We Can Do Hard Things

The devil wants me fat with like a sort of scary picture of a banana split.

You Just Need to Lose Weight and 19 Other Myths About Fat People and What We Don't Talk About When We Talk About Fat, which rearranged my brain on a molecular level.

Your book just, you know, one of those books that it just like it, my brain just, I was like, Oh, she's fucking me up like in the best way.

I love in your book, how the end is like this vision of, of what it would look like if fat people had equal access to healthcare, all the things we've been talking about.

More of Jesus, Less of Me.

So these are the scriptures upon which the religion of anti-fatness is based, right? You can have your Bible study. You can all get together and study those books.

One of them is The Serpent Beguiled Me and I Ate a heavenly diet for saints and sinners. Does that not say it all?

So these are the scriptures upon which the religion of anti-fatness is based, right? You can have your Bible study. You can all get together and study those books.

There's also your body, his temple help Lord. The devil wants me fat with like a sort of scary picture of a banana split. Terrifying.

So these are the scriptures upon which the religion of anti-fatness is based, right? You can have your Bible study. You can all get together and study those books.

It's actually the book I read right before starting this podcast.

I'm a very detail oriented person. Like I think a lot of people who read either the books are sort of like, how did you fit all of this into this kind of like matrix of a book?

So the idea is that there are places and spaces or reasons just to be fully human.

And I think it's very useful to apply that to time because time also is structured and it's also something that involves our interactions with other people.

I am suggesting we take protective stance in defense of ourselves, each other, and whatever is left that makes us human.

When I learned about that, I thought to myself that it sounded like a real life version of the story of the useless tree by the Chinese philosopher Zhuangzi, who talks about a similar large gnarled tree that is seen by a carpenter.

Then the tree appears to him in a dream and basically is like, who are you to call me useless? My uselessness has been very useful for me. Obviously, I'm still alive and you are a mortal man. You will die soon.

I feel like the humor of that story and sort of the irony of Old Survivor, I find very compelling because it's this perfect illustration of how being or appearing useless in one frame it could actually be the thing that rescues you from it.

So it's this book about this woman and she doesn't get married off because she's not attractive. Okay?

So she starts this like wild convent with this, but these like renegade women, they end up saving their selves and actually living full lives.

And there's this scene where the woman who started it talks about how had she been pretty, she never would have been powerful or free. So she was like the old survivor.

And did you get what you Wanted on this earth? And what was that? To feel myself beloved.

I want to feel beloved by myself.

Her recent album, The Returner is just, it's a real experience. You've got to listen.

The new record had just dropped. The Returner had just dropped

And she, he walked by her room and she had the door closed as she often does when she's doing deep listening. And she was listening to Demons from The Returner over and over again and learning the words and figuring out the chords on the piano and stuff. So yeah, it just, that was such a triumph. Like she likes one of the songs.

Well, Pod Squad, if you are in need of a beginning of returning to your body, I do recommend Alison's latest album, The Returner. I feel like it's an anthem to that reclamation of being here now, of feeling, of knowing that you also have the right, the God-given birthright of experiencing joy and love and peace inside your body.

And it feels like you could play your records back to back and it would be like, where are they? And then the returners like, here they are.

She was playing along to ladies of the Canyon and a deeper cut, a song called for free, um, which is Joni singing about a busker and, and how nobody's paying attention because they're not famous and she's off stroking the star maker machinery, but really she just wants to go jam with this, this beautiful musician who's playing clarinet on the street for free.

I slept last night in a good hotel when shopping today for juice, the wind rushed around in the town, children let out from the school's gorgeous melody. And at the end there's this beautiful clarinet solo as she's, you know, I heard his refrain as the signal changed. He was playing really good for free and she crosses the street and goes on with her life. And then this beautiful clarinet solo comes out of it.

And I remember my mom singing along and hearing the sound of the clarinet for the first time and being like, like electrified by that sound. Like what is that sound? You know, and my mom, I remember asking later, what was that? And she said, it's a clarinet, you know, that that was the clarinet and that imprinted on me.

And I was always, I feel like in some ways, I think we all have a birthright, every human on the planet living now, we are the improbability of us being who we are in this time. The fact that we come from no matter what our heritage, what our lineage, what our set of challenges or privileges, we all come from long lines of survivors. And that is our human birthright, is this resilience. I was very moved in by a theme in The Returner, which feels very much like part of my recovery, which is, it feels like this big love story to embodiment. Nailed it.

And I remember asking later, what was that? And she said, it's a clarinet, you know, that that was the clarinet and that imprinted on me.

So just in case you didn't hear it, pod squad, what happened is under the piano, she's holding Joni. Okay. Then she hears the clarinet fast forward to she's on stage at the gorge was it? It was the gorge. Joni Mitchell and playing the clarinet. And Joni Mitchell says, Alison Russell, the most beautiful clarinet player I've ever heard.

Something that most beautiful clarinet player ever, you know, she did. It was just like a sweet, she demanded that I take a solo during young at heart and you just, Joni asked you to do something, do it and try not to mess it up.

Well, Pod Squad, if you are in need of a beginning of returning to your body, I do recommend Alison's latest album, The Returner.

We made The Returner in six days. And it was over- No way!

It was 15 women and one non-binary identifying gender extents of amazing divine being. And three chosen brothers, 10 songs, six days.

It's where Joanie recorded Blue. Oh no way. It's where Carole King recorded Tapestry.

And you know, it's shock us made records there. The good ghosts in that place are just outrageous.

And I remember sitting under there and watching my mom's feet on the piano and she was playing along actually Joni Mitchell's her favorite artist, you know, been listening to Joni since I was in utero with my mom.

No way.

And she was playing along to ladies of the Canyon and a deeper cut, a song called for free, um, which is Joni singing about a busker and, and how nobody's paying attention because they're not famous and she's off stroking the star maker machinery, but really she just wants to go jam with this, this beautiful musician who's playing clarinet on the street for free.

Like Tracy Chapman, who sang Behind the Wall, like Sinead O'Connor, who sang war and made it about child abuse. Like Tori Amos, who sang Barbados, me and a gun and a man on my back, but I haven't seen Barbados. So I must get out of this.

Like Tracy Chapman, who sang behind the wall, like Sinead O'Connor, who sang war and made it about child abuse. Like Tori Amos, who sang Barbados, me and a gun and a man on my back, but I haven't seen Barbados. So I must get out of this.

Oh my God. She believes with no evidence it's reckless. It's beautiful. Your bullshitting ways can be very, very beautiful and helpful. Also her next book, the beautiful bullshitter.

Andrea is the author of seven books, most recently, You Better Be Lightning.

Her works include "Drive Here and Devastate Me"; "How Poetry Can Change Your Heart"; and the chapbook "Bad Girls, Honey: Poems About Lana Del Rey."

Her works include "Drive Here and Devastate Me"; "How Poetry Can Change Your Heart"; and the chapbook "Bad Girls, Honey: Poems About Lana Del Rey."

I don't think that it serves any of us to write books that are just so insular that they become objects of voyeurism, inviting people into voyeurism.

Where do you go to escape the pain of reality?

I'm often in a situation where somebody is saying a cruel thing to me or a dismissive thing, and I'm taking on that hurt that they've located some visible flaw in me and my character when in fact, of course, they're only speaking from their own hurt.

You're always looking at the wrong hurt.

And it ends in a bar with another man asking me, how is it possible that your husband manages the burden of your body?