1 00:00:00,200 --> 00:00:04,160 Speaker 1: Family Secrets is a production of iHeartRadio. 2 00:00:07,880 --> 00:00:11,160 Speaker 2: Without the contents of the shopping bag, I could never 3 00:00:11,240 --> 00:00:15,280 Speaker 2: have crowds opened the marrow bones of my parents' secrets, 4 00:00:15,840 --> 00:00:21,279 Speaker 2: decoded their conflicts, their zigzagging passions, the craggy map of 5 00:00:21,360 --> 00:00:26,520 Speaker 2: their marriage, their letters to one another, answer questions I 6 00:00:26,560 --> 00:00:28,000 Speaker 2: didn't know enough to ask. 7 00:00:31,120 --> 00:00:35,480 Speaker 3: That's Letty Cotton Pogribin, a founding editor of Miss magazine, 8 00:00:35,720 --> 00:00:41,639 Speaker 3: writer lecturer, social justice advocate, and author, most recently of Shanda, 9 00:00:42,080 --> 00:00:46,120 Speaker 3: a Memoir of Shame and Secrecy. Letty's story is like 10 00:00:46,120 --> 00:00:50,680 Speaker 3: one of those Russian nesting dolls, secrets within secrets within secrets, 11 00:00:51,040 --> 00:00:54,520 Speaker 3: each one giving way to the next, and Letty unearths 12 00:00:54,520 --> 00:00:59,680 Speaker 3: them tenaciously and courageously, discovering one after another until she 13 00:00:59,720 --> 00:01:13,759 Speaker 3: finds arrives at the tiny, hard kernel of what is true. 14 00:01:14,040 --> 00:01:17,720 Speaker 3: I'm Danny Shapiro, and this is family secrets, the secrets 15 00:01:17,720 --> 00:01:20,200 Speaker 3: that are kept from us, the secrets we keep from others, 16 00:01:20,520 --> 00:01:22,800 Speaker 3: and the secrets we keep from ourselves. 17 00:01:28,640 --> 00:01:31,559 Speaker 2: The landscape of my childhood had, you know, very few 18 00:01:31,840 --> 00:01:34,760 Speaker 2: hills or valleys. It was just a sort of flat 19 00:01:34,840 --> 00:01:40,200 Speaker 2: plain of pleasure in my everyday life, except that I 20 00:01:40,280 --> 00:01:43,959 Speaker 2: had very very very unhappy parents. They argued every night 21 00:01:44,000 --> 00:01:48,920 Speaker 2: after dinner. I was raised in Jamaica, Queens. My parents 22 00:01:48,960 --> 00:01:53,920 Speaker 2: moved there from the Bronx. When they moved, they imagined 23 00:01:54,040 --> 00:01:57,080 Speaker 2: a land, hired, new life for themselves. We lived next 24 00:01:57,160 --> 00:02:00,960 Speaker 2: door to my aunt Hillie. My mother's very close to 25 00:02:01,040 --> 00:02:03,760 Speaker 2: a person of my life, and I was a street kid. 26 00:02:03,800 --> 00:02:05,320 Speaker 2: I mean I went out in the morning and didn't 27 00:02:05,320 --> 00:02:06,600 Speaker 2: come back until dinner time. 28 00:02:06,840 --> 00:02:07,880 Speaker 4: We played stickball. 29 00:02:08,880 --> 00:02:12,000 Speaker 2: Jamaica was really like a suburb at that point, and 30 00:02:12,360 --> 00:02:14,400 Speaker 2: it's in the Borough of Queens, but it felt like 31 00:02:14,440 --> 00:02:18,040 Speaker 2: it was long island. I went to Hebrew School from 32 00:02:18,320 --> 00:02:22,120 Speaker 2: age three until I graduated from Hebrew High School, and 33 00:02:23,080 --> 00:02:26,280 Speaker 2: in between I went to the Yeshiva Central Queens for 34 00:02:26,320 --> 00:02:29,640 Speaker 2: two years, and my dad was the president of the shool, 35 00:02:29,720 --> 00:02:32,360 Speaker 2: which made him what we call a big Maha, which 36 00:02:32,400 --> 00:02:35,240 Speaker 2: made me the daughter of a big macha. So I 37 00:02:35,280 --> 00:02:37,320 Speaker 2: sat on his lap on the bema and I got 38 00:02:37,360 --> 00:02:38,400 Speaker 2: a lot of privileges. 39 00:02:39,160 --> 00:02:40,840 Speaker 3: Tell me about the mother of your childhood. 40 00:02:41,560 --> 00:02:45,320 Speaker 2: The mother of my childhood was an omnipresent mother. One 41 00:02:45,360 --> 00:02:48,960 Speaker 2: would call her a helicopter mom. I guess she didn't 42 00:02:48,960 --> 00:02:51,799 Speaker 2: work outside the home at that point. She was devoted 43 00:02:51,840 --> 00:02:55,639 Speaker 2: to me and my father and the house and making 44 00:02:55,680 --> 00:02:59,920 Speaker 2: it beautiful and cooking and decorating, and eventually she was 45 00:03:00,080 --> 00:03:04,200 Speaker 2: an amateur painter. She always took lessons, she was always 46 00:03:04,200 --> 00:03:05,360 Speaker 2: going to adult education. 47 00:03:05,639 --> 00:03:07,280 Speaker 4: She was the kind of woman who. 48 00:03:07,080 --> 00:03:10,680 Speaker 2: Had a majon group and on a bridge group, and 49 00:03:11,080 --> 00:03:13,280 Speaker 2: she and my dad were sort of leaders of the 50 00:03:13,480 --> 00:03:18,160 Speaker 2: Jewish community. My synagogue was quite an institution way back 51 00:03:18,200 --> 00:03:21,799 Speaker 2: when synagogues were many of them very small, and then suddenly, 52 00:03:22,120 --> 00:03:24,840 Speaker 2: you know, they burst onto the scene when Jews left 53 00:03:24,840 --> 00:03:29,079 Speaker 2: the cities and formed these communities where they were kind 54 00:03:29,120 --> 00:03:33,280 Speaker 2: of constructing palaces that matched many of the churches they 55 00:03:33,320 --> 00:03:33,800 Speaker 2: had seen. 56 00:03:33,960 --> 00:03:35,480 Speaker 4: And my synagogue had a. 57 00:03:35,440 --> 00:03:40,160 Speaker 2: Bowling alley in it and a big ballroom and you know, 58 00:03:40,200 --> 00:03:43,520 Speaker 2: a chapel as well as a very large sanctuary. 59 00:03:44,200 --> 00:03:45,760 Speaker 4: And so I hung around there. 60 00:03:45,880 --> 00:03:49,360 Speaker 2: I played sports there, I went with horror classes there, 61 00:03:49,440 --> 00:03:52,320 Speaker 2: and it filled my life that I went to public 62 00:03:52,360 --> 00:03:56,200 Speaker 2: school PS one thirty one. Then I went to Jamaica 63 00:03:56,280 --> 00:03:59,680 Speaker 2: High School and entirely public school educated except for my 64 00:04:00,240 --> 00:04:03,840 Speaker 2: education Jewish education. And I will say that my home 65 00:04:04,000 --> 00:04:08,280 Speaker 2: was what you might call today high conservative. In my house, 66 00:04:08,480 --> 00:04:12,440 Speaker 2: you know, we did Shabbat in a full blessing fashion. 67 00:04:12,480 --> 00:04:15,560 Speaker 2: In other words, my father didn't just say the one 68 00:04:15,600 --> 00:04:17,920 Speaker 2: line prayer over the wine. He said the whole kiddish 69 00:04:18,279 --> 00:04:20,920 Speaker 2: that type of thing. And my mother lit the candles 70 00:04:20,960 --> 00:04:24,000 Speaker 2: and we had a holla, and we usually had chicken 71 00:04:24,040 --> 00:04:29,440 Speaker 2: soup and chicken or chicken and brisket, and my mother 72 00:04:29,640 --> 00:04:34,159 Speaker 2: made crispy potatoes and overcooked green vegetables because who knew 73 00:04:34,440 --> 00:04:38,520 Speaker 2: she was really used to making Jewish food utol mush together. 74 00:04:40,440 --> 00:04:46,560 Speaker 3: So there was the culture of Jewishness and you're very 75 00:04:46,640 --> 00:04:49,560 Speaker 3: much steeped in it. What did faith feel like during 76 00:04:49,600 --> 00:04:50,520 Speaker 3: those years? 77 00:04:51,160 --> 00:04:51,480 Speaker 4: Faith? 78 00:04:52,320 --> 00:04:55,360 Speaker 2: You know, God was a white man and a long beard, 79 00:04:55,560 --> 00:04:58,240 Speaker 2: and I had to behave because God was watching me, 80 00:04:59,240 --> 00:05:02,719 Speaker 2: and I had to behave because the whole family was 81 00:05:02,760 --> 00:05:05,600 Speaker 2: watching me, and they were watching I mean, I'm one 82 00:05:05,640 --> 00:05:09,520 Speaker 2: of twenty four cousins on both sides because my parents 83 00:05:09,520 --> 00:05:12,080 Speaker 2: were each one of seven, so we had a huge 84 00:05:12,120 --> 00:05:17,000 Speaker 2: extended family. Everybody was sort of checked the box of 85 00:05:17,080 --> 00:05:21,360 Speaker 2: a different incarnation of Judaism. We had our stream left 86 00:05:21,400 --> 00:05:25,800 Speaker 2: wingers who were atheists militant atheists, and we had our 87 00:05:25,960 --> 00:05:29,359 Speaker 2: Orthodox who wouldn't let you use the same think for 88 00:05:29,960 --> 00:05:32,640 Speaker 2: a very spoonness for a folk that had been in 89 00:05:33,480 --> 00:05:36,880 Speaker 2: a piece of roastbeed. If you think fill around the roof. 90 00:05:36,960 --> 00:05:40,200 Speaker 2: That's my mother's town. She came here when she was 91 00:05:40,400 --> 00:05:43,000 Speaker 2: seven or eight or nine, I'm not sure, because she 92 00:05:43,080 --> 00:05:45,360 Speaker 2: lied about her age among all the other things. She 93 00:05:45,440 --> 00:05:49,480 Speaker 2: lied about as required by whatever was going on in 94 00:05:49,480 --> 00:05:53,520 Speaker 2: her life. And I think my relatives were performative in 95 00:05:53,560 --> 00:05:57,000 Speaker 2: the sense that they wanted to be real Americans and 96 00:05:57,000 --> 00:05:59,720 Speaker 2: they had to figure out what that meant. So of 97 00:05:59,760 --> 00:06:03,640 Speaker 2: course it meant losing your accent, and it meant not 98 00:06:03,960 --> 00:06:07,919 Speaker 2: over doing your Judaism publicly unless you were in a 99 00:06:07,960 --> 00:06:11,479 Speaker 2: safe space where some of my uncles and aunts were. 100 00:06:11,520 --> 00:06:14,480 Speaker 2: They were in very Jewish communities in this country. 101 00:06:14,880 --> 00:06:15,599 Speaker 4: Others weren't. 102 00:06:15,640 --> 00:06:19,720 Speaker 2: They were integrated into the larger worlds. And some of them, 103 00:06:19,800 --> 00:06:21,919 Speaker 2: you know, looked like they came right off the boat, 104 00:06:22,000 --> 00:06:27,880 Speaker 2: and some looked like Petty Lamar or Betty Hutton. And 105 00:06:28,080 --> 00:06:32,599 Speaker 2: the only thing that was like uniformly wonderful, warm and 106 00:06:32,640 --> 00:06:38,320 Speaker 2: go moochlat, you know, like really homie was our meal times. 107 00:06:38,360 --> 00:06:41,840 Speaker 2: Everybody was talking. I loved our meal times. 108 00:06:42,320 --> 00:06:42,520 Speaker 4: You know. 109 00:06:42,560 --> 00:06:44,840 Speaker 2: They would always just pull up a bench or a 110 00:06:44,920 --> 00:06:47,279 Speaker 2: chair or open a bridge table. It was always room 111 00:06:47,320 --> 00:06:52,599 Speaker 2: for everybody, and during the conversations I just learned about life. 112 00:06:53,000 --> 00:06:55,680 Speaker 2: I mean, they'd had arguments about which bridge to take, 113 00:06:55,920 --> 00:06:59,440 Speaker 2: you know, between queens and the province, or whether you 114 00:06:59,520 --> 00:07:03,240 Speaker 2: said or kigel to pronounce to pronounce the correct Yiddish 115 00:07:03,240 --> 00:07:06,160 Speaker 2: word for noodle pudding, And it was just full of 116 00:07:06,240 --> 00:07:11,000 Speaker 2: laughter and jokes and arguments. I learned to argue. One 117 00:07:11,040 --> 00:07:13,040 Speaker 2: of the things that I, as a feminist, have always 118 00:07:13,080 --> 00:07:17,840 Speaker 2: felt comfortable with is disputation, because I learned it at 119 00:07:17,920 --> 00:07:19,920 Speaker 2: my family dinner tables. 120 00:07:20,000 --> 00:07:24,680 Speaker 3: In your nuclear family growing up, you also had a 121 00:07:24,960 --> 00:07:27,720 Speaker 3: much older by fourteen years sister named Betty. Can you 122 00:07:27,760 --> 00:07:29,920 Speaker 3: tell me a little bit about Betty at that time 123 00:07:30,000 --> 00:07:31,160 Speaker 3: and your relationship with her. 124 00:07:31,960 --> 00:07:35,360 Speaker 2: Betty was, for me, as a child, the most glamorous 125 00:07:35,400 --> 00:07:38,360 Speaker 2: teenager on earth, and it was during the Second World War, 126 00:07:38,440 --> 00:07:42,280 Speaker 2: and she had a dressing table with a tool skirt 127 00:07:42,400 --> 00:07:43,440 Speaker 2: and a bit mirror. 128 00:07:43,920 --> 00:07:46,200 Speaker 4: She had a room of her own full of your. 129 00:07:46,440 --> 00:07:51,200 Speaker 2: Nineteen forties teenage stuff, record albums and pictures of movie 130 00:07:51,240 --> 00:07:55,120 Speaker 2: stars and movie star and magazines. So Betty was my 131 00:07:55,360 --> 00:07:59,960 Speaker 2: ideal woman and she never resented me. She taught me 132 00:08:00,120 --> 00:08:02,320 Speaker 2: to tell time when I was like. 133 00:08:02,360 --> 00:08:05,960 Speaker 4: Four or five. She taught me to read. 134 00:08:06,040 --> 00:08:09,000 Speaker 2: I mean, she just was a dream sister to me. 135 00:08:09,480 --> 00:08:12,480 Speaker 2: I never missed having anyone my age because I had 136 00:08:12,520 --> 00:08:13,640 Speaker 2: so much more I felt. 137 00:08:15,480 --> 00:08:19,600 Speaker 3: It's nineteen fifty one. Letty is twelve years old. It's 138 00:08:19,640 --> 00:08:22,680 Speaker 3: a very cold Sunday in March, and Letty and her 139 00:08:22,680 --> 00:08:25,280 Speaker 3: family are at a cousin's bar Mitzah, which is being 140 00:08:25,280 --> 00:08:28,520 Speaker 3: held at a seaside community on the north shore of Boston. 141 00:08:29,320 --> 00:08:32,120 Speaker 3: Letty's playing Gin Rummy with some of her cousins while 142 00:08:32,120 --> 00:08:35,439 Speaker 3: the adults congregate in the kitchen. Letty beats a much 143 00:08:35,520 --> 00:08:40,360 Speaker 3: older cousin at cards, and that cousin, in retaliation, blurts 144 00:08:40,400 --> 00:08:41,240 Speaker 3: something out. 145 00:08:42,240 --> 00:08:44,360 Speaker 2: And she threw the cards at me and pushed the 146 00:08:44,600 --> 00:08:47,679 Speaker 2: bridge table over at me, and she screamed, you think 147 00:08:47,720 --> 00:08:51,360 Speaker 2: you're so smart. You know your mother wasn't even in 148 00:08:51,400 --> 00:08:55,120 Speaker 2: our family until your father married her and brought Betty. 149 00:08:55,200 --> 00:08:57,720 Speaker 2: And you know, I'm the oldest cousin, and Betty is 150 00:08:57,760 --> 00:09:00,800 Speaker 2: like pretending to be the oldest cousin. And she just 151 00:09:00,960 --> 00:09:05,120 Speaker 2: was shrill and insistent, and I just leapt out. I 152 00:09:05,120 --> 00:09:07,720 Speaker 2: couldn't take it in. It just was, you know, too 153 00:09:07,800 --> 00:09:11,000 Speaker 2: much to absorb. And when I woke up. My parents 154 00:09:11,080 --> 00:09:13,920 Speaker 2: were kneeling on either side of me. My mother had 155 00:09:13,920 --> 00:09:16,040 Speaker 2: a wet wash glove to my far and my father 156 00:09:16,200 --> 00:09:18,560 Speaker 2: was smoking, you know, one of his lucky strikes. And 157 00:09:18,600 --> 00:09:21,920 Speaker 2: they somehow managed to pull me up off the floor 158 00:09:21,960 --> 00:09:25,080 Speaker 2: and put me in my toddle pote and they took 159 00:09:25,120 --> 00:09:28,680 Speaker 2: me walking out on the beach and they said, we'll explain, 160 00:09:28,840 --> 00:09:32,920 Speaker 2: we'll explain, and they did, and we walked and walked 161 00:09:32,960 --> 00:09:35,560 Speaker 2: and walked and slobbed in this wet sand, with this 162 00:09:35,760 --> 00:09:39,120 Speaker 2: plustery wind and the crashing of the waves. My poor 163 00:09:39,160 --> 00:09:42,120 Speaker 2: mother was still in her barments for dress up and pumps. 164 00:09:42,640 --> 00:09:45,360 Speaker 2: And they told me they had each been married before 165 00:09:45,960 --> 00:09:49,240 Speaker 2: that my mother had a daughter who was my sister Betty. 166 00:09:49,600 --> 00:09:54,360 Speaker 2: And eventually it told me my father had a daughter too, 167 00:09:54,800 --> 00:09:57,680 Speaker 2: that he hadn't seen her since she was twelve. He 168 00:09:57,800 --> 00:10:02,320 Speaker 2: had kind of loust track of her when he married 169 00:10:02,320 --> 00:10:05,800 Speaker 2: my mother. So I was extremely confused. It was all 170 00:10:06,160 --> 00:10:10,760 Speaker 2: like an avalanche of information. And my father's he was 171 00:10:10,800 --> 00:10:13,320 Speaker 2: a lawyer, and he liked to be extremely logical and 172 00:10:13,440 --> 00:10:16,240 Speaker 2: very rational, so he said, just listen to the chronology. 173 00:10:17,280 --> 00:10:20,720 Speaker 2: Mom and I were each married in nineteen twenty three, 174 00:10:21,520 --> 00:10:25,199 Speaker 2: mom's daughter was born in nineteen twenty five. My daughter 175 00:10:25,280 --> 00:10:28,719 Speaker 2: was born in nineteen twenty seven. And soon after that 176 00:10:29,160 --> 00:10:33,360 Speaker 2: each of us got divorced from our first spouses. And 177 00:10:33,480 --> 00:10:36,160 Speaker 2: we met each other in nineteen thirty seven, and you 178 00:10:36,280 --> 00:10:38,560 Speaker 2: got married in nineteen thirty nine. And of course this 179 00:10:38,800 --> 00:10:42,120 Speaker 2: was no easier to absorb than anything else. So he said, 180 00:10:42,800 --> 00:10:45,000 Speaker 2: I'll draw it for you. I'll draw a family tree. 181 00:10:45,360 --> 00:10:49,280 Speaker 2: When he took a stick off the detritus on the shoreline, 182 00:10:49,600 --> 00:10:52,200 Speaker 2: and he drew like an a tree by barbells, and 183 00:10:52,640 --> 00:10:55,240 Speaker 2: on one round side he put his name, and on 184 00:10:55,320 --> 00:10:57,520 Speaker 2: the other side he put my mom's name in Then 185 00:10:57,760 --> 00:11:01,600 Speaker 2: he drew her husband first us Joe Holtzman. 186 00:11:01,960 --> 00:11:02,720 Speaker 4: And on the other. 187 00:11:02,640 --> 00:11:06,760 Speaker 2: Side of his name he drew his first wife, named Paula. 188 00:11:07,679 --> 00:11:10,400 Speaker 2: And then he ruws a line down from my mom 189 00:11:10,520 --> 00:11:13,400 Speaker 2: and Joe, and he puts a little circle and he 190 00:11:13,440 --> 00:11:15,160 Speaker 2: puts Betty's name in it. 191 00:11:15,360 --> 00:11:16,680 Speaker 4: Fine, I get that now. 192 00:11:17,120 --> 00:11:19,720 Speaker 2: And then he puts with a long line between the 193 00:11:19,760 --> 00:11:22,360 Speaker 2: two of them, he puts my name down from their 194 00:11:22,440 --> 00:11:25,200 Speaker 2: bar bell. I'm with him, I'm actually with him. I 195 00:11:25,200 --> 00:11:27,480 Speaker 2: see my sister came from the first husband, and I 196 00:11:27,520 --> 00:11:31,080 Speaker 2: came from their marriage, and he brought a line down 197 00:11:31,120 --> 00:11:35,880 Speaker 2: from his bar belt with Paula, and he writes in Ena, 198 00:11:36,280 --> 00:11:39,120 Speaker 2: and that's how I found out I had another sister. 199 00:11:40,000 --> 00:11:42,680 Speaker 2: It turns out my parents had met each other when 200 00:11:42,760 --> 00:11:45,520 Speaker 2: they each of them separately, had put their daughters in 201 00:11:45,679 --> 00:11:49,960 Speaker 2: a quote very fine boarding school, the best boarding school, 202 00:11:50,080 --> 00:11:53,480 Speaker 2: Jewish boarding school in the country. That kept saying, and 203 00:11:53,600 --> 00:11:57,680 Speaker 2: Reena and Betty had become friends. And Reena and Betty 204 00:11:58,080 --> 00:12:02,520 Speaker 2: plotted to get my parents together, except they used to 205 00:12:02,559 --> 00:12:05,840 Speaker 2: come on separate visiting days. So they made this elaborate 206 00:12:05,920 --> 00:12:08,679 Speaker 2: reason why my mother had to come on the day 207 00:12:08,760 --> 00:12:11,840 Speaker 2: my father did, or vice versa. And they just said, 208 00:12:12,080 --> 00:12:13,480 Speaker 2: and they're going to fall in love and they're going 209 00:12:13,520 --> 00:12:14,520 Speaker 2: to get married. 210 00:12:14,360 --> 00:12:16,240 Speaker 4: And they did. So. 211 00:12:16,480 --> 00:12:18,720 Speaker 2: I mean, this was a wonderful story told in a 212 00:12:18,760 --> 00:12:23,960 Speaker 2: horrible context, and I was like trembling. And at the 213 00:12:24,040 --> 00:12:27,440 Speaker 2: same time I realized that I had been lied to, 214 00:12:28,360 --> 00:12:32,600 Speaker 2: that they had constructed and lived in the Queens, as 215 00:12:32,640 --> 00:12:34,520 Speaker 2: I said, they moved from the Bronx to Queens to 216 00:12:34,520 --> 00:12:38,280 Speaker 2: start a new life, and they lived this lie. But 217 00:12:38,440 --> 00:12:42,280 Speaker 2: worst of all, they lied to me. My sister also, Betty, 218 00:12:42,800 --> 00:12:47,040 Speaker 2: also lied to me. One time I was looking up 219 00:12:47,040 --> 00:12:50,000 Speaker 2: a word and I opened her dictionary and it said 220 00:12:50,000 --> 00:12:53,440 Speaker 2: the word Betty Holtzman in the fly leaf, and I said, 221 00:12:53,720 --> 00:12:54,840 Speaker 2: who's Betty Holtzman? 222 00:12:55,320 --> 00:12:55,560 Speaker 4: Oh? 223 00:12:55,600 --> 00:12:58,240 Speaker 2: Oh, oh, she said, you know, I mean, looking back, 224 00:12:58,320 --> 00:13:02,680 Speaker 2: I realized she was talking, you know, feeling panicked to 225 00:13:02,840 --> 00:13:04,840 Speaker 2: fill in, you know, some kind. 226 00:13:04,640 --> 00:13:06,959 Speaker 4: Of believable story. 227 00:13:07,000 --> 00:13:09,600 Speaker 2: And she said, when I was in high school, I 228 00:13:09,600 --> 00:13:12,360 Speaker 2: had a boyfriend named Holsman, and I wanted to see 229 00:13:12,480 --> 00:13:15,160 Speaker 2: what my name would look like if I married them. 230 00:13:15,360 --> 00:13:17,040 Speaker 3: That was very quick witted of her. 231 00:13:17,559 --> 00:13:20,400 Speaker 2: She was quick witted, to be sure. She was as 232 00:13:20,520 --> 00:13:24,280 Speaker 2: much of a prevaricator as my mother. They everybody learned 233 00:13:24,280 --> 00:13:28,480 Speaker 2: to lie because they had to keep things nice, They 234 00:13:28,520 --> 00:13:32,479 Speaker 2: had to keep the perfect family saga intact. 235 00:13:35,840 --> 00:13:40,760 Speaker 3: I understand why your parents kept it a secret and 236 00:13:40,800 --> 00:13:43,880 Speaker 3: intended for it to remain a secret from you. But 237 00:13:44,400 --> 00:13:47,880 Speaker 3: I'm wondering, why do you think Betty, even as she 238 00:13:47,920 --> 00:13:51,520 Speaker 3: became a teenager and a young adult, that she also 239 00:13:52,480 --> 00:13:55,800 Speaker 3: for all those years she was part of that deceit. 240 00:13:56,480 --> 00:14:00,000 Speaker 2: Because my parents instructed her that I couldn't be told 241 00:14:00,080 --> 00:14:02,080 Speaker 2: because I was too young to be trusted to keep 242 00:14:02,080 --> 00:14:04,880 Speaker 2: the secret from all their friends, from the Rabbi, from 243 00:14:04,920 --> 00:14:09,200 Speaker 2: the counter, from everybody so Betty had to keep the secret. 244 00:14:09,640 --> 00:14:14,679 Speaker 2: Everyone knew it, and everyone was onto it. They kept saying, 245 00:14:15,000 --> 00:14:18,560 Speaker 2: everything's fine. People accept us as we are. We're just 246 00:14:19,120 --> 00:14:22,560 Speaker 2: we're a family. We're a nice Jewish family. With Betty, 247 00:14:23,080 --> 00:14:25,200 Speaker 2: I said, well, you know, come to think of it, 248 00:14:25,280 --> 00:14:30,200 Speaker 2: didn't anybody notice that we're fourteen years apart? She said, well, 249 00:14:30,240 --> 00:14:33,200 Speaker 2: people didn't ask. Most people didn't ask personal questions. But 250 00:14:33,280 --> 00:14:36,400 Speaker 2: when some of my closer friends did, said why they 251 00:14:37,000 --> 00:14:39,800 Speaker 2: what happened that they're fourteen years apart? I told him 252 00:14:40,200 --> 00:14:43,880 Speaker 2: I had trouble conceiving. I mean, my mother had it 253 00:14:43,920 --> 00:14:50,280 Speaker 2: all figured out. My mother was a past master at invention, reinvention. 254 00:14:52,040 --> 00:14:58,360 Speaker 2: She created a perfect facade because she wanted to be perfect. 255 00:14:58,720 --> 00:15:03,400 Speaker 2: She thought all Americans were like that. Shanda means shame 256 00:15:03,440 --> 00:15:06,640 Speaker 2: in Yiddish. Everything was a shonda in my and my family. 257 00:15:07,200 --> 00:15:09,920 Speaker 2: You know, if somebody had mental illness, it was a shonda. 258 00:15:10,000 --> 00:15:13,240 Speaker 2: I mean, divorce was the worst shonda, except for cancer, 259 00:15:13,520 --> 00:15:17,320 Speaker 2: that was worse. So my mother had been a divorced 260 00:15:17,560 --> 00:15:20,640 Speaker 2: single mother. There was no such thing. There was no 261 00:15:20,720 --> 00:15:24,440 Speaker 2: label single mother. That's why my mother. It turns out 262 00:15:24,920 --> 00:15:27,600 Speaker 2: I didn't know this, of course, said Betty, took board 263 00:15:27,600 --> 00:15:31,520 Speaker 2: in school at age three. She did it because she 264 00:15:31,720 --> 00:15:34,120 Speaker 2: had to go to work in a sewing machine factory, 265 00:15:35,200 --> 00:15:38,120 Speaker 2: and she would have had to leave Betty with her parents, 266 00:15:38,120 --> 00:15:40,640 Speaker 2: who still had a lot of the kids are still 267 00:15:40,640 --> 00:15:41,000 Speaker 2: at home. 268 00:15:41,080 --> 00:15:42,120 Speaker 4: My mother was the eldest. 269 00:15:42,640 --> 00:15:45,520 Speaker 2: They lived in three rooms in the Lower east Side 270 00:15:45,560 --> 00:15:48,120 Speaker 2: classic if you think of Hester Street movie, that's how 271 00:15:48,160 --> 00:15:50,520 Speaker 2: they lived. If you've ever been to the Lower east 272 00:15:50,560 --> 00:15:54,560 Speaker 2: Side tenement Mesion, that was their life. And my grandparents 273 00:15:54,560 --> 00:15:59,360 Speaker 2: couldn't speak English more than you know, rudimentary English, and 274 00:15:59,440 --> 00:16:02,280 Speaker 2: it was kay us there and it was a toilet 275 00:16:02,280 --> 00:16:06,080 Speaker 2: in the hallway for like forty people my whole family, 276 00:16:06,120 --> 00:16:09,640 Speaker 2: and two or three other apartments. So she didn't want 277 00:16:09,720 --> 00:16:12,640 Speaker 2: Betty to grow up there. And my grandparents didn't read 278 00:16:13,000 --> 00:16:16,240 Speaker 2: the New York American books or now New York goes, 279 00:16:16,280 --> 00:16:19,240 Speaker 2: you know, classical music stations, the where my mother had 280 00:16:19,320 --> 00:16:24,160 Speaker 2: learned to do. And so she always told Betty, you know, 281 00:16:24,680 --> 00:16:26,840 Speaker 2: that's why I put you there, so that you would 282 00:16:26,840 --> 00:16:31,200 Speaker 2: grow up become a real American and a lady, which 283 00:16:31,320 --> 00:16:34,880 Speaker 2: Betty did. They had lived through the Shanda, the power 284 00:16:34,880 --> 00:16:37,800 Speaker 2: of shame. So my mother when she made new friends, 285 00:16:37,840 --> 00:16:39,800 Speaker 2: she told them she was single, and she never said 286 00:16:39,840 --> 00:16:43,520 Speaker 2: a word about For ten years, she never said a 287 00:16:43,560 --> 00:16:46,760 Speaker 2: word about having been married, or that she had a daughter. 288 00:16:48,480 --> 00:16:51,640 Speaker 2: And I, who, as I said, had a helicopter mom, 289 00:16:52,160 --> 00:16:55,080 Speaker 2: a mom who you know, did drawings with me and 290 00:16:55,160 --> 00:17:00,000 Speaker 2: built little structures with me and teach me to plant seeds. 291 00:17:00,280 --> 00:17:04,359 Speaker 2: Mother put her child in boarding school. It's so beyond me. 292 00:17:05,160 --> 00:17:09,400 Speaker 2: It's cognitive dissonance, but it's true. So I have to 293 00:17:09,560 --> 00:17:10,360 Speaker 2: make sense. 294 00:17:10,160 --> 00:17:13,840 Speaker 3: Out of all that. Where do you think that this 295 00:17:14,000 --> 00:17:19,679 Speaker 3: capacity to lie so seamlessly and keep secrets? Where do 296 00:17:19,720 --> 00:17:21,080 Speaker 3: you think that came from? And your mother? 297 00:17:21,680 --> 00:17:23,800 Speaker 2: My mother was great liar because she was raised by 298 00:17:23,800 --> 00:17:27,800 Speaker 2: a great liar. She had a mother who kept secrets 299 00:17:27,880 --> 00:17:32,840 Speaker 2: pretty artfully and thoroughly. My grandmother was betrothed to a 300 00:17:32,880 --> 00:17:36,160 Speaker 2: man completely inappropriate for her, much too old for her, 301 00:17:36,960 --> 00:17:38,679 Speaker 2: and she had to help bear her parents. 302 00:17:38,840 --> 00:17:41,520 Speaker 4: So she got married. But in the bridal. 303 00:17:41,240 --> 00:17:45,360 Speaker 2: Chamber, while he was going and changing into whatever Orthodox 304 00:17:45,400 --> 00:17:48,399 Speaker 2: men put on for that first night, she tied the 305 00:17:48,400 --> 00:17:52,560 Speaker 2: bed sheets together and she shinneyed out the window. She 306 00:17:52,760 --> 00:17:56,920 Speaker 2: was a runaway bride, and nobody ever knew it because 307 00:17:56,960 --> 00:18:00,840 Speaker 2: when they came to America, my grandparents both my grandparents. 308 00:18:01,000 --> 00:18:02,960 Speaker 2: She went and ran away to the man who she 309 00:18:03,040 --> 00:18:06,520 Speaker 2: loved was my grandfather, and when they came here, they 310 00:18:06,680 --> 00:18:08,760 Speaker 2: just blotted it out. 311 00:18:09,040 --> 00:18:11,000 Speaker 4: They never told anybody that. 312 00:18:11,000 --> 00:18:14,120 Speaker 2: She'd ever done that, that she'd had this marriage. They 313 00:18:14,160 --> 00:18:16,960 Speaker 2: were desperately afraid that it would be such a shanda 314 00:18:17,000 --> 00:18:20,760 Speaker 2: that nobody would marry their kids because in the tightly 315 00:18:21,119 --> 00:18:24,080 Speaker 2: organized Jewish ghettos of New York, to put it that way, 316 00:18:24,600 --> 00:18:26,800 Speaker 2: on the Lower East Side, everybody knew each other, and 317 00:18:26,840 --> 00:18:29,280 Speaker 2: everybody knew, you know, where they came from. They were 318 00:18:29,359 --> 00:18:32,280 Speaker 2: just deathly afraid that somebody would know this story and 319 00:18:32,320 --> 00:18:34,879 Speaker 2: then they would be shamed, and they couldn't make a 320 00:18:34,880 --> 00:18:38,479 Speaker 2: shit off, which is a match with their seven children 321 00:18:38,560 --> 00:18:42,040 Speaker 2: and any other Jews seven children. So mom had seen 322 00:18:42,240 --> 00:18:45,440 Speaker 2: My mom had seen this, and my mom did this 323 00:18:45,480 --> 00:18:48,280 Speaker 2: with her childhood. She faked her high school graduation a 324 00:18:48,320 --> 00:18:50,760 Speaker 2: photograph by going to a studio and paying a guy 325 00:18:51,040 --> 00:18:53,800 Speaker 2: so she could go into the prop box and take 326 00:18:53,880 --> 00:18:57,000 Speaker 2: out a signon to where to make her look older, 327 00:18:57,040 --> 00:19:00,359 Speaker 2: and I rolled up diploma and have a picture taken. 328 00:19:00,840 --> 00:19:04,600 Speaker 2: And she tithed herself from her salary as a sewing 329 00:19:04,640 --> 00:19:07,959 Speaker 2: machine operator to pay back this photo studio guy, so 330 00:19:08,040 --> 00:19:10,159 Speaker 2: she could put that up and make people think she 331 00:19:10,280 --> 00:19:14,199 Speaker 2: was a high school graduate. She was extremely creative in 332 00:19:14,240 --> 00:19:14,720 Speaker 2: her line. 333 00:19:17,920 --> 00:19:35,560 Speaker 3: We'll be right back. When Letty is fourteen years old, 334 00:19:36,000 --> 00:19:37,960 Speaker 3: just a couple of years after her father has drawn 335 00:19:38,119 --> 00:19:42,919 Speaker 3: their revelatory family tree in the sand, Rena, Letty's older sister, 336 00:19:43,320 --> 00:19:48,440 Speaker 3: shows up. It's nineteen fifty four and Rena needs help. 337 00:19:49,800 --> 00:19:51,480 Speaker 2: Opened the door and there was a woman with a 338 00:19:51,600 --> 00:19:55,080 Speaker 2: very long braid, facing away from the door, and she 339 00:19:55,200 --> 00:19:58,040 Speaker 2: flipped herself around and she stuck out her hand and 340 00:19:58,080 --> 00:20:02,840 Speaker 2: she said, Hi, bunny, that was my childhood name. I'm 341 00:20:02,880 --> 00:20:04,399 Speaker 2: your sister, Rena. 342 00:20:04,720 --> 00:20:05,520 Speaker 4: That's how I met her. 343 00:20:06,119 --> 00:20:11,120 Speaker 2: She had come to us because my father was a lawyer, 344 00:20:11,359 --> 00:20:14,560 Speaker 2: as I said, and she needed a lawyer to be 345 00:20:14,640 --> 00:20:17,440 Speaker 2: able to get a marshall to allow her to return 346 00:20:17,440 --> 00:20:21,000 Speaker 2: to her mother's apartment and retrieve her stuff. My mother 347 00:20:21,240 --> 00:20:24,200 Speaker 2: was so happy to see her. My mother didn't abandon her. 348 00:20:24,520 --> 00:20:26,960 Speaker 2: It turns out my mother knew her when my mother 349 00:20:27,040 --> 00:20:27,879 Speaker 2: married my father. 350 00:20:28,240 --> 00:20:31,320 Speaker 4: Rena was part of their life. So my mother was really. 351 00:20:31,080 --> 00:20:33,359 Speaker 2: Glad to see Rena, who was a friend of Betty 352 00:20:33,400 --> 00:20:36,280 Speaker 2: when they were children. They all sat on this lime 353 00:20:36,359 --> 00:20:39,919 Speaker 2: colored half seat. Love's seat. We had two of them, 354 00:20:39,960 --> 00:20:43,040 Speaker 2: and I never forget it. Rena just plopped herself down. 355 00:20:43,160 --> 00:20:46,479 Speaker 2: My mother came downstairs in her bathroom and it was sweet. 356 00:20:46,560 --> 00:20:49,520 Speaker 2: Brina sat down and there there two of them were 357 00:20:49,560 --> 00:20:55,040 Speaker 2: talking and I find out she's a PhD in anthropology, 358 00:20:55,560 --> 00:20:59,000 Speaker 2: and she was left with a mother who was really psychotic, 359 00:20:59,200 --> 00:21:00,800 Speaker 2: and she had become so violent. 360 00:21:01,200 --> 00:21:02,240 Speaker 4: She had cracked right. 361 00:21:02,200 --> 00:21:05,679 Speaker 2: Rena's glasses and she had pushed her torso out the 362 00:21:05,720 --> 00:21:10,320 Speaker 2: window and threatens to throw her out, and Rena had escaped, 363 00:21:10,520 --> 00:21:13,399 Speaker 2: but she had all her you know, scholarly materials. She 364 00:21:13,440 --> 00:21:16,480 Speaker 2: was writing a book on her thesis in that apartment. 365 00:21:16,560 --> 00:21:19,520 Speaker 2: So she needed my father to be able to get 366 00:21:19,840 --> 00:21:22,600 Speaker 2: that stuff. And that's why she had come back to us. 367 00:21:23,440 --> 00:21:26,400 Speaker 2: My mother had her live in and we had an attic. 368 00:21:26,960 --> 00:21:28,199 Speaker 4: A different housage make up. 369 00:21:28,359 --> 00:21:30,639 Speaker 2: My father had earned a little more money and it 370 00:21:30,720 --> 00:21:33,679 Speaker 2: had a finished attic which Betty and her whole family 371 00:21:33,680 --> 00:21:36,439 Speaker 2: would come in with their kids and stay in. And 372 00:21:36,480 --> 00:21:39,879 Speaker 2: now here was Rena in this attic. Betty lived in 373 00:21:39,920 --> 00:21:43,000 Speaker 2: Westchester at the time, so she wasn't living there, but 374 00:21:43,040 --> 00:21:45,320 Speaker 2: she came for you know, weekends, and now Rena was 375 00:21:45,400 --> 00:21:48,399 Speaker 2: up there and I had this new sister, and she 376 00:21:48,600 --> 00:21:53,480 Speaker 2: was fabulous. Her dissertation was on the Machuaya, who happened 377 00:21:53,480 --> 00:21:56,719 Speaker 2: to live on Upper Broadway, and she did all her 378 00:21:56,720 --> 00:22:00,399 Speaker 2: field work on Upper Broadway. And while she was living 379 00:22:00,440 --> 00:22:03,440 Speaker 2: with she would slept me up there to visit with 380 00:22:03,600 --> 00:22:07,040 Speaker 2: this tribe. And these were people who if you see 381 00:22:07,240 --> 00:22:10,760 Speaker 2: fortune tellers and doors in store windows and so on, 382 00:22:11,520 --> 00:22:14,720 Speaker 2: that's the sort of tribe they belonged to. They called 383 00:22:14,760 --> 00:22:18,040 Speaker 2: themselves Romany. And I was at their feasts and I 384 00:22:18,240 --> 00:22:23,520 Speaker 2: was sitting and watching them do people's futures and crystal balls, literally, 385 00:22:23,600 --> 00:22:26,240 Speaker 2: And I'm fourteen years old, and this person, Rena, has 386 00:22:26,320 --> 00:22:30,200 Speaker 2: dropped out of heaven and I am besodic with her. 387 00:22:30,680 --> 00:22:32,280 Speaker 4: I have a sister, Betty. 388 00:22:32,600 --> 00:22:35,160 Speaker 2: Who is a Ladies Home journal prototype. 389 00:22:35,520 --> 00:22:35,760 Speaker 4: You know. 390 00:22:35,920 --> 00:22:40,280 Speaker 2: She makes lambshades out of potholders, and she cooks, you know, 391 00:22:40,520 --> 00:22:45,280 Speaker 2: dinners from Good Housekeepings recipes, and she mends things and 392 00:22:45,359 --> 00:22:49,680 Speaker 2: she's wonderful and smart. But here's this genius. My father 393 00:22:49,800 --> 00:22:53,000 Speaker 2: was quick to say she's a genius. Her IQ is 394 00:22:53,000 --> 00:22:54,959 Speaker 2: one hundred and eighty as if he made you know, 395 00:22:55,000 --> 00:22:59,280 Speaker 2: he made her this IQ, and she is now suddenly 396 00:23:00,240 --> 00:23:03,200 Speaker 2: this with this long braid a part of my life. 397 00:23:05,920 --> 00:23:09,040 Speaker 3: When Letty's fifteen, her father sits her down and offers 398 00:23:09,040 --> 00:23:13,399 Speaker 3: her a lucky Strike cigarette. This is highly unusual, a 399 00:23:13,480 --> 00:23:18,159 Speaker 3: clue that he's about to tell her something serious, something huge. 400 00:23:18,480 --> 00:23:20,840 Speaker 3: And then he tells her that her mother has cancer. 401 00:23:21,400 --> 00:23:25,440 Speaker 3: She's very sick. In fact, her mother has only weeks 402 00:23:25,560 --> 00:23:28,880 Speaker 3: left to live. And Letty hasn't been the only one 403 00:23:28,960 --> 00:23:31,560 Speaker 3: kept in the dark about her mother's illness. It was 404 00:23:31,640 --> 00:23:33,840 Speaker 3: kept a secret from almost everybody. 405 00:23:35,480 --> 00:23:38,320 Speaker 2: My mother wouldn't tell anybody. She wouldn't tell her friends, 406 00:23:38,480 --> 00:23:41,680 Speaker 2: her best friends. When we had the Shiva and people came, 407 00:23:41,960 --> 00:23:44,879 Speaker 2: her friends uniformly said, this is such a shock. 408 00:23:45,800 --> 00:23:47,280 Speaker 4: We didn't know. We didn't know. 409 00:23:48,720 --> 00:23:52,399 Speaker 2: So not knowing is such a theme of my life, 410 00:23:52,440 --> 00:23:57,679 Speaker 2: of wanting to know everything. It's why I think I 411 00:23:57,720 --> 00:24:00,919 Speaker 2: became a writer. It's why I think I became a 412 00:24:00,960 --> 00:24:04,359 Speaker 2: feminist because so much she was unavailable to women. Women 413 00:24:04,359 --> 00:24:08,080 Speaker 2: didn't tell the truth about their lives because it might 414 00:24:08,119 --> 00:24:11,800 Speaker 2: not make them look good, and you had to satisfy 415 00:24:11,880 --> 00:24:19,520 Speaker 2: a very exacting norm. Femininity was unachievable, but everybody aspired 416 00:24:19,880 --> 00:24:23,280 Speaker 2: to be perfect. And I think I became a feminist 417 00:24:23,320 --> 00:24:27,479 Speaker 2: because of all of that that was hidden hiddenness was 418 00:24:28,440 --> 00:24:31,680 Speaker 2: to mix a Christian metaphor of my cross to bear her. 419 00:24:34,320 --> 00:24:37,240 Speaker 3: So in a very short span of time, Letty learns 420 00:24:37,280 --> 00:24:40,000 Speaker 3: about and meets her new half sister, her mother grows 421 00:24:40,040 --> 00:24:42,760 Speaker 3: ill and eventually dies, and in the wake of all 422 00:24:42,800 --> 00:24:45,760 Speaker 3: of this, she goes off to college early, when she's 423 00:24:45,800 --> 00:24:47,080 Speaker 3: only sixteen years old. 424 00:24:48,160 --> 00:24:49,520 Speaker 4: I went away to college. 425 00:24:49,760 --> 00:24:52,520 Speaker 2: My father just dropped me off, and for a while 426 00:24:52,600 --> 00:24:58,080 Speaker 2: as a freshman, I really learned quickly that being a 427 00:24:58,080 --> 00:25:01,159 Speaker 2: berieved child was not a great thing for a co ed. 428 00:25:01,359 --> 00:25:04,280 Speaker 2: That's what we used to call girls in college. And 429 00:25:04,480 --> 00:25:07,720 Speaker 2: I didn't want pity. I wanted acceptance. So I made 430 00:25:07,840 --> 00:25:10,959 Speaker 2: very short shrift of the fact that my mother had 431 00:25:11,000 --> 00:25:14,760 Speaker 2: died four months before, and I tried to kind of 432 00:25:14,760 --> 00:25:17,960 Speaker 2: fit in. But my father had made it clear to 433 00:25:18,000 --> 00:25:20,440 Speaker 2: me that he was going to pay the tuition, room 434 00:25:20,480 --> 00:25:22,639 Speaker 2: and board, but the rest I was on my own. 435 00:25:23,600 --> 00:25:27,080 Speaker 2: So I was sixteen years old, and he told me 436 00:25:27,160 --> 00:25:29,520 Speaker 2: that it was important to him to be left on 437 00:25:29,600 --> 00:25:31,639 Speaker 2: his own when he was sixteen, and he became a 438 00:25:31,640 --> 00:25:34,880 Speaker 2: Hebrew school teacher and he became a tutor of bar 439 00:25:34,920 --> 00:25:37,800 Speaker 2: mits for boys, and it was the making of him. 440 00:25:38,040 --> 00:25:41,200 Speaker 2: And then he put himself through college and then through 441 00:25:41,280 --> 00:25:44,600 Speaker 2: law school. He was very proud he was in nineteen 442 00:25:44,640 --> 00:25:47,000 Speaker 2: twenty three. He was a graduate lawyer and not a 443 00:25:47,040 --> 00:25:49,760 Speaker 2: lot of Jews were, And you know, he made his 444 00:25:49,800 --> 00:25:52,960 Speaker 2: own way and I would too. So I mean, looking back, 445 00:25:53,000 --> 00:25:56,480 Speaker 2: as a feminist, I could kind of reframe that whole 446 00:25:56,480 --> 00:25:59,160 Speaker 2: thing and say, great, it made. 447 00:25:58,920 --> 00:26:03,120 Speaker 4: Me an independent. But as a child, just as her mother, 448 00:26:03,240 --> 00:26:05,280 Speaker 4: it's felt like crap. 449 00:26:05,960 --> 00:26:09,960 Speaker 2: And then I realized that, you know, my dormmates had 450 00:26:10,040 --> 00:26:14,040 Speaker 2: different lives. Their parents hung around till they had unpacked 451 00:26:14,080 --> 00:26:18,080 Speaker 2: their stuff, and then when we were all living together, 452 00:26:18,200 --> 00:26:22,239 Speaker 2: my dormmates parents sent them pin money, which was what 453 00:26:22,280 --> 00:26:25,080 Speaker 2: it was called, and they would, you know, they would 454 00:26:25,160 --> 00:26:28,280 Speaker 2: all hop into somebody's car if there was somebody who 455 00:26:28,320 --> 00:26:31,320 Speaker 2: had a driver's license, and go into Harvard Square and 456 00:26:31,520 --> 00:26:34,520 Speaker 2: have ice cream cones at Brigham's. And I had to 457 00:26:35,359 --> 00:26:38,719 Speaker 2: measure out what pin money I had because I was 458 00:26:38,760 --> 00:26:43,920 Speaker 2: working from the beginning, I became secretary to the. 459 00:26:43,280 --> 00:26:44,800 Speaker 4: Brandi's Hillel Rabbi. 460 00:26:45,160 --> 00:26:48,720 Speaker 2: I worked in the public department in the alumni office, 461 00:26:48,720 --> 00:26:52,240 Speaker 2: and I tutored athletes. In my sophomore year, I started 462 00:26:52,280 --> 00:26:56,480 Speaker 2: tutoring athletes in English and biology. So I had a 463 00:26:56,480 --> 00:26:57,880 Speaker 2: lot of jobs in order to. 464 00:26:57,880 --> 00:26:58,720 Speaker 4: Have the kind of. 465 00:27:00,280 --> 00:27:02,639 Speaker 2: Life that a cod in the nineteen fifties was supposed 466 00:27:02,640 --> 00:27:04,439 Speaker 2: to have, Like I could buy a lipstick, and I 467 00:27:04,480 --> 00:27:07,760 Speaker 2: could have a pizza and all that sort of thing. 468 00:27:08,240 --> 00:27:11,960 Speaker 2: And I only mention that because my father had masqueraded 469 00:27:12,320 --> 00:27:16,560 Speaker 2: as a very wealthy guy, a successful lawyer. He used 470 00:27:16,560 --> 00:27:18,080 Speaker 2: to be the one who picked up the check when 471 00:27:18,240 --> 00:27:21,280 Speaker 2: he and my mom went out with another couple. He 472 00:27:21,400 --> 00:27:25,040 Speaker 2: always dressed go beautifully, he always had a nice car. 473 00:27:25,720 --> 00:27:29,280 Speaker 2: But later I discovered a whole lot of hidden letters. 474 00:27:29,320 --> 00:27:35,000 Speaker 2: I discovered my father was really just a performing masculinity, 475 00:27:35,119 --> 00:27:39,439 Speaker 2: which included that Jewish men had to provide well for 476 00:27:39,520 --> 00:27:43,040 Speaker 2: their families and look good. So my father, when he 477 00:27:43,040 --> 00:27:44,800 Speaker 2: said you're going to be on your own, really was 478 00:27:44,800 --> 00:27:46,199 Speaker 2: saying I can't help you. 479 00:27:47,160 --> 00:27:50,920 Speaker 4: I'm having enough trouble myself. Who knew? I never knew that. 480 00:27:55,440 --> 00:28:11,840 Speaker 3: We'll be back in a moment with more family secrets. 481 00:28:13,160 --> 00:28:15,920 Speaker 3: But the letters are not uncovered for years. In fact, 482 00:28:16,160 --> 00:28:19,120 Speaker 3: Letty lives an entire life before she makes these discoveries 483 00:28:19,359 --> 00:28:23,359 Speaker 3: about her father's performances. She finishes college and begins a 484 00:28:23,400 --> 00:28:27,480 Speaker 3: career in publishing. She marries Bert, has three children and 485 00:28:27,520 --> 00:28:32,560 Speaker 3: eventually six grandchildren. She writes twelve books. She becomes known 486 00:28:32,600 --> 00:28:35,840 Speaker 3: as one of the leading feminists of her generation. But 487 00:28:36,040 --> 00:28:39,960 Speaker 3: through it all, a certain feeling never leaves her. It's 488 00:28:39,960 --> 00:28:42,320 Speaker 3: the feeling that there's more she doesn't know about her family, 489 00:28:42,840 --> 00:28:46,200 Speaker 3: that there's more she must find out. Sometime in the 490 00:28:46,200 --> 00:28:50,360 Speaker 3: early two thousands, Letty comes across another letter in which 491 00:28:50,560 --> 00:28:56,000 Speaker 3: something peculiar stands out, something about twins. 492 00:28:56,280 --> 00:28:58,840 Speaker 2: I had taken out my father's album of his trip 493 00:28:58,880 --> 00:29:02,240 Speaker 2: to Palestine, and at one point I noticed that there 494 00:29:02,320 --> 00:29:04,680 Speaker 2: was a sort of slap in the front cover, and 495 00:29:04,760 --> 00:29:06,840 Speaker 2: I reached in to think see if there was anything 496 00:29:07,200 --> 00:29:10,320 Speaker 2: in there of interest, and out came a letter one 497 00:29:10,360 --> 00:29:12,880 Speaker 2: of my father had written to my mother, and my 498 00:29:12,920 --> 00:29:14,760 Speaker 2: mother had written to my father, and in it there 499 00:29:14,840 --> 00:29:19,720 Speaker 2: was a ps from my sister saying to my father, 500 00:29:20,240 --> 00:29:23,320 Speaker 2: Mom is doing fine and the twins are kicking. 501 00:29:24,160 --> 00:29:25,960 Speaker 4: So I read this. My eyes pop out. 502 00:29:26,280 --> 00:29:30,080 Speaker 2: I pick up the Varna, call my sister living in Westchester, 503 00:29:30,360 --> 00:29:34,280 Speaker 2: and I say, Betty, listen to this. A PS on 504 00:29:34,360 --> 00:29:37,360 Speaker 2: a letter that mom wrote to Dad when he was 505 00:29:37,360 --> 00:29:41,480 Speaker 2: in Palestine, and it says Mom's doing fine. Obviously about 506 00:29:41,480 --> 00:29:45,120 Speaker 2: the pregnancy with me and the twins are kicking. 507 00:29:45,800 --> 00:29:46,560 Speaker 4: Was I a twin? 508 00:29:47,480 --> 00:29:50,000 Speaker 2: She said, don't be ridiculous. You know she's very matter 509 00:29:50,040 --> 00:29:52,960 Speaker 2: of Are you crazy? I wouldn't know if if mom 510 00:29:53,000 --> 00:29:53,560 Speaker 2: had twins. 511 00:29:53,880 --> 00:29:55,840 Speaker 4: I was there. I said, what do you mean? I 512 00:29:55,920 --> 00:29:56,200 Speaker 4: was there? 513 00:29:56,240 --> 00:29:58,560 Speaker 2: I was outside the hospital. I was waiting in the car. 514 00:29:59,080 --> 00:30:01,720 Speaker 2: Dad went in to get mom. He came out with 515 00:30:01,800 --> 00:30:04,040 Speaker 2: Mom and the nurse had the baby. The nurse put 516 00:30:04,080 --> 00:30:06,560 Speaker 2: you in my arms. It was the happiest day of 517 00:30:06,600 --> 00:30:09,440 Speaker 2: my life. She said, how would I I would never 518 00:30:09,520 --> 00:30:12,360 Speaker 2: forget if there were two babies. I said, Betty, you 519 00:30:12,360 --> 00:30:14,080 Speaker 2: weren't in the delivery room. 520 00:30:14,800 --> 00:30:15,960 Speaker 4: She said, they would have told me. 521 00:30:17,400 --> 00:30:20,440 Speaker 2: At this point, you know, I knew my parents had 522 00:30:20,480 --> 00:30:23,680 Speaker 2: lied about everything. So I said, they couldn't lied about this. 523 00:30:23,920 --> 00:30:27,520 Speaker 2: They were world class liars. They wouldn't have won anybody 524 00:30:27,600 --> 00:30:30,800 Speaker 2: in Jamaica to know that mom gave birth to twins 525 00:30:30,840 --> 00:30:31,760 Speaker 2: and one died. 526 00:30:32,280 --> 00:30:33,160 Speaker 4: That would be a shanda. 527 00:30:33,240 --> 00:30:35,600 Speaker 2: I would be like, oh, yeah, yo, did you hear 528 00:30:35,640 --> 00:30:36,240 Speaker 2: what happened? 529 00:30:36,440 --> 00:30:36,720 Speaker 4: Steal? 530 00:30:38,280 --> 00:30:42,200 Speaker 2: So they wouldn't have told you. She said, that is crazy. 531 00:30:42,320 --> 00:30:45,680 Speaker 2: That's crazy. I don't remember ever writing that, And so 532 00:30:45,760 --> 00:30:47,880 Speaker 2: I put the thing away, and I thought maybe it 533 00:30:47,920 --> 00:30:50,880 Speaker 2: was a joke. My mother was having so many kicks 534 00:30:50,880 --> 00:30:53,520 Speaker 2: in her belly that she called them twins. 535 00:30:54,920 --> 00:30:57,840 Speaker 3: So that's what Letty does. She puts the thing away. 536 00:30:58,560 --> 00:30:59,720 Speaker 3: Maybe it was a joke. 537 00:31:01,400 --> 00:31:05,080 Speaker 2: I think throughout my life after my mother died, and 538 00:31:05,160 --> 00:31:08,200 Speaker 2: I looked at my childhood writings and my teenage writings 539 00:31:08,560 --> 00:31:12,040 Speaker 2: before I started writing journalistically, these things that were just 540 00:31:12,080 --> 00:31:13,840 Speaker 2: poured out of me. When I was in college, I 541 00:31:13,880 --> 00:31:18,960 Speaker 2: see that I believed I had a presence traveling with me, 542 00:31:19,080 --> 00:31:23,480 Speaker 2: and I assumed it was my mother. I felt her presence, 543 00:31:23,600 --> 00:31:26,640 Speaker 2: and I know it's very woo woo, but I always 544 00:31:26,640 --> 00:31:27,320 Speaker 2: felt what is. 545 00:31:27,320 --> 00:31:27,960 Speaker 4: Going on here? 546 00:31:28,000 --> 00:31:30,680 Speaker 2: I feel my mother's presence, and it was a comfort, 547 00:31:31,600 --> 00:31:36,200 Speaker 2: but it also was something that couldn't explain. And then 548 00:31:36,560 --> 00:31:39,720 Speaker 2: in twenty nineteen, my granddaughter was in a college course 549 00:31:39,720 --> 00:31:43,400 Speaker 2: where she studied biographies and then was assigned to write 550 00:31:43,400 --> 00:31:46,520 Speaker 2: a biography of a living person. And she asked me 551 00:31:46,600 --> 00:31:50,320 Speaker 2: if I might let her write about me, and then 552 00:31:50,600 --> 00:31:54,320 Speaker 2: she dug in, Like my granddaughter, Molly just does deep 553 00:31:54,400 --> 00:31:57,000 Speaker 2: drill into my life. She read all my books. She 554 00:31:57,080 --> 00:31:59,480 Speaker 2: went up to Smith's College where my archives are. She 555 00:31:59,560 --> 00:32:03,360 Speaker 2: read to all my article files and my childhood musings 556 00:32:03,400 --> 00:32:05,600 Speaker 2: and so on, except I've had left a lot of 557 00:32:05,640 --> 00:32:09,600 Speaker 2: stuff in my study in New York and after all, 558 00:32:09,680 --> 00:32:12,080 Speaker 2: but she did. She said, I'm coming to your study 559 00:32:12,120 --> 00:32:15,720 Speaker 2: and I want to go through whatever's there. And she said, 560 00:32:15,920 --> 00:32:18,320 Speaker 2: where are the childhood stuff? I said, oh, I kept 561 00:32:18,520 --> 00:32:21,080 Speaker 2: very few. It's under there, and it's a very deep 562 00:32:21,120 --> 00:32:25,000 Speaker 2: cabinet with two big shells. And she squats down. She 563 00:32:25,040 --> 00:32:27,360 Speaker 2: takes out my little diaries. You know, we all kept 564 00:32:27,720 --> 00:32:30,880 Speaker 2: leather bound diaries with locks and keys, as if everyone 565 00:32:30,880 --> 00:32:33,400 Speaker 2: wanted to know about our lives, we had to lock 566 00:32:33,440 --> 00:32:40,320 Speaker 2: them up. And also underneath water this humongous plastic shopping bag, 567 00:32:40,600 --> 00:32:44,120 Speaker 2: huge shopping bag, like if you had bought a winter 568 00:32:44,160 --> 00:32:46,120 Speaker 2: coat and put it in your shopping bag, big fat 569 00:32:46,200 --> 00:32:51,680 Speaker 2: chopping bag full of letters and documents and citizenship papers. 570 00:32:51,720 --> 00:32:52,760 Speaker 4: And I mean I. 571 00:32:52,760 --> 00:32:55,840 Speaker 2: Dumped it on the dining room table. I knew what 572 00:32:55,960 --> 00:32:58,640 Speaker 2: it was the minute I saw, but I had forgotten 573 00:32:58,680 --> 00:33:02,640 Speaker 2: all about it. When my sister Betty died, I went 574 00:33:02,760 --> 00:33:07,520 Speaker 2: up to see her in her sister living place in Brooklyn, Massachusetts. 575 00:33:07,640 --> 00:33:09,600 Speaker 2: I knew it was the last time I would see her, 576 00:33:10,080 --> 00:33:14,040 Speaker 2: because she was deferring food and she was about to 577 00:33:14,240 --> 00:33:16,320 Speaker 2: entery though, three days when she was going to refuse 578 00:33:16,400 --> 00:33:19,240 Speaker 2: drink and that would be it. And so I went 579 00:33:19,320 --> 00:33:21,680 Speaker 2: up for my last visit with her, and she points 580 00:33:21,720 --> 00:33:24,040 Speaker 2: to a bit chopping pad leaning against the wall, and 581 00:33:24,080 --> 00:33:26,000 Speaker 2: she says, take this with you when you go home 582 00:33:26,640 --> 00:33:30,240 Speaker 2: someday you want to read through it. And I took it. 583 00:33:30,360 --> 00:33:32,080 Speaker 2: I took it on the train back to New York, 584 00:33:32,360 --> 00:33:36,120 Speaker 2: and I was weeping so hard I couldn't even pick 585 00:33:36,160 --> 00:33:39,480 Speaker 2: out one thing. And when I get home, I'm so upset. 586 00:33:40,120 --> 00:33:42,640 Speaker 2: I said, I'll read it tomorrow. I shoved it down 587 00:33:42,720 --> 00:33:47,800 Speaker 2: underneath in this deep, deep cabinet was deep jails. And 588 00:33:47,840 --> 00:33:51,480 Speaker 2: then three days later she died. So I never went 589 00:33:51,600 --> 00:33:54,240 Speaker 2: back to that shopping pad. I couldn't think of back 590 00:33:54,640 --> 00:33:58,880 Speaker 2: doing that. I was in such deep morning. Eight years later, 591 00:33:59,560 --> 00:34:02,680 Speaker 2: Molly comes to my house and finds it. I dumped 592 00:34:02,680 --> 00:34:06,520 Speaker 2: it on my dining room table, and there are hundreds of, 593 00:34:07,040 --> 00:34:11,960 Speaker 2: you know, earmail qwinkled letters of my parents writing to 594 00:34:12,000 --> 00:34:15,120 Speaker 2: each other in those days. They letters and pages and 595 00:34:15,160 --> 00:34:18,160 Speaker 2: pages of each other's lives and the weather and what 596 00:34:18,239 --> 00:34:21,560 Speaker 2: they ate, but also what were they were arguing about. 597 00:34:21,840 --> 00:34:25,680 Speaker 2: That's how I learned about my parents' marriage. They had 598 00:34:25,800 --> 00:34:29,319 Speaker 2: arguments in these letters. My mother had pleading pleading my 599 00:34:29,400 --> 00:34:32,279 Speaker 2: father to reform his ways. When he plays cards with 600 00:34:32,360 --> 00:34:35,960 Speaker 2: his friends, well he's gone. This was when we had 601 00:34:35,960 --> 00:34:39,120 Speaker 2: another round of letters when my father sent my mother 602 00:34:39,200 --> 00:34:41,560 Speaker 2: and I when I was a baby down to Florida 603 00:34:41,960 --> 00:34:44,680 Speaker 2: to spend the winter in Miami because I had constant 604 00:34:44,680 --> 00:34:45,520 Speaker 2: colds and cloths. 605 00:34:45,920 --> 00:34:46,479 Speaker 4: So there were. 606 00:34:46,440 --> 00:34:50,200 Speaker 2: Letters between them every single day during that period. And 607 00:34:50,239 --> 00:34:54,040 Speaker 2: that's when my father was having money troubles. He just 608 00:34:54,239 --> 00:34:58,480 Speaker 2: was explicit on the page, and she was honest and 609 00:34:58,680 --> 00:35:01,920 Speaker 2: strong on the page. I learned people I had never 610 00:35:02,400 --> 00:35:07,960 Speaker 2: known in these crinkly pages with fading ink. My father 611 00:35:08,040 --> 00:35:11,759 Speaker 2: wrote like chicken script. My mother wrote beautiful penmanship because 612 00:35:11,800 --> 00:35:14,800 Speaker 2: that was for her, being a real American. Was writing 613 00:35:14,840 --> 00:35:18,400 Speaker 2: perfectly letters, which they all were. You wouldn't think they 614 00:35:18,400 --> 00:35:20,480 Speaker 2: were written with a line, and you know, rule around 615 00:35:20,520 --> 00:35:24,600 Speaker 2: to them. And my mother, who had eighth grade education, 616 00:35:24,719 --> 00:35:29,920 Speaker 2: turned out to be incredibly lyrical in her or incredibly 617 00:35:30,320 --> 00:35:33,919 Speaker 2: furious in her pros. It was on the page. Every 618 00:35:33,960 --> 00:35:36,439 Speaker 2: bit of it was. If I found the dead sea 619 00:35:36,440 --> 00:35:41,080 Speaker 2: squirrels in my backyard and I learned who my parents were. 620 00:35:41,320 --> 00:35:43,560 Speaker 2: I had inklings of who they were. I never knew 621 00:35:43,600 --> 00:35:46,800 Speaker 2: who they were. They were always clues along the way, 622 00:35:47,160 --> 00:35:51,719 Speaker 2: and this flashed everything out. I feel I know who 623 00:35:51,760 --> 00:35:56,960 Speaker 2: they are now. I forgive my father. Took me eighty 624 00:35:57,000 --> 00:36:00,200 Speaker 2: something years to forgive my father. I never said the 625 00:36:00,200 --> 00:36:02,480 Speaker 2: cottage for my father because he wouldn't let me say 626 00:36:02,480 --> 00:36:05,600 Speaker 2: the cottage for my mother when she died, because it 627 00:36:05,640 --> 00:36:07,600 Speaker 2: wasn't done. 628 00:36:10,280 --> 00:36:13,640 Speaker 3: Letty writes, had my parents known their words would end 629 00:36:13,680 --> 00:36:16,840 Speaker 3: up under their daughter's microscope, I doubt they would have 630 00:36:16,880 --> 00:36:21,160 Speaker 3: expressed their sore points and vulnerabilities in such unguarded prose. 631 00:36:22,520 --> 00:36:26,320 Speaker 3: But the letters don't only reveal her parents' private selves. 632 00:36:26,840 --> 00:36:30,160 Speaker 3: They reveal more about that word Letty had tucked away 633 00:36:30,320 --> 00:36:35,760 Speaker 3: years earlier, that word she thought might have been a joke, twins. 634 00:36:36,960 --> 00:36:40,080 Speaker 2: Then I find this shopping back, and I find two 635 00:36:40,239 --> 00:36:43,560 Speaker 2: more mentions of the twins. When my father was in 636 00:36:43,640 --> 00:36:47,680 Speaker 2: Palestine and my parents were corresponding. In one letter said 637 00:36:48,360 --> 00:36:54,239 Speaker 2: Mom is doing fine and the twins are kicking. Then 638 00:36:54,440 --> 00:36:58,200 Speaker 2: another letter turns up in which my father writes, I 639 00:36:58,320 --> 00:37:00,960 Speaker 2: dance with women on the boat and I lost at 640 00:37:01,040 --> 00:37:03,280 Speaker 2: Jin Rummy, and I lost in the dance concert. 641 00:37:04,040 --> 00:37:04,920 Speaker 4: The women didn't. 642 00:37:04,719 --> 00:37:07,560 Speaker 2: Dance as well as you did, he said, but I 643 00:37:07,600 --> 00:37:11,640 Speaker 2: know I'm coming home to you and the twins, and 644 00:37:11,680 --> 00:37:14,239 Speaker 2: I will love you and the twins. So that was 645 00:37:14,280 --> 00:37:18,480 Speaker 2: the second and I realized that I had obviously been 646 00:37:18,600 --> 00:37:23,359 Speaker 2: unable to process that I was a twin, nor did 647 00:37:23,400 --> 00:37:25,360 Speaker 2: I put it together with the fact that all my 648 00:37:25,480 --> 00:37:28,719 Speaker 2: life after my mother died, I felt that I was 649 00:37:28,760 --> 00:37:34,399 Speaker 2: not alone. And to top it all off, I gave 650 00:37:34,440 --> 00:37:39,600 Speaker 2: birth to twins. So since I've been kind of mystical 651 00:37:40,000 --> 00:37:45,080 Speaker 2: leaning person, I now wonder if what I thought was 652 00:37:45,080 --> 00:37:49,440 Speaker 2: my mother came from the company in some spiritual. 653 00:37:48,920 --> 00:37:50,360 Speaker 4: Way, was my twin. 654 00:37:51,560 --> 00:37:55,000 Speaker 2: My daughter Rabigail wrote a book on twins, and she 655 00:37:55,440 --> 00:37:58,640 Speaker 2: thought maybe it was a phantom twin. But then I 656 00:37:58,680 --> 00:38:02,600 Speaker 2: found out that phantom twins supure much earlier in my 657 00:38:02,680 --> 00:38:05,560 Speaker 2: mother and my father were writing in my seventh in 658 00:38:05,600 --> 00:38:09,080 Speaker 2: my mother's seventh months, so it would have disappeared in 659 00:38:09,800 --> 00:38:12,640 Speaker 2: the first three or four or five months. So I 660 00:38:12,640 --> 00:38:15,839 Speaker 2: think I must have been a twin and didn't know it, 661 00:38:15,880 --> 00:38:19,799 Speaker 2: And now I believe I was, and I believe that 662 00:38:19,920 --> 00:38:22,800 Speaker 2: explains why I never felt really totally alone. 663 00:38:24,200 --> 00:38:26,960 Speaker 3: I want to ask you, you know, all of these 664 00:38:27,000 --> 00:38:31,919 Speaker 3: different kinds of shondas they are so different from each other. 665 00:38:32,440 --> 00:38:36,480 Speaker 3: There is the shonda of doing something wrong or quote 666 00:38:36,560 --> 00:38:40,319 Speaker 3: unquote wrong, or doing something that doesn't fit in the 667 00:38:40,360 --> 00:38:46,600 Speaker 3: social mores of society. But then there's the shonda of 668 00:38:47,200 --> 00:38:53,560 Speaker 3: becoming sick with cancer, or the shonda of losing a baby, 669 00:38:54,280 --> 00:38:56,400 Speaker 3: you know, or in a way what you were talking 670 00:38:56,400 --> 00:38:59,400 Speaker 3: about when you first got to Brandie, of feeling like 671 00:38:59,480 --> 00:39:02,719 Speaker 3: there was a shonda in having lost your mother four 672 00:39:02,760 --> 00:39:06,359 Speaker 3: months earlier, that it would make people pity you. It's 673 00:39:06,480 --> 00:39:10,520 Speaker 3: all under this umbrella of shonda. Do you think that 674 00:39:10,520 --> 00:39:14,359 Speaker 3: that's particular to Jewish people or do you think that 675 00:39:14,360 --> 00:39:15,960 Speaker 3: that's a universal idea. 676 00:39:16,600 --> 00:39:20,160 Speaker 2: I am only speaking for a culture I know, and 677 00:39:20,200 --> 00:39:23,920 Speaker 2: that is the culture of your speaking Eastern European immigrants 678 00:39:23,960 --> 00:39:28,719 Speaker 2: to this country. And I know that shame based secrecy 679 00:39:29,040 --> 00:39:32,759 Speaker 2: really well. I don't know others. I've intrigued others, but 680 00:39:32,880 --> 00:39:35,560 Speaker 2: I can't vouch for them. I will tell you that 681 00:39:35,680 --> 00:39:38,640 Speaker 2: I was steeped in the biblical stories that are full 682 00:39:38,640 --> 00:39:43,479 Speaker 2: of secrets. God hides, you know, hester I mean, Lea 683 00:39:43,600 --> 00:39:47,120 Speaker 2: is behind a veil and Jacob thinks he's marrying Rachel. 684 00:39:47,360 --> 00:39:52,719 Speaker 2: So trickery abounds, Pretense abounds in the talment shaming is 685 00:39:52,840 --> 00:39:56,640 Speaker 2: a kind of murder. It's like considered like shedding blood. 686 00:39:56,719 --> 00:40:01,880 Speaker 2: So I feel shame and secrecy are intrinsically Jewish because 687 00:40:02,719 --> 00:40:06,839 Speaker 2: I know Judaism. I have been steeped in it. It's 688 00:40:06,840 --> 00:40:10,960 Speaker 2: my hiding, is my heritage, and it's my legacy from 689 00:40:11,040 --> 00:40:11,640 Speaker 2: my family. 690 00:40:15,600 --> 00:40:19,759 Speaker 3: After a lifetime of shanda and all kinds of familial secrecy, 691 00:40:20,440 --> 00:40:24,560 Speaker 3: now Letty grapples with her own secret, her own illness. 692 00:40:25,320 --> 00:40:30,480 Speaker 3: She's diagnosed with a tumor. It's benign, absolutely not cancerous, 693 00:40:31,000 --> 00:40:33,360 Speaker 3: but it is in her brain and she does have 694 00:40:33,440 --> 00:40:38,360 Speaker 3: it surgically removed. When she receives the diagnosis. She doesn't 695 00:40:38,360 --> 00:40:42,560 Speaker 3: even consider telling anyone outside of her immediate family. It's 696 00:40:42,600 --> 00:40:46,640 Speaker 3: in her DNA not to tell. But it's also in 697 00:40:46,680 --> 00:40:50,600 Speaker 3: her DNA to understand that secrets don't serve us, not 698 00:40:50,719 --> 00:40:53,080 Speaker 3: in the long run, not if we want to be 699 00:40:53,160 --> 00:40:57,800 Speaker 3: our fullest, most whole selves. This diagnosis is part of 700 00:40:57,880 --> 00:41:02,920 Speaker 3: Letty's story, so slowly, carefully, she begins to tell it. 701 00:41:04,840 --> 00:41:07,359 Speaker 2: As I say, I think it was like this old 702 00:41:07,440 --> 00:41:10,040 Speaker 2: joke about what they asked about what real estate and 703 00:41:10,040 --> 00:41:13,960 Speaker 2: what matters and what matters is location, location, location, So 704 00:41:14,040 --> 00:41:17,399 Speaker 2: what mattered to me was that this illness was in 705 00:41:17,480 --> 00:41:21,120 Speaker 2: my brain, and I was raised to believe. I was 706 00:41:21,120 --> 00:41:24,640 Speaker 2: like a little Jewish girl who was told we are 707 00:41:24,760 --> 00:41:28,919 Speaker 2: our brains. That's what allowed us to survive. We knew 708 00:41:28,960 --> 00:41:32,880 Speaker 2: when to hide, we knew when to strive. If you're smart, 709 00:41:33,120 --> 00:41:35,760 Speaker 2: you don't have to be beautiful. You'll find a way. 710 00:41:36,120 --> 00:41:39,759 Speaker 2: And here I had a tumor in my brain. No 711 00:41:39,840 --> 00:41:43,319 Speaker 2: one hears tumor and doesn't think cancer, and so I 712 00:41:43,400 --> 00:41:46,239 Speaker 2: still have a lot of trouble telling the story of 713 00:41:46,400 --> 00:41:49,160 Speaker 2: it because I know when people hear tumor, they're gonna 714 00:41:49,160 --> 00:41:53,160 Speaker 2: think I have cancer. I never had brain cancer. And 715 00:41:53,280 --> 00:41:57,120 Speaker 2: you who our schooled as I was that you are 716 00:41:57,160 --> 00:41:59,960 Speaker 2: your brain. I didn't want to lose my brain because 717 00:42:00,080 --> 00:42:02,120 Speaker 2: I didn't want something growing in my brain because my 718 00:42:02,160 --> 00:42:05,360 Speaker 2: brain is my mind. I depend on my mind my 719 00:42:05,400 --> 00:42:11,680 Speaker 2: whole life. Having a brain tumor is an involuntary affliction, 720 00:42:12,800 --> 00:42:16,239 Speaker 2: but it falls under the rule brick of people will 721 00:42:16,280 --> 00:42:20,720 Speaker 2: be talking about me and I will end up being 722 00:42:21,160 --> 00:42:24,680 Speaker 2: the woman who has a tumor, and that will be 723 00:42:24,719 --> 00:42:27,600 Speaker 2: a shanda. I don't know whether it's called a shanda, 724 00:42:27,719 --> 00:42:31,160 Speaker 2: but you just don't want to be exposed when you 725 00:42:31,200 --> 00:42:34,520 Speaker 2: don't want to be exposed that in some way, it 726 00:42:34,560 --> 00:42:39,439 Speaker 2: will diminish you, it will misrepresent you, it will mark you. 727 00:42:40,760 --> 00:42:43,759 Speaker 2: That's the Shonda part, that you're no longer. 728 00:42:43,520 --> 00:42:44,160 Speaker 4: Who you are. 729 00:42:45,440 --> 00:42:49,840 Speaker 2: You are a representative of yourself constructed by somebody else 730 00:42:50,160 --> 00:42:53,920 Speaker 2: because of this information. You're somebody who might be dying. 731 00:42:55,080 --> 00:42:57,839 Speaker 2: You're somebody who can't be hired for lecture day. You're 732 00:42:57,880 --> 00:42:59,920 Speaker 2: somebody who might not be clear headed about right. 733 00:43:02,000 --> 00:43:04,960 Speaker 3: Can you talk a little bit about what you mean 734 00:43:05,000 --> 00:43:05,800 Speaker 3: by good shame. 735 00:43:06,680 --> 00:43:10,440 Speaker 2: I think good shame is alias conscience. I use a 736 00:43:10,480 --> 00:43:13,960 Speaker 2: really trivial example, and that is I reached from my phone, 737 00:43:14,320 --> 00:43:17,080 Speaker 2: pulled it out of my pocket, and I was walking 738 00:43:17,120 --> 00:43:19,360 Speaker 2: on the trails of Central Park. 739 00:43:19,520 --> 00:43:21,160 Speaker 4: I was all by myself. 740 00:43:22,400 --> 00:43:24,759 Speaker 2: In the what's called the ramble, and out of my 741 00:43:24,840 --> 00:43:28,000 Speaker 2: pocket wrapped a tissue. And I was walking fast walking, 742 00:43:28,000 --> 00:43:31,280 Speaker 2: which I like to do. And I could have kept going. 743 00:43:31,600 --> 00:43:33,799 Speaker 2: I could have just kept going. No one was behind me, 744 00:43:33,880 --> 00:43:35,239 Speaker 2: no one was in front of me, no one was 745 00:43:35,280 --> 00:43:37,759 Speaker 2: sitting up on a ledge. But I stopped and went 746 00:43:37,840 --> 00:43:41,239 Speaker 2: back because I would be ashamed of myself if I 747 00:43:41,360 --> 00:43:45,279 Speaker 2: left litter on a nature trail, and I count that 748 00:43:45,520 --> 00:43:49,719 Speaker 2: as good shame. It's not the shame that the base is, 749 00:43:49,920 --> 00:43:53,120 Speaker 2: and it's not corrosive. Of course, you know your own 750 00:43:53,120 --> 00:43:56,600 Speaker 2: counturs the day. We spend the whole day repairing and 751 00:43:56,680 --> 00:43:59,960 Speaker 2: asking forgiveness, and we feel cleanse and we feel new. 752 00:44:00,440 --> 00:44:03,680 Speaker 2: But you can't feel cleansed a new if somebody said 753 00:44:03,760 --> 00:44:06,879 Speaker 2: you are a bad person, and if you were raised 754 00:44:06,880 --> 00:44:10,920 Speaker 2: by a parent who said shame on you, it's different 755 00:44:10,960 --> 00:44:14,160 Speaker 2: then you did this bad thing. I just think good 756 00:44:14,160 --> 00:44:17,520 Speaker 2: shame is something that keeps us on the straightened arrow 757 00:44:17,600 --> 00:44:19,359 Speaker 2: or trying. It's aspirational. 758 00:44:20,239 --> 00:44:25,480 Speaker 3: You also describe it as prophylactic, preventative, and preemptive. And 759 00:44:25,520 --> 00:44:28,120 Speaker 3: the last thing, very near the end of your books 760 00:44:28,160 --> 00:44:31,920 Speaker 3: that you write is I'm convinced that happiness lies in 761 00:44:31,960 --> 00:44:33,160 Speaker 3: a secret, free. 762 00:44:32,920 --> 00:44:38,600 Speaker 2: Life because I got it all out. 763 00:44:43,440 --> 00:44:47,520 Speaker 3: Here's Letty with some wise and beautiful words from Shonda. 764 00:44:50,080 --> 00:44:53,840 Speaker 2: Secrets flutter through the chambers of the heart like ghosts 765 00:44:53,840 --> 00:44:57,720 Speaker 2: who won't give up the haunt. Yet, when we speak 766 00:44:57,800 --> 00:45:03,480 Speaker 2: something once thought unspeaks. When we admit a devastating humiliation 767 00:45:04,440 --> 00:45:08,960 Speaker 2: or a violation of societal norms, we freak the immensity 768 00:45:09,000 --> 00:45:12,880 Speaker 2: of our shame to human scale, and the truth told 769 00:45:13,320 --> 00:45:16,480 Speaker 2: finds its reflection in the eyes of the one who 770 00:45:16,560 --> 00:45:20,879 Speaker 2: hears it and makes the choice to accept us as 771 00:45:20,920 --> 00:45:24,560 Speaker 2: we are, or to forgive what we imagined to be 772 00:45:24,719 --> 00:45:31,440 Speaker 2: forever unforgivable. In that moment, the burden lifts, the window opens, 773 00:45:31,880 --> 00:45:39,120 Speaker 2: and we're free. 774 00:45:43,480 --> 00:45:47,520 Speaker 3: Family Secrets is a production of iHeartRadio. Molly's Accurr is 775 00:45:47,520 --> 00:45:50,680 Speaker 3: the story editor and Dylan Fagin is the executive producer. 776 00:45:51,960 --> 00:45:53,960 Speaker 3: If you have a family secret you'd like to share, 777 00:45:54,360 --> 00:45:56,800 Speaker 3: please leave us a voicemail and your story could appear 778 00:45:56,800 --> 00:46:00,200 Speaker 3: on an upcoming episode. Our number is one a day 779 00:46:00,280 --> 00:46:04,440 Speaker 3: eight Secret zero. That's the number zero. You can also 780 00:46:04,560 --> 00:46:09,359 Speaker 3: find me on Instagram at Danny Rider. And if you'd 781 00:46:09,400 --> 00:46:11,880 Speaker 3: like to know more about the story that inspired this podcast, 782 00:46:12,280 --> 00:46:14,160 Speaker 3: check out my memoir Inheritance. 783 00:46:33,560 --> 00:46:37,759 Speaker 1: For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, 784 00:46:37,840 --> 00:46:39,920 Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.