Podcasts

Being a big walker, I listen to a lot of audio — mostly Podcasts and Audiobooks and occasionally music. One of my favorite podcasts is one that I never hear anyone else ever mention: Everything Is Stories.

They describe themselves as "an ongoing survey of personal histories. Each episode is a first person narrative from someone who has lived through consequential changes to their notion of self and the world... Sometimes these stories explore the philosophy of outsiders. But most importantly, these stories examine what it is to be human...We don’t record to defend or demonstrate an idea. Rather, we create a document of what was seen and felt during their transformative experiences."

Episodes are released sporadically and, with the exception of being top shelf quality and first person narration, the stories have little in common with one another. The current story, The Disorientation of Survival, is a multi-part piece about a gay fraudster growing up in the era of AIDS.

A good starter episode might be Reviled and Maligned: "Peter Stefan, owner of Graham Putnam & Mahoney funeral parlor in Worcester, Mass., found himself thrust into the national spotlight in the spring of 2013 amid a damning controversy. With implications that still linger to this day, Stefan and his team faced the question of where to draw the line on who deserves a burial. EVERYTHING IS STORIES explores the morality behind such decision-making and how one man—during a time of universal anger, fear and sadness—stood up for what he thought was right."

The part they're keeping hidden in that description is that Stefan and his team were burdened with the task of burying one of the Boston Marathon bombers. Here's the trailer:

Or what about this episode from last season:

"Charles Farrell could be labeled a number of things: pianist, writer, boxing manager, and hustler. As a teenager, Farrell lived in the streets of Boston, playing piano in mafia-owned clubs. With a love for boxing, he started gambling on high-profile matches while also managing fighters. He fixed an array of professional fights by using code-talk with trainers, foolproof matchmaking, and buying referees and judges. In this story, the highs and lows of gangster culture are explored as Charles Farrell describes the ease of taking advantage of society’s vulnerable parts."

That's Season 3, episode 6: Sesquipedalian. Here's the "trailer":

Everything Is Stories is, of course, available for free wherever you get your podcasts. You can also listen online.

As a sidenote, EIS is now funded by Oscilloscope, which was founded by Adam Yauch (Beastie Boys' MCA) and David Fenkel. Yauch died of cancer in 2012. That same year, Fenkel left Oscilloscope to co-found the wonderful distro, A24.

On a recent episode of the NYTimes Modern Love podcast, actor Andrew Garfield reads Chris Huntington's wonderful essay Learning to Measure Time In Love and Loss (both gift links).

Not only is the essay terrific and Garfield's performance excellent, but during it, he breaks down and the moment is rather extraordinary for how uncommon it is in today's culture and media. Some actors would have asked for the piece to be edited to be seamless — some podcasts would have done it without being asked — but offering it up whole was the correct decision and I urge you to listen to it.

In the opening, before he reads the essay, Garfield unknowingly quotes Stanley Kunitz's The Testing-Tree when he says, "The heart lives by breaking." The full quote is, "In a murderous time, the heart breaks and breaks and lives by breaking." It's a wonderful line that's grown in meaning for me as I've aged. (Kunitz's book, Passing Through, is one of the many books in my bathroom. I've always kept books in my bathrooms. In more recent times, they're an excellent encouragement to not take my phone with me. You're just sitting there. Read a poem!)

You can read Kunitz's The Testing-Tree here.

Garfield mentions that Huntington's essay brings Rilke to mind. Specifically, Robert Bly's translation of The Man Watching:

I can tell by the way the trees beat, after
so many dull days, on my worried windowpanes
that a storm is coming,
and I hear the far-off fields say things
I can't bear without a friend,
I can't love without a sister

The storm, the shifter of shapes, drives on
across the woods and across time,
and the world looks as if it had no age:
the landscape like a line in the psalm book,
is seriousness and weight and eternity.

What we choose to fight is so tiny!
What fights us is so great!
If only we would let ourselves be dominated
as things do by some immense storm,
we would become strong too, and not need names.

When we win it's with small things,
and the triumph itself makes us small.
What is extraordinary and eternal
does not want to be bent by us.
I mean the Angel who appeared
to the wrestlers of the Old Testament:
when the wrestler's sinews
grew long like metal strings,
he felt them under his fingers
like chords of deep music.

Whoever was beaten by this Angel
(who often simply declined the fight)
went away proud and strengthened
and great from that harsh hand,
that kneaded him as if to change his shape.
Winning does not tempt that man.
This is how he grows: by being defeated, decisively,
by constantly greater beings.

I know little of Garfield, but that he was in The Social Network and was one of the Spidermans, but the few interviews I've heard with him have shown him to be thoughtful and intelligent. His thoughts on grief are particularly admirable. If you enjoyed the above, you might appreciate his interview with Marc Maron from a few years ago.

You may believe that rhino poaching is a one-sided, cut-and-dried affair, but there's nuance, and you can get it in this excellent podcast: The Invisible Hand.

Georgina Savage returns to South Africa to document her family’s fight in a poaching war, but as she gets more immersed in the lives of those involved, she must confront the colonial past of her country and its implications on a conflict close to home.

I listened to this episode of 99% Invisible a while back and have been thinking about it ever since. It explores tradition, religion, class, and the holy work of Parsis who labor in the roofless Towers of Silence, sacred structures where bodies of the dead are left for vultures.

Regardless of what you think about religion, India, or vultures, I promise you, it's a fascinating listen that goes places you won't anticipate.

Towers of Silence - 99% Invisible

Situated right near downtown Mumbai, India is an area of about 55 acres of dense, overgrown forest. In one of the most populous cities in the world, this is a place where peacocks roam freely — a space out of time. This forest is protected by a religious community. It has survived in a relatively

99% InvisibleLasha Madan

It's reported by Producer Lasha Madan.

Radio Lab really hit it out of the park with this episode on memory and forgetting.

Due to a Transient Ischemic Attack (a TIA) I had in 2016, I have a particular interest in memory and recall.

Not only will this podcast episode challenge your understanding of what memories are, but you'll be surprised at how they're created, and how they're recalled.

The final segment of the episode is about Clive Wearing, who suffers from the most extreme case of amnesia ever recorded. His memories vanished after just seven seconds. "Every moment is his first waking moment." Heartbreaking.

Truly top-notch reporting.

Memory and Forgetting

Remembering is a tricky, unstable business. This hour: a look behind the curtain of how memories are made...and forgotten.

Everything is Alive is an unscripted interview show / podcast in which all the subjects are inanimate objects. In each episode, a different thing tells us its life story--and everything it says is true." There have been three episodes so far: 1. Louis, can of soda; 2. Maeve, lamppost; 3. Dennis, pillow. They're not "sequential," but I do suggest listening to them in order.

I pitched them on participating as on a particular vinyl record, but I never heard back.

Everything is Alive

Everything is Alive is an unscripted interview show in which all the subjects are inanimate objects. In each episode, a different thing tells us its life story--and everything it says is true.

Everything is AliveThe Jennifer Mills News