Holly Frey: Warning! The following show includes discussion of escorts, drugs, septagenarian Tinder, eclipses,
Holly Frey: star-powered therapy, and Donald Trump's former former former lawyer. For
Holly Frey: listeners with Victorian sensibilities, please keep a fan, and smelling
Holly Frey: salts nearby.
Jean Le Bec: So, I guess my biggest question is am I ever
Jean Le Bec: going to have sex with somebody again?
Mangesh Hattikudur: We're sitting in Jean Le Bec's third floor apartment, right off
Mangesh Hattikudur: the 93rd Street stop in Bay Ridge. Jean is a
Mangesh Hattikudur: former teacher, just like my mom; roughly the same age,
Mangesh Hattikudur: seventy four. But Jean's a New York 74. She's got
Mangesh Hattikudur: that city girl edge.
Jean Le Bec: My name is Jean Ann Le Bec and I am
Jean Le Bec: a storyteller.
Mangesh Hattikudur: The sex question it's big for Jean because she was
Mangesh Hattikudur: married for 41 years. And she expected to stay married forever.
Mangesh Hattikudur: But right before the city went into lockdown, her marriage dissolved.
Mangesh Hattikudur: And it's taken her about three years to get to
Mangesh Hattikudur: this point.
Jean Le Bec: The truth is, I don't want to marry anything. I'm not
Jean Le Bec: looking for that. And I don't want to live with anybody.
Jean Le Bec: I'm not looking for that.
Mangesh Hattikudur: But she is craving something; some form of intimacy.
Jean Le Bec: Okay. So my daughter is my biggest support and fan,
Jean Le Bec: and when I've told her these stories about, you know?
Jean Le Bec: Guys who just really want to sex text you; they
Jean Le Bec: don't really want to go further than that. All the
Jean Le Bec: weird men that I have had a date with just...
Jean Le Bec: [she's like] Okay, Mom. Here's where we're at right now. I
Jean Le Bec: think what you need to do is call up an escort service.
Mangesh Hattikudur: That's right. It's early on a Saturday morning. I am
Mangesh Hattikudur: barely awake. I haven't even had my cup of coffee.
Mangesh Hattikudur: And I'm pretty sure I'm hearing her right. Like, is
Mangesh Hattikudur: this sweet 74-year old woman really asking permission to...
Jean Le Bec: ... hire somebody. You are there, and it's a very
Jean Le Bec: clear cut relationship, you know, hire them for four hours.
Mangesh Hattikudur: I don't know if an astrologer could help with that. I
Mangesh Hattikudur: don't know if any astrologer has ever been asked whether
Mangesh Hattikudur: it's the right time to hire an escort. But we're
Mangesh Hattikudur: about to find out. From Kaleidoscope and iHeart Podcasts, I'm
Mangesh Hattikudur: Mangesh Hattikudur. Welcome the Skyline Drive
Mangesh Hattikudur: CHAPTER ONE: POUND CAKE AND CHEMO
Mangesh Hattikudur: So let's talk a second about Jean's question, and questions
Mangesh Hattikudur: like these.
vox populi: [Woman 1] Will I ever have a partner that feels safe and secure? [Man 1] Why do Scorpios get such a bad rap? [Man 2] I'm kind of curious how many dogs I will have in my life. [Man 3] Is it insane to consider trying to be a standup comedian? [Man 4] As a man who is rapidly balding, will any of my hair ever grow back?
Mangesh Hattikudur: That's what the show was supposed to be: finding people
Mangesh Hattikudur: with questions I'd never think to ask, pairing them with
Mangesh Hattikudur: an astrologer, then generally having a good time. And I
Mangesh Hattikudur: was going to take this anthropological view of it all...
Mangesh Hattikudur: like stand back, watch without judgment, try to understand and enjoy.
Mangesh Hattikudur: But just as our production was about to get off
Mangesh Hattikudur: the ground, I traveled to Queens to get a reading
Mangesh Hattikudur: from a random astrologer. And that astrologer? He warned me
Mangesh Hattikudur: that my dad's health would soon take a drastic turn.
Mangesh Hattikudur: Within twenty minutes, my dad had emailed me that the
Mangesh Hattikudur: cancer had spread through his liver. So now, a few
Mangesh Hattikudur: days later, I'm in Conyers, Georgia.
Mangesh Hattikudur: Conyers is mostly famous for being a speed trap on
Mangesh Hattikudur: the road between Atlanta and Athens, and my parents settled
Mangesh Hattikudur: here because my dad took a job down the road
Mangesh Hattikudur: a few years back. But there's little else that would
Mangesh Hattikudur: have drawn them here. Like there are strip malls and
Mangesh Hattikudur: Waffle Houses; banks; Targets. And then these quiet winding roads
Mangesh Hattikudur: that veer off it with names like Christian Circle. The
Mangesh Hattikudur: doctor's office is tucked away on one of these winding roads,
Mangesh Hattikudur: and we're waiting for the doctor in a little exam room.
Mangesh Hattikudur: It's actually the way my dad wants it. All of
Mangesh Hattikudur: us here: my mom, sister, me.
Mangesh Hattikudur: I'm a little surprised when the doctor walks in and
Mangesh Hattikudur: he's Indian.
Oncologist: So the pathology report still says preliminary.
Mangesh Hattikudur: I didn't know that they had more of us out
Mangesh Hattikudur: in Conyers. I like him immediately. He seems to really
Mangesh Hattikudur: know and care about my dad, and he's concerned for
Mangesh Hattikudur: us too. But when he starts, it's clear the news
Mangesh Hattikudur: isn't good.
Oncologist: But the CT scan shows that that entire liver was
Oncologist: studded by small, tumors.
Mangesh Hattikudur: It turns out it's an aggressive, small cell cancer. And
Mangesh Hattikudur: it's going to need an aggressive response.
Oncologist: Waiting is okay, but your disease is behaving way too aggressive.
Mangesh Hattikudur: No, no, it's it's wonderful.
Mangesh Hattikudur: I've turned on my voice recorder-- not for podcasting, but
Mangesh Hattikudur: because I'm feeling lightheaded; uneasy about how much of this
Mangesh Hattikudur: information I'll retain. And so far it sounds like the
Mangesh Hattikudur: chemo can only do so much.
Oncologist: Why did I say it's not that great news? Because
Oncologist: small cell lung cancer is notorious not to stay in
Oncologist: control with chemotherapy. It goes away, but it comes right back.
Oncologist: Um so, not a good diagnosis at all, but very
Oncologist: treatable in its current situation.
Mangesh Hattikudur: This whole thing is basically cancer whack-a-mole. You can bat
Mangesh Hattikudur: the cancer back, cheer a little, and then start again...
Mangesh Hattikudur: until time runs out. The only time I smile is
Mangesh Hattikudur: when my dad asks timidly:
Umesh Hattikudur: Oh, yes! I've heard that medical marijuana can help with the nausea
Umesh Hattikudur: and other things.
Mangesh Hattikudur: I remember my friend Howard. When his dad got cancer,
Mangesh Hattikudur: Howard got him a pound cake loaded with THC and
Mangesh Hattikudur: they spent the night laughing as his dad shared memories
Mangesh Hattikudur: along with these ridiculous life goals: like how his one
Mangesh Hattikudur: regret as a young man in China was that he'd
Mangesh Hattikudur: never taken a shi* on the doorstep of the French embassy. Anyway,
Mangesh Hattikudur: I daydreamed a little about sourcing some edibles and playing
Mangesh Hattikudur: my dad's favorite records as we chat through the night...
Mangesh Hattikudur: before I hear this:
Oncologist: You really don't want elderly parents to be dealing with
Oncologist: metastatic cancer 300 miles away. It's just not ... Invariably,
Oncologist: no matter how slow the treatment goes is the only part.
Mangesh Hattikudur: In the best case scenario, we'll get three to four
Mangesh Hattikudur: more years with my dad. That's if the treatment takes.
Mangesh Hattikudur: It's something to hope for, but it's more likely we'll
Mangesh Hattikudur: get three to four months.
Mangesh Hattikudur: The thing is, there's no time to waste. A nurse
Mangesh Hattikudur: wheels my dad to a different wing to begin the
Mangesh Hattikudur: chemo immediately. My mom is trying to be brave, but
Mangesh Hattikudur: she's still dazed. I tug at her arm and hold
Mangesh Hattikudur: it as we walk to the car. Everything is daunting,
Mangesh Hattikudur: but it also feels manageable. So instead of worrying, I
Mangesh Hattikudur: focus on our wish list. My dad still speaks some Portuguese
Mangesh Hattikudur: from his childhood in Goa, and I know he wants
Mangesh Hattikudur: to see Lisbon. I know he wants to see his
Mangesh Hattikudur: grandkids more. He wants to see my sister getting married.
Mangesh Hattikudur: So I'm thinking, what can I do? What money do
Mangesh Hattikudur: we need? How can I move my schedule around? Four
Mangesh Hattikudur: months is not a lot of time, but I'm going
Mangesh Hattikudur: to make it feel like enough.
Mangesh Hattikudur: CHAPTER TWO: SECRETS AND LIES
Jean Le Bec: I lived in a family with a lot of secrets.
Mangesh Hattikudur: Secrets are the thing that shaped Jean, and I have
Mangesh Hattikudur: a feeling it's what's driven her to tell these beautiful,
Mangesh Hattikudur: unvarnished stories about herself. Inside her place, past the entry
Mangesh Hattikudur: and the kitchen doorway and the hallway lined with photos,
Mangesh Hattikudur: there's a living room filled with vintage furniture. Stuff you'd
Mangesh Hattikudur: covet from your favorite thrift store. Jean tells me to
Mangesh Hattikudur: sit anywhere; make myself comfortable. And so I do: first
Mangesh Hattikudur: on this bright, beautiful sofa. And then on an ottoman,
Mangesh Hattikudur: just a little closer to her.
Jean Le Bec: I grew up right here in Brooklyn-- not in Bay Ridge, but
Jean Le Bec: in Crown Heights. Which is now a groovy, groovy place
Jean Le Bec: to live. But during those days it was a hard-working
Jean Le Bec: Irish Catholic neighborhood. And we were the only Jewish family.
Mangesh Hattikudur: Kids playing marbles, buying nickel comics, hanging out on stoops,
Mangesh Hattikudur: running around the neighborhood until the lamp post flicker and
Mangesh Hattikudur: you just know it's time to race home. It all
Mangesh Hattikudur: sounds so idyllic, but her childhood was also cloaked in
Mangesh Hattikudur: something darker because of her parents political leanings.
Jean Le Bec: We lived this kind of life of secrets and lies.
Jean Le Bec: They couldn't tell anybody they were American Communists. They couldn't
Jean Le Bec: tell anybody they knew Jules and Ethel Rosenberg.
Mock 50s TV documentary: A refresher on Julius and Ethel Rosenberg: Julius Rosenberg A
Mock 50s TV documentary: Taurus and Ethel Rosenberg A Libra met and fell in
Mock 50s TV documentary: love at the Young Communist League. When Taurus and Libra
Mock 50s TV documentary: come together in a love affair, it can be the
Mock 50s TV documentary: unification of two halves of a whole. Julius had a
Mock 50s TV documentary: steady job working for the Army Signal Corps as an engineer,
Mock 50s TV documentary: but he was fired for being a socialist commmunism
Mock 50s TV documentary: [tape click] What is it? Who are the apostles of
Mock 50s TV documentary: a system that attempts to destroy the American way of life?
Mock 50s TV documentary: In the nineties and fifties, a communist panic swept across America,
Mock 50s TV documentary: set off by a Scorpio named Senator Joseph McCarthy. McCarthy
Mock 50s TV documentary: was known for his wild and sensational attacks. The Scorpio
Mock 50s TV documentary: zodiac sign concerns itself with beginnings and endings and is
Mock 50s TV documentary: unafraid of either. They also travel in the world that
Mock 50s TV documentary: is black and white and has little use for gray.
Mock 50s TV documentary: At the time, Hollywood directors, prominent politicians, and government insiders
Mock 50s TV documentary: were terrified for their lives and careers. In the couple
Mock 50s TV documentary: was put on trial for passing atomic secrets to the Soviets.
Mock 50s TV documentary: The Rosenbergs claimed innocence, but they still got the electric chair.
Mock 50s TV documentary: The man who prosecuted them? A 23-year old pisces named
Mock 50s TV documentary: Roy Cohn. One witness from the trial, tried to take
Mock 50s TV documentary: back his testimony. He said the reason he lied on
Mock 50s TV documentary: the stand was because Cohn had threatened to lock up
Mock 50s TV documentary: his wife and make life hell for his family. Many
Mock 50s TV documentary: people associate Pisces with dreams and secrets as a mutable sign.
Mock 50s TV documentary: Pisces holds adaptive, fluid and shape-shifting quality.
Mangesh Hattikudur: Anyway, back to Jean. It makes sense that her family
Mangesh Hattikudur: hid the fact that they were close with the Rosenbergs.
Mangesh Hattikudur: But that wasn't the only secret they were hiding.
Jean Le Bec: My sister is gay. Being gay during those times was
Jean Le Bec: really a horrifying thing. And I remember when she told
Jean Le Bec: me she was gay, I thought this was the greatest
Jean Le Bec: thing I ever heard. And she was like: you cannot
Jean Le Bec: tell a soul, nobody can know about this.
Mangesh Hattikudur: Like being Communist, being Jewish, being gay was just another
Mangesh Hattikudur: thing she couldn't talk about. As she's telling me about
Mangesh Hattikudur: her past, it makes more sense why Jean's welcomed me in;
Mangesh Hattikudur: why she's agreed to talk. The thing is, Jean is
Mangesh Hattikudur: a total romantic.
Jean Le Bec: One of my favorite stories that I told was the
Jean Le Bec: time I had my first orgasm. I had been married,
Jean Le Bec: I had a baby, and still didn't know my own body.
Mangesh Hattikudur: It's the 1970s and Jean is in her twenties-- a single
Mangesh Hattikudur: mom with a kid. She had briefly been married to
Mangesh Hattikudur: her high school sweetheart, and now she's working at this
Mangesh Hattikudur: daycare center where she has this colleague named Mona. And
Mangesh Hattikudur: they're a lot alike. They're both putting themselves through school
Mangesh Hattikudur: in the evenings. They both have little girls that are
Mangesh Hattikudur: the same age.
Jean Le Bec: We formed this friendship with each other, and then one
Jean Le Bec: night we went to see this movie and was sitting
Jean Le Bec: in the car and she looks at me and says,
Jean Le Bec: you know, I really feel like kissing you. I said,
Jean Le Bec: so kiss me!
Mangesh Hattikudur: That kiss. It was like fireworks.
Jean Le Bec: I mean, Mona and I had been intimate, but I never
Jean Le Bec: had an orgasm. After this orgasm, she put on candles
Jean Le Bec: and everything, and she looked at me and she said: "you know, sweetie,
Jean Le Bec: you could do this anytime you want." I mean, the
Jean Le Bec: whole idea of that kind of power. And so I
Jean Le Bec: begin to be kind of a crazy masturbator. You know.
Jean Le Bec: I would like go to my job at the daycare center,
Jean Le Bec: and it was lunchtime, I'd run back. And so it was
Jean Le Bec: this whole description of just feeling giddy with this kind
Jean Le Bec: of new found knowledge.
Mangesh Hattikudur: Mona would move away not long after, leaving the city,
Mangesh Hattikudur: but it wasn't long before Jean would fall in love again.
Mangesh Hattikudur: In fact, in some ways, her next love would hit
Mangesh Hattikudur: her even harder. Here's the story she told at the Moth:
Jean Le Bec: It's assembly day and I'm so nervous. My class is
Jean Le Bec: putting on a play for the entire school, and I'm
Jean Le Bec: walking down the auditorium-- the center aisle --carrying all these props.
Jean Le Bec: And [deleted name] takes my hand to help me navigate
Jean Le Bec: up the stage steps, and my hand melts into his,
Jean Le Bec: and his hand melts into mine, and our fingers linger, never
Jean Le Bec: wanting to let go. And as Miss Hall crosses the
Jean Le Bec: stage to go to the piano, and kids are getting
Jean Le Bec: their assembly seats, and the rain is beating against the window,
Jean Le Bec: we fall madly in love.
Mangesh Hattikudur: Jean and that teacher? They get married, raised her daughter together...
Mangesh Hattikudur: and then a son, too. They become grandparents together. And
Mangesh Hattikudur: then one morning, 41 years later...
Jean Le Bec: ... over coffee, he said, "I'm leaving."
Mangesh Hattikudur: Her husband came clean about another woman he'd been seeing.
Mangesh Hattikudur: But it wasn't long before Jean realized there were more.
Jean Le Bec: He was having copious amounts of affairs. It was almost
Jean Le Bec: like a house of cards fell down. Um, he's an
Jean Le Bec: expert con man. He swept me off my feet. It
Jean Le Bec: was almost like that love that, you know, you think
Jean Le Bec: you're never ever going to find again. And then it
Jean Le Bec: all just kind of crashed. And I had to kind
Jean Le Bec: of weed through the betrayal.
Mangesh Hattikudur: It didn't take much detective work for Jean to realize
Mangesh Hattikudur: he'd been cheating since the start of their relationship... with friends, colleagues,
Mangesh Hattikudur: random women along the way. Jean was heartbroken. She still is.
Mangesh Hattikudur: And it's tainted the way she looks at the past.
Jean Le Bec: Because I see a happy family, but I think: Was
Jean Le Bec: he involved with this woman then? Or who was he
Jean Le Bec: involved with then?
Mangesh Hattikudur: Jean is done grieving. She no longer wants to look backwards.
Jean Le Bec: What is this next journey about for myself? Because I
Jean Le Bec: feel like I'm at the brink of something. I just
Jean Le Bec: don't know what the brink is. I don't know what
Jean Le Bec: something is.
Mangesh Hattikudur: The truth is, Jean does not believe in astrology. She's
Mangesh Hattikudur: had opportunities before to have her chart read, but she's
Mangesh Hattikudur: never really seen the point.
Jean Le Bec: You know, my sister was into astrology, but you know,
Jean Le Bec: we all thought it was bullshit, you know? And I
Jean Le Bec: always thought, like, please have a glass of wine, relax,
Jean Le Bec: it's more meaningful than this.
Mangesh Hattikudur: But that was then. Today, at 74, Jean recognizes how
Mangesh Hattikudur: precious her time is. Over and over, she tells me,
Mangesh Hattikudur: I've got ten years, ten good years to drink in
Mangesh Hattikudur: all the richness of life. And if there's any chance
Mangesh Hattikudur: that astrology can unlock that secret, she's open to it.
Mangesh Hattikudur: Oh and there's still the matter of the escorts. More
Mangesh Hattikudur: on that after the break.
Mangesh Hattikudur: CHAPTER THREE: WHEELS THAT WORK
Janelle Belgrave: You know, I don't think humans hang on to things
Janelle Belgrave: that don't work. Like the wheel is awesome, like we
Janelle Belgrave: still use it. We don't say, oh, this wheel is
Janelle Belgrave: out of date. Like no, it's functional, right? So that's
Janelle Belgrave: the same thing with astrology. Like we don't study this
Janelle Belgrave: stuff because it doesn't work.
Mangesh Hattikudur: Over the summer, my friends and I started the search
Mangesh Hattikudur: for a house astrologer for this show. We thought hard
Mangesh Hattikudur: about using Dr Kumar, but I was reluctant. Looking back,
Mangesh Hattikudur: it's obvious why. Dr Kumar's predictions had set off a
Mangesh Hattikudur: chain of events that I just needed to compartmentalize away
Mangesh Hattikudur: from the show. I needed a different experience, and Janelle
Mangesh Hattikudur: Belgrave is definitely that. She is sunny and relentlessly encouraging.
Mangesh Hattikudur: And the first time I chatted with her, I was
Mangesh Hattikudur: smiling the whole time. Like, I love the way she
Mangesh Hattikudur: peppered the conversation with this secret knowledge of just how
Mangesh Hattikudur: pervasive astrology is.
Janelle Belgrave: If you don't think there are multi billionaires using astrology
Janelle Belgrave: to get ahead, let me tell you something: they're out there.
Mangesh Hattikudur: I mean, that's what my whole show was supposed to
Mangesh Hattikudur: peek into. But it was actually something more than that.
Mangesh Hattikudur: As my little team of skeptics here talked about the production,
Mangesh Hattikudur: we decided that using Janelle almost seemed fated. Like when
Mangesh Hattikudur: Mary and Mitra set out to find an astrologer for
Mangesh Hattikudur: the show, they independently made lists and somehow, not only
Mangesh Hattikudur: did they both find Janelle, but they both had her
Mangesh Hattikudur: as their top choice. So we chalked it up to
Mangesh Hattikudur: destiny and rolled with it.
Mangesh Hattikudur: Janelle's real New York too. She's from Queens and her
Mangesh Hattikudur: parents are immigrants from Panama. Janelle doesn't sugarcoat things, so
Mangesh Hattikudur: when I asked her about the birthday for this show
Mangesh Hattikudur: and the show's timing, let's just say she was
Mangesh Hattikudur: less optimistic than Dr Kumar, who told me the show
Mangesh Hattikudur: was going to be a mega hit.
Janelle Belgrave: So you guys said that it was May sixteen am
Janelle Belgrave: in Brooklyn, New York. Correct?
Mangesh Hattikudur: That's when we named the show. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Janelle Belgrave: Right, okay. Right, okay. Soooo, you guys are a Taurus sun,
Janelle Belgrave: a Cancer-rising moon, in Sagittarius. Um, you guys planned this
Janelle Belgrave: right under an eclipse, which is really interesting.
Mangesh Hattikudur: Is that bad?
Janelle Belgrave: Um, not necessarily bad, but eclipse energy can be very volatile.
Mangesh Hattikudur: I guess I've got to temper my expectations. But even
Mangesh Hattikudur: when Janelle is prepping you for a turbulent time ahead,
Mangesh Hattikudur: I like how she's still encouraging.
Janelle Belgrave: You're starting under a lot of retrogrades and that's okay,
Janelle Belgrave: but you just have to know that you can have
Janelle Belgrave: to be patient use that to your benefit.
Mangesh Hattikudur: Now this is an aside, but last year I started
Mangesh Hattikudur: giving monstera plants away to people who had been going
Mangesh Hattikudur: through hard things. It is a super Instagram-able plant, but
Mangesh Hattikudur: that's not why I like it. The monstera is unusual.
Mangesh Hattikudur: If left in the dark, it exhibits something called negative phototropism,
Mangesh Hattikudur: where all the new stems will actually grow into the darkness.
Mangesh Hattikudur: It's a clever trick. In the jungle, darkness signals the
Mangesh Hattikudur: presence of a larger tree, so the monstera trusts that
Mangesh Hattikudur: it can lean into the shadows and pool all of
Mangesh Hattikudur: its energy into climbing that trunk... because it believes sunlight
Mangesh Hattikudur: will come.
Mangesh Hattikudur: I like that reminder because I've needed that reminder. And
Mangesh Hattikudur: that's what's so great about Janelle. The beauty she's found
Mangesh Hattikudur: in reminding people that hope still exists.
Janelle Belgrave: There's always hope in the darkest moments of our life.
Janelle Belgrave: When you look back, it's like, Yeah, there was that
Janelle Belgrave: some person that came to me that day and said something,
Janelle Belgrave: and that was the thing I needed to get to
Janelle Belgrave: the next day. And that next day was miraculous.
Mangesh Hattikudur: There's a joy in pairing up a couple you have
Mangesh Hattikudur: a good feeling about. Jean is so clearly yearning, and
Mangesh Hattikudur: I wanted to witness what magic might come out when
Mangesh Hattikudur: you put Jean and Janelle, and all their stars and
Mangesh Hattikudur: their stories, in a room together.
Mangesh Hattikudur: CHAPTER FOUR: YOU DON'T WANT TO WASTE A MINUTE
Mangesh Hattikudur: It is months before I see Jean again. We are sitting in her apartment. This time it's my producer Mitra and me, and we've set up a consult with Janelle, but 20 minutes in, everything is going wrong. Sound waves are flashing across the laptop. But apparently it hasn't been taping. Uh, worse, the backup recorder got jammed, and then our batteries died. It's like this taping is jinxed. Of course Janelle doesn't miss a beat. She makes a crack about eclipses and the universe showing us just how real astrology is, and she reminds us that if we'd tried this a few days from now, everything would've gone smoothly. We all laugh, but we try again.
Janelle Belgrave: Okay, so where should we start?
Mangesh Hattikudur: In my head, I'm screaming: “Escorts. We've got to talk about escorts!” If you listen to the tape from 15 minutes ago, it is all static. But what you would've heard, what I wish we still had, was the discussion and where it began. Before Jean had even said the word escort, Janelle basically said: "Jean, your chart is telling me that you're meant to go enjoy yourself. The universe wants you to enjoy yourself. So go on dates, go on hikes, go have sex, go do the things that feel fun."
Mangesh Hattikudur: But I don't have that tape, because I started this show in an eclipse. And somehow it's easier to tell myself that, to make that the excuse, than to stop Jean from taking the conversation in the direction she needs it to go.
Jean Le Bec: I have been feeling like I'm on the edge of something, but I don't know what that looks like.
Janelle Belgrave: Mm. I gotcha. Okay. So I actually want to take you back to your last new moon that you had. So basically, this is just to show you that there's no such thing as like linear time in astrology. So when we are at a new moon phase in our life, it's when we're starting a brand new chapter, we've ended one chapter. Okay? So back in 2011, April, 2011, you had a new moon happen in your progressed chart at 19 degrees of Aries. So if you can think back to what was happening in your life in 2011-
Jean Le Bec: I can tell you exactly. I, I know exactly what was happening because that was so- I can't believe you just said that. I'm blown away.
Janelle Belgrave: Okay, hold on to that thought. Don't give, don't give it away just yet. Cause I want us to kind of flow through it. So back then you planted seeds, right? Okay. And then you're gonna track the moon.
Mangesh Hattikudur: As she continues, Janelle traces her cursor over the flow of the moon through Jean's sign, and she shows her how the moon has moved with her over the years.
Janelle Belgrave: So around probably I would say 2016 or so is when things probably got a little bit rocky, especially when it came to marriage.
Jean Le Bec: Oh yeah.
Janelle Belgrave: So September of 2019 maybe would've been a time where things might've gotten a little bit tough.
Jean Le Bec: Oh my God. Yeah. I have the chills. I do have the chills.
Janelle Belgrave: I'm showing you how astrology works. Just showing you the timing. So we're seeing this moon hit with Pluto, right? So possibly endings, deaths, changes, transformations-
Jean Le Bec: Endings, endings.
Mangesh Hattikudur: The scene reminds me of what my friend Pete, the rockstar astrologer, told me, this concept of Jyotish Mati — what you're going for in a great reading. Like that shared connection between astrologer and the person being read, passing the light of awareness.
Jean Le Bec: I'm really sitting here completely overwhelmed, I have to tell you. Because when you, like, say a specific thing, like September, you know, 2019, um, (BEEP) looked me in the face and said, bye-bye. I'm leaving you for another woman. And so that's a month, that's a time that I don't really- no one really knows, like, oh, that happened. But then when you just said it, I was like, you did not just say that.
Janelle Belgrave: Yeah, right? Sometimes it's very literal. Pluto is the planet, uh, Pluto is the planet of death and transformation and saying, this is the end.
Mangesh Hattikudur: I'm watching the two of them, and it's clear something has clicked. In just a few minutes, Jean is transformed from this person who is, I guess, willing to give astrology a chance to someone who's sitting on her hands to stop herself from waving them so excitedly. Despite the screen, there is an intensity between them. Every month or day Janelle throws out seems to provoke this avalanche of memories. And each time Jean is about to let out this rush of words, like, just let them spill from her mouth, Janelle smiles like a Cheshire cat. She tells her to hold it in just a little more.
Mangesh Hattikudur: Janelle is confident there's power in astrology. She's felt it for decades now, but in this moment, that power is so clear. It's animating every dopamine receptor in Jean's brain, and she is buzzing, glowing with electricity.
Janelle Belgrave: If I know, if I have two and a half years to make use of this energy, I have to do it. Otherwise, it's not gonna come back for another, what, 14 years.
Jean Le Bec: Right.
Janelle Belgrave: I don't wanna have to waste that time. Right.
Jean Le Bec: Exactly. No, I don't. At 74, you don't wanna waste a minute.
Mangesh Hattikudur: CHAPTER FIVE: A COUCH WITH A VIEW
Mangesh Hattikudur: My sister's a psychologist, a PhD. And we have this line we use about Indians. It's okay to be a psychiatrist, but it's not okay to see a psychiatrist. Years ago, when my wife and I were looking into international adoption from India, the forms indicated that if you'd ever seen a psychiatrist, you'd be disqualified from adopting. I'm ashamed to admit that for years it kept me from seeing a grief counselor. I mean, along with all the other stresses of life, I lost a cousin to a suicide and a best friend to an overdose, and I struggled. I was a shell of myself.
Mangesh Hattikudur: The truth is, in those years I was not a great dad or a great husband, and I could have used the therapy. But I also didn't want to limit our options as potential parents.
Mangesh Hattikudur: Anyway, for Indians, including the Indian government, the stigma is real. So things like religion and astrology, they fill the gap. And it makes sense, right? Astrology allows you to put a symbol on something that's hard to name and to reframe your problems from a different lens. It's therapy for people who just don't want to go to therapy. But what happens when those notions are flipped? Like, what if your therapist was secretly powering their sessions using the stars to amplify their understanding of you? Because that's what Ava does.
Ava (therapist): Oh my God. I feel like I'm a little bashful. I'm a licensed therapist.
Mangesh Hattikudur: Ava, which is not her real name, is a successful trauma therapist from the Midwest, and she's keenly aware of the baggage that astrology carries.
Ava (therapist): Do I worry if I bring it up people don't take me seriously? Of course. For younger clients, I think it's kind of almost a way of connecting. But yeah, my clients who are older, it's a little bit more of a finesse.
Mangesh Hattikudur: So before she dives in with a new client, she floats a few questions to see just how open she can be with them.
Ava (therapist): It's something that I kind of test the waters to see: are they into astrology? Is it something they're not that into, right. And if they are, it's wonderful, cuz we can fold that into our understanding. Like, holy shit, like, Saturn and Mars are being transited by Saturn. That, from what you're telling me, that makes a lot of sense.
Mangesh Hattikudur: Of course, even when they're not into astrology. Ava still keeps an eye on their chart.
Ava (therapist): I still have their birthdays. I can see where their planets are. Which isn't to say that changes how I show up to them. My number-one job is to be here with the client. Therapy existing in this world of diagnoses and insurance and all these things that are trying to make it be short, and get people back to work, and make people legible in this really fucked up system, right, so much of that is not helpful in the actual work of therapy. But I think astrology just, it allows me to kind of ground back into the trust of having this big perspective and this small perspective at the same time.
Mangesh Hattikudur: There are so many people who see therapy and astrology at odds with one another. But Ava, she hopes there's new ways about thinking about both, because both have the ability to give you agency. I mean, isn't that what we go to therapy for? Isn't that what we want from astrology, to access perspectives big and small? Because so much of what we're looking for is someone to tell us what really matters, what we can set aside, and to teach us what to spend our precious time on.
Ava (therapist): This idea of human progress is linear just boggles my mind. Like, what the heck? That makes no sense to me. And with astrology it is not at all, right? Planets are coming into places and then going back, and you're like, this is so frustrating. I'm back to where I was. And then it moves forward.
Mangesh Hattikudur: To Ava, there's something very human about acknowledging that in the fog of healing, things are often more complicated than just trying to move forward.
Ava (therapist): We're trying to understand things that are beyond comprehension in some ways, right? How humbling to know that we don't always have to. I think that astrology and trauma therapy really hold that capacity in a really beautiful way.
Mangesh Hattikudur: CHAPTER SIX: MIC CHECK
Mangesh Hattikudur: Jean and I sat in her apartment after the reading, and we talked for a while.
Mangesh Hattikudur: What's spinning in your head? Like, what are you thinking about?
Jean Le Bec: First of all, I feel, I don't know if I can, you could- I feel stoned outta my mind. I feel as though I'm on some, like, acid trip or something.
Mangesh Hattikudur: Coming into this reading, I thought we'd devote a good bit of conversation to the salaciousness and fun of hiring an escort. But so much of this, to me, felt like Jean just needed to be seen. What she needed from the astrologer and what she actually wanted from the escort was the same thing. She needed someone from the outside world to remind her just how much she mattered.
Jean Le Bec: I think what was most empowering about this for me was, at 74 and living alone, you often feel very invisible. You know, you do. And it's like, I say to myself, oh my God, I could die right now. No one's even gonna know. You know, that kind of feeling. And what she did by saying: Hey, this is what's happening- I mean, I could not repeat now, the moon in the house and the- but there was an overall sense of: You are part of the flow of the energy of the earth, my dear, and you are on a ride, you know? And you have been since you were born, and you will continue. And so by saying, “You have the power to do that,” it was like, I'm not invisible. I'm not. And that was very- that was very big.
Mangesh Hattikudur: I'm envious of Jean, because whatever you think of astrology, she got to feel seen. And then she had the luxury of time to process it. She decided for herself what she wanted to take out of it and what she wants the rest of her life to be. It's a gift.
Mangesh Hattikudur: On May 7th, 2022, exactly a month after I got a warning about my father's health in the form of a reading, he passed. I won't tell you the details yet. I'm just not ready. But I will tell you this. That list I made for my dad? We hardly got through it. And all that time I thought I'd been promised, it slipped through my clenched fist.
Mangesh Hattikudur: Sitting in Jean's room, listening to this talk of moons and whether this is the close of a chapter or just another middle, I am not present. But before I can slip too far away, Mitra adjusts my hand. She moves the mic I'm holding just a hair away from my face. But that touch, it pulls me back into the moment, and then it makes me smile. Because whatever else I've been through, I'm so lucky to be here. To get to work on projects I love. To meet people like Jean. And as much as my days now will be divided between longing for a past that I cannot have and divining what the future can be, I know she's right when she says this.
Jean Le Bec: This is the only moment. This is the only moment, and no other moment will be greater or less than. It's just- this is the moment.
Mangesh Hattikudur: Next week, we tackle an unsolved mystery in the Reagan White House.
1980s reporter: Mr. President, will you continue to allow astrology to play a part in the makeup of your daily schedule, sir?
Press: (Boos) Come on. Knock it off, man.
Mangesh Hattikudur: So-- did Ronald Reagan use astrology to guide his foreign policy? Also, we get distracted watching Saturday morning cartoons, we dig up some televangelist beef, we learn about Boris Yeltsin's late-night cravings, and we find an incredible gem hiding in an old Johnny Carson clip. It's eighties week here on Skyline Drive, so be sure to tune in.
Mangesh Hattikudur: Thank you so much for listening. Skyline Drive is a production of Kaleidoscope and iHeart Podcasts. This show is hosted and written by me, Mangesh Hattikudur, but this show would be a bad idea sitting in a drawer somewhere if it were not for all these incredible people. Mary Phillips-Sandy is just the best. She's our supervising producer, and I don't know how she pulled this off with everything else going on. Mitra Bonshahi senior produced this whole thing and brought the delightful Jean LeBec into our world. Mark Lotto is such a mensch and story editor who really made this whole story incredible. This episode was also produced and mixed by the wonderful Anna Rubanova. Thank you so much, Anna. With scoring as always from Botany, check out his SoundCloud. The insane music in between is courtesy of Azadi Records, Raaginder, Himanshi Suri, Monsoon Siren, and also Peter Matthew Bauer. This song playing right now is off his beautiful new album Flowers. If you want to hear all of this music, we link to a mix tape in the show notes.
Mangesh Hattikudur: Oh my gosh, the fifties narration. So funny, right? That was Adam Bozarth. Thank you so much, Adam, for doing that Rosenberg section and making me laugh so hard. Also, the astrology descriptions come from astrology.com. Jean's story about falling in love is from the Moth. Go download their wonderful show immediately. Additional production and research support from the wonderful Lizzie Jacobs, who is my wife and my rock, my superstar Aunt Suman Bakshi, and my cousin Arjun Bakshi, who helped me out of a giant pickle.
Mangesh Hattikudur: This show is executive produced from iHeart by my good pals, Nikki Ettore and Katrina Norvell. Also gotta thank my partners from Kaleidoscope. Just the best team! Oz Woloshyn, Kate Osborne, Costas Linos, and the super dynamic Vahini Shori who made the crazy sweet collage of my family on Insta. P.S., Vahini, my mom loved it. Special thanks to all the kiddos who bore with us through this production. All my friends at iHeart, Shanta and Saurabh, my family everywhere. My pal Holly Frey, who read this episode's warning, if you haven't listened to Stuff You Missed in History Class, you're missing out. Or you can check out her excellent podcast, Criminalia. Go download both immediately. And just one last, thank you as always to my Amma and my Dad, Lalita and Umesh Hattikudur, who I thank my lucky stars for. Thank you all for listening.