Sarah Austin Janess (16:33)

That was Hasan Minhaj. Hasan is a comedian and writer living in Los Angeles. He's developing a solo show of stories called Sakoon. I talked to Hasan the day after the moth show.

Hasan Minhaj (16:44)

A lot of times people wonder when I was standing there at that doorstep, why I didn't say anything in that moment. And you know, in that moment, as I stood there on their doorstep, I felt that they were right, that I wasn't a good fit. Because, you know, Bethany's father was a very successful cardiologist. And they weren't just some toothless yokels yelling camel jockey from the back of a pickup truck. They were this well to do family that had had me over for dinner and I believed what they had to say. They would smile at me from across the dinner table and were prejudiced through their teeth. And so as a 17 year old, I just felt that who was I to ruin this special day for them, you know, like, I really do and did feel that, you know, they were like this like J. Crew catalog of a family and maybe prom and this type of celebration wasn't for people who looked like me.

Sarah Austin Janess (17:48)

Has that feeling changed?

Hasan Minhaj (17:50)

Yeah, I think it's changed because of the fact that I've gotten the courage to share the story for a really, really long time. I was just like, too ashamed to share it. And now that I've been sharing the story and hearing from people that, hey, like, it's okay, you weren't in the wrong. I've experienced something similar to that, that I realized that there really are just, you know, different types of people in this world. And there are people that are like, accepting and then there are people that maybe aren't. I think the scariest thing about that lesson that I learned is that, and I wish I could tell 17 year old me, was that it is. This world is tough to navigate because there are a lot of people that may smile in your face but hold prejudices against certain types of people, whether it's their race, sexuality, creed, or class in their heart. And sometimes it's very tough for you to determine that. But I guess we just have to have faith that there is a group of people out there that is ultimately good and believe in equality for everybody.

Sarah Austin Janess (18:53)

You said you're closer to your father now than you've ever been.

Hasan Minhaj (18:56)

This.

Hasan Minhaj (18:57)

This might seem weird, but storytelling kind of got me to reverse engineer a positive relationship with my father and a deeper relationship with the rest of my family. A lot of my family is from Aligarh in India, and they live in Aligarh in Delhi. And they just didn't know a lot of these stories about my life and me getting to do the Moth and have a recorded medium of these, like, key stories from these kind of pivotal moments in my life and me sharing it with them has made us a lot closer. And at the Moth, when we do rehearsals, it's like it's five disparate people sharing, like, the deepest, darkest secret of their life. And then we all go have dinner afterwards and it's like, if only more things in life are like that, you know, like the first day at your job or the first day at school. I think the world would probably be a better place and everyone would be a lot more empathetic to one another rather than being like, hey, this is my name and this is what I do. If there are any young kids listening that are struggling with identity and are struggling with being proud of who they are, it's okay to be proud of who you are and don't worry about what people will think.

Sarah Austin Janess (20:16)

So since Hassan told this story, he did meet Bethany and he did forgive her. And he said their conversation was one of the best experiences he's had. Hassan and Bethany are both engaged and both to people of Indian descent. To see a photo of Hasan in high school, go to themoth.org Coming up next, two stories from our open mic slam series. One from New York City and one from Seattle.

Mel Dockery (20:57)

The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts and presented by prx.

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Sarah Austin Janess (22:38)

This is the Moth radio hour from PRX. I'm Sarah Austin. Janess. Ellen DeGeneres is beloved by many, but Katherine Smaika, our next storyteller, has a special place for Ellen in her heart. Kathryn told this story at one of our slams in Seattle. We partner with public radio station KUOW to produce this open mic series. And the theme this night was nerve.

Katherine Smaika (23:03)

Short people. So for a long time in my family, there was a spoken understanding that my grandmother refused to watch the Ellen DeGeneres show because the host was a lesbian. And she used to say, the nerve of that woman being all gay in public like that. And my relatives used to joke about it at family dinners. And there was an unspoken understanding not to tell my grandmother that I was a lesbian. My uncle had said, you know, she's pretty old already, so you should just, you know, wait it out until she just walks away. So it became like another kind of family joke, like, don't tell grandma that Katherine's gay. And in college, I had this rainbow bracelet that I used to take off when I went into her house, even though I knew she wouldn't know what that meant. And sometimes she'd walk into the kitchen and I'd be telling a story about a girl I was dating and all of a sudden, like, tone of town to very G rated and be like, she's such a nice friend. And then it was just exhausting though, and the coming out process, did it feel very freeing if I was keeping secrets? And so anyway, so I, you know, the challenge with my grandmother was nerve wracking. But she and I had that in common because she was no stranger to challenges. She had moved all the way across the country to be with her husband who ended up dying really early. And she raised 12 kids mostly by herself. She never finished school. And she, I just like, I didn't want to be one of those challenges because I thought that'd be really lame, like having a queer granddaughter, like, what are you going to do with that. So she. So anyway, so whenever we hung out, I was a total nervous wreck. And so it was late summer, about two years after coming out, and a bunch of people were at grandma's house. And the summer had been like, long and wonderful and full of this woman that I loved so much. And I was just sitting in the back porch smiling and thinking about her. And grandma came outside and I think we were talking about how my younger sister was about to get her driver's license, which is already like a terrifying thing. And then I asked her about how she and my grandfather met. It's a story I've heard a billion times, but I love hearing it again. She got this smile and she was talking about what grandpa was like in his early 20s and about their slightly sneaky courtship, because I learned a couple years back that she basically conned a priest into setting her up on a dinner date with my grandfather, which I thought was adorable and hilarious. And so she was telling me about him. And she has great stories, but mostly I love watching her talk about him. And I can tell that she still remembers exactly how his hand used to fit in hers and the intensity of his scent. He smelled like pipe tobacco and mint. And it's been over two decades, actually, since he passed away. And I know that she's thought of him every day. And she's telling me about him on the back porch that day. And she said, he was the best man I know. So you need to find yourself someone like that. Someone who will love you and respect you and tell you you're beautiful and someone to bring home to meet the family for family dinner. And without thinking, I said, well, I think I already have, Grandma. And then I was like, oh, my God, I said that out loud. So I was like, I don't know what to do. And I was like, she's going to kill me. And like, what's going to happen? Oh my God, I'm a lesbian. She's going to kill me. And so she said, is he a nice boy? And I said, yes, she is a very nice lady. And the two of us looked at each other for a long time and I have no idea what was running through her head, but mine was going something like, why are you still sitting here?

Hasan Minhaj (27:04)

Like, run.

Katherine Smaika (27:05)

She's like, actually going to kill you. And she reached over and patted my hand and said, well, you tell her to come around anytime, alright? And I was like, what? And she. I looked over and she had this smile on her face that meant she was thinking of my Grandpa. And she said, you're my granddaughter and I love you so much. And you should know that there will always be a place at my dinner table for you and whoever you love. And I, like, wanted to cry and I wanted to hug her and also wanted to make sure that she knew I was telling her I was gay, to be clear. But she. She said she just kept looking at me and patting my hand, and so I was like, thank you. And since then, grandma is the first to reprimand anyone who tells a gay joke. And my uncles are actually the worst offenders. And when someone says, like, okay, so a queer walks into a bar, she is the first to just slap him upside the head and tell him to cut it out. And every once in a while, I will even see the Ellen DeGeneres show playing in the living room. As it turns out, Ellen DeGeneres is not the only woman around that house with a lot of nerve.

Sarah Austin Janess (28:42)

That was Catherine Smaika in sea. Catherine spends her days working at the newspaper the Stranger and her nights with lowercase her literary magazine. Next, another story from the slam series, this time in New York, where we partner with public radio station wnyc. The storyteller is Mel Dockery. Her son brought her to the slam, encouraged her to put her name in the hat, and she won. Here's Mel.

Jeremy Orvik (29:25)

In 1997, I decided to become an American citizen after 30 years, 33 years, actually, in this country. And the reason that I did it, I thought, was for a really basic and intrinsic American value, financial greed. Now, there are a lot of rules that you had to comply with. Obviously, if you're going to become a citizen, fingerprinting eligibility, who you're married to, endless things. Have you ever been arrested of a serious crime? And I managed to crawl through all of those. And the final two things that I had to pass was the word, the civics test, and the interview to see if I was an eligible huddled mass to come into America. So I have to explain about the civics test in those days. I think they have lessened the number of questions. Now, there were a possible 300 questions that you had to be able to answer, and they were going to ask you 10 of them. So I was a little disappointed at the interview when he said, who is the current American president Clinton? What color is the flag? Red, white, and blue. Name two states other than New York and New Jersey. I picked Oklahoma and Arkansas, trying to make it a little bit harder. And then he said, who discovered America? Now I know that another intrinsic value of America because It was the Founding Father that said, it is, thou shalt not tell a lie. So here I was, stuck. Who discovered America? I wanted to say, well, the first person that stood erect out of the primordial slime, I suppose, but I thought that wouldn't be a good way of phrasing it. So I said, the first people who were here, I could tell he didn't like it. And I said, well, I know, I know you want me to say Christopher Columbus, but that is politically incorrect. Somehow I managed to drag myself through the civics test and we came to the interview and it started off really well. You know, we had some pleasant conversation and I thought, I think this guy likes me. And then he said, will you be prepared to bear arms for the United States, States of America? And I said, well, again, can't tell a lie. I couldn't kill anyone. And he said, why not? I mean, to be an American citizen, I have to say I'm going to kill somebody. But anyway, I said, I don't know, I just couldn't. And he thought a bit, and I thought a bit. And he said, do you belong to a religious organization that forbids killing? And I said, no. Then he leant across his desk and sotto voce, he said, how old are you? And even softer I said, 55. So he leant back and then he leant forward again and even softer he said, it's highly unlikely that you'll have to fight. Hey, presto. I said, fine. And he put a big check mark next to barons. So just know that if there's a war that breaks out and I'm carrying a gun or carrying the landmine, that's all I do. And somehow, miraculously, I became a citizen of the United States of America. And about a week later, yes, yay. About a week later, I had to fly up to Boston on the Boston shuttle. And of course, Boston, you have to fly around because you get stuck in traffic. And I look down and I see Boston harbor sparkling in the sunshine and I start to cry. My harbor, my tea party. And I realized that I became an American citizen for more than just financial greed. Thank you.

Sarah Austin Janess (34:26)

That was Mel Dockery. Mel is a retired corporate trainer in the financial field and she's been taking telling stories most of her life. After our break, an emergency physician must make a life and death decision for his ailing mother.

Mel Dockery (34:52)

The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts, and presented by the Public Radio Exchange prx.org.

Sarah Austin Janess (35:05)

I'm Sarah Austin Janess and you're listening to the Moth Radio Hour. Some of the stories you hear on our stage started out as a pitch. People call our hotline or tell us their story through our website, and we develop these pitches for our live events. The next story from Jeremy Orvik began with this message.

Jeremy Orvik (35:21)

The story I'd like to tell you has to do with my mother. I'm an emergency physician and she about six months ago got diagnosed with lung cancer. Incredibly difficult to do this in about the 40 seconds I have remaining. But the real short version, she had a port placed in her chest, which in front of me. I caused her lung to collapse. In the series of having a couple of anxiety attacks and other things that she had gone through that day, she began to go into cardiovascular collapse right in front of my face. And my story involves basically getting her into the ER real quickly and as she's going under with sedation, anesthesia, going through the process of deciding whether or not we should even try to bring her back from this. There's a whole other aspects to my life this relates to, and no way I can do it justice here. But I do think it's a compelling story about, for me at least, being incredibly powerful, being incredibly powerless and standing by somebody who stood by me their whole life. Anyway, she's still alive and doing fine. Love to tell you guys more about it. Thank you.

Sarah Austin Janess (36:18)

We reached out to Jeremy. Maggie Sino, our senior producer, directed his story and he told the version you're about to hear. Four years after the original pitch, when the story had grown. The event was produced in partnership with Iowa Public Radio, and the theme was Heart of Darkness. Here's Jeremy Orvik at the Moth in Iowa City.

Jeremy Orvik (36:42)

Thank you. The first thing that I remember in this life is actually a tornado. My mother had me on her left shoulder and my twin brother was on her right. My older brother was following us down the stairs into the basement here in our home in Iowa. I remember I could see the sky through a window over her shoulder. I could see the sky through it, and it was violent. I was a year and a half old. There were so many examples like that of my mother protecting us when we were children. She used to go after the neighborhood creeps armed with only her car keys. Yeah. Mind you, my mother was five foot one. She drank instant coffee. She had, and she wore fuzzy cat sweatshirts. She used to put her arm across me if she had to slow down the car very quickly. I think in the idea that she could protect me more than, say, seat belts or airbags could. I pointed out to her once that that required taking her hand off the steering wheel thingy. She loved me like that. Undoubtedly. My mother's tendency to shelter and protect everything that came her way contributed to my eventual desire to go to medical school and become an emergency physician. When I was 36, into my second year of practice, my mother started developing this pain in the right side of her chest. At first, I treated it as if it was maybe a pleurisy or a muscle pull. But as time wore on, we got some tests, and that eventually landed us with a diagnosis of metastatic small cell lung cancer. And this after she'd already had both breast cancer and melanoma. And I have to be honest with you, for the first time in my life, I was so completely defeated, humbled by this. I mean, so much had already happened to her. She had lost her parents and her brother and my father, her husband had died when my twin and I were 16. And now this. And I suppose it was grief that I was experiencing, but the unusual grief of someone forced to wait for it. And perhaps particularly so because as a physician, I would see these patients with cancer come into my emergency department, these jaundiced, hollow, broken people, their families just wrecked. And perhaps more acutely so, as an emergency physician whose function it is to treat, to intervene, to do something, I knew that ultimately I would be rendered powerless to do anything to help this person who I loved so much. However, my mother decided to treat her cancer, and for my part, I made her a promise that I would keep her out of pain and that when her end came, it would be a dignified one. And we moved forward with treatment. When you treat a widespread cancer like that, it's generally done via chemotherapy. Chemotherapy is really just a group of caustic chemicals through, theoretically more toxic to the cancer than to the rest of you. It has to get into the body in order to be effective. And over time, most patients elect to have a port, or port, a cath, placed into their bodies to aid in the administration. It's less painful than multiple peripheral IVs. There's various styles of port, a cath, but at the end of the day, it's really just a tube within a tube, the second tube being one of your veins. My mother had her port placed here on the right side of her chest, under her clavicle on a spring morning. After the procedure, we waited for a couple of hours for her to rest, and then we went to the oncology center for her first round of chemo. The chemo was preceded by A few liters of fluid to hydrate the body and prepare the kidneys for what's coming. I was actually out of the room when they started the third liter of fluid. That's when the nurse came to find me and told me I had to come back, that my mother wasn't doing well. Sure enough, when I got back to her bedside, her heart rate was up and she was breathing very quickly. She was very sweaty, and the veins in her neck were bulging, and her trachea was tugged over to the left. All of these are signs of shock, but a particular type of shock that can happen when the lung collapses. You see, the human lung works much like a bellows within our chests. And much like a bellows, if exposed to external pressure, it can collapse. As it so happens, when the surgeon had placed the catheter tip earlier that morning, he had accidentally gone through the rear wall of the vein up here in her chest. So the catheter tip was sitting inside her chest wall, and all the fluid we had been giving her all morning was pouring into there. This was collapsing her lung, pushing it over onto her heart, and very rapidly killing her. I don't know what the odds are against that complication. I don't know what the odds are against that complication happening when you have a son who happens to be an emergency physician, who happens to be at the bedside there to make the diagnosis. I don't know why my mother had to survive breast cancer and melanoma and a thousand heartbreaks in between to be diagnosed with lung cancer 20 years after she quit smoking. And I can't tell you why. My first memory is of a tornado. So there we were in the oncology center, really no emergency equipment available for me. I did the only thing I could. I picked her up, I threw her in the back of the car, and we drove to the closest emergency department a few minutes away. When I got her into the trauma bay, there she was, barely conscious, barely breathing. And I had about a minute before anyone came in the room to really think about it. You see, the way I saw it, this cancer was going to kill her. There was no question about it. No amount of hope, no amount of prayer, no amount of livestrong wristbands were going to change that. It was going to get her, and it was going to be awful and painful and drawn out. And the way I saw it was that perhaps the best way to keep my promise to her, to care for her, was to have this be it. Because there she was, barely conscious, barely breathing, but no longer in pain, no longer afraid. Dignified. And all I had to do to let that process happen, to make that process happen. I mean, no matter how good a doctor, how good a nurse came through those doors, it was going to take them a couple of minutes to figure out what was happening here. A couple more minutes to do anything about it. All I had to do was delay them. Withhold information, lie if needs be, and this would be it. Well, truth be told, I only had about a minute. And truth be told, I wasn't ready to lose her. So the ER doc came in and I gave him the 10 second version. He said, well, we need to open up her chest. I said, I agree. He said, do you want to do it? I said, no, man, that's all you. So he sliced open her chest. Fluid shot across the room, her lung re inflated, her heart started beating properly, she pinked up. And literally within a few minutes, my mother was giving us the double thumbs. Yeah, my mother. It's a crazy story. I know. I can prove it. I have pictures on my iPhone. The decision of that day bought us another couple years with my mother. It bought us a trip to Costa Rica. It bought us a stupid cruise. I'm sorry. I'll just say it was sorry. Honest. Don't go on cruises. It bought us the best birthday of my life. Playing cranium on the living room floor of my home in Santa Cruz. My mother cracking up, watching my twin try to pantomime out a bachelor party. It's tempting with a captive audience, but I'll spare you the reenactment. Don't beg. The cancer was what it was. And fast forwarding a couple of years from that day in the emergency department, my mother was having some confusion and some difficulty walking, so. So I took her back to the oncologist and we got some tests that we already knew the answer to. The cancer was everywhere. We had lost, and it was time. And when I asked my mother what she wanted to do, she said, you take me home to die. When I got her into her room, I had what would really amount to be the final conversation I would ever really have with her. Please understand. She was covered in her own urine. She couldn't walk. We weren't on hospice yet. Things weren't looking good, and I hadn't slept in a few days. And I was growing increasingly more desperate as the things that made my mother. Her name was Sue. As the things that made sue sue were being taken from me. And despite my training, despite my background, with these hands, I was powerless to Stop it. Hopeless. As helpless as the next person. So I offered what I could. I took her hands and I said, mom, I can end all this for you right now. I've had years to prepare for this day. I am ready for this. I can take you out and you'll never know what hit you. I did that. I looked my mother in the eyes and I offered to end her life. I knew that the offer could end my career. I knew it could land me in jail. And I also knew that my mother, who had sued three life insurance companies when my father died, my mother, she did. My mother, who had remortgaged her house to help me pay for medical school, sue, who chased the neighborhood creeps armed with only her car keys, could not be allowed to suffer. She heard my offer. She just stared at me for the longest time. She said nothing. And after a little while, she smiled just the tiniest bit. And two days later, and without me having to make good on that offer, sue died. It wasn't really clear to me at the time if she had understood what it was I was offering, that I was trying to keep good on this promise and trying to care for her. But as time has gone on, as I remember that look in her eyes after I offered what I did, as I remember that vast gulf of silence, it's become increasingly more clear to me, and I'm sure of it now, that in my mother's quiet acceptance of what lay before her and in not accepting the offer that I made, my mother while dying was saving me.

Sarah Austin Janess (49:13)

That was Jeremy Orvik. Jeremy is an emergency physician and surfer living in Santa Cruz, California. To see a photo of him and his mom, sue, go to themoth.org.

Hasan Minhaj (49:30)

While.

Sarah Austin Janess (49:31)

You'Re there, you can pitch us your story like Jeremy did by recording it right on our site, or call 877-799-MOTH. That's 877-799-6684. The best pitches are developed for moth shows all around the world. Here's a pitch we liked.

Cynthia Riggs (49:48)

Hello, this is Cynthia Riggs. I live on Martha's Vineyard. Last February, I received a package from someone I hadn't thought about for more than 60 years. And in the package, there were brown paper towels with pencil cryptograms on them. And I didn't have any idea what this was all about. But gradually, the mystery unraveled. Sixty years ago, in 1950, I was a college student and I had a job in a laboratory in San Diego sorting plankton. I'd never been west before, and this was thrilling to me. However, my co workers were no longer thrilled with the job. Here was this naive college kid who was a way to lessen the boredom and I didn't have any idea what their pranks meant or their coded conversations. And finally it dawned on me that I was a joke among the veterans and I turned to Howie, this quiet guy, for help. I wrote him a cryptogram on a paper towel. Howie worked it out and it's all there on the paper towels he kept for six plus decades. Also in the packet was a coded message from the Howie of today which says, I have never stopped loving you. Howie didn't make it easy for me to track him down, but I did. June 15th was my 81st birthday. Howie is 90. He's got a book titled Living to 120. So I figure if I can make it to 110, we have a 30 year relationship ahead of us, which is more than most marriages.

Sarah Austin Janess (51:41)

Remember. You can pitch us your story@themault.org you can share these stories or others from the Moth Archive through our website. We're also on Facebook and Twitter hemoth. That's it for this episode of the Moth Radio Hour. We hope you'll join us next time.

Mel Dockery (52:14)

Your host is this hour was Sarah Austin Janess Sarah also directed the stories in the show along with Maggie Sino. The rest of the Moth directorial staff includes Kathryn Burns, Sarah Haberman, Jennifer Hickson, and Meg Bowles. Production support from Whitney Jones. Moth Stories are True is remembered and affirmed by the Storytellers. Moth events are recorded by Argo Studios in New York City, supervised by Paul Ruet. Our theme music is by the Drift. Other music in this hour from Rudresh Mahamdaba, Ry Cooter, Brian Bromberg and the Bad plus you can find links to all the music we use at our website. The Moth is produced for radio by me, Jay Allison with Vicki Merrick at Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. This hour was produced with funds from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the John D. And Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. Committed to building a more just, verdant and peaceful world, the Moth Radio Hour is presented by the public radio exchange prx.org for more about our podcast. For information on pitching your own story and everything else, go to our website themoth.org.