Host: Sarah Austin Jenness
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Sarah Austin Jenness: [00:00:13] From PRX, this is the Moth Radio Hour. I'm Sarah Austin Jenness.
In this episode, stories all about letters. It turns out letters are not a thing of the past. Some people, like me, are still writing and stamping, opening and reading them.
Our first story is from Meg Ferrill. She told this at an open mic StorySLAM in San Francisco, where we partnered with public radio stations KQED and KALW. Here's Meg, live at The Moth.
[cheers and applause]
Meg: [00:00:50] It's 1998, and it's my second year in college. I know I look exceptionally young. [audience laughter] I had just picked my major, and I had done this by going into one of the buildings on campus where they housed all the banners, one for each of the majors. I looked up and I saw it and I was like, “That's it.” And it said, leisure studies. [audience laughter] And I was like, “I can do that. I can do that really, really well. [audience laughter]
And so, the exceptional leisure studies major I was, I decided to push out all my core requirements and just focus really, intensely on my electives. [audience laughter] And so, I chose human sexuality, because it sounded exotic. And yes, I was naive and innocent at the time. I also chose it, because at the time I was also dating my first girlfriend, and I thought it might be relevant. [audience laughter]
So, the class started. It started first with STDs. It was just like picture after picture after picture after picture after picture of STDs, which is really hard on me, because I'm a visual learner. [audience laughter] And then, we quickly moved into sexuality. And because it was the 1990s, we really just covered homosexuality, bisexuality and heterosexuality, because at the time, we didn't talk about much. If you were a man and you had a piercing in your right ear by urban legend, “You were gay.” Like, what did we know? We all wore scrunchies. We were like a confused nation completely. [audience laughter]
So, I should also tell you that I went to school in North Carolina. And North Carolina is not the liberal hotbed that you think it is. [audience laughter] At least, it wasn't in 1998. The other thing you need to know, is that I've never really been much of an activist. Yes, I did adopt a manatee in seventh grade, [audience laughter] but I have no idea where he is right now. [audience laughter] So, for these reasons combined, I was in the closet at the time.
And so, when we started talking about homosexuality, I was really interested about what was going to happen. At first, most things start out when you have a group of 18- and 19-year-olds and it's like hive mind and they're all like, “I don't know. What do you think about homosexuality? I don't know. What do you think about homosexuality? I don't know. What do you think?” And then, it spiraled really fast until they're all going to hell. [audience laughter]
Yeah. And I was like, “Oh, my God, I'm in the center of the worst bad after school special ever.” Or, perhaps, this is the moment that all of my Degrassi high training should come into action. [audience laughter] I wasn't sure what it was. But the one thing I knew was I was starting to get really upset, because people were throwing out words like hell and Satan and all these things. And these were all of my class friends, and it was really starting to burn on me. And so, it kept going and it kept spiraling worse and worse. And then, one girl stood up and she said-- I remember she turned to the class, like she was making this grand announcement and she's like, “If my kid was ever gay, I'd disown them.”
The class just kept agreeing with it. It seemed to make sense to them. And then, finally, someone else got up in the class and she goes, “If there's someone gay here, they should just stand up and tell us why.” [audience laughter] I'm like, “What the--" [audience laughter] Like, seriously, in what scenario would that make sense? [audience laughter] That is the most unsafe space I can imagine. [audience laughter] So, I kept it inside.
Mostly, I was really mad at them, because they weren't who I thought they were. But I was also mad at me, because I was doing exactly what I knew I would do. Nothing. I just went home really mad and really angry and really hurt. I sat down at my roommate's computer, and I started typing out this letter to my classmates. I just filled it with all the anger, and all the hate and every single word I could put. Just fire. And then, I went and dropped it off anonymously at my teacher's desk, because that's what I do. I push the anger, and then I just drop off anonymous notes, [audience laughter] because I'm passive aggressive. [audience laughter]
So, then, I went to class. And 20 minutes in, the teacher did something I had not expected. She read my letter. I expected her to read my letter, but it was how she read my letter. Like, where I had shoved anger into each word, she read it calm and patient and compassionate and almost loving, giving people the space to actually take in the word for themselves. And so, when I said, homosexuality is not a choice, she said, “Homosexuality is not a choice.”
She continued reading my letter with my words, but her tone. She went on from there and she said, “Right now, I'm sitting next to you, as I have this whole semester, the same person that you've laughed with, the same person that you've worked with. But if last week I had told you about who I loved, you would have looked at me differently, maybe with disgust, maybe with hate, maybe something even worse. But by remaining anonymous, you can accept me for who I am.”
And then, she kept reading my letter. When she got to the end, she folded it up and there was this huge silence, like this long, painful silence. I swear the only thing you could hear was my heart beating out of my chest. It was like a homo heart Edgar Allan Poe moment. [audience laughter] And then, from the back of the room, there was a slow clap that grew into thunderous applause as the whole room erupted into cheers and clapture, which isn't a word. [audience laughter] Sorry.
I even looked at the girl who had said she would disown her own kid. She had tears streaming down her cheeks as she slapped her hands violently, so excited with the moment. And guys, I would like, because I'm very vain to say that it was my words that peeled the hate from the room that day, but it wasn't. It was my teacher. It was the way she said my words, because this is the thing, guys, your words can be magical, they can be brilliant, they can be perfectly constructed, but they are worth nothing unless they're heard. Thank you, guys.
[cheers and applause]
Sarah Austin Jenness: That was Meg Ferrill. Meg is a Portland, Oregon based storyteller, comedian and writer. She's working on a book for young people about what she wishes she had known sooner in life. She says the book may be the mildest form of a midlife crisis.
Meg once heard the advice, “Shred your bank statements, but save your love letters.” So, she says the letters she's kept are accruing interest in her heart. She held onto the letter from this story too, which reminds her that anger isn't the way to unity. It was written over 24 years ago, and Meg says she believes in the power of being vulnerable, so she's shared it with all of us. To see that letter, go to themoth.org.
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Sometimes the mail comes and you just cannot open a letter for fear of what's inside. You can't unread a letter.
Our next storyteller is Danielle Dardashti. Danielle told this at an open mic StorySLAM in New York City, where WNYC is a media partner of The Moth. And just a technicality, this story involves a package with a letter inside. Here's Danielle, live at the Moth.
[cheers and applause]
Danielle Dardashti: [00:09:22] It's January 2013. I'm in a job I love, working for a boss I love at a major media company. On Tuesday, January 15th, I close the largest deal of my career. After months of strategizing and negotiating, I reel in a multimillion-dollar deal that is all new business for the company. And I feel amazing. It's like in a movie where I'm walking down the halls, and everyone's high fiving me, and telling me congratulations in the elevator and I feel like a rockstar.
Two days later, my daughter, Raquel, who's nine years old at the time, comes down with a stomach bug, and I have to call in sick to work to stay home with her. I'm up all night with her on Thursday night on the bathroom floor. And now, it's Friday morning at 09:00 AM and we're still on the bathroom floor together. There's a lull between vomiting episodes. I check my phone, and I see that I have three missed calls from my boss. So, I call her back.
The moment she gets on the phone I can hear that she doesn't sound exactly like herself. Maybe she's on speakerphone and she says, “Hi, Danielle. Sorry to bother you at a bad time. I'm in Dina's office.” Dina is the head of HR. “She says we had to make some tough decisions today and eliminate several jobs, including yours.” The rest of the conversation is a complete blur. Something about numbers on a spreadsheet, mass layoffs across the company.
My email has already been shut off and they're overnighting me a package outlining my severance agreement. My daughter, Raquel, starts throwing up again. I'm holding a wet washcloth on her head, and I'm leaning over the toilet with her, and I'm crying and she's saying, “Mommy, what's the matter?” And I'm saying, “No, I'm okay. I am okay” But I'm not okay. I'm a wreck. I feel rejected and unappreciated. I cry for three full days, Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Monday is Martin Luther King Day, and it's the day that Obama is inaugurated to a second term in office.
I'm sitting in my living room in my pajamas still. I've been wearing the same pajamas for three days now, and I'm watching the inauguration on TV. At some point, in the middle of the inauguration, suddenly I feel a sense of hope reemerging in me like, “Yes, I can take a shower. [audience laughter] Yes, I can put on a bra. Yes, I can open that severance package and see what's inside and what they offered me.”
So, I tear it open and I am taken aback such a generous offer. They're offering me six months full pay severance, and I've only been at the company for less than two years. Suddenly, I'm feeling extremely grateful and elated, and I feel like I need to thank my boss for this. So, I sit down at my computer--
I realize I have a lot of people I need to thank. I need to thank the Chief Revenue Officer, and the CEO and the Chief Marketing Officer. So, I just copy all of them on the email. And it goes something like this. “Dear, everyone, thank you for this awesome opportunity to work with all of you. Thank you for recognizing my abilities and promoting me into this amazing role. I've learned so much over the last two years and we've all accomplished so much together. This massive deal I just closed the other day, I know you're going to do amazing things with this client and make me very proud. Gratefully yours, Danielle Dardashti.”
I didn't want to overthink it, so I just hit send. [audience laughter] Two hours later, my phone rings. It's someone in HR and she says, “Hi, Danielle. I'm calling from Dina's office and we have decided to grant your request for an enhanced severance package. [audience laughter] Instead of six month’s severance, we're offering you 12 month’s severance and your entire backend bonus. We're overnighting you a new package outlining this new offer.”
I'm thinking, what the fuck just happened? [audience laughter] It wasn't until two years later that I found out they misinterpreted my enthusiastic email as a threat to sue them. [audience laughter] [audience cheers and applause]
So, what's my takeaway? Well, it certainly never hurts in business to be thankful, [audience laughter] but sometimes being grateful pays off big time.
[cheers and applause]
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Sarah Austin Jenness: That was Danielle Dardashti. Danielle lives in White Plains, New York with her husband and their two college aged kids. She's an Emmy Award winning documentary producer, cofounder of a show called StoryBoom. And she's also working on a podcast called The Nightingale of Iran.
When Danielle told this story at our Moth StorySLAM competition, she won. To see a photo of her on stage, go to themoth.org. And while you're there, check out our schedule of open mic storytelling events. Come out once night to a city near you and throw your name in the hat for a chance to get picked. We want to hear your stories.
[victorious music]
In a moment, two love letters, one to a romantic partner and one to the tooth fairy, when The Moth Radio Hour continues.
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Jay: [00:17:06] The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. And presented by PRX.
Sarah Austin Jenness: [00:17:17] This is the Moth Radio Hour from PRX. I'm Sarah Austin Jenness.
This is an episode with stories all about letters. That's right, physical letters that show up in your mailbox. You can hold them in your hand. People are still sending them, letters to set the record straight, thank you. Letters, I'm sorry letters. And yes, also love letters.
Our next story was told by Matty Struski at a Moth StorySLAM in Los Angeles, where we partner with public radio station KCRW. Here's Matty, live at The Moth.
[cheers and applause]
Matty: [00:17:59] I've always been a really great guy to break up with. [audience laughter] When I was in high school, I used to watch my friends go through these horrible breakups. And in attempts to win their exes back, they would always come up with these grand romantic gestures that look great when you see them in a rom com, but when you experience them in real life are just stalkery is the only word I can come up. I swore to my 17-year-old self that I would never become emotional over a breakup. No matter what happened, I would always maintain my dignity.
A couple of years later when I was in college, I met Sarah. She was amazing. She had pink hair, and she was an artist, and she loved to dance and sing karaoke and she just felt free. We used to stay up all night listening to music and talking about things that mattered. When we were together, I felt free. We just fell for each other really hard. Things were great, because I was young, and I was in love for the first time, and everything was new, and raw and I had never felt like this before in my life. I think that's why I had such a hard time when she broke up with me.
The worst part of the breakup was that she didn't really give me a reason. She just chose another guy over me, and it just crushed me. Suddenly, my dignity and myself respect didn't seem to matter that much to me. I wanted to get her back and I wanted to tell her how I felt. But I'm not one for giant romantic stalkery gestures, so I grabbed a pen and I wrote the first love letter that I ever wrote in my life. I just poured my guts out on the page, and I told her how much I loved her and I told her that I've never loved anybody like I loved her and I could never see myself loving anybody else the way I loved her. Without her around me, I just felt empty and lost.
I put this letter in an envelope and I mailed it to her and I just waited. I kept waiting and I didn't get a response from her. I felt so humiliated. I was so mad at myself for writing this letter. I just hated myself for not walking away with a clean break from this relationship. But eventually, I moved on and I got over Sarah and I graduated from college. I dated other women who broke up with me and I handled that with dignity and grace. [audience laughter] I moved from Boston to Los Angeles. My life was going pretty well.
But I always, even years later, I hated the fact that I wrote this letter. It just haunted me. It was one of those things that hangs around in the back of your mind, taking you down a notch when you're feeling a little bit too good about yourself. I'd be walking down the street enjoying a beautiful day and thinking about how good my life was going, and then this voice would just be like, “Oh, yeah, but remember that letter you wrote to Sarah, you pathetic piece of shit?” And I'd be like, “Oh, yeah. Right.” [audience laughter] And so, that's how it was for a while. I would think about it. Not all the time, but when I did, it just really made me feel bad about myself.
One day, I go home, and I grab my mail, and I'm thumbing through the mail and I just stop in my trash, because there's a letter and it's from Sarah. I haven't talked to Sarah in 10 years since I wrote that letter to her. I open it up, and it's pretty short and it just says, “I'm going to be in LA pretty soon and I'd love to catch up with you and talk face to face.” She left her number, so I called her and we arranged to meet up at this coffee shop down the street from my apartment in Los Feliz.
So, we ended up meeting up at the coffee shop. After we had some small talk and we caught up for a few minutes, she said, “Listen, the reason I got in touch with you is I met this guy and I'm moving in with him. I was cleaning out my apartment and going through my things and I stumbled across this,” and she pulls out the letter that I wrote her. I just froze. And she said, “I'm really sorry, I never responded to this. I was in a really bad place then. But you need to know I've been carrying this letter around for 10 years from place to place. It really helped me get through some rough times. Just being able to read it and know that somebody at some point loved me the way that you did, it really, it helped me and I just wanted to say thank you.”
And then she slid the letter across the table to me and she said, “But the guy I'm with now is amazing.” [audience laughter] He's amazing, and I'm in a much better place in my life and I don't think that I need this letter anymore. [audience laughter] I just wanted to give it back to you. And part of me, [chuckles] part of me wanted to grab that letter and just run out into the street and light it on fire right there and destroy this symbol of humiliation that I've been carrying around for the last 10 years. But I didn't, because when I looked at it, the letter, it looked worn and it looked like it had been read and reread dozens of times over the years.
I realized that letter meant a completely different thing to her than it did to me, where I saw shame and humiliation and embarrassment. She saw warmth and comfort and love. I just said, “Sarah, I wrote that letter for you, and I wanted you to have it. And a lot of things might have changed in the last 10 years, but that hasn't.” She just smiled and she put it back in her bag and we didn't talk about it again.
We ended up spending a really great day together. We just hung out, we reminisced about old times, and she left. We kept in touch after that. We wrote letters back and forth for a bit, and then letters changed to emails, and emails changed to Facebook posts. We're both married now, and we both have kids of our own.
Every once in a while, I still think about that letter. I'm amazed by how much different I feel about it now than I used to. I used to just feel so embarrassed by it. But now, I'm really proud that I wrote it. You know, I'm glad that I told her how I felt, even though it took us 10 years to talk about it. I'm glad that it was able to help her through some rough times in her life. I don't know what she ended up doing with that letter, but I like to think that she held onto it and I like to think that maybe someday if she's having a rough day, she might stumble across it again, and it might bring a smile to her face and help her through another rough time. It might have taken me 30 years to realize it, but that letter allowed me to have the most dignified breakup I've ever had in my life. Thank you.
[cheers and applause]
Sarah Austin Jenness: That was Matty Struski. Matty lives in Pasadena, California with his wife, Valerie. He's a full time stay at home dad to their nine-year-old daughter, Rain. Matty and Sarah still touch base about every six months or so. He says it feels like we pick up right where we left off every time.
I have to admit, this story had me sobbing the first time I heard it. I have some old love letters too, but none that have been discussed decades after the fact. That is some emotional maturity.
[soft piano melody]
Our next story is all about letters to the tooth fairy. So, anyone out there listening with kids, just a word of caution. These letters reveal secrets. Live from a StorySLAM in Boston, where we partner with public radio station, WBUR and PRX, here's Lu Levin.
[cheers and applause]
Lu Levin: [00:25:29] So, I'm a Jewish kid from a small Jewish town in New York, originally. It's called New City, New York, but it's actually sweetly named Jew City to the other Jews. [chuckles] Something nice about having that bigger population as a kid is that come the holidays, it's more 50/50 in classrooms you have kids that are celebrating Christmas and kids that are celebrating Hanukkah for presents. [chuckles]
I really enjoyed that as a kid, but the thing that kind of I wished I had more in my religion was that all of the kids that celebrated Christmas and Easter and stuff had Santa and the Easter bunny to believe in and make them happy. I thought that was really cool. But all I had was the tooth fairy. So, I really, really dug the tooth fairy. [audience laughter] I really enjoyed getting visits from her, because it was like, “Oh, they get chocolate, but I get a quarter when I lose my tooth.” [chuckles]
So, it's a first grade, and I have parents that work really hard to make me and my sister feel loved but also have to work a lot. My mom was getting her master's in education and about to start teaching. And my dad was an organic chemist, so that included long hours at the lab. I didn't really see a lot of them at parents come to school things. But one day in first grade, I came home and I was like, “I want to make a new friend. I'm going to write to the tooth fairy. She's always shown up for me. So, I'm just going to leave a letter under my pillow.” [audience laughter]
I wrote my first letter to the tooth fairy. I said, “Dear, tooth fairy. I'm in first grade. You've collected my teeth before, but it's nice to meet you. [audience laughter] I feel like we could be really good friends, and I'd love to hear about your life and your job. I'm super interested. [audience laughter] Write me back if you feel like that would be a good idea. No pressure.” [audience laughter] I stuck it. I showed my mom. I was like, “Mom, I'm writing to the tooth fairy. I hope she answers.” And my mom was like, “Mm. [audience laughter] Yeah, me too. That sounds fine.” And that night, I stuck it under my pillow, I went to sleep, no expectations, but hoping for a response.
The next morning, I woke up and I saw this beautiful letter under my pillow on purple stationery with glitter on the border and a fairy sticker in the corner. And it said, “It's so nice to talk to you. Not a lot of people do that with me. I'm really excited. [audience laughter] I think you're a great kid.” Just nice things about wanting to start a friendship with me. So, I was ecstatic, not only because I got a response, but because I knew it was definitely from the tooth fairy, because we did not have fancy stationery or stickers in the house. [audience laughter]
I kept writing to her every night. But before I would put it under my pillow, I would tell my mom, just because I wanted to let her know how the progress was going. [audience laughter] We were never going to have a playdate, but I was still stoked. My mom would always nod her head and be like, “I'm glad it's going well. Keep doing it.” And so, this is obviously how my mom knew that the tooth fairy would be getting letters. But eventually, in your friendship, you can stop telling your mom that you're talking to someone, because you're just friends, you're just talking. It made me so happy and joyful to get these letters back.
So, one night, I was like, “I'm going to ask the tooth fairy what she looks like.” It's the elusive question, but I feel like we're there. [audience laughter] And so, I say, “Hi, tooth fairy. I hope you're doing well. Thanks for responding to my last letter. I'm just wondering-- You can trust me. No pressure, but you can trust me. What do you look like? Could you just tell me anything? I'm so excited to know, because we would have contests at the dentist's office to draw the tooth fairy for a bowl of Hershey’s Kisses, and I wanted to win.”
And so, I left this letter under my pillow, but I did it without telling my mom this time. And in the morning, my letter was still there, I hadn't gotten answer and I thought, “Oh my God, have I betrayed the tooth fairy's trust? Am I losing something that I've loved and that's made me happy for so long?” I told my mom and my mom was like, “Oh, man, she's probably just collecting teeth of the world. Don't worry.” [audience laughter] I ended up getting a letter back late the next night, which was good. So, my belief was still there and it was strong enough for me to bring a letter or four into first grade show and tell.
So, I come in and I'm like, “Hey, guys, I've been writing the tooth fairy. We're really close friends. And if you want to give it a shot, she would probably talk to you too, hear my letters.” There's this cool kid in class named Jordan Houseman, and he says from the back of the room, that's not the tooth fairy, it's your mom. And I go, “Oh,” for a sec, because that hurts to hear that someone is calling your friendship fake. And I say, “It's not my mom. We don't have the stationery in the house.” [audience laughter]
And I keep writing for a little while from extra responses here and there. My mom is working. It gets a little bit iffy. Eventually, I did realize that the tooth fairy wasn't real. I don't know when, but the other important thing that I realized, is that if the tooth fairy looks like my mom, who cares about me like my mom does, then that makes me just as joyful. Thank you.
[cheers and applause]
Sarah Austin Jenness: That was Lu Levin. Lu lives in Brooklyn, New York, where they're learning how to rollerblade. Lu is a program coordinator at NYU Law and loves to hunt down tooth rotting baked goods. And if you're wondering about Lu's mom, she's now retired and spends her days bird watching and playing pickleball. She kept the letters from this tooth fairy exchange. They are just the cutest. To read all of them, visit themoth.org.
When we return, rejection letters from the heart and a special message from the other side, when The Moth Radio Hour continues.
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Jay: [00:32:47] 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 Jenness: [00:32:59] You're listening to The Moth Radio Hour from PRX. I'm Sarah Austin Jenness. We've been hearing all about letters in this hour.
This next story takes it up a notch. It includes hundreds of handcrafted letters. Otis Gray told this at a Moth GrandSLAM in Brooklyn, New York. Here's Otis.
Otis: [00:33:24] On paper, you'd think that you'd hit rock bottom when you just answered a Craigslist ad for a job wrapping a naked guy in duct tape in South Philadelphia. [audience laughter] But you'd be wrong. Rock bottom is not getting that job. [audience laughter] Yeah, he turned me away at the door when he opened it and was visibly shocked that Otis was not a girl's name, which is both stupid and sexist. But I had just spent four years at art school as a sculptor and had an absent father, so I was accustomed to rejection to that point. [audience laughter] But at least with the duct tape, man, there was a reason why I got turned away.
Shortly after, when I got rejected for the Fulbright scholarship, there was not a reason. I got a form email saying, “You have not received the Fulbright scholarship. It is not our policy to explain the reasons for this outcome. Please do not contact us.” I had spent nearly a year pouring my entire soul into this application. You submit like your entire person, you have letters of recommendation, your entire body of work, your grades, a personal statement that defines you to your core, everything.
I know that the normal response to rejection is generally sadness and disappointment. My whole life I've dealt with it, like, “Okay, tell me, how can I fix this? What can I do? Why?” And now, I was so mad. You can't tell me which part of me wasn't good enough which was not a unique feeling, because while I do joke about my daddy issues, it was not his policy to explain the reasons for that outcome either.
About a month later, after I got rejected, a former professor who knew I wasn't doing so hot called me and said, “Hey, you seem desperate. [audience laughter] How do you want a job writing personalized rejection letters to high school students?” [audience laughter] I have never been so good at something so quickly in my entire life. [audience laughter] So, this foundation, what they did was they gave money to high school students pursuing summer programs in the arts. My job was to take the judges feedback and craft it into these little personalized rejection letters. I was impartial. I didn't see them or their work, just the critique of it. That year, I wrote 160 letters. And these things were Shakespearean. [audience laughter]
I was taking all this untethered rage I felt from being ambiguously rejected and making them into these poetic little compliment sandwiches like, “Dear, Layla, you know, your use of lights and dark in your charcoal is phenomenal, and you have a really unique grasp of composition for your age. But you got to get out there and explore, girl. Get out of your comfort zone. Relentlessly, follow your curiosity into the darkness. You owe this to yourself, Layla.” [audience laughter]
I was like the general patent to this little brigade of art marines all over the country. The more that I wrote, the more they started coming out like, “Dear, Patrick, your passion at 14 shines through. And you play the oboe like you sold your soul to the goddamn devil, boy. You don't even need this scholarship. [audience laughter] You get that oboe money, Patrick.” [audience laughter]
Doing this, I felt so whole because these kids were putting themselves out there, open to judgment and I had the opportunity to give them the feedback that I never got. Then I had to write one letter. It was a young dancer. I'm going to call her Sarah. And Sarah was applying for one of the best ballet programs in the entire country. And the judges said that she was really talented, but they were afraid that if she went to this program, they were afraid that her spirit would beaten down by the judgment implicit in the ballet world around body image and that she might better off doing a program in contemporary dance instead.
So, now, I knew that this girl, Sarah, probably didn't look like your stereotypical ballerina. It was my job to tell her that a factor in why she wasn't accepted was a part of her that she maybe couldn't change. I had spent all my time up till then searching for reason and answers and asking why. But this was a bad reason. I thought about my dad. If the answer is just you, what do you do with that? So, I reckon with this, and I agonized over it for days and then I sat down and I wrote, “Dear, Sarah, in the future, you would greatly benefit from an intensive ballet program. But a program in contemporary dance might be exactly what you need as well. The choice is yours. You have the passion, and the drive and the talent to just thrive in any environment you choose to go into. So, just go and do it.”
After four years of this job and over 700 personally crushed dreams, [audience laughter] I can confidently say that that wholeness that I felt was not writing well-reasoned rejections. It was learning that it just didn't always matter. It didn't matter which part of me wasn't good enough, especially if it was a reason that I couldn't change or a reason that I would never change. I hope that if these beautiful little weirdos take anything from these letters, it's that you should never ever beg someone to tell why you aren't good enough. You go and you show them how fucking wrong they were. Thank you.
[cheers and applause]
Sarah Austin Jenness: That was Otis Gray. Otis is a Vermont native who just moved to Brooklyn, New York, where he's a radio producer and a podcast host. He recently produced Sesame Street's bedtime podcast, Goodnight, World! And he has his own show called Sleepy, where he reads old books to help you get to sleep. He just wrapped his eighth year of writing these letters. He says he's written over 800 personalized rejections to date and about 100 acceptance letters. And he still really loves doing it.
Our final story about letters is from the beyond, if you believe in that kind of stuff and I do. Live from our StorySLAM in Boston, here's Stacey Perlman.
[cheers and applause]
Stacey: [00:41:25] So, I am the type of person that believes in spirits and that there are people that can speak to spirits. So, a few years ago, when a family friend recommends that I meet with a medium named Tish, I naturally jumped at the chance. I'm really excited about this, because I've never done this before. But I'm also a bit of a cynic about basically everything in life. I knew that I was at risk for hearing what I wanted to hear. So, I promised myself on the drive to her home that I wouldn't read too much into what she was saying and that I would watch my body language, I didn't want to feed into whatever she told me.
But I'm surprised when I get there, because Tish was this 40 something year old woman and she's got short cropped hair, she's wearing jeans and a T-shirt. It's really casual. I don't know exactly what it was I was expecting, but it definitely wasn't a soccer moment. So, she starts to tell me about my career, and my relationships and I'm keeping this promise that I made to myself in the back of my head. I know I need to give her some information to work with, but I keep my answers really short and I put on my best poker face. She tells me I'm going to meet this strong female mentor at this job I'm about to start, and that the man that broke my heart a few years ago is going to reappear into my life.
I internally roll my eyes at this, because I know the odds of this happening are just nil, like, it's not going to happen. But it doesn't matter, because I'm waiting for her to get to the good stuff. I'm waiting for her to dramatically announce to me that there's some other presence in the room with us. This is how it always happens on all these ghost shows that I watch on TV. Well, she instead just asks me if there's anybody I want to connect with. She's giving me the option today. [chuckles]
If there's anybody, I want her to pick up on in the room, it's my friend, Eric. We met when were 16, and we dated in that really limited way that two teenagers from neighboring small towns with learner's permits can date. [audience laughter] But after a few months, I broke things off with him. We agreed though that we were going to remain friends. He kept his word. I, on the other hand, had a much harder time. I did not know how to deal with how awkward I now felt in front of him. So, when he'd call or message me, I would always just shut the conversation down. I'd just end it as quickly as possible.
This went on for a few months. We didn't see each other for a while. We both got our driver's licenses. One day, my mom tells me that she saw on the news Eric lost control of his car. He slammed into a tree and he didn't make it. And at 16, I did not know how to handle the guilt I was feeling, because two weeks before that, he reached out to me and he said, “You should give me a call sometime. We should hang out.” And I agreed, but I never actually planned on calling him. And now, with this news, I don't remember why it was so difficult for me to be his friend.
But I don't tell Tish any of this. I just vaguely respond to her that I had a friend in mind. I'm using this as a bit of a test for her, because I don't know if all those predictions she mentioned earlier are really ever going to happen. But if she can tell me anything in this moment about Eric, then I will know she is the real deal. So, she starts to tell me a few different things about him. But nothing's really resonating with me. She mentions a car accident, so she gets that, but I'm not convinced and I'm actually starting to lose a lot of hope in this whole situation. I feel foolish for being there.
And then, she looks at me and tells me, he says, thank you for the letters. All that energy I'd been putting into maintaining my body language just completely dissolves, and tears are streaming down my face. I'm crying, because I had never told anybody that I used to write letters to Eric. I used to write to him apologizing for being such a bad friend and asking for his forgiveness. I did this for almost two years, and I would lead these on his grave and then I went off to college.
As time went on, the years passed, I would tell myself, you were only 16. You need to give yourself a break. And so, my life basically went on. But now, it's nine years later after his death, and I'm sitting in front of Tish, who has just acknowledged for the very first time the existence of these letters, and I sheepishly ask her what the teenager in me had always wanted to know. “Does he forgive me?” And she tells me that he says, “There's nothing to be forgiven for, because our paths in life cross when they're supposed to. And your path with him just happened to be a short one. He wants you to know that's okay.”
Now, I don't know if that was really Eric speaking to me through Tish or if Tish is telling me what I want to hear, because I'm basically a stranger crying in her home right now. [chuckles] But it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if I believe in all of this. It doesn't matter if Tish has proven herself to me, or if she's telling me what I want to hear, because more than anything, it's what I needed to hear. I just didn't know that after all these years, I still needed to hear it. And so, I left that day, not necessarily with his forgiveness, but I did finally leave with my own. Thank you.
[cheers and applause]
Sarah Austin Jenness: That was Stacey Perlman. Stacey is a clinical social worker who just started her own private practice. She's lived in Revere, Massachusetts for seven years with her rescue dog named Faye. She still goes back to Tish “The Medium” from time to time.
Eric died in 2001 when they were both sophomores in high school. Stacey has only one photo of herself and Eric. They went to his winter ball together, and his mom gave her a copy of the photo from that dance. The photo still sits in a frame in Stacey's home all these years later. To see that photo of Stacey and Eric, go to themoth.org.
The stories in this hour were told at our open mic nights. But remember, you can pitch us your story about a letter you wrote, or received or any other story about an important turning point. Record 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 letter related pitch that we loved.
Scott McArthur: [00:47:46] I'd like to tell you the story about my grandfather's foot. Some years ago, my grandfather, James Scott, had a really terrible bout of angina. It meant that he couldn't do his walking in the Scottish Highlands that he had done all his life. But rather than give up, what James did was he started to write to his family. And for some reason, he decided to write to me more than anyone else. For the best part of 30 years, he wrote to me every week about what was happening in his living room, in his town, in the family. And in the end, once he did pass, when he was 86, I was left with a foot deep thick pack of letters. And that's why I call it my grandfather's foot.
It was an amazing experience for me, because I'm not particularly a letter writer, but Jimmy wrote to me every week and I wrote back. And looking back on those letters. And I still have these letters. It's a beautiful record that it's like [chuckles] the archaeology of my life and it's there mirrored by him coming back to me. So, thanks, James Scott. I love you, man.
Sarah Austin Jenness: [00:48:58] Remember, you can pitch us at 877-799-MOTH or online at themoth.org, where you can also share these stories or others from The Moth Archive.
That's it for this episode of The Moth Radio Hour. Write a letter to someone you care about and we hope you'll join us next time.
[overture music]
Jay: [00:49:39]] This episode of the Moth Radio Hour was produced by me, Jay Allison, Catherine Burns, and Sarah Austin Jenness, who also hosted the show. Coproducer is Viki Merrick. Associate producer, Emily Couch.
The rest of The Moth's leadership team includes Sarah Haberman, Jenifer Hixson, Meg Bowles, Kate Tellers, Jennifer Birmingham, Marina Klutse, Lee Ann Gullie, Suzanne Rust, Brandon Grant, Sarah Jane Johnson and Aldi Kaza.
Our pitch came from Scott McArthur of Moreton in Marsh, England.
Moth stories are true, as remembered and affirmed by the storytellers. Our theme music is by the Drift. Other music in this hour from Kaki King Stellwagen Symphonette, Jacky Terrasson, Blue Dot Sessions, Cory Wong and Fergus McCreadie. We receive funding from the National Endowment for the Arts.
The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. And presented by PRX. For more about our podcast, for information on pitching us your own story and everything else, go to our website, themoth.org.