Host: Sarah Austin Jenness
[Uncanny Valley theme music by The Drift playing]
Sarah: [00:00:12] From PRX, this is The Moth Radio Hour. I'm Sarah Austin Jenness. This hour has four stories that explore the real you. An introvert meets an extrovert at a bar, long-held religious beliefs are challenged, a dream job is in jeopardy after a diagnosis, and what happens when there's another you, [cheers and applause] a digital robot version of you? Well, our first storyteller, Jon Ronson, will tell us all about that. Here's Jon live at The Moth.
Jon: [00:00:47] This story starts like a lot of great stories do, with me accidentally typing my name into Google [audience laughter] and inadvertently pressing search. [audience chuckles] And I discovered that there was another Jon Ronson on Twitter, and his Twitter name was Jon_Ronson and his picture was a picture of my face. [audience chuckle] And as I looked in surprise at his timeline, he tweeted, "Going home. Got to get the recipe for a huge plate of mussel and guarana in a bap with mayonnaise. #yummy." [audience chuckles] "Who are you?" I tweeted him. "Watching Seinfeld, would love a delicious plate of lemongrass stew. #foodie," he wrote. [audience chuckles] I didn't know what to do. The next morning, I checked the other Jon Ronson's Twitter feed before I checked my own. In the night, he tweeted, "I'm dreaming something about time and [beep sound]." [audience chuckles]
He had 20 followers. Some of them were people that I knew from real life [audience laughter] who were presumably wondering why I'd suddenly become so passionate about fusion cooking [audience laughter] and also candid about dreaming about [beep sound]. [audience laughter] So, I did some digging and I discovered that it was a spam bot created by an academic from the University of Warwick called Luke Robert Mason. And I thought, "Oh, well, this is fine. I'll email him and I'll tell him that I don't like the spam bot and he'll take it down." So, I emailed him and I said, "I'm sorry, can you take down your spam bot, please?" And he emailed back, "We prefer the term infomorph to spam bot." [audience chuckles] So, I wrote, "But it's taken my identity." And he replied, "The infomorph isn't taking your identity. It is repurposing social media data into an infomorphic aesthetic." I felt a tightness in my chest. [laughter] I was at war with a robot version of myself. [audience chuckle]
A month passed, and the other Jon Ronson was tweeting about 30 times a day about his soirees. [audience chuckles] The other Jon Ronson, I should say, was having a much better life than I was having in the entire period. I was only invited to one thing that would be called a soiree. And as I turned up, the host said to me, "Would you like some potato chips?" And I said, "No, thank you. I'm going to have cereal when I get home." [audience chuckles] So, I saw out the corner of my eye, my wife was glaring at me and mouthing something. And I said, "What?" And she mouthed, "Be more general. [audience chuckles] Your small talk. Make it more general." [audience laughter] It was just basic small talk as far as I understand the concept.
Anyway, I emailed Luke Robert Mason, and I said, "Well, if you won't take down your spam bot, maybe we can meet and I can film the encounter and put it onto YouTube and you can explain your reasons for creating the spam bot, and I can explain why I don't like the spam bot." And he wrote me back to say, "We would very much like to meet you to explain our reasons behind the infomorph." And I said, "That's great. I'm very much looking forward to hearing your reasons behind the spam bot." [audience chuckles] So, I rented a room in central London, and three of them turned up, and they were all academics, and I asked them all to sit in a row on a sofa so I could film them all in a single shot.
One of them said, "Okay, we'll play along, but we know what you're doing. It's a form of psychological control." [audience chuckles] And I said, "Is it?" And he said, "I do it to my students. I sit them in a row and I sit in a chair separately." And I said, "Why would you want to psychologically control your students?" And he looked briefly worried that I'd caught him saying something eerie. And he said, "It's about controlling the learning environment." And I said, "Well, I'm not trying to psychologically control you." But actually, I think back on it, I think I kind of was. Anyway, so he said, "Do you want to go through the London phone book and tell everybody in the phone book called Jon Ronson that they're not allowed to be called Jon Ronson?" And I said, "No, because those people aren't called Jon Ronson because of me, whereas you're calling this spam bot Jon Ronson because of me." And he said, "Well, you're proposing yourself as the real Jon Ronson, [audience chuckles] and we feel annoyed with you [audience laughter] because we feel that what you're really doing is brand management." And I said, "It's just me tweeting." And I said, "My problem is that, you know, if it was like porn or fraud, it would be okay, but this, it's plausible and it's an idiot, [audience laughter] and it's like a misrepresentation of me." And he said, "Would you like it to be more like you?" And I said, "No, I'd like it to not exist." And he said, "Well, I find that disturbing because you want to kill these algorithms. You must feel threatened in some way." So, I said, "You're a troll."
And then I staggered out into the London afternoon, and I dreaded uploading the footage because I'd been so screechy [audience chuckles] and I didn't want YouTube comments mocking my screechiness. [audience chuckles] But I posted it and I left it 10 minutes. And then, with some apprehension, I had a look. And the first comment said, "These people should respect Jon's personal liberty." And I thought, "Wow." And then the second comment said, "Vile, disturbing idiots. Playing with the man's hurt and anger and then laughing at his pain." And I nodded soberly. [audience laughter] And then the third comment said, "Break them. [beep sound] them, destroy them." And I was giddy with joy. I was like Braveheart wandering through a field, at first alone, and then I realized that hundreds are marching behind me.
And then the next comment said, "If I could see these people face to face, I would say that they are [beep sound]. The [beep sound] in the middle is a [beep sound] psychopath." And I thought, "I hope nobody's going to actually hurt them." [audience chuckle] And then the next message said, "Gas them." And I won. The academics were shamed into acquiescence, and it was like their public shaming had set a factory restore button and everything went back to normal. And it was a wonderful feeling, the feeling of victory. I felt like I felt overwhelmed with this good feeling, like a sedative. And they shut down the spam bot, and they made a big deal out of it. They tweeted it and said, “I'm afraid that we're going to have to close you down now. Do you know what that means?" And then they said, "You only have a few hours left. I hope you choose how to spend them wisely. I hope you had a happy life." And I said, "Just turn it off. Jesus." [audience chuckles]
And it felt great to be victorious. But as I stood over the corpse of the spambot, I suddenly thought to myself, “Were we doing to them what they were doing to me? Were we turning them into something that wasn't quite human? And then I thought, were we the people in the lithographs, being ribald at whippings?" And then I thought, “Maybe what's going on here is that there's an escalation in the war on human flaws, and we're soldiers in that war because we just don't like it when somebody's not normal." And then I was thinking, “Well, maybe what we're saying here is that we are normal and this is the average. Maybe what we're doing is defining the boundaries of normality by becoming furious and tearing apart the people outside of it." Thank you.
[cheers and applause]
Sarah: [00:11:20] That was Jon Ronson. [Tiny Resistors from Todd Sickafoose playing] Jon is a journalist, screenwriter, and author whose works include The Men Who Stare at Goats and So You've Been Publicly Shamed, where a longer version of this story appears. Thankfully, this infomorph spam bot is not annoying Jon any longer. Jon says, "It's dead. Well, it's frozen in time. Its old tweets are still there, but it's no longer active." And you can find the real Jon Ronson online if you type his name into Google, just like he did. [music continues] For extras related to many of the stories you hear on The Moth Radio Hour, go to themoth.org. When we come back, a hardworking woman has a seizure while at her dream job and an introvert is sent a glass of wine at a bar from a bold would-be suitor.
[Tiny Resistors from Todd Sickafoose continues]
Jay: [00:12:40] The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts and presented by the Public Radio Exchange, prx.org.
Sarah: [00:13:33] [crowd murmuring] This is The Moth Radio Hour from PRX. I'm Sarah Austin Jenness. We're sharing stories of challenged identities. Sometimes a medical diagnosis can change the way we see ourselves. When our next storyteller, Sitawa Wafula, realized she was epileptic at the age of 17, she didn't let it stop her from achieving her dream of working in actuarial science. But the aftermath of one specific seizure that she talks about in this story [cheers and applause] changed her view of herself and the world. Here's Sitawa Wafula live at The Moth.
Sitawa: [00:14:13] I love numbers. I love how straightforward and direct they are. I love how one plus one is always equals to two. And how two plus two without a doubt equals to four. And so, when it was time for us to decide what we wanted to do in university, I knew for sure that I wanted to work with numbers. So, you can imagine my joy when I heard about something called Actuarial Science. [audience laughter] For those of you who do not know what that is, it's this really amazing course that has you spending your days doing things like calculus and probability and statistics. It's what insurance companies use to know the mortality rates, hence tell you how much premium you need to pay. It's what governments use to know what areas to invest. I mean, who wouldn't want to spend the rest of their lives doing that? [audience laughter]
But just before I went to university, I was diagnosed with epilepsy. And the doctor told me that I had to make sure I did three things. Ate well, slept well, and never missed my medication. So, armed with the doctor's advice, I enrolled to do actuarial science at the University of Nairobi. A few years into it, I was lucky enough to get an internship at an insurance company. I remember my first day there. I had a mismatched suit, but it was a suit nevertheless, and the director's assistant was assigned to show me around. And since we were almost the same age, we quickly clicked and made it a routine to come very early in the morning just to share our dreams and ambitions.
A few weeks into the job, the company got a really big business deal, which meant all of us had to chip in. And we spent one Friday afternoon learning how to use this new fancy photocopying machine. [audience chuckle] On Saturday morning, when I reported for duty, I got the honorable duty of working with a new photocopying machine. I remember walking into the copier room armed with a rim of papers and a stack of files that I needed to photocopy. I opened the machine just to make sure it had enough papers, as we had been instructed the day before.
Then I woke up in the hospital, and the doctor told me that I have something called photosensitive epilepsy. This is a type that is triggered by flashing lights, and in my case, with the beam from the photocopying machine. And since I had a known history of epilepsy, the doctor said that there was no need for me to be admitted and that I should go home and get some rest. So, I went home, got some rest, and was looking forward to Monday morning to redeem myself at the workplace.
On Monday morning, I went back to the office and the director's assistant told me that I had been given two weeks to get more rest. I was really excited about this because here I was doing my dream job and I was working for a company that cared about my health. And so, I went home and I did some research on this photosensitive epilepsy so that I could make sure it never happens in the workplace again. And after the two weeks, I went back to work and the director's assistant told me that they'd given me two more weeks. This time round, I wasn't as excited as I was before. For some reason deep within me, this two plus two was not adding up to four. [audience chuckles]
And so, in the evening after work hours, I called the director's assistant and I asked her if she had heard anything about my case. And after a few minutes of silence, in what was almost like a whisper, she said to me, "Sitawa, the director said that we cannot work with someone like you." This meant that they couldn't work with someone with a health condition like mine. And after a few more moments of silence, she said that he was thinking of telling the person who'd introduced me to this insurance company to break the news to me. I can't really recall how that fun conversation ended. I don't know if she hung up fast or if I hung up fast, but I remember bursting out into tears and I cried because of the pain I felt that the director of this insurance company did not have the courage or the integrity to tell me to my face that I didn't have a job anymore. But he kept giving me two and two more weeks off. But most of all, I cried because I didn't ask for this. I just started falling down.
And so, after a few days of crying, I turned my tears into words and moved those words to a blog. And before I knew it, people living with epilepsy were coming to my blog for inspiration and information and support. And as the numbers grew, I started a hotline and they were able to get prompt support from it. I still love numbers. I love the truth in them. I love the fact that numbers tell us things about people. And from the numbers I have interacted with, I see a future where people like me living with epilepsy increase in the workplace. I also see a future where people working with us know that they can work with us and they can touch us and they will not get this thing that we have. And this thing that we have only puts us down for a little while. And after that, we are able to rise up to contribute to the well-being of this amazing world that we live in. Thank you.
[cheers and applause]
Sarah: [00:21:37] That was Sitawa Wafula. [The River Between by Jami Siebert playing] Sitawa says she still loves the mathematical part of actuarial science. For some time after this, she wanted to return to it, but now she calls it the one that got away. Sitawa lives in Kenya, and her blog is called My Mind, My Funk. She describes herself as a nomadic mental health crusader. We met Sitawa in a Moth community storytelling workshop that we taught in Nairobi, and she says she uses the storytelling techniques learned at The Moth to spark conversations about mental health.
[The River Between by Jami Siebert continues]
[crowd murmuring] Next up is a story from Maureen Freeman. She told it at a Milwaukee StorySLAM where we partner with Wisconsin Public Radio and Radio Milwaukee. The theme was Rules, and the story is about stepping out of your comfort zone. In fact, what you're about to hear is a recording of the first time Maureen had challenged herself to tell a story on stage. Here's Maureen Freeman. [applause]
Maureen: [00:23:07] Okay, we ready? Well, present moment being evidence to the contrary, I normally don't do this kind of thing, putting myself out there like this. As a general rule, for me it's just a reflection of reality. Other rules of mine are guidelines that keep me in a good zone, and still others mark where I should stretch beyond the limits of the norm. And all of them are why I'm here. So, several months ago in Washington D.C. where I'm from, after a long workday, I still had hanging over me this writing task that I needed to do. I'd been avoiding it for weeks and my self-imposed deadline loomed and I needed to think of some way to get myself to do this already. And I came up with an idea I thought might work.
I decided I would go to this really lovely bar downtown that I knew. It was a lounge inside a beautiful hotel and I would treat myself to a really nice glass of Chardonnay. That was the carrot. The stick would be that I would be by myself at this bar. And the last thing I want is to be seen as putting myself out there alone in a bar. Just the thought makes me queasy. But I could avoid this dreadful possibility if I kept myself busy with the writing task. So, it was a good plan, and it worked. When the bartender slid toward me a full glass of Chardonnay, I was ready with the writing pad on my lap and pen in my hand, and I put my head down and went right to it. And the words, the sentences, paragraphs, just steadily filled the page.
I scribbled extra notes outside the margins and the rules of grammar and usage didn't matter now, I could apply them later. Sometimes I paused and took a few sips and then quickly resumed writing. And as long as I was writing, it was as if I was kind of invisible to all the people around me, which was great. So, things were going well. Several pages later, I was nearly finished. I looked at my glass. Just a few swallows left, so the timing was perfect. I took one swallow and put the glass down and started on the final two paragraphs to go. And then something in the corner of my eye made me look up as the bartender slid toward me a full glass of Chardonnay. And he said, "This is from the gentleman at the end of the bar."
And I was in a really good zone at that point that my first thought was that friends of mine must be here, so I wonder who. [audience chuckles] So, I was looking around to see, and I didn't recognize anyone. And then it hit me, to my horror, [audience chuckles] that a stranger had sent me a drink while I'm sitting alone in a bar. I was mortified and kind of peeved because he had breached my invisibility and derailed my plan. And I think the bartender maybe noticed the stricken look on my face and maybe quickly or correctly guessed that I wasn't too good at this. But he came back and kind of leaned over and said, in a very helpful way, "This is a nice thing," [audience laughter] which burst my little bubble of bitterness. But still, I felt stranded, kind of outside my zone. And I was clueless about the rules of this new situation I was in.
And I realized that for most people, this is not a big deal, but for me, it's practically an existential crisis. [audience chuckles] “What's the protocol? Do I drink this? And if so, how much? [audience laughter] Do I talk to him? And if so, for how long?” I wanted guidelines, and I had none. So, I just let go and I took a blind leap. So, after a more careful scan around the bar, I spotted him. And he looked over, and his very friendly wave said, "Yep, that was from me." So, I smiled and waved back. He came over to introduce himself. I invited him to sit, [audience chuckles] and then we talked, and we kept talking.
And he told me later that he had recently given himself a new rule to be more social when an opportunity presented itself. So, he had just followed his rule and I had let go of mine. And here we were, just two friendly people, sitting and talking and talking and just talking. And eventually we finished up and left. We walked to the metro station together, same line, opposite directions. And on the platform, we exchanged goodnights and business cards. And soon after, we exchanged emails and text messages and phone calls at random hours of the day and night. But no, this story does not end as a tacky formula romance would. Instead, I'd say we quickly became like longtime friends. Besides, I live in Washington D.C. and he's in New York City and pursuing a serious relationship, long distance doesn't work as a general rule. [laughter] Thank you.
[applause]
Sarah: [00:28:53] [Barnacle from Todd Sickafoose playing] That was Maureen Freeman. Maureen and the gentleman in the story enjoyed a friendship for a few months, but eventually fell out of regular touch. Maureen is a director of communications, and she says she still does some of her best work when alone and focused. But when she's not working, like many introverts, she's always open to adventures both large and small.
[Barnacle from Todd Sickafoose continues]
When she read my email saying the story would be on The Moth Radio Hour, she was sitting on a train going through customs at the Mongolia-Russia border, and she responded, "I've been to 15 countries since telling this Moth story and I met some wonderful people, but absolutely none of them in a bar." Testing your own personal limits can lead to adventure. And our story after the break takes this idea even further by exploring a life where the storyteller says only yes.
[Barnacle from Todd Sickafoose continues]
Jay: [00:30:28] The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts, and presented by the Public Radio Exchange, prx.org.
[murmuring]
Sarah: [00:30:41] You're listening to The Moth Radio Hour from PRX. I'm Sarah Austin Jenness. This hour explores stories of how our personalities evolve. And in this last story, Elna Baker's faith and belief system are put to the test. Elna told the story back in 2006 at a night called Cat Out of Bag - Stories of Confessions. Here's Elna Baker live at The Moth.
[applause]
Elna: [00:31:11] So, I'm 27 years old and I've never had sex. I also don't drink, I don't smoke, I don't do drugs, and I don't drink coffee. I'm Mormon. Yay [chuckles]. [audience laughter] And you know, it's hard being Mormon in New York City and not drinking and smoking and whatever, but it's especially hard to try to live in New York and not have sex because it's like Sex and the City. And I'm young and I want to have relationships and be able to experience those things and instead, after six years of living in the city and not having sex, the longest relationship I was able to sustain was four weeks. And that's only because he was out of town for two of them [chuckles]. [audience laughter]
And in addition to that, there's this huge part of me that would love to be considered sexy, but if you're not selling sex, you really shouldn't advertise. [audience chuckles] So instead I present myself as cute or as someone in the audience pointed out, like, I'm on Star Trek. [audience laughter] Thank you, so kind. [laughs] So, I'd gotten good at thinking of myself as being cute. And I remember one time I was walking through the East Village and I passed this vintage boutique and I walked in and there was all this vintage lingerie. And I happened upon this slip and it was literally the sexiest thing I'd ever seen. It was like it was hanging on like an invisible Lauren Bacall. It was like dark navy blue with this blue lace at the top and these thin straps.
And I couldn't help myself. I tried it on and I remember I looked in the mirror at myself and for the first time in my life, I was like, "I'm sexy. Who knew that I could be sexy?" And woo hoo [chuckles]. So, I bought it. And it's not like any guy's allowed to see me in it because even when you're Mormon, once you get married, you have to wear the garment. So, it sits in a drawer in the back of my closet. But occasionally late at night, I'll take it out and try it on and look in the mirror and be like, "I'm still sexy," [audience chuckles] and put it back in the drawer.
I think there's a lot of misperceptions that people have about Mormons. And more than anything, the one that bothers me is this idea that Mormons say no. No sex, no drugs, no alcohol, which I think would make me seem like a very boring person. But whereas I say no to certain things, I try to say yes to everything else, which makes me very pleasant. And I learned the power of saying yes when I was going to college at NYU. They used to have these career fairs that they would set up for the business students. And I was a drama major, so they didn't even set up booths for us, they sort of saw what was coming. Unemployment. [audience chuckles] But if you were a Stern business student, there would be all these companies trying to recruit you. So, one day I was passing through this recruitment hall and a man stopped me and he was like, "Are you a Stern business student?" And so, I said “Yes.” He said, "Are you interested in a job at Morgan Stanley?" “Yes.”
And I just kept answering yes to all of his questions. And before I knew it, I had a free triangle highlighter with the three different colors. [audience chuckles] And I was like, "This is amazing." [audience laughter] And so, I just started doing that all the time. I would say yes. And I ended up stumbling into a paper convention. And next thing I knew, I went to a bridal convention and I kept getting all these free trinkets just by saying yes. And it all led up to the mother of all conventions. I had some friends in town and went to the Marriott in Times Square and were having breakfast and my friend happened to glance under the table and there was a badge and it said, Bob Barnett, 7-Eleven convention. And I was like, "Yes." [audience laughter] So, we go downstairs in this huge banquet celebrating 75 years of 7-Eleven.
So, I start mingling with people. And I end up meeting the woman who organized the whole convention. So, she starts asking me for my feedback and I'm like, "I go to conventions all the time [audience chuckles] and this is the best convention I've ever been to." And she's like, "Well, are you going on today's activities?" And I was like, "Oh, yes." So, she gave me four tickets to Madame Tussauds, four tickets to Radio City Music Hall. And then she said, "Will I be seeing you on tonight's cruise?" “Yes.” [audience laughter] And then she didn't give me tickets, so I was like, "Oh, but you know, I sent all this stuff and I never got anything." And she was like, "What?" She ran off and then came back with four tickets worth $150 each on a dinner cruise around Manhattan.
So, that night me and my friends got dressed up and we go into this cruise and literally there's like 500 7-Eleven employees and us. [audience chuckles] So, I started making friends. And like, I didn't lie. Like, when people asked me what I did for 7-Eleven, I was like, "Come on, man, leave work at work. You know, [audience laughter] we're here to have fun." And then they serve us this four-course dinner and at the end of it, we're eating our dessert and my friend leans in and he's like, "Elna, I dare you to make a toast." And I don't drink, so I've never made a toast, like, but I've seen movies. So I was like, "Yes." So, I take my glass and tink, tink, tink, and everybody shut up. "I would like to make a toast to 7-Eleven for redefining convenience." [audience laughter]
[chuckles] And they were like, "Yes!" And what I love about saying yes is like, it's like where you start at the beginning of the day and where you end up can be two totally different places just based on all the things that you say yes to. And yet then there's this whole other side of my life where I do say no, and sex being the biggest obstacle of them. And I think it's one thing to say no to sex when you've been in a two-week relationship, but it's an entirely different experience when you feel like you're in love. And I met my yes counterpart four years ago. I was working at a TV show. He was in the audience, and we started talking, and it was immediately. I was like, "It's you." And he was like, "It's you." And we were like, "Yes."
Our first date was amazing. We were walking down the streets of New York, and we happened upon a movie set. And he was like, "We should sneak in and pretend like we're extras." And I was like, "Yes." [audience laughter] And so, we were in the back of all these scenes, and we ended up in the makeup trailer. And the woman was like, "Did the director send you here?" And we were like, "Yes." [audience chuckles] And she said, "What did he send you here for?" And at the same time, we both said, "Black eyes." And she gave us these huge black eyes. [audience chuckles] And then we just spent the rest of the day running around New York City with giant black eyes. And it was incredible. And literally every date, one after the other, was even more exciting.
And really, there was only one problem. He didn't know that I was Mormon, probably because I didn't tell him. [audience chuckles] And I totally rationalized it. I was like in addition to being Mormon, I am many other things. But really, like, I wanted to be able to date him, and I wanted it to be more than two or four weeks, and so I didn't tell him. And then two months went by, and then you start to feel guilty because you start to feel like the person doesn't really know you because they only know half of you. And so, I told him, you know, as casually as you can say that. I was like, "Oh, you know, by the way, I'm Mormon." And he's like, "What? Elna, I'm an atheist. Can you be with an atheist?" “Yes. [audience chuckles] Can you be with a Mormon?” And he looked at me and he was like, "Yes." And so, we kept dating, and we kept going on our adventures, and it was great, except that there were these grander things that were that would not leave us alone no matter how hard we tried.
And I remember one of them in particular was when I found out that he didn't believe people had souls. I was like, "What?" Like, I really didn't-- I thought irregardless of religion, everyone believed that. But he was like, "No, I don't believe in souls." And I was like, "Well, then what-- what's inside of you?" He's like, "Well, my DNA." And I was like-- and I remember I stopped him on the sidewalk and I put my hands on his shoulders. And I just looked into his eyes, and he's like, "What are you doing?" I'm like, "I am looking at your soul, and I can see it, and I can hear it, and I know that it's there." And so, he said, "Well, what does my soul have to say?" And so, I listened, and I was like, "It says [beep sound] you. [beep sound] you. I've been living inside you for 29 years, and you've been ignoring me the entire time." [audience laughter]
I was like, it's not like Mormons are supposed to swear. But then, like, when making a religious point, that was the only word that came into my head. [audience laughter] And so we kept dating, even though, like, at this point, I realized my soulmate doesn't actually believe in souls [audience chuckles] but I was willing to be okay with that. But then the whole sex thing comes up, and he's like, "Are we going to have sex?" And I was like, "No. No." And so, then he started to pull away, and he started to retreat. And it's so interesting because, like, every girl knows when a guy is starting to phase her out. It's like, even if coincidentally, he didn't answer his phone that day, it's like you know because you feel it. And so, I knew that he was phasing me out, and I started thinking, "Well, why? Well, it's probably because I'm Mormon, and it's probably because I won't have sex." So, then I really started to think about those things, not as the way things are or as necessity, but as, like, truth. Like what if this person is the love of my life and I end up marrying some Mormon guy because I'm supposed to that I like, "Okay," and I regret the decision for the rest of my life. Or what if he's right and God doesn't exist? And then I end up making this sacrifice for an entirely imaginary reason. And then also sex when you feel like you could love someone, it just feels like the natural progression of things. Not that it's this awful thing. And so, then I was like, "Well maybe I could have sex. [chuckles] No. No.”
And then we went out again, and we met up. And right when I saw him, I could tell it was going to be one of the last times that we saw each other. And we went to this outdoor exhibit, but it started to rain, so we ended up back at my apartment. We put on a DVD. We made grilled cheese sandwiches. It was like the middle of the afternoon on a Tuesday, and we were watching the movie. But I was still wet from the rain, so I stood up and went into my room to change, and I took off my t-shirt, and I was just going to put another shirt on when I opened my drawer and I saw that blue slip. And I was like, "What if you put that on?" I was like, "No, you can't put that on. It's like the middle of the afternoon on a Tuesday. That would be so weird." [chuckles] But then also it's like, "But you own that, and you've never worn it."
And also like, “What is this thing, this sex thing?” And, like, “You can say yes to that.” And what I like about saying yes is that when you say yes, everything can change. And sometimes you want things to change. And so, I took that slip out and I put it on, and I walked out into the living room. And he was like, "What are you doing?" And I was like, "Shh." And I walked up to him, and we started kissing. And then we laid down on the couch, and we were kissing. And the moment started to build more than it had before. And as this was happening, I leaned into his ear and I heard myself say, "You need to pray and find out if God exists." And he was like, "What?" [audience laughter] And I was like, "What?" And I said, "Nothing. Nothing. I didn't say anything." [audience chuckles] And so then we started to kiss again, and the moment started to build again. And then it happened again. I leaned into his ear, and I said, "How can you know that God doesn't exist unless you've at least asked?" And he was like, "What are you saying?" And I was like, "I don't know. I just want to have sex right now." And so, he sat up, and I sat up, and he was like, "Elna, what are you trying to ask me?" And I was like, "Well, look, the only thing-- The only reason I believe the things that I do is because I prayed and asked, and how can you know for sure that something isn't true unless you at least ask?" And so, he said, "Do you want me to pray?" “Yes.”
And so, he said, "Okay, I can do that." And I was like, "Really?" And he left. And the minute he left my apartment, I remember I knelt down and I prayed like I've never prayed in my life. When you say, "God, you can never-- you never have to answer another one of my prayers, but answer this one. And if he prays, tell him you're there." And then, of course, I made the mistake of telling my sister about this. And then she told my parents, and then my parents told my uncle and aunt and my grand-- and next thing I know, there's like a Mormon family tree across America praying that if he prays, he'll get an answer. [audience chuckles] And then I didn't hear from him for two weeks.
And then when I did, we agreed to meet up in Union Square. We met up and we sat on a bench together. And at first it was just small talk. And so finally I just asked the question I most wanted to ask. I said, "Did you pray?" And he said, "Yes." And I was like, "You did? What happened?" And he said that he sat in his room in silence and that he prayed, and he asked God if God existed and that he listened for a long time. And then he realized that if he did get an answer, it would just be himself telling himself that he got an answer because he wanted to be with me and that it wouldn't be real. And that was it. And the relationship ended.
And it's funny because as hard as he tried to find God for me and as hard as I tried to have sex for him, we ultimately were these things that were, a Mormon and an atheist. And yet before that I always thought that I didn't have sex because I was Mormon, but I realized I don't have sex because I don't want to have it yet. And that for me, sometimes saying no is actually saying yes. Thank you.
[applause]
Sarah: [00:47:19] [To the Little Radio by 3 Leg Torso playing] That was Elna Baker. Elna is a comedian and the author of a book with the inordinately long title The New York Regional Mormon Singles Halloween Dance. She told the story at The Moth over 10 years ago, and in that time, she has continued to say yes, including the time she said yes to her boyfriend Mark, when he asked her to marry him. To see Elna's wedding photo and for extras related to many of the stories you hear on The Moth Radio Hour, go to themoth.org.
Now, while you've been listening to these stories, you may have remembered some of your personal stories and we want to hear them. Moth stories are true. You are the main character, and they involve some sort of a challenge. You can pitch us your story by recording it right on our site or call 877-799-MOTH. That's 877-799-6684.
The best pitches are developed from Moth shows all around the world. Here's a pitch we liked, and it's actually also on theme of this hour, Identity.
Sarah DeBolt: [00:48:26] A few years ago, I went through a period of really severe depression, during which time I was admitted to the psych ward of a hospital in Boston, where I lived. One of the most memorable moments of that really painful experience happened when I woke up my first morning in the hospital. I was laying there trying to wrap my head around where I was and how I had ended up there when a nurse opened the curtain and said, "Good morning, Susan. Are you feeling suicidal today?" Okay, first of all, my name is Sarah. Second of all, who says that? I just thought that if you're going to talk to somebody who the day before was making really concrete plans about how to kill themselves, that A, you would try to get their name right, and B, maybe try to be more delicate about their situation. Honestly, it was so absurd that I thought it was really funny. And that instant when I got this tiny glimpse of my sense of humor buried under all of that pain and despair, gave me a tiny flicker of hope that I would survive this and that somehow, maybe I was going to be okay.
[To the Little Radio by 3 Leg Torso continues]
Sarah: [00:49:33] Remember, you can pitch us your story at themoth.org or call 877-799-MOTH. That's 877-799-6684. That's it for this episode of The Moth Radio Hour. We hope you'll join us next time. And that's the story from The Moth.
[Uncanny Valley theme music by The Drift playing]
Jay: [00:50:14] Your host this hour was Sarah Austin Jenness. Sarah also directed the stories in the show along with Catherine Burns and Jenifer Hixson. The rest of The Moth's directorial staff includes Sarah Haberman and Meg Bowles. Production support from Timothy Lou Ly. The pitch in this hour came from Sarah DeBolt. The Moth would like to thank the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation for their support of The Moth Community program, as well as Andrew Quinn and Rachel Stretcher from the Aspen Institute. Moth stories are true, as remembered and affirmed by the storytellers. Our theme music is by The Drift. Other music in this hour from Todd Sickafoose, Jami Siebert, and 3 Leg Torso. You can find links to all the music we use at our website. The Moth Radio Hour is produced by me, Jay Allison, with Viki Merrick at Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts.
This hour is produced with funds from the National Endowment for the Arts. The Moth Radio Hour is presented by the Public Radio Exchange, prx.org. For more about our podcast, for information on pitching us your own story, and everything else, go to our website, themoth.org.
[Uncanny Valley theme music by The Drift ends]