Anne Lamott

For Anne Lamott, it goes Jesus, the cat, and then everyone else. Amy hangs with the 'Bird by Bird' author and talks about how she deals with bad reviews, binging on 'Below Deck' and People magazine, and dating someone who's allergic to cats. Host: Amy PoehlerGuests: Tina Fey and Anne LamottExecutive producers: Bill Simmons, Amy Poehler, and Jenna Weiss-BermanFor Paper Kite Productions: Executive producer Jenna Weiss-Berman, coordinator Sam Green, and supervising producer Joel LovellFor The Ringer: Supervising producers Juliet Litman, Sean Fennessey, and Mallory Rubin; video producers Jack Wilson and Aleya Zenieris; audio producer Kaya McMullen; social producer Bridget Geerlings; video editor Drew van Steenbergen; and bookers Kat Spillane and Paige GarbariniOriginal music: Amy Miles Check Allstate first for a quote that could save you hundreds: https://Allstate.com Switch today at https://visible.com for just 25/mo. Or get premium Visible+ pro plan and save $10 on your first month with code HANG. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:38Speaker 00

  Hello, everyone, and welcome to another episode of Good Hang. Very excited to have our guest on today. It is the great writer Anne Lamott. And I know we've had writers on before and authors, but this is an author author. This is a writer writer. You know what I mean? Anne Lamott is a bestselling author who has written such books as Bird by Bird and Traveling Mercies and Operating Instructions. And we're going to talk to Anne about so many good things today. We're going to talk about Jesus, and we're also going to talk about Mary. We're going to talk about being a, you know, a sweet and tender kid in San Francisco trying to figure out life. We're going to talk about finding love with people who are allergic to cats. And you love cats, and what do you do about it?

• 1:22Speaker 00

  And we're going to talk about her new book that she wrote with that love, her husband Neil Allen. And it is called Good Writing, and we're going to get into that. So lots to discuss today with Anne and thrilled that she's here. And, you know, I wanted to, I wanted to find somebody who loved Anne like I did and was a fan of her books. And I figured, why not go back to one of my nearest and dearest friends and friend of the pod, the one, the only, my favorite writer, Tina Fey. Tina?

• 1:53Speaker 00

  Tina Elizabeth Fey, are you there?

• 2:02Speaker 00

  This episode is presented by Allstate. Checking Allstate first could save you hundreds on car insurance. Not checking how long that recipe takes before you start cooking? Well, that's how you learn that simmer for four hours is buried halfway down the page. Yeah, checking first is a good idea. So check Allstate first for an auto quote. It could save you hundreds. You're in good hands with Allstate. Potential savings vary. Subject to terms, conditions, and availability. Allstate North American Insurance Company and Affiliates, Northbrook, Illinois.

• 2:42Speaker 00

  Hi.

• 2:43Speaker 01

  Hi.

• 2:44Speaker 00

  Hi. Betty, thank you for coming on again. You are an official friend of the pod. You've been on now, I think, 14, 15 times?

• 2:52Speaker 01

  I love it. The one time I came on, and remember, I was all dressed up like Gwyneth Paltrow. And nobody, nobody caught on that that was, that was me.

• 3:00Speaker 00

  Oh, my God, you were so good.

• 3:03Speaker 01

  I just do a really good Gwyneth Paltrow impression.

• 3:07Speaker 00

  Your hair looks incredible.

• 3:09Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 3:10Speaker 00

  Is this a blowout?

• 3:11Speaker 01

  This is a blowout. And I'm spending a lot, there's a lot of breakage, but we're just going to press through. We're going to press through.

• 3:18Speaker 00

  Are you at a point now where you're getting a blowout, even if you're not working?

• 3:21Speaker 01

  For my own sanity, sometimes I go like once a week, like a 1950s lady. Also, because of the thought of, of walking around my apartment with wet hair. I can't take it.

• 3:31Speaker 00

  Oh, yeah, yeah.

• 3:32Speaker 01

  Because I can't do hair. This is like something Anne might write about because it's an exercise in hope and faith. And every time I air dry my hair, I believe it's going to come out better. And it never does.

• 3:44Speaker 00

  Actually, Anne Lamott, who, you know, is an amazing writer. She's written fiction, she's written memoir, she's written, she's like an essayist. She's, she's self revealing. She, she's written in all different genres that I want to talk to her about today. She has also written about hair and like her hair, her body, like coming to terms with our like physical selves, like, and she, and she's really funny about it. Like how she tries to reconcile like we all do, like her physical parts.

• 4:18Speaker 01

  That was so interesting when you were talking to Carol Burnett, too, about, you know, how old do you feel? She's like, I feel 11. Didn't she say 11?

• 4:25Speaker 00

  11.

• 4:26Speaker 01

  Yeah, and I get that. And we do forget you, there, there are times when you, you absolutely feel that way and you just, and you absolutely forget about the carcass that you're in and how long it's been around.

• 4:40Speaker 00

  I asked you to do this first part because you and I have talked about Anne Lamott and how much we like her and like her writing. And I think there will be people listening to this pod today that will be diehard fans of hers and then people that might be discovering her work for the first time. If you were to talk to somebody who had never read her, how would you describe her as a writer?

• 5:05Speaker 01

  I would describe her writing as very honest and funny. And it's like meeting a new friend when you meet a friend who you instantly go, oh, you're, you're one of my people, you know? Because she's so direct and she is so, yeah, she's just so unguarded in her memoirs. And I also, I love the book Bird by Bird. I give that book to people all the time. Anyone interested in writing, any kid, you know, going to college. It's just, it's such a helpful, demystifying book about writing.

• 5:48Speaker 01

  And yeah, you know, Anne's books, I've turned to them many times in my adult life for, to, to, to take comfort. They, they are a comfort, you know? Traveling Mercies and Operating Instructions and Some Assembly Required, the different phases in your life, that those books are all a tremendous comfort. And they make you, they help you feel less insane.

• 6:10Speaker 00

  That's so true. Anne Lamott, I'm going to find out more about her today. I've been like reading her stuff in preparation for this. This is actually, this is the first writer I've ever, I mean, other than comedy writers like yourself and others, but like this is the first like writer, writer, writer.

• 6:26Speaker 01

  Pro's writer, yeah.

• 6:27Speaker 00

  Pro's writer, yes. It's a little more daunting to have, I feel like I need to work harder.

• 6:33Speaker 01

  No, I think it's going to be great. And I think, I was thinking too, like, oh, yeah, what can I ask her? And I was torn up, like, in some ways, I was like, well, I can't ask her to like minister to us. Because I want to be like, Anne, why is God taking only the good people? Do you know, Anne, why, what's happening?

• 6:52Speaker 00

  It's so funny you say that, Betty, because I, I feel like my instinct is to keep saying, Anne, how can we help, help? Like, Anne, can you tell me?

• 7:01Speaker 01

  Totally do, Anne.

• 7:02Speaker 00

  And I wonder, I want to ask her, like, does she get that a lot? Does she get people saying like, Anne, tell me how to? Because she does minister in her own way.

• 7:12Speaker 01

  In her own way, but it's probably tough to do on the spot. Can I tell you some things that I tried to make notes of, like, what you might want to ask her?

• 7:20Speaker 00

  Incredible, Tina, best student ever.

• 7:22Speaker 01

  You can cut any of this out because, okay.

• 7:24Speaker 00

  Please and thank you.

• 7:25Speaker 01

  Let me see. And I got some new glasses. Check them out.

• 7:28Speaker 00

  Let's see.

• 7:29Speaker 01

  They're a little more square.

• 7:31Speaker 00

  Oh, I love them.

• 7:34Speaker 01

  All right, let's see. Also, I had sort of a game that I thought maybe we could.

• 7:38Speaker 00

  Look at Tina doing all the work for me yet again. This, guys, I just, this isn't, this is an example of Tina's love language. I just want to point out, you ask her to do, hey, can you jump on for 15 minutes? And Tina does research and also offers up a game that she's thought of. This is how she shows her love, and I am forever grateful for it. Thank you.

• 7:59Speaker 01

  Thank you for knowing that about me. This is, this is my love language. Like, I'm not, if I had to buy like a physical gift, I would struggle. But this is all like that. As I said before, I would like her to minister to us and let, try to help us understand why God is only taking the good people and leaving all the turds behind.

• 8:20Speaker 01

  Then I started thinking like, it might be because she's a creative person. I wanted to ask her some would you rathers?

• 8:26Speaker 00

  Ooh.

• 8:27Speaker 01

  You have to say with those? So I'll just bang through these and you can edit them out as you see fit. Anne, would you rather only be allowed to eat pasta with butter for the rest of your life? Or you can have anything you want at any time, but all of your meals will be served on a moving bus? What about that?

• 8:49Speaker 01

  So if you're hungry, you have to go down, get the bus. Oh, my lights are ringing. And then you eat on the bus. Would you rather only be allowed to reread books you've already read? Or only be allowed to read new things and never look back?

• 9:05Speaker 00

  Oh, Tina, that's deep.

• 9:07Speaker 01

  Okay. And then this is the sort of the game I was gonna propose, which is because Anne is so open and revelatory about herself in her writing, we feel like we know her. We don't really know her. But there's a game that I like to play on road trips with my family, where you pick a person and then everyone, the way your family has to guess who, someone that you know and who they're thinking of, is you have to answer these questions like, okay, if this person was a breakfast cereal, what would they be? If this person was whatever. And so I thought, what if you and I, like, to try to answer these questions to describe Anne, but then ask her and see what she says? And see if we get close.

• 9:49Speaker 00

  Perfect. Okay.

• 9:51Speaker 01

  Okay. So here's the ones I had so far, which is, I started with, if Anne was a color, what color would she be? I'm gonna say sort of a burnt orange.

• 10:01Speaker 00

  I was just about to say a sunset orange.

• 10:04Speaker 01

  There we go.

• 10:04Speaker 00

  Oh, boy. Let's see what she says. I hope she gets it right.

• 10:08Speaker 01

  Because we're right. Why am I, look at my lights keep flickering. I'm gonna pay these bills. If Anne was a breakfast food, what do you think she would be?

• 10:19Speaker 00

  Let's not forget, she lives in California. So I'm gonna say like an avocado toast.

• 10:25Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 10:26Speaker 00

  What would you say?

• 10:27Speaker 01

  I'm gonna say, for some reason, I'm gonna say sort of like a porridge with probably some kind of nuts, probably, let's say, a California almond. And, you know, maybe some, maybe some fruits, but I think a lot of brown sugar, like a sneaky amount of brown sugar.

• 10:49Speaker 01

  Like a mound of brown sugar that renders it back to unhealthy.

• 10:55Speaker 00

  Perfect. Delicious.

• 10:57Speaker 01

  If Anne was a holiday within the year, what would she be?

• 11:01Speaker 00

  Oh, wow. This is a good one, because it really makes you think about what holidays you consider good and bad holidays. And I'm sure we've talked about this on this pod and elsewhere, but Tina and I don't always agree about what makes a good or bad holiday.

• 11:18Speaker 01

  I like a lot of holidays.

• 11:19Speaker 00

  Well, the biggest example being Halloween.

• 11:23Speaker 01

  Right. I like Halloween. Amy does not like Halloween.

• 11:26Speaker 00

  No. It's for children. Halloween is for children. I'm gonna say Thanksgiving.

• 11:32Speaker 01

  Thanksgiving. Yeah.

• 11:33Speaker 00

  You were gonna say that, too?

• 11:35Speaker 01

  I wrote Thanksgiving. Duh, obviously.

• 11:38Speaker 00

  Thanksgiving, duh. Okay, so I hope she gets that right.

• 11:41Speaker 01

  Because gratitude and community and, yeah.

• 11:45Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 11:45Speaker 01

  If, okay, what if she was a house pet? What kind of, some kind of pet?

• 11:49Speaker 00

  I think it's a cat.

• 11:51Speaker 01

  Yeah. I wrote down a cat also. And then I also wrote down kind of that maybe she's kind of like a Greek cat, the ones that kind of mostly live outside and are pretty self-sufficient. But they come around sometimes. Also, a little bit of a bearded dragon in that there's, I feel like there's a stillness, there's a watchful eyes, and that she is able to eat cockroaches and still get nutrition out of it.

• 12:16Speaker 00

  Still can't believe you have a bearded dragon in your house. You know what will happen is eventually, one morning, you will wake up and that will be, bearded dragon will be gone.

• 12:24Speaker 01

  Illuse in the house.

• 12:25Speaker 00

  Yep. And you're gonna fall asleep looking for it, and then it's gonna be on your chest, over your mouth, sucking your spirit out.

• 12:36Speaker 01

  Good luck. Good luck finding it.

• 12:40Speaker 01

  A day of the week. What day of the week do you think Anne would be?

• 12:43Speaker 00

  Well, I'm gonna say, it might be too on the nose, but I'm gonna say Sunday.

• 12:46Speaker 01

  Sunday.

• 12:47Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 12:48Speaker 01

  Sunday. Come on, Anne, you gotta get that right. Faith. And also, I think because it's a day where you kind of take it easy on yourself.

• 12:55Speaker 00

  So true. And you have a little bit of Sunday blues, which Anne isn't afraid of and isn't afraid of talking about.

• 13:01Speaker 01

  I bang my lights to that. Yes.

• 13:05Speaker 01

  That was all I prepared.

• 13:06Speaker 00

  Okay, this is a perfect game. This is so fun. Of course, Betty, you come with a fully realized, written game.

• 13:12Speaker 01

  Oh, God bless.

• 13:13Speaker 00

  God bless is right. Thank you for that.

• 13:15Speaker 01

  I'll see you very soon.

• 13:17Speaker 00

  I will see you very soon. Thanks for your time. Love you.

• 13:20Speaker 01

  Bye. Love you, too.

• 13:20Speaker 00

  Bye.

• 13:23Speaker 00

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• 14:09Speaker 00

  Anne Lamott brought me a, um, a package.

• 14:14Speaker 02

  A care package.

• 14:15Speaker 00

  Oh, my gosh, how are you?

• 14:16Speaker 02

  Good.

• 14:17Speaker 00

  Thank you for doing this.

• 14:18Speaker 02

  Are you kidding?

• 14:20Speaker 00

  Can I open it now? First of all, beautifully wrapped.

• 14:22Speaker 02

  Thank you.

• 14:23Speaker 00

  Did you wrap it?

• 14:24Speaker 02

  I had a lot of trouble with it. I want to say, I had a lot of trouble.

• 14:28Speaker 00

  Are you a good wrapper?

• 14:29Speaker 02

  Could I have the ribbon back?

• 14:30Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 14:31Speaker 02

  Yeah, the ribbon's great. Unless you really want it.

• 14:33Speaker 00

  No, the ribbon is beautiful.

• 14:34Speaker 02

  Yeah. It's my best ribbon.

• 14:36Speaker 00

  But what's the present?

• 14:37Speaker 02

  Okay. There's a bunch of things. What is that? Okay, that's from Mexico. That's the hand of God. But it's a really special one, because it not only has Mother Mary, it has a baby goat.

• 14:49Speaker 00

  Oh, wow.

• 14:50Speaker 02

  Don't you love Mary? I mean, how can you not love Mary? Right?

• 14:55Speaker 00

  I want to talk about Mary.

• 14:56Speaker 02

  All right, we'll talk about Mary. I love her.

• 14:58Speaker 00

  I love her.

• 14:58Speaker 02

  That's my favorite, favorite pair of socks. I got them in Paris, but they're from Japan. I only worn them once, but not for years. But I've always saved them because they were so incredible.

• 15:10Speaker 00

  They're beautiful.

• 15:10Speaker 02

  Yeah. You know, sometimes if you feel worried or lonely and you put on socks that someone gave you, they just can change your whole day around.

• 15:18Speaker 00

  Oh, Anne, I love these. Thank you for this. This is so nice.

• 15:22Speaker 02

  Okay, now, this is really special. You know, I hang out with a lot of sober people. And when COVID happened, the old ladies at my favorite women's group started making miracle bracelets for the young, the newcomers, the women and girls who came in who were brand new in COVID, which made everything. So I never wear these unless I need a miracle. And that means I'm feeling very mentally ill and tweaked and clenched and clutched. Then I go get a miracle bracelet and I put it on. And I think, I'm gonna keep my hands off the spaceship till I hear back from God or whatever she's up to today. And so then I put that on. And I'm not kidding, it works 100% of the time.

• 16:03Speaker 00

  This is a beautiful beaded miracle bracelet. And I will say, it has a little bit of like a Taylor Swift energy, too, which I've.

• 16:08Speaker 02

  Oh, I've never heard about. Oh, this is the best thing. Wait, wait, wait, you have to look at the cover.

• 16:14Speaker 00

  Pocket blessings by blessings abound. Okay, so I'm opening up a tiny box with what looks like a little ribbon inside. And Anne, just to, just to let everybody know again, Anne has brought me a beautiful box of gifts. And here's one that has tiny blessings. Oh, and it's a little blessing.

• 16:31Speaker 02

  A little scroll.

• 16:32Speaker 00

  A little scroll. Oh, wow. A little scroll with a blessing in it.

• 16:38Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 16:39Speaker 00

  Oh, my gosh. Do you know?

• 16:42Speaker 00

  Anne knows. Oh, and it says, you are a blessing. Coming in real hot, Anne Lamott, coming in with all of these gifts. I mean, you've already given me so much, and here we are with this beautiful box. Anne Lamott is with me. And I'm so thrilled. You know, when I was thinking about being with you today and thinking about what we were gonna talk about, or what I should talk to you about and all that stuff, I just had the moment where, a moment you would remind me to have, which is like, oh, don't forget, you're just gonna be in each other's company.

• 17:16Speaker 02

  Right. We're just hanging.

• 17:18Speaker 00

  I know.

• 17:19Speaker 02

  I know. We've never gotten to be together. We've had this really nice friendship, but we've never been in actual touch before.

• 17:26Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 17:26Speaker 02

  I mean, it's funny, because I feel like if I wrote to you and said, Amy, I'm in, I need you, you'd say, okay.

• 17:34Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 17:34Speaker 02

  What do you need? And if you said that to me, I'd say, okay, I'm there. What do you need? And I would show up.

• 17:40Speaker 00

  I know.

• 17:40Speaker 02

  Wherever you were. Isn't that funny? We've never actually been in the same room together.

• 17:44Speaker 00

  I feel that, too. I really do. I, I.

• 17:47Speaker 02

  It's funny.

• 17:48Speaker 00

  You know, you are a person who I just said, will you be my friend? And you said, yes, I'd love to be your friend. And it's a good, I always love to be reminded that I haven't met all the people I'm supposed to meet, and I'm not friends with all the people I'm supposed to be friends with. And I feel like you and your writing and the way you. Include all of us in your life and your world is why I feel emboldened to do things like that. So, thank you. You're our first author that we've ever had on Good Hang.

• 18:18Speaker 02

  Oh, wow.

• 18:19Speaker 00

  And it means a lot to me that you're doing this. When I talk to other actors and performers, I feel like we're, I don't know, we're sharing a vocabulary, but there is a funny thing that happens with writers where people like myself want to make sure that we sound smart.

• 18:41Speaker 02

  I know. Well, I feel that too, all the time with everyone. Oh, yeah, yeah. And I have to do a special draft of everything I write where I go through and I take out the lies and I go through and I take out all the stuff that I just shoehorned in so that people think I'm smarter than I am or that I'm educated.

• 18:59Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 19:00Speaker 02

  And then I take it and I go, it's okay, honey. You're just where you are. It's fine.

• 19:04Speaker 00

  Isn't it funny? We just keep doing it. Same thing with like advice. Like someone told me one time, like, wait until someone asks you for advice to give it and no one ever asks. No one ever actually asks, what do you think I should do?

• 19:18Speaker 02

  That's so hurtful. Well, Amy, what do you think I should do?

• 19:22Speaker 00

  I think you should just keep doing what you're doing.

• 19:24Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 19:25Speaker 00

  I feel, I feel like, Anne, do you get this a lot? Because I'm already feeling this way where people say to you, Anne, tell me, like, do they want you to kind of emotionally lay hands on them and make them feel better or different? Do you find that people ask out of you?

• 19:42Speaker 02

  A little bit.

• 19:43Speaker 00

  Yeah. What's that like?

• 19:44Speaker 02

  Well, you know, I've been a Sunday school teacher for 32 years, so I have a lot of tricks up my sleeve. I've recently retired, but I always do this thing with my kids and it's a tiny failing church. So, there might be four kids there and they could be a four year old, up to a 15 year old, right? And I do this thing called Loved and Chosen with them. And so, I might go, is there anyone here wearing a sort of navy shirt with pink grid on it? Well, you know how little kids are, they go?

• 20:15Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 20:16Speaker 02

  And wave at me. And I go, oh, Amy, you are loved and chosen as is. Why don't you come sit with me for a minute? And I do, but it might be like, is anyone wearing Pokemon shoelaces, right? But that's what I just try to convey to people that, you know, you're loved and chosen and you're exactly where you're supposed to be. And I really care. And can I get you a glass of water?

• 20:38Speaker 00

  You know, you're reminding me of when Mr. Rogers used to say the names at the end of his show. Remember that? And he would look through and say, NIC, and he would say all these names. And you'd be kind of waiting to see if your name came up, if he could see you. It was such, that's an example of just like little people and big people. They just want to be seen.

• 20:57Speaker 02

  They just want to be seen. So do we.

• 20:59Speaker 00

  Yeah, we all want to, I mean, that truly, if I was to sum up what your writing does for me is it makes me feel less alone and it makes me feel seen. And it also gets rid of the mystery of things that I think keeps us apart from each other. I want to talk about all of that today and all the stuff that you've written. And I kind of want to start, if it's okay, with talking about the stuff that you write currently in real time, all the time, because you're here to talk about your new book that you wrote with your wonderful husband, Neil. What are your steps when you're working on something where you're calling yourself out, where you're taking?

• 21:41Speaker 02

  I edit me the way I would edit you. I edit me with a lot of gentleness. I'd say to me or you, I'd say, you know what, Amy, I love this, but I think maybe it goes somewhere else, not in this piece you just handed me, which means it doesn't work here at all. But I would say it in that way.

• 21:58Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 21:59Speaker 02

  And I would say, it just feels a little bit like on the first page, like you're sort of clearing your throat a little bit. But on page two, you start to get into it. And that's where you caught my, you know, that's how I would talk to you. Now, also, I know you're a parent of sins also. And, you know, nothing worked, right? But bribes and threats. I mean, anything else? No. Bribes and threats. So, I'll say, okay, Annie, if you write this one passage, we're going to stop and go for a walk. We're going to stop and watch MSNBC. We're going to stop and have a half a sandwich, you know?

• 22:34Speaker 00

  Yeah, treats at the end.

• 22:35Speaker 02

  And threats. If you don't.

• 22:39Speaker 02

  And so, I'm strict and friendly with myself when I'm working and writing. And I do a lot of bribes and threats. And somehow, you know, and then I write incredibly terrible first drafts. And then I go back and I take out half.

• 22:57Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 22:57Speaker 02

  I take out half. And that part's so painful. I don't know if it's the same with you as a comedian, but it's like you hate to just lose something, you know, that you loved and thought really worked.

• 23:07Speaker 00

  Well, anytime you think anything works, it usually goes away. Like, it's always like, oh, that's the best joke. And it never makes the movie, never makes the sketch because you just, you've become so attached to it. You're just like in love with it. And then someone goes, well, you could lose this first piece. And you're like, my favorite joke?

• 23:26Speaker 02

  I know. We can't be friends anymore. I know. Jessica Mitford, the great writer from Oakland, said, you have to kill your little darlings.

• 23:34Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 23:34Speaker 02

  And you have to go through. And all those lines I use to try to get you to think something about me, like that I'm smarter than, better than, more ironic, anything. I just have to cut because then I'm going to hand it to my husband, my current husband, Neil Allen. And he is going to notice it. And he's going to say, you just don't need this. And he's going to mark it. So, it's better just to do it before.

• 23:55Speaker 00

  Now, you refer to Neil as your current husband. Why?

• 23:58Speaker 02

  Well, he's also my first husband. Yeah. I got married three days after I started getting social security.

• 24:05Speaker 00

  I cannot wait to talk to you about that because the way you write about and have shared your feeling about partnering up and later in life is like, I've gotten so much from it. But before we get there, I discovered you with Hard Laughter, which was that your first book?

• 24:23Speaker 02

  It's my first book. That was 45 years ago.

• 24:26Speaker 00

  Wow. How old were you when you wrote that book?

• 24:28Speaker 02

  I was 24 when I, I was 24 when I sold it. I think I was 25 when I published it. Yeah. I mean, it was just an amazing break.

• 24:37Speaker 00

  How, what was that, how did you get that first break? How did you go from writing and being published?

• 24:43Speaker 02

  Well, my dad's agent had always agreed to represent me if I ever wrote anything representable. My dad was a well-known writer. And I kept sending her these stories. And you know what they do before you kind of hit, before you really come up with something? Oh, this, it's like when a kid makes you something like an ashtray out of clay with a dent for the cigarettes. Did you make that? So much. She was, I was like, oh, did you make that? And they were just terrible. And then my dad got sick, which as you know, from Hard Laughter, he got a metastasized melanoma in his brain. And we knew he wasn't going to make it because no one ever had yet in 77. And so, I started writing a book

• 25:24Speaker 02

  about how a family stays afloat when, you know, an anvil has dropped on the family, when the center of the family is not going to be there forever. And a lot of it was that we were laughing, you know? And it was black gallows humor. And I've always said that laughter is carbonated holiness. If you're laughing in a really tough patch of time, you're on holy ground. And my brothers are funny. And I wanted to write a love letter to my dad so he would know how my brothers and I felt about him. And so, I changed it a bit in that there was always a little bit of hope in the novel that he was going to be okay, which we knew he wasn't. And I sent off six chapters and my agent

• 26:10Speaker 02

  loved it. And it was really rough.

• 26:14Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 26:14Speaker 02

  You know, it's just like she saw the diamond in the rough or something, you know? And she showed it to an editor at Viking, Cork Smith, and he loved it. It was the strangest.

• 26:26Speaker 00

  And you were writing it while your dad was ill, right?

• 26:29Speaker 02

  And I finished it and sold it by the time, while his brain was still working. The last eight months or so, he was really not very functional. But he, you know, called me to tell me and had read it and loved it. And I mean, that was like the great miracle of my life.

• 26:44Speaker 00

  Wow.

• 26:45Speaker 02

  Yeah. But the first two reviews I got were pre-pub reviews, Publishers Weekly and Kirkus. And I got them in the mail. I mean, I don't know if your audience is even familiar with waiting for mail to find out news about your career and your finances. But I got these in the mail from my agent and they just were terrible reviews. They just said, we hate her. She's right about thinking she's a loser, as demonstrated in this new novel.

• 27:16Speaker 00

  So, you get your first terrible reviews and you have to make a decision there about what you're going to do with them. What do you do with them? Where do you put them?

• 27:22Speaker 02

  Well, then there were, then I got, it was amazing. Well, luckily, I was still drinking at the time. So, I got through that. And then by, I didn't have a cent literally in the world, but by hook and by crook and by good friends, I got the money together to go to New York for publication. And Anne Tyler, one of my favorite writers to this day, wrote this rave in the New York Times Book Review.

• 27:47Speaker 00

  Wow.

• 27:48Speaker 02

  So, right. So, then you think I've arrived. I'm the queen of the hill. I'm the total princess of all the earth. And then, of course, the next day, you get a bad one.

• 27:57Speaker 00

  Totally.

• 28:02Speaker 00

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• 30:54Speaker 00

  Amy. I was reading something you wrote, and I shared it with my friends just the other day, because you do often engage with the world and you kind of like tell us, like, I know it's bad out there. You do the opposite of gaslighting, basically, which is like, here's the bad things that happened this week, I saw it too, what should we do about it? And the what should we do about it is never anything that feels, I don't know, it just feels simple and right and real, and we're all kind of working it out together. Would you mind reading something that you wrote?

• 31:31Speaker 02

  No.

• 31:32Speaker 00

  Okay, so it's just this, so it was this little section here, because I wanted to ask you about it. It was when you were 68 and you were writing about that year.

• 31:41Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 31:42Speaker 00

  Okay.

• 31:43Speaker 02

  But turning 68 means you weren't born yesterday. Turning 68 means you've seen what you've seen. Ukraine, Sandy Hook, the permafrost, Marjorie Taylor Greene. By 68, you have seen dear friends literally ravaged by cancer, lost children, unspeakable losses, the midterms are coming up, my mind is slipping, my dog died. Really, to use the theological terms, it is just too frigging much. And regrettably, by 68, one is both seriously uninterested in a vigorous debate on the existence of evil, or even worse, a pep talk. So what does that leave? Glad you asked.

• 32:28Speaker 02

  The answer is simple: a few very best friends with whom you can share your truth. That's the main thing. By 68, you know that the whole system of our lives works because we are not all nuts on the same day. You call someone and tell them that you hate everyone in all of life, and they will be glad you called. They felt that way three days ago, and you helped pull them out of it by making them laugh or a cup of tea, you took them for a walk or to Target.

• 32:57Speaker 00

  The idea that we're all not nuts on the same day, I mean, talk about a blessing, and it is exactly what we're still dealing with right now, which is like, what do we do? The world just keeps spinning out of control. Things just feel darker and darker and darker. What do we do? We make each other tea.

• 33:16Speaker 02

  We make each other tea, and we try to shine a little brighter by, you know, laughter shines us up a bit. And so goodness and fresh air and radical self-care, you know, you might binge on Below Deck or Don't Tell Anyone, but People Magazine. Always, right? And radical self-care. You do what you would do with a close friend, you know? And with a close friend, if she isn't even worse shaped than you are, you're the one that says, I'm on my way. I'll be there in 15 minutes, bring your wallet.

• 33:51Speaker 00

  I mean, we, I talk about it a lot here and just kind of show by example all of the friends that give so much to me and that I feel so proud to be a part of their group. But I feel like female friendship is...

• 34:07Speaker 02

  It's different.

• 34:08Speaker 00

  It's different. Why is it different, Anne?

• 34:10Speaker 02

  Well, it's different because we have always been so much more emotional and truth-telling than men. They weren't raised to tell the truth, they were raised to look good, you know? They were raised to seem or be powerful or to amass more prestige and power and money and whatever. And we understood, I mean, women, our bodies are messy, the work of women is messy, we're the, you know, in the Christian tradition, we're the last at the cross and the first at the cave, you know? And we're there for birth and death, and we're comfortable, we get comfortable with it, you know? I was literally saved by girlfriends, the way other people are saved by Jesus or Buddha, and I mean that literally. I was literally saved by chapter books, too, and I mean that literally.

• 34:53Speaker 02

  I meant, it meant that no matter what the world threw at with me, I could still be with Shelley Adams tomorrow. When I'm six years old and I'm 72 soon, and Shelley Adams and I still walk two or three times a week. And when I, when the world has just thrown all this horrible bleak stuff at me, get in bed with Ann Tyler or Barbara Kingsolver, and there's going to be truth, and there's going to be laughter, and there's going to be insight, and there's going to be, it's going to comfort my entire soul. And I feel that, and I love a lot of men writers, a lot of men, and I've been influenced them, but I turn to women writers for truth and comfort.

• 35:30Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 35:31Speaker 02

  I just do.

• 35:32Speaker 00

  I feel the same, and I, and I think you're, I feel like by reading your writing over the years, I've also got to walk with your friends. Like, you bring your friends in your work a lot, and you do that wonderful thing that is so loving, which is, because to me, teasing is kind of a love language. And the way you tease when your friends tell you the truth, like when you talk about horrible Bonnie, for example, like, could you, could you speak about...

• 35:58Speaker 02

  Horrible Bonnie was my mentor when I first got sober, which was in 1986. And I was called her Horrible Bonnie because no matter what I had on my mind when I called her, and it might be disgusting, like for a new drunk, barely sober woman, and she'd always say, "Oh, dearest, I am so glad you called." And then she would say, "Everything was going to sort out at the end," which is what John Lennon says. John Lennon says, "Everything will work out in the end. If it doesn't look okay, it's not the end," you know? And so Mary Baker Eddy, the mother of all-new thought of Eckhart Tolle, Marianne Williamson, everybody says that. But Bonnie would say it in this loving mother, grandmother voice.

• 36:41Speaker 02

  And at first I go, "Oh, no, I don't think you're, you know, I think, I don't think you understand the complexity of the..." And she would just say, "Oh, I know, darling." And so I was called her Horrible Bonnie, because she'd always ruin my bad moods, and she'd always make me have hope and faith again. And that when you're with people that help you understand that it's the inside person that just needs to feel, to connect with their loving, sweet, generous heart, that is literally what heaven on earth is like, is when you connect with how generous your heart is, even though your mind is like, you know, cranky and cringey and trying to figure out who to blame. In my case, I think you're fine. But in my case, usually the default step is to figure out who to blame.

• 37:25Speaker 00

  Oh, yeah.

• 37:26Speaker 02

  Right? And then I can relax.

• 37:28Speaker 00

  Oh, I mean, and also, you know, I don't know about you, but of the two emotions, anger and hurt, I'd much rather be angry than hurt.

• 37:36Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah.

• 37:37Speaker 00

  I mean, angry all the way.

• 37:38Speaker 02

  All the way.

• 37:39Speaker 00

  So I'd much rather be mad than sad.

• 37:41Speaker 02

  Oh, of course.

• 37:42Speaker 00

  Sad's the, sad is, is not where I want to live.

• 37:45Speaker 02

  No. So let me tell you what is in between those, I think, and it's one of the things I wrote down. What keeps happening when we feel that separation from, like if we're hot, if we've been hurt, or if we've gotten the bad review, or we've gotten the, you know, neglected, or kind of blown off or whatever, paradoxically...

• 38:07Speaker 02

  What I feel and what I think a lot of the women I'm close to have felt, you just go into that shame spiral.

• 38:12Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 38:12Speaker 02

  Right? Instead of just crying or feeling grief.

• 38:15Speaker 00

  Yeah. So tell people what operating instructions for people who haven't read it is about.

• 38:19Speaker 02

  Well, okay, let me go back and say, when my dad got sick, I did what you do. You go to the library and you look for books by people you respect, who have been through a similar circumstance, and you read how they got through it. It's our only hope, mine, most of the time. And, but there were no books in the 70s about cancer because it was unseemly. You didn't talk about death or dying.

• 38:42Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 38:43Speaker 02

  You know, it was just like, whoa, what a buzzkill, right? And so when I had a baby, I went to the library to find books. And I was single and I was broke, as usual. And there was just nothing about the fact that it can be so boring.

• 38:58Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 38:59Speaker 02

  And I had an infant and pretty soon the infant got colic. And I would started write, I started keeping this journal. And like, I'd write things like that one night, just strung out on that exhaustion. It's unbelievable. I thought about wrapping up my baby really carefully in blankets and putting him on the porch for the night, just so I could get one night's sleep. Because, you know, it's like, put your own oxygen mask on first. And no one had written stuff like that yet.

• 39:27Speaker 00

  No.

• 39:27Speaker 02

  Or I had written at one point, I thought he had gone down and I could cry with my love for him. And then I wrote, oh, God, now he's raised his loathsome reptilian head. And no one had written that before.

• 39:39Speaker 00

  That's right.

• 39:40Speaker 02

  And so people were like, oh, my God. So then the next book after that was my first writing book, which was called Bird by Bird.

• 39:46Speaker 00

  Right.

• 39:47Speaker 02

  So it went from that to Bird by Bird. And then I think I wrote some more novels.

• 39:52Speaker 00

  Now, the thing about operating instructions, and I remember reading it before I had kids. And you didn't, I didn't understand, I understood later what you were actually really talking about, about that, that those early times when you feel sleep deprived and like, the only one getting it wrong and all that stuff. You're right, what you did, it's still transgressive, still, to say, I'm not completely and madly in love.

• 40:19Speaker 00

  I'm actually really stressed out and I'm not feeling the bliss I'm supposed to feel. Or I don't think I'm doing it right. Or there is still this crazy amount of pressure for young mothers to have to instantly be in love with the new role that they have.

• 40:37Speaker 02

  Right. The shame of being a parent is just something that just hadn't been talked about at all.

• 40:41Speaker 00

  Even the realization that your parents are people is a relatively new idea. That your, that your mother is, was a girl and that your, your parents are people. It's not that old of a thought. Yeah.

• 40:55Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's true. So then I want to do the same thing with writing, because all existent writing books said, if you did certain things, probably an outline, and this and that and the other, that it, things would go well and you would almost certainly sell your book. And then you would have really, really good self-esteem all the time. And I wanted to say, this is how I do it. I sit down and it goes badly most days. I sit down with the bad self-esteem and the raging ego ping pong game, and I start writing and it's awful. It's unreadable. It's god awful. But I have a secret. I keep my butt in the chair and I know to write really terrible first drafts. I know, and a lot of writing students don't believe

• 41:40Speaker 02

  that the writers they love most in the world, the books they love most in the world began as god awful, overly long, purple prose first drafts.

• 41:50Speaker 00

  But Annie, do you ever find other writers pushing back on the idea or your ideas of that? Because when you say that, what you're doing is you're opening up, you're like, you know, people always believe there's some kind of special room.

• 42:05Speaker 02

  Right.

• 42:06Speaker 00

  That only certain people are allowed to go into. And there's certain vocabulary that keeps people out of the room. And when you open up the door and say, come into the room, or here's how we do it here, other people that are in the room don't always like it.

• 42:16Speaker 02

  Right.

• 42:16Speaker 00

  Do you ever feel that? Or did you ever feel that when you were first writing about writing?

• 42:20Speaker 02

  Almost everyone I've talked to, ever, about writing has said, oh, that's the same with me. Yeah, but I just keep my butt in the chair and I bribe, I use bribes and threats. Now, it's funny, because yesterday Nate Silver, the legendary Nate Silver, out of nowhere, not referencing me, said, people talk about writing first drafts and that it's okay not to get it right as you're going. So I find that a great waste of time or something like that. Then I thought, well, that must be so nice.

• 42:48Speaker 00

  Yeah, to have a fully formed.

• 42:49Speaker 02

  To be, to have a fully formed thing. It's like when right wing Christians tell you what the truth is and you think, God, that just must be so nice to be so sure of yourself. Like, I never am.

• 43:00Speaker 00

  Yeah, like, no one ever is.

• 43:02Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 43:02Speaker 00

  Well, okay, you, you, you talk about right wing Christians and Christianity, and we've talked a lot about spirituality. And you, did you find your faith through sobriety? Is that when you became?

• 43:17Speaker 02

  No, I found my faith drunk. I'd always believed in God and my parents were atheists. So we weren't, and I know you were raised Catholic. And that, that's a very beautiful way to have been raised. I mean, some issues.

• 43:31Speaker 02

  Putting that aside.

• 43:35Speaker 00

  But. Where did you first find God as an atheist?

• 43:40Speaker 02

  I was living across, I was on a houseboat, literally twice the size of this table, with a sleeping loft and salletto. And, and I would be so hungover and I'd walk across the street to this flea market that was in this economically totally deprived place where the crack epidemic had taken place, mostly people of color, six churches in a place of 2,000 people. So, and there was this, because when you're hungover, you want kind of greasy food and a lot of coffee. And, and I would hear music from the civil rights movement coming out of this one ramshackle church with this horrible,

• 44:20Speaker 02

  Charlie Brown Christmas tree out in front of Pine Tree that, you know, it looked like Bertrand Russell at the end. And, but I could hear this music coming. And I had been raised on civil rights music and on Joan Baez and the Weavers and Pete Seeger. And I knew all the words. And sometimes I think grace means you've just run out of any more good ideas. And I'd run out of any more good ideas. I'd tried everything. I tried to stick to four or five social drinks and the non-habit forming marijuana on it, and, and some pills. And one day at a time, and I couldn't.

• 44:54Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 44:54Speaker 02

  So I finally went and I sat down in this church. And the thing was, they know, there's like 30 or 40 people, same church, that I've been at all these 41 years now. And they didn't try to hassle me. They didn't try to get me to sign on or to come to Bible study or to figure out anything or to figure out who shot the Holy Ghost. They just could see I was desperate and lonely. That's the G O D acronym of the gift of desperation. And I sat there and I was like desperate, but like crabby, you know?

• 45:32Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 45:32Speaker 02

  And I couldn't relate to people, but they got me water. I always left before the sermons because I didn't want too much of the Jesus stuff.

• 45:40Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 45:40Speaker 02

  And then little by little, it just ground me down. Little by little, I started staying. And I just always got, and I got while I was drinking and trying to be other religions, that Jesus was this sweet, sweet shepherd, you know? And he just, and he had this incredible mother. And that it was the ultimate as-is program. And that as I was, which was horrible and messy and promiscuous and nuts, although charming, I mean, had a perfect life. I had, I had three books published. I was well-known in the community. Everybody I loved lived in my county, my mom, my brothers, my cousins.

• 46:23Speaker 02

  And, but my insights were like Swiss cheese. And little by little, I could kind of bear the Jesus part. And, and so I started sticking around. And one day I was walking to my houseboat on the, along the dock. And I just, this is going to sound like I'm crazy, but I could just feel them. And I could feel them like if a little cat, a little stray cat was running alongside me. And I didn't want a little stray cat. And all my friends are progressive activists. They all worked at Mother Jones at the time. And it was like I was kind of kicking the little cat away, go away. Because you feed a little stray cat, it's not a stray cat anymore. You probably own a cat now, right? I'm not stupid. So, but then I finally just stopped.

• 47:05Speaker 02

  And I don't, this was grace, which is spiritual WD-40, you know? With that long, thin, red straw that's, and it squirted me. And I just said, okay, fine, come on in.

• 47:18Speaker 00

  So has it, now that that little cat came, what is that? What, how has your faith changed? Like, I think for people, when they think about faith, I think sometimes they think of it like a bank account that just, you know, like, an account that gets bigger and bigger. Like, you get more and more and more faithful.

• 47:35Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 47:36Speaker 00

  Is that how it works? Does it go away and come back? Does the cat go away sometimes and come back? Does it, what, how does it change?

• 47:43Speaker 02

  Because I, I do the work, you know, I do the practice and I study.

• 47:47Speaker 00

  And the practice keeps it.

• 47:48Speaker 02

  And I do, I read the Bible a little bit every morning. And my friends believe in God and a lot of them believe in Jesus and in a non-annoying way. And, and I just, that has, I mean, my best friend died, as you know, from operating instructions when I was not that sober.

• 48:07Speaker 00

  And how old were you again, Annie?

• 48:09Speaker 02

  When she died?

• 48:09Speaker 00

  Yeah. How old was she and you?

• 48:11Speaker 02

  She was 37.

• 48:12Speaker 00

  That's right.

• 48:12Speaker 02

  I think I was 37 too. And I got sober when I was 32 and I had a two, three-year-old, no, two-year-old. And, and it was very, very scary. And I wrote about it a lot in operating instructions. But, you know, I, I don't have an interesting or sophisticated theological, no different than that day with the stray cat. I have the theological understanding like a really bright second grader, you know? And I, I don't have conversations, I'm not asked to have conversations about the triune nature of the deity, you know? People will say, I can't feel God anymore. I can't feel God right now. And I'll say, oh, good, why don't you sit down, let's have a cup of tea? Or do you want to go, you want to go shopping? You want to go for a walk?

• 48:57Speaker 02

  Or do you want to lie down on the couch with me? And so I don't have interesting intellectual answers about faith. I just can feel it, its truth in me. I just feel it in my heart. It's like I have a heart cave. And in it is my little one, my little Annie that I always was, and, and my big old Annie, and, and Jesus and Mary. And I can just feel them and I. For whatever reason, I just let it go at that.

• 49:25Speaker 00

  Yeah, I mean, even my question is interesting that I'm realizing because I think there's like this idea that there's some deep second chamber, third chamber to all of it, right? Like that there's some, like, did you get to level 10?

• 49:38Speaker 02

  I didn't. I didn't.

• 49:41Speaker 00

  I mean, there is none. I mean, that's the, that's the big thing you find out in every department of life, which is like, you think there's some secret room where all the cooler people, smarter people, more evolved people are, and there isn't.

• 49:55Speaker 02

  And there isn't. There's just where we are, where our butts are, where our hearts are. I know. Well, um, yeah, I keep it very simple. I keep it very practical. Can I ask you something?

• 50:05Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 50:06Speaker 02

  Do you think this is going okay?

• 50:08Speaker 00

  Oh, my God, I think this is going great.

• 50:09Speaker 02

  Oh, okay, good.

• 50:10Speaker 00

  Let's ask Jenna, though. She's listening, Jenna.

• 50:12Speaker 02

  Okay, good.

• 50:13Speaker 00

  I think this is going great.

• 50:14Speaker 02

  Oh, okay, good.

• 50:15Speaker 00

  And thank you for asking that. And I love that you asked that because what I wanted to say about, like, you are willing to kind of keep, you, you keep checking in.

• 50:26Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 50:27Speaker 00

  Like, it's important to check in, but that is, that's not always easy to do, to check in and like, kind of dip your toe into the, like, there's the way in which we can kind of all live in our worlds of, I don't know, our comfort, comfortable worlds. And then we kind of sometimes, especially when we get older, I know for myself, have to kind of force ourselves to get uncomfortable. Like, we, we, comfort is really nice.

• 50:49Speaker 02

  Right, right. But you also discover that it's in the discomfort and the dark nights of the soul that the growth and the healing happens. Because I would be four foot seven if I had had anything to do with how, how I was gonna grow. I don't like discomfort. I don't like growing pains. I don't like mess. It makes me crazy. I've been sober 40 years, and I've discovered that that is where it's gonna happen. It's like, I'm not, and Jesus doesn't have a magic wand and tap you on the head and say, go forth, little one, you know, be happy and joyful. But Jesus, and Jesus in the distressing form of other people usually, sits down next to you, shoulder to shoulder, and says, you know, I can just

• 51:31Speaker 02

  sit here for as long as you need, and we'll breathe together, and things will change.

• 51:35Speaker 00

  So do you believe this idea of, like, other, other difficult people are gurus for you? You know that when someone's like, oh, he's your guru, she's your guru? Like, this horrible person is in your life for some reason?

• 51:48Speaker 02

  I feel that later.

• 51:49Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 51:50Speaker 02

  I can tell when I'm really uncomfortable because somebody's annoying me, or, or they just seem so stupid or so wrong.

• 51:58Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 51:59Speaker 02

  I can tell that something good is gonna come of it in me. But I'm not, I don't want to sit next to them at the table. And it's like in, in one of the many 12-step programs I'm in, this, there's one for people with tiny control issues. They use the word intimacy to mean into me I see. And when I have that feeling of I'm seeing in me, I don't love it. I'm not avoiding the beautiful, generous, silly, playful. I'm avoiding the parts that is scared, that are scared and judgmental, that endless judgment. And, but, you know, if you want to heal it, you got to reveal it. And as soon as I can see it, and I share it with my best girlfriend, I start to get better.

• 52:39Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 52:39Speaker 02

  You know, people say, oh, let go and let God. And I just want to poke him in the forehead with a plastic fork like they're a baked potato, because if I could have let go and let God, I definitely would have, trust me.

• 52:51Speaker 00

  Well, that's when people say, like, oh, you just have to feel your feelings. And I'm like, you gotta be kidding me.

• 52:56Speaker 02

  Oh, stop.

• 52:57Speaker 00

  Please? Like, there's gotta be another way.

• 53:01Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 53:01Speaker 00

  Than actually feeling your feelings.

• 53:03Speaker 02

  I know, no, definitely.

• 53:04Speaker 00

  Barf.

• 53:04Speaker 02

  But reveal, sharing it with a friend, because then you, at some point, you start laughing. Maybe you cry because a person's saying, you know, I have that exact same thing, and I have a lot of shame around it. And it's that kind of short, core shame that you might be disgusting or not okay. It's not truth, though.

• 53:22Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 53:23Speaker 02

  It's not truth. It's something that, like, my husband Neil, and we need to segue to Neil in a minute, but he does this work with-

• 53:29Speaker 00

  I love Anne, is just like quietly controlling this interview.

• 53:32Speaker 02

  I know. I don't want, I don't want-

• 53:34Speaker 00

  Are you kidding me? There's, there's nothing I love more than a woman, a woman who's a little older than me, who I respect, having control issues.

• 53:41Speaker 02

  Okay, good.

• 53:41Speaker 00

  Let's talk about Neil.

• 53:42Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 53:43Speaker 00

  Can you tell everyone you're meet cute? How did you meet?

• 53:46Speaker 02

  Well, we met on Match, and Match.com. Well, there's a Match wing for older people. I forgot it was called Our Time. And, but I'm pretty well-known in the Bay Area, and-

• 54:01Speaker 00

  And Anne, had you, had you dated before this?

• 54:03Speaker 02

  I'd been with a man for six years, and I hadn't been with anyone for a couple of years.

• 54:07Speaker 00

  Okay.

• 54:07Speaker 02

  Yeah. And, yeah, I'd been in relationships before, but I'd never gotten married. And then, so I was, I, I decided I would learn to date, because I had never had to date. You just, certainly when you're drinking, you don't have to date. You just know you're gonna be with this person, and they have cocaine, or they have money, or they have a car, or they can get your cigarette lit, you know, or whatever. And after I got sober, I just didn't know how to date, but I always kind of knew who, like, the next hostage was gonna be, you know? And I didn't know how to, like, sit down with someone, have coffee, and get to know them. So I decided, I wrote a piece, it's online, you can find it, if you put Anne Lamott in Match.com. I had a terrible year of dating. Like, I dated this

• 54:49Speaker 02

  one guy who had this beavis and butthead laugh, and I had to sit through the whole coffee, and I was just going, like, that guy in the three-studio just going, I was like that. And, but people, men were bringing me manuscripts, stuff like that.

• 55:04Speaker 00

  Oh, wow.

• 55:05Speaker 02

  Yeah. And it was just awful.

• 55:06Speaker 00

  Oh, God, yeah.

• 55:07Speaker 02

  And one man said, right before our third date, said, is it too soon to bring you a plot treatment? And I said, yeah, a little bit. And I never saw him again. But, so I learned how to date, and I learned a lot about who I am and what I needed. This, what I wanted my whole life was a man who, if he were a woman, would be my very best girlfriend, my ultimate best girlfriend. I'd never had that. I'd always had it, I'd been with a really, really nice man, and I'd, but it wasn't, he wouldn't have been my best girlfriend because he didn't have the depth and the, kind of the layers, the archaeological layers that a woman, or the lasagna that a woman's being would, would present us. And so then

• 55:48Speaker 02

  I saw this tall, handsome guy on Match, on Our Time, and he was spiritual, and he, I thought, overeducated. And, but he seemed like he had a nice sense of humor. So I wrote to him, and we wrote a little back and forth. Well, it turned out he's allergic to cats. And I have a cat, and I live for the cat. For me, it goes, Jesus, the cat, everyone else, right? And so I thought, well, I can't, I, my grandson lives with us, so I couldn't be with somebody who was allergic to the cat, because I'd have to go to his house all the time, and I basically don't like to leave my house.

• 56:22Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 56:22Speaker 02

  And so I, so we sort of, it didn't turn into anything. About four months later, I saw this really attractive man with beautiful face and a profile, and I wrote, and I said, oh, I love your profile. And he wrote back, you already rejected me. I think I'm not Jesus-y enough. And I wrote back, I couldn't care less how Jesus-y you are. It was just the cat. And he said, well, I have lived with cats. I'm violently allergic, but if you put brewer's yeast in their kibble, after a week, I won't be very allergic to the cat. And I thought-

• 56:54Speaker 00

  That's a trick?

• 56:55Speaker 02

  It's a trick. That's a hack. And so I thought he was just either trying to get me to do whatever, or he needed an agent or something. And we got together, and we've never been apart for a single day, unless one of us has been out of town. And that was coming up on 10 years ago. So that was how we met cute. Now, I'm gonna segue into-

• 57:15Speaker 00

  Anne, I love that.

• 57:16Speaker 02

  I know, right, I know. And he would be my best girlfriend.

• 57:20Speaker 00

  Yeah, he would. He just loves, he loves to chat. You guys have shared interests. He loves, he does, he loves the bigness of you. He does, you don't have to dim your light around him.

• 57:32Speaker 02

  Mm-mm. And he loves God, and it's not quite the same, but it's, you know, it's so much the same.

• 57:37Speaker 00

  But is that true that you wouldn't have minded if he didn't love God?

• 57:40Speaker 02

  It would have been hard for me if he didn't have God in his life, because it would have been like not speaking English. But his, like, what he is, is, I would say, more eastern. He has more eastern traditions in him. But one of us will be writing, he's a very accomplished writer, and he'll, he might come in and say, can we talk about spirit? And I'll go, yeah. And he'll write down, or all, usually it's me saying, can we talk about, can we talk about the soul? And, and then I'll scribble down everything he says, and then steal it all. Or he'll do the same. And so we have this, we jam, you know, we do these endless jams and riff, because on the first or second first date, I think, we both found out how much time we'd both spent with dying people. He was

• 58:22Speaker 02

  a hospice volunteer, and I've had many, many people who have died, and I've been with many people, because their families have asked me in, because I'm not afraid of it, you know, because I went through it with my dad and Pammy and a lot of people by now. And we talked about that. Well, who can you talk to, like, a date? And when he said, oh, yeah, I'm a hospice volunteer, I went, you've got to be kidding.

• 58:44Speaker 00

  You're like a Romeo.

• 58:45Speaker 02

  And then we both wanted, we both had decided we wanted to play ripple at our memorial services. And so then, three years later, he asked me to marry him, and, and we played ripple for our processional.

• 58:57Speaker 00

  I mean, it's so, kind of getting back to what we said in the beginning, it's so, it's such a good reminder to remember that we have not met all the people we're supposed to meet. We have not loved all the people we're supposed to love. Like, life is still, like, if we are lucky enough to be talking today, like-

• 59:15Speaker 02

  I know.

• 59:16Speaker 00

  Like, I, I thought about this thing when I woke up today, that, that I have hanging in my house, and I thought of you, which is that Dalai, very famous Dalai Lama quote, like, every morning when you wake up, think to yourself, I am so fortunate to have woken up. I have one precious life. Like, it's just basically, like, if you are still around, you're still around.

• 59:33Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 59:34Speaker 00

  So you and Neil wrote a book, Good Writing. And the book is about, you know-

• 59:41Speaker 02

  Good writing.

• 59:41Speaker 00

  Yeah, about kind of like, it's, I really like it, because it is, it's like Neil's-

• 59:48Speaker 00

  Very smart and helpful ways to get your sentences better. And then Anne comes in to say, this reminds me of something. And wait a second, it's like listening to a conversation.

• 1:00:01Speaker 02

  Yeah, it is a conversation.

• 1:00:02Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:00:03Speaker 02

  The subtitle of good writing is 36 Rules to Improve Your Sentences. And Neil had them on our first date. And I've been teaching writing since before Milton Berle, you know? And as my father would say. And, um, and he had these rules because he was a journalist for 10 years at the Bergen County Record. And they were all rules like, like, uh, you know, like layer your sentences, um, bring in sense, bring in the sense, take out the boring stuff. I forgot what rule it is, but you know, write from good verbs. You don't need to say, Amy walked across the studio. You'd say, Amy staggered across the studio. Amy tiptoed, Amy slunk across the studio. Amy danced, you know? And, and they were all brilliant rules.

• 1:00:45Speaker 02

  So then about two years ago, he said, oh, I'm turning those rules into a book. I said, oh, that's great. He's a wonderful writer. So he wrote sort of meditations on each of the rules. And then I became, then I became convinced that somewhere in this book, there was a place for me. And I sort of tugged on his shoulder one day. I said, you know, I know something about writing.

• 1:01:06Speaker 00

  I wrote a very successful book called Burbank.

• 1:01:09Speaker 02

  Once. And, um, and I said, I'd really love to annotate your rules, you know, and lighten it up a little. I mean, his rules are great. And so I would come in and then I'd write my meditations, which would frequently point out that he is overeducated and there are rules that I think people can ignore. And instead, in my experience, what might work better is.

• 1:01:32Speaker 00

  Well, I like your, the challenger in me likes the idea of like someone having a rule and then someone getting to poke the rule. Like, and a, and a good rule, it can, can stand the poking.

• 1:01:45Speaker 02

  Totally.

• 1:01:46Speaker 00

  Okay. We do this thing on the pod where we ask somebody who is a friend of yours or a fan of yours, or someone who loves your work, um, or loves our guest to ask them a question. And I really thought about who to ask for this. And I realized, I'm like, I should just ask my old friend because my old friend Tina Fey is a huge fan of you.

• 1:02:09Speaker 02

  Oh, she is.

• 1:02:10Speaker 00

  And she's an incredible writer. She's one of the best writers I know. And her and I have talked about you and your books and your writing. And so Tina and I were talking about you, just I hope your ears were burning in a good way.

• 1:02:22Speaker 02

  Thank you.

• 1:02:23Speaker 00

  But we were talking well behind your back. And we were, we were talking about, um, the ways in which your book provides comfort and how your books, your work, your posts, all of it feel like it is a way in which, in a world with so little comfort, um, that you keep doing that for us and we're so grateful for it. And women pass around your work like, um, what I imagine they did with medicine back in the day. It's really special. And I'm thrilled that she wanted to, um, talk about you and, and to me about you. So she had some questions for you.

• 1:03:03Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:03:04Speaker 00

  Tina was like, um, wanted me to give you some would you rather?

• 1:03:08Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:03:08Speaker 00

  Would you rather only eat pasta with butter for the rest of your life? Or you can have anything you want to eat at any time, but all of your meals have to be served on a moving bus?

• 1:03:19Speaker 02

  Um, pasta.

• 1:03:20Speaker 00

  Okay. Would you rather be allowed to reread books you've read? And that be the only thing that you're allowed to read? Or only new things and never look back?

• 1:03:30Speaker 02

  I read only books I've read and loved.

• 1:03:33Speaker 00

  Ooh, okay. Okay. Um, we have answered some of these for you. You tell, hopefully you'll get it right.

• 1:03:42Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:03:43Speaker 00

  And if you were a color, what color would you be?

• 1:03:46Speaker 02

  Lavender.

• 1:03:47Speaker 00

  Oh, we both got it wrong. We both said the same color.

• 1:03:49Speaker 02

  What'd you say?

• 1:03:50Speaker 00

  We both said like a orange, like a sunset orange or a burnt orange.

• 1:03:53Speaker 02

  Because I don't look good in that color. I only like colors that I look good in.

• 1:03:57Speaker 00

  Okay, that's true. Tina, we got it wrong, so lavender, okay. If you were a breakfast food, what do you think you would be?

• 1:04:03Speaker 02

  Oatmeal.

• 1:04:04Speaker 00

  Yeah, she nailed it. Tina said some kind of porridge.

• 1:04:07Speaker 02

  Yeah, I love oatmeal.

• 1:04:08Speaker 00

  If you were a holiday, what would you be?

• 1:04:10Speaker 02

  I love Easter.

• 1:04:11Speaker 00

  We should have picked that one.

• 1:04:13Speaker 02

  Yeah, I heard a great line or read it somewhere. It said, uh, we are Easter people living in a Good Friday world. And I love that so much because it's such a Good Friday world. It's so.

• 1:04:24Speaker 00

  What does that mean, a Good Friday world?

• 1:04:26Speaker 02

  Good Friday world is where they crucify Christ and it's dark and the sky turns black and there's no hope anywhere. And all we see is power and evil and corruption and cruelty. And then two days later, we see the spring, we see resurrection, we see new life. So, um, you know, the cross looked like a big wind for the Romans. And then two days later, no, it's Jesus and Mary going, we're okay, you're okay. Come with us.

• 1:04:55Speaker 00

  Yeah. Okay. Um, what kind of house pet would you be?

• 1:05:00Speaker 02

  A cat.

• 1:05:00Speaker 00

  Yeah, we got that right.

• 1:05:02Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:05:02Speaker 00

  A specific kind of cat?

• 1:05:03Speaker 02

  No.

• 1:05:04Speaker 00

  And what is the best, what do you love about cats?

• 1:05:07Speaker 02

  I just love that it's like having a little monkey living at your house. And they're so pathetically needful of your love, even though they pretend.

• 1:05:15Speaker 00

  They are?

• 1:05:16Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah. My cat is an embarrassment. She is so desperate for, and also she's standoffish. I mean, depending on their mood.

• 1:05:23Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:05:23Speaker 02

  Yeah. But, um, I just, I always had cats and I always knew that if I could find the cat, I was going to be okay. I wasn't alone anymore.

• 1:05:31Speaker 00

  Hmm.

• 1:05:31Speaker 02

  Yeah. Dogs are too easy. I mean, dogs love, I'm not going to name names, but dogs love anyone.

• 1:05:38Speaker 00

  But cats, you don't know where they are.

• 1:05:40Speaker 02

  No, it's awful.

• 1:05:41Speaker 00

  And I don't like that.

• 1:05:42Speaker 02

  I wrote a piece about that in one of these books about, I was going to get buttons made that said, the kitten is not dead, the kitten is in the living room. Because I went through, the kitten is dead with Neil.

• 1:05:53Speaker 00

  Oh, I remember that.

• 1:05:54Speaker 02

  And he kept saying, no, the kitten's not dead. The kitten's hiding, the kitten's probably in the living room.

• 1:05:59Speaker 00

  The hiding is stressful for me.

• 1:06:01Speaker 02

  It's a nightmare.

• 1:06:02Speaker 00

  I like, I like the pet that comes to, comes out to greet you.

• 1:06:06Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:06:06Speaker 00

  But I understand. And then what day of the week would you be?

• 1:06:11Speaker 02

  I love Sunday mornings. Not because I'm going to church, because it's Sunday morning and it's the Sabbath and you are commanded to, to, to do as little as possible. And I believe rest is a sacred act. And I, you know, it's the end of the week and it's just such a luxurious warm blanket of a day for me.

• 1:06:29Speaker 00

  And, and as the people that are listening, like, Sunday blues is a real thing. And it's definitely a thing when I have kids getting ready for Monday for school. Like that, that feeling of dread, we talked about it a little bit. How do you, can you give us all, as, as I'm, I'm asking you to do this, even though I, I don't want to put you on the spot, but like this feeling, like what do you do with your dread? How do you break it apart so it doesn't get so big and, and, and snowball into something big?

• 1:06:58Speaker 02

  I do a lot of breath work.

• 1:07:00Speaker 00

  Right. I always forget about that.

• 1:07:02Speaker 02

  I do breath work and I pray and I, um, call a girlfriend or I go find Neil or my son and I say, do you have a minute? And then I say, what's going on? And as soon as you share it with someone, it's lessened. That's the only way I've ever been able to let go is to share it with somebody.

• 1:07:19Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:07:19Speaker 02

  And then it gets so much, it dilutes it.

• 1:07:22Speaker 00

  Mm hmm. It's so true. And so, and it always goes back to that simple thing of like, just not trying to go in your space capsule and take care of it by yourself.

• 1:07:30Speaker 02

  Right. Figure it out is a terrible slogan. It's a terrible slogan. And, and breath is, Holy Spirit, and breath is life. And, uh, and I pray, I say, you know, I wrote a book called Help Thanks Wow, The Three Essential Prayers. And I'm usually saying one of them, help me, help me, I am in a hole too deep to get myself out of. Or I'm going, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, that you got me out of that hole, thank you. Or I'm stepping outside and I'm going, wow, it's so beautiful in the world. It's so fresh and blue and the, and things are starting to bloom in California. The paper whites are blooming. And, um, so I'm always saying one of those three prayers.

• 1:08:14Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:08:14Speaker 02

  And they always work.

• 1:08:15Speaker 00

  Well, I'm going to say wow back to you, Annie.

• 1:08:18Speaker 02

  Thank you.

• 1:08:19Speaker 00

  Thank you for doing this. You're so, I mean, I, I'm just, thank you for my presence.

• 1:08:25Speaker 02

  You're welcome.

• 1:08:26Speaker 00

  Thank you for my hand.

• 1:08:28Speaker 02

  Yeah, with Mary and the goat.

• 1:08:30Speaker 00

  Give it up for Mary, shout out to Mary.

• 1:08:32Speaker 02

  Shout out to Mary, yeah.

• 1:08:35Speaker 00

  Shout out to Mary, the original pop star.

• 1:08:38Speaker 02

  Right. Right. Who's, who told that little boy, Diego, don't be afraid, I'm here. And that's what she says now, says it to us both right now. Don't be afraid, I'm here. You're okay.

• 1:08:51Speaker 00

  Oh, Anne Lamott, everybody. Thank you for being here.

• 1:08:55Speaker 02

  Thank you.

• 1:08:56Speaker 00

  It means so much. Thank you, Anne Lamott, so much for joining us. And for today's Polar Plunge, I feel like, I feel compelled to, to say what Anne would say, which is to remind you that good behavior and good action can be small and tender. It doesn't have to be a giant, I don't know, sweeping gesture. So on behalf of Anne's good works and in an attempt to just kind of, I don't know, put a drop of goodness, a molecule of goodness back in the world, maybe mow your neighbor's lawn or shovel their driveway or leave a gift for them.

• 1:09:38Speaker 00

  Maybe put a little gift on your neighbor's porch today, cookies that you made, I don't know, and write from your secret admirer. But that might be weird, so don't do it like that. But you know what I mean? Just do something for your neighbor. Think about people around you. Do something small. As Anne would say, give them water, give them a cup of tea. Say hello to people who perhaps haven't been said hello to today. Anne always reminds me to do that. I'll do the same and pass it on. Thanks for listening to Good Hang. See you soon. Bye. You've been listening to Good Hang. The executive producers for this show are Bill Simmons, Jenna Weiss-Berman, and me, Amy Poehler. The show is produced by The Ringer and Paperkite.

• 1:10:20Speaker 00

  For The Ringer, production by Jack Wilson, Kat Spillane, Kaia McMullin, and Aleia Zaneras. For Paperkite, production by Sam Green, Joel Lovell, and Jenna Weiss-Berman. Original music by Amy Miles.

• 1:10:38Speaker 03

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