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Speaker 1: Family Secrets is a production of iHeartRadio. If I ever

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Speaker 1: ran into my father, would either of us recognize each other?

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Speaker 1: If I saw someone who I was positive was him,

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Speaker 1: would I approach him or would I let it go

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Speaker 1: in order to save myself the humiliation of not being

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Speaker 1: recognized or a brief, hurried encounter. There was always the

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Speaker 1: chance that I'd catch him at the perfect time when

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Speaker 1: he was available and interested, even if only for a

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Speaker 1: few minutes.

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Speaker 2: That's Nobile Airs, music industry entrepreneur, podcast host, musician and

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Speaker 2: author of the recent memoir My Life in the Sunshine.

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Speaker 2: Nobiles is a story full of grace and grit and

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Speaker 2: talent and the many ways longing can shape us over

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Speaker 2: the course of a lifetime. I'm Danny Shapiro, and this

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Speaker 2: is family Secrets, the secrets that are kept from us,

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Speaker 2: the secrets we keep from others, and the secrets we

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Speaker 2: keep from ourselves. So I usually begin by asking my

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Speaker 2: guest to describe the landscape of her childhood, but in

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Speaker 2: your case, I'm actually going to start by asking about

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Speaker 2: the landscape of your mother's life in the couple of

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Speaker 2: years before you were born.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, that's an interesting way to look at it. I've

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Speaker 1: learned so much about it in recent years. She would

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Speaker 1: say that she had a fairly unhappy childhood. She was

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Speaker 1: a you know, on paper two parents, a father was

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Speaker 1: a lawyer in New York City that lived in Long Island,

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Speaker 1: had a younger brother, you know, very sort of picture perfect.

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Speaker 1: But I think she just had a hard time as

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Speaker 1: a teenage ballet answer who had her teacher who you know,

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Speaker 1: as I think, physically abusive. I think would hit her

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Speaker 1: with the yardstick that stuff that she wanted to do,

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Speaker 1: but that didn't turn out the way she wanted. And

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Speaker 1: when soon as she was eighteen, moved to New York City,

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Speaker 1: and this is nineteen sixty nine, kind of an incredible

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Speaker 1: time to be able to do that, you know, by

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Speaker 1: yourself as a teenager, and had an apartment in Greentted Village.

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Speaker 1: She's very close with her younger brother. My uncle Alan

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Speaker 1: was two years younger, so he would come visit her.

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Speaker 1: So I think the way she describes those years is

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Speaker 1: that she was kind of lost, just had sort of

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Speaker 1: you know, normal jobs. They worked in movie theaters. So

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Speaker 1: she had a great apartment in a great neighborhood and

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Speaker 1: was just trying to figure out what to do and

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Speaker 1: didn't really feel any direction. Was done with dancing, kind

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Speaker 1: of retired already, and the way she divisited, really wanted

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Speaker 1: to give someone a better childhood than she had and

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Speaker 1: wanted a best friend. In this park Ampton Square and

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Speaker 1: still there in Grantwich Village, and she would walk by

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Speaker 1: and see kids and see parents playing with those kids,

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Speaker 1: and she said to herself, Wow, I really want to

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Speaker 1: be a young single mother, and I want to give

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Speaker 1: somebody a really great life, and I want to have

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Speaker 1: a best friend. So that was the sort of seed

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Speaker 1: that she planted, and that kind of became what her

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Speaker 1: life was about. But she wasn't looking. She wasn't actively

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Speaker 1: looking for a father or me or a husband. I

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Speaker 1: think she wasn't even concerned with a relationship at the time.

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Speaker 1: And she was nineteen twenty. And when she was twenty one,

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Speaker 1: she was at a jazz club, the Village Gate, very

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Speaker 1: famous jazz club with my uncle who was a jazz musician,

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Speaker 1: and they ran into Roy Ayers, who at the time

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Speaker 1: was already pretty well known jazz musician, and Alan met

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Speaker 1: him a few times. I think they've even played together.

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Speaker 1: So they were talking and my mother's words are that

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Speaker 1: the second she saw him, she just thought, that's him.

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Speaker 1: This is the person I'm going to have my child with,

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Speaker 1: and very clearly not this is the person I want

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Speaker 1: to marry, or this is the person that I want

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Speaker 1: to be with. But really like she saw the father

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Speaker 1: of her child and that is where things kind of

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Speaker 1: changed for her.

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Speaker 2: It's such an extraordinary thing, and I think it really

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Speaker 2: bears talking about how incredibly unusual that would have been

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Speaker 2: for a young, middle class Jewish young woman in nineteen

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Speaker 2: sixty nine to sort of have that vision for her life.

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Speaker 1: Right right, Yeah, I mean, what's funny, It didn't seem

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Speaker 1: that strange to me. I always knew that story until

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Speaker 1: I finally really sat down and started getting more details

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Speaker 1: and learning more about her her mindset at the time.

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Speaker 1: So only recently did I even consider, wow, that's wild.

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Speaker 2: You know, well, I think we almost never think that

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Speaker 2: about our own lives or our own childhoods, maybe until

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Speaker 2: we get old enough to have some perspective on them

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Speaker 2: in sort of the wider world. But you know, my

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Speaker 2: senses that she was she had such certainty about what

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Speaker 2: she was doing. So she and Roy have you know,

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Speaker 2: something of a relationship. I mean, they see each other

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Speaker 2: on and off right.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I think barely. I think I think three times

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Speaker 1: over the course of a year or so, like really

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Speaker 1: not dating, and she would say that she was, she

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Speaker 1: was in love with them at the time, but she

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Speaker 1: was also very very aware that that's not where he was.

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Speaker 1: I think he was very upfront about it. You know,

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Speaker 1: he's a bit older at the time. If she was

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Speaker 1: twenty one, I think he was about thirty. His star

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Speaker 1: was really rising, he was touring, he was doing all

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Speaker 1: these things, and I think he was very clear that

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Speaker 1: he wasn't looking for a relationship. I wondered if maybe

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Speaker 1: she would have been more into it had he been

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Speaker 1: into it, But it didn't change the fact that there

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Speaker 1: was one thing that she wanted from him, and it

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Speaker 1: was a child. The story is that she and my

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Speaker 1: uncle left an event one night and she realized, oh,

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Speaker 1: I'm really close to Roe's apartment. I wonder if he's home,

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Speaker 1: I'm going to get pregnant tonight.

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Speaker 2: Noabille's mom's plan worked. She indeed got pregnant that very night,

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Speaker 2: and Nabil was born in New York City in nineteen

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Speaker 2: seventy two.

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Speaker 1: He lived on Downing Street in Greenwich Village. I know

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Speaker 1: the exact building. We walk by it all the time now,

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Speaker 1: which is great. And then when I was one, I

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Speaker 1: think we moved to Boston or Cambridge, Massachusetts. My uncle

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Speaker 1: Alan was going to Berkeley School of Music. He was

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Speaker 1: in college at this point, so we moved there to

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Speaker 1: be with him and so he could kind of help

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Speaker 1: with me. There's lots of pictures some then, but I

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Speaker 1: don't remember that. But what I do think, I remember

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Speaker 1: I was always into music. I mean, at a very

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Speaker 1: young age, there were always records on. We were always

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Speaker 1: hanging out with musicians. I saw live music certainly before

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Speaker 1: I can remember. We know I was at concerts as

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Speaker 1: a baby. So I was playing drums a lot, on

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Speaker 1: pots and pants and on like a big African drum

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Speaker 1: that the friend gave us. And so my uncle Alan

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Speaker 1: bought me a drum set when I was two and

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Speaker 1: a half years old. But this is like a real

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Speaker 1: drum set, not like a kid's drum set. It was

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Speaker 1: a full sized adult drum set that was really beat

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Speaker 1: up and had some sharp edges and it was kind

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Speaker 1: of rough. But I remember him. We had a basement

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Speaker 1: apartment and I remember him walking the drums down the

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Speaker 1: stairs one at a time, putting them on the ground

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Speaker 1: and be hitting them. And I have a memory of

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Speaker 1: what one of the symbols sounded like because I was

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Speaker 1: so surprised when I hit it, and it was so

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Speaker 1: loud and it really scared me and it created this

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Speaker 1: kind of ringing in my ear. And that was, I mean,

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Speaker 1: even at two and a half, a turning point in

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Speaker 1: my life, and that, you know, established who I was.

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Speaker 1: And if anything, he didn't do it to make me

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Speaker 1: a drummer. He knew that it was already happening. I

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Speaker 1: think he did it to sort of facilitate what existed.

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Speaker 2: I love that and it makes me laugh because in

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Speaker 2: many other families, the idea of you know, an uncle

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Speaker 2: bringing a drum set to a two and a half

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Speaker 2: year old child.

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Speaker 1: Thanks thanks uncle, Thanks so.

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Speaker 2: Much, uncle, Alan. But your mother was it, doesn't It

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Speaker 2: sounds like she was completely on board.

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Speaker 1: She was completely loved it. It would always encourage me

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Speaker 1: to play. It didn't again. Another one of those things

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Speaker 1: that in my mind doesn't seem strange at all until

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Speaker 1: I really look back and think about it. Decades later.

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Speaker 2: When no Bille is a child in Cambridge, his mom

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Speaker 2: attends community college. She's dedicated to giving her son the

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Speaker 2: best life possible. She's determined to secure a more stable

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Speaker 2: financial future for them, so they moved to Amherst, where

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Speaker 2: she finishes her undergraduate degree at UMass and then gets

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Speaker 2: her MBA. Nabiel calls these the golden years. His beloved

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Speaker 2: uncle Allan has relocated to New York, but Nabil and

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Speaker 2: his mom still get to see him regularly. They travel

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Speaker 2: back and forest into New York City as much as possible,

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Speaker 2: And keep in mind, this is the seventies and New

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Speaker 2: York City is a particularly cool place to be, but

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Speaker 2: Amherst is a great place to be too. Nabil goes

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Speaker 2: to an incredibly diverse and wonderful public school, and though

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Speaker 2: he and his mom are on welfare eating off food stamps,

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Speaker 2: to Nobiel, it never feels like they're poor. To Nabiel,

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Speaker 2: it feels rich, golden.

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Speaker 1: We lived in this development called North Village Departments, which

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Speaker 1: was UMass sort of university funded student housing. So it

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Speaker 1: was maybe one hundred and fifty or two hundred of

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Speaker 1: these like almost like barracks. I think, you know, we

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Speaker 1: would call them projects now, but it didn't feel like

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Speaker 1: projects because they weren't tall, brick buildings. They were single story,

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Speaker 1: kind of connected at the sides. It almost looked like

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Speaker 1: condos really not quite as nice with big shared backyards.

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Speaker 1: And the only people who could live there were either

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Speaker 1: students at UMAs or professors at UMAs or someone who

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Speaker 1: had something to do with the university, and you had

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Speaker 1: to have children. So it was sort of this wild

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Speaker 1: free for all again seventies, no bike helmets, no you know,

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Speaker 1: no police, no concerns about anything. No one got hurt,

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Speaker 1: nothing bad was happening, So it was amazing. There was

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Speaker 1: children of all races, of all religions. It was so

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Speaker 1: truly diverse in every way, and so many kids who

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Speaker 1: had single parents who were going back to school. So

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Speaker 1: it was weird for me as a kid. For you know,

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Speaker 1: I'd be seven years old and amrist with a single

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Speaker 1: white mother who was still in her twenties and on

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Speaker 1: welfare and a black father who wasn't in the picture.

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Speaker 1: And I was a totally normal kid. I knew kids.

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Speaker 1: So with the worst situation, there were kids who's you know,

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Speaker 1: whose dads were in prison and that's why the mom

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Speaker 1: was there. Like it was really it was so unique

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Speaker 1: and that our situations were all different but we were

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Speaker 1: all similar in that we all had weird situations and

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Speaker 1: so everyone it wasn't weird at all. I was totally

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Speaker 1: a normal kid and loved it. So it never even

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Speaker 1: occurred to me that, yeah, everyone else has a father,

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Speaker 1: and look at you know, look at Joey out there

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Speaker 1: playing baseball with his dad like that. I mean, of

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Speaker 1: course I still thought about my father occasionally, but he

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Speaker 1: was never We had a few of his records. This

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Speaker 1: biggest record came out in nineteen seventy six, and now

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Speaker 1: I think we moved to Amherst in seventy seven, so

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Speaker 1: even he played there once and that's the first time

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Speaker 1: I remember meeting him. My mother took me. He played

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Speaker 1: at the huge football stadium that's still there at UMass.

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Speaker 1: It was Grateful Dead, Patti Smith and Roy Yers. That

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Speaker 1: was the concert was the spring concert in May of

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Speaker 1: nineteen seventy nine. And what's funny is I remember the concert,

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Speaker 1: but I don't remember the other parts of it, which

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Speaker 1: my mother later told me. But we went early and

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Speaker 1: tried to go backstage. You know, this is Roy's son,

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Speaker 1: and we want to talk to him. My mother is

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Speaker 1: very good at being pushy and getting what she wants

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Speaker 1: New Yorker and they let us in, and I don't

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Speaker 1: remember that. And so she said that we talked to

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Speaker 1: him for a while, that he was really nice and

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Speaker 1: really friendly, and over the years, and there'd been a

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Speaker 1: couple other times we ran into him on the street

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Speaker 1: in New York and we had talked to him for

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Speaker 1: you know, thirty seconds or one minute. But I think

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Speaker 1: I even then might have realized what she was doing

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Speaker 1: was showing him that she did it and that we

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Speaker 1: were in good shape, and that not that he didn't

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Speaker 1: need to worry, because I don't think she thought he

230
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Speaker 1: was worried, but more that that thing, you know, that

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Speaker 1: she said to him, I want to have a child.

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Speaker 1: I want you to be the father. You don't need

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Speaker 1: to be involved. I think as much as he was

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Speaker 1: keeping his end of the deal, which was pretty easy,

235
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Speaker 1: I think she wanted to show that she was keeping

236
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Speaker 1: her end and she was doing a really good job

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Speaker 1: and that maybe it wasn't as easy.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, there's there's something that's really moving about that that

239
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Speaker 2: throughout it, it feels like both you and your mother

240
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Speaker 2: when it comes to Roy, there's this sense of look

241
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Speaker 2: how it turned out, Look how it turned out?

242
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Speaker 3: And you could be proud. We're proud, all right.

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Speaker 2: No Bil is seven years old when he and his

244
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Speaker 2: mom go to that concert, and even though he didn't

245
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Speaker 2: retain much memory about the encounter, there is a memento

246
00:12:19,480 --> 00:12:22,440
Speaker 2: of that concert that he or perhaps his mom kept

247
00:12:22,480 --> 00:12:26,280
Speaker 2: for years, tucked away in a photo album, a backstage

248
00:12:26,400 --> 00:12:29,800
Speaker 2: pass on which no Bil evaluated the performers. In his

249
00:12:29,840 --> 00:12:33,920
Speaker 2: Little Boy script, next to Patti Smith and The Grateful Dead,

250
00:12:34,120 --> 00:12:38,520
Speaker 2: he wrote boo, and next to Roy Ayer's name, na

251
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Speaker 2: Bil wrote, yay.

252
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Speaker 1: That's such a funny detail to look at years later.

253
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Speaker 1: I mean, obviously, when I sort of tried to convince

254
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Speaker 1: myself that actually I had a great childhood and it

255
00:12:51,000 --> 00:12:52,800
Speaker 1: didn't feel like he was missing, and all these things

256
00:12:52,840 --> 00:12:55,679
Speaker 1: that said for so long, that is this weird little

257
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Speaker 1: bit of you know, three letter proof. That's at least

258
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Speaker 1: how I felt, whether it's true. The fact that I

259
00:13:01,720 --> 00:13:04,480
Speaker 1: wrote yeah next to his name meant he's on my

260
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Speaker 1: team or I'm on his team, and those other two

261
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Speaker 1: teams are the opposing teams and a child brain.

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Speaker 2: The following year, Nobul is eight when he sees his

263
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Speaker 2: father again. Alan knows Roy a bit, and he brings

264
00:13:18,240 --> 00:13:22,760
Speaker 2: Nobile to Electric Lady Recording studio where Roy's recording. This time,

265
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Speaker 2: the visit leaves more of an impression.

266
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Speaker 1: I can see it so well, I can smell it,

267
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Speaker 1: I can really remember it. Between seven and eight was

268
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Speaker 1: when my brain developed in such a way that memories

269
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Speaker 1: are different or emotions are different. The UMass thing was

270
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Speaker 1: no big deal. It was fun to see. I don't

271
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Speaker 1: even remember talking to him, which I apparently did. But

272
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Speaker 1: one year later, I was with Alan in New York Allan,

273
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Speaker 1: I guess ran into Roy on the street and happened

274
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Speaker 1: to mention that I was in town, and Roy said, oh,

275
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Speaker 1: I'm recording an Electric Lady. Bring him by. So one

276
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Speaker 1: night we just showed up. I was so excited because

277
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Speaker 1: I was so into music. I was eight years old,

278
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Speaker 1: so I was a huge Kiss fan. This is you know,

279
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Speaker 1: if you were a boy in the music in the seventies.

280
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Speaker 1: That was my band and all of their albums. So

281
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Speaker 1: maybe not all of them, but definitely those early seventies

282
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Speaker 1: albums were recorded electric ly. They said so on the

283
00:14:08,040 --> 00:14:12,400
Speaker 1: album covers. So I was going in. I was not thinking, oh,

284
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Speaker 1: this is such a big deal. I'm going to meet

285
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Speaker 1: my father. It was nothing like that because my mother

286
00:14:16,640 --> 00:14:18,440
Speaker 1: Alan never made it a big deal because I think

287
00:14:18,480 --> 00:14:20,640
Speaker 1: they didn't want it to be. So I remember being

288
00:14:21,120 --> 00:14:24,240
Speaker 1: so nervous that I might meet Kiss, Like, surely they're here.

289
00:14:24,280 --> 00:14:26,600
Speaker 1: They just work here, right, all their albums say so,

290
00:14:27,160 --> 00:14:29,360
Speaker 1: and I didn't. But we walked into this room, into

291
00:14:29,480 --> 00:14:31,960
Speaker 1: one of the studios, and there's kind of a lounge outside,

292
00:14:32,800 --> 00:14:35,160
Speaker 1: and it's like a classic and I guess the recording studio.

293
00:14:35,200 --> 00:14:36,680
Speaker 1: I mean, it's one of the most famous in the world,

294
00:14:36,760 --> 00:14:38,560
Speaker 1: but something you would see in a movie where you

295
00:14:38,720 --> 00:14:40,520
Speaker 1: go into this lounge and you can see the mixing

296
00:14:40,520 --> 00:14:43,080
Speaker 1: board and then there's this huge wall of kind of

297
00:14:43,080 --> 00:14:46,320
Speaker 1: soundproof glass. So there's music happening there but I can't

298
00:14:46,320 --> 00:14:49,560
Speaker 1: hear it. But I see Roy in there with headphones on,

299
00:14:49,640 --> 00:14:53,600
Speaker 1: singing into a microphone. I'm so excited again, more about

300
00:14:53,760 --> 00:14:55,880
Speaker 1: the music in the fact of that where we are

301
00:14:56,040 --> 00:14:58,840
Speaker 1: and what's happening. That's the thing at that point. But

302
00:14:58,880 --> 00:15:01,920
Speaker 1: when he comes out, it's no big deal. There's lots

303
00:15:01,960 --> 00:15:04,160
Speaker 1: of people there, people from his band. They're all super

304
00:15:04,200 --> 00:15:07,480
Speaker 1: cool and I'm sure talented. It feels very like sort

305
00:15:07,480 --> 00:15:10,360
Speaker 1: of special charismatic room, and he kind of just like

306
00:15:10,440 --> 00:15:14,120
Speaker 1: points to everyone. They're obviously ordering dinner, and he points

307
00:15:14,160 --> 00:15:16,280
Speaker 1: at me and he says, do you want some tempora?

308
00:15:17,000 --> 00:15:19,200
Speaker 1: And I remember him pointing at me, and I just

309
00:15:19,280 --> 00:15:21,480
Speaker 1: remember thinking, like you know that feeling, and like you

310
00:15:21,600 --> 00:15:24,920
Speaker 1: end up in a conversation with someone and you feel like, wait,

311
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Speaker 1: did I forget that we've already been introduced and all

312
00:15:27,400 --> 00:15:29,360
Speaker 1: these things have already happened. How is this person so

313
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Speaker 1: far ahead in the conversation? And that's what I remember feeling, like,

314
00:15:33,160 --> 00:15:36,960
Speaker 1: just thinking like, well, do do you even know who

315
00:15:36,960 --> 00:15:38,720
Speaker 1: I am? Or should I know who you are? You're

316
00:15:38,720 --> 00:15:41,120
Speaker 1: just asking me if I want tempora? And I said no,

317
00:15:41,520 --> 00:15:43,440
Speaker 1: and then he kind of just bounced around. He's, you know,

318
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Speaker 1: very charismatic center of attention, especially at his recording session,

319
00:15:48,280 --> 00:15:51,280
Speaker 1: and I remember not speaking to him anymore, and eventually

320
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Speaker 1: with Alan just leaving, and much like my mother the

321
00:15:54,440 --> 00:15:57,920
Speaker 1: times we met him, it wasn't a big deal to Alan.

322
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Speaker 1: He never there was no like so sorry, I wish

323
00:16:01,160 --> 00:16:03,880
Speaker 1: your father was more interested in your life. There's never

324
00:16:03,960 --> 00:16:06,200
Speaker 1: anything like that. It was really just like cool, that

325
00:16:06,280 --> 00:16:07,520
Speaker 1: was fun. What do you want to eat? Or where

326
00:16:07,520 --> 00:16:09,720
Speaker 1: do you want to go? I think everyone was sort

327
00:16:09,760 --> 00:16:14,880
Speaker 1: of careful to not let me be disappointed, but still

328
00:16:14,960 --> 00:16:18,040
Speaker 1: let me kind of have whatever limited window I could

329
00:16:18,200 --> 00:16:20,840
Speaker 1: into my father's life. But I do remember that feeling

330
00:16:20,880 --> 00:16:24,840
Speaker 1: disappointing or at least very confusing, like knowing, well, he

331
00:16:24,920 --> 00:16:28,080
Speaker 1: invited me here, but he didn't seem at all interested

332
00:16:28,120 --> 00:16:30,920
Speaker 1: in talking to me. That's very strange, and that felt

333
00:16:30,960 --> 00:16:32,680
Speaker 1: like a lot to process for an eight year old.

334
00:16:34,240 --> 00:16:37,200
Speaker 3: Yeah, huge, and you know he doesn't even say.

335
00:16:36,960 --> 00:16:42,280
Speaker 1: Hello, right exactly. It's a big word to miss.

336
00:16:42,880 --> 00:16:46,960
Speaker 2: Do you think that Alan and your mother that either

337
00:16:47,000 --> 00:16:50,080
Speaker 2: of them or both of them felt, you know, privately

338
00:16:50,120 --> 00:16:54,000
Speaker 2: felt like, oh, that's fucked up, but wouldn't want you

339
00:16:54,200 --> 00:16:57,560
Speaker 2: to experience them feeling that way, or do you think

340
00:16:57,560 --> 00:16:58,680
Speaker 2: that they didn't feel that way.

341
00:16:59,680 --> 00:17:01,880
Speaker 1: I think I thought it was fucked up. I think

342
00:17:02,120 --> 00:17:06,880
Speaker 1: my mother maybe felt a little more in disbelief that

343
00:17:06,920 --> 00:17:12,360
Speaker 1: he wouldn't be more interested because I'm so fascinating, I'm

344
00:17:12,400 --> 00:17:17,200
Speaker 1: telling you her, but I think that's what she felt.

345
00:17:17,240 --> 00:17:19,480
Speaker 1: Necessarily mad or not that it was crazy, but just

346
00:17:19,480 --> 00:17:22,280
Speaker 1: just like really, yeah, disbelief is the word, Like, don't

347
00:17:22,280 --> 00:17:24,439
Speaker 1: you get this, this thing that you helped to make

348
00:17:24,520 --> 00:17:27,479
Speaker 1: is sitting here like you should be more engaged and

349
00:17:27,520 --> 00:17:30,159
Speaker 1: I think Alan, he's not like this, But I mean

350
00:17:30,200 --> 00:17:34,240
Speaker 1: he is lifelong used to musicians, and a lot of

351
00:17:34,280 --> 00:17:36,200
Speaker 1: them are narcissists, and a lot of them are only

352
00:17:37,000 --> 00:17:41,120
Speaker 1: doing the thing that progresses their thing, And so to him,

353
00:17:41,200 --> 00:17:44,000
Speaker 1: I think that's just who he was, and he wasn't

354
00:17:44,000 --> 00:17:46,400
Speaker 1: surprised by that, and even knew that before it existed.

355
00:17:48,600 --> 00:17:52,120
Speaker 2: It seems like it contributed to some really healthy bedrock

356
00:17:52,840 --> 00:17:54,200
Speaker 2: of for you.

357
00:17:54,800 --> 00:17:57,520
Speaker 1: Yeah, I never ever heard a bad word about my father.

358
00:17:57,640 --> 00:18:00,800
Speaker 1: There was never like, oh, he doesn't send money, and

359
00:18:00,840 --> 00:18:03,359
Speaker 1: if your father weren't around, we could have a better house.

360
00:18:03,400 --> 00:18:05,720
Speaker 1: Like There's just nothing like that. All the things that

361
00:18:05,800 --> 00:18:08,800
Speaker 1: I think people think I was feeling or hearing this

362
00:18:08,840 --> 00:18:11,199
Speaker 1: didn't exist. And the rare instances that he did come

363
00:18:11,280 --> 00:18:15,000
Speaker 1: up in conversation, my mother or uncle would say things like, oh, yeah,

364
00:18:15,040 --> 00:18:19,000
Speaker 1: he's the talented, wonderful, charismatic guy who helped bring you

365
00:18:19,040 --> 00:18:19,560
Speaker 1: into the world.

366
00:18:22,080 --> 00:18:25,000
Speaker 2: When Nabile is nine, he and his mom moved back

367
00:18:25,000 --> 00:18:28,600
Speaker 2: to New York City with her newly minted MBA. She

368
00:18:28,640 --> 00:18:32,480
Speaker 2: gets a job at American Express, and when Nobile is ten,

369
00:18:33,200 --> 00:18:36,000
Speaker 2: his mom takes him to hear Roy play at the Village.

370
00:18:36,040 --> 00:18:40,160
Speaker 1: Gate was really close to where we lived, so we

371
00:18:40,240 --> 00:18:43,040
Speaker 1: just went there early, thinking of course he'll be there early.

372
00:18:43,520 --> 00:18:47,080
Speaker 1: And we were inside the club. There's nobody there. The

373
00:18:47,080 --> 00:18:49,639
Speaker 1: club was empty, maybe they were just practicing or sound checking.

374
00:18:49,680 --> 00:18:52,600
Speaker 1: And ran right into Roy and a woman who I

375
00:18:52,640 --> 00:18:54,880
Speaker 1: think we assume was his wife. He was married soon

376
00:18:54,920 --> 00:18:57,440
Speaker 1: after I was born, and they're still together, but I

377
00:18:57,480 --> 00:18:59,600
Speaker 1: don't know for sure who that was, but it seemed

378
00:18:59,640 --> 00:19:02,920
Speaker 1: like it, and it was this really quick moment just

379
00:19:02,960 --> 00:19:05,679
Speaker 1: said hi, didn't introduce us to the woman. It very

380
00:19:05,760 --> 00:19:07,720
Speaker 1: now I'm remembering then too. At the times I talked

381
00:19:07,720 --> 00:19:10,080
Speaker 1: to him, it felt very much like I'm really busy,

382
00:19:10,160 --> 00:19:12,919
Speaker 1: I'm doing a lot, I gotta go. Always felt like that, like,

383
00:19:12,960 --> 00:19:15,560
Speaker 1: even if he was charming and felt sort of present,

384
00:19:15,640 --> 00:19:17,520
Speaker 1: it always felt like he had one foot out the

385
00:19:17,560 --> 00:19:19,560
Speaker 1: door while you were talking to him, you know. And

386
00:19:19,600 --> 00:19:22,119
Speaker 1: that was probably a few hours before he actually played.

387
00:19:22,960 --> 00:19:24,679
Speaker 1: And I don't remember this part of it, but this

388
00:19:24,720 --> 00:19:27,000
Speaker 1: is what my mother told me that, you know. Later on,

389
00:19:27,160 --> 00:19:29,280
Speaker 1: I was like, let's just go home, and she said, wait,

390
00:19:29,320 --> 00:19:32,399
Speaker 1: don't you want to stay and see him play? And

391
00:19:32,440 --> 00:19:34,719
Speaker 1: I said something like, well, he didn't have time for us,

392
00:19:34,760 --> 00:19:37,560
Speaker 1: so why would I have time for him, which is

393
00:19:37,600 --> 00:19:42,040
Speaker 1: definitely obviously another look into me being another year or

394
00:19:42,040 --> 00:19:46,040
Speaker 1: two older and starting to feel the idea that, you know,

395
00:19:46,359 --> 00:19:49,359
Speaker 1: this guy's never been missing. But the more I'm exposed

396
00:19:49,400 --> 00:19:52,120
Speaker 1: to him, the more I realized that something feels off

397
00:19:52,160 --> 00:19:52,600
Speaker 1: about it.

398
00:19:56,440 --> 00:19:59,679
Speaker 2: And then another New York run in, not just with

399
00:19:59,800 --> 00:20:03,879
Speaker 2: Roy this time, but also with his children. Now Bale's

400
00:20:04,000 --> 00:20:04,800
Speaker 2: have siblings.

401
00:20:07,320 --> 00:20:09,800
Speaker 1: So my mother had never driven in her life, was

402
00:20:09,840 --> 00:20:12,520
Speaker 1: taking driving lessons in New York City, which is I

403
00:20:12,600 --> 00:20:15,200
Speaker 1: just can't imagine doing that as like, you know, thirty

404
00:20:15,280 --> 00:20:18,320
Speaker 1: year old or something. And so sometimes we would have

405
00:20:18,359 --> 00:20:21,160
Speaker 1: the instructor wherever we felt like going. I would come along,

406
00:20:21,200 --> 00:20:23,560
Speaker 1: of course, because I went to everything, and the lesson

407
00:20:23,560 --> 00:20:26,280
Speaker 1: would end at some destination since we had a car.

408
00:20:26,640 --> 00:20:29,000
Speaker 1: So we lived in the village of just Way downtown,

409
00:20:29,080 --> 00:20:32,520
Speaker 1: and we had friends, my mother's friend Jenny and her

410
00:20:32,600 --> 00:20:34,840
Speaker 1: daughter around my age, and they lived on the Upper

411
00:20:34,880 --> 00:20:36,840
Speaker 1: West Side, which you know, was not terribly far. It's

412
00:20:36,840 --> 00:20:38,840
Speaker 1: a subway right away, but we got a car for

413
00:20:38,880 --> 00:20:41,440
Speaker 1: a minute, so we had the instructor drop us off there,

414
00:20:41,520 --> 00:20:44,520
Speaker 1: and I think her daughter went to the same school

415
00:20:44,560 --> 00:20:46,399
Speaker 1: as Roy's kids, who are all We're all around the

416
00:20:46,400 --> 00:20:48,400
Speaker 1: same age, as kids are maybe two or four years

417
00:20:48,440 --> 00:20:50,439
Speaker 1: younger than me. And she said, there's this, you know,

418
00:20:50,480 --> 00:20:52,840
Speaker 1: this great fair at the school on a Saturday afternoon's

419
00:20:52,920 --> 00:20:55,320
Speaker 1: let's all go there. And so we went. And it

420
00:20:55,400 --> 00:20:57,280
Speaker 1: was this very sunny day and kind of lots of

421
00:20:57,359 --> 00:21:00,360
Speaker 1: kids and people around and you know, food and all

422
00:21:00,400 --> 00:21:02,880
Speaker 1: that kind of stuff, music, and we were walking down

423
00:21:02,920 --> 00:21:05,920
Speaker 1: this kind of sunny trail and I remember we stopped,

424
00:21:06,640 --> 00:21:07,919
Speaker 1: and of course I didn't know why. I mean, my

425
00:21:07,960 --> 00:21:11,000
Speaker 1: mother ran into someone, and she's so social and so gregarious,

426
00:21:11,000 --> 00:21:14,320
Speaker 1: and so she was just talking. But I realized it's like, oh,

427
00:21:14,400 --> 00:21:17,280
Speaker 1: this is this is Roy, who's with a woman and

428
00:21:17,320 --> 00:21:19,840
Speaker 1: two kids. And I think, you know, just a couple

429
00:21:19,960 --> 00:21:22,840
Speaker 1: hours earlier, it had been casually dropped that his kids

430
00:21:22,880 --> 00:21:24,840
Speaker 1: went to the same school. So I think I pretty

431
00:21:24,880 --> 00:21:27,800
Speaker 1: quickly put it all together. And I remember being a

432
00:21:27,840 --> 00:21:30,560
Speaker 1: little taller than those kids and Roy and my mother

433
00:21:30,640 --> 00:21:34,360
Speaker 1: talking briefly, and her sort of I could tell even then,

434
00:21:34,400 --> 00:21:38,520
Speaker 1: I remember her voice did this thing. It's just a

435
00:21:38,560 --> 00:21:41,080
Speaker 1: sort of it's a slightly I want to impress you thing.

436
00:21:41,720 --> 00:21:43,400
Speaker 1: I could just tell the difference in the tone we're

437
00:21:43,440 --> 00:21:46,320
Speaker 1: talking to somebody who she thinks is important or something

438
00:21:46,359 --> 00:21:48,479
Speaker 1: like that. I could just I remember feeling that at

439
00:21:48,520 --> 00:21:50,920
Speaker 1: the same time, I remember these two kids and kind

440
00:21:50,920 --> 00:21:55,480
Speaker 1: of looking at them and them I can't imagine having

441
00:21:55,520 --> 00:21:57,800
Speaker 1: any idea who I might be, but me having some

442
00:21:58,000 --> 00:22:02,119
Speaker 1: idea who they were, just my two half siblings, and

443
00:22:02,240 --> 00:22:05,520
Speaker 1: just thinking, this is very strange to be standing here

444
00:22:06,480 --> 00:22:09,760
Speaker 1: doing this, not really knowing what to think still as

445
00:22:09,800 --> 00:22:11,879
Speaker 1: a nine or ten year old, but just being again

446
00:22:11,960 --> 00:22:15,520
Speaker 1: at this position where this you know, it's so strange

447
00:22:15,560 --> 00:22:17,960
Speaker 1: how easy it still is in New York. You run

448
00:22:17,960 --> 00:22:20,359
Speaker 1: into people, but it's really weird. But it's your father

449
00:22:20,400 --> 00:22:22,440
Speaker 1: who you don't know. And it happens all the time.

450
00:22:22,800 --> 00:22:24,280
Speaker 1: They're seemingly all the time.

451
00:22:24,240 --> 00:22:30,320
Speaker 2: And once again there's no hello, like there's no introduction. Now,

452
00:22:30,600 --> 00:22:33,560
Speaker 2: not that it would have been really likely or feasible

453
00:22:33,600 --> 00:22:35,720
Speaker 2: for him to say, you know, this is not he's

454
00:22:35,720 --> 00:22:40,760
Speaker 2: your half brother, but no, just absolutely no, you know,

455
00:22:41,000 --> 00:22:42,520
Speaker 2: no need to make everybody comfortable.

456
00:22:43,000 --> 00:22:46,600
Speaker 1: No. And I remember my mother complimenting him and him

457
00:22:46,840 --> 00:22:50,800
Speaker 1: sort of doubling down more like, you know, it's like

458
00:22:50,840 --> 00:22:53,040
Speaker 1: the equivalent of her saying, well, you look great, and

459
00:22:53,119 --> 00:22:54,840
Speaker 1: him saying, like, I know I looked great, don't I

460
00:22:54,880 --> 00:22:56,680
Speaker 1: look great and tell me more about how great I look.

461
00:22:56,720 --> 00:22:58,399
Speaker 1: That's what it felt like. That's what it felt like.

462
00:22:58,440 --> 00:23:01,080
Speaker 1: The conversation was not like, oh, so do you what

463
00:23:01,160 --> 00:23:03,400
Speaker 1: if you went up to It wasn't reciprocal in that way.

464
00:23:05,560 --> 00:23:09,920
Speaker 2: So shortly thereafter you and your mom moved to Salt

465
00:23:10,000 --> 00:23:14,240
Speaker 2: Lake City. Yeah, and that was precipitated by a job

466
00:23:14,359 --> 00:23:16,679
Speaker 2: for her and also kind of a desire to get

467
00:23:16,720 --> 00:23:17,320
Speaker 2: out of the city.

468
00:23:18,440 --> 00:23:20,359
Speaker 1: Yeah, that was the big thing. I think she know,

469
00:23:20,440 --> 00:23:22,479
Speaker 1: she got her MBA. She did everything she was supposed to.

470
00:23:22,520 --> 00:23:24,960
Speaker 1: She had not she wasn't rich, but like, you know,

471
00:23:25,119 --> 00:23:27,800
Speaker 1: a much more high paying job in New York. We

472
00:23:27,840 --> 00:23:29,639
Speaker 1: had a great apartment in the village. I went to

473
00:23:29,760 --> 00:23:33,720
Speaker 1: Little at Schoolhouse. This an incredible liberal private school. So,

474
00:23:33,800 --> 00:23:36,080
Speaker 1: you know, we were doing it. Four years ago we'd

475
00:23:36,080 --> 00:23:37,760
Speaker 1: been on welfare and now we're living in New York

476
00:23:37,800 --> 00:23:41,320
Speaker 1: City doing everything. But she really hated American Express. She

477
00:23:41,400 --> 00:23:44,040
Speaker 1: was not built for corporate life and was wearing suits

478
00:23:44,040 --> 00:23:46,160
Speaker 1: every day, and it was very high pressure and people

479
00:23:46,200 --> 00:23:48,719
Speaker 1: worked late, and everyone was trying to get ahead and

480
00:23:48,760 --> 00:23:50,760
Speaker 1: she wasn't. She just wanted to have a job and

481
00:23:50,960 --> 00:23:54,040
Speaker 1: got paid and come home. So they moved a big

482
00:23:54,080 --> 00:23:56,040
Speaker 1: part of the company to Salt Lake City and sort

483
00:23:56,040 --> 00:23:58,359
Speaker 1: of offered anyone who was willing to go. This is

484
00:23:58,600 --> 00:24:02,320
Speaker 1: great incentive. I think it was the same or more

485
00:24:02,359 --> 00:24:04,600
Speaker 1: money in a city that at the time probably cost

486
00:24:04,800 --> 00:24:07,959
Speaker 1: significantly less to live in and the kind of the

487
00:24:08,000 --> 00:24:11,400
Speaker 1: most family city in America. So the promise of like true,

488
00:24:11,560 --> 00:24:14,600
Speaker 1: nine to five people leave work. It's very family based.

489
00:24:14,680 --> 00:24:17,680
Speaker 1: So we went and visited, and I remember that took

490
00:24:17,800 --> 00:24:19,600
Speaker 1: very well, and I really surprised to how much we

491
00:24:19,720 --> 00:24:22,280
Speaker 1: liked it. So we moved there, which was a crazy,

492
00:24:22,600 --> 00:24:25,160
Speaker 1: crazy thing to do for our you know, for who

493
00:24:25,200 --> 00:24:27,399
Speaker 1: we were and what our life was. To pick up

494
00:24:27,440 --> 00:24:29,200
Speaker 1: and move to Salt Lake City in nineteen eighty two

495
00:24:29,280 --> 00:24:30,800
Speaker 1: is just a massive change.

496
00:24:31,880 --> 00:24:33,840
Speaker 2: That's something that really struck me, you know, when I

497
00:24:33,880 --> 00:24:38,159
Speaker 2: think about what you were talking about about Amherston and

498
00:24:38,240 --> 00:24:42,560
Speaker 2: the way that you grew up until age seven in

499
00:24:42,600 --> 00:24:50,640
Speaker 2: this world where you didn't have any concerns about being different,

500
00:24:51,000 --> 00:24:57,520
Speaker 2: or about racial identity, or about kids don't really as

501
00:24:57,560 --> 00:25:00,600
Speaker 2: a rule want to be seen as as different or

502
00:25:00,640 --> 00:25:02,560
Speaker 2: even special, you know, just they just don't want that.

503
00:25:02,960 --> 00:25:05,480
Speaker 2: And that was so foundational for you getting all the

504
00:25:05,520 --> 00:25:08,960
Speaker 2: way to age seven, really in this kind of weird utopia.

505
00:25:09,520 --> 00:25:09,920
Speaker 1: Yeah.

506
00:25:09,920 --> 00:25:10,720
Speaker 3: And then you.

507
00:25:10,720 --> 00:25:12,399
Speaker 2: Get to Salt Lake City, which has got to be

508
00:25:12,440 --> 00:25:15,520
Speaker 2: one of the whitest places on that on the planet.

509
00:25:16,119 --> 00:25:19,240
Speaker 1: Yeah, and even more than that, so not only one

510
00:25:19,240 --> 00:25:21,720
Speaker 1: of the whitest places, but I mean truly the most

511
00:25:21,760 --> 00:25:25,359
Speaker 1: family places because of the Mormon Church. So everybody had

512
00:25:25,359 --> 00:25:27,440
Speaker 1: a mother and a father, and lots of people had

513
00:25:27,680 --> 00:25:31,479
Speaker 1: three or four siblings and so that so it wasn't

514
00:25:31,560 --> 00:25:35,119
Speaker 1: just the having the black father thing, but also just

515
00:25:35,200 --> 00:25:37,000
Speaker 1: having one parent, just the two of us. That was

516
00:25:37,080 --> 00:25:40,000
Speaker 1: really I feel like we stood out just by existing

517
00:25:40,160 --> 00:25:42,240
Speaker 1: anywhere in the grocery store, at the bank, you know,

518
00:25:42,320 --> 00:25:43,879
Speaker 1: it was really so different.

519
00:25:45,160 --> 00:25:49,480
Speaker 2: So was that a change for you, like emotionally and

520
00:25:49,720 --> 00:25:52,040
Speaker 2: you know, sort of interest in the realm of feeling,

521
00:25:52,119 --> 00:25:55,000
Speaker 2: you know, going from you'd been in amatest, you'd been

522
00:25:55,000 --> 00:25:56,000
Speaker 2: in New York City.

523
00:25:56,440 --> 00:25:58,680
Speaker 3: Both were places that made a lot more sense.

524
00:25:59,400 --> 00:26:02,960
Speaker 2: Yeah, and now you're in this place where you you know,

525
00:26:03,000 --> 00:26:05,800
Speaker 2: you really have to kind of fight to belong.

526
00:26:07,000 --> 00:26:11,080
Speaker 1: Uh huh. Yeah, it definitely was. And I don't know

527
00:26:11,119 --> 00:26:14,040
Speaker 1: where this instinct came from. If it's from my mother,

528
00:26:14,160 --> 00:26:16,600
Speaker 1: if it's somehow genetically from my father, if it's from

529
00:26:16,600 --> 00:26:20,080
Speaker 1: my uncle. But I think I'm because I never thought

530
00:26:20,080 --> 00:26:22,440
Speaker 1: about these things and amhers and even New York, of course,

531
00:26:22,560 --> 00:26:24,720
Speaker 1: was totally very diverse, and there are lots of kids

532
00:26:24,720 --> 00:26:29,520
Speaker 1: so single parents, and suddenly I definitely noticed I was different.

533
00:26:29,520 --> 00:26:32,080
Speaker 1: I mean simply visually, my skin was darker. I had

534
00:26:32,119 --> 00:26:33,800
Speaker 1: a pretty big afro at the time, so it was

535
00:26:33,960 --> 00:26:37,000
Speaker 1: much more I think, noticeably black than I am now,

536
00:26:37,080 --> 00:26:41,800
Speaker 1: where I'm largely balding in my fifties. It was very obvious.

537
00:26:41,840 --> 00:26:43,800
Speaker 1: And then, of course my name Deal, which is Arabic

538
00:26:43,840 --> 00:26:45,639
Speaker 1: and has nothing to do with my race, but the

539
00:26:45,680 --> 00:26:48,320
Speaker 1: assumption is constantly there. So you know, you have this

540
00:26:48,320 --> 00:26:50,520
Speaker 1: ten year old kid from New York with darker skin

541
00:26:50,640 --> 00:26:53,840
Speaker 1: and afro and an exotic name. To my mother's credit,

542
00:26:54,200 --> 00:26:55,840
Speaker 1: we were in the best place you could be in

543
00:26:55,880 --> 00:26:58,440
Speaker 1: Salt Lake City, the best neighborhood, really close to the

544
00:26:58,520 --> 00:27:01,359
Speaker 1: University of Utah. That there's anything wrong with the Mormon

545
00:27:01,440 --> 00:27:04,359
Speaker 1: churchs I had incredible experiences with all my Mormon friends,

546
00:27:04,400 --> 00:27:07,080
Speaker 1: but the least Mormon part of the state that you know,

547
00:27:07,160 --> 00:27:09,760
Speaker 1: where eventually there was an openly gay mayor and the

548
00:27:09,800 --> 00:27:11,680
Speaker 1: sort of you know, the blue dot in the Red

549
00:27:11,720 --> 00:27:13,560
Speaker 1: state is exactly where we were. We were in the

550
00:27:13,640 --> 00:27:17,760
Speaker 1: right place. But kids would just ask me things that

551
00:27:17,800 --> 00:27:19,320
Speaker 1: didn't feel like they were making fun of me. It

552
00:27:19,320 --> 00:27:22,199
Speaker 1: didn't feel malicious, but they were so curious because I

553
00:27:22,320 --> 00:27:24,520
Speaker 1: was so exotic, and this is, you know, again like

554
00:27:24,600 --> 00:27:28,000
Speaker 1: before the internet, before so many things, So where's your father?

555
00:27:28,200 --> 00:27:30,879
Speaker 1: Can I touch your afro? What's your name mean? And

556
00:27:30,960 --> 00:27:34,800
Speaker 1: I just, amazingly was never used to those questions at

557
00:27:34,840 --> 00:27:36,880
Speaker 1: ten years old. No one was really asking me those

558
00:27:36,920 --> 00:27:40,760
Speaker 1: things because it wasn't special, and I loved that. So

559
00:27:41,600 --> 00:27:44,879
Speaker 1: suddenly I realized, Okay, no one's being mean to me,

560
00:27:45,240 --> 00:27:48,640
Speaker 1: but they're really curious. So I was always open about

561
00:27:48,680 --> 00:27:50,520
Speaker 1: my race. I would say my father's black and my

562
00:27:50,560 --> 00:27:55,199
Speaker 1: mother's white. I definitely said that they're divorced, which of

563
00:27:55,240 --> 00:27:58,119
Speaker 1: course wasn't true. They were never married, they were never together,

564
00:27:58,680 --> 00:28:00,600
Speaker 1: and I think even at that age, it felt like

565
00:28:00,640 --> 00:28:02,959
Speaker 1: a betrayal to my mother. I felt terrible saying that,

566
00:28:03,000 --> 00:28:06,359
Speaker 1: because she'd done such an incredible job and carried through

567
00:28:06,400 --> 00:28:09,879
Speaker 1: with everything she'd planned with flying colors. Felt like, this

568
00:28:09,960 --> 00:28:12,800
Speaker 1: feels bad that I have to say this thing that's

569
00:28:12,880 --> 00:28:16,399
Speaker 1: not true, that is so much less impressive than proof.

570
00:28:16,960 --> 00:28:20,080
Speaker 1: But it was the easiest way to stop the conversation,

571
00:28:20,280 --> 00:28:22,000
Speaker 1: and that was the goal at ten years old, not

572
00:28:22,080 --> 00:28:24,840
Speaker 1: to explain, you know, it was my whole life story,

573
00:28:25,600 --> 00:28:28,679
Speaker 1: So divorce shut it down. No one would ask questions

574
00:28:28,680 --> 00:28:30,720
Speaker 1: about that because as a kid in the eighties, people

575
00:28:30,720 --> 00:28:32,640
Speaker 1: were at least sort of used to divorce. They fell

576
00:28:32,720 --> 00:28:35,800
Speaker 1: bad for you, and they moved on. So that's kind

577
00:28:35,840 --> 00:28:37,439
Speaker 1: of it was the first time in my life when

578
00:28:37,480 --> 00:28:39,840
Speaker 1: I sort of found myself, you know, sort of lying

579
00:28:39,880 --> 00:28:43,000
Speaker 1: about who I was to shut down the conversations. What

580
00:28:43,080 --> 00:28:44,800
Speaker 1: was so fun is that Alan would come visit us

581
00:28:44,800 --> 00:28:46,320
Speaker 1: all the time in Salt Lake and I would go

582
00:28:46,360 --> 00:28:48,120
Speaker 1: to New York all the time to visit him. That

583
00:28:48,160 --> 00:28:50,560
Speaker 1: was sort of part of the deal when my mother

584
00:28:50,600 --> 00:28:53,880
Speaker 1: and I moved there and I would go to New York,

585
00:28:54,440 --> 00:28:56,360
Speaker 1: I don't know, sometimes four or five times a year,

586
00:28:56,400 --> 00:28:58,680
Speaker 1: I feel like. And it was so fun because then

587
00:28:58,760 --> 00:29:00,440
Speaker 1: it was like, Wow, there were these move movies that

588
00:29:00,480 --> 00:29:02,240
Speaker 1: haven't even opened in Salt Lake that I can see.

589
00:29:02,280 --> 00:29:04,520
Speaker 1: There are bands that I can see. That was such

590
00:29:04,560 --> 00:29:07,080
Speaker 1: a huge thing, and that's a lot of I think

591
00:29:07,160 --> 00:29:09,720
Speaker 1: how I got along in Salt Lake City, which I

592
00:29:09,760 --> 00:29:11,720
Speaker 1: really did. I really liked it and had friends and

593
00:29:11,840 --> 00:29:13,480
Speaker 1: was happy there. But a lot of it was that

594
00:29:13,640 --> 00:29:15,800
Speaker 1: I was the kid who went to New York all

595
00:29:15,840 --> 00:29:18,160
Speaker 1: the time, who had a record collection, who knew things

596
00:29:18,200 --> 00:29:20,400
Speaker 1: people didn't know, who could talk about dans, who had

597
00:29:20,400 --> 00:29:23,320
Speaker 1: a drum set. Like That's who I became, and that

598
00:29:23,440 --> 00:29:26,360
Speaker 1: was really what I leaned into. And I let that

599
00:29:26,440 --> 00:29:29,120
Speaker 1: make me more unique than my name or my hair

600
00:29:29,240 --> 00:29:31,320
Speaker 1: or anything like that. And I don't think I got

601
00:29:31,320 --> 00:29:33,600
Speaker 1: that then, but it's definitely what I was doing, and

602
00:29:33,640 --> 00:29:36,280
Speaker 1: I'm really glad I had all the tools to do it.

603
00:29:37,040 --> 00:29:40,200
Speaker 1: So as I got older in high school, I wanted

604
00:29:40,200 --> 00:29:42,080
Speaker 1: to get a job so I could make money to

605
00:29:42,080 --> 00:29:44,240
Speaker 1: buy drums and buy records and all the things I loved.

606
00:29:44,280 --> 00:29:46,640
Speaker 1: And so Alan said, come to New York for the summer.

607
00:29:47,280 --> 00:29:49,520
Speaker 1: I'll find your job. My friend is a lawyer. He

608
00:29:50,000 --> 00:29:52,680
Speaker 1: wants a messenger at his law firm, which is amazing.

609
00:29:52,720 --> 00:29:54,760
Speaker 1: So I had this crazy job for two summers, the

610
00:29:54,800 --> 00:29:58,200
Speaker 1: summer between sophomore and junior and junior and senior year,

611
00:29:58,800 --> 00:30:01,680
Speaker 1: where I would stay my uncle's apartment in Chelsea and

612
00:30:02,040 --> 00:30:04,600
Speaker 1: would go to work every day from nine to five

613
00:30:04,680 --> 00:30:07,120
Speaker 1: at this sort of fancy law office in Midtown. It

614
00:30:07,200 --> 00:30:08,920
Speaker 1: was really small, firms to a couple of people in

615
00:30:08,960 --> 00:30:11,160
Speaker 1: the office, and I would sit at the front desk

616
00:30:11,240 --> 00:30:13,040
Speaker 1: until they needed me to do something. And when they

617
00:30:13,040 --> 00:30:15,360
Speaker 1: did a run around the city, I'd get some papers

618
00:30:15,400 --> 00:30:18,680
Speaker 1: and you have to run them downtown to some other offices.

619
00:30:18,840 --> 00:30:21,000
Speaker 1: And I just really got a different look at the

620
00:30:21,040 --> 00:30:23,680
Speaker 1: city than when I lived there, when I even visited,

621
00:30:23,720 --> 00:30:26,600
Speaker 1: because you know, we just lived in cool neighborhoods and

622
00:30:26,680 --> 00:30:29,360
Speaker 1: went to the same place. But this was New York City.

623
00:30:29,400 --> 00:30:31,840
Speaker 1: This is you know, running up and down crazy streets

624
00:30:31,840 --> 00:30:34,360
Speaker 1: and elevators and office buildings. So I really started to

625
00:30:34,400 --> 00:30:36,960
Speaker 1: see this thing. This is the late eighties. You know,

626
00:30:37,120 --> 00:30:40,720
Speaker 1: I grew up in these these very racially diverse places

627
00:30:40,720 --> 00:30:43,520
Speaker 1: where everyone did everything. Now I live in Salt Lake City,

628
00:30:43,840 --> 00:30:47,560
Speaker 1: which is extremely white. But now these summers, I'm in

629
00:30:47,600 --> 00:30:50,320
Speaker 1: New York, where there's still a mix, but there's obviously

630
00:30:50,560 --> 00:30:53,880
Speaker 1: roles for each of the different races. And I started

631
00:30:53,880 --> 00:30:56,200
Speaker 1: to notice that all the people I was delivering papers

632
00:30:56,200 --> 00:30:58,960
Speaker 1: to and taking papers from were white, and they were

633
00:30:58,960 --> 00:31:01,800
Speaker 1: in a nice air condition offices, and they were wearing suits,

634
00:31:01,960 --> 00:31:04,080
Speaker 1: and they were never friendly to me. They wouldn't even

635
00:31:04,120 --> 00:31:06,479
Speaker 1: look at me. But the people who were friendly were

636
00:31:06,480 --> 00:31:08,400
Speaker 1: the people who held the doors open. They are the

637
00:31:08,440 --> 00:31:10,800
Speaker 1: people who you know, worked on the streets, and those

638
00:31:10,880 --> 00:31:12,760
Speaker 1: are the black and brown people. And I was I

639
00:31:12,840 --> 00:31:15,360
Speaker 1: really every day would just see it as I walk

640
00:31:15,440 --> 00:31:17,280
Speaker 1: down the street in New York. It was just it

641
00:31:17,320 --> 00:31:21,400
Speaker 1: was impossible for me to not see this really obvious

642
00:31:21,480 --> 00:31:24,160
Speaker 1: division that I still see there and I still see

643
00:31:24,160 --> 00:31:26,040
Speaker 1: in tons of cities. But that was the summer I

644
00:31:26,160 --> 00:31:29,680
Speaker 1: really noticed it and realize, I, now, this is this

645
00:31:29,800 --> 00:31:31,800
Speaker 1: is kind of what the world is like. Salt Lake

646
00:31:31,920 --> 00:31:34,520
Speaker 1: is not what the world is like, and unfortunately Amherst

647
00:31:34,680 --> 00:31:35,480
Speaker 1: is not either.

648
00:31:36,600 --> 00:31:40,440
Speaker 2: And you also promised yourself that you weren't going to

649
00:31:40,440 --> 00:31:43,120
Speaker 2: be like that when you became successful.

650
00:31:43,800 --> 00:31:46,000
Speaker 1: It was just like I wasn't visible. I was just

651
00:31:46,640 --> 00:31:48,840
Speaker 1: the person holding the paper that needed to be signed.

652
00:31:48,840 --> 00:31:51,080
Speaker 1: But you know, I would get to some hot shot

653
00:31:51,080 --> 00:31:52,960
Speaker 1: and they would sign the papers, but they wouldn't look

654
00:31:52,960 --> 00:31:55,000
Speaker 1: at me, they wouldn't say hello, they wouldn't do anything.

655
00:31:55,000 --> 00:31:56,680
Speaker 1: And I just thought like, this is so weird. Why

656
00:31:56,680 --> 00:31:59,800
Speaker 1: wouldn't you I'm standing here, can you say hi? Or

657
00:32:00,480 --> 00:32:02,720
Speaker 1: or something like that? And it, yeah, it really did

658
00:32:02,760 --> 00:32:04,560
Speaker 1: sort of create this feeling and be like, well, I'm

659
00:32:04,920 --> 00:32:07,000
Speaker 1: never gonna do that. That's such an easy thing to do.

660
00:32:08,080 --> 00:32:11,280
Speaker 2: There's this echo there of I mean, who else who

661
00:32:11,280 --> 00:32:14,040
Speaker 2: else didn't say hello? And who else was like, you know,

662
00:32:14,400 --> 00:32:16,600
Speaker 2: I gotta go, I gotta go, you know, and didn't

663
00:32:16,600 --> 00:32:19,400
Speaker 2: look you in the eye. So it's interesting, like you were,

664
00:32:19,680 --> 00:32:21,840
Speaker 2: you're kind of continuing to play that out in a

665
00:32:21,880 --> 00:32:22,720
Speaker 2: totally different way.

666
00:32:23,400 --> 00:32:25,479
Speaker 1: Yeah, it is really easy to see that parallel. I mean,

667
00:32:25,480 --> 00:32:28,600
Speaker 1: these are very They all sort of become big moments

668
00:32:28,600 --> 00:32:30,400
Speaker 1: that have something to do with each other, even though

669
00:32:30,600 --> 00:32:32,920
Speaker 1: you know, one person is my father and other people

670
00:32:32,960 --> 00:32:36,239
Speaker 1: are completely faithless. It's a kind of similar feeling. And

671
00:32:36,280 --> 00:32:40,160
Speaker 1: it's weird because it's not it's not necessarily a feeling

672
00:32:40,200 --> 00:32:42,920
Speaker 1: like I'm super important, don't you see me. It's just

673
00:32:42,960 --> 00:32:45,760
Speaker 1: a feeling of like, don't be an asshole, I'm here.

674
00:32:50,520 --> 00:33:07,400
Speaker 2: We'll be back in a moment with more family secrets.

675
00:33:09,520 --> 00:33:12,480
Speaker 2: As Nobille nears the end of high school, his mom

676
00:33:12,560 --> 00:33:15,600
Speaker 2: suggests to him he might want to change his last name.

677
00:33:16,400 --> 00:33:20,280
Speaker 2: She's recently changed hers from Brausman to Blair.

678
00:33:23,320 --> 00:33:26,280
Speaker 1: She was working at I Think Fidelity Investments. She moved

679
00:33:26,280 --> 00:33:27,960
Speaker 1: around to jobs in Salt Lake, but was working in

680
00:33:28,160 --> 00:33:30,560
Speaker 1: HR and I think was doing a lot of exit

681
00:33:30,600 --> 00:33:33,040
Speaker 1: interviews with people at layoffs. They would lay them off

682
00:33:33,040 --> 00:33:35,920
Speaker 1: and realize like, oh, I don't like everyone who just

683
00:33:35,960 --> 00:33:39,560
Speaker 1: got fired knowing my name potentially coming after me, which

684
00:33:39,600 --> 00:33:41,320
Speaker 1: is you know, some New York street smarts. So she

685
00:33:41,400 --> 00:33:43,720
Speaker 1: just started using a fake name for fun, and Blair

686
00:33:43,760 --> 00:33:44,920
Speaker 1: sounded like a soap opera star.

687
00:33:45,640 --> 00:33:50,080
Speaker 2: So why did she think that you should change your surname.

688
00:33:50,480 --> 00:33:52,440
Speaker 1: I was born to Bill Braufman, so that was, yeah,

689
00:33:52,480 --> 00:33:54,760
Speaker 1: that was my name till I was seventeen, and I remember,

690
00:33:54,760 --> 00:33:56,760
Speaker 1: of course it was hard to spell. Always be r

691
00:33:56,840 --> 00:34:00,720
Speaker 1: au f as in frank m a n. Still, you know,

692
00:34:00,760 --> 00:34:02,320
Speaker 1: it took three times to get through that, and I

693
00:34:02,320 --> 00:34:05,240
Speaker 1: think when she changed it to Blair, even fictitiously, she

694
00:34:05,320 --> 00:34:08,080
Speaker 1: realized like, oh, wow, you say it. No one even

695
00:34:08,120 --> 00:34:10,040
Speaker 1: asks how to spell it, let alone. You know what

696
00:34:10,239 --> 00:34:13,640
Speaker 1: makes you repeat it? It was she realized how hard her

697
00:34:13,719 --> 00:34:15,960
Speaker 1: real name was when she started using a fake name.

698
00:34:16,000 --> 00:34:17,960
Speaker 1: And so that was right around the time I got

699
00:34:17,960 --> 00:34:20,680
Speaker 1: accepted to college outside of Seattle. I was planning to

700
00:34:20,719 --> 00:34:22,720
Speaker 1: move and a place where I really didn't know anybody.

701
00:34:22,960 --> 00:34:24,600
Speaker 1: I was kind of in a way starting a new life,

702
00:34:24,600 --> 00:34:26,600
Speaker 1: and she just said, you know, you should think about this.

703
00:34:27,480 --> 00:34:30,239
Speaker 1: It's been really great for me. Your life could be

704
00:34:30,320 --> 00:34:32,680
Speaker 1: much easier. You're going someplace where you don't know anyone,

705
00:34:32,760 --> 00:34:35,839
Speaker 1: it's a totally clean slate. What do you think? And

706
00:34:36,080 --> 00:34:38,040
Speaker 1: I was open to the idea, and I remember thinking

707
00:34:38,080 --> 00:34:41,240
Speaker 1: about making up names and thinking like, huh, well, Airs,

708
00:34:41,640 --> 00:34:44,960
Speaker 1: I like it sounds really good. I remember very specifically,

709
00:34:45,000 --> 00:34:47,520
Speaker 1: thinking sort of mathematically, which is the way my brain is.

710
00:34:47,560 --> 00:34:49,799
Speaker 1: My first name is Nippil, it's five letters. My middle

711
00:34:49,880 --> 00:34:53,120
Speaker 1: name mall that's five letters, and Airs is five letters.

712
00:34:53,160 --> 00:34:55,359
Speaker 1: So I thought, well, that's kind of cool, five five

713
00:34:55,400 --> 00:34:58,319
Speaker 1: and five. And of course it's the only name that

714
00:34:58,360 --> 00:35:02,560
Speaker 1: there actually is a connection. But it wasn't to actually

715
00:35:02,560 --> 00:35:05,000
Speaker 1: connect myself to my father. I mean, in nineteen eighty

716
00:35:05,239 --> 00:35:09,160
Speaker 1: eight or eighty nine in Salt Lake City, he was invisible.

717
00:35:09,239 --> 00:35:11,680
Speaker 1: He did not play there. There wasn't a huge jazz

718
00:35:11,680 --> 00:35:13,399
Speaker 1: scene in Salt Lake. I'm sure a few people knew

719
00:35:13,400 --> 00:35:15,480
Speaker 1: who he was, but nobody ever asked me about it.

720
00:35:15,480 --> 00:35:17,200
Speaker 1: You know, he was not part of my life in

721
00:35:17,200 --> 00:35:19,799
Speaker 1: Salt Lake. He was almost forty then, so as someone

722
00:35:19,840 --> 00:35:22,080
Speaker 1: who was into music and was a teenager, in my mind,

723
00:35:22,440 --> 00:35:24,399
Speaker 1: I would have thought like, wow, well, forty, his career

724
00:35:24,480 --> 00:35:27,200
Speaker 1: is obviously over. It beaked in the seventies. I had

725
00:35:27,239 --> 00:35:30,280
Speaker 1: no idea how much bigger he'd become, So it wasn't

726
00:35:30,440 --> 00:35:33,120
Speaker 1: at all, Oh, well, people will know that I'm his son,

727
00:35:33,239 --> 00:35:34,600
Speaker 1: That's why I want to do this. In fact, I

728
00:35:34,640 --> 00:35:36,719
Speaker 1: assumed that had nothing to do with it. No one

729
00:35:36,719 --> 00:35:38,839
Speaker 1: would ever know who he was. He was done. It

730
00:35:38,880 --> 00:35:41,520
Speaker 1: was really just that it sounded good and I liked it,

731
00:35:41,560 --> 00:35:44,480
Speaker 1: and I trusted my mother. The way I remember it

732
00:35:44,560 --> 00:35:49,400
Speaker 1: was so simple and felt so transactional as opposed to emotional.

733
00:35:49,400 --> 00:35:52,640
Speaker 1: It really felt like, this is easy, this makes sense,

734
00:35:53,000 --> 00:35:56,360
Speaker 1: and there's no risk, so sure, let's do it, I

735
00:35:56,400 --> 00:35:58,800
Speaker 1: think at that time and the last time I actually

736
00:35:59,040 --> 00:36:01,400
Speaker 1: encountered him in person very soon after we moved to

737
00:36:01,400 --> 00:36:05,040
Speaker 1: Salt Lake when I was still ten, and now I'm seventeen.

738
00:36:05,160 --> 00:36:06,920
Speaker 1: I definitely have not run into him in New York

739
00:36:06,960 --> 00:36:09,520
Speaker 1: this whole time. Don't hear his music in Salt Lake

740
00:36:09,560 --> 00:36:12,080
Speaker 1: City like he really Seven years is a long time

741
00:36:12,080 --> 00:36:14,239
Speaker 1: for a seventeen year old from ten to seventeen, so

742
00:36:14,400 --> 00:36:16,960
Speaker 1: in my mind, he was pretty non existent.

743
00:36:19,160 --> 00:36:22,239
Speaker 2: When Nabil is away at college, his mom falls in

744
00:36:22,280 --> 00:36:25,400
Speaker 2: love with a man named Jim She hadn't been dating

745
00:36:25,640 --> 00:36:29,040
Speaker 2: or prioritizing her personal life over the years, but now

746
00:36:29,040 --> 00:36:32,720
Speaker 2: that Nobil has grown, it's her turn. At their wedding,

747
00:36:33,120 --> 00:36:38,239
Speaker 2: an unexpected feeling overcomes Nobil. I wish Roy could see this.

748
00:36:38,440 --> 00:36:42,080
Speaker 2: He thinks. He doesn't really wish that Roy were there

749
00:36:42,280 --> 00:36:45,719
Speaker 2: per se, but he does wish Roy could see how

750
00:36:45,760 --> 00:36:48,879
Speaker 2: happy his mother is, how happy they both are, how

751
00:36:48,920 --> 00:36:53,200
Speaker 2: well they're doing. Of course, Nobil is reminded that this

752
00:36:53,280 --> 00:36:56,720
Speaker 2: is just what his mother had always done too, wanting

753
00:36:56,760 --> 00:37:00,400
Speaker 2: to prove to Roy somehow that life had marched tolly

754
00:37:00,440 --> 00:37:05,400
Speaker 2: on without him. After the wedding, life continues to march on.

755
00:37:06,320 --> 00:37:10,400
Speaker 2: Nabielle finishes school, he plays and tours with successful bands.

756
00:37:11,040 --> 00:37:14,800
Speaker 2: He opens his own record store in Seattle, Sonic Boom Records,

757
00:37:15,080 --> 00:37:19,719
Speaker 2: which becomes a big deal. Things are really taking off now.

758
00:37:19,760 --> 00:37:22,759
Speaker 2: Bille registers that he has a very strong drive to

759
00:37:22,800 --> 00:37:27,400
Speaker 2: succeed creatively, to make things happen, and he finds himself

760
00:37:27,440 --> 00:37:31,840
Speaker 2: wondering where does it come from. His mother and Alan

761
00:37:32,160 --> 00:37:35,560
Speaker 2: had been ambitious in their own ways, but this propulsive

762
00:37:35,680 --> 00:37:37,320
Speaker 2: energy is something different.

763
00:37:38,840 --> 00:37:41,520
Speaker 1: As I get into my thirties, I guess even the

764
00:37:41,560 --> 00:37:43,560
Speaker 1: late twenties to think I start to realize, like, wow,

765
00:37:43,600 --> 00:37:45,120
Speaker 1: I'm at a point in my career, in my life

766
00:37:45,120 --> 00:37:47,360
Speaker 1: too where a lot of people are asking or commenting

767
00:37:47,480 --> 00:37:49,160
Speaker 1: saying the sort of how do you do all these

768
00:37:49,200 --> 00:37:51,520
Speaker 1: different things? And to me, it never felt like I

769
00:37:51,560 --> 00:37:53,440
Speaker 1: was doing a lot of different things. It always feels

770
00:37:53,440 --> 00:37:55,279
Speaker 1: like these are all the same thing. There's just these

771
00:37:55,760 --> 00:37:58,520
Speaker 1: different facets of it, are different versions. But for a

772
00:37:58,520 --> 00:38:02,240
Speaker 1: long time I coloonna record store my friend and business partner, Jason,

773
00:38:02,280 --> 00:38:04,080
Speaker 1: and that was great and I loved it, and that

774
00:38:04,200 --> 00:38:05,839
Speaker 1: was I guess what I would call my real job

775
00:38:05,880 --> 00:38:09,560
Speaker 1: at the time. But also played in bands and always

776
00:38:09,600 --> 00:38:12,120
Speaker 1: toured and loved doing that and that was the really

777
00:38:12,320 --> 00:38:14,279
Speaker 1: fun part of things, being able to leave town for

778
00:38:14,360 --> 00:38:16,840
Speaker 1: a month and drive around the country and play drums

779
00:38:16,880 --> 00:38:18,840
Speaker 1: and come back and still have a job. And I

780
00:38:18,920 --> 00:38:21,000
Speaker 1: was also I started my own record label, so I

781
00:38:21,000 --> 00:38:23,239
Speaker 1: was putting out records by other bands that I liked,

782
00:38:23,239 --> 00:38:25,360
Speaker 1: and it was all to me, it's all this music.

783
00:38:25,400 --> 00:38:27,880
Speaker 1: These are just three different things, three different departments. This

784
00:38:27,920 --> 00:38:32,480
Speaker 1: is one thing. But I definitely just started to feel

785
00:38:33,880 --> 00:38:36,000
Speaker 1: and maybe even recognized that I didn't know a lot

786
00:38:36,080 --> 00:38:37,480
Speaker 1: of other people who had it, because to me, it

787
00:38:37,480 --> 00:38:40,160
Speaker 1: didn't feel unique or special or different, but just this

788
00:38:40,400 --> 00:38:46,440
Speaker 1: absolute internal drive and push and momentum that whatever I did,

789
00:38:46,680 --> 00:38:48,960
Speaker 1: I just really wanted to be all in. Even if

790
00:38:48,960 --> 00:38:51,840
Speaker 1: it was several different things, they were all really important.

791
00:38:51,920 --> 00:38:53,919
Speaker 1: That's why I was doing them. I wasn't doing them

792
00:38:53,960 --> 00:38:57,239
Speaker 1: to havelf do them. And I think around that time

793
00:38:57,280 --> 00:39:00,600
Speaker 1: and my father had not only never stopped too but

794
00:39:01,239 --> 00:39:04,439
Speaker 1: sort of picked up more. In the nineties, hip hop

795
00:39:04,480 --> 00:39:06,440
Speaker 1: obviously became a big thing, and so many of his

796
00:39:06,560 --> 00:39:09,520
Speaker 1: songs were sampled so many times, so he started to

797
00:39:09,520 --> 00:39:11,560
Speaker 1: have a resurgence. He was also still putting out new

798
00:39:11,600 --> 00:39:14,360
Speaker 1: music and touring, and I noticed that I paid attention

799
00:39:14,400 --> 00:39:16,040
Speaker 1: to it. That was in the business. And of course

800
00:39:16,280 --> 00:39:18,520
Speaker 1: now that I had his name, people would often ask

801
00:39:18,560 --> 00:39:20,799
Speaker 1: me if there was any relation, or you look like him?

802
00:39:20,840 --> 00:39:22,520
Speaker 1: All these things started to come up, the stuff that

803
00:39:22,560 --> 00:39:25,239
Speaker 1: I never thought would happen when I chose that name.

804
00:39:25,840 --> 00:39:28,880
Speaker 1: So to me, it was logical. I'm watching this guy who's,

805
00:39:28,880 --> 00:39:31,279
Speaker 1: you know, in his fifties and sixties, which again, when

806
00:39:31,320 --> 00:39:34,960
Speaker 1: I'm twenty eight, still seems pretty old, watching him continue

807
00:39:35,040 --> 00:39:38,640
Speaker 1: to tour the world, and I'm I'm feeling this really

808
00:39:38,680 --> 00:39:41,480
Speaker 1: intense push and pull and not seeing it and the

809
00:39:41,520 --> 00:39:43,879
Speaker 1: people I'm closest to and sort of, yeah, I think

810
00:39:43,880 --> 00:39:46,120
Speaker 1: come to the conclusion that it had to be from him.

811
00:39:46,160 --> 00:39:47,240
Speaker 1: There has to be some connection.

812
00:39:47,960 --> 00:39:51,160
Speaker 2: There's also this great irony that happens a little bit later,

813
00:39:51,640 --> 00:39:54,880
Speaker 2: which is that as you become more and more successful

814
00:39:55,200 --> 00:39:57,800
Speaker 2: and you do have the Air's last name, and people

815
00:39:58,000 --> 00:40:00,520
Speaker 2: you know know or assume that he's your father, of

816
00:40:00,600 --> 00:40:03,040
Speaker 2: people thinking that there was nepotism involved.

817
00:40:03,520 --> 00:40:06,000
Speaker 1: Yeah, That's the funny thing that there are points when

818
00:40:06,000 --> 00:40:10,720
Speaker 1: I've never been as upfront and truthful about the story

819
00:40:10,760 --> 00:40:13,880
Speaker 1: with my mother and my father, simply to defend anyone

820
00:40:13,920 --> 00:40:16,360
Speaker 1: thinking like, oh, oh, your job in the music business,

821
00:40:16,400 --> 00:40:20,040
Speaker 1: right your father's Oh no, no, it has nothing to

822
00:40:20,040 --> 00:40:25,879
Speaker 1: do with it. Yeah.

823
00:40:25,960 --> 00:40:28,400
Speaker 2: When Nobil is in his mid thirties, he starts to

824
00:40:28,440 --> 00:40:31,880
Speaker 2: see a therapist to help him unpack the myriad layers

825
00:40:31,880 --> 00:40:33,640
Speaker 2: of life.

826
00:40:34,239 --> 00:40:36,120
Speaker 1: My mother was in therapy for a long time when

827
00:40:36,120 --> 00:40:37,600
Speaker 1: I was growing up, the whole time we were in

828
00:40:37,600 --> 00:40:40,360
Speaker 1: Salt Lake and I was and this is in the eighties,

829
00:40:40,360 --> 00:40:42,719
Speaker 1: this is before everyone was in therapy. And she was

830
00:40:42,800 --> 00:40:44,759
Speaker 1: very open about it, and I think it helped her.

831
00:40:44,800 --> 00:40:47,239
Speaker 1: And so I was always kind of fascinated by it

832
00:40:48,040 --> 00:40:50,879
Speaker 1: and sort of wanted to do it. And I don't

833
00:40:50,920 --> 00:40:54,560
Speaker 1: know if it's because I'm not the most sort of

834
00:40:54,680 --> 00:40:56,760
Speaker 1: vocal emotional person. I mean, a lot of the stuff

835
00:40:56,760 --> 00:40:59,000
Speaker 1: that we're talking about is not telling people in my

836
00:40:59,040 --> 00:41:01,760
Speaker 1: life story for life of reasons, kind of protecting myself

837
00:41:02,200 --> 00:41:05,040
Speaker 1: and having this mother who is so so open, sometimes

838
00:41:05,080 --> 00:41:07,120
Speaker 1: too open for me. Sometimes it tries to me crazy,

839
00:41:07,520 --> 00:41:09,160
Speaker 1: and so in some ways I think I'm trying to

840
00:41:09,160 --> 00:41:10,760
Speaker 1: be the opposite of her, like a lot of people

841
00:41:10,800 --> 00:41:13,520
Speaker 1: do with their parents. But when I was thirty four,

842
00:41:13,640 --> 00:41:16,520
Speaker 1: I went through a big breakup, and I'd been a

843
00:41:16,560 --> 00:41:20,080
Speaker 1: littleman for a long time. This breakup just's felt like, huh,

844
00:41:20,280 --> 00:41:22,600
Speaker 1: maybe I should try therapy. That's the kind of thing

845
00:41:22,640 --> 00:41:24,200
Speaker 1: you do when you go through a breakup.

846
00:41:24,560 --> 00:41:27,480
Speaker 2: Well, and as is the case with any therapist, your

847
00:41:27,560 --> 00:41:30,840
Speaker 2: father's story would be total catnip for a therapist who

848
00:41:31,280 --> 00:41:34,840
Speaker 2: would want to dig into what that felt like for you.

849
00:41:35,120 --> 00:41:38,880
Speaker 1: Yeah, right, exactly. Session one minute, one second one was

850
00:41:40,040 --> 00:41:42,360
Speaker 1: let's talk about your father. As soon as I started

851
00:41:42,360 --> 00:41:44,799
Speaker 1: doing it, and I assume that that's so we del

852
00:41:44,880 --> 00:41:47,680
Speaker 1: at the same time. It was, you know, I wasn't

853
00:41:47,719 --> 00:41:49,200
Speaker 1: like no, I don't want to talk about that. I

854
00:41:49,200 --> 00:41:53,640
Speaker 1: think I was interested in again this very positive idea

855
00:41:53,760 --> 00:41:55,560
Speaker 1: of therapy. It didn't mean anything was wrong with me.

856
00:41:55,640 --> 00:41:57,760
Speaker 1: It was a place to safely talk about the things

857
00:41:57,800 --> 00:42:01,120
Speaker 1: I've never felt safe talking about, and that's top of lists.

858
00:42:01,120 --> 00:42:04,680
Speaker 1: So my therapist getting into that felt like, oh, wow,

859
00:42:04,719 --> 00:42:07,840
Speaker 1: this is interesting. I can finally talk about this. It's safe.

860
00:42:08,200 --> 00:42:12,200
Speaker 1: There won't be judgment, I think, and it definitely it

861
00:42:12,239 --> 00:42:14,240
Speaker 1: didn't change my mind about things, but it was interesting

862
00:42:14,280 --> 00:42:16,000
Speaker 1: to just at least be talking about it on a

863
00:42:16,040 --> 00:42:18,920
Speaker 1: regular basis, and I think it led me to wanting

864
00:42:18,920 --> 00:42:19,480
Speaker 1: to meet him.

865
00:42:20,160 --> 00:42:25,320
Speaker 2: So then you hear that Roy's playing in Seattle at

866
00:42:25,600 --> 00:42:28,360
Speaker 2: the Triple Door. It also occurs to you that you know,

867
00:42:28,400 --> 00:42:31,640
Speaker 2: you're you're in your mid thirties, he's nearing seventy, okay,

868
00:42:31,880 --> 00:42:33,759
Speaker 2: and there's a little bit of a feeling I think of,

869
00:42:34,560 --> 00:42:35,640
Speaker 2: you know, if not now when?

870
00:42:36,640 --> 00:42:38,400
Speaker 1: Yeah, that was it. I mean, he would play in

871
00:42:38,400 --> 00:42:40,839
Speaker 1: Seattle pretty much every year, as I recall, I would

872
00:42:40,880 --> 00:42:43,160
Speaker 1: see it listed in the in the paper. Sometimes people

873
00:42:43,160 --> 00:42:45,239
Speaker 1: would say something, you know, oh, I see your dad's

874
00:42:45,239 --> 00:42:47,560
Speaker 1: playing again. I own a record store. All I'd do

875
00:42:47,800 --> 00:42:50,560
Speaker 1: all day long is talk to people customers, regulars who

876
00:42:50,600 --> 00:42:53,080
Speaker 1: come in. So it's not like I was hanging out

877
00:42:53,120 --> 00:42:54,960
Speaker 1: in the law firm hearing these things. Like I was

878
00:42:55,160 --> 00:42:57,239
Speaker 1: in the place where people are going to talk about it,

879
00:42:57,800 --> 00:42:59,600
Speaker 1: and every time it didn't. I don't remember it really

880
00:42:59,640 --> 00:43:01,480
Speaker 1: even if acting me, I just remember thinking, Oh, yeah,

881
00:43:01,480 --> 00:43:03,840
Speaker 1: he's coming to town again. He does it every year.

882
00:43:04,040 --> 00:43:06,680
Speaker 1: I never really seriously thought about going to see him.

883
00:43:06,880 --> 00:43:09,600
Speaker 1: I think I would sometimes deliberately be out of town,

884
00:43:09,960 --> 00:43:12,920
Speaker 1: which is obviously something to sort of protect myself or

885
00:43:12,960 --> 00:43:15,759
Speaker 1: to at least maybe even to just say to people like, oh,

886
00:43:15,800 --> 00:43:17,200
Speaker 1: I'm going to be out of town. I think I

887
00:43:17,239 --> 00:43:19,360
Speaker 1: would actually book a trip just to make it easier.

888
00:43:19,840 --> 00:43:23,160
Speaker 1: So obviously the therapy dug up all of this, and

889
00:43:23,480 --> 00:43:26,239
Speaker 1: pretty soon in I saw the listing or someone told

890
00:43:26,280 --> 00:43:28,560
Speaker 1: me that he's coming, and for some reason, when she

891
00:43:28,640 --> 00:43:30,640
Speaker 1: said that it was someone in the store, it just

892
00:43:30,760 --> 00:43:33,080
Speaker 1: hit me differently. All these new thoughts came up, and

893
00:43:33,280 --> 00:43:35,200
Speaker 1: it wasn't like, oh I better book a trip out

894
00:43:35,200 --> 00:43:38,319
Speaker 1: of town or I don't care. It was huh, I

895
00:43:38,400 --> 00:43:41,520
Speaker 1: need to figure out how to see him. It totally flipped.

896
00:43:41,560 --> 00:43:43,480
Speaker 1: It was one eighty. Definitely part of it was the

897
00:43:43,520 --> 00:43:46,319
Speaker 1: age thing that he was nearing seventy. It's sure he

898
00:43:46,360 --> 00:43:48,080
Speaker 1: comes back every year, but one of these years he

899
00:43:48,160 --> 00:43:51,040
Speaker 1: might not. And it wasn't even necessarily he's going to die,

900
00:43:51,120 --> 00:43:53,840
Speaker 1: but it was seventy, like, certainly he might not tour

901
00:43:53,920 --> 00:43:57,880
Speaker 1: again next year. That's getting pretty old. So I decide

902
00:43:57,960 --> 00:44:02,200
Speaker 1: it's time. And it's very easy to sort of justify

903
00:44:02,440 --> 00:44:06,440
Speaker 1: my need or my want by the very pragmatic logical stuff.

904
00:44:06,480 --> 00:44:09,000
Speaker 1: My thinking was, you know, every time I go to

905
00:44:09,040 --> 00:44:11,440
Speaker 1: a doctor and he asks about my family history, I

906
00:44:11,480 --> 00:44:13,719
Speaker 1: can't tell him anything about my father's side. And now

907
00:44:13,760 --> 00:44:15,840
Speaker 1: I'm thirty five, and these are things I'm going to

908
00:44:15,880 --> 00:44:18,840
Speaker 1: want to know someday. So for those reasons alone, it

909
00:44:18,880 --> 00:44:20,239
Speaker 1: would be great to talk to him and try to

910
00:44:20,239 --> 00:44:22,840
Speaker 1: get some medical history and family history. So that was

911
00:44:22,880 --> 00:44:26,760
Speaker 1: at least the easy thing to tell myself, and probably

912
00:44:26,760 --> 00:44:28,759
Speaker 1: not tell other people, because I definitely I'm not that

913
00:44:28,840 --> 00:44:30,840
Speaker 1: kind of person. I doubt I told anyone I was trying,

914
00:44:30,880 --> 00:44:33,360
Speaker 1: because that would make me feel bad if I didn't

915
00:44:33,360 --> 00:44:36,600
Speaker 1: see him, to have to tell people that. But I

916
00:44:36,680 --> 00:44:39,280
Speaker 1: decided to try to reach him, and I told my mother.

917
00:44:39,480 --> 00:44:41,680
Speaker 1: We still talked all the time, and we still do now,

918
00:44:42,040 --> 00:44:46,120
Speaker 1: and I'd never heard her. She turned into a totally

919
00:44:46,160 --> 00:44:49,880
Speaker 1: different person. She was so worried and so protective and

920
00:44:50,080 --> 00:44:52,399
Speaker 1: warned me of so many different things, and like she's

921
00:44:52,480 --> 00:44:55,320
Speaker 1: been hiding all this stuff for thirty five years waiting

922
00:44:55,360 --> 00:44:59,200
Speaker 1: for this moment, which was just like, Oh, why are

923
00:44:59,200 --> 00:45:01,040
Speaker 1: you going to do that? I put yourself out there

924
00:45:01,080 --> 00:45:02,920
Speaker 1: like that, even if you get a hold of him,

925
00:45:02,960 --> 00:45:05,359
Speaker 1: he's not going to show up. He's so flaky, You're

926
00:45:05,400 --> 00:45:07,879
Speaker 1: really setting yourself up. It was I could really hear

927
00:45:07,920 --> 00:45:10,520
Speaker 1: in her voice how scared she was for what I

928
00:45:10,600 --> 00:45:13,319
Speaker 1: was going to encounter. And she definitely always talked about

929
00:45:13,400 --> 00:45:15,840
Speaker 1: him as like he's a musician, he's kind of flaky.

930
00:45:15,880 --> 00:45:17,840
Speaker 1: He was always hard to pin down. But it really

931
00:45:17,880 --> 00:45:20,200
Speaker 1: came out in a much much stronger way on this

932
00:45:20,320 --> 00:45:22,000
Speaker 1: phone call when I decided I wanted to.

933
00:45:21,920 --> 00:45:24,319
Speaker 3: Meet him, because she was protective of you.

934
00:45:24,880 --> 00:45:28,839
Speaker 1: So protective. It was so obvious, and it also then

935
00:45:28,920 --> 00:45:32,080
Speaker 1: really just colored in for me a bit more about

936
00:45:32,080 --> 00:45:34,920
Speaker 1: her relationship with him, and maybe I remember thinking, oh,

937
00:45:34,960 --> 00:45:37,120
Speaker 1: I think maybe she was a little bit more into

938
00:45:37,200 --> 00:45:39,840
Speaker 1: him than she kind of led on. But regardless, I

939
00:45:39,920 --> 00:45:42,799
Speaker 1: just said I think I actually told her not so

940
00:45:42,880 --> 00:45:45,279
Speaker 1: much because I wanted her to know but because I

941
00:45:45,320 --> 00:45:46,600
Speaker 1: wanted to know if she knew how to get a

942
00:45:46,600 --> 00:45:49,160
Speaker 1: hold of him, and she was the logical first step,

943
00:45:49,160 --> 00:45:52,360
Speaker 1: and she said no, I found his booking agent online

944
00:45:52,400 --> 00:45:56,040
Speaker 1: and email and sent this sort of very safe email,

945
00:45:56,280 --> 00:45:58,120
Speaker 1: knowing that if he saw it, he would know who

946
00:45:58,200 --> 00:46:00,600
Speaker 1: I was. I said, you know, my name's Nabia. My

947
00:46:00,640 --> 00:46:02,759
Speaker 1: mother was Louise. She used to know Roy back in

948
00:46:02,760 --> 00:46:04,640
Speaker 1: the early seventies, and they were kind of dropped all

949
00:46:04,680 --> 00:46:06,919
Speaker 1: these clues, but that's it, and just said, I see

950
00:46:06,960 --> 00:46:08,840
Speaker 1: he's coming to town soon. I'd love to get together.

951
00:46:09,200 --> 00:46:11,720
Speaker 1: Can you give him my number or whatever. I didn't

952
00:46:11,719 --> 00:46:14,840
Speaker 1: hear back, but I mean the feeling of sending that

953
00:46:14,920 --> 00:46:17,680
Speaker 1: email was just like, I can't I mean, I remember

954
00:46:17,760 --> 00:46:20,000
Speaker 1: my heart was racing. I can't believe I just sent

955
00:46:20,040 --> 00:46:23,200
Speaker 1: it and now, and I was so nervous right after

956
00:46:23,280 --> 00:46:25,480
Speaker 1: I sent it, of all the things that might happen,

957
00:46:26,320 --> 00:46:28,160
Speaker 1: and the biggest of which what my mother won me,

958
00:46:28,239 --> 00:46:32,359
Speaker 1: of setting something up but him not following through and

959
00:46:32,400 --> 00:46:35,200
Speaker 1: me standing there, you know, waiting for him, or something

960
00:46:35,239 --> 00:46:37,480
Speaker 1: like that. I really really felt terrible, and I was

961
00:46:37,520 --> 00:46:39,760
Speaker 1: angry at myself for trying. Why did you put yourself

962
00:46:39,800 --> 00:46:41,560
Speaker 1: out there so much. What do you open to get?

963
00:46:41,600 --> 00:46:43,279
Speaker 1: All this stuff was going through my head to the

964
00:46:43,320 --> 00:46:46,480
Speaker 1: point where when I hadn't heard back, maybe even the

965
00:46:46,480 --> 00:46:49,520
Speaker 1: next day, the first thing I did was email my

966
00:46:49,600 --> 00:46:51,560
Speaker 1: friend who was the promoter at the show at the

967
00:46:51,560 --> 00:46:54,160
Speaker 1: Triple Door, and I just said, you know, spilled this

968
00:46:54,239 --> 00:46:55,480
Speaker 1: out an email. I was like, I don't know if

969
00:46:55,480 --> 00:46:57,600
Speaker 1: you know this. Roy is my father. The show is happening.

970
00:46:57,640 --> 00:47:00,560
Speaker 1: I tried his booking agent, but if that doesn't work now,

971
00:47:00,560 --> 00:47:02,759
Speaker 1: I'm at a point where I can't reel it back

972
00:47:02,800 --> 00:47:04,640
Speaker 1: and I need to just show up. Will you let

973
00:47:04,680 --> 00:47:08,360
Speaker 1: me backstage in three months or It was so unnecessarily early,

974
00:47:08,800 --> 00:47:11,319
Speaker 1: but I was just so so I had so much

975
00:47:11,320 --> 00:47:12,920
Speaker 1: anxiety about it. And he said sure, he can come

976
00:47:12,960 --> 00:47:14,520
Speaker 1: backstage at the show. And there was this thing in

977
00:47:14,560 --> 00:47:17,359
Speaker 1: my head that was, unless I hear back from him,

978
00:47:17,600 --> 00:47:19,520
Speaker 1: I'm going to show up that night and walk right

979
00:47:19,560 --> 00:47:22,480
Speaker 1: in and say hi, and that's going to be really,

980
00:47:22,760 --> 00:47:25,120
Speaker 1: really difficult, and I really don't want to do that.

981
00:47:27,000 --> 00:47:29,839
Speaker 1: So I had a little bit of time, and maybe

982
00:47:29,840 --> 00:47:32,240
Speaker 1: a week later, I just emailed the booking agent again

983
00:47:32,920 --> 00:47:35,400
Speaker 1: and said, Okay, that last email was kind of soft.

984
00:47:35,600 --> 00:47:38,880
Speaker 1: Roy is my father. I haven't seen him in however long,

985
00:47:39,440 --> 00:47:41,200
Speaker 1: I am going to this show no matter what, and

986
00:47:41,239 --> 00:47:42,880
Speaker 1: I'm going to talk to him. It would be a

987
00:47:42,920 --> 00:47:46,839
Speaker 1: lot easier if you could help facilitate that, like kind

988
00:47:46,840 --> 00:47:49,480
Speaker 1: of threatening email something that is really not my style,

989
00:47:49,520 --> 00:47:52,040
Speaker 1: but it was so it was just weighing on me

990
00:47:52,080 --> 00:47:55,000
Speaker 1: so heavily, and I was so scared for you know,

991
00:47:55,080 --> 00:47:57,640
Speaker 1: I'd rather send a threatening email than show up and

992
00:47:58,120 --> 00:48:01,600
Speaker 1: risk who knows what. And the agent replied right away

993
00:48:01,600 --> 00:48:03,960
Speaker 1: and said, yeah, yeah, I'm forwarding this to Roy, like

994
00:48:04,560 --> 00:48:07,480
Speaker 1: my female and I was like, oh god, okay, And

995
00:48:07,520 --> 00:48:09,360
Speaker 1: so at least that to me sort of put it

996
00:48:09,360 --> 00:48:10,719
Speaker 1: out of my head. And I was going to the

997
00:48:10,719 --> 00:48:13,399
Speaker 1: therapist too. But to me, however far away, the show

998
00:48:13,480 --> 00:48:16,360
Speaker 1: was still weeks away. There's nothing to do now, this

999
00:48:16,440 --> 00:48:19,239
Speaker 1: guy's forwarding it to Roy, my friend's getting me backstage.

1000
00:48:19,480 --> 00:48:22,120
Speaker 1: There's nothing for me to do until that day, either

1001
00:48:22,160 --> 00:48:23,640
Speaker 1: I hear from him or I don't. But you know,

1002
00:48:23,800 --> 00:48:27,080
Speaker 1: there's no reason to make myself sick every day. And

1003
00:48:27,200 --> 00:48:30,400
Speaker 1: out of the blue, one day, I wake up to

1004
00:48:30,440 --> 00:48:32,520
Speaker 1: a voicemail from a New York number and I'm like, oh,

1005
00:48:32,520 --> 00:48:34,200
Speaker 1: I wonder what that is. And I listened to it

1006
00:48:34,239 --> 00:48:37,040
Speaker 1: and it's him. It's Roy, my father. The first time,

1007
00:48:37,080 --> 00:48:39,360
Speaker 1: of course he's ever called me, and maybe even the

1008
00:48:39,360 --> 00:48:41,719
Speaker 1: first time I've heard him say my name, which I

1009
00:48:41,719 --> 00:48:45,280
Speaker 1: thought was interesting, and he has this very like, calm,

1010
00:48:45,400 --> 00:48:47,480
Speaker 1: nice voice, and he just I can't believe I didn't

1011
00:48:47,520 --> 00:48:52,040
Speaker 1: save this voicemail, just thinking myself, but but he just says, Hey,

1012
00:48:52,040 --> 00:48:54,000
Speaker 1: it's Roy. I hear you're in Seattle. I'm gonna be

1013
00:48:54,000 --> 00:48:57,160
Speaker 1: there soon, you know, Okay, call me back, like really,

1014
00:48:57,280 --> 00:48:59,839
Speaker 1: like as if we were buddies, or as if we'd

1015
00:49:00,120 --> 00:49:02,680
Speaker 1: out last year, like very sort of but in a nice,

1016
00:49:02,760 --> 00:49:07,560
Speaker 1: not hurried, like very welcoming voicemail. And I listened to

1017
00:49:07,600 --> 00:49:11,640
Speaker 1: it several times. I was so happy, and I can't

1018
00:49:11,680 --> 00:49:14,880
Speaker 1: tell if the happiness was wow, my father called me

1019
00:49:14,920 --> 00:49:17,160
Speaker 1: and said my name and was nice, or if the

1020
00:49:17,200 --> 00:49:20,319
Speaker 1: happiness was, man, I'm so glad I don't have to

1021
00:49:20,360 --> 00:49:22,799
Speaker 1: go crash his backstage, which and I'm sure it was

1022
00:49:22,800 --> 00:49:26,600
Speaker 1: a combination, but it was just sort of relief and

1023
00:49:26,680 --> 00:49:28,680
Speaker 1: a bit of acceptance and all this stuff at the

1024
00:49:28,719 --> 00:49:32,200
Speaker 1: same time. It was really a really intense morning. I

1025
00:49:32,200 --> 00:49:35,040
Speaker 1: remember really clearing my head for some reason, thinking like,

1026
00:49:35,600 --> 00:49:37,279
Speaker 1: when I call him, it needs to be perfect I

1027
00:49:37,320 --> 00:49:39,040
Speaker 1: can't just like call him right back right now. I

1028
00:49:39,080 --> 00:49:41,399
Speaker 1: need to go to work, look at the numbers from

1029
00:49:41,440 --> 00:49:44,160
Speaker 1: last night, drink my coffee, do my little morning routine,

1030
00:49:44,200 --> 00:49:46,520
Speaker 1: and then call him when my brain's kind of clear.

1031
00:49:46,600 --> 00:49:48,960
Speaker 1: And I do and he picks up, and it's just

1032
00:49:49,000 --> 00:49:51,440
Speaker 1: as wonderful as the voicemail is super friendly, and it

1033
00:49:51,480 --> 00:49:53,360
Speaker 1: turns into you know, great, I'll pick you up at

1034
00:49:53,360 --> 00:49:55,120
Speaker 1: your hotel the day of the show. We'll go to

1035
00:49:55,200 --> 00:49:57,480
Speaker 1: lunch and I'll see you then. And it's in a

1036
00:49:57,480 --> 00:49:59,600
Speaker 1: week or something. And I call my mother all excited,

1037
00:49:59,680 --> 00:50:02,799
Speaker 1: you know, kind of a nicer version of you know,

1038
00:50:02,840 --> 00:50:04,719
Speaker 1: everything you're worried about is not going to happen. He's

1039
00:50:04,760 --> 00:50:07,480
Speaker 1: so great, and she's just like, he's not gonna come.

1040
00:50:08,000 --> 00:50:09,719
Speaker 1: And this is, you know, this is not who my

1041
00:50:09,760 --> 00:50:12,200
Speaker 1: mother is. This is not me with like god, Mom,

1042
00:50:12,239 --> 00:50:15,239
Speaker 1: you always do that. It's the opposite of that. So

1043
00:50:15,360 --> 00:50:18,000
Speaker 1: it still really shakes me, just that, just about this

1044
00:50:18,040 --> 00:50:21,600
Speaker 1: specific thing and a specific person, how little she believes

1045
00:50:21,600 --> 00:50:24,239
Speaker 1: in him and how worried she is about me. But

1046
00:50:24,880 --> 00:50:28,319
Speaker 1: he does. And I remember weirdly pulling up to the

1047
00:50:28,320 --> 00:50:31,160
Speaker 1: hotel and thinking I should be so nervous right now,

1048
00:50:31,160 --> 00:50:33,480
Speaker 1: but I'm not even a little bit nervous, and maybe

1049
00:50:33,520 --> 00:50:35,560
Speaker 1: it was because of the ease of those phone calls,

1050
00:50:35,600 --> 00:50:39,000
Speaker 1: but I just parked the car, walked in and saw

1051
00:50:39,040 --> 00:50:41,960
Speaker 1: this guy who was obviously him, and we both kind

1052
00:50:42,000 --> 00:50:45,040
Speaker 1: of smiled and pointed each other out, and just like

1053
00:50:45,160 --> 00:50:49,960
Speaker 1: immediately it was easy. It just it really did feel natural,

1054
00:50:50,000 --> 00:50:52,040
Speaker 1: as if we'd talked before, or as if we'd hung

1055
00:50:52,080 --> 00:50:55,760
Speaker 1: out before, and this was a continuation of something something recent.

1056
00:50:55,920 --> 00:50:58,319
Speaker 1: There was no like, God, I can't believe him looking

1057
00:50:58,360 --> 00:51:02,080
Speaker 1: at you. It just wasn't that at all, very unique, weird,

1058
00:51:02,200 --> 00:51:05,960
Speaker 1: special experience. He said he wanted sushi, So there's lots

1059
00:51:05,960 --> 00:51:07,960
Speaker 1: of great sushi in Seattle, but we were supposed to

1060
00:51:08,000 --> 00:51:09,640
Speaker 1: go to my favorite place. We pulled up and it

1061
00:51:09,680 --> 00:51:11,640
Speaker 1: was closed on whatever day of the week that was,

1062
00:51:11,680 --> 00:51:14,600
Speaker 1: and I remember feeling so like I was trying to

1063
00:51:14,640 --> 00:51:17,759
Speaker 1: impress him, you know, with great sushi in Seattle. Now

1064
00:51:17,800 --> 00:51:19,480
Speaker 1: I have to go to this other place that's still

1065
00:51:19,560 --> 00:51:22,640
Speaker 1: really good, but not as good. So definitely these funny

1066
00:51:22,640 --> 00:51:25,520
Speaker 1: things of like do I care that he's my father

1067
00:51:25,640 --> 00:51:27,800
Speaker 1: or do I not? I'm not sure, But to me

1068
00:51:28,080 --> 00:51:30,000
Speaker 1: that was a moment of me caring that I was

1069
00:51:30,000 --> 00:51:33,680
Speaker 1: trying to impress my father, and we so we have sushi,

1070
00:51:33,760 --> 00:51:38,040
Speaker 1: and I just kind of launch in till I mean,

1071
00:51:38,080 --> 00:51:39,840
Speaker 1: I brought a notebook and I said, you know, do

1072
00:51:39,840 --> 00:51:41,000
Speaker 1: you mind if I take some notes. I have a

1073
00:51:41,040 --> 00:51:42,759
Speaker 1: lot of questions. He was like, yeah, that's fine. He

1074
00:51:42,840 --> 00:51:45,520
Speaker 1: was very calm, very present, didn't feel like he wanted

1075
00:51:45,560 --> 00:51:49,000
Speaker 1: to leave or had to leave. And I asked about family,

1076
00:51:49,040 --> 00:51:51,480
Speaker 1: and I asked about medical history, and he told me everything,

1077
00:51:51,520 --> 00:51:53,360
Speaker 1: told me about his three sisters and as much as

1078
00:51:53,360 --> 00:51:56,280
Speaker 1: he could about his parents, and I was furiously writing.

1079
00:51:56,880 --> 00:51:58,920
Speaker 1: And also when I would look at him, it was

1080
00:51:59,120 --> 00:52:02,200
Speaker 1: just so intense to sit across the table from this

1081
00:52:02,239 --> 00:52:04,439
Speaker 1: person who looked so much like me. He was thirty

1082
00:52:04,520 --> 00:52:07,640
Speaker 1: years older, but he would like even just like scratch

1083
00:52:07,680 --> 00:52:10,600
Speaker 1: his eye or laugh or make some kind of gesture,

1084
00:52:10,600 --> 00:52:12,520
Speaker 1: and it was seriously like looking into a mirror. And

1085
00:52:12,520 --> 00:52:16,080
Speaker 1: I just couldn't believe for how little time we'd spent together,

1086
00:52:16,120 --> 00:52:19,600
Speaker 1: which was seriously, what maybe five minutes of my life

1087
00:52:19,640 --> 00:52:22,600
Speaker 1: in five different spurts up to that point, to look

1088
00:52:22,640 --> 00:52:25,920
Speaker 1: at him and see how insanely much not looked, but

1089
00:52:25,960 --> 00:52:28,839
Speaker 1: how much he felt like me, and how wild it

1090
00:52:28,960 --> 00:52:31,920
Speaker 1: was to see that, and feel that it was really

1091
00:52:31,920 --> 00:52:34,719
Speaker 1: intense and incredible and really cool. And I think he

1092
00:52:34,800 --> 00:52:36,520
Speaker 1: noticed it too, and he pointed at me and he's like,

1093
00:52:36,520 --> 00:52:39,239
Speaker 1: oh you got He pointed to his head and he's like,

1094
00:52:39,280 --> 00:52:41,200
Speaker 1: oh you got You lost your hair before I did,

1095
00:52:41,239 --> 00:52:44,440
Speaker 1: said things like that. But also what was happening He

1096
00:52:44,480 --> 00:52:46,319
Speaker 1: pointed to his cheek bones, He's like, oh, you got

1097
00:52:46,320 --> 00:52:48,960
Speaker 1: these two Native American blood. So what was happening for

1098
00:52:49,040 --> 00:52:52,480
Speaker 1: me was not just the connection thing, but he was

1099
00:52:52,920 --> 00:52:57,920
Speaker 1: absolutely confirming that I was his son, which I didn't doubt,

1100
00:52:58,160 --> 00:53:01,160
Speaker 1: but I wondered if he doubted. And the fact that

1101
00:53:01,200 --> 00:53:03,000
Speaker 1: he was saying, oh, you got this from me, you

1102
00:53:03,040 --> 00:53:05,800
Speaker 1: got this from me, and surely saw the same manners

1103
00:53:05,800 --> 00:53:08,319
Speaker 1: and things that I saw, I think made it undeniable.

1104
00:53:08,760 --> 00:53:12,040
Speaker 1: And he was just very obviously you know, knew it.

1105
00:53:12,120 --> 00:53:14,920
Speaker 1: And so those things were great. I mean I really

1106
00:53:15,040 --> 00:53:17,439
Speaker 1: was trying to drag out the lunch. It was only lunch,

1107
00:53:17,480 --> 00:53:19,120
Speaker 1: but they were like, do you want dessert or coffee?

1108
00:53:19,160 --> 00:53:20,799
Speaker 1: And I would you know, at a meal like that,

1109
00:53:20,880 --> 00:53:22,440
Speaker 1: you look at the other person and say, I don't know,

1110
00:53:22,440 --> 00:53:23,960
Speaker 1: what do you think? I was just like, yes, yes,

1111
00:53:24,360 --> 00:53:27,200
Speaker 1: you know. I keep bringing us things because I need

1112
00:53:27,200 --> 00:53:29,799
Speaker 1: to take this longer. Can you take a while, because

1113
00:53:29,840 --> 00:53:33,240
Speaker 1: I just wanted more information, and at the time, even

1114
00:53:33,280 --> 00:53:36,319
Speaker 1: though I wanted it to happen more, I think I

1115
00:53:36,440 --> 00:53:40,000
Speaker 1: knew this is it. This is never happening again. I

1116
00:53:40,080 --> 00:53:42,280
Speaker 1: really felt like that, like I have to get everything

1117
00:53:42,280 --> 00:53:45,160
Speaker 1: I can right now, because no matter how natural and

1118
00:53:45,280 --> 00:53:47,880
Speaker 1: great and this feels, and how much it feels like,

1119
00:53:48,520 --> 00:53:50,239
Speaker 1: I'll be able to do this from now on, I

1120
00:53:50,280 --> 00:53:53,040
Speaker 1: don't think that's true. I think I knew that, and

1121
00:53:53,120 --> 00:53:55,200
Speaker 1: so I was just trying to get it all in.

1122
00:53:55,280 --> 00:53:57,479
Speaker 1: And there's a moment towards the end where he looked

1123
00:53:57,480 --> 00:54:00,000
Speaker 1: at me and he said, you know, I'm proud of you.

1124
00:54:00,440 --> 00:54:03,680
Speaker 1: And it really hit me in the wrong way. It

1125
00:54:03,680 --> 00:54:06,279
Speaker 1: didn't hit me, especially after everything I was feeling and

1126
00:54:06,760 --> 00:54:10,239
Speaker 1: feeling connected and seeing are similar mannerisms and everything. It

1127
00:54:10,520 --> 00:54:14,520
Speaker 1: just went through my brain too quickly. It went right

1128
00:54:14,560 --> 00:54:16,239
Speaker 1: to the other side. It didn't go to my heart.

1129
00:54:16,280 --> 00:54:18,799
Speaker 1: It went to my brain. And I didn't say this,

1130
00:54:18,880 --> 00:54:21,160
Speaker 1: of course, but what I thought was, Oh, you should

1131
00:54:21,160 --> 00:54:23,040
Speaker 1: really just say you're proud of yourself, because you're just

1132
00:54:23,080 --> 00:54:24,880
Speaker 1: looking at me thinking you did a good job and

1133
00:54:24,920 --> 00:54:27,840
Speaker 1: you got away with a lot. That's what it felt like,

1134
00:54:28,480 --> 00:54:29,680
Speaker 1: but I didn't say that. Of course.

1135
00:54:30,880 --> 00:54:34,320
Speaker 2: Well, it's so interesting because you know, for your whole life,

1136
00:54:34,760 --> 00:54:37,560
Speaker 2: when it came to your father, both for you and

1137
00:54:37,600 --> 00:54:40,279
Speaker 2: your mother, there always was this feeling of, you know,

1138
00:54:40,719 --> 00:54:43,120
Speaker 2: wanting him to see, look how well we did. But

1139
00:54:43,200 --> 00:54:46,720
Speaker 2: it didn't have the quality of so that you'll be proud,

1140
00:54:46,840 --> 00:54:51,200
Speaker 2: like it's actually not about you, right, So it was

1141
00:54:51,239 --> 00:54:53,600
Speaker 2: more like you and your mom. It was about your

1142
00:54:53,640 --> 00:55:00,000
Speaker 2: mom saying or showing that she had done this amazing thing.

1143
00:55:00,160 --> 00:55:01,799
Speaker 2: She had had this vision for the way she wanted

1144
00:55:01,840 --> 00:55:03,879
Speaker 2: to live her life and what she wanted to do

1145
00:55:03,920 --> 00:55:06,880
Speaker 2: that was very much out of step with the times

1146
00:55:06,880 --> 00:55:09,319
Speaker 2: that she was living in, and she did it. So

1147
00:55:09,440 --> 00:55:12,000
Speaker 2: for him to turn to you and say I'm proud

1148
00:55:12,000 --> 00:55:15,719
Speaker 2: of you almost has like a whiff of ownership exactly.

1149
00:55:15,760 --> 00:55:18,560
Speaker 1: That's exactly what it felt like. And my initial knee

1150
00:55:18,600 --> 00:55:20,719
Speaker 1: jerk was you don't get to take any of this.

1151
00:55:25,760 --> 00:55:26,600
Speaker 3: We'll be right back.

1152
00:55:39,280 --> 00:55:44,239
Speaker 2: This lunch strikes another sour note when Nabil's have siblings

1153
00:55:44,760 --> 00:55:47,880
Speaker 2: and to May and Ayana come up in conversation.

1154
00:55:50,120 --> 00:55:54,040
Speaker 1: That's the first moment where I feel sort of non openness.

1155
00:55:54,080 --> 00:55:55,880
Speaker 1: I suppose everything else I've asked you know, tell me

1156
00:55:55,920 --> 00:55:57,960
Speaker 1: about your mother, tell me about how you got into music.

1157
00:55:57,960 --> 00:55:59,520
Speaker 1: It was really just like an interview, and he just

1158
00:55:59,719 --> 00:56:02,600
Speaker 1: mat went into it, told me everything, and I asked

1159
00:56:02,640 --> 00:56:04,759
Speaker 1: about family. Another kid, you know, one is in North

1160
00:56:04,760 --> 00:56:06,920
Speaker 1: Carolina in two May, and so I wasn't as focused

1161
00:56:06,960 --> 00:56:08,560
Speaker 1: on him because I've lived in Seattle and I was

1162
00:56:08,560 --> 00:56:10,839
Speaker 1: in New York a lot. And Iana is in New York.

1163
00:56:10,880 --> 00:56:12,200
Speaker 1: And I said, wow, I'd love to meet her. I'm

1164
00:56:12,200 --> 00:56:14,440
Speaker 1: in New York all the time. And he sort of

1165
00:56:14,480 --> 00:56:17,560
Speaker 1: physically I could see it, like, you know, that's that

1166
00:56:17,680 --> 00:56:19,799
Speaker 1: was the first thing I said that just gave him

1167
00:56:19,800 --> 00:56:22,719
Speaker 1: some reservation, and he kind of he said something I

1168
00:56:22,760 --> 00:56:24,680
Speaker 1: don't remember exactly what, but it's something like, oh, that

1169
00:56:24,760 --> 00:56:26,840
Speaker 1: might take some time, or something that was, you know,

1170
00:56:26,920 --> 00:56:30,200
Speaker 1: a bit political and not no and maybe even reasonable too.

1171
00:56:30,560 --> 00:56:31,960
Speaker 1: But it was just the first thing that I'd sort

1172
00:56:32,000 --> 00:56:34,640
Speaker 1: of felt like, oh, Okay, I'm definitely not just getting everything

1173
00:56:34,640 --> 00:56:36,680
Speaker 1: I want from sitting here for an hour an hour

1174
00:56:36,680 --> 00:56:39,239
Speaker 1: and a half. And I really loved the idea of

1175
00:56:39,520 --> 00:56:41,359
Speaker 1: my half siblings, so that was disappointing.

1176
00:56:43,120 --> 00:56:46,800
Speaker 2: Later that evening, Roy plays his show No Bill attends

1177
00:56:47,080 --> 00:56:50,319
Speaker 2: but doesn't go backstage after all. He goes right home

1178
00:56:50,400 --> 00:56:54,279
Speaker 2: after the performance, feeling content he'd asked enough of the

1179
00:56:54,400 --> 00:56:57,840
Speaker 2: day and of his father. Things had mostly gone so

1180
00:56:57,960 --> 00:57:01,399
Speaker 2: well at lunch, Why risk heaven another interaction that might

1181
00:57:01,480 --> 00:57:06,640
Speaker 2: not go as smoothly, But quickly after this connective day

1182
00:57:06,640 --> 00:57:11,920
Speaker 2: with Roy, a tidal wave of longing comes crashing into nubil.

1183
00:57:13,000 --> 00:57:17,200
Speaker 2: That long, friendly lunch had unleashed something in him that

1184
00:57:17,360 --> 00:57:21,160
Speaker 2: was either really buried or not previously there at all,

1185
00:57:21,800 --> 00:57:24,440
Speaker 2: a longing for a relationship with his father.

1186
00:57:25,800 --> 00:57:28,720
Speaker 1: I was in New York easily five or six times

1187
00:57:28,760 --> 00:57:32,400
Speaker 1: probably that year, and so there was absolutely just like, wow,

1188
00:57:32,480 --> 00:57:34,240
Speaker 1: I need to not only do I want to meet

1189
00:57:34,440 --> 00:57:36,880
Speaker 1: my sister, but I would like to sit with him again.

1190
00:57:36,960 --> 00:57:40,480
Speaker 1: I want to learn more. And there weren't specific unanswered questions.

1191
00:57:40,480 --> 00:57:43,480
Speaker 1: I think I got everything specific in that one interview.

1192
00:57:43,520 --> 00:57:45,600
Speaker 1: It would have been very easy to say I did it.

1193
00:57:46,080 --> 00:57:48,360
Speaker 1: I don't need anything more. I have all the information

1194
00:57:48,400 --> 00:57:50,200
Speaker 1: I'm going to get. I met him, we connected, It

1195
00:57:50,520 --> 00:57:53,600
Speaker 1: was positive the end, and I know maybe I should

1196
00:57:53,640 --> 00:57:56,360
Speaker 1: have done that because what happened was, and I think

1197
00:57:56,360 --> 00:57:57,760
Speaker 1: I said to him at that lunch like I'm in

1198
00:57:57,760 --> 00:57:59,920
Speaker 1: New York all the time. It would be great to

1199
00:58:00,200 --> 00:58:03,600
Speaker 1: like get coffee, and really, what I was saying was like, look,

1200
00:58:03,760 --> 00:58:07,080
Speaker 1: I'm thirty five, you met me. I'm not crazy, I'm

1201
00:58:07,120 --> 00:58:09,440
Speaker 1: making you look good. I'm not asking for money. I'm

1202
00:58:09,480 --> 00:58:13,840
Speaker 1: not asking for anything. You got office Scott free let me,

1203
00:58:14,000 --> 00:58:15,640
Speaker 1: you know, hang out with me once in a while

1204
00:58:15,680 --> 00:58:17,760
Speaker 1: and give me some more information. That's I think what

1205
00:58:17,880 --> 00:58:20,800
Speaker 1: I was saying pretty plainly, and he said yeah, of course,

1206
00:58:21,280 --> 00:58:23,120
Speaker 1: And so to me, I was like, Wow, this will

1207
00:58:23,160 --> 00:58:24,920
Speaker 1: be cool. I'll get coffee with him again in New

1208
00:58:25,000 --> 00:58:26,640
Speaker 1: York and maybe I'll learn some more and maybe I'll

1209
00:58:26,680 --> 00:58:30,120
Speaker 1: eventually meet my half siblings, and connecting with him might

1210
00:58:30,200 --> 00:58:33,400
Speaker 1: be part of that, because really my target was the siblings.

1211
00:58:34,120 --> 00:58:36,240
Speaker 1: And so every time I went to New York, I

1212
00:58:36,240 --> 00:58:38,760
Speaker 1: would email him first, I would call him. I was

1213
00:58:38,800 --> 00:58:40,480
Speaker 1: really always trying to set it up, like are you

1214
00:58:40,520 --> 00:58:42,920
Speaker 1: in town, And that's when it kind of turned into

1215
00:58:43,680 --> 00:58:45,320
Speaker 1: he never emailed me that so I was like, Okay,

1216
00:58:45,320 --> 00:58:47,000
Speaker 1: if he's not good on email, that's fine. I would

1217
00:58:47,080 --> 00:58:50,000
Speaker 1: call or text and sometimes he would pick up and

1218
00:58:50,040 --> 00:58:52,560
Speaker 1: I would have to explain who I was. And that

1219
00:58:52,760 --> 00:58:55,680
Speaker 1: was maybe the worst feeling of all the bad feelings.

1220
00:58:55,720 --> 00:58:57,840
Speaker 1: It was felt more like being a kid at elected

1221
00:58:57,920 --> 00:59:01,560
Speaker 1: Lady or someplace where you know, it's hey, it's no Bill,

1222
00:59:02,400 --> 00:59:04,560
Speaker 1: and he'd say who is this? And I should just

1223
00:59:04,560 --> 00:59:07,520
Speaker 1: feel like the logical thing would be to say the

1224
00:59:07,600 --> 00:59:10,240
Speaker 1: Bill your son, but I was never gonna say that

1225
00:59:10,360 --> 00:59:13,000
Speaker 1: because that's not what I felt like, and so I

1226
00:59:13,000 --> 00:59:16,320
Speaker 1: would say the bille in Seattle or like in the

1227
00:59:16,400 --> 00:59:20,920
Speaker 1: Bille Louise's, like, you know, anything but your son. That'd

1228
00:59:20,960 --> 00:59:24,040
Speaker 1: have to do this weird, weird dance to try to explain,

1229
00:59:24,120 --> 00:59:25,720
Speaker 1: and then he'd be like, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, how's

1230
00:59:25,720 --> 00:59:28,600
Speaker 1: it going, you know, And it always really quick, always

1231
00:59:28,600 --> 00:59:30,560
Speaker 1: felt like he was doing seven other things at once,

1232
00:59:30,640 --> 00:59:32,560
Speaker 1: and it didn't even feel personal. It just felt like,

1233
00:59:32,640 --> 00:59:34,400
Speaker 1: this is what I'm like on the phone. I'm busy,

1234
00:59:35,360 --> 00:59:37,680
Speaker 1: and so I was always so nervous. I'd have to Rushian's,

1235
00:59:37,720 --> 00:59:39,000
Speaker 1: you know, I'm gonna be in New York next week,

1236
00:59:39,640 --> 00:59:41,520
Speaker 1: I'm playing or I can come meet somewhere and he'd

1237
00:59:41,520 --> 00:59:43,960
Speaker 1: be like, oh, oh, I'm gonna be in Russia and

1238
00:59:44,080 --> 00:59:46,760
Speaker 1: be like what, And then we'd hang up and I

1239
00:59:46,760 --> 00:59:48,600
Speaker 1: would go to Royers dot com and I would see

1240
00:59:48,600 --> 00:59:50,920
Speaker 1: who was playing Saint Petersburg next week, And so it

1241
00:59:50,960 --> 00:59:52,880
Speaker 1: was almost this thing where I felt like he was

1242
00:59:52,920 --> 00:59:56,320
Speaker 1: being dishonest because these crazy stories, except he was actually

1243
00:59:56,360 --> 00:59:59,920
Speaker 1: being honest. So sometimes it was true, but other time

1244
01:00:00,240 --> 01:00:02,320
Speaker 1: it was just like, Okay, call me when you get

1245
01:00:02,360 --> 01:00:03,960
Speaker 1: to town or something like that. But it was always

1246
01:00:04,000 --> 01:00:07,680
Speaker 1: a kind of brush off and it never culminated in anything.

1247
01:00:07,760 --> 01:00:10,800
Speaker 1: And every time on those trips I was thinking about

1248
01:00:10,880 --> 01:00:13,880
Speaker 1: him definitely sort of reverted it to a needy kid

1249
01:00:14,160 --> 01:00:16,400
Speaker 1: in some ways for the first time in my thirties.

1250
01:00:16,880 --> 01:00:21,360
Speaker 1: And eventually, almost exactly a year after that first Seattle night,

1251
01:00:22,080 --> 01:00:24,120
Speaker 1: I see that he's playing in Seattle again, and it's

1252
01:00:24,160 --> 01:00:26,240
Speaker 1: at a different club. It's one block from my apartment.

1253
01:00:26,320 --> 01:00:28,520
Speaker 1: So in my head, I'm like, Okay, let's reset everything.

1254
01:00:29,200 --> 01:00:31,440
Speaker 1: Maybe he's just not good when he's home. He travels

1255
01:00:31,440 --> 01:00:32,960
Speaker 1: a lot. It's been too much to try to do

1256
01:00:33,000 --> 01:00:34,960
Speaker 1: all these New York things. I'm just going to try

1257
01:00:34,960 --> 01:00:38,280
Speaker 1: to recreate last year because that works so well. So

1258
01:00:38,280 --> 01:00:40,600
Speaker 1: so I called him and said, you know, I live

1259
01:00:40,640 --> 01:00:42,920
Speaker 1: a block from the venue you're playing in Seattle. It

1260
01:00:42,920 --> 01:00:44,440
Speaker 1: would be great to see you that night. Maybe the

1261
01:00:44,440 --> 01:00:46,280
Speaker 1: whole band come up, come up, and I'll make dinner

1262
01:00:46,320 --> 01:00:47,840
Speaker 1: for everybody. And I was just thinking about how to

1263
01:00:47,880 --> 01:00:49,720
Speaker 1: make it easy and how to make something work. And

1264
01:00:50,400 --> 01:00:52,760
Speaker 1: he was very short, just kind of like, oh, that's

1265
01:00:52,840 --> 01:00:54,360
Speaker 1: kind of a crazy night, you know, to just come

1266
01:00:54,400 --> 01:00:55,960
Speaker 1: to the show. Just come to the show. I remember

1267
01:00:55,960 --> 01:00:58,120
Speaker 1: that's how the call ended exactly. He said that twice

1268
01:00:58,400 --> 01:00:59,800
Speaker 1: and I don't know if he hung up on me,

1269
01:00:59,840 --> 01:01:03,240
Speaker 1: but that's how it ended. And so, still being a

1270
01:01:03,240 --> 01:01:05,040
Speaker 1: person in the band, I was giving him credit. I

1271
01:01:05,040 --> 01:01:07,240
Speaker 1: thought like, Okay, you know, some people don't like to

1272
01:01:07,280 --> 01:01:09,560
Speaker 1: eat before concerts, some people don't like to make plans

1273
01:01:09,600 --> 01:01:12,760
Speaker 1: before concerts. All this. Come to the show as he suggested,

1274
01:01:13,360 --> 01:01:15,960
Speaker 1: and I did, but I didn't feel good at it.

1275
01:01:16,000 --> 01:01:18,680
Speaker 1: And I remember it sort of manifesting itself musically at

1276
01:01:18,720 --> 01:01:21,760
Speaker 1: the first pil concert. I loved the music. I was

1277
01:01:21,800 --> 01:01:24,120
Speaker 1: so amazed. I had so much fun watching the audience

1278
01:01:24,200 --> 01:01:26,600
Speaker 1: love it. I felt connected to it. And I think

1279
01:01:26,640 --> 01:01:29,439
Speaker 1: it's partially because I felt connected to him that day.

1280
01:01:30,040 --> 01:01:32,840
Speaker 1: And a year later, I was watching it and I

1281
01:01:32,920 --> 01:01:35,040
Speaker 1: just wanted it to end, and I remember thinking, man,

1282
01:01:35,120 --> 01:01:37,080
Speaker 1: is this the same band they felt sound as good?

1283
01:01:37,120 --> 01:01:39,480
Speaker 1: They're playing this song too fast, They're playing this song

1284
01:01:39,520 --> 01:01:43,080
Speaker 1: too slow. This crowd looks weird. Who are these people

1285
01:01:43,160 --> 01:01:46,120
Speaker 1: like that everything felt negative about the concert, and I'm

1286
01:01:46,120 --> 01:01:49,120
Speaker 1: sure it's because of my mindset and when it ended.

1287
01:01:49,160 --> 01:01:50,800
Speaker 1: This is more of a kind of small club. The

1288
01:01:50,840 --> 01:01:54,160
Speaker 1: other place was a theater. The band walked off the stage,

1289
01:01:54,200 --> 01:01:56,520
Speaker 1: and I had this terrible feeling like this is the

1290
01:01:56,560 --> 01:01:58,240
Speaker 1: only chance I'm going to get to talk to him.

1291
01:01:58,560 --> 01:02:01,120
Speaker 1: He might be walking into a backstae, but he also

1292
01:02:01,200 --> 01:02:03,360
Speaker 1: might be walking straight out to a car and that's it.

1293
01:02:03,680 --> 01:02:05,520
Speaker 1: So I thought that would be the only chance I

1294
01:02:05,600 --> 01:02:06,960
Speaker 1: had to talk to him. I didn't want to wait

1295
01:02:06,960 --> 01:02:08,640
Speaker 1: and see if he left and find out he did.

1296
01:02:08,720 --> 01:02:11,040
Speaker 1: So I touched his shoulder and he looked at me

1297
01:02:11,080 --> 01:02:14,800
Speaker 1: and I said, hey, wrong, it's no bill, and he said, hey,

1298
01:02:14,920 --> 01:02:19,000
Speaker 1: how you doing. I gotta go, and he pointed, you know, anywhere,

1299
01:02:19,360 --> 01:02:21,200
Speaker 1: and then just kind of walked off. And I remember

1300
01:02:21,240 --> 01:02:23,440
Speaker 1: the feeling. It felt like a movie. The way my

1301
01:02:23,520 --> 01:02:26,040
Speaker 1: hand felt and his shoulder left it. It was really

1302
01:02:26,080 --> 01:02:29,200
Speaker 1: just like that's it. That was like, that was the

1303
01:02:29,240 --> 01:02:32,120
Speaker 1: moment I get And I looked around with my two friends.

1304
01:02:32,160 --> 01:02:34,200
Speaker 1: So I'd brought my bandmate and his girlfriend. They knew

1305
01:02:34,200 --> 01:02:37,320
Speaker 1: the whole story, and they just had these really devastated

1306
01:02:37,320 --> 01:02:41,080
Speaker 1: faces on, which made me feel even worse, and that

1307
01:02:41,240 --> 01:02:48,320
Speaker 1: was it. That's the last time I saw him.

1308
01:02:48,480 --> 01:02:51,360
Speaker 2: Over the next several years now, Biale's life continues to

1309
01:02:51,400 --> 01:02:55,160
Speaker 2: evolve in wonderful ways. He moves back to New York,

1310
01:02:55,600 --> 01:02:58,560
Speaker 2: finds a place in Fort Greene, a neighborhood he loves.

1311
01:02:59,480 --> 01:03:02,400
Speaker 2: In two thousand nine, he takes a job as general

1312
01:03:02,480 --> 01:03:05,720
Speaker 2: manager of a UK record label called four AD, and

1313
01:03:05,760 --> 01:03:08,520
Speaker 2: eventually the label becomes part of a larger company with

1314
01:03:08,640 --> 01:03:13,280
Speaker 2: multiple record labels, and Nabil becomes us president of Beakers Group.

1315
01:03:14,680 --> 01:03:18,200
Speaker 2: All the success is the backdrop to a random voicemail

1316
01:03:18,240 --> 01:03:22,200
Speaker 2: one day, when Nabil is least expecting it, a message

1317
01:03:22,320 --> 01:03:26,440
Speaker 2: from Roy just calling to say, hey, thinking about you.

1318
01:03:27,800 --> 01:03:29,880
Speaker 1: It didn't make me feel good, and I'm sure that

1319
01:03:30,080 --> 01:03:32,640
Speaker 1: was how he thought it would make me feel, but

1320
01:03:32,720 --> 01:03:35,480
Speaker 1: it really immediately made me feel like maybe he just

1321
01:03:35,560 --> 01:03:38,040
Speaker 1: had some guilt and hadn't called me back. And there's

1322
01:03:38,160 --> 01:03:41,240
Speaker 1: no part of me wanted to call him and risk

1323
01:03:41,320 --> 01:03:43,800
Speaker 1: getting him at the wrong time, which was always be

1324
01:03:43,880 --> 01:03:46,479
Speaker 1: most of the time now and trying to make things worse.

1325
01:03:46,600 --> 01:03:48,680
Speaker 1: I think I decided to just leave that one as

1326
01:03:48,720 --> 01:03:51,560
Speaker 1: it was and not make any action. And there was

1327
01:03:51,600 --> 01:03:54,000
Speaker 1: no invitation. It didn't say call me or let's do something.

1328
01:03:54,000 --> 01:03:55,400
Speaker 1: It was just thinking about you.

1329
01:03:57,480 --> 01:03:59,680
Speaker 2: Though there's no part of Nabil that wants to call

1330
01:03:59,720 --> 01:04:03,200
Speaker 2: his and risk getting him at the wrong time. There's

1331
01:04:03,240 --> 01:04:06,320
Speaker 2: still the matter of his two half siblings, M two

1332
01:04:06,400 --> 01:04:10,040
Speaker 2: May and Ayana. Now Bil reaches out a number of

1333
01:04:10,040 --> 01:04:13,520
Speaker 2: times to Ayana, but she doesn't respond. He does meet

1334
01:04:13,680 --> 01:04:16,959
Speaker 2: M two May and finds himself thinking more deeply about

1335
01:04:17,000 --> 01:04:20,880
Speaker 2: what makes a family a family. Is it shared history,

1336
01:04:21,440 --> 01:04:25,680
Speaker 2: is it jeanes, Why does it matter or what really matters?

1337
01:04:25,760 --> 01:04:29,360
Speaker 2: And why he wants to know more so he sends

1338
01:04:29,400 --> 01:04:31,040
Speaker 2: away for a DNA test.

1339
01:04:33,480 --> 01:04:35,520
Speaker 1: The twenty three and me thing was so fascinating. I

1340
01:04:35,520 --> 01:04:38,800
Speaker 1: think it came from obviously it sort of failed attempts

1341
01:04:38,840 --> 01:04:42,360
Speaker 1: to connect further with my father, failed attempts to connect

1342
01:04:42,360 --> 01:04:44,080
Speaker 1: with my sister who just never got back to me.

1343
01:04:44,200 --> 01:04:46,080
Speaker 1: And then I did meet with him to May. He

1344
01:04:46,160 --> 01:04:48,720
Speaker 1: was actually quite open and we had lunch, and I

1345
01:04:48,720 --> 01:04:50,720
Speaker 1: think it was actually just the idea that we got

1346
01:04:50,720 --> 01:04:53,480
Speaker 1: along fine and he was very nice. I didn't feel

1347
01:04:53,520 --> 01:04:56,320
Speaker 1: like a connection, and that really surprised me, and so

1348
01:04:56,720 --> 01:04:59,120
Speaker 1: I kind of felt like, so that's it, that's everyone

1349
01:04:59,200 --> 01:05:01,280
Speaker 1: I'm ever going to meet, and everything I'm ever going

1350
01:05:01,360 --> 01:05:04,400
Speaker 1: to know about that side of my family. That seems impossible.

1351
01:05:04,680 --> 01:05:07,120
Speaker 1: And I know so much about my mother's side, she's

1352
01:05:07,160 --> 01:05:09,920
Speaker 1: so good at keeping track. I have pictures, family trees,

1353
01:05:10,440 --> 01:05:13,680
Speaker 1: and my father's side. That's it. So let's try twenty

1354
01:05:13,680 --> 01:05:16,080
Speaker 1: three in me this thing that everyone's doing, just to

1355
01:05:16,120 --> 01:05:19,479
Speaker 1: see what happens. It wasn't an actual goal. It wasn't

1356
01:05:19,520 --> 01:05:22,000
Speaker 1: let me find out about this person. It was really

1357
01:05:22,040 --> 01:05:25,600
Speaker 1: just like, let's see what it yields. And I did

1358
01:05:25,600 --> 01:05:27,600
Speaker 1: it and got the sort of grid back and the

1359
01:05:28,120 --> 01:05:31,200
Speaker 1: graph and everything telling me that I was fifty one

1360
01:05:31,200 --> 01:05:34,600
Speaker 1: percent Ashkenazi Jewish, which was pretty fascinating and which means

1361
01:05:34,640 --> 01:05:39,000
Speaker 1: my mother is like one hundred two percent. Yes, And

1362
01:05:39,640 --> 01:05:42,520
Speaker 1: you know, nothing surprising at all, nothing that interesting. It

1363
01:05:42,600 --> 01:05:45,600
Speaker 1: was like, ah, this is fun. And then got a message.

1364
01:05:45,600 --> 01:05:47,400
Speaker 1: Of course, I turned on the messaging thing because I'm

1365
01:05:47,400 --> 01:05:50,400
Speaker 1: trying to find people. Got a message from a guy saying,

1366
01:05:50,520 --> 01:05:52,880
Speaker 1: you know, we're distant cousins. It wasn't like a huge deal,

1367
01:05:52,960 --> 01:05:54,840
Speaker 1: but he said, I have an heirs family tree you

1368
01:05:54,920 --> 01:05:57,840
Speaker 1: might want to see. Do you want it? He emailed

1369
01:05:57,840 --> 01:06:01,120
Speaker 1: me this document and it was incredible. Guy Samuel Ayres

1370
01:06:01,400 --> 01:06:04,400
Speaker 1: wrote it in nineteen sixty three. He's my great uncle.

1371
01:06:04,840 --> 01:06:06,800
Speaker 1: And I immediately kind of flipped through it. It was

1372
01:06:07,400 --> 01:06:10,040
Speaker 1: a scan of what was a sort of loosely printed

1373
01:06:10,040 --> 01:06:11,840
Speaker 1: book it looked like, and so I scrolled to the

1374
01:06:11,960 --> 01:06:14,080
Speaker 1: end to look at the actual tree part, and I

1375
01:06:14,160 --> 01:06:18,480
Speaker 1: saw Roy, and I saw his three sisters, and I

1376
01:06:18,520 --> 01:06:21,120
Speaker 1: saw his parents' names. All of that match the NFL

1377
01:06:21,160 --> 01:06:24,600
Speaker 1: had given me. So I immediately, you know, assumed, wow,

1378
01:06:24,640 --> 01:06:26,840
Speaker 1: this is incredible, this is authentic, this is it, and

1379
01:06:26,880 --> 01:06:29,600
Speaker 1: then read the whole thing, and it starts with one

1380
01:06:29,600 --> 01:06:32,280
Speaker 1: man who was enslaved in eighteen twenty four. He was

1381
01:06:32,280 --> 01:06:35,479
Speaker 1: born in eighteen twenty four, Isaac Ayres. And it goes

1382
01:06:35,520 --> 01:06:38,280
Speaker 1: through everybody, and it goes through all these branches that

1383
01:06:38,320 --> 01:06:41,640
Speaker 1: tells stories about people, it has their photographs. It's this

1384
01:06:41,800 --> 01:06:45,360
Speaker 1: incredible document and it just blows my mind that this

1385
01:06:45,440 --> 01:06:49,040
Speaker 1: has just been sitting probably lots of places, and this

1386
01:06:49,120 --> 01:06:51,760
Speaker 1: guy was nice enough to see me connect and send

1387
01:06:51,760 --> 01:06:54,080
Speaker 1: it to me, and so that just sent me down

1388
01:06:54,080 --> 01:06:56,440
Speaker 1: this even I'm already being kind of relentless, but just

1389
01:06:56,480 --> 01:07:00,160
Speaker 1: this even more relentless search where I realized, well, now,

1390
01:07:00,200 --> 01:07:02,120
Speaker 1: I mean, now I have to research more about these

1391
01:07:02,160 --> 01:07:05,680
Speaker 1: people and it's so hard to research and slaved Americans.

1392
01:07:05,680 --> 01:07:07,800
Speaker 1: I can't get anything else. But what I can get

1393
01:07:07,920 --> 01:07:11,600
Speaker 1: is information on the slaveholder who is mentioned as a

1394
01:07:11,680 --> 01:07:14,520
Speaker 1: doctor in this town of Ashland, Mississippi, which is a

1395
01:07:14,520 --> 01:07:17,280
Speaker 1: small town. It's really easy to find stuff on him.

1396
01:07:17,520 --> 01:07:20,440
Speaker 1: And on this website find a grave. I'm looking at

1397
01:07:20,440 --> 01:07:23,439
Speaker 1: his gravestone and there's a note from a woman named

1398
01:07:23,520 --> 01:07:27,360
Speaker 1: Karen saying, you know, bless our ancestors or something like that.

1399
01:07:27,400 --> 01:07:30,800
Speaker 1: And Karen's email is sitting there, so I email her

1400
01:07:31,240 --> 01:07:34,400
Speaker 1: and it's a weird, crazy email to right saying, you know,

1401
01:07:34,600 --> 01:07:38,120
Speaker 1: I think I think your ancestors owned mine. I'm not

1402
01:07:38,240 --> 01:07:42,680
Speaker 1: after anything, just information. I have a job. Whatever the

1403
01:07:42,680 --> 01:07:45,439
Speaker 1: things you say, you can relate all the things that say,

1404
01:07:45,520 --> 01:07:48,240
Speaker 1: I really don't want anything. And then even more with

1405
01:07:48,320 --> 01:07:50,600
Speaker 1: the slaverything. I'm not coming after you. I'm not going

1406
01:07:50,680 --> 01:07:52,520
Speaker 1: to murder you, I'm not going to out you. I

1407
01:07:52,720 --> 01:07:56,280
Speaker 1: just want information. And sent that just thinking like wow,

1408
01:07:56,400 --> 01:07:58,080
Speaker 1: I mean I'm never going to hear from her, but

1409
01:07:58,120 --> 01:08:00,600
Speaker 1: I had to send it. And the next day it

1410
01:08:00,680 --> 01:08:04,320
Speaker 1: was incredibly open welcoming email from the so MA named

1411
01:08:04,360 --> 01:08:07,760
Speaker 1: Karen saying, wow, you know that's an incredible story. I

1412
01:08:07,840 --> 01:08:10,280
Speaker 1: happened to be a hobby genealogist. I know a lot

1413
01:08:10,280 --> 01:08:12,600
Speaker 1: about those times and those people, and I'm happy to

1414
01:08:12,600 --> 01:08:17,879
Speaker 1: share information. And that just turned into this long email

1415
01:08:17,880 --> 01:08:20,719
Speaker 1: for it. We never spoke emailed constantly and it would

1416
01:08:20,720 --> 01:08:24,200
Speaker 1: be half very specific here's some documents from the farm

1417
01:08:24,240 --> 01:08:26,960
Speaker 1: in eighteen sixty that I found, and then half really

1418
01:08:27,200 --> 01:08:30,000
Speaker 1: simple personal stuff about her and her husband and what

1419
01:08:30,040 --> 01:08:31,840
Speaker 1: they were making for dinner that night, and then I

1420
01:08:31,880 --> 01:08:34,640
Speaker 1: would respond the same way. And the day that I

1421
01:08:34,760 --> 01:08:37,599
Speaker 1: bought my wife her wedding ring, I got an email

1422
01:08:37,640 --> 01:08:40,519
Speaker 1: from Karen and had my reply, you know whatever, thanks

1423
01:08:40,520 --> 01:08:43,000
Speaker 1: for the information about the farm. By the way, I'm

1424
01:08:43,000 --> 01:08:45,400
Speaker 1: so excited I just bought a ring I'm proposing to Aja.

1425
01:08:45,520 --> 01:08:48,960
Speaker 1: It became this really incredible thing where she felt so

1426
01:08:48,960 --> 01:08:51,719
Speaker 1: so close in so many ways, and it was really

1427
01:08:51,800 --> 01:08:54,200
Speaker 1: fun to get that ring and think, wow, I can't

1428
01:08:54,200 --> 01:08:57,479
Speaker 1: wait for Karen to know about this. Really, we developed

1429
01:08:57,479 --> 01:09:00,320
Speaker 1: this deep important connection and I'd never even spoke into

1430
01:09:00,360 --> 01:09:00,839
Speaker 1: this person.

1431
01:09:01,960 --> 01:09:05,400
Speaker 2: It's so extraordinary and like it so underscores the whole

1432
01:09:05,400 --> 01:09:09,000
Speaker 2: idea of you know, what is family? Who do we

1433
01:09:09,000 --> 01:09:13,200
Speaker 2: connect to and why? I mean the connection that you

1434
01:09:13,280 --> 01:09:16,360
Speaker 2: had with Karen, is that, as you said, her ancestors

1435
01:09:16,400 --> 01:09:20,800
Speaker 2: owned your ancestors, and then all of these generations later

1436
01:09:20,960 --> 01:09:25,920
Speaker 2: because of generosity of spirit and curiosity and openness, it

1437
01:09:25,960 --> 01:09:29,920
Speaker 2: becomes a completely different thing. Yeah, and you know, and

1438
01:09:29,960 --> 01:09:33,880
Speaker 2: then you describe your meeting your half brother and not

1439
01:09:34,040 --> 01:09:37,400
Speaker 2: feeling a connection, you know, which is your story is

1440
01:09:37,439 --> 01:09:41,280
Speaker 2: so much about how DNA matters and doesn't matter, and

1441
01:09:41,360 --> 01:09:44,200
Speaker 2: it really just basically depends on who the people are,

1442
01:09:44,520 --> 01:09:47,080
Speaker 2: what they're bringing to the table, what they're looking for,

1443
01:09:47,200 --> 01:09:49,479
Speaker 2: and whether they connect or they don't connect.

1444
01:09:50,800 --> 01:09:54,400
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's exactly it. And that's that's really where I've landed.

1445
01:09:54,439 --> 01:09:56,479
Speaker 1: And then, you know, when my book came out in

1446
01:09:56,560 --> 01:09:58,720
Speaker 1: June twenty twenty two, and I did a lot of

1447
01:09:58,760 --> 01:10:00,680
Speaker 1: book to her in because I'm a and person and

1448
01:10:00,760 --> 01:10:02,719
Speaker 1: really wanted to do that. I wanted to meet people,

1449
01:10:02,760 --> 01:10:05,680
Speaker 1: and it was fascinating when you know, sometimes I'd meet

1450
01:10:05,720 --> 01:10:08,160
Speaker 1: someone who was a cousin, which was great. Sometimes I'd

1451
01:10:08,160 --> 01:10:10,360
Speaker 1: meet someone who was in my father's band and just

1452
01:10:10,479 --> 01:10:13,800
Speaker 1: came to tell me some story from him about the seventies.

1453
01:10:13,800 --> 01:10:17,440
Speaker 1: And all of these people felt like really strong connections,

1454
01:10:17,439 --> 01:10:20,600
Speaker 1: and it's because they found out about my story and

1455
01:10:20,640 --> 01:10:23,360
Speaker 1: they came to sort of help me or to give

1456
01:10:23,400 --> 01:10:26,160
Speaker 1: me something, or even sometimes it felt like seriously, to

1457
01:10:26,240 --> 01:10:28,920
Speaker 1: like give me a little piece of myself. They read

1458
01:10:28,920 --> 01:10:31,919
Speaker 1: this thing that sort of talked about what I'm missing,

1459
01:10:32,400 --> 01:10:34,160
Speaker 1: and they thought, well, I have some of that. So

1460
01:10:34,160 --> 01:10:36,360
Speaker 1: I'm going to go to this book talk in topio

1461
01:10:36,880 --> 01:10:38,920
Speaker 1: and tell this guy about what it was like when

1462
01:10:38,920 --> 01:10:41,720
Speaker 1: I recorded the keyboards on that song in nineteen seventy two.

1463
01:10:41,880 --> 01:10:45,320
Speaker 1: It's really fascinating to have a stack of these stories.

1464
01:10:45,360 --> 01:10:49,519
Speaker 2: Now, that's so beautiful, Nobil. The idea that people were

1465
01:10:49,600 --> 01:10:53,320
Speaker 2: showing up to give you little pieces of your life

1466
01:10:53,520 --> 01:10:56,519
Speaker 2: or your history, like to sort of, yeah, to gift

1467
01:10:56,560 --> 01:11:00,679
Speaker 2: you with these memories and these moments. But it also

1468
01:11:01,120 --> 01:11:04,439
Speaker 2: comes from having done the writing, you know, having put

1469
01:11:04,479 --> 01:11:07,000
Speaker 2: the story out there in the world so that that

1470
01:11:07,000 --> 01:11:10,200
Speaker 2: would be possible. You have all these relatives who come

1471
01:11:10,200 --> 01:11:12,719
Speaker 2: out of the woodwork, who find you, who read something

1472
01:11:12,760 --> 01:11:16,240
Speaker 2: of yours, and you know, word spreads, and the ones

1473
01:11:16,240 --> 01:11:20,840
Speaker 2: who reach out to you are incredibly embracing of you

1474
01:11:21,520 --> 01:11:27,280
Speaker 2: and embracing of you as Roy's son, embracing of you

1475
01:11:27,520 --> 01:11:31,439
Speaker 2: as their relatives, their nephew, their cousin.

1476
01:11:32,240 --> 01:11:35,360
Speaker 1: Yeah. So as a result of the family tree in

1477
01:11:35,400 --> 01:11:38,439
Speaker 1: the Karen story. I wrote the story for NPR code

1478
01:11:38,439 --> 01:11:41,120
Speaker 1: Switch that they published on Thanksgiving, and that got kind

1479
01:11:41,120 --> 01:11:44,800
Speaker 1: of shared and some cousins read it. And these are

1480
01:11:44,960 --> 01:11:48,320
Speaker 1: very close cousins. This is Roy's sister's daughter, so my

1481
01:11:48,479 --> 01:11:51,439
Speaker 1: first cousin, and she messaged me on Facebook saying, this

1482
01:11:51,520 --> 01:11:54,160
Speaker 1: is amazing. We're cousins. Let's talk. And even just that

1483
01:11:54,320 --> 01:11:57,400
Speaker 1: idea was so sort of a lightning bolt, like, wait

1484
01:11:57,439 --> 01:12:00,599
Speaker 1: a minute, I have close relatives who are interested and connecting,

1485
01:12:00,640 --> 01:12:03,479
Speaker 1: and so we immediately got on this phone call, taught

1486
01:12:03,479 --> 01:12:06,000
Speaker 1: for a while, connected so much. They live in Los Angeles,

1487
01:12:06,080 --> 01:12:08,400
Speaker 1: and at the end of the call, she said, oh,

1488
01:12:08,400 --> 01:12:10,559
Speaker 1: by the way, you should call your aunt, michelle A.

1489
01:12:11,320 --> 01:12:13,040
Speaker 1: She wants to meet you. And I thought that all

1490
01:12:13,080 --> 01:12:15,640
Speaker 1: three of my father's sisters had passed, but michell A

1491
01:12:15,800 --> 01:12:18,960
Speaker 1: was still alive. So I call her immediately, and this

1492
01:12:19,120 --> 01:12:21,439
Speaker 1: is my father's sister, my aunt. This is as close

1493
01:12:21,439 --> 01:12:24,680
Speaker 1: as it gets. And this woman is just wonderful, so delightful,

1494
01:12:24,720 --> 01:12:28,760
Speaker 1: so many questions. Really immediately feels like my aunt. I

1495
01:12:28,800 --> 01:12:32,000
Speaker 1: go to La Fast for a work trip and have

1496
01:12:32,160 --> 01:12:34,240
Speaker 1: lunch with her, and I mean she's in her seventies.

1497
01:12:34,240 --> 01:12:36,960
Speaker 1: She shows up with this heavy bag full of photos,

1498
01:12:37,000 --> 01:12:40,959
Speaker 1: photos of my grandparents, photos of them as kids, family photos,

1499
01:12:41,960 --> 01:12:45,519
Speaker 1: really incredible stuff. And you know, she unfortunately passed away

1500
01:12:45,840 --> 01:12:48,639
Speaker 1: last year, but I got to have a few great

1501
01:12:48,720 --> 01:12:50,479
Speaker 1: days with her, one of which is a big part

1502
01:12:50,520 --> 01:12:52,240
Speaker 1: of the book. But I said, you know, I would

1503
01:12:52,280 --> 01:12:55,360
Speaker 1: love to go to the cemetery sometime and see my

1504
01:12:55,479 --> 01:12:59,160
Speaker 1: grandparents grave, your parents, And she takes me to the

1505
01:12:59,160 --> 01:13:02,360
Speaker 1: cemetery in England would and it was just this incredible

1506
01:13:02,360 --> 01:13:04,280
Speaker 1: moment where the two of us we walked there kind

1507
01:13:04,280 --> 01:13:06,400
Speaker 1: of she's old and needed help walking, so we were

1508
01:13:06,479 --> 01:13:09,960
Speaker 1: kind of locked arms and stood over my grandparents grave

1509
01:13:10,000 --> 01:13:12,760
Speaker 1: and she just introduced me to my grandmother as if

1510
01:13:12,760 --> 01:13:15,360
Speaker 1: my grandmother was standing there, and said these really nice

1511
01:13:15,360 --> 01:13:18,240
Speaker 1: things about me, and again just sort of legitimize, like

1512
01:13:18,880 --> 01:13:22,040
Speaker 1: you know, I am your daughter and this is my nephew,

1513
01:13:22,160 --> 01:13:24,519
Speaker 1: and we are all related and all connected. And it

1514
01:13:24,560 --> 01:13:27,040
Speaker 1: was very powerful, incredible experience.

1515
01:13:31,720 --> 01:13:36,400
Speaker 2: Here's Nobiel reading one last passage from his remarkable memoir

1516
01:13:36,920 --> 01:13:38,200
Speaker 2: My Life in the Sunshine.

1517
01:13:42,200 --> 01:13:45,880
Speaker 1: Beloved father and mother lay below airs. Their names and

1518
01:13:45,960 --> 01:13:49,320
Speaker 1: dates were below that roy E nineteen oh five to

1519
01:13:49,400 --> 01:13:53,080
Speaker 1: nineteen sixty nine and Ruby m nineteen oh seven to

1520
01:13:53,160 --> 01:13:56,439
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty five. They were close in age, I thought

1521
01:13:56,439 --> 01:14:00,599
Speaker 1: to myself, But Ruby outlived Roy by a long time years.

1522
01:14:01,520 --> 01:14:04,400
Speaker 1: As if at a ceremony, Michelle and I stood naturally

1523
01:14:04,680 --> 01:14:08,800
Speaker 1: facing the grave, looking down with her arms still linked. Hi, mamma,

1524
01:14:09,200 --> 01:14:11,120
Speaker 1: she spoke, in a voice similar to the one she

1525
01:14:11,240 --> 01:14:13,920
Speaker 1: used with her husband' z, but less as an equal,

1526
01:14:14,320 --> 01:14:16,360
Speaker 1: more with the tone of a daughter than a wife.

1527
01:14:16,920 --> 01:14:20,840
Speaker 1: This is your grandson, Nebille, she spoke, slowly, allowing the

1528
01:14:20,880 --> 01:14:24,240
Speaker 1: moment of my introduction to hang a bit longer. It

1529
01:14:24,320 --> 01:14:27,559
Speaker 1: was moments like these, the moments of affirmation that I

1530
01:14:27,640 --> 01:14:31,120
Speaker 1: cherished the most. Rory staring at me and saying she's

1531
01:14:31,160 --> 01:14:35,200
Speaker 1: looking at family, and now Michelle telling my grandmother that

1532
01:14:35,320 --> 01:14:40,240
Speaker 1: I was her grandson. When I hear everybody loves the sunshine,

1533
01:14:40,280 --> 01:14:43,599
Speaker 1: which happens more often than ever, the opening chords still

1534
01:14:43,600 --> 01:14:47,400
Speaker 1: catch me off guard, but now the lazy synthesizer melody

1535
01:14:47,439 --> 01:14:50,200
Speaker 1: allows me to relax. I hear and feel it with

1536
01:14:50,240 --> 01:14:53,120
Speaker 1: a new sense of appreciation, a new sense of connection.

1537
01:14:53,800 --> 01:14:56,479
Speaker 1: As my father's voice shoots out from the speakers and

1538
01:14:56,560 --> 01:15:00,120
Speaker 1: into the warm light, I smile and quietly sing along

1539
01:15:00,960 --> 01:15:16,120
Speaker 1: my Life, My Life, My Life, My Life. In the Sunshine.

1540
01:15:16,240 --> 01:15:20,280
Speaker 2: Family Secrets is a production of iHeartRadio. Molly Zacour is

1541
01:15:20,320 --> 01:15:23,479
Speaker 2: the story editor and Dylan Fagan is the executive producer.

1542
01:15:24,760 --> 01:15:25,320
Speaker 3: If you have a.

1543
01:15:25,240 --> 01:15:27,800
Speaker 2: Family secret you'd like to share, please leave us a

1544
01:15:27,840 --> 01:15:30,719
Speaker 2: voicemail and your story could appear on an upcoming episode.

1545
01:15:31,240 --> 01:15:35,160
Speaker 2: Our number is one eight eight eight Secret zero. That's

1546
01:15:35,160 --> 01:15:38,960
Speaker 2: the number zero. You can also find me on Instagram

1547
01:15:39,200 --> 01:15:48,000
Speaker 2: at Danny Ryder. And if you'd like to know more

1548
01:15:48,000 --> 01:15:50,880
Speaker 2: about the story that inspired this podcast, check out my

1549
01:15:50,920 --> 01:15:52,280
Speaker 2: memoir Inheritance.

1550
01:16:03,160 --> 01:16:05,759
Speaker 3: For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeart