Untangling

Summary

Podcast Summary: RISK! – Episode "Untangling" Release Date: April 22, 2025 Host: Kevin Allison

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Introduction

In the April 22, 2025 episode of RISK!, titled "Untangling", host Kevin Allison delves into the intricate and emotional journey of divorce. The episode features two compelling stories from Elaine Gale and Heather Farley, each offering unique perspectives on ending a marriage and the personal transformations that follow. Allison emphasizes the theme of compassion, both towards oneself and others, setting the stage for deeply personal and heart-wrenching narratives.

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Elaine Gale: Weaving a New Web

Timestamp: [05:57]

Elaine Gale opens her story, "Weaving a New Web," by recounting a vivid dream where she interacts with a cardboard cutout of her ex-husband on stage. The dream symbolizes her tumultuous emotions surrounding their divorce—ranging from love and hatred to desperation. This dream inspires her to create a life-sized cardboard cutout, representing the full scale of her emotional upheaval.

Elaine Gale [05:57]: "The pain of divorce is life-sized. You can't cut it in half or shrink it down or miniaturize it."

Elaine shares the logistical challenges of setting up the cutout in her garden and the eventual decision to store it in her shed, symbolizing her attempt to manage lingering memories and emotions. She humorously notes her ex-husband's advice against marrying or divorcing a writer, highlighting the complexities of controlling one's narrative post-divorce.

The narrative takes a darker turn as Elaine describes her ex-husband's sudden departure for Austin with a much younger girlfriend during the pandemic, fueling her anger and leading to a near-act of vandalism. However, thanks to intervention from her practical friend Terry from Iowa, she avoids committing a misdemeanor, opting instead to focus on personal growth.

Elaine reflects on her descent into depression, substance use, and self-doubt, eventually finding solace in small moments and random kindnesses that signify her healing journey. She draws parallels between her experience and the resilience of spiders rebuilding their webs, underscoring the theme of renewal and adaptation.

Elaine Gale [21:24]: "Love changes us. Even love that ends the web I weave now is different because of our marriage."

Elaine concludes her story with a poignant reflection on her marriage, loss, and the ongoing process of self-discovery and acceptance.

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Heather Farley: Breaking Point

Timestamp: [28:57]

Heather Farley's story, "Breaking Point," begins with her reflections on her upbringing and marriage. Coming from a modest background, Heather contrasts her family's frugality with the affluent lifestyle of her husband's family, leading to cultural and personal clashes.

During the divorce negotiations, Heather demonstrates her assertiveness by prioritizing meaningful personal connections over material possessions. She requests her gray Russian cat and a piece of Robert Rauschenberg's artwork, symbolizing her desire to retain elements of her identity and past amidst the dissolution of her marriage.

Heather Farley [28:57]: "Was this really what it boiled down to? Was this all I had?"

Heather recounts a manic episode triggered by her anxiety over giving away the valuable artwork. In a moment of emotional turmoil, she impulsively decides to gift the painting to the public, a decision she later regrets deeply. This act leads to a profound sense of loss and shame, compounding her struggles with the divorce.

Through her journey, Heather explores themes of self-worth, identity, and resilience. She details her path from despair to empowerment, highlighting how the divorce became a catalyst for personal growth and reevaluation of her values.

Heather Farley [44:06]: "Pizza is a luxury. But my parents' Yankee frugality was actually them saving everything they could to provide for their children."

Heather's story is a testament to the complexities of ending a marriage and the strength required to rebuild one's life from the fragments of the past.

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Conclusion

In "Untangling," Kevin Allison masterfully navigates the delicate subject of divorce, presenting stories that are both raw and relatable. Through Elaine Gale and Heather Farley’s narratives, the episode underscores the multifaceted nature of ending a relationship—highlighting pain, anger, resilience, and ultimately, the journey towards healing and self-discovery. The episode serves as a compassionate space for listeners to connect with their own experiences of loss and growth.

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Notable Quotes

• Elaine Gale [05:57]: "The pain of divorce is life-sized. You can't cut it in half or shrink it down or miniaturize it."

• Elaine Gale [21:24]: "Love changes us. Even love that ends the web I weave now is different because of our marriage."

• Heather Farley [28:57]: "Was this really what it boiled down to? Was this all I had?"

• Heather Farley [44:06]: "Pizza is a luxury. But my parents' Yankee frugality was actually them saving everything they could to provide for their children."

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This episode of RISK! not only entertains but also provides deep insights into the human condition, particularly the emotional labyrinth that is divorce. Through authentic storytelling, listeners are invited to reflect on their own experiences and cultivate compassion for their personal untanglings.

Transcript

[Kevin Allison]

Hey folks, this is Kevin. On this week's episode of Risk, you'll hear Elaine Gale and I breathed fire.

[Elaine Gale]

All over it and incinerated her. Her blonde hair turned black, her heart crisp and charred, her fertility folded like a deck of cards.

[Kevin Allison]

That and more. But first, if you're LGBTQ and you're anywhere near Rhinebeck, New York this June, I'm leading a workshop on the beautiful campus of the Omega Instit called Storytelling for LGBTQ pride. From June 13 to June 15, go to eomega.org and look for Storytelling for LGBTQ Pride. It's gonna be a beautiful, fun, therapeutic and potentially life changing weekend together. Many people have made friends for life at our workshops or come to understand their own life experiences in entirely new ways, or discovered a new creative hobby that's more fulfilling than they might have ever imagined before. So Again, go to eomega.org and look for Storytelling for LGBTQ Pride.

[Heather Farley]

We'll be right back.

[Kevin Allison]

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[Elaine Gale]

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[Kevin Allison]

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[Elaine Gale]

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[Kevin Allison]

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[Elaine Gale]

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[Kevin Allison]

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[Elaine Gale]

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[Heather Farley]

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[Kevin Allison]

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[Heather Farley]

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[Kevin Allison]

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[Elaine Gale]

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[Heather Farley]

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[Elaine Gale]

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[Heather Farley]

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[Elaine Gale]

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[Heather Farley]

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[Elaine Gale]

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[Heather Farley]

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[Kevin Allison]

Now here's the hello folks, this is Risk, the show where people tell true stories they never thought they'd dare to share. I'm Kevin Allison and this is Lala Hathaway and Willow behind me now. And we're calling this week's episode Untangling. These are two stories about divorce, and when I hear them, it reminds me to be grateful that my divorce in 2010 was relatively simple. Not that there was no grief or tension around things, but on a scale from amicable to contentious, it was more on the amicable side. My ex husband and I are still friends and you know, I think we have a lot of compassion for our younger selves and I hope for our older selves too. I can say, you know, compassion is such a theme of risk. It's our mission to create a space for you to connect with more compassion toward yourself and toward others. And certainly hearing from Heather Farley and Elaine Gayle today might just benefit you in that way. I'll talk more about Heather later, but first we're going to hear from Elaine Gayle, who shared this at a Risk live show in LA in 2024. Here she is now. This is Elaine Gale with a story we call Weaving a New Web.

[Elaine Gale]

I had a dream that I was performing a story with a cardboard cutout on stage of my ex husband and the cardboard cutout was on a spring. And so in this piece I was talking about the divorce and I got really angry and I hit it and it popped down and then popped back up. And then I was telling another story and I was so angry and I kicked it and it went down and it would just pop right back up. And then in another part of the dream I was actually like lying on the stage holding on to the cutout's ankles and begging it to not leave. So I just Loved this dream. When I woke up, I'm like, wow, it just reminds me so much of divorce. Like the conflict about it. Like you love someone, you hate them, you want them to go away, you want him to stay. So I decided, you know, I'm going to ask my ex husband. I'm going to call him and ask him. You got to get permission to use someone's likeness, right? I'm going to call him and ask him if I can make a cardboard cutout for a performance. So I called him, he said yes, it's like amazing. So he also said that he would never marry another writer. And that's like, fair enough. So you know what they say? Never marry a writer, you'll get written about. And they also say, never divorce a writer because you lose control of the narrative. So basically I ended up ordering this cardboard cutout. And when I called the company, they said, well, you've got three options. It can be 3 foot tall, 5 foot tall, or 6 foot tall. And it was super tempting to save $80 and order the 3 foot tall version. I was like, $80? I could do a lot with that. But you know, the pain of divorce is life sized. You can't cut it in half or shrink it down or miniaturize it. No, I had to order the most expensive 6 foot tall life size cutout to represent this full size absence. So when I got the cutout, I set it up in the garden just to, you know, like, test it out. It wouldn't even stand up by itself, like as some exes don't, right? They need support. So I got like this piece of wood and I like used that blue tape, you know, and taped it. And then I went inside and was doing other things and totally forgot about it. And I walked outside to water the plants and like, almost had a stroke. Like, my ex is like sitting there in like my garden. So then I live in a small house in Silver Lake. So I was like, okay, I've got to put this away. So I folded it up and first I put it under my bed and I was like, that's just like feng shui wrong, right? Like, that's like not okay. So then I put in my attic. It also didn't feel right. So I finally stuck it in the shed outside, which is where it lives today. So now. Oh yeah. The other thing my ex said to me is, can you just please cover my face now? I was like, that's reasonable. So I found like a camo gator from the deep pandemic. You Know the gators, like, before we found out they didn't really work right, just like our marriage. So I put that over his face when I performed. So our divorce vibe was peaceful, though. It was a lot less House of Cards and a lot more conscious uncoupling. We did our divorce without lawyers, and we sat under a fig tree in Santa Barbara, and we decided who got what, when, why, where, how. So we had two dogs at the time, Karma and Lucky. And we both moved into separate apartments afterwards that you can only have one dog. So I got Lucky and he took Karma. Now, Karma we got right before we got married. And two months after I served him divorce papers, she died. So our Karma was complete on this marriage. I know. So he took the grill and the lawnmower. Both things scared me. I took the beach chairs, and it was okay. I also made more than him, so I had to give him half my 401k and all our savings. Now, six years ago, he had cheated on me in a midlife existential crisis, and I was gonna divorce him then, but we reconciled, did counseling together, got back together, and then I wrote a show about it, but this time it was over. It was for good. And I also handed him the keys to our shiny Infiniti, a car that he loved so much he washed it weekly. He took better care of the car than me. And I figured, why not? Every other kind of infinity I thought we had was already gone. So we met at the courthouse to sign the papers on Valentine's Day, 2020, right before the pandemic started. So it was, like three weeks before the pandemic started. Now, I was very sentimental, and I brought a Hammond's candy bar from Denver, where we first moved in together in 2004. And then I brought a gold unicorn pen for the signing. And I figured, you know, well, it could be a little bit of magic, you know, as we separated from each other, and maybe it'd be like a hope for future love for us both. The pen was a prayer. Now, I didn't mean for the prayer to get answered immediately, just for him. So we were walking to our cars, and we're hugging goodbye, and my face was near his neck and his hair and his sweater, and he just still smelled like home, you know? And then he told me, I'm leaving the next morning to go to Austin to visit my new girlfriend. And it turns out she's 17 years younger than me. And they met in their master's degree program in family counseling that I paid for for him with a second job. So I became incandescent with rage. And I would like to just astrologically explain this. I have a Scorpio moon in the 12th house, which means that I have very robust revenge fantasies. I mean, like every Halloween, if I'm not static cling, I go as Uma Thurman from Kill Bill. So I was so angry and I went home and I just. Oh, I was fuming. I couldn't even get to sleep. I took like six Benadryls and I still didn't sleep, although I didn't have any allergies. So that was great. But I had another dream where I became that goddess Kali. And his new girlfriend Julia was sitting right in front of me in a beanbag on a hamburger phone, talking to my ex husband. And I breathed fire all over it and incinerated her. Her blonde hair turned black, her heart crisp. Her fertility folded like a deck of cards. So when I woke up, I was still pissed. So I went to my. I went to the fridge and I pulled out a dozen eggs and I was dressed in my unicorn pajamas. And I drove to the Santa Barbara airport because I knew exactly where he was gonna park the Infiniti at the very back, away from all the other cars by itself. Cause he was so scared of door dings. So sure enough, I drive up, came in hot. I was listening to Taylor Swift. We are never ever getting back together at the highest, highest volume. I get out, I get some eggs, and I'm going to just like egg the shit out of his infinity. And just then there's a call on my Bluetooth and it's up so loud because the music I was listening to on the way over, I was scared it would like rustle up a, you know, Santa Barbara airport guard or something. So I answer it. It's my best friend Terri. She's like, hey, sister, I was just thinking about you. Whatcha doing? You know, there's always one friend who's just like so dialed in. Do you know what I mean? They're just. They know, like they're in the etheric realm, tracking you like a border collie. So I was like, nothing, nothing. I'm not doing a thing. Not a thing. So I finally, finally told her yes. I was in the parking lot about to commit a misdemeanor and egging my ex husband's car. So Terry, who's from Iowa, very practical. She was against the idea and told me how terrible it is to have egg yolk on a car, how terrible it is to the paint. I was like, that's the point. That's right. You got that right. So anyways, then she started talking about karma and it'll boomerang. It'll take me out. It's not a good idea. So I'm like, okay. At that point, I was a little deflated. So I got back into my car, saw the wisdom of her Iowa sensibility, and drove home. And where I took an extra large mushroom microdose just to calm down. So, I mean, I am a Taurus and a sixth generation Nebraskan. It's hard enough for me to let go of an egg, let alone a marriage. And it was really hard for me to swallow that my ex had already been in a new relationship, safely tucked in to a new relationship with someone else during the pandemic. And I was just trying to figure it all out on my own. And you know, honestly, the 17 year difference in age really grated on me. I would text him, so did she get her braces off yet? Not yet. He texts me back. It was easy for me, you know, if you're the hero of your own story. It was easy for me to make her the villain and him the villain. But I also made myself the villain. I started to get really depressed, like rocking back and forth in a corner and worried I'd always be alone and maybe I was unlovable. And I'd drink a bathtub full of chardonnay a week during the deep pandemic. I'd go to Trader Joe's and put all these snacks in my cart, right? And then put them all back. Does anybody else do that? Except for the baked cheese crunchies. Those are, like, insane. Those are great. I'd keep those. And I'm obviously at the wrong store, right? I should have been at Erewhon. Like, that's the right store for hookups, but, oh, well. So after a while, I just decided after a while, like, who did I want to become in the process of this divorce? I wanted to become better, not bitter. Ex wife was a thing I never thought I'd be. I was the child of divorced parents, and I thought I'd be married once and for life. So it was really difficult for me to adjust to this new reality. But after a while, I realized, really, our marriage isn't a failure. It's actually a container for my own evolution. And the divorce could be also. So after four years, the debris field of the divorce is clearing and I'm discovering all these, like, unexpected random kindnesses. Like, I was keeping this hand sanitizer in my medicine cabinet. This tangerine hand sanitizer from CVS that my ex husband gave me right after we signed the papers in the deep pandemic. When he got it, it was like everybody was sold out. Do you remember when you were ordering toilet paper from like South Dakota and stuff? It was like that period. So he gave me one of them and it was so touching to me. It was like his last act of protection as my husband. And I had kept it, it was empty and it was still in my medicine cabinet and I finally threw it away. And also I went to the beach this summer and I had one of our Tommy Bahama beach chairs. Cause I got those in the divorce, right? So I'm at the beach and I'm sitting there and I'm journaling, whatever, and I go to leave and I go to shut the Tommy Bahama beach chair. And I don't know how. Oh my God, they're so hard to shut. Like even a doctor can't shut those fuckers, right? They're so hard. Anyway, and I realized every single time he'd gone to the beach for 17 years, he'd carried all the stuff there and he'd taken it all down and carried it back to the car. And I sat there and googled how to close a Tommy Bahama beach chair and I found like 100 videos, thankfully. And I cried again, feeling his full size absence. So the divorce has changed me. I don't take love for granted. I know that loss is always on the way. And I'm slower, I'm sweeter, and I'm simpler. Like I lie around and I just think about like how great corduroy is, right? Like it's so great. And I watch like YouTube videos for hours of giraffes eating romaine leaves. I mean, it's like mesmerizing. And it reminds me to eat s'more salad. And also I was studying forever those pictures of the spiders. Do you remember when NASA gave drugs to spiders and then took pictures of the webs that they wove? Does anybody remember that? There's like mescaline and then there's like ayahuasca and psilocybin. So I'd stare at those forever. You know, love changes us. Even love that ends the web I weave now is different because of our marriage. And really we could learn a lot from spiders when we're not so scared of them, right? I mean, they don't care if you knock down their web. They just redo it somewhere else. They're fine. So our wedding date was October 13th. And this fall would have been our 16th anniversary. But does it count when you're not counting anymore? I found also our wedding album, which I had not looked at in ages, which I also kept, and I was looking through it. And the very last picture in the wedding album is a picture of us blackened out in silhouette with the colorful Arizona sunset in the background. And it was supposed to be, you know, this symbol of our eternal love. And instead it's become this mirror cutout. Our marriage cut right out from the center of our lives. And he replaced that. He replaced me in the cutout right away with somebody else. But for me, it's a little more complex. Like sometimes it feels like infinity, like so many possibilities. Other times it feels like a black hole, you know, of the past tugging on me. Sometimes I feel empty and sometimes I feel emptied in a great way. But I'm still so hopeful. Like last week I was walking around the reservoir, the Silver Lake reservoir, and I saw all these empty spiderwebs, just kind of like in the wind. And they were so beautiful and so complex and abandoned, just like marriage. And for me, I couldn't help think about the spiders with a smile on my face and the better place that I hoped that they had all created for themselves. Thank you.

[Kevin Allison]

We'll be right back.

[Heather Farley]

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[Elaine Gale]

Imagine if you could ask someone anything you wanted about their finances. How much do you make? Who paid for that fancy dinner? What did your house actually cost? On every episode of what We Spend, a different guest opens up their wallets, opens up their lives really, and tells us all about their finances. For one week. They tell us everything they spend their money on. My son slammed like $6 with the.

[Heather Farley]

Blueberries in five minutes.

[Elaine Gale]

This is a podcast about all the ways money comes into our lives and then leaves again. Which of course we all have a lot of feelings about.

[Heather Farley]

I really want these things.

[Elaine Gale]

I want to own a house, I want to have a child. But this morning I really wanted a coffee. Because whatever you are buying or not buying or saving or spending at the end of the day, money is always about more than your balance. I'm Courtney Harrell and this is what we spend, listen to and follow what we Spend An Odyssey Original podcast available now. Wherever you get your podcasts.

[Heather Farley]

Eczema isn't always obvious, but it's real. And so is the relief from Ebgliss. After an initial dosing phase of 16 weeks, about 4 in 10 people taking EBGLIS achieved itch relief and clear or almost clear skin. And most of those people maintained skin that's still more clear at one year with monthly doses.

[Elaine Gale]

EBGLIS Librekizumab LBKZ, a 250mg injection, is a prescription medicine used to treat adults and children 12 years of age and older who weigh at least 88 pounds or 40 kilograms with moderate to severe eczema, also called atopic dermatitis, that is not well controlled with prescription therapies used on the skin or topicals, or who cannot use topical therapies. EBGLIS can be used with or without topical corticosteroids. Don't use if you're allergic to ebglis. Allergic reactions can occur that can be severe. Eye problems can occur. Tell your doctor if you have new or worsening eye problems. You should not receive a live vaccine when treated with Epglis. Before starting Epglis, tell your doctor if you have a parasitic infection searching for real relief.

[Heather Farley]

Ask your doctor about epglis and visit ebglis.lilly.com or call 1-800-lilyrx or 1-800-545-5979.

[Kevin Allison]

Are you still quoting 30 year old movies? Have you said cool beans in the past 90 days? Do you think Discover isn't widely accepted? If this sounds like you, you're stuck in the past. Discover is accepted at 99% of places that take credit cards nationwide, and every time you make a purchase with your card, you automatically earn cash back. Welcome to the now it pays to Discover. Learn [e-mail] credit card Based on the February 2024 Nielsen report, we're back this.

[Tess Henley]

Is your don't let it just happen to you what's your the deal's on the table in clear view physical your eyes and mind they don't know how you got it F and I'll tell you what it is the moment you see you want it Take the risk. You're out of your mind in that song out of your mind it is what it is or is now.

[Kevin Allison]

This is Risk. This is Hannah Cohen behind me now. And we just heard a story from Elaine Gale who you can find on Instagram Lane Underscore Gayle folks. One of our Patreon patrons, Nico, recently sent us this note with their donation. I fondly remember walking in the woods listening to Risk every week after moving away from home. That was in 2015 and I've never stopped listening. Now whenever I do, it feels like meeting an old friend. Thank you for giving consistency in this world that very much isn't wow. Thank you so much Nico. It's no exaggeration to say that feedback like that keeps us going in terms of our morale. And two, we couldn't keep the show running like we do if it weren't for the support over on Patreon, which has dipped a bit lately. So come on over and find all of the [e-mail] risk also folks, my 8 week long online storytelling workshops that are happening this spring and summer. They still have some slots left in them. One starts on April 24, another starts on May 14. The last one starts on June 1. You can email me to learn how you can join in. I'm@Kevin risk-show.com you will be with other Risk fans who are the most thoughtful and fun and creative people you'll ever meet. And we'll all be learning about story structure, scenic detail, emotional arcs, building tension and suspense. We'll all be sharing stories that are super short for various occasions as well as Risk length stories. So again, email me at kevinrisk-show.com and I'll tell you all you need to know about the upcoming online workshops. Next up, we're going to hear from Heather Farley. I'll tell you Heather's story. Every breaking wave from the episode of Risk called Live at Caveat two is unforgettable. It's one of the more recent classics in the mix. And here she is again with another knockout of a story, Heather Farley with a story we call Breaking Point.

[Heather Farley]

It would be unfair to say that I came from little, but I didn't come from much either. My father was always quick to remind us, the family, that pizza was a luxury and we should appreciate it as such when it managed to materialize on our plates. So when I married up, and I mean up, every little thing threw me for a loop. For example, I remember an early meal with my husband to be and his mother and stepfather and his mother snidely looking at me and saying, you hold your silverware like an American, and I'm 17 years old. I thought, I am an American. But I looked at the way she was holding her fork and knife, and I corrected myself, and I was sure never to make that mistake again for 17 years, which was the duration of my marriage to their son. So 17 years come and go, and he and I are sitting in our living room in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, having the conversation where we divvy up our belongings. He was as beautiful to me as he was the first day I'd seen him across a classroom when I was 17 years old. There was no denying him. I mean, I could be angry, I could be sad, I could be bitter. He was still beautiful, and the look in his dark brown eyes was sad and shocked and maybe a little bit angry, but they were the same eyes I'd fallen in love with. And he says to me, all I want are my quilt and my books. I'd made him a quilt. Why this was important at this moment was not entirely clear. I'm picturing him walking around the streets of Brooklyn with a trunk full of paperbacks and a blanket on his back. And I can tell it all seems very melancholy, romantic to him, and I'm not impressed. So I kind of quickly glance around the room, and I see our gray little white Russian cat. And her eyes lock with mine, and she cocks her head in what felt like a knowing way. And I think, I want the cat. And I glance above the cat, and I see hanging on the wall a piece of artwork. And I say, all I want are the cat and the Rauschenberg. And he looks at me. I mean, his eyes are kind of wide, and I can tell he's wondering if I really have the moxie to be asking for the most valuable gift we'd received during our marriage. And he falters. And I think he sputters out, like, you can't be serious, or something to that effect. You can't. You wouldn't. Why would you? And then he stops, because he knows this is on him. So he surrenders. So I walk away from the marriage with our IKEA sectional couch, our Kate Spade wedding china. Our little gray kitty and the ration bird. Anyone who's familiar with modern art knows the name Robert Rauschenberg. Anyone who's not might be familiar with his name or the intimation of it from its place on the set of the television show Frasier. There's that perennial realm of Frasier's living room. And you see in a hallway in the back, a big piece of contemporary art and the letters B, E, R, G spelling at the end of Robert Rauschenberg's name. And this is meant to signify to the knowing viewer that Frasier is rich. And having this piece of artwork made me feel rich, too. Some years later, I was married again, and it was ending again. And I was in this arrangement the person with the greatest marital asset being this piece of art. And I remember at this point, my second husband was gone, out of at least our house. I'm sitting in what would soon no longer be my living room. And I was more sad about leaving the living room than I was about leaving my husband. I mean, it was a great place. It was not a cramped New York City apartment. It was out in the country. And I'm looking around and I see my fancy painting, this Rauschenberg, which was a portrait of the palm of a hand. It had really never done anything for me as a piece of art. It was his signature in the lower right hand corner. That is what I fixated on. It was what reminded me that it was important. But it wasn't the piece of art itself that really ever blew my skirt up. And I looked up at this piece of art on the wall, and I started thinking about it in relation to my worth in general. Was this really what it boiled down to? Was this all I had? And I thought of the life I'd had with my first husband and the young girl I was when I first entered that relationship and the woman I'd grown into throughout the course of it and the person I was that night. And I thought, no, you know, I'm not. I can't be summed up by my belongings. And I took the painting off the wall, and in its place, I hung my NYU diploma, which I thought was a much better indicator of my, you know, what I had to offer. This was something I had worked incredibly hard for, that I was very proud of. And I thought this is who I was going to be. The next me was going to be someone who prided herself on her mind, not her assets. And in the next moment, I decided I didn't want the painting in my life at all. And I was going to give it away. Now, mind you, what I didn't realize was that I was in the early stages of a manic episode. But this seemed like a brilliant idea at the time. I would get rid of the painting. I would exorcise the demons of that sad last marriage. The even sadder second one. The new me was not going to be defined by any of that. I wasn't going to auction it off, though. I wasn't going to sell it to a gallery or give it to a friend or return it to my ex. I was going to get rid of it that night, like I said, I'd taken it off the wall and I thought, I'm gonna give it to the world. It's a gift. I'm gonna give it away. I'm gonna wrap it like a gift. And I didn't have right wrapping paper, so I grabbed a throw blanket. It was beige and cream striped with a little bit of fringe on. Was October, November when this happened. It was chilly, and I thought, oh, it looks like a Christmas present now. I grabbed the hat as I was leaving my home. I'm a big music person, and most moments in my life always have a soundtrack. And this hat I put on was a little beige beanie with neon orange. It looked like headphones kind of stitched into it. And there were headphones inside the cap. And I selected the soundtrack for this momentous occasion. I'd been listening to the song Walking on Thin Ice by Yoko Ono a lot. So there I go into the chilly night. And it is icy underfoot. So I feel the poetry in this moment. And I hear Yoko bleeding in my ear with lemons. Wild riffs. Walking on thin ice I'm paying the price for throwing the dice for throwing the dice in the air. There's this little park not far from where my building is on the main street of this town. But there are benches, a few benches, dark pine green wooden benches. And I think, okay, well, that's where the painting is going to go. And I picked the centermost bench to set this gift to the universe on, as I've dubbed it in my mind. The fringe of the blanket I have wrapped it in is rippling in the breeze on this chilly night. And as I set it down, I think to myself, goodbye, Goodbye to all that. Which is also the name of my favorite story by Joan Didion. And it's her story of leaving New York. It's her story of being sad in New York, of feeling devalued in New York of crying, as she says, in.

[Elaine Gale]

Chinese laundries, in cafes, in bars, in men's apartments, in the dark on the street in New York.

[Heather Farley]

She says, goodbye to all that. And I thought, goodbye to all that. And I walked away. I remember when I was coming to after this episode sometime shortly after having my mom call all over town in search of it. I mean, I wasn't even fully in command of my mind yet. But I knew I had fucked up big time. I had given away something that was more valuable than anything I would ever own ever again. And the panic that I felt was hot on my face. I mean, I just wanted to throw up. And it easily could have been my undoing all over again. It was a full body seizure of shame and confusion and regret and embarrassment and shock. It could be anywhere. It could be in the dump. It could be in your grandmother's living room. It could be in a punk house. And there was a long time when I would picture a cinematic vision of myself standing there in the park that night and putting it on the bench and thinking I was free. But all I could hear was my mother in law's voice ringing in my ears. Does she know what she's giving up? And I heard that over and over and over again for a very long, long time. And I would physically shake my head and just smile and think, there's nothing you can do about it now. There's a highly celebrated museum in the town I live now, and they recently had a retrospective on the work of Robert Rauschenberg. Now, entry to this museum costs maybe 20, $25 a ticket, which is more than I can afford on an average weekend. But they have a program where they will give a member of the hoi polloi a $2 entrance as long as they flash their food stamp card, which I happen to have one of, because that's just where I am in my life right now. And it's not exactly a proud moment to have to reveal your financial status to the person behind the desk selling tickets, but it is what it is. And I wanted to see the work. And I wanted to tell them that there was a time when I was a collector, not a girl on food stamps looking for cheap admission to gaze through the window. But of course, I didn't. These days, I think of it and I laugh. Pizza is a luxury. But my parents Yankee frugality, it turns out, was actually them saving and saving and saving everything they could so that when they were gone, they could provide for their children. And they provided me with A place to fall when I needed it most. And I still love that Yoko Ono song. And there's another line in it that her amazing omniscience declares. When our hearts return to ashes, it'll be just a story. And that's all it is to me.

[Tess Henley]

It give me one to remember When I swim with my clothes on I just skin my feet we feel I need the clouds between my toes Lucky you To see my smile I'm way too sad to be so wild but some way somehow Someday from now I know I know Some way somehow Someday from now I know I know Joy is on the way Joy is on the way Me hey.

[Kevin Allison]

This is Risk. This is Tess Henley behind me now. And we just heard from Heather Farley. You can find her on instagram @stormy heather 17. Look her up. And by the way, both stories on this episode were edited by Hope Brush and all the music on the episode is by women. So this just so happens to have been an all women episode. Except for me, my voice. Folks, Risk will be in Atlanta on May 8th at aisle five. Then we'll be in D.C. on June 7th at the Miracle Theater. And finally we'll be in Philly on June 19th at Fringe Arts. And more information and tickets can always be found at risk-show.com live. And remember, in order to raise funds for my big move to Thailand in August, I'm having one on one hangout sessions with riskfans on Zoom for $100 a pop or more. If you like, you can email me about [e-mail] where I will also answer any questions about my three online storytelling workshops happening this spring and summer. Just reach out to me at kevinrisk-show.com folks. The next Risk Reacts episode where I listen to a story told on another podcast and react to it in real time. I'm listening for the first time and reacting in real time. Oh my gosh. This one is so, so good. Believe me, you do not want to miss it. It's me reacting to an episode of Love and Radio and it's a story called Silver Dollar by Daryl Davis. So that's next week. And meanwhile, folks, today's the day. Take a risk.

[Tess Henley]

Joy is on the way. Hey. Joy is on the way. Hey. Pray you take the line in me. They set me free. You turn a lie to me they set me free. You turn the line at me then set me free. And I tell you what it is. The moment you see you want to take the risk.