Presenting Heavyweight: Etta

Summary

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Podcast Summary: The Happiness Lab – Presenting Heavyweight: “Etta”

Podcast: The Happiness Lab with Dr. Laurie Santos
Episode: Presenting Heavyweight: Etta
Date: September 26, 2025
Host: Dr. Laurie Santos (intro), Jonathan Goldstein (Heavyweight host)
Special Guests: Gregor Ehrlich, Etta Ehrlich, Milt Ehrlich, Lexi, Dimitri
Main Theme: Navigating aging, letting go, and family dynamics through the lens of one artist’s life, her collections, and the meaning of legacy and happiness.

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Episode Overview

Dr. Laurie Santos introduces a moving episode of the podcast Heavyweight, hosted by Jonathan Goldstein. The story centers on his longtime friend Gregor Ehrlich grappling with aging parents—Etta and Milt—who refuse to leave their Victorian home, which is overflowing with Etta’s vast art collections. The dilemma serves as a meditation on attachment, letting go, family love, mortality, and how we seek happiness and legacy.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Etta’s House: A Home Full of Art and Attachment

• Etta Ehrlich, aged 88, is a prolific outsider artist and collector, amassing countless objects—egg beaters, bisque knotters, bottles—all transformed into art.
  • "She has like maybe 200 egg beaters. Antique egg beaters she has... she probably has 2,000 bisknotters." — Gregor Ehrlich (05:41)
• Her bottles are special: Each inscribed with calligraphic, Zen-like messages about letting go, yet she herself struggles with the very act those messages urge.
  • "Stop schlepping your old being into the future." — one of Etta’s bottle inscriptions (08:36)
• Etta’s paradox: Her art begs for release and flow, but she clings to it:
  • “These works which talk about being stuck with the grasping level. I suffer from that.” — Etta (09:04)

2. Family Concerns: The Danger and Dilemma of ‘Stuff’

• Gregor’s Motivation: Fears for his parents’ safety in a cluttered, multi-story home.
  • “There’s all kinds of dark things that can happen in a house full of staircases.” — Gregor (06:46)
• Etta’s View: Moving is more than about a house; it’s about her life’s work and possessions.
  • “To move out of the house isn’t simply a question of selling the furniture… It’s, my God, what do we do with all this?” — Etta (07:07)

3. A Family of Perspectives

• Milt (Etta’s husband): Outwardly claims disinterest in objects, but supports Etta’s collecting by constantly bringing her new treasures:
  • “I don’t get attached to furniture and bottles and stuff.” — Milt (09:34)
  • “Yesterday. I’m always interested in what she’s doing, and I often find the raw materials…” — Milt (09:59)
• Milt’s greatest attachment is Etta: Despite years of marriage, he remains enchanted by her.

4. Letting Go and Legacy: The Museum or Hypnosis Debate

• Gregor’s Plan: Create a museum in a family barn to house Etta's collections.
  • “What if you don’t get rid of your possessions and we make a museum of your stuff?” — Gregor (12:11)
• Siblings’ Take:
  • Dimitri: Highly skeptical, lists logistical and safety issues with the barn, proposes hypnosis instead (17:43-18:42).
    • “Maybe hypnosis. It stopped her from smoking, which is probably a more powerful psychological and physical addiction than collecting things.” — Dimitri (18:42)
  • Lexi: The more level-headed, thinks the museum idea is half-baked.
• Jonathan mediates: Trying not to take sides between Gregor and Dimitri (20:27).

5. Family Humor and Dynamics

• The siblings’ banter with Goldstein about hypnotism and even hair loss is punctuated with dry wit and twinges of sibling rivalry.
  • “There is a new hypnosis that works on what’s called voluntary baldness syndrome.” — Dimitri (22:43)
  • “Why would someone do that on purpose?” — Jonathan (22:52)

6. A Turning Point: Etta’s Art Show and Milt’s Health Crisis

• Etta is offered a solo show at the Carter Burden Gallery (26:41).
• At the opening, she receives the acclaim she’s long hoped for.
  • “Her ego was buffed from many sides. Everything going great.” — Gregor (27:56)
• That night, Milt collapses, prompting Etta to acknowledge the inevitable.
  • “...if Milt isn't coming back to it, that's it… You win. Empty out the house.” — Etta (28:29)
• For Etta, a mental shift: “There is a new little piece in my head that says things are going to change.” — Etta (30:16)

7. Letting Go in Practice: The Bottle Drive

• Etta devises a way to part meaningfully with her things: pairing each inscribed bottle with someone for whom its message is right.
  • “I now have a whole shelf full of stuff that I am now earmarking to give away.” — Etta (30:49)
• Gregor worries about how people might interpret the messages as backhanded criticism.
  • “If you give someone a bottle that says, like, I wish, like, I was present, then it’s sort of an implication that you’re not present.” — Gregor (31:54)

8. Facing Death, Seeking Closure

• Etta is eventually diagnosed with brain cancer, with only weeks to live.
• Gregor and family move in; he sits vigil at Etta’s bedside, helping her let go.
  • “I stayed there for six weeks, eight weeks, and sort of did the bedside vigil as she slowly died.” — Gregor (36:07)
• In her last days, Etta finds greater peace, no longer focused on her things, but instead on moments and dancing in her mind.
  • “She told me she would be laying there with her eyes shut, but smiling… she’s like, dancing by just flowing her hand in the air. It felt like a great death.” — Gregor (37:13)

9. Aftermath: The Family’s Struggle to Let Go

• The siblings are now the ones who find their late mother’s possessions hard to relinquish.
  • “...after all the years trying to get her mom to let go of her stuff, she herself is finding it so hard to let go of that very same stuff.” — Jonathan (37:33)
• Milt stays in the house; Dimitri and family move in to keep him company.

10. Legacy, Memory, and the Final Message

• Gregor continues, fitfully, to curate a space for Etta’s art—"less about a full-fledged museum... more of just a place to honor his mom."
• Jonathan receives a final bottle from Etta, inscribed with:
  • “I would love to live like a river flows, carried by the surprise of its own unfolding.” — Etta (40:23)
• Goldstein’s parting reflection:
  • “Bodies are vessels, just like colorful bottles are vessels, just like podcasts and houses packed with stuff. And all of art is — it's all just stuff. And stuff can be beautiful, but it's there to help us get closer to the non-stuff.” — Jonathan (40:32)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On contradiction and letting go:
  • “All the bottles bear messages imploring one to let go. Yet Etta is incapable of letting go of the very bottles doing the imploring.” — Jonathan (08:36)
• On facing mortality:
  • “Inaction is a choice. Not doing anything, something's bound to happen, sooner or later… watching the second hand sweep around the clock face until somebody's dead is the most passive and weakest possible way to exist and die.” — Gregor (11:30)
• On family legacy:
  • “Why do people make art? And he thinks the reason people make art is so that they're not forgotten when they die…” — Gregor (38:00)
• On spiritual acceptance:
  • “In the actual room of death and dying… it felt more like she was at peace with a lot of stuff… she would indicate that she's, like, dancing by just flowing her hand in the air. It felt like a great death.” — Gregor (36:23)
• On living and letting go:
  • “I would love to live like a river flows, carried by the surprise of its own unfolding.” — Etta’s bottle to Jonathan (40:23)

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Important Timestamps

• 04:41 – Introduction to Gregor and description of Etta’s collections
• 07:07 – Etta discusses why moving is so hard
• 08:07–10:39 – Etta’s bottles, messages about letting go, and the family dynamics
• 12:11 – Gregor’s plan for the “Etta B. Ehrlich Museum”
• 15:56–18:42 – Siblings’ reactions, hypnosis idea
• 26:41 – Etta’s gallery show; turning point for Etta and family
• 28:29 – Milt’s health scare and Etta’s resolve to finally change
• 30:49 – Etta’s new plan: giving her bottles to the “right” people
• 36:07–37:13 – Etta’s final weeks and Gregor’s bedside vigil
• 40:23 – Jonathan receives Etta’s final bottle; her last words resonate

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Conclusion

This touching episode, filled with wit and family wisdom, explores the human struggle to let go—not just of things, but of our roles, our houses, our fears—and ultimately, of each other. Through a full circle of attachment and release, Etta’s lesson for her family, and for listeners craving happiness, is to flow like a river, “carried by the surprise of its own unfolding.”

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Transcript

[Dr. Laurie Santos]

Pushkin. Hey, it's Dr. Laurie Santos here. As a podcast host, I'm often asked, what's your favorite podcast? And my answer is always the same. My favorite podcast is Heavyweight. Heavyweight's a show about creating space for difficult conversations and resolving long standing regrets with humor and empathy. Each week, host Jonathan Goldstein sits down with people to revisit a defining regret or a lost connection, or an unsolved mystery from their life. Jonathan tries to help his guests make it right, often with a fair bit of comedy mixed in. Heavyweight is pretty much the best podcast ever. So you could imagine how excited I was when my favorite podcast joined the slate here at Pushkin. And today I'm extra excited since Heavyweight is finally launching their new season. And that means I get to share one of Heavyweight's new episodes with you. In this episode of Heavyweight, you'll hear from Gregor. Gregor's parents are pushing 90, and Gregor wants to move them out of their big Victorian home, but his parents refuse. So Gregor has come up with a bold plan to get them out. As I'm sure you'll soon see, this is a really touching story about learning to let go. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did. Here's Heavyweight.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Hello, I'd like to welcome to the show Jackie Cohen. Bye bye, Jackie.

[Etta Ehrlich]

Bye bye.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Now, it's a new season. I'm with a new company, Pushkin Industries, and I thought it might be nice for you to, you know, tell everyone how much the show has meant to you.

[Etta Ehrlich]

Do you see the look on my face right now?

[Jonathan Goldstein]

We're on the telephone.

[Etta Ehrlich]

Can you imagine what kind of look I have on my face right now?

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Ecstasy.

[Etta Ehrlich]

Disgust.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Heavyweight is back. Mamela. They thought we were down for the count.

[Milt Ehrlich]

Can I hang up now?

[Jonathan Goldstein]

But what's this? Oh, oh. With a right and a left. Heavyweights back. Pushing it with Pushkin Mamela. Pushkin Industries.

[Milt Ehrlich]

Okay, I got it. I gotta go.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Okay, you go with that. Bye. Bye. From Pushkin Industries, I'm Jonathan Goldstein and this is. This is Heavyweight. Today's episode, Etta, right after the break.

[Dr. Laurie Santos]

This is an Iheart podcast.

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[Gregor Ehrlich]

All right, you ready? You're rolling. You got levels? Me, me ma moo. Okay, go.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

This is Gregor. You might know him from such previous episodes as Gregor. Gregor is one of my oldest friends and today he's coming to me with a problem.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

I'll take it from the top. Okay, so I have two parents, Milton and Etta.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Etta and Milton are both pushing 90 and Gregor's problem is that they refuse to move out of their house. It's the same three story Victorian Gregor grew up in. He was 12 when the family first moved in. He still remembers the excitement as they unloaded boxes from the moving truck or moving trucks.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

You know, normal people move with like a big giant 18 wheeler moving truck. I believe when we moved we had six moving trucks.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

One for the family's belongings, the other five for the collections. Some people collect coins, some people collect comic books. Gregor's mother Etta collects collections.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

She has like maybe 200 egg beaters. Antique egg beaters she has. Do you know what a bisque knotter is?

[Jonathan Goldstein]

No.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

In occupied Japan, people bought these little figurines where the head would wobble back.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

And forth like a bobble headed dollar, something like that.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

Anyway, she probably has 2,000 bisknotters.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Then there are the 19th century weaving looms, the handmade baskets, the medieval scythes. Etta Ehrlich is an artist, and her collections are the source of her inspiration. Etta sees beauty in everything, and in her hands, everything becomes art. She'll sculpt lint from the dryer. She'll put googly eyes on a splatter of dried bird poop.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

My mother was. Has been unbelievably prolific in making art for, like, the last 35 years, to a degree where now the living room is, like, full to the brim with a million pieces of art. And every week she probably makes five or ten more pieces of art.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

None of this would be a problem, except that a large, cluttered house is becoming increasingly dangerous for Gregor's elderly parents.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

I fear the more conventional fears. I fear my mother falling down a flight of stairs, or my father. I mean, there's all kinds of dark things that can happen in a house full of staircases.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

And so Gregor wants to move his parents into a smaller apartment, something more manageable. That's his plan?

[Etta Ehrlich]

Yeah, that's his plan. But that's not my plan.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

This is.

[Etta Ehrlich]

Etta, the practical thing is we can't be in the house too much longer. I'm 88. Yeah, but to move out of the house isn't simply a question of selling the furniture.

[Milt Ehrlich]

It's.

[Etta Ehrlich]

It's. My God, what do we do with all this?

[Jonathan Goldstein]

All this, all the collections, is what's keeping Etta in the house. And of all her many collections, of all her milking stools and antique rolling pins, it's her collection of fragile, colorful bottles that is perhaps the biggest impediment to moving. By Gregor's estimate, Etta has thousands. Wine bottles, perfume bottles, old decanters, bottles washed up from the bottom of the ocean. As well as being an artist, Etta is a Buddhist. And her bottles are not just bottles, but a series of meditations. Because on each of the bottles, in fancy fonts and careful calligraphy, Etta places a message in the form of a Zen like riddle.

[Etta Ehrlich]

I turn my noose to tightropuse and madly D. Isn't that gorgeous? That's very nice, but how's about this one? It's a black bottle with gold calligraphy, and it has. The first letter shows a breath. Somebody blowing a breath. Do you see it?

[Jonathan Goldstein]

It really does look like a breath is blowing. That's by design.

[Etta Ehrlich]

There you go. There you go. You want me to give that away for nothing?

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Other inscriptions are stop schlepping your old being into the future. Or we cling to illusions of control. After hearing a few, I start to recognize a theme all the bottles bear messages imploring one to let go. Yet Etta is incapable of letting go of the very bottles doing the imploring or much of anything else. There is a little bit of a paradox or there's something to kind of be struggling with here.

[Etta Ehrlich]

You're very, very sharp. That is exactly, exactly true. These works which talk about being stuck with the grasping level. I suffer from that.

[Milt Ehrlich]

I could leave tomorrow.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

This is Gregor's dad, Milt. If the taxi pulled up right now, you would jump in.

[Milt Ehrlich]

I'm ready to go. Yeah, I'll stop you there. He's never taken a taxi in his.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Life, but if I pulled up right now.

[Milt Ehrlich]

You get it, goober doober. I don't get attached to furniture and bottles and stuff. I'll just reinforce that point that while my father made posit that he's a daoist and not attached to anything, he is very much complicit, relentlessly bringing home the raw material through which my mother, you know, turns the art out.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

When was the last time you brought something home, Milt?

[Milt Ehrlich]

Yesterday. I'm always interested in what she's doing, and I often find the raw materials walking around in the woods or anywhere. Find Stu. The only requirement is if I find something, it has to have what she calls charm.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

As for Milt, what he's charmed by, exceedingly charmed by, is Etta. Milt is a poet, and after over 60 years of marriage, he still writes poems about her, rhapsodizing about the way she creates art or cooks or the way she dances. Milt says he can watch Etta dance all night. He just doesn't understand her being so chained to her belongings.

[Etta Ehrlich]

I'm stuck. But I am not coming up with a solution that's any better, am I?

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Yeah.

[Etta Ehrlich]

You know, except dying. And that's not a solution. No, it's not a solution for Greg. He's left holding the whole thing.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Of Milton, had his three kids, Gregor is perhaps the one most ready to serve the child. His parents hand a to do list when he comes to visit.

[Etta Ehrlich]

I mean, he talks mean, and that's because he has meanness in him. I'm not saying he doesn't, but he's also a very kind, giving, generous, loving person.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Yes, he is.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

Yeah.

[Etta Ehrlich]

Yeah. Don't tell him I said so.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

Inaction is a choice. Not doing anything, something's bound to happen sooner or later and just sort of watch the second hand sweep around the clock face until somebody's dead is the most passive and weakest possible way to exist and die. It just feels like, you know, the Damoclean Sword of Mortality is coming, and all we're going to do is sit here and watch Rachel Maddow until it cuts our head off.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

And so, because Etta can't let go, Gregor wants my help in pulling off a most extravagant workaround, one that will allow Etta to both keep her stuff and still move out the plan of action that Gregor wants to present to her.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

What if you don't get rid of your possessions and we make a museum of your stuff?

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Gregor explains to me the details. It seems that in the 1960s, Etta and Milt bought a farmhouse with no running water or indoor plumbing. Gregor's plan is to convert the barn into the Etta B. Ehrlich Museum, Convincing one's mother to downsize by way of a feral farmhouse museum that, by Gregor's own admission is probably a breeding ground for the Hantavirus has all the makings of a classic cockamamie scheme. But this is just the beginning.

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[Jonathan Goldstein]

For his plan to build a museum to work, Gregor will need his siblings on board. So as his emotional envoy, I begin by phoning his sister Lexi. Lexi is the level headed one of the three and I want to get her read on the plan. I mean, is it realistic that he'll be able to turn the barn into a museum like that? Perhaps this plan is a bit half baked, but I figure I might have more luck getting Gregor's brother Dimitri on board. Dimitri's never been afraid of a scheme that runs a little pink on the inside. So I give him a call. We haven't spoken since I moved from New York, where Dimitri lives, to Minnesota.

[Milt Ehrlich]

I hate to see a Minneapolis area code when you call. It makes me sad your business doesn't.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Bring you to Minnesota.

[Milt Ehrlich]

I'm guessing it does sometimes. I interviewed Prince for a cover story. Everyone warned me to be very careful with Prince. He's very touchy.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Dimitri is a personal trainer who's kickboxed his way across Thailand. He's also a journalist who interviews celebrities.

[Milt Ehrlich]

So I went there, waited all day for the interview.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

And a musician who had a song go platinum six times in Belgium.

[Milt Ehrlich]

Hey, you want to jam? And I was like, okay. So I wound up actually jamming with Larry, Graham and Prince for like 20 minutes.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

What?

[Milt Ehrlich]

That was one sentence.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Before Dimitri can launch into his next sentence, I jump in. So your brother Gregor.

[Milt Ehrlich]

Yeah, I'm familiar with it.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

He has this plan, which maybe you're also familiar with. When I'm finished rehashing Gregor's museum plan. Dimitri offers a laundry list of issues.

[Milt Ehrlich]

It's a 99 to 100% chance of getting Lyme disease walking out of your car to the barn because it's high grass, a lot of deer getting poison ivy. There's also, like, horrible black mold because, as you know, the farmhouse burned down when my albino baker friend Theo stayed there and lit a fire, and the roof and the whole house burned down.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

And along with his friend Theo's trouble, there was also his friend Sonam's trouble in that cursed place.

[Milt Ehrlich]

My friend, who spent 25 years as a Buddhist monk under the Dalai Lama, had to use a broom to fight off a very large raccoon that was in the house and was, like, growling at us, like, just horrifying.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

But for Dimitri, even more daunting than the rabid raccoons is changing his mother's mind on the matter. Whenever he's tried to clear space in his parents home, it refills overnight, suggesting Etta's problem can't be solved by physical means. Instead, he thinks the problem has to be attacked at its psychological root. She needs to learn how to let go. And for this, Dimitri has just the solution.

[Milt Ehrlich]

Well, maybe hypnosis. It stopped her from smoking, which is probably a more powerful psychological and physical addiction than collecting things.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Etta was a pack a day smoker, a habit she hung onto for nearly 30 years.

[Milt Ehrlich]

Our friend who was a hypnotist, said, oh, I can hypnotize you. And she went into the session thinking, this isn't gonna work. The whole time the hypnosis was going on, she was like, this isn't working. This isn't working. And then she walked out and never smoked again. He was an interesting person, too. His name was Saul Feldstein. He actually had one of his eyeballs was, like, hanging out of his head face. And it was like a sort of early commune hippie thing.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Having grown up on TV sitcoms of the 1970s, I'm well aware of the power of hypnosis hanging out of his face. Hypnosis gave Fred Flintstone the self control to stop eating brontosaurus burgers. It gave the Fonz the confidence that jumped Snake Canyon on his motorcycle.

[Milt Ehrlich]

One of his eyeballs.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

As a boy, I always wondered what it would feel like to have my full potential unlocked through the hypnotic arts.

[Milt Ehrlich]

Hanging out of his face. And he was very successful as a hypnotist.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Wow. Unlike building a museum, hypnosis requires neither time, effort, nor those awful Stanchions that snap back with that loud, thwacking sound that make everyone turn around and stare at you. Fully convinced that Saul Feldstein is the solution to all of our problems and that museums belong in a museum. Dimitri and I say our goodbyes.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

We're slating in on part two. Johnny discusses post talking to Dimitri. Here we go.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

I need to tell Gregor that I like Dimitri's idea much better than his, but I need to tread lightly. From Cain and Abel to Stephen and Alec Baldwin. I know how competitive brothers can be. And unlike the Lord or Alexander Ray Baldwin Sr. I don't want to be seen playing favorites. Do you think you're that, like, hypnotism has a role in this?

[Gregor Ehrlich]

Well, I hear that, like, your voice went up an octave when we started talking about hypnotism and you got excited about hypnotism.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Well, Dimitri seemed to think that it could help.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

Okay, so the two of you should go see a movie together.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Going to movies is Gregor and my thing. Clearly, I'm arousing some jealousy. I need to keep my arguments away from Demetri and grounded in the merits of hypnotism. This whole barn thing as the symptom. But through hypnosis.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

Why are you saying it with, like, the weird accent on the word hypnosis?

[Jonathan Goldstein]

I mean, do you think that hypnotism has something to offer here?

[Gregor Ehrlich]

My short answer would be absolutely not. I think it's a waste of time. Hypnosis. Hypnosis, Hypnosis.

[Milt Ehrlich]

Hi, Johnny, how are you?

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Hey, Dimitri. Hi. I've got your brother Gregor on the line with me.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

We've met.

[Milt Ehrlich]

Hi, how are you?

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Can you make the case to your brother?

[Milt Ehrlich]

Sure. I just think that, you know, there's no harm, there's certainly no nothing to lose. It takes 15 or 20 minutes. And she's proven that she's very susceptible to hypnotic suggestions. So why not try it?

[Gregor Ehrlich]

I agree with all those points. My main feeling is that getting someone to stop a behavior like smoking is much, much easier than getting someone to change their personality, which is harder to hypnotize someone out of.

[Milt Ehrlich]

That may be true. I wouldn't disagree. There.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Swept up in a wave of brotherly bonhomie, I decide it's a safe space to cautiously share my one secret boyhood longing. And along the way, I could get hypnotized that as something, too.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

Yeah, A lot of stuff.

[Milt Ehrlich]

Yeah.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

And immediately regret it. What do you mean, a lot of stuff?

[Milt Ehrlich]

I mean, that smug smile they could work on.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

We could give you a whole brand New thing where you're like super charming.

[Milt Ehrlich]

All the time, being more able to look people in the eye, not always.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

Hide behind a microphone.

[Milt Ehrlich]

Actually, you know, there is all joking aside, there is a new hypnosis that works on what's called voluntary baldness syndrome, where they realize that a lot of men are sort of doing it on purpose.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Why would someone do that on purpose?

[Milt Ehrlich]

Well, it's just that it turns out that hair loss is more of like an act of willful insolence, often and a cry for pity.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

I used to love my hair.

[Milt Ehrlich]

Well, if you loved it so much, why did you get rid of it?

[Jonathan Goldstein]

First of all, I find it offensive. And Gregor chime in here because I'm sure you're equally offended.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

No, Dimitri used to be bald as an egg and then he willed it back on.

[Milt Ehrlich]

I think if you did at the same time with my mother, we can get a two for one deal.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

Package deal.

[Milt Ehrlich]

I'm just saying it's science. If you read the New England Journal of Medicine.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

With Gregor and Dimitri aligned and friends again at my expense, I set out in search of the one eyed hippie hypnotist Saul Feldstein. But it turns out Saul died in 2019 at the age of 92. So I reach out to other hypnotists, all of whom pretty much hang up on me once I explain the project. So hypnotism is out, the museum is out. I'm stuck with my crap personality and Etta is stuck with her house full of crap. And Gregor is still at an impasse. But things are about to change. Coming up after the break, Etta's big night.

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[Etta Ehrlich]

This guy told me that I was beautiful.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

Well, you are.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

What's going on here?

[Etta Ehrlich]

Foreign.

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[Dr. Laurie Santos]

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[Jonathan Goldstein]

Gregor tells me that Etta has been offered a show at the Carter Burden Gallery in Manhattan. Etta is an outsider artist, so the offer of her own solo exhibition feels like finally, at the age of 88, she's being invited inside. The show, with its formal invitations and coat check, feels like validation. It's the kind of opportunity Etta has always hoped for, and for Gregor, it feels like an opportunity for her pieces to find good homes outside her home. The show opens on March 21, 2019. Gregor and I make a plan to speak the morning after so he can tell me how it went. When we speak, what Gregor tells me is that things that night took a wild turn. Do you want to explain?

[Gregor Ehrlich]

Sure. I flew into town for my mom's art opening. Okay. We're here at the art opening. It's a pretty good crowd. Everyone's eating wine and cheese and it's.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Great, but it's so loud.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

It was almost like a cartoon version of my mom's success story in that, like, some stranger guy came up and was like, you're a beautiful woman.

[Milt Ehrlich]

You're beautiful.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Thank you. It's very nice to hear my age.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

Her ego was buffed from many sides. Everything going great.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Hello, Gregor's dad, Milt on the other hand, wasn't having as good a time. He spent most of the evening in the corner, nibbling on crackers. At the end of the night, Gregor approached him.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

Well, Father, what'd you make of that?

[Milt Ehrlich]

Oh, it's very nice. A little bit exhausting.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

He seemed like even though he sometimes talks in a quiet voice, he was especially quiet, like I could hardly hear him.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

On the drive home, Milt conked out. When the family couldn't rouse him, they realized he wasn't just sleeping, but completely unconscious. Etta began yelling, wailing Milt's name. He was driven to the hospital, where the EMTs lifted him onto a gurney. The doctors thought he might be having a stroke, but they couldn't say for sure. In the waiting room, Etta turned to Gregor and said, you might as well order the dumpsters right now. Meaning, you win. Empty out the house, because if Milt isn't coming back to it, that's it. How do you know when the Damoclean sword of mortality isn't just dangling above you, but actually falling? How do you know when it's time to pick up the remote, turn off Rachel Maddow, and finally act? The night, a milestone in Etta's career, was meant to symbolize a turning point, and it was just not the kind she was hoping for. Milt was eventually sent home from the hospital, but his clap signaled a change for Gregor, too. For so long, he'd been saying, maybe it's time. But maybe it was time to stop saying maybe.

[Etta Ehrlich]

Hello?

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Hi, it's Gregor and Jonathan.

[Etta Ehrlich]

Oh, and I thought this was a scam call. How do you like that? How are you?

[Gregor Ehrlich]

Well, I wouldn't be so sure. It's not.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

We haven't finished the call yet.

[Etta Ehrlich]

Right. So what's the pitch?

[Gregor Ehrlich]

Johnny wanted to dredge up a bunch of painful family issues.

[Etta Ehrlich]

Oh, sure, why not? The painfuler, the better.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

I want to talk with Etta about the night of the art opening and the way it affected her thinking about remaining in the house.

[Etta Ehrlich]

I won't be able to stay here alone. Either I will become ill or Milt will become ill, and I need somebody to help me. There is a new little piece in my head that says things are going to change.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

In the aftermath of the art show opening, as Etta's new reality sunk in, another plan began to take shape, one that Etta came up with. Her idea is to pair each of her message on a bottles with the right person. In this way, each one will find the right home.

[Etta Ehrlich]

I now have a Whole shelf full of stuff that I am now earmarking to give away.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

That's something that you've not normally done.

[Etta Ehrlich]

No, I only gave very few things away, you know, to my best friend or to the kids or something like that. Very few. Very, very few.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Do you think it's at the beginning of something, more of this to come?

[Etta Ehrlich]

Yeah, yeah, it has to be. It has to be. I take it very seriously. When I think of giving a person a bottle, I have to think, would it be good for that person?

[Gregor Ehrlich]

Okay, now we're rolling.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

All right. A few weeks later, I call Gregor to see how Etta's bottle drive is coming along.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

So she called me this morning saying I thought of the perfect person to give the perfect bottle to, but I'm afraid it's going to hurt his feelings. Okay, she wants to give you a bottle.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

She wants to give. Okay, well, that. Wow, that's. That's really nice. Why, why would that hurt my feelings?

[Gregor Ehrlich]

You know, if you give someone a bottle that says, like, I wish, like I was present, then it's sort of an implication that you're not present. You know what I mean? It could be interpreted sometimes as like a sort of a criticism. So I don't know how you'll take it.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Well, did she tell you what my bottle says?

[Gregor Ehrlich]

That's as much as I can say at this point, as much as I'm authorized to say.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Even though I should know better, know how Gregor will dangle this knowledge over my head like a cat dancer. My curiosity gets the better of me, and so I keep asking Gregor what the bottle says, which he uses as an opportunity to dissect my personality. All I can say, he says, is that it addresses some of your deep seated issues.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

Despite all your insights about other people, you sort of tend to remove yourself from the collective and put yourself in the position of, like, journalistic observer.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Uh huh.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

When you have these insights, you know, your dime store insights, you bolt on at the end of things where you're like, maybe we all need someone to run to that Hallmarky nonsense that you tend to spout at the end of these jerk.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

You feel comfortable just saying something like that to someone, telling me about my dynasty.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

I knew you were going to take it the wrong way.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

What's the right way to take that?

[Gregor Ehrlich]

I think sometimes you sort of make yourself resistant, like, oh, I don't matter. I'm just the fly on the wall to watching the human condition. As you know, people live and die and suffer and babies are born and old people lowered into the ground. Oh, when the dirt hits the coffin, that reminds me of my sponsor, I think. You just. You use this thing to remove yourself from what's actually going on.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Okay. All right.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

You're like. You know what would really make this thing sing. Now, let me just get a shot of you throwing your art off the bridge. That's what we need to finish this.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Maybe Gregor thinks I'm being too prying with his mom, and this is just an expression of his protectiveness. So I apologize to him and tell him I'll try to be more respectful. It turns out that Gregor has little respect for my respect.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

Yeah. Hey, lady, I could be more respectful. I won't tell you to throw your stuff in the garbage. I'll tell you to throw it in the recycling bin. That way it don't wind up in a landfill. You understand? Very respectful. Like, we'll even separate out the green bottles from the clear glass. Very good, Johnny.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Why would you even let me speak to your mother?

[Gregor Ehrlich]

I don't know. I mean, I thought maybe you could patch things up.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

I don't know. Over the next couple years, Etta continues to slowly search out the right homes for her bottles. Whereas in the past, Etta was only able to give away a few, Gregor estimates that she hands out about a hundred. During this time, Milt is in and out of the hospital with cardiac issues ranging from fainting spells and high blood pressure to an actual heart attack. But then, in the summer of 2022, it's Etta who receives some bad news. Three years after Gregor and I first spoke, Gregor phones to tell me his mother has been diagnosed with brain cancer. The doctor found nine metastases in her brain. They went to three different hospitals in five days, and the consensus was that it wasn't a matter of months, but of weeks. In what felt like only days, Etta went from carrying laundry up the stairs to needing to be carried up the stairs herself. With Etta's illness, Gregor decides to move in. The whole family does, into the big packed house they grew up in. A hospital bed is set up on the main floor in Etta's old office, and Gregor wakes up at sunrise and sits at Etta's bedside in silence. He speaks with her, makes her comfortable. He tells her it's okay to go, that everything is okay.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

I stayed there for six weeks, eight weeks, and sort of did the bedside vigil as she slowly died.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

In those final weeks, Gregor saw a change come over Etta.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

In the years running up to her death, she would say things like, Listen, there's a rolled up rug in the attic that's worth a lot of money. Make sure that they don't, you know, cheat you out of that one. That was always kind of a sort of joke, sort of real thing. But when the actual room of death and dying was happening, that stuff didn't really come up. It felt more like she was at peace with a lot of stuff and a lot of the stuff. She told me she would be laying there with her eyes shut, but smiling. And I'm like, you know, mom, what are you thinking about? And she was just. Just with her hand, she would indicate that she's, like, dancing by just flowing her hand in the air. It felt like a great death.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

The words on the bottles had finally sunk in. In the end, Etta could dance out of the world gracefully, no grasping. It's the living who are left to grasp.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

Since my mom died, it feels like it's harder to throw things out than I thought.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

This is Gregor's sister, Lexi again. Like Etta, Lexi is an artist. And like Gregor, she's surprised by how after all the years trying to get her mom to let go of her stuff, she herself is finding it so hard to let go of that very same stuff.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

It just feels really hard to like her art. It feels. It's like a part of her.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Yeah, but it's not her. Yeah.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

I had an interesting conversation with my dad the other day, who was, of course, really, you know, grief stricken. And he was saying, why do people make art? And he thinks the reason people make art is so that they're not forgotten when they die. Like you do something that remains in the world. I think of her a lot.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Do you still carry with you your mother's love? Do you feel it?

[Gregor Ehrlich]

I carry her with me. I mean, in the way that.

[Etta Ehrlich]

You.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

Know, when I experience something, I can't help but hear my mother's voice making fun of me for my description of what I'm experiencing. I might be describing something, telling her about just some quotidian thing in the day. You know, this is a nice sunset, but it'd be nicer if that truck weren't backing up. And I can hear her being like, why are you so rotten? What is wrong with you? I mean, that type of thing.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

You can try to move your aging parents out of their house. You can treat death like a to do list with items to check off, but ultimately, you can't control how people live or die. Even after Etta's death, Milt remained in that very same house. It's Dimitri and his own family that move in so that Milt doesn't have to be alone. And over the next few years, Gregor, in fits and starts and with disregard for what anyone thinks, continues to work on the museum. Only it's become less about a full fledged museum open to the public, and more of just a place to honor his mom. And then one day, Gregor texts, saying he found a sealed box in the Victorian with my name on it written in Etta's hand. When the box arrives, I unravel what seems like yards and yards of bubble wrap. Etta had taken great care. The bottle is a beautiful blue, the blue of a childhood toy. It's curvaceous and feels good in my hand. Upon it, Etta laid out her words to me.

[Etta Ehrlich]

I would love to live like a river flows, carried by the surprise of its own unfolding. See what I mean?

[Jonathan Goldstein]

I do. But how dare she? I'm kidding. Cue the outro music. Cue the dime store insight. Whether it's to a museum in the wilds of upstate New York or to a landfill, none of us knows where we're flowing. In the face of that, we need to learn how to let go. My feeling about what comes after death is constantly changing. I don't have a spiritual practice, so all I have is a feeling. And my feeling today is that bodies are vessels, just like colorful bottles are vessels, just like podcasts and houses packed with stuff. And all of art is it's all just stuff. And stuff can be beautiful, but it's there to help us get closer to the non stuff. Because we like the words Etta inscribed on one of her final bottles. All important matters are inv. Sam the furniture's returning to its goodwill home now that the last month's rent is scheming with the damaged deposit. Take this moment to decide if we meant it, if we tried. I felt around for far too much things that accidentally touch. This episode of Heavyweight was produced by Phoebe Flanagan and me, Jonathan Goldstein. Our senior producer is Kahlilah Holt, and our supervising producer is Stevie Lane. Editorial guidance from Emily Condon. Special thanks to Steve Marsh, Amy Gaines, McQuaid and Sarah Nix. Our production counsel is Jake Flanagan. Emma Munger mixed the episode with original music by Christine Fellowes, John K. Sampson and Bobby Lord. Additional scoring by Boxwood Orchestra and Blue Dot Sessions. Our theme song is by the Weaker Thans, courtesy of Epitaph Records. Follow us on Instagram @H heavyweightpodcast or email us @H heavyweightushkin FM. And if you'd like your very own Etta B. Ehrlich original. Her bottles can be found on her Instagram Dab Erlich. We'll be back next week with a new episode. Can you believe it? Back in the saddle. Hiding behind that mic. Oh, yeah.

[Milt Ehrlich]

Oh yeah.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

So I wanted to go through the entire thing just to make sure the fact and also make sure that the.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

Art that your mother made. She put bird poop with googly eyes. Is that correct?

[Jonathan Goldstein]

She spelled it with two GS.

[Gregor Ehrlich]

Okay. How many times would you say you were rejected by girls? In the dozens.

[Milt Ehrlich]

Is that correct?

[Dr. Laurie Santos]

That was an episode from the new season of Heavyweight. Thanks for listening. You can hear new episodes on Thursdays and you can find Heavyweight. Wherever you get your podcasts, stop settling for weak sound.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

It's time to level up your game and bring the boom.

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[Jonathan Goldstein]

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[Gregor Ehrlich]

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[Jonathan Goldstein]

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[Gregor Ehrlich]

Bring the Boom X Boom.

[Dr. Laurie Santos]

This is an I heart podcast.