← Selected Shorts
Selected Shorts
The New You
00:58:57
Host Meg Wolitzer presents two stories about personal transformation. In Kenneth Calhoun’s “Mindless in America,” a SELECTED SHORTS commission, a couple trapped by their own technology resolves to lead a simpler life. The reader is Justin Kirk. In “D Day,” by Rachel Khong, God has a Plan B for the human race. Spoiler alert—how do you think you’d look with a tail? Or scales? The reader is Katrina Lenk.
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- [00:00]
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- [00:57]
Unknown Speaker
To the People when you say when.
- [01:00]
You say yes.
- [01:10]
Meg Wolitzer
What would you do to become a new you? Could you give up the thing to which we're all addicted, the Internet? Or surrender yourself to an absolutely unknown future? I'm Meg Wolitzer, and this week on Selected Shorts, the risks and rewards of personal transformation. Stay with me. You're listening to Selected Shorts where our greatest actors transport us through the magic of fiction, one short story at a time. Sometimes being a person can mean feeling a little trapped. I mean, you're always you. And who among us during tough times has not imagined becoming someone or something other than ourselves? As in, gee, the life of that pop star seems really great. Wouldn't it be nice to be them for maybe a few minutes? Or how about a month? Just long enough to become bored with a life of talent, wealth and fame. Okay, one year tops, and then I'll come back to my old life, my old self. I swear on this Selected Shorts, we're going to hear fiction about people who discover a whole new side of themselves. That is, they hit on a real chance to become someone or something new. And whether the characters lunge a change or resist it, whether they live a full new life or shrink back into their old selves, is all part of the fun. One story is all about going analog in the age of digital overload, and the other is about trying to maintain real friendship in the midst of an upheaval. The first work we'll hear is by writer Kenneth Calhoun. He's published stories in Tin House and the Paris Review, among other places. His novel Black Moon is all about insomnia and how it upends civilization. This piece, Mindless in America, about bettering yourself with books is one that shorts commissioned from Calhoun directly. Our reader is actor Justin Kirk. His impressive list of credits includes the series Succession Weeds and the Angels in America miniseries. And now Justin Kirk performs Mindless in America by Kenneth Calhoun Mindless in America.
- [03:38]
Farrah
By Kenneth Calhoun we decided, Farrah and I, that we needed to reclaim our minds. Our minds were shot contemporary circumstances, everything from pandemics and remote jobs. Social media, the exuberant adoption of nonlinear storytelling in movies and TV shows had turned our minds into mush, if not overnight, oats. We moved through life in a stupor, sat through cycles of stoplights in a daze, forgot all our passwords, left some baked Cornish game hens on the counter. Overnight. We could either just lie back and let it continue till our brains leaked from our noses onto our memory foam pillows at night, or, by God, we could do something. We thought about it for a while, discussing it in gasps as we came up for air while feeding at the content trough, or when bouncing between various bad content cults. The one with the mouse ears, the one with the dragons, the one with the capes. Don't ever forget the one with the balls. Eventually we decided that, okay, sure, it is important to have a mind, or what some call a life of the mind. So yes, we decided, let's do it. Let's reclaim our goddamn minds. To do this, we knew we needed to read books, which are good content, just as there are good fats. We used to read books years ago but fell out of practice due to a vestigial impulse. We still bought them to read books. We knew we needed some nice chairs to sit on while reading them. Hold up, I said. Now. Isn't sitting the new smoking well? Not if you're reading while sitting, farah said. Then it's the new goat yoga. We looked up chairs online. Farrah wanted chairs with armrests, so I showed her some recliners on my shopping screen. She wrinkled her nose at the recliners and said they were too suggestive of shop minds. The people who are drawn to such chairs are slaves of the content cults, she explained. And hello, look at those massive cup holders. You could dump a bucket of chicken wings in one, toss the bones in the other. I wonder how many people have died in such chairs, choking on a chicken bone. Graveyards full, I said assuredly, as though I had researched this very thing. Alien archaeologists far in the future will unearth rows and rows of graves, each filled with human bones, inexplicably, to their alien minds. One chicken bone. We checked out Wayfair, where We found some great deals. The chairs we sought, we learned, were called accent chairs. Most had armrests. You could get two small table to sit between them. Or we'd put books to be read, possibly beverages. We found a set we liked, discounted by 30% and did the usual research. The price comparisons, the weighing of customer reviews. Not one review mentioned reading books while sitting on the chairs. We were not deterred. Farrah said she wanted her feet to be elevated when she read books, so we added an ottoman to our cart. The chairs were upholstered with a tweedy fabric one might find in a library, and the neutral color went well with many of the books we had purchased over the years. Like collectors, the ottoman, purchased at an 80% discount, was leopard spotted. Mmm. It only took three days for the chairs to arrive. We gorged on a lot of bad content as we waited, like a last hurrah. All screens blazing. Phones, laptops, tablets, plasmas, like the command center for a Mars landing or mall security. Then we heard the delivery van backing up, making a warning sound like an angry cyborg duck. That first day, we did our jobs, or what we call typey typey. At opposite ends of the condo, every now and then, we called out to each other sexy threats about the book we planned to read that evening. I'm going to read the fuck out of that book tonight. I screamed. My book isn't going to walk right for a week. Farrah exclaimed. My paperback is going to be a hardcover. When I get through with it, I'm going to fondle its flaps. She yelled. Also, I'm going to lick the tip of my finger before turning each page. We tried for more of these sexy threats, but our brains were tapped out, hers anyway. Mine was overtaken by other reptilian impulses. These were some of the hottest things I'd heard Farah shout in recent months. Needless to say, I was aroused. And from across the condo, in another room entirely, Farah sensed this shift in my blood flow by reading into my horny silence. No, she said before I could even broach the topic. It's all typey typey in here. Sorry, babe. I made some cookies. The feeling passed. That evening, we rushed our dinner, eager to get to those books. After the dishes were loudly crammed into the washer and the crumbs were swept up so as to discourage the mouse, we approached our new reading chairs and the books waiting there on the little table. Conditions were good for book reading. We had shut off the tv, silenced our phones, closed our laptops, had the windows open to the sunset. Pleasant breeze had ventured in, rustling our potted plants. Palms. Traffic on the street below had died down. At this hour most people were inside, consuming bad content. I thought I saw the mouse out of the corner of my eye, but Farrah couldn't validate. Ever since we spotted the mouse on our countertop gnawing on a cauliflower chip, it had inhabited the corners of our eyes. We were constantly thinking we'd seen it darting through the edge of our periphery. It often proved to be nothing, as it did now. Forget that little creep. Let's read, farah said, rubbing her hands together briskly as if warming them for the handling of the book. Hmm. We each selected our books from the stack. Mine was mostly green and orange. Farrah had selected one that was golden brown with Dijon mustard yellow highlights. Before we settled into them, we made a picture of Negronis to place on the little end table. We believe that's what Stanley Tucci would do. We sat back, Farrah with her feet up on the limbless leopard torso, me with one arm resting on the armrest, now comfy. We began to read. Now the book I had chosen was 107 years old. I wanted to visit the mindset of a people whose minds weren't shot. It was written before minds were turning into mush, so I figured it would help in the effort to reclaim my own mind if it turned out to have a nonlinear story shape. I was okay with that. I told Vera. She had warned me, having somehow recalled from a college course, that the author of the book I had chosen was an early pioneer of the nonlinear story shape. I shrugged, undeterred. If people chose to make a nonlinear story shape back then, I said, they really fucking meant it. Time was, I struggled to complete the thought and ended up saying more real. I did not immediately encounter any leaps in chronology, however, but this didn't mean there weren't any. What it meant was I'd only read two pages before my mind or the tiny nerve bundle that I had left began to wander. First I looked at Farrah's feet on the ottoman. The metallic green color of her toenail polish reminded me of beetles we used to see a lot in the summers of my youth. I turned to Farrah. Your toes. They were my. Shh, she said. She pointed the open book before her reading. You read, too? I tried to read more, first checking the number of total pages in the book, many, then getting down another page before I gave some thought to a think piece I was always thinking about writing. The piece would be about all the vomiting going on in movies and TV shows. So I believed. I noticed a significant uptick in scenes featured characters throwing up. It was so prevalent, I assumed a new Oscar category had been introduced. Farrah agreed. I was onto something. There did indeed seem to be more actors losing their lunch on screen these days. And I wondered if some new technology had been invented that allowed actors to more convincingly vomit on screen. In the past, an actor would hold the prop vomit in their mouth and on cue, spit it out. I believe it was some kind of creamed soup that they used. It was never enough to be convincing, Just a mouthful worth. Or what my Irish friend once called rejecting a pint as he stood over me patting my back on an old Spanish street. But these days, in nearly every movie, there was inevitably a rather prolonged vomit scene. And it wasn't just a mouthful. It was gallons of the stuff. Like actors heaving and retching for what seemed like ages, captured from a variety of angles. This happened in every sort of film, not just those in which someone was overcoming an addiction or a person was pregnant. Didn't seem like cgi looked too good. Couldn't motion track barf, could you? I wondered if it was some kind of physical rig, a tube or a hose or something attached to a bag filled with fake vomit. Or if maybe actors and actresses were really vomiting. The method ones, probably, but it seemed like that's a lot to ask of a regular non method actor. Couple times in recent months, Farrah asked if I'd been working on my think piece. It's such a good idea, she'd say. And I'd lie and say, oh yeah, I've been outlining it. Or I'd say I need to talk to a Hollywood producer or a prop guy, Someone who can tell me what the hell's going on with all this vomit. Truth was, I didn't know what I was driving at with all this. Just an observation. If my mind wasn't shot, I might have been able to see more meaning in it. Why more vomiting in the stories we were being told? How is this kind of zeitgeist capturing an anxiety Unique Chanel. What did it say about what it means to be alive today? I had no idea I was stuck. So the think piece was more so an unfinished thought piece. God damn it. Yeah, it really did frustrate me that my mind was so shot. I mean, it was seriously shot. Sometimes it made me angry or existentially bummed. But I didn't want Farrah to see that, given her own struggles. I was hoping this scheme to buy chairs and read books and turn things around before they got too bad. I wondered how the reading was going for her. I tried to sneak a peek at the number of pages she had gotten through. What I saw instead was her quickly hiding her phone under the pages. Hey, lady, I said. I see that. Shh. I'm. What you see what I see? You have your phone there, in between the pages. What? She said, feigning surprise. She opened the book to the pages where her phone was stashed as if accidentally coming across it. Oh, this? No, I'm just using it as a bookmarker. Yeah, my book didn't come with one. I remember them coming with one. I guess that's not the thing anymore. Probably due to the environment. The sea turtles or the polar bears. You're using your phone as a bookmarker? She nodded with my face only. I gave her a full dose of parent style disappointment, but dialed it way down. When I saw her eyes fill with tears, her chin began to wildly quiver. Oh, hey bunny, I said.
- [16:16]
Unknown Speaker
It's.
- [16:16]
Farrah
It's okay. Don't cry. This only made matters worse, this tender display of sympathy. She ramped up from sobs to full blown blubbering. Seeing her in such distress caused my own chin to quiver, my own eyes to go glossy. We reached out to each other from our matching accent chairs. It's just so hard, she said between blubbers. I know, I said, arching toward her, being careful not to knock over the negronis. I pressed my head into her temple. I really had to extend my neck to do it. We're too far gone. Maybe, I said. Yeah, maybe our minds are too shot. They're too shot. I looked down at her book. It was nonfiction, about the very thing we were battling, the losing of our minds. The title was Mindless in America. She had calculated that reading about the problem would help her transcend the problem. Maybe it only amplified it. At any rate, I had nothing to show for my alternate route of fiction. I couldn't focus on it, even though the book was quite celebrated and had clearly proven itself as an immortal text. No, it wasn't the books. It was us. It was our messed up minds. Still, we had to try. We have to try, I said. Yes, she said bravely. We must. Or else what? We sit around catching flies in our mouths, our jaws slack with stupidity. That's no way to live. Now there isn't enough protein in flies, I agreed. We'd have to eat a lot of them. Problem is, they've been known to carry germs. She shook head at me, dismayed, as she pressed her fingers under her eyes as if to push the tears back into the shallow pond of her skull. What? I said, sensing I had said something stupid. Literalness is the refuge of the shot mind, she said glumly, as though repeating a symptom she'd read on a mayoclinic.com listicle called Late Stage Indicators of a Completely Shot mind. As though pronouncing me and my apparatus too far gone, I clapped my hand over my mouth, blocking any further idiotic utterances. I reached out to her with my other hand. She pulled back, looked at it as if it was contagious. Panic rose. The thought of being alone in my mindlessness did a viral TikTok dance before for my inner camera phone. I leaned, reached for her, nearly knocking over the negronis when we both heard a loud snap. What the ha? Our heads swiveled, trying to spot the source. Nothing looked amiss, or especially snap causing. Inside, our rusty gears turned, trying to identify it. It had been a classic analog snap, vintage maybe. A really loud click, but more violent. Not a beep nor bleep nor buzz. Nothing from the digital realm. It had an ancient physicality to it. A thing had hit another thing, producing a sound. But what thing? And what other thing had the breeze, the very same one animating our indoor palms, caused an object to fall? Had something shifted in a shelf? Maybe the cool evening air had caused a material in the very framework of the building to shrink or expand, thereby causing the sound of vintage old school snap. But even before we completed these contemplations, our minds, however wrung out, arrived at a most plausible explanation. The mouse, we said. We said the mouse, but really we meant the mouse trap. Two weeks ago I had gotten fed up with glimpsing the mouse in the corner of my eye and the gradual diminishment of our cauliflower chip supply. So I bought traps online. I tried the non lethal variety first, baiting them with peanut butter, switching to feta cheese when the mouse showed no interest in neither creamy nor crunchy smears. When the non lethal traps proved to be ineffective, I reluctantly pivoted to the traditional mousetrap that kind of smashes a mouse with Old Testament brutalism. We didn't want to kill the little guy, but enough was enough. I baited these traps with the mouse's apparent favorite, the cauliflower chips. Forgot all about them, given the state of my mind. Meanwhile, the mouse was darting through the corner of our eyes at all hours, seemingly uninterested in the bait, as though it had sworn off cauliflower chips for dietary reasons. And yet now the snap. Dreading that we might discover the mouse had not been instantly killed and that it was lingering suffering sorrowfully, and that one of us would have to smash it further with a pan or hammer, or even a book, we rose from our reading chairs, went straight for the trap in the kitchen, triangulating on the place from which the snap had seemingly been issued, books raised like mouse smashing mallets. I placed a trap behind the toaster oven. So that's where we went first, approaching tentatively, our faces configured with a pre gross out grimace. We stood before the toaster oven and noticed through the little window in the door I'd forgotten about some chocolate chip cookies I'd made using a small batch toaster oven recipe I'd found online. Oh, there's cookies, sarah said. Oh, I made those, I said, remembering just this afternoon while you did. Typey, typey, so they're fresh. We took them out. Indeed, they were still warm. We ate them over the sink, splitting them evenly between us. When they were gone, we checked the toaster oven for more because maybe one or two had fallen to the grill. Unfortunately, this was not the case. Major bummer. We had sex in the kitchen and watched a new docu series about tacos on Netflix.
- [22:48]
Meg Wolitzer
That was mindless in America by Kenneth Calhoun, read by Justin Kirk. I'm Meg Wolitzer. The word relatable can be pretty pejorative among writers, but as anyone with a smartphone and wi fi and social media might attest, Calhoun's story is nothing if not relatable. Readers attention spans are frequently stress tested in our electronic era, but writers attention spans are too. You might be sitting and working on a long, lyrical paragraph, and maybe you take a brief break to go online and the next thing you know you're going down the rabbit hole looking at, I don't know, the top 10 resorts, even though you have no plans to go to any resort anytime soon. And then when you finally get back to working on that long lyrical paragraph, you now decide to set it in Turks and Caicos. There's a danger in the fact that the very machine that many writers use to create their work can also be the instrument of their distraction when we return. Becoming a new furrier scalier you. I'm Meg Walitzer. You're listening to selected shorts recorded live and performance at Symphony Space in New York City and at other venues nationwide.
- [23:58]
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- [24:30]
Unknown Speaker
What you listen to on your run, on your road trip, your kids graduation song, their wedding dance, your retirement party, the soundtrack of your life changes as your life does. Just like a financial plan from Northwestern Mutual, it's a better way to money. Our financial advisors get to know you better. They meet you where you are and help you get where you want to go. Let's get started@nm.com and the Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Company, Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
- [25:22]
Meg Wolitzer
Welcome back. This is Selected Shorts, where our greatest actors transport us through the magic of fiction, one short story at a time. I'm Meg Wolitzer. This week's stories are all about you. That is a new you, distinct and different from the old you. While Shorts is not self help, strictly speaking, literature can make you a more empathetic version of yourself. At least that's what we writers hope. Dig into our archives@pledshorts.org or on your favorite podcasting platform and maybe you can write the definitive title about stories as self improvement. Our second and final story of this hour is by Rachel Kong. She is the author of two novels, Goodbye Vitamin and her latest, Real Americans. She's got this light, funny way of taking on difficult issues, which you're about to hear. Reading this story of friendship in the face of indelible change is Katrina Lenk. She starred as Bobby in the revival of Stephen Sondheim's company and won a Tony for her performance in the Band's Visit. Her many series credits include the Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. Now Katrina Lenk reads a lightly condensed version of D Day by Rachel Kong.
- [26:42]
Unknown Speaker
D Day. And on the 2 billionth, 556 millionth, 750,000th day, God reconsidered what he had made and decided that the world would be better off if human beings were other animals entirely. If there were no such thing as human beings at all. There would be species, but there wouldn't be races. You wouldn't look at a fellow zebra's face and think yourself superior. You wouldn't amass untold wealth. You would murder at times, but no one would take it personally. In the absence of people personally wouldn't be a thing. You wouldn't buy a gun and shoot children. You wouldn't invent nuclear weapons.
- [27:37]
Farrah
You could.
- [27:37]
Unknown Speaker
You wouldn't blithely burn fossil fuels and irreversibly affect the planet's climate. Jade was at her best friend Ruby's house when both of their phones pinged with the news like it was an Amber Alert or a hurricane warning. Ruby wouldn't have been surprised if God were the subject of an Amber Alert. Look out for God. Driving a windowless white van with a vanity plate, to be honest, Ruby didn't think very much of God. What animals have friends? Jade asked Ruby. Ruby typed the question into her phone. Cetaceans are capable of true friendship, ruby read. Hire primates, elephants, camelids, certain members of the horse family. Camelids are camels? Jade asked. And llamas and alpacas. At the end of the month, God declared, all people would be transformed. Ruby, Jade, and the rest of humanity would have 30 days to select what they wanted to spend the rest of their lives as they had the entire animal kingdom to choose from. After the deadline, humans would not exist. They sat down to eat their dinner. Ruby poured their wine into her favorite little museum store glasses, which were shaped like egg cups. The friends clinked their glasses together and drank. What animals get drunk? Ruby asked. That one I know. Jade laughed. Elephants and parrots. Deer, moose, bats. So elephants have friends and get drunk, Ruby mused. Except it takes a lot to get them drunk. Obviously, if females are Jade peered into her phone. Six to 8,000 pounds. It would be nice, weighing six to 8,000 pounds and not obsessing over it. Jade twirled spaghetti around her fork and conveyed it to her mouth. What'd you put in this sauce? It's so good. Fish sauce. You like it? I'm gonna miss your cooking. You won't, though, ruby said, laughing sadly. I mean, that's the kind of beautiful thing. The change was meant to take us down a peg. A naval expression. A ship's colors were maneuvered via pegs. There were higher and lower colors, more and less honorable ships. Humanity was to be taken down a peg so that we would stop coming up with such stupid sayings in the first place. For the first two weeks after the announcement, political bickering paused. Instead, zoologists were in high demand, appearing on television shows, looking a bit confused by their newfound fame. Nature programs, which had been declining in popularity, saw a surge in viewership and revenue. What's your choice, people? Asked one another. Everyone everywhere was trying to make sense of Things ferret out the superior choice. Not ferrets or other rodents. For most, Ruby thought, it was ludicrous. The point was to be freed of trivial human concerns. And yet humans were already trying to extrapolate based on human social conventions like romance and marriage. Penguins were well publicized as animals that mated for life. Many, many people wanted to be penguins. But were we going to have a world full of penguins when it was getting so warm? Mammals were most popular. Cold bloodedness left many, well, cold. It was the same with insects. God had declared extinct animals an option. But of course it was possible, even probable, that you might go extinct again in the United States. The choices soon became political. Ruby thought this, too, was absurd. There was nothing inherently political about animals. But once the partisan pundits took sides, you could predict what an American would choose based on their political affiliation. Conservatives tended not to go with anything that underwent metamorphosis, like caterpillars or tadpoles. They were unwilling to become anything too radically different from themselves. As a result, they were primarily interested in primates like orangutans and gibbons. Libertarians gravitated to lone wolves and fiddler crabs, every man for himself type animals. They liked defensive animals, too, porcupines and skunks. Liberals were sensitive to the fact of climate change and opted for animals that could withstand extreme heat and would do best in the sweltering climate of our near future. They thought of themselves as individuals who were committed to creative expression. But really, when it came down to it, they wanted to do what celebrities did. Whatever was trending on social media, they wanted to be part of a literal flock. Geese and sheep were popular choices. Jade and Ruby met at their favorite old movie theater. At the concession stand, Jade ordered a large popcorn from an acne riddled teen named Halvor. What's your choice? Jade asked. Halvor. It was small talk now. Electric eel, Halvor said. Very cool, jade replied. In the darkened theater, Ruby produced the friend's preferred condiments from her purse. Furikake sea salt, a double bag baby food jar of melted real butter. They had been friends since they were six years old. That was 30 years of being friends. At six, they'd made perfume together by steeping rose petals in water. At 12, they'd practiced freak dancing. At 18, they'd held the other's hair back as they each puked from too many jello shots. They knew which movie the other wanted to see without asking. There had been a deluge of personal essays and podcasts about the impending change, which everyone was now calling Devolution. Day D day. It was such a human thing to call it a regression. But there hadn't been enough time for the medium of film to grapple with the concern of the day, so going to the movies was still a very anthropocentric activity. The friends emerged from the darkened theater, their eyes squinting to adjust to the light. Ruby loved the movie, but she could tell from the neutral expression on Jade's face that Jade hadn't liked the film, so she tempered her enthusiasm. Enthusiasm. Jay didn't fully express her dislike of it, but it wasn't a lack of honesty that kept them from sharing. It was that they understood each other so well already without speaking. They weren't the sort of friends who had spirited exchanges over art. Ruby had those friends, friends who derived pleasure from aesthetic arguments. With them there was the pleasure of combat, articulating your differences in perception. Insane, insisting on your rightness. But though these conversations could be a lot of fun, you could also leave the encounters feeling more rigid in who you were. With Jade it was different, and Ruby thought it made their relationship more special. It did make Ruby a little sad, though, that she couldn't gush over how wonderful the movie was. But although commonalities bolstered a friendship, Ruby knew better than to be hurt by Jade's lack of enthusiasm. It happened more frequently than you would think that someone you loved loved different things than you. At their favorite pho restaurant, Jade ordered for the both of them their usual two rare steak pho's, two Vietnamese iced coffee, and a number 44 barbecue pork vermicelli to share. Ruby squirted hoisin and sriracha into a little dish in a yin yang symbol. Animals that get the most sleep, Ruby said, are sloths, koalas, bats, armadillos, cats. You know, bats sleep a lot and get drunk, so those are pluses. But they gross me out. You're only finding them gross because of your own humanness. You wouldn't find yourself gross as a bat. You wouldn't like consider yourself in any reflective surfaces. They were both artists, Jade a painter and Ruby a novelist. But Ruby had always been the more practical of the two. It was what it was. Ruby disliked her own practicality. Every day she wrote for four hours. She only drank alcohol on weekends. In her 30s she metabolized alcohol less efficiently, so any amount ruined her writing. Mornings she lived by Flaubert. Be boring and orderly in your life so that you may be violent and original in your work. While everyone was busy being upset that they would be transformed into non homo sapiens. Ruby had come up with a spreadsheet of animals listing the pros and cons of each. Don't make fun of me, jade admitted. But I'm thinking of seeing an astrologer. Jade, ruby said, shocked. I knew I shouldn't mention it. No, I'm sorry. Of course you should. I'll be curious to hear what they think. Even though there was less than a month left of capitalism itself, businesses were still springing up consultants who claimed to be able to look into your soul via your eyes and tell you exactly what animal you were meant to be. Astrologers who could tell you via your birth chart what was best for you. Real estate developers pivoted from luxury condos to luxury holding pens and aquariums, as though any animal would elect to live in captivity, however luxurious. Ruby thought it was terrible and predatory and greedy. What animals experience sexual pleasure? Jade asked Ruby. Not cats. Razor penises? Ruby shuddered. Dolphins, maybe. Don't dolphins seem so. I don't know. Basic. The golden retrievers of cetaceans, Definitely. Jade dipped a raw bean sprout in sriracha. I've been thinking of being a bonobo. Except that's what all the Republicans want to be. They won't be Republican as bonobos, though. None of us will be anything human. Yeah, but don't you think some republican essence will remain? No, I don't. We should be together, though, you and me, don't you think? I'm not seriously considering bonobo. Not as penguins, ruby said. I refuse to be a penguin. We won't be penguins. I wonder if God would let us be rocks, ruby joked. Jade and Ruby stay who we are forever. There would be nobody around to find us precious, to wear us as adornment. There's something very lovely about that, ruby agreed happily. One week remained. Ruby wanted to bask in the most human things. What were they to her? They were domestic tasks that most others found unspectacular. Cooking noodles, solving crossword puzzles, replacing the ink in her fountain pen, pumicing her rough feet, responding to emails with sorry for my delay in getting back to you. She even savored for the first time sitting in traffic on her way to Jade's apartment. What's the most human thing we could do right now? Jade asked. Escape an escape room. Bake a multi layered cake. Jade nodded. Let's bake a cake and do an escape room. They were frosting the cake when Jade, using the offset spatula to smooth the frosting around the cake's sides, spoke up I think I want to be a whale, jade said. She seemed nervous to be saying this out loud, and Ruby turned surprised to her friend. In her hand she held edible flowers harvested from Jade's container garden, and she felt her fist involuntarily closing around them, crushing their delicate petals. It was the first time either of them had expressed a real desire. Until that moment, they'd only brought up possibilities in a joking way. Oh wow, ruby said. She tried not to seem too surprised or at all alarmed. What kind? Bowhead whales live to 200. Ruby affixed the flowers, pansies and calendula, to the sides of the cake. It was a two tiered carrot cake. Their hands were orange from grating the carrot. I don't know if I want to live that long, ruby said slowly. Really? Jade asked. Don't you think it will be fun being in the same pod for 200 years? I would love to be in your podcast, ruby assured. I think they're also called gams. But what if we chose a shorter lived whale? Blue whales only live to 80 or 90. Jade's voice had a tinge of desperation in it. Or beluga whales. They live to 50 plus. They're cute. We won't know that we're cute. Don't be like that, Ruby, jade said. Tears were gathering in her eyes. Be honest with me. Could you be a whale? I don't know, Jade, ruby said. I have to think about it. I'm sorry. They sliced and ate the cake in silence. When it came time for their escape room appointment, Jade told Ruby she wasn't in the mood. Oh, okay, ruby said. We could do something else. We could grill a couple steaks. That's very human. Actually, I think I'd rather be alone right now, jade said. Okay, ruby said. Of course. No problem. She took her car keys from Jade's kitchen counter. Then she hugged her friend, who returned her embrace stiffly. All her life Ruby had felt like a weirdo what other people had. Groups of friends, romantic partners, weddings where they were treated like celebrities. Spiritual spacious houses, adorable and well behaved children. Covetous experiences Ruby had never wanted. She wasn't shirking these things as a point of identity, like a digital nomad or monk, but simply because she had always viewed them as extraneous, empty. It was being around Jade, a human being, that made her feel like she wasn't wholly worthless. Ruby thought of how she had recently picked up what looked like a tiny black seed from her kitchen counter. Was it a seed or bead or piece of plastic? Viewing it under a magnifying glass. She saw that it had numerous tiny legs. One leg moved. She'd shrieked and dropped the bug somewhere on her kitchen floor. Since then, she had thought of herself that way, a minuscule life form no larger than a sesame seed that made God shudder a little in disgust. Only Jade had witnessed Ruby in every iteration of her life and not fled. They hadn't even vowed to stay together as married people did. And yet Jade remained, and Ruby, too. That counted for something, didn't it? Ruby loved her friend so dearly. Why couldn't she agree to be a whale? It could be so simple. And yet something held her back. 32 hours remained. Jade and Ruby carpooled to their friend Cassandra's house. In their larger friend circle, everyone had been throwing extravagant parties, trying to spend all the money they could before money no longer mattered. Last week they'd attended a party with butter sculptures and not one but four. Four ice luges. Ruby received a chilled vodka shot from an ice penis chiseled with veins originating from a glistening male torso. At another party, a turducken sat on an enormous doily. The host sliced neatly into it with an electric carving knife, exposing the wonders within a breathtaking meat geode. Jade and Ruby were pleased to see their friends enjoying themselves, but as usual, the two of them wound up talking to each other. Ruby's parents wanted to be turtledoves, and her younger brother would be a partridge. They were irritated with her for not wanting to be a bird. Along with them. Ruby's mother was so bereft that she wouldn't speak to her, but Ruby had always been the odd one out. The odd duck, so to speak. Jade's mother wanted to be a poodle, even though Jade had encouraged her to pick something wilder. How would a domesticated dog manage without a human owner? Did they even know how to hunt? It would be better to be a house cat, Jade had argued, but stubbornly, Jade's mother insisted on being a poodle. What are you thinking? Jade asked finally. The friends had been avoiding the question all night, wanting to enjoy the party. I think, ruby said slowly, watching her friend's face. I think I want to be a turtle. Ruby always postponed decisions right up until the deadline. She had abandoned her spreadsheet. She always tried to plan things. It was this way with her writing, too. But in the end this, like riding, was an intuitive endeavor. She couldn't explain it, but Ruby felt deep in her bones that she wanted to be a turtle. But turtles live even longer than whales, jade said neutrally, as she could manage, I guess it wasn't about the lifespan at all, ruby admitted. I don't know if I can explain it. A freshwater turtle. I don't think I want to be a sea turtle, unfortunately. So we won't even be in the same body of water. I know, Jade. I'm sorry. You can't let me hold you back from being a whale. Jade said nothing. Please, please don't be mad at me, ruby said. I couldn't stand it if you were mad at me in our last she looked at her watch. 29 hours. Jade said nothing. Still. I'm just sad, jade said finally. I'll miss you. You won't actually. Stop it, Ruby, jade said angrily. Don't tell me I won't be able to miss. Tears fell down her cheeks in pronounced, dramatic rivulets. I will miss you. And I'll miss you, Jade, ruby said. She told herself she wouldn't, but she started crying, too. Jade slept over at Ruby's. In the morning they indulged in a hungover feast of painkillers and waffles and bacon, which Ruby made extra crispy, the way Jade liked. Afterward, they climbed onto Ruby's roof and threw dirty dishes off the side of it because they didn't need to wash them anymore. The dishes shattered satisfyingly on the asphalt. In their final daylight hours, they planned to hang glide, scuba dive, and say goodbye to their families. The hang gliding and scuba diving were ways of confirming their choices. They would never know flight, and Jade needed to make sure the ocean was where she truly belonged. The hang gliding was done in tandem. Ruby and Jade were each strapped to an experienced cloth glider to soar over the earth like a kite or bird. The sky was blue puffs of idyllic white clouds, and below was like a diorama, which in a way to God it was. Humans were the heads of pins trees like green tufts of a wool sweater, and in the great blue ocean below, a bowl of water surfboards floated like sprinkles. It was literally breathtaking. Ruby's head grew light, and she reminded herself to inhale. After that they changed into rubbery black suits, strapped oxygen tanks to their backs, and slid their feet into flippers. The water, which had appeared blank from above, was rich with life. Schools of shining fish, cityscapes of vibrant coral, marine animals that stone struck them as wearing expressions that were stoic, clownish, expectant, smug. Yes, it was anthropomorphizing, but why not engage in anthropomorphism? On this one final occasion, Jade and Ruby swam side by side, through curtains of gently waving seaweeds, each gesturing to capture the other's attention, to point out interesting fauna and flora. It was all transcendently beautiful, Ruby thought. It wasn't that she was regretting her decision to be a freshwater turtle, but she was overcome with a feeling of wonder, of awe. As Ruby swam soundlessly beside her best friend amid the other creatures, she reluctantly conceded that God had done a pretty good job with the world. Quite honestly. It was possibly too good, too magnificent for any human to take in, too intricate, too improbable, too sublime. Maybe that was why human beings had the myopia they did, starting wars, committing atrocities against the planet and one another. Maybe that was why Ruby had spent so much of her own humanity obsessing over what someone thought of her, or being annoyed with family members who voted for the wrong president, or reading arguments on Twitter. Humans were more at ease with human sized problems, being struck with awe, remembering how small one was, how little one knew, the fact of one's mortality and insignificance and triviality. It was all deeply uncomfortable. That evening, Ruby and Jade visited their families. At the front door, Ruby hugged her father and brother. Her mother was still too upset to speak with her, so Ruby left a handwritten note that she hoped sufficiently expressed how much she loved her back. At Ruby's house they popped popcorn and watched Chung King Express. Over the years they'd found the film charming and then annoying and now charming again. They brushed and flossed their teeth. Not because they had to, but because sleeping with clean teeth felt nice. Lights out, laying side by side, they began to talk the way they had when they were girls having sleepovers. Earlier that day they had texted their final decisions to God, whale for Jade and turtle for Ruby, and received brown thumbs up emojis. At four in the morning, their time, all of humanity would evaporate. Each person would be transformed and placed in a suitable habitat. It would happen painlessly, God assured. Although what did God even know? Ruby wondered, about pain? He experienced neither pain nor pleasure. He didn't know what it was like to have a best friend like Jade. Poor God, Ruby thought having a friend like Jade had been the best experience of her whole human life. Remember the time we raced snails? Jade asked. Ruby could hear her smiling in the dark. And my mom got so mad because it was dinner time and the snails are too slow, I remember, and we brought them inside in our pockets to race in the bathtub. Delilah and Joseph. I can't believe you remember that. And one of them, I think it was mine. It died from fright before we reached the bathtub. I. I forgot about that. How terrible. It's probably one of the reasons God is doing all this, that we're so careless with other animals. Yeah. And with each other. They lay in the silence for a long moment. Do you want to be conscious when this happens? Ruby asked. Or should we try to get some sleep? I don't know. What about you? I don't know either. There was another long silence. Jade, I'm sorry that Ruby paused. There were so many things she needed to apologize for that she didn't even know where to begin. The times she'd neglected her friend because she believed her work was paramount. The times she'd been stubborn and hadn't compromised, when she easily could have to make Jade happy. The times she knew Jade was going through difficulties but hadn't known what to say. Despite being a writer, she wasn't good with spoken words. During those periods she'd cooked bulk meals for Jade. Tagines she'd lovingly prepared with lemons she'd preserved herself, or kimchi stews. With kimchi she'd fermented and mopped Jade's floor or taken out Jade's trash. She knew Jade would have liked verbal reassurance, too, but Ruby didn't know how to offer it. She never would now. It's okay, Ruby. Jade's voice was clear and steady. I know. I know you. I love you so much. I love you, Jade. Ruby reached out to take her friend's hand. In the dark they held hands, squeezing occasionally until their hands grew unbearably sweaty and each released the other at the same time. I don't think I can sleep, jade said. Me neither. Should we do something else? Ruby stood up and turned the lights on. She peeked out the window and saw that other lights were on, too. What about? Ruby thought. What about YouTube? Karaoke? It was a perfect idea. Online they could find almost any song in the world, lyrics presented against a backdrop of bizarre, often unrelated videos. The friends danced and laughed and sang at the top of their lungs to Tracy Chapman and the Cranberries and Macy Gray and Nirvana. Oh, I know. Ruby exclaimed. What? Jade asked. She held her closed fist to her mouth, a pretend microphone. I have a good one. Hang on. Ruby angled her laptop away from Jade so that the song selection would be a surprise. The familiar notes of Pachelbel's Canon in D came on. Jade broke into laughter, delighted. They didn't need the lyrics. The friends knew them by heart. Ruby turned the lights back off and held her cell phone flashlight up, swaying with the chorus, Jade held hers up too. They sang loudly about being friends forever, no matter how their lives changed. La la la la la la la la la la la la la la. Ruby and Jade sang together at the top of their lungs. La la la la la la la la la la la la la la. They put their phones down and with their arms around each other, were singing as loudly as they had ever sung. When in a moment, a hundredth of a second, Ruby and Jade vaporized with the rest of humanity, atoms scattering, traveling, reassembling. Jade in the Pacific Ocean and Ruby in an Australian pond. But as to be expected with such an enormous undertaking, there was a glitch. For a fraction of a second, Jade in the body of a blue whale and Ruby in the body of a freshwater turtle, sustained human thoughts. Jade thought Ruby and Ruby thought Jade. Then God put his divine palm to his divine face and corrected the error. From then on, Jade swam and Ruby basked in the sun's warm rays. And God looked upon everything that he had made. And behold, it was very good.
- [58:09]
Meg Wolitzer
That was D Day by Rachel Kong, performed by Katrina Lenk. I'm Meg Wolitzer. I love how Kong opens that story, just really letting the reader have it, listing all the scary things humans have done and continue to do, and then, with all that as a given, just skips into this story of a friendship that defies seismic change. I don't know about you, but I found myself wondering what animal I would choose in that situation. I am a dog person, though part of the reason I love dogs is that they seem human to me. My childhood dog, Max Dachshund, reminded my whole family of Humphrey Bogart. Seriously, they shared a face. Though Max did not have a Hollywood career, nor did he hang around with Lauren Bacall. I guess many of us would probably choose our animal based not only on its animal qualities, but also on our projection onto it of our own humanness. Maybe we would see, or imagine we would see, a humanity that we could relate to and respond to, a humanity that we, we with all our flaws, would know we might never be quite able to achieve. Two tales of transformation, one about remaking yourself in circumstances you have some control over, and the other retaining something of yourself when your circumstances are dictated to you. Whether a transformation like that comes from within or without the desire to shape or mold the self is pretty universal. I think we all want to shed our skins from time to time, whether figuratively or maybe literally. For your sake and for my own. Ophidiophobic self. I hope your skin shedding is entirely wonderfully figurative. I'm Meg Wolitzer. Thanks for joining me for Selected Short Selected Shorts is produced by Jennifer Brennan and Sarah Montague. Our team includes Matthew Love, Drew Richardson, Mary Shimkin, Vivienne Woodward, and Magdalene Robleski. The readings are recorded by Myles B. Smith. Our programs, presented at the Getty center in Los Angeles are recorded by Phil Richards. Our mix engineer for this episode was Jennifer Nolsen. Our theme music is David Peterson's that's the Deal, performed by the Deardorf Petersen Group. Selected Shorts is supported by the Dungannon Foundation. This program is also made possible with public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature. Selected Shorts is produced and distributed by Symphony Space Psoriatic Arthritis symptoms can be.
- [61:05]
Farrah
Unpredictable I had joint pain and I couldn't move like I used to. I needed relief. I got Cosentyx. It helped me move better.
- [61:17]
Cosentyx
Cosentyx Secukenumab is prescribed for people 2 years of age and older with active psoriatic arthritis. Don't use if you're allergic to Cosentyx. Before starting, get checked for tuberculosis. An increased risk of infections and lowered ability to fight them may occur like tuberculosis or other serious bacterial, fungal or viral infections. Some were fatal. Tell your doctor if you have an infection or symptoms like fevers, sweats, chills, muscle aches or cough had a vaccine or plan to or if inflammatory bowel disease disease symptoms develop or worsen. Serious allergic reactions and severe eczema like skin reactions may occur. Learn more at 1-844-cosentix or cosentyx.com.
- [61:57]
Farrah
Ask your rheumatologist about Cosentyx.