Speaker 1: Hello, guys.
Speaker 2: I am so happy to be bringing you more many questions,
Speaker 2: but I'd be lying if I said it wasn't with
Speaker 2: an extraordinarily heavy heart. As my home is currently under siege.
Speaker 2: It feels like from wildfires and wins. So many of
Speaker 2: my friends and so many people have lost everything. I
Speaker 2: wanted to acknowledge that before sharing more stuff that I've made,
Speaker 2: we made it with joy. If you are able to,
Speaker 2: if you feel willing, donating to the Humane Society dot
Speaker 2: org in Los Angeles who have an emergency animal relief fund,
Speaker 2: or donating to Pasadena Humane dot org, which is an
Speaker 2: emergency shelter and may have been unbelievable in taking animals
Speaker 2: in throughout this nightmarish situation. The Lafoodbank dot org and
Speaker 2: the Redcross dot org are all places that would gratefully
Speaker 2: receive donations that will make real time difference to people.
Speaker 1: That's it, That's what I got.
Speaker 2: I really hope you enjoy this season and these beautiful conversations.
Speaker 2: I love making this show. This show was born in
Speaker 2: Los Angeles, in my house with me and my computer
Speaker 2: and my amazing producer, Aaron, and I want to keep
Speaker 2: sharing through hard times and good times so please enjoy
Speaker 2: these episodes, and if you are listening from California, you
Speaker 2: stay safe. The very first time I met you was
Speaker 2: through my car window exiting right that movie theater on
Speaker 2: Sunset was The Sunset.
Speaker 3: Set, Yeah, Sunset, and I've just seen.
Speaker 1: Best in the show. We'd literally just been to see
Speaker 1: the film and with your.
Speaker 3: Sister, right, yeah, yeah, I remember that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that when we lost our minds.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and I lost our minds.
Speaker 3: That was a big moment in my life.
Speaker 4: So thank you.
Speaker 1: Hello, I'm Mini Driver. I've always loved Preust's questionnaire. It
Speaker 1: was originally in nineteenth century parlor.
Speaker 2: Game where players would ask each other thirty five questions
Speaker 2: aimed at revealing.
Speaker 1: The other player's true nature.
Speaker 2: In asking different people the same set of questions, you
Speaker 2: can make observations about which truths appear to be universal.
Speaker 2: And it made me wonder, what if these questions were
Speaker 2: just the jumping off point, what greater depths would be
Speaker 2: revealed if I asked these questions as conversation starters.
Speaker 1: So I adapted.
Speaker 2: Pru's questionnaire and I wrote my own seven questions that
Speaker 2: I personally think are pertinent to a person's story.
Speaker 1: They are when and where.
Speaker 2: Were you happiest? What is the quality you like least
Speaker 2: about yourself? What relationship, real or fictionalized, defines love for you?
Speaker 2: What question would you most like answered, What person, place,
Speaker 2: or experience has shaped you the most? What would be
Speaker 2: your last meal? And can you tell me something in
Speaker 2: your life that's grown out of a personal disaster? And
Speaker 2: I've gathered a group of really remarkable people, ones that
Speaker 2: I am honored and humbled to have had the chance
Speaker 2: to engage with. You may not hear their answers to
Speaker 2: all seven of these questions. We've whittled it down to
Speaker 2: which questions felt closest to their experience, or the most surprising,
Speaker 2: or created the most fertile ground to connect. My guest
Speaker 2: today is the legend that is Jane Lynch. From playing
Speaker 2: Christy Cummings in Christopher Guest's Best in Show, to Sue
Speaker 2: Sylvester on Glee, to Saz Pataki on Only Murders in
Speaker 2: the Building, there are very few actors who have made
Speaker 2: me laugh as hard as Jane has and for so
Speaker 2: many years.
Speaker 1: On the show.
Speaker 2: We talk about our shared love of companionship and independence,
Speaker 2: and I reminded her of the first time we met
Speaker 2: when I was driving out of the parking at the
Speaker 2: movie theater where I just watched Best in Show, and
Speaker 2: I saw her walking down the street and I rolled
Speaker 2: down the window and I just screamed, like.
Speaker 1: I said, she's a legend. What is the quality you
Speaker 1: like least about yourself?
Speaker 3: Let's see my narrator in my head.
Speaker 4: Ah.
Speaker 2: My boyfriend calls that the bad guest. Oh good, And
Speaker 2: in fact, I was tearful yesterday morning about something, and
Speaker 2: he said, the bad guest has arrived. And instead of
Speaker 2: you telling them to get the fuck out of your house,
Speaker 2: you're not welcome here.
Speaker 1: You are a bad guest. Get out.
Speaker 2: I sit down and entertain them and try to feed
Speaker 2: them seven different types of food, try to appease them,
Speaker 2: listen to them, and allow them to have the floor. Yeah,
Speaker 2: so tell me about your narrator slash bad guest.
Speaker 3: Well, sometimes the narrator isn't even really telling me bad
Speaker 3: things about myself or damn.
Speaker 4: It's like from watching television too much as a kid.
Speaker 3: I'm always telling a story to comfort myself or to
Speaker 3: enrage myself. There's just constant commentary that isn't even really me.
Speaker 3: It's about maybe it is a bad guest. It's like
Speaker 3: obsessed with fixing things. Well, we need to do that,
Speaker 3: and then we need to do that, and before I
Speaker 3: go over there and have to do it. It's obsessive, compulsive,
Speaker 3: and it sometimes is relentless.
Speaker 1: Is there any way of shutting it off?
Speaker 2: Is there anything that you do that is a definitive
Speaker 2: turns the volume down on the nariety there is?
Speaker 4: I've been gardening a lot.
Speaker 3: I don't know if you can tell, Probably not, but
Speaker 3: I have a bump into black eyes. They're kind of yellow.
Speaker 3: I put makeup on, but I've been crazy gardening and
Speaker 3: I took a big pot and I put it down
Speaker 3: and I hit my head on top of the fence
Speaker 3: and had like a goose egg and then woke up
Speaker 3: with two black eyes.
Speaker 4: They're yellow. Now I'm fine.
Speaker 2: But anyway, that's honestly come by though, I mean, yes, it's.
Speaker 1: Honest hard work.
Speaker 3: And then I don't have that narrator go seepy times.
Speaker 2: Do you think it's because it's doing this other thing.
Speaker 2: I'm sure that neurologically using another part of your brain
Speaker 2: to do something creative does this silencing thing. But do
Speaker 2: you think it's like being in nature, like physically connecting
Speaker 2: with something else. I think it is now I do
Speaker 2: the same thing on I I surfing, Yeah, or if
Speaker 2: I go in the ocean and swim, does the same thing.
Speaker 2: It's the only real way of shutting.
Speaker 3: That fom and it shuts everything. You become quiet of
Speaker 3: mind when you're doing that. It's like meditation. It's the
Speaker 3: discursive mind quiet.
Speaker 1: Discursive mind quiet, Yeah, the narrator quiet.
Speaker 3: All stuff that we all are habitually conditioned. The programs
Speaker 3: need to keep running, yeah, they stop. And living in
Speaker 3: nature is a really important thing to do.
Speaker 1: They taught it in the school that I went to.
Speaker 1: You were quite literally taught that.
Speaker 2: But if I was fucking around in class, which I
Speaker 2: think I was probably ADHD when I was a kid,
Speaker 2: or maybe still am, and I couldn't sit still or
Speaker 2: stop talking, and they would routinely send me outside to
Speaker 2: go and run around all these fields and these orchards.
Speaker 2: They were like do a lap and come back wow.
Speaker 2: Or they would be like do a handstand.
Speaker 3: And it worked.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it truly worked.
Speaker 2: I really believe that. Yeah, it was amazing. We should
Speaker 2: be teaching that in the actual ways of dealing with
Speaker 2: what I think we would now call anxiety. Those voices,
Speaker 2: whether that's a narrator or a commentator, or a bad
Speaker 2: guest or whomever that other voice commenting negatively or creating
Speaker 2: negative reaction.
Speaker 1: It's quite simple.
Speaker 2: The solution, remove yourself from your current situation, go and
Speaker 2: do something else. And I do think that being outside,
Speaker 2: even if it's a walk around your block, does that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that is so important, you know. I called myself,
Speaker 3: I said to myself, the narrator, said to myself this morning,
Speaker 3: I'm kind of an Akham's razor, Gal.
Speaker 4: You know what that is.
Speaker 3: Okham's razor is go to the simplest solution for something.
Speaker 3: And for a child losing their little mind, anxiety and whatever,
Speaker 3: which is normal for a child, what's the simplest solution,
Speaker 3: Move them, move them in nature. Do it absolutely, you know,
Speaker 3: And I think that that's good for us too. There
Speaker 3: are simple answers to so much simple simple.
Speaker 2: By the way, that's the other thing that I'm a
Speaker 2: huge proponent of, which is the solution to your problem
Speaker 2: is never commence your in size with the problem.
Speaker 1: It is always a little tiny flicker.
Speaker 2: Of the needle in another direction will have this huge effect.
Speaker 2: And I think we get stuck in the notion of
Speaker 2: when a problem feels overwhelming, the idea that we've got
Speaker 2: to find a solution that is as big as the problem,
Speaker 2: and it's just not true. It really is as simple
Speaker 2: as sometimes taking your shoes and socks off and standing outside.
Speaker 1: Of the ground taking a shower, yeah, or going to sleep.
Speaker 3: You're absolutely right, because our mind, it's our mind and
Speaker 3: our narrator and the unwelcome guest that tells us how
Speaker 3: big something is, and it's never that big.
Speaker 2: Is that left over from like the saber tooth tiger?
Speaker 2: Like is that really just like reptilian brain just going,
Speaker 2: You've got to have my voice going roll the rock
Speaker 2: in front of the cave because the tiger's coming, right,
Speaker 2: Is it left over? Yeah, to the idea of trying
Speaker 2: to foresee danger's constantly.
Speaker 3: That that is my thing, is it's averting some danger.
Speaker 3: But I would imagine that that that is true from
Speaker 3: most of humanity, and I think that we've gotten so
Speaker 3: far away from ourselves we can't even identify that that's
Speaker 3: what it is. All we know is we have this
Speaker 3: free floating anxiety, and it causes us to do stupid
Speaker 3: things like vote, vote for stupid people and elections because
Speaker 3: it feels so big, and this one person says, I
Speaker 3: got it.
Speaker 4: Don't you worry about it? I got it?
Speaker 1: Yeah, fair, Yeah.
Speaker 3: I think fear is a big motivating thing and also
Speaker 3: free floating.
Speaker 4: You know that we can't attach it to anything.
Speaker 2: Yeah, untethered anxiety agreed? When and when will you happiest?
Speaker 3: I could think of one moment where I thought I
Speaker 3: was going to burst out of my body. I have
Speaker 3: a very good friend. Her name is Laura Coyle, and
Speaker 3: we've been friends now for about thirty years. But we
Speaker 3: were on Melrose in West Hollywood in like nineteen ninety five.
Speaker 3: It almost sounds like I'm in love with her, and
Speaker 3: I am in a way, just not that kind of
Speaker 3: romantic love. And she was in the candy Slash ice
Speaker 3: cream shop picking something up for us, and I was
Speaker 3: sitting at the little table waiting for her and looked inside,
Speaker 3: and I looked at her doing her Laura Coyle thing,
Speaker 3: which is kind of ordering people around and yet at
Speaker 3: the same time being really, you know, sweet and wonderful
Speaker 3: and open hearted and generous and kind. And I thought,
Speaker 3: I don't think I've ever been happier in my life
Speaker 3: than I am right now.
Speaker 4: To be in.
Speaker 3: The wake of this person, of this person's energy and
Speaker 3: zest for life, and it inspired it in me and
Speaker 3: I will never forget that moment.
Speaker 2: Wow, God, that I love that ton of phrase. To
Speaker 2: be in the wake of someone.
Speaker 3: She's a force of nature, you know, and I'm kind
Speaker 3: of a force of nature too, but she's really a
Speaker 3: force of lature in the best possible way.
Speaker 1: Will you, because it's so funny.
Speaker 2: I use that lyric in a song with the Ira
Speaker 2: not smiling in somebody's wake, and it was in reference
Speaker 2: to the notion of being in a relationship with someone
Speaker 2: and you're just that kind of following to steps behind,
Speaker 2: smiling in the weight that they leave. I love the
Speaker 2: idea of being in the positive that you're drafting behind
Speaker 2: someone's energy and joy and more.
Speaker 3: Drafting tour, as you would say at drafting exactly, and
Speaker 3: drafting in the way is another good one too. That's
Speaker 3: a beautiful image too, unless, of course, you feel like
Speaker 3: you're being dragged through it and no one's paying attention
Speaker 3: to you.
Speaker 2: Well, that's exactly it. My son told me a terrible
Speaker 2: joke the other day that sort of pertained to this.
Speaker 2: He went waterboarding in Guantanamo Bay, sounds really fun if
Speaker 2: you don't know what either of those things are.
Speaker 1: And quite good, isn't it.
Speaker 2: That's quite good. It's quite a good one. But I
Speaker 2: was just thinking about being dragged. I'm always using boat
Speaker 2: analogies and being dragged behind boats or in the water
Speaker 2: or something, and how it can go from being super
Speaker 2: positive to super negative. Yeah, but in the same way
Speaker 2: that someone's energy can do that to us. What is
Speaker 2: it about your friend that was joyful to be in
Speaker 2: her experience, to be in her wake?
Speaker 3: She us one hundred percent. She has the knowing that
Speaker 3: the world is good and kind and wants the best
Speaker 3: for everybody. She just knows this inherently.
Speaker 1: Do you think that's true? Do you agree with that?
Speaker 1: Or do you want to believe that?
Speaker 3: I want to believe that to I think everything's perception
Speaker 3: and I don't have that. And when I'm with her,
Speaker 3: I do or I stand back and go oh wow.
Speaker 3: Like she'll see someone upset in a restaurant. There was
Speaker 3: a girl in a restaurant who was at her computer
Speaker 3: and her face went into her hands and she started
Speaker 3: to cry, and Laura was up. She went over there
Speaker 3: and she's you know, I'm like, no, let the girl
Speaker 3: break down and you know, and let her have her
Speaker 3: own moment, and I don't want to get involved that
Speaker 3: kind of a thing. And Laura's on her haunches talking
Speaker 3: to her and pointing into her face, but in a beautiful, caring,
Speaker 3: compassionate way, and within like five minutes, the girl is laughing.
Speaker 3: And her computer crashed and she was on her way
Speaker 3: to a job interview and she needed her computer. So
Speaker 3: she was very upset about that. And of course Laura
Speaker 3: got it fit because I'm sure she got somebody to help,
Speaker 3: because she's not technologically minded, so I'll bet somebody came
Speaker 3: over and helped. But as I watched this whole thing,
Speaker 3: I was like, you know, there's just no room in
Speaker 3: her world for anybody being upset. It's just it's not
Speaker 3: worth it to be upset about this stuff. And believe me,
Speaker 3: Laura's not perfect. She gets upset about stuff, she gets frustrated,
Speaker 3: but her base, that which she comes her operating system,
Speaker 3: is the world is this adventurous place, and there are
Speaker 3: these wonderful people, and ultimately we are all for one
Speaker 3: and one for all. And now she's a pisces. So
Speaker 3: every once in a while she finds out maybe that's
Speaker 3: not true, and she'll collapse into tears. But for the
Speaker 3: most part, it's who she is, and it's not like
Speaker 3: fake or anything. It's it's kind of a beautiful thing.
Speaker 2: Do you think that astrology aside, even though obviously I
Speaker 2: love it.
Speaker 4: I love it, dig it.
Speaker 2: We're going to get back to that. Do you think
Speaker 2: the world is divined into two kinds of people? The
Speaker 2: people for whom it is inherently everything's not going to
Speaker 2: work out and it's fucked up, and all the good
Speaker 2: stuff is really just the gravy, and you have to
Speaker 2: enjoy it because really it is. We are in the
Speaker 2: hell realm here, and the people who go this is
Speaker 2: it's an amazing place. It is inherently kind and good,
Speaker 2: and we have to accommodate the hardship with our goodness.
Speaker 3: Well, you know what, in the way you just explained it,
Speaker 3: I would say, yes, I agree with you, But I
Speaker 3: also think within each person is a nuanced mix of
Speaker 3: those things. I mean, there are some people in this
Speaker 3: world and we know them, they're in our lives who
Speaker 3: do see the world as being this awful place. I'm
Speaker 3: never going to get what I want. I'm being left
Speaker 3: behind but then they'll have moments like when they hang
Speaker 3: out with someone like my friend, where you kind of
Speaker 3: lift and that lifts for a little while. But I
Speaker 3: think there can be people who are that way, you know,
Speaker 3: a bigger percentage. But I do think it's kind of
Speaker 3: a spec I know that I live within a spectrum
Speaker 3: of it, and I would say that I'm probably more
Speaker 3: towards the more positive side of that binary, more towards
Speaker 3: seeing the world as being positive, except when I'm in
Speaker 3: New York.
Speaker 4: I have a hard time in New York.
Speaker 2: That's really funny that our binary nature would just be
Speaker 2: completely fucked by New York.
Speaker 4: Yeah, totally.
Speaker 1: Place is just completely it will either.
Speaker 2: And yet there are people who would argue that it
Speaker 2: is the greatest city on the earth and you don't
Speaker 2: want to live anywhere else and it is extraordinary and
Speaker 2: that's funny.
Speaker 3: Yeah, well that way, you know, I would say, from
Speaker 3: like twenty ten to twenty twenty, I felt that way
Speaker 3: that New York was the greatest city in the world.
Speaker 3: I went there three or four times a year. I
Speaker 3: loved it. And I also had a very good friend
Speaker 3: who I just adored, who has now passed away.
Speaker 4: So I'm really.
Speaker 3: Feeling the absence of her in New York. But the
Speaker 3: minute I would fly in, I mean there was such
Speaker 3: a bounce to my step. I would we go to
Speaker 3: the same restaurant and we'd have dinner and would sit
Speaker 3: there for like six hours, laughing and screeching. So she
Speaker 3: was New York for me. And now she's gone, and
Speaker 3: New York has kind of turned too since the pandemic.
Speaker 1: It's it's kind of it's a very different place.
Speaker 4: I agree, yeah, although I.
Speaker 2: Got to say the other day, I was there because
Speaker 2: my mother and aw lives there and I was staying
Speaker 2: with her on the Upper East Side, and I went
Speaker 2: to a salon to get my hair done and I
Speaker 2: was walking out of the building and fran Leebowitz was
Speaker 2: walking out of the building at the same time, and
Speaker 2: it was just one of the and I was like, hey, Frian,
Speaker 2: and she immediately like I was just someone who was
Speaker 2: going to bug her, And then she saw it was me.
Speaker 2: And I've known her for many, many, many many years,
Speaker 2: not well, but to say hello to and she was like, oh, hey,
Speaker 2: a many watch now and now we're walking down Park
Speaker 2: Avenue together and I'm like, do you mind if I
Speaker 2: walk with you? And she's like, what I mind, And
Speaker 2: then we suddenly have this conversation about New York conservation
Speaker 2: and architectural edicts and this and that, and she's smoking
Speaker 2: a cigarette and walking back Avenue and.
Speaker 1: It's just the most New Yorkkee.
Speaker 2: I'm like, there's got to be a hidden camera someone
Speaker 2: dorm and a waving at her HI brand and people
Speaker 2: going by recognizing her. She is this extraordinary character. But
Speaker 2: it was New York has movie moments, it does, and.
Speaker 4: That's one of them.
Speaker 3: For sure. The Upper East Side is a lovely place
Speaker 3: to be too. You know, tourism is it hasn't changed.
Speaker 1: It hasn't changed. And the tourist us now like Disneyland, Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3: And then I was in Soho.
Speaker 2: I was it was, she can't be in Soho anymore.
Speaker 2: I used to live there. You can't be there anymore.
Speaker 2: It's it's can't walk down the street. It's so crouded
Speaker 2: you can't walk. And many they're dead, they're like eyes
Speaker 2: are dead. A lot of them are young, and as
Speaker 2: they're walking around their phones. And I was in Starbucks
Speaker 2: and there was a line out the door and everybody
Speaker 2: in line was.
Speaker 3: Kind of young, and they were all on their phones,
Speaker 3: and then there was a deadness. I almost started screaming, like,
Speaker 3: wake up.
Speaker 2: Oh my god, that's the moment. That's the Peter Finch moment.
Speaker 2: Now it's study exactly mad as hell, and I'm not
Speaker 2: going to take it anymore.
Speaker 1: It's now wake.
Speaker 3: Up, beautiful city. Look at these old buildings. I know
Speaker 3: I'm not like an old lady, but I had a
Speaker 3: really hard time there it this last time.
Speaker 1: Well, let's move on from mel okay.
Speaker 3: Let's move on to something nice. I started so nice,
Speaker 3: so positive.
Speaker 1: By the way, That's how I start every day.
Speaker 2: And it's a it's a slow and always foreseen slump,
Speaker 2: slump yum into mine.
Speaker 1: What would be your life?
Speaker 4: Last meal? A ribbi from Luckies?
Speaker 3: Have you been to lucky?
Speaker 2: It's just ate the I just two nights ago and
Speaker 2: it was in I didn't know that it was outside
Speaker 2: of Raouls in New York. It was the best peppercorn
Speaker 2: steak I have ever had. And I eat I'm essentially
Speaker 2: I don't really eat meat. I don't eat I mean,
Speaker 2: I can't say I'm a vegetarian, because once a year
Speaker 2: I will eat a piece of meat and it will
Speaker 2: be usually from rowls. But it was from Lucky, Isn't
Speaker 2: It was the greatest thing I've.
Speaker 3: Even I like the Romanian steak there, that's my favorite.
Speaker 1: What's a Romainan?
Speaker 3: I would have that The Romanian steak is it's not
Speaker 3: too big, but it's the most flavorful, tender rib meat
Speaker 3: and it's some kind of garlic oil sauce that is
Speaker 3: just I guess it's Romanian, but it's just delicate and
Speaker 3: wonderful and I just love it.
Speaker 4: No, no, medium rare.
Speaker 1: Hmm, I don't know that I could go medium rare.
Speaker 1: I think I could go medium.
Speaker 3: Well, and there you might even want to go medium well,
Speaker 3: because you know it's still they're.
Speaker 1: Just washing that they're not Yeah, they'd have it.
Speaker 3: Yeah right, right, Yeah, that's cold blue center, right, that's
Speaker 3: cold in the center.
Speaker 2: And then then it's signon, so it goes blue sign then,
Speaker 2: which I suppose is bloody, and then it's rare, and
Speaker 2: then they don't listen to you if you say anything.
Speaker 4: We vegans with this talk.
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, exactly. Everybody everybody's gone, everybody's gone. This just
Speaker 1: you in there right in your life?
Speaker 2: Can you tell me about something that has grown out
Speaker 2: of a personal disaster?
Speaker 4: Oh, God.
Speaker 3: Yes, I'm a little reluctant to say it because it
Speaker 3: involves another person, but yeah, I was married for about
Speaker 3: a year and a half. It was disastrous. Yeah, and
Speaker 3: I emerged from it almost I had like a spiritual
Speaker 3: awaken when I emerged from it. So much emotional stuff
Speaker 3: that was wrapped up into this really tight, condensed experience
Speaker 3: that I had been carrying with me all my life
Speaker 3: and it kind of all got thrown at this one
Speaker 3: person relationship experience and when it popped, all of that stuff,
Speaker 3: all of that emotional stuff fell away, so much of
Speaker 3: my over identifying with being someone who is incapable of
Speaker 3: living life and maybe this person will carry me along
Speaker 3: in their way and I will do life better. Like, oh,
Speaker 3: that's just one thing that was thrown into this, But
Speaker 3: a lot of it was self denial. Self Yeah. I
Speaker 3: don't even know the words for it. I just can't
Speaker 3: even find the words. But it was this hot ball
Speaker 3: of need ooh and it exploded and it went away forever,
Speaker 3: I mean forever.
Speaker 2: You know, that's really amazing that you have quite definitive experience.
Speaker 2: It seems to me that you do learn from your
Speaker 2: experiences or the lessons that you are presented with, like,
Speaker 2: that's that kind of completion is I mean, I found
Speaker 2: that quite rare.
Speaker 3: What doesn't happen all the time, But boy am I
Speaker 3: grateful when they do signify?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, never underestimate the things that we carry, right,
Speaker 2: and that when we are if we are lucky enough
Speaker 2: to finally be unburdened of some of those things, it's
Speaker 2: more often than not under really difficult circumstances that we
Speaker 2: might call this is a shitty, terrible, awful thing that happened.
Speaker 2: And yet the other side of that is this profound
Speaker 2: letting go. But we wouldn't necessarily choose it, Like, who
Speaker 2: knows if you'd known ahead of time that it was
Speaker 2: going to be a torturous relationship, would.
Speaker 4: You have done?
Speaker 3: Even though I'm really glad what happened, sometimes I go
Speaker 3: back in my mind and try to find the point
Speaker 3: where I could have walked away.
Speaker 1: Oh I do that all It's a waste.
Speaker 3: It is a totally in the moment, I'm kind of
Speaker 3: excited about it. Yeah, like, oh, there that was the
Speaker 3: point I should have just booked it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's so funny though, that whole you know, I've
Speaker 2: had an interesting relationship with the notion of forgiveness, because
Speaker 2: I really genuinely think being encouraged to forgive isn't always
Speaker 2: the right thing to do. I think you have to arrive, yes,
Speaker 2: but sovereignly, independently, completely in the moment. The idea of
Speaker 2: it being an immediate response that's going to make you
Speaker 2: feel better, it's like telling someone to calm down when
Speaker 2: they're really angry.
Speaker 1: It just won't do well.
Speaker 3: It's a cultural thing, Judeo Christian cultural conditioning that says
Speaker 3: that's exactly want to just forgive them and then and
Speaker 3: so you forgive too fast before you're anywhere near I
Speaker 3: mean forgive means forgetting anyway. You have to be ready
Speaker 3: to let it go. And it's a process that happens organically.
Speaker 3: It's not a decision we make. Because we make that
Speaker 3: decision from our smallest self, the part of our self
Speaker 3: that is still injured, that still feels like we were
Speaker 3: done wrong. You can't forgive from that place. It doesn't
Speaker 3: happen no at all.
Speaker 1: And I think also allowing it to be.
Speaker 2: A process that doesn't look like one day I felt
Speaker 2: like I was resentful and couldn't forgive them, and the
Speaker 2: next day I could it's really interesting how it's a spectrum. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I think I will probably be working forever on this
Speaker 2: one particular relationship that I think forgiveness is a huge
Speaker 2: part of it. But it's fascinating just allowing that to
Speaker 2: be true and not thinking you have to radically do
Speaker 2: something and immediately feel better about it. I think that's
Speaker 2: a huge misnoment and I definitely got the wrong end
Speaker 2: of the stick around that for a while. What relationship,
Speaker 2: real or fictionalized, defines love.
Speaker 4: Fear, say, a room of one zone.
Speaker 3: But she killed herself, But that's okay, by the way,
Speaker 3: that's a version of love. It is, it is.
Speaker 4: It is.
Speaker 2: Weirdly, Virginia Wolf killing herself was an expression of of
Speaker 2: love because she I don't know.
Speaker 1: That's hard to qualify, but I feel like for her
Speaker 1: it was.
Speaker 3: I do too, and I think that Nicole Kidman did
Speaker 3: a very good job of it in the movie.
Speaker 2: I did beyond her nose prosthetics, I don't know.
Speaker 3: I guess I forgave that that was I guess I didn't.
Speaker 3: I didn't even forgive.
Speaker 4: She's so brilliant. Yeah, she's brilliant.
Speaker 1: She's just brilliant. But the nose was a bit warm.
Speaker 2: It's a bit distracting, but it shows how good of
Speaker 2: an actor she.
Speaker 1: I think that it didn't matter.
Speaker 4: She acted past it.
Speaker 1: She acted past her eyes. That should be a down.
Speaker 3: Give us both credit for that. Oh yes, best defines
Speaker 3: love or a relationship, relationship and also real or fictionalized
Speaker 3: that could be in a poem or in a book.
Speaker 3: Oh how about? And I forget who said this? I
Speaker 3: think it was Khalil Joe Brown. Let the winds of
Speaker 3: heaven dance between you and I have have that with
Speaker 3: my beautiful partner, wife's spouse.
Speaker 2: Do you, yes, let the winds of heaven dance between you? Okay,
Speaker 2: practically because that is a really beautiful and etheric idea.
Speaker 2: How does one do that on a rainy Wednesday in November?
Speaker 1: How do we keep that?
Speaker 2: How do we do that when life isn't as poetic
Speaker 2: as it sounds?
Speaker 4: Well, it sounds kind of poetic to me, I know.
Speaker 3: I think what it's talking about is now falling into
Speaker 3: each other where you lose yourself so you're deeply, deeply
Speaker 3: in love. And there's that do you know that painting
Speaker 3: where he's bringing his wife flowers and he's flying Basically
Speaker 3: he's levitating. Yeah, he's soofering. Yeah, but he's in his
Speaker 3: studio and he's doing his thing, and yet he's still very,
Speaker 3: very in love. I've never been tempted to have that
Speaker 3: kind of codependent relationship. So for me, it's always been
Speaker 3: getting into relationships and going to stay back, let the
Speaker 3: winds of heaven dance between us. But I have found
Speaker 3: they're people who are like that.
Speaker 2: It's gonna say one thing, you're super hot, but let
Speaker 2: the winds of having Dan.
Speaker 3: I'm going to be in my art studio thinking about you.
Speaker 3: In fact, I'm gonna be levitating. I'm gonna be hovering.
Speaker 3: But don't knock on my door except to bring the flowers,
Speaker 3: which she's doing. Actually she's levitating. Oop, there's my doorbell.
Speaker 1: You need to get it.
Speaker 3: You can't hold on our dog groomers stop by to
Speaker 3: bring me some peach rum jam What do you mean
Speaker 3: that's delicious?
Speaker 1: Go and taste it, peach rum jama. Then it smells
Speaker 1: super rum.
Speaker 3: It's a little you know, I'm sober. I could get
Speaker 3: drug from this.
Speaker 1: Maybe they're scraping on your turst.
Speaker 2: Okay, wait, I'm now really thinking about the winds of
Speaker 2: having danced between the two things. First of all, my
Speaker 2: boyfriend really early on we're six years in now, he
Speaker 2: said that our relationships, and I think this is the robot.
Speaker 1: Version of the Khalil Gibran.
Speaker 2: It's a then diagram that we are both those circles
Speaker 2: and we have that space in the middle where we
Speaker 2: cross over. But you know, ninety percent is us ourselves,
Speaker 2: and then there's the area that we cross over. And
Speaker 2: you must never think that it should be more than
Speaker 2: or more than that is healthy. I think you're absolutely right.
Speaker 2: I have been tempted into super codependent relationships and like
Speaker 2: nothing good lies down, well, you.
Speaker 3: Lose yourself ultimately, you you you invest your happiness into
Speaker 3: someone else, and you know another person can't take that.
Speaker 1: Who's that?
Speaker 3: Mildred?
Speaker 1: Who's there? Mildred? Mildred coming on? Cookie, Mildred on cookie
Speaker 1: over here? You want some peach? Mildred? Let me see?
Speaker 3: Oh are you right there?
Speaker 4: See?
Speaker 3: What are you doing? She is a Belgian shepherd.
Speaker 2: Oh look she's she's.
Speaker 3: Trying to look all sexy. So I'll rubber belly. It's enticing.
Speaker 3: But I'm on a podcast with milk Driver.
Speaker 4: Love.
Speaker 2: What about the living next door to each other, like
Speaker 2: you know, Helen the bottom cart and Timber and live
Speaker 2: next door to each other with a connecting tunnel.
Speaker 1: I think it's the most brilliant.
Speaker 3: Modern and brilliant, and it's wonderful and it's great for.
Speaker 1: The kids everyone has.
Speaker 3: You know, if I had, it's really fun.
Speaker 1: I would have a slide.
Speaker 3: To connect them. Yeah, you know, Queen Christina. Though Greta
Speaker 3: Garbaum would be and I love Greta Garbo. She's talking
Speaker 3: to her man servant and she said, I would love
Speaker 3: to have a man as a lover, but I should
Speaker 3: like for him to live next door.
Speaker 2: That is essentially well, I believe. I don't believe in
Speaker 2: sharing bathroom. I think you share a bed intentionally. But
Speaker 2: I like sleeping into a sort of sacred and singular.
Speaker 2: But I know that it's it's not easy.
Speaker 3: I could never do that. And now let me give
Speaker 3: some support and some validation. I don't know if they
Speaker 3: need it, but like I'll hear about relationships where people
Speaker 3: just can't get enough of each other, you know, they
Speaker 3: just can't. My parents they loved each other so much.
Speaker 3: My father would go away for a weekend to do something,
Speaker 3: and God, when he would come home they'd be like, oh,
Speaker 3: I missed you so much. My dad did summer school
Speaker 3: when we were growing up, and we grew up on
Speaker 3: the South side of Chicago, and he went to the
Speaker 3: University of Wisconsin, and we found the love letters between them.
Speaker 3: He was gone like four weeks, and you know, five
Speaker 3: o'clock comes around every day and I think of you
Speaker 3: and I get into bed and I miss you so much,
Speaker 3: and oh, it's just so beautiful.
Speaker 1: It's really sweet.
Speaker 2: I mean, I really do think, like, like whatever blows
Speaker 2: your hair, like, is it just being entwined and that's
Speaker 2: your reality or is it more ostensibly aloof But your
Speaker 2: intimacy is really intimate because you choose it, and it's
Speaker 2: it's as long as a choice.
Speaker 3: And it suits who you are. You know, it's not
Speaker 3: coming from fear. It's not coming from fear of intimacy,
Speaker 3: but it's it suits who you exactly. One of the
Speaker 3: things I've learned over the years is, I'm sure you
Speaker 3: have too, is what suits me?
Speaker 2: I think it's a very intrepid and wonderful exploration to
Speaker 2: figure out what suits.
Speaker 3: One and have no shame around it.
Speaker 2: You know, that's a good point to have no shame
Speaker 2: and not be worried about identifying it to other people,
Speaker 2: right right, And thank you so much for sharing all
Speaker 2: your beautiful insight.
Speaker 1: It's so lovely.
Speaker 2: I love hearing all the expansive things that you think.
Speaker 1: Thank you so.
Speaker 4: Much and enjoy well.
Speaker 1: Thank you, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 4: You're welcome. You're welcome.
Speaker 1: Mini Questions is hosted and written.
Speaker 2: By Me Mini Driver, Executive produced by Me and Aaron Kaufman,
Speaker 2: with production support from Jennifer Bassett, Zoe Denkler, and Ali Perry.
Speaker 2: The theme music is also by Me and additional music
Speaker 2: by Aaron Kaufman. Special thanks to Jim Nikolay Addison, O'Day,
Speaker 2: Henry Driver, Lisa Castella, Anick oppenheim A, Nick Muller and
Speaker 2: Annette wolf A, w kPr, Will Pearson, Nicki Etoor, Morgan
Speaker 2: Levoy and Mangesh had Tiggadore