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- [00:00]
Intuit TurboTax
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Makers 46
The Moth is supported by Makers 46, a handcrafted bourbon that begins as fully matured maker's mark. Then makers 46 is finished longer inside barrels containing seared French oak staves, and only during the cool winter months when bourbon matures more slowly. The result is a more complex taste, highlighted by bigger vanilla oak and caramel flavors. Online at makers46.com makers46 Bourbon whiskey, 47% alcohol by volume, distilled in Loretto, Kentucky, reminds listeners to drink responsibly.
- [02:41]
Dan Kennedy
Welcome to the Moth podcast. I'm Dan Kennedy. We have an awesome show for you this week. Two Favorite Stories from Our Story Slam Series the first one is from our LA Slam series. It's told by Amira Choudhury. Some of you may know I'm a huge fan of Iggy Pop stories. I give this one my personal seal of approval. It's awesome. It was told in 2012 and the theme of the night was Rebound. Here's Amira Choudhury.
- [03:13]
Amira Choudhury
When I was a teenager, in spite of being a straight A student, I had delinquent tastes in music. I loved 70s punk rock like the Ramones and the Sex Pistols, who, if you don't know, are the spiritual ancestors of bands like Nirvana and Green Day. Of all these bands, my absolute favorite were those godfathers of punk, Iggy Pop and the Stooges. Nobody epitomized sex, drugs and rock and roll the way they did. It was 1997 and Iggy's record company had just released their greatest hits compilation called Nude and Rude to coincide with his 50th birthday. Being a delinquent, I skipped class to listen to the CD at my mall's Blockbuster Music. But then, being a straight A student, I wrote a review of it for my local paper, the Sun Sentinel. When the article was published, I clipped it and sent it to Iggy's record company, hoping they would deliver as fan mail. And they did. A few months later I got this envelope in the no return address, New York postmark and a Georgia O'Keeffe flower postage stamp, which my artist friend Carlos later explained was supposed to represent lady parts. So I tear open the envelope and inside is this card with this absurd photo of Iggy on the COVID wearing a crown. And when I open it, I realize that it's a personal note from Iggy himself. Iggy wrote Amira hi, I got your letter. When you get this card, give me a call if you want to, please. 212. There's a machine, so leave a number. If I'm not there, I'll be in South Florida quite soon, which is where I lived at the time. It'd be nice to meet you, Iggy. I was nervous and flipping out because Iggy Pop was my idol, my teenage fantasy, and he wanted to talk to me on the phone. I was sure I was going to pass out, so I begged my boyfriend Eric to phone the number on a three way conference call for moral support. Eric dials the number and the answer machine picks up. The message on the machine isn't something normal and comforting like hi, I'm not here. Leave a number after the beep but rather, Iggy's sneering, this is that thing you throw peanuts at. Take a shot, sucker. So poor Eric is awkwardly leaving a message when Iggy, who screens his phone calls like Gwen Stefani, picks up. Now Eric is stammering and calling him Mr. Pop. And somehow Iggy smoothly talks him into hanging up. And then Iggy and I are alone together on the phone. I'd like to think that after reading my review, Iggy must have thought I was older and worldlier than I was, because we hit it off really well. He was in the process of getting divorced, was on the rebound, leaving New York, moving to Miami, and he wanted to meet me. He told me that he liked my exotic name. So although we never explicitly discussed it, I was pretty sure I'd get to live out my wildest rock star fantasies with Iggy Pop. Iggy and I spoke a couple of nights in a row, and in the meantime, I persuaded my friend Carlos to drive me to Miami. Everything was set, except for a time and a place. Let me stress that this was happening in 1997, when people still talked on the phone and didn't just text all the time. Also, I only had one line in my house and the kind of family where everyone picks up the phone in the other room and listens in or interrupts as they see fit. So when I called Iggy the next night to arrange a meeting, my mom, who had gotten word that I was spending a lot of time on the phone with an older man, picks up the other line and says, amira, time for Benny buys. It's a school night. The game was up. I awkwardly confessed that I was only a high school student, and Iggy politely explained that he couldn't meet me anymore or every male member of my bloodline would come after him with swords. I'm not lying. That was the last I ever heard from him. At the time, I was absolutely mortified that this had happened, because the coolest thing that had ever happened to me had just ended in the most uncool way imaginable. But after years of therapy, I've come to see that the real hero of this story is not me or Iggy Pop, but my mom, who, despite working two jobs, still had the attention span to save me from my inner teenage delinquent. And while I didn't get to live out my rock star rebound fantasies with Iggy Pop, she got to live out every mother's fantasy. My mom told Iggy Pop that it was a school night.
- [09:33]
Dan Kennedy
Love that story. Another entry into the crowded category of Iggy Pop folklore. Amira chowri has a Ph.D. in mathematics from UC San Diego and is currently a research fellow at the Institute for Mathematics and its Applications in Minnesota. Minneapolis. Okay, and now our second story. A quick advisory in case you're listening at work or something like that. This next story has some awesome and totally appropriate profanity in it, so be sure to turn it up loud. It's from a Grand Slam here in New York City. And to set the scene for you, it was a very warm night in late July. We had all been at the Music hall of Williamsburg for, I would say, about two hours or so. It was a long show, it was a great show, but we were winding down. And then Aaron Barker, the final storyteller of the night, got up on stage, stepped up to the mic, and this happened.
- [10:37]
Aaron Barker
All right, so when I was in junior high, my mom left my family, which I know sounds like a terrible thing, but actually, bear with me, it was awesome because it was just me, my dad, and my brother. And every single night for dinner, we had pizza. And also I now, after school, had a coveted hour alone in the house. Before my brother got home from elementary school, I would spend this hour almost exclusively playing air guitar to my Barenaked lady scene. And then my brother would get home and we'd walk our retriever, Samuel, around the neighborhood. And then we'd watch Pokemon, and then my dad would come home and we'd eat pizza again. And it was awesome. Every day was a perfect day until the night of my school play. After our performance, one of our illustrious cast members, Bethany, came up to me with her mother, and she said to me the four words that would live in Is your dad single? I think back to this moment a lot and I wonder how my life would be different if I'd said no. But I didn't. I said yes. And within a year, my dad was married to this woman and she and her two stupid kids were living in our house. She had, like I said, two kids. Bethany, the first one, was the same age as me, and she was the Jesus freak to end all Jesus freaks. I went to church every Sunday and I was in the youth group, but even I was like, all right, Bethany, easy on the Jesus. She was a member of an all female Christian barbershop quartet called Voices of Praise. And the four of them would wear matching puffy painted sweatshirts and scrunchies to school all the time. Her brother Robbie was a year older than us, and he was a genius. He was building a computer from scratch. In his room. And he was also, like, a musical prodigy and got straight A's and everything. It became clear almost immediately after they moved in that my perfect life was gone. There was no more air guitar after school because Robbie and Bethany were there watching me with their judging eyes. The only show that was ever on our television was Bethany's favorite show, which was Seventh Heaven, which is the worst show in the universe. And my dad gave our dog Samuel away because Bethany was allergic. And what made it even worse was that I didn't know what my role was in the family anymore. Because my brother had always been the adorable baby. And then I was the good, smart one. And now Bethany was the good one, and Robbie was the smart one. And there was no way I could compete with either of them. I remember hearing my dad talking on the phone to my grandparents. And he was talking about Bethany and her choir recital and how good she was, and. And then he was talking about Robbie the mathlete, and how smart he was. And then he said, oh, Erin, no, she's not really doing anything. The clincher came at Christmas. What I wanted for Christmas more than I'd ever wanted anything was a Fender Stratocaster. This very specific Strat that was hanging up at our local music store that was the exact same color blue as the one Ed Robertson from the Barenaked Ladies played. And my dad, he took me to the store and he let me try it out and everything. And I knew. I just knew from the way he was smiling that he was definitely gonna buy it for me. And on Christmas morning, it was there under the tree, but it was also attached to a card that said, to Robbie, you guys. It was in that moment that I realized that though the good role and the smart role were both taken in my family, there was one vacancy still available. And that was the role of the complete and total asshole. And I assumed it immediately. I started drinking and swearing and just kind of being a general dick. I once egged my own house with actual eggs from my own refrigerator. And then came report card day. Obviously, Robbie had straight A's on his report card. And all the teachers loved Bethany. But me, for the first time ever, I had some C's and D's on my report card. And I was just sitting there, just feeling so frustrated by the fact that I could just never compare to them. And I realized that what would really make me feel better, what would really be a good idea in this situation, would be to set my report card on fire in a kitchen pot. In a symbolic gesture of my rebellion against their standards. Unfortunately, I failed to predict exactly how much smoke your standard 9th grade report card produces. It is quite a lot. So before long, my dad and Becky were both knocking on the door demanding to know what was going on over the following months. It got around school, probably from Robbie, that I had not only set a fire, but that I had been attempting to burn my house down and kill my whole family. I never corrected anyone because I had to make a choice and I could either have people think I was a psychopath or have people think I was emo. And psychopath was clearly less embarrassing. So over the course of a year, I'd gone from being the good and smart one to being the psychopath, which I'll admit bothered me for a long time. But now I'm grown up and Robbie's not a rocket scientist and Bethany is not the second coming of Christ. She's actually just kind of an asshole who lives in the Midwest and posts photos on Facebook of herself in line on Chick Fil? A. So it's hard to be jealous of that. And I realized that maybe there never was any such thing as the good one or the smart one or the asshole and that I'm just me, which is some combination of all three. Thank you.
- [17:58]
Dan Kennedy
Aaron Barker is a writer, editor and two time Moth Grand Slam champion living in New York City. She is senior producer of the science storytelling project called the Story Collider and she considers herself to be a Gryffindor.
- [18:14]
Makers 46
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Dan Kennedy
Enter Moth also listeners in Oregon, here's a quick announcement. The Moth main stage is returning to Port. That's going to be Monday, December 15th. For tickets and a list of all of our upcoming tour stops, visit themoth.org.
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Makers 46
Our podcast host, Dan Kennedy is a writer and performer living in New York and author of the new novel American Spirit, available now.
- [19:39]
Dan Kennedy
Thanks to all of you for listening and we hope you have a story worthy week. Podcast audio production by Paul Ruest at the Argo Studios in New York. The Moth Podcast and the Radio Hour are presented by prx, the Public Radio Exchange, helping make public radio more public at prx. Org.