath and I make a move and the shape changes.

You’ll understand this ending once you hear his story, and you’ll see how he took the lesson he learned when working with the clay and applied it to his life. That’s the gift he’s handing to the audience. To take a breath, make a move, and watch the world change. But let’s take a step back for context.

I’m crying and it just feels terrible. The weight of the entire world feels like it’s on top of my shoulders, on top of my body, pressing me into this carpet.

In just this one sentence you can feel Peter’s pain. He’s not in a good place. And although he obviously wants relief, he doesn’t have a path to make that happen. And then comes a simple suggestion from his wife.

Sarah says to me, Peter, you need to take a pottery class.

This is the pivot point. The one sentence that opens up an entirely new world to Peter. A world where he finds himself and creates a path forward: take a breath, make a move, and watch the world change.

Whenever someone says, “I don’t have a story to tell.“, I begin to probe, ask a few questions, dig a little deeper into their life experiences. And sure enough, there comes a moment in the conversation when they tell me about a pivot in their life. A change that started with one sentence, thought, idea, etc. It could have come from a friend or a family member. Someone at work or school or church. Hell, it can come from watching the television or reading a book.

The point is, this happens to everyone, but too often we overlook the impact that such event have on our life. Think about your own life journey, and see whether something similar arises. An event, and a lesson learned that others could benefit from hearing. And if you already have your story idea in hand, while considering the events you plan to include in your narrative, try to be aware of any pivot points that are worth sharing.

Transcript (edited for readability)

So I’m sitting, laying face down on my living room floor, and the carpet is rough against my cheeks and all I want to do is just burrow underneath the carpet. I want to hide. I want to dig in a hole. I want to get my body, my soul, my everything underneath, to hide, to get away from everything. There’s bees in my head. It’s anxiety. My heart is beating. I’m crying and it just feels terrible. The weight of the entire world feels like it’s on top of my shoulders, on top of my body, pressing me into this carpet.

I am trying to write a new show. I had been working for 20 years hustling as an artist and what I’ve been working on lately is what I’ve been calling, autobiographical, first-person narrative, which is just a fancy way of saying, telling a story. And anytime you have a fancy way of doing something, it gets all messed up. So my wife, Sarah, is brushing my hair and she’s reading my tarot cards and she’s holding me like the Pieta, and I’m just trying to get through this moment.

I thought I was writing a comedy about myself. Turns out it was a psychological horror story, and it didn’t feel good. I had made the choice, the medium I was going to work in my life was generally going to be pain.

I found it to be true early on, that whenever I would talk about a time in my life where there was some kind of change or some growth, it never happened in a victory or out of joy. It was always in heartbreak or pain or misery or failure is where I would grow. And so, that’s how I would present my medium. That was what I was working, in the pain of my past and I was tired of it. I didn’t want to do it anymore. I just didn’t care. I didn’t care about myself or telling any more stories or doing anything and I’m just crying and it’s just about over and Sarah says to me, Peter, you need to take a pottery class.

And I’m 40 years old. I had never taken a pottery class. I had played with Play-Doh when I was a kid, probably. I went to Catholic school. We didn’t have the money for pottery classes. It was, okay babe, I kind of dismissed it. Thank you so much, but, you know, how’s that going to help anything? And then I spend the rest of the night trying to go to bed to end that day to get to the next one, which is the way it goes when you feel that way.

And at the end of the next day, Sarah says to me, have you registered for a pottery class yet? And I said, no, I haven’t. She says, I’m going to take a shower and by the time I get out of the shower, I want you registered for a pottery class. And I get on the computer and I start to look for a pottery studio near where we live in Queens and I’m looking around and I find this place called Brick House in Long Island City.

I’m like, I like the Commodores. So I register for a private lesson. And she comes out and she says, did you register? I said, yes, I did. I have a lesson in five days. I said, why can I ask you? Why a pottery class? She just looked at me. She said, I think it would be gentle and I think it might feel like a hug.

So five days later I’m in Long Island City and I walk into the ceramic studio, a place I’d never been in my life and I don’t understand what is going on. There are walls packed with shelves and things. There are tennis balls next to WD40 next to cornstarch next to yard sticks next to bundles of sticks, random buttons, all kinds of weird, just strange things.

The floor feels like it had been wet and dried and wet and dried and wet and dried to the point that now it feels like stale waffles underneath my feet. I’m looking around and feeling the clay dust. I can feel it gritting in my teeth. I can smell the earth in the air. I look around and everyone in the place is working with these balls of this brown clay.

This woman comes up to me and she’s wearing mismatched six shades of pink somehow. And two different colored socks and sandals. It’s October. She looks like she’s been happily cutting her own hair for the last 50 years. She says to me, are you here for Peter? I say, I am Peter, and this confuses her, and she says, my name is Liberty Valance. I said, what? And now I’m confused.

And then this guy, who looks if the Queensboro bridge had a troll, it would be this guy. And he’s got a red beard and he’s chuckling in the corner and I’m looking around like, oh, I get it, this is where the weirdos are. Okay.

So then Peter comes out. He’s the teacher and he looks like me-in-30-years. He’s a robust older gentleman with a halo of hair loosely tied in a ponytail, a big long gray beard that reaches the center of his chest. And he comes over to me with kindness in his eyes. He says, I’m Peter. I say, I’m Peter. And it doesn’t register any confusion with him.

And the kindness in his eyes runs deep and his hands look strong and he says, have you ever done this before? I said, no. He said, good. Here’s what we’re going to do. I’m going to just teach you. There’s no grades. I’m not your first grade teacher. Don’t worry about it. And the second rule is today we’re just going to have fun. And I tell him, I’m not so sure I remember how that even feels.

And he just nods his head and says, come this way. So he walks me over to the pottery wheels and we sit down and he takes a ball of clay and he places it in my hand, and it’s both wet and somehow dry at the same time. It’s cold to the touch in my hand. It is about the size of a grapefruit. It’s heavy.

You know when they tell you when you go to the produce section to get produce that is a little heavier than it looks and you never understand what that means. This is what clay feels like in my hand and it’s earth. It’s the earth. And it’s in my hands, touching my skin. And Peter says, okay, the first thing we’re going to do is we’re going to center.

And I don’t know what that means. He turns on the wheel and the wheel starts going around and says, and he puts the clay in the center of the wheel and he says, you can’t center a little bit. You’re either centered or you’re not. And that’s blowing my mind and he shows me how to use my body, how to brace my arm up against my ribs and to make my hands into the shape of a tool and I would hold my hands over the clay and not let the clay…

He says, don’t let the clay, he’s got this voice, it sounds like if you drizzled honey over some soft summer thunder. And he’s telling me, okay, so you’re going to adjust, it’ll just be, and then it’ll be centered. He says, you’re going to learn how to do this, you’re going to forget it, and then it’s okay because I’m here and I’m not going anywhere.

So I breathe out and I brace my arm and the clay wobbles and wobbles and wobbles and wobbles and all of a sudden it doesn’t. It’s still and it’s spinning. I raise my hands and it’s spinning so fast but it’s not moving at all. It looks like it’s completely still and he says, there you go, you’re centered.

And then he tells me, okay, you’re gonna wet your hands and then you’re gonna drop your first hole, and you take your fingers and you put it in the center of the dome of clay and you drop your hole and you open the clay. And it opens so quickly. I take to it like a duck to water. It feels so satisfying, like when you’re cutting wrapping paper and the scissors just slide up the wrapping paper. It feels like that.

And he tells me okay, now he shows me how to lift, and he shows me what to do, and all of a sudden this lump of clay went from being nothing to a cup that turns into a bowl, that turns into an object that exists in the whole world. And all of the art I’ve been making has been ephemeral, just performance and it disappears.

And this is now a thing that actually exists. And he cuts it off and he puts it to the side and he puts another ball of clay and I center it again and he tells me that all I got to do now is just make sure that I breathe. He says that’s the most important thing. He says, you’re going to touch the clay gently, you’re going to take your hands off the clay gently and in between every move you’re going to breathe. And then that piece starts to wobble a little bit and all I have to do is cut it off and get another piece of clay. I can just start over. There’s no stakes. It just feels good.

As Peter is telling me and we go through about four, four different balls of clay. He tells me, uh, all these things again, these steps over and over because I learn them and I forget them, but he’s there. But what I hear is the subtext of what he’s actually saying to me, which is, you take a breath, you make a move, and the shape changes.

The hour goes by like that and I stand up and I tell him, I say Peter, thank you so much. I’ve been depleted. I needed that so bad. My battery has been empty and I just have not been feeling good. And he gives me a hug, because me-in-30-years is a good hugger. And then, as he hugs me, he tells me he’s proud of me.

So I start to cry. And, me-in-30-years, is a great crier too, and we’re just holding each other and crying and the bridge troll and the pink lady are just laughing. Everybody’s having a wonderful time and I leave the studio, I wave goodbye to the island of broken toys and I go home and I get back to my apartment and I sit on the couch and, Sarah says, how was it? And she tells me later that in this very small voice from my very big body, I just gently say, I loved it. I can’t believe somebody lets me do this. And she nodded her head and she said, okay, I want you to go sign up for a weekly class. So I did.

About two weeks later I show up for my Thursday 10:00 AM weekly class. I go in there and I walk directly to the wheels and on the wheel that’s supposed to be mine is a pile of brand new tools, some wooden carving sticks, a wooden knife, a wire, a sponge.

There’s also this blue bowl, rudimentary, kind of thick walled blue bowl. And I pick it up and on the underside of it, it’s carved Peter underneath. Teacher Peter had fired it, glazed it and fired it for me and left it on my wheel. And I pick it up and the glaze is cool in my hand and it’s very smooth like glass and it feels perfect in my hands because my hands were the things that made this and the grooves are the grooves of my fingers in the surface of the clay. And this object is now part of the world and I made it. It was the earth and I shaped it and inside the way the glaze melted is the universe.

And I put it to the side and I get another ball of clay and I sit down and I start to center. And I look all around me and I can see all the people working everywhere and and and everyone here is taking these, uh, balls of clay or slabs of clay or or pieces of clay and they’re turning into something and it’s coming from a place inside their soul that is supported and beautiful and joyful.

So, what I realize then is now I can make anything. I can make anything for who I am today. I can make things to honor who I had been. I can make things for what is. And all I have to do is joyfully, mindfully, with intent and with compassion for myself, is to sit still and take a breath and make a move and the shape changes. And I take a breath and I make a move and the shape changes. And I take a breath and I make a move and the shape changes.

Thank you.

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Molly Kendall at The Moth NYC StorySLAM

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Personal stories come in a variety of flavors, from happy to sad, and clueless to insightful, but some fall into a category that I call wild/crazy/funny. For example, we’ve all heard stories that evoked the response, “And what were you thinking?” For me, the tale that Molly Kendall shared at The Moth NYC StorySLAM back in 2016 was one such story.

It’s just six and a half minutes, yet it brought out a number of universal themes that all of us can relate to. Give it a watch, then think about the many facets of being human that were highlighted. Then consider how those themes relate to some of your experiences, and whether they can be woven into your story.

Here were some insights that I came away with. The point is that when crafting a personal story, you should put yourself in the shoes of the audience as a way to feel how they might react to the story. So even when an experience is unique to you, the underlying themes should be universal so that the audience can reflect upon their own journey.

The Themes That Resonated With Me

  1. Impulsivity vs. Consequence: Stemming from  impulsive and seemingly bold decision, the result was a cascade of awkward, unforeseen consequences.

  2. Vulnerability (Literal and Figurative): Molly is literally vulnerable under the coat — a physical representation — and that reality translates into emotional vulnerability and embarrassment as the story unfolds.

  3. Loss of Nerve/Confidence: The initial “blast of courage” quickly dissipates, replaced by panic, regret, and an inability to act or explain herself. She puts herself into an impossible situation.

  4. Social Awkwardness and Embarrassment: The humor stems from the excruciatingly awkward situations — the bus ride, the scene at the restaurant, the inability to take off the coat. We feel for her and wonder what we would do in that situation.

  5. Finding Connection Despite Chaos: Despite the bizarre and mortifying date, their relationship survived and flourished, which suggests that connections can happen even amidst absurdity. There is hope, even in the worst of situations.

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Transcript

About 12 years ago, I moved to New York City, and to this day, I do not know why I did that. But it was an adventure, and to support my adventure, I had to work two, three, however many jobs, running here to there, trying to find my feet on this pulsing, frenetic city.

Um, within the beginning of the time that I was here, I met this man named John. And being a product of someone who was born and raised here, he had a very calm spirit within this craziness that I felt. Um, so he and I started to see each other.

One winter night, he invited me over. Of course, I’m going to go. And so I opened my closet of really tired, old-looking clothes, and I think with this like blast of courage and insanity… Screw it. I’m not going to wear any of these. I’m just going to wear my snow boots – it’s the middle of winter – my snow boots, and I grabbed my old Navy all-weather, camel-colored trench coat. And I threw that on. And I’m like, “Yes! Every man’s dream!”

And I jumped on the M14D bus. And it was empty. And I realized, looking at this empty bus full of empty seats, I cannot sit down. The coat isn’t long enough. And… I’m just going to hold this pole and hope that like this trip goes really quickly.

So I get to his house, and he buzzes me up, and I go up. And I’m thinking, like on the bus, I had lost like all of my courage. And I thought, like, what am I doing? What am I doing? I am not this kind of person. Whatever that means. I’m not. This is not who I am.

And I get to his apartment, and I open his door, and he’s fully clothed, winter jacket on, and he’s lacing up his boots. And he’s like, “You know what? I’m so hungry. Let’s go out to dinner.” And I said, “No, I’m not hungry.” And he said, “Okay, just like, just pizza.” And I was like, “I hate pizza. No.” And he said, “Sushi.” And I was like, “No, I don’t…” And I just couldn’t tell him, like, I just couldn’t tell him what I had done because I was not… I didn’t know what I had done!

And he’s like, “All right, you know what? Bruno…” this, this bartender at the steakhouse where we often went to. He’s like, “Bruno’s at the bar at Strip House. We’re just going to go there. Don’t worry about it. We’re going to have lamb chops.” He knew, like, the secret to my heart was lamb chops. And he said, “Let’s go there.” And I thought, “Oh my god, every time I say no, it gets like worse! Like, pizza to sushi to steak! Like, now it’s going to be forever, and I’m naked!” And… “Okay, let’s go. Let’s just, let’s just go.”

And so we go to Strip House and like, it’s the middle of winter, so the beautiful, lovely, sweet coat check lady is like, “Oh, can I take your coat?” And I was like, “No.” Oh, okay. So we go… Bruno sees us at the bar, and he’s like, “Oh, John, Molly, hey, come on, sit down here, I have your places for you. Molly, take off that stupid coat! It looks like you’re ready to run away!”

And I was like, “Oh my god, if you only knew!” And I thought, “Before, before I sit down, like, this is my chance, this is my chance, I’m just gonna tell him and we’re gonna go. Like, I have to get this over with!” But I couldn’t because I was just too embarrassed. Like, what have I done?

And so we sat down. And Bruno said, “What would you like to drink?” And I was like, “What would get me drunk the fastest so I have the courage to tell him?” And I said, “A martini.” Boom, he makes the martini. It’s down. Gone. And then he’s like, “Wow, okay, would you like something else?” “Yeah, just another martini, another martini. Like, I need to think, I need to think.”

And he makes the martini, and in like the haze of somewhere else, I hear John ordering like three or four courses of something or something. And there’s like a seafood tower involved, and like lamb chops, and truffled creamed spinach, and like amazingness. But I was just trying to think, like, how do I get out of this? How do I tell him? And I just, I can’t get my courage back. The courage that told me like, “Just go naked!” Like, that courage was gone.

And so Bruno’s like, “No, seriously, like, take off your jacket.” And I was like, “You know what? I caught a chill outside. Like, it’s cool, like, I’m fine.” And then, like, to help me, Bruno decided to like turn up the heat in the bar. Oh my god! No, seriously! Okay. So he turned up the heat of the bar. I’m sitting at the bar, there’s like sweat dripping down my face, down into my like old Navy camel-colored all-weather trench coat.

And I just didn’t know what to do. And the lamb chops come out, and I want the lamb chops! And I still don’t have the courage to say it. And finally, John’s like, “Do you want to start with steak or lamb?” And I was like, “You’re talking about steak, and I’m naked! I’m naked! The polyester is now sticking to my body!” And… “We just, we just have to get out of here because I’m naked!”

And he looked at me, and he’s like, “We gotta wrap it up.”

And okay, I know I’m over time, but I have to tell you guys that that was like 11, 12 years ago, whatever. Present day, we now have a three-and-a-half-year-old daughter. And I look at her, and she’s like this demon, like from the moment that she was born, she’s this like tornado in a tiny little thing.

And I look at her, and I think, like, “How do I help mold you into the person you’re supposed to be?” And I realized that when I was saying, like, “I am not this person,” that we don’t have control over who we are and what we’re supposed to be. And least of all, we don’t have control over our kids. But we can be more than we ever imagined.

Thank you.

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A Perfect Life Uprooted – Salima Saxton at The Moth in London

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The Moth has been hosting storytelling events for 20+ years, and the thousands of storytellers who have graced their stages are proof that every story is unique, and that the best stories come from our personal experiences.

In this story told at The Moth London Mainstage on September 28, 2023, Salima Saxton talks about how her (nearly) perfect life was uprooted when her husband had a nervous breakdown, and the changes they entire family made in order to build an even better life.

I’ve encountered a lot of people whose lives were interrupted by an unforeseen event. In this situation it was a mental health issue, but for others it could be a physical health crisis, death in the family, or one of many other scenarios. And quite often these people don’t feel that their story is anything exceptional, not worth sharing on a stage. But I can assure you that there are people out there who will benefit from such stories, so spend a bit of time watching Salima’s talk and thinking about she constructed it. Here are a few of my own observations.

Salima begins her story by taking us to a specific point in time, and it happens to be a day, Valentine’s Day, that we assume would be a happy day. But such is not the case, as the mood turns dark when her husband, Carl, comes into the room. Over the next minute it becomes apparent that Carl is struggling, although we still don’t know any of the details, or the reason why. She has our attention.

Rather than tell us what’s happening, Salima takes a step back in time to share the moment when she first met her husband, and in doing so, we return to a romantic story line, one which culminates in their marriage.

We get a sense of their domesticated life in a shishi neighborhood where their kids attended private school, where they didn’t learn much, which gets a laugh, and thus keeps the tone of her story uplifting at this juncture.

The tone shifts again with her comment about their lives lacking joy, and that brings us back to the opening of the story, to Valentine’s Day, nearing the half way point of the story. Think about how much has been said in 5 1/2 minutes.

In short order their lives are turned upside down in an effort to take care of her husband, and we get a clear sense of Salima’s self-determination to do whatever it takes. We also hear a change in attitude as she “couldn’t give a fuck actually”.

When hearing a well-told story you sometimes hear a brilliant line that defines the topic. In this case, “when your life explodes and it morphs into something far better, the fear evaporates, disappears, distills, just goes into the atmosphere”

With calm returning to their lives, she beautifully brings the story to an end. An impactful personal story connects the audience to the storyteller, while at the same time inspiring us to reflect on our own lives, and what’s really important.

Valentine’s Day. It reminded me that most success is a wiggly line on a grubby piece of graph paper. I used to think of success as tick, tick, tick, ambition, ambition, ambition. Now? Now I think of it as… Finding the people, finding the places that make you feel safe and bring you home.

Transcript

00:00 So, it was Valentine’s Day. My husband Carl came into the sitting room and he closed the door. He was wearing a big thick winter coat even though it was quite mild outside, and he was shivering, he was trembling. I didn’t recognize him.

Something terrible has happened, he said.

00:22 My husband Carl is a coper. He is a man with a plan. If you want someone on your team, pick Carl. He’s an oak tree.

Then he said, I just can’t do this anymore. Whatever I do, it is never enough. He had a business. He has a business. He’d been navigating it through COVID, through Brexit, through all of it.

And I’m embarrassed to admit right now that I just kind of got used to him being stressed all the time. I barely saw it anymore.

And then he added, do you love me? Can you still love me? Because sometimes I just think it would be better if I wasn’t here anymore.

01:11 I met Carl when I was 22 in the waiting room of an audition room for a Bollywood film. Neither of us got the part. I asked him for the time, as a really spurious reason to talk to him, because he was simply the most handsome man I’d ever seen in my life.

On our first date, I asked him if he wanted children over the starter. I cried over the main course. I am a crier. And over dessert, I very optimistically asked him for a second date. Miraculously, he agreed, and six weeks later, he asked me to marry him.

01:56 The following summer, we were married in a London registry office. Me in a red vintage dress, him in an ill-fitting suit. He still looked really handsome. We cobbled together a reception at a pub down the road. A chef friend of ours and made a big chocolate cake, and we bought tons of boxed wine from a cash and carry.

So on my side, my family. There was my dad, very angry because I’d walked myself down the aisle. There were my extended family, the Buddhists, the Amnesty International members, the Liberals, the very earnest guests. On the other side was Carl’s family. They were different.

There was a man called Mickey Four Fingers, whose name really explains the man. There was a group of ex-cons whose gold jewellery competed for attention with their gold teeth. And then there was his dear dementia-ridden mum, Pat. She’d actually been a getaway driver for her naughty brothers in the 80s. She was an amazing woman, but now she just called everybody darling, very, very charmingly, but mainly because she didn’t really know where she was or who any of them were.

So it was a joyous, it was a sad, it was an awkward, it was a stressful occasion. And it made both of us yearn for elders that could be there to hold our hands in such big life events.

03:30 We both wanted to rocket away from our upbringings. Carl, partly for physical safety. Both of us, no, really for physical safety. Both of us for emotional safety. And together we did that. I also had ideas of success from 90s rom-coms and TV series.

You remember, The Party of Five, the O.C.. I had an idea that if I had a kitchen island,  freshly cut flowers, linen napkins and a gardener, like just a weekend one, then somehow the perfect TV family would just walk in.

04:09 So together, Carl and I did actually do some of that. We lived in the shishi neighborhood. I had a tiny dog that I carried under my arm, Raymond, because he couldn’t really walk very far. And our three kids, they went to a progressive private school where they called the teachers by their first name, didn’t wear uniform, and didn’t learn so much. But they were happy in their early years, at least.

I hadn’t had this kind of education, by the way. I’d been to a state school. I’d ended up at Cambridge. I’d really been like a happy geek at school. And sometimes Carl and I wondered what we were doing, kind of pushing ourselves to such an extent to make sure that our kids went to that kind of school. I think it was another idea of ours to be safe, to be successful.

But there wasn’t much joy in all of this, you know. We were just busy, frantically scrabbling up this hill all the time. Yeah, we had the kitchen island, we did have linen napkins, but they were grubby and they were mainly kept in the back of the kitchen cupboard.

So that Valentine’s evening, when Carl said to me he couldn’t live like this anymore, it cut through all of it. He kept saying to me, do you love me? Can you still love me? Do you love me?

And I kept saying, you are loved. Oh my God, you’re so loved. I felt angry. I felt angry at him. I felt angry at me. How could we have got this so wrong that the boy in the ill-fitting suit was asking me whether I still loved him?

I phoned our family doctor who said that she thought Carl was having a breakdown and that he needed medication and respite immediately. I phoned a friend whose husband had had a breakdown a few years earlier. And I remember standing on the front lawn in my pajamas. It was dark. I was freezing cold. And I was kind of whispering into the phone so my kids wouldn’t hear, so the neighbors wouldn’t hear. I mean, who cares?

So I realized that things had to change really quickly. This life of ours that we had created was a weight around us, and Carl in particular was gasping at the surface for air. I had to change things immediately. I knew it. So I told Carl that.

I said that we were going to move to my childhood home, that we were going to take the kids out of the school and we were going to do things very differently, and look after him. He’d always looked after us.

So I did that. It was a bit like triage, I suppose. I gave notice to the school. I started to pack up the house. And then I would drive out of London with my car filled to the brim to set up my kids’ bedrooms in advance of us moving. I would do that at that end. I would go to the tip, visit schools, and then drive home to London sobbing.

07:30 I felt like I’d… I’d just taken a shrinking pill. I felt like everyone in London with their game faces was saying, who did you think you were trying to live this big life? I felt ashamed. I felt ashamed for feeling ashamed. I remember saying to people, oh, please don’t tell them because I think it would make really good gossip. But then there are the people, and there are the moments that stand out for me.

There was the friend that flew across the ocean with squish mellows for my children and words for me saying, we have got this. We have got this. There were the class mums who organized my son’s birthday party. There was the woman in the playground who squeezed my hands because she could see I was feeling really wobbly.

All those signs of kindness had actually always been there, but I’d been too busy looking for other things. So for about 13 weeks, I lived on coffee, sausage rolls, and adrenaline, and by that April my kids were in their new school, Carl was beginning to resurface, and I could kind of exhale again.

That February 14th took the sheen off everything. I couldn’t give a fuck. Can I swear? I don’t know. I couldn’t care less about… I couldn’t give a fuck actually. About appearances suddenly. I just couldn’t. I felt like I’d woken up.

We lost the Deliveroo. We lost complicated cupcake flavors. We lost hotel people bar watching, which I love. We lost the perfect butter chicken tully. Oh, and we lost 24-hour access to buttons, chocolate buttons and Pringles. We lost the people for whom a postcode matters. Most surprisingly of all, we lost the fear.

Because, you know, when your life explodes and it morphs into something far better, the fear evaporates, disappears, distills, just goes into the atmosphere. I’m not scared anymore. There’s just like a little firefly of fear. And that’s to do with the health of the people that I love.

10:16 There was an afternoon last summer. I was sitting in the garden in the farmhouse that we now live in. And it was sunny. And I was watching my husband and my son tear up the lawn on the ride-on mower. There were my two girls, and they were leading their friend’s horse, Stan, to get a bowl of water just inside the front door.

And there was our cat, Tigger, failing to catch a mouse in the hedgerow. Tigger was an indoor cat, actually, in London. But now, well, gone is this skittish creature whose mood you could never predict. Instead, we have a creature that leaps up trees, parties all night, purrs by the fire. She knows exactly who she is. I think much like all of us.

11:10 Valentine’s Day. It reminded me that most success is a wiggly line on a grubby piece of graph paper. I used to think of success as tick, tick, tick, ambition, ambition, ambition. Now? Now I think of it as… Finding the people, finding the places that make you feel safe and bring you home.

Thanks.

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