Speaker 1: Pushkin Khalila Holt, Welcome to the studio.
Speaker 2: You don't have to welcome you to the studio. Every
Speaker 2: time I feel welcome, I think they're welcome carries over
Speaker 2: week to week.
Speaker 1: I am a host of a nationally broadcast podcast.
Speaker 2: It's what we do host with the most.
Speaker 1: We're contractually obliged to welcome our guests, and you are
Speaker 1: my guests. Make no mistake about it.
Speaker 2: You're going to like offer me something to drink or no.
Speaker 1: So now we're going to be listening to a encore
Speaker 1: presentation of a little episode called Joey.
Speaker 3: Yes.
Speaker 1: And actually there is a line in this story that
Speaker 1: I still quote that we both oh, that's true. At
Speaker 1: the end of our meetings, Yeah, that's true, one person
Speaker 1: will say to the other adios.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think it's you guys late to audios.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And as you listen, you'll be able to hear
Speaker 1: where that quote comes from.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So maybe you guys can work that into your
Speaker 2: lives too.
Speaker 1: All right, So let's get to it. Coming right up,
Speaker 1: an encore presentation of Joey And at the end of
Speaker 1: the episode, we're going to check in with Joey and
Speaker 1: a surprise guest.
Speaker 2: I can't wait to find out who it is.
Speaker 1: It's not you. No, you're a guest, but you're not
Speaker 1: a surprise guest.
Speaker 4: No.
Speaker 2: People are like, yeah, that makes sense that she is there.
Speaker 1: But first a word from our sponsors. Hi, John, Okay,
Speaker 1: if I were to plan a surprise vacation for us,
Speaker 1: where would you want to go? Did you say vacation?
Speaker 1: Surprise vacation?
Speaker 5: It could just never happen with my work schedule, like
Speaker 5: I can, that can never happen.
Speaker 1: Where would you want to go?
Speaker 5: Why would I want to go?
Speaker 1: For fun in the sun? Listen, no stress, you sound
Speaker 1: the idea of actually being on.
Speaker 6: Vacation with you, nice idea.
Speaker 1: It wouldn't be vacation with any It would be a
Speaker 1: slight caation because we do everything on a sleigh. We
Speaker 1: dashed through the snow and I don't know, like check
Speaker 1: our phones and argue. Occasionally you'd hang up on me
Speaker 1: and I'd start the show. But up bump from Gimblet Media.
Speaker 1: I'm Jonathan Goldstein and this is Heavyweight Today's episode. Joey
Speaker 1: as a young man, whenever conflict arose, my go to
Speaker 1: move was to roll up into a fetal ball and
Speaker 1: pray to go unnoticed. Of course, this only made matters worse. Case.
Speaker 1: In point one afternoon, while riding a trolley, I fell
Speaker 1: into a daydream and missed my stop. Anyone else in
Speaker 1: my position might have yelled, I missed my stop. Up
Speaker 1: or open the door please, But in imagining all these
Speaker 1: trolley riding strangers turning around to stare at me, my
Speaker 1: mind went blank. So I decided it might be simpler
Speaker 1: draw less attention if I just jumped off. As I
Speaker 1: landed onto the street, I heard a high pitched scream
Speaker 1: that I would later realize was coming from me. Instead
Speaker 1: of drawing less attention, I was now center stage. The
Speaker 1: trolley conductor skidded to a halt, and all the passengers
Speaker 1: ran to the windows to watch as I painfully crawled
Speaker 1: into a nearby bush. Once in the bush, I hid
Speaker 1: waiting for the trolley to leave. For young Jonathan Goldstein,
Speaker 1: the cost of staying silent that day was two twisted
Speaker 1: ankles and the loss of my pride. Hey, Joey, hey.
Speaker 7: There to hear from you.
Speaker 1: This is young Joey, and he recently had a bad
Speaker 1: day that forced him to realize his fear of being seen,
Speaker 1: his fear of speaking up was exacting a far greater
Speaker 1: cost than a mere double ankle injury. It was ruining
Speaker 1: his life, and so he's reached out for help from.
Speaker 3: Me and just never get myself in a situation like
Speaker 3: this again.
Speaker 1: I think Joey is twenty two years old, and the
Speaker 1: lead up to his terrible, horrible, no good, very bad
Speaker 1: day begins right after his art school graduation, when he
Speaker 1: moved into an artist's loft in downtown.
Speaker 3: LA live in that downtown city life kind of living,
Speaker 3: that communal living style.
Speaker 1: The downside was that the loft had bedsheets for walls
Speaker 1: in six roommates. But the plus side, the loft had
Speaker 1: bed sheets for walls and six roommates, six super cool roommates,
Speaker 1: a DJ, a dollmaker, a photographer, a guy who quote
Speaker 1: trimmed weed, and super coolest of all, a podcaster.
Speaker 3: And I pictured these cool artist types having great parties
Speaker 3: and a lot of cool people over and all the
Speaker 3: artists in the LA scene would come through and I
Speaker 3: was gonna come in and hopefully fit in immediately.
Speaker 1: But Joey didn't fit in immediately. He never felt comfortable
Speaker 1: just hanging out with everyone, never knew what to say,
Speaker 1: and so he ended up spending most of his time
Speaker 1: alone in his room, rehearsing icebreakers. I like your tattoo,
Speaker 1: he'd repeat to himself, your tattoo. I like it, sweet tat,
Speaker 1: he'd say, pointing limply at the mirror, like a socially
Speaker 1: crippled Travis Bickle. Unable to come up with anything that
Speaker 1: felt right, paralysis set in. Joey began spending all day
Speaker 1: in his room, a shadow behind a bedsheet.
Speaker 3: They'd all be in the living room right next to
Speaker 3: my room, hanging out, watching a movie, drinking, hanging and
Speaker 3: doing the thing, and I would be in my room,
Speaker 3: just like making people uncomfortable with by not, you know,
Speaker 3: being out there.
Speaker 1: Joey had been living in the loft several weeks when
Speaker 1: he realized just how isolated he'd become. One day, well,
Speaker 1: waiting outside the bathroom, he ran into one of his
Speaker 1: new roommates.
Speaker 3: She She was like, oh, Hi, what's your name? Oh
Speaker 3: where do you live? I was like, uh, here, I'd
Speaker 3: live here.
Speaker 1: Eventually, Joey began avoiding the loft altogether. He'd spend every
Speaker 1: day wandering the street, only returning in the evening.
Speaker 3: When I was back in my house at night, I
Speaker 3: would sneak into my room and then make and then
Speaker 3: make it drink make sure I didn't drink too much
Speaker 3: water so that my bladder was empty so I wouldn't
Speaker 3: have to leave my room to pee. My new goal
Speaker 3: was to just be as unobtrusive as a roommate as possible,
Speaker 3: be invisible, so in this time I would just try
Speaker 3: to spend all my day out of the house, out
Speaker 3: on my rollerblades, which I had also recently taken up.
Speaker 1: Everyone needs a hobby, and Joey found one that provided
Speaker 1: both good exercise as well as a way to free
Speaker 1: himself from the oppressive yoke of human dignity. And so
Speaker 1: it was while rollerblading that Joey discovered his new home
Speaker 1: away from home, the pizza Parlor. The pizza parlor played
Speaker 1: cool music and had cool art on the walls. It
Speaker 1: even served cool pizza. There was one shape like a
Speaker 1: marijuana leaf, and other shape like circles. But because Joey
Speaker 1: was Joey, even a simple thing like ordering pizza was
Speaker 1: a challenge, and so he rehearsed his icebreakers.
Speaker 3: I found myself like making sure I could you know,
Speaker 3: have something to say, like preparing something for the quick
Speaker 3: interaction while I buy my pizza.
Speaker 1: Like kind of thing.
Speaker 3: I don't know, Like if it's raining out, I would
Speaker 3: have something clever to say about.
Speaker 1: That, Or give me an example of the clever thing
Speaker 1: that you would say when it was raining.
Speaker 3: I'd say, oh, man, bummer, and this is not rollerblading weather, okay,
Speaker 3: like I would, or I don't know what I'm trying
Speaker 3: to say.
Speaker 1: Slowly, Joey began making social inroads, even managing to earn
Speaker 1: himself a nickname, that rollerblading guy. His fantasy is a
Speaker 1: fun and friendship with his bohemian loft buddies were over,
Speaker 1: but his fantasy is a fun in friendship with his
Speaker 1: bohemian pizza parlor buddies had only just begun.
Speaker 3: I had planned on continuing to visit there and making
Speaker 3: these friendships grow and hopefully progressing them to real life
Speaker 3: friendships outside of the shop.
Speaker 1: And so every morning Joey would blade straight to the
Speaker 1: self service refrigerator that housed the day old dollar slices.
Speaker 3: I pretty much exclusively ate pizza from that moment on
Speaker 3: for all your meals pretty much. There was definitely days
Speaker 3: that went by when it was just pizza, Like how
Speaker 3: many slices a day. Were you eating to say four
Speaker 3: or five two for breakfast and then stick them in
Speaker 3: my backpack for the rest of the day.
Speaker 1: What were you doing for fruits and vegetables?
Speaker 3: I occasionally got the veggie slice.
Speaker 1: And that was Joey's life, eating za, rolling blades, and
Speaker 1: waiting for old man scurvy until one terrible, horrible, no good,
Speaker 1: very bad day, January fourteenth, was like every other day.
Speaker 1: I woke up to go get my pizza, headed into
Speaker 1: the shop and unfortunately I only found pepperoni in the fridge.
Speaker 1: Joey is a vegetarian, and so without having prepared anything
Speaker 1: and clever to say, like pepperoni pizza, Oh man, bummer,
Speaker 1: Pepperonis aren't vegetarian, he instead said nothing and tried to
Speaker 1: just roller blade back out the door without anyone noticing.
Speaker 1: But he'd only bladed a couple of blocks when he
Speaker 1: saw a familiar face biking towards him.
Speaker 3: And it's one of the pizza chefs. So I just
Speaker 3: thought he was gonna hell, I don't know. I thought
Speaker 3: he was gonna say, what's up, man, let's hang out.
Speaker 3: What's your name?
Speaker 8: Will?
Speaker 7: Let's you know. I thought he was just interested in me.
Speaker 3: So I was excited to see him biking towards me,
Speaker 3: and I took off my headphones to greet him. And
Speaker 3: the first thing he said is don't come back. I said,
Speaker 3: excuse me. He said, you're taking slices.
Speaker 1: I said what, And then it clicked, flipping through the
Speaker 1: dollar slices and then abruptly leaving in silence. Looked fishy,
Speaker 1: like Joey was stealing pizza.
Speaker 3: And I was kind of like panicking talking to him,
Speaker 3: like I could feel that I could hear the panic
Speaker 3: in my woice and stuff. But I didn't know what
Speaker 3: to say, so I kind of just I was kind
Speaker 3: of speechless, and I, you know, didn't have the confidence
Speaker 3: to keep fighting. Okay, Yeah, and then he.
Speaker 7: He biked away.
Speaker 3: I started crying on the streets, and I must have
Speaker 3: looked ridiculous, rollerblading down the street while crying.
Speaker 1: At that point, it was a terrible day. It became
Speaker 1: horrible as well as no good and very bad when Joey,
Speaker 1: crying on the street, received a phone call bearing more
Speaker 1: bad news.
Speaker 3: The roommates had been kind of talking and they that
Speaker 3: they used the words getting under their skin.
Speaker 1: The roommates found Joey's silent, sneaky ways, unsettling. They wanted
Speaker 1: him out.
Speaker 3: I like went and got my stuff, and I don't know,
Speaker 3: I basically moved out in that moment. I like just
Speaker 3: left without without seeing anybody, and I kind of ran away.
Speaker 1: As the day came to a close, Joey called the
Speaker 1: one person he always calls, the person he's leaned on
Speaker 1: his whole life, Elise, his twin sister.
Speaker 3: She gave me the same advice that everyone did, which
Speaker 3: is just you know, go talk to them, be normal.
Speaker 3: But I don't know, I mean, I never was able
Speaker 3: to take that advice from anybody coming from her, though
Speaker 3: it was especially I felt especially bad.
Speaker 4: He was like almost in tears telling me this story.
Speaker 1: Elise knows Joey better than anyone, and he's relied on
Speaker 1: her socially his entire life. When he started dating, Elise
Speaker 1: introduced him to her friends, and when he was too
Speaker 1: anxious to attend family functions, Elise would go in his place.
Speaker 4: And he told me about how he cried, which is
Speaker 4: always he doesn't cry that often.
Speaker 7: Hm.
Speaker 4: Hm, you could tell it was a big deal that
Speaker 4: he expressed that he cried about it. And he told
Speaker 4: the whole story and I was laughing so hard because
Speaker 4: it's a really funny story, and I wanted him to
Speaker 4: see that it was funny too, and he could see
Speaker 4: the humor in it, but he was also pretty clearly devastated.
Speaker 1: When I ask Elise what's so funny about her brother
Speaker 1: crying on the phone, she makes a pretty strong case,
Speaker 1: casually eviscerating him in the way only a loving sister can.
Speaker 4: Him and his rollerblades and often like funny looking tank tops,
Speaker 4: his like creeper mustache, and his mullet definitely wait, just
Speaker 4: the look.
Speaker 1: Of him, Hang on a second. He has a mullet.
Speaker 4: Full mullet full, full, creepy young child mustache, and his
Speaker 4: shoulders and arms look looks strong, but they're small, and
Speaker 4: same with his legs. His legs are shockingly skinny. They
Speaker 4: do have an incredible shine to them, I will admit.
Speaker 1: Does he does he play?
Speaker 4: I'm not sure that's ointment. I'm guessing that's just his
Speaker 4: oily self.
Speaker 1: I don't want Joey to have to wait years and
Speaker 1: years like I did, just to know the sweet joys
Speaker 1: of uncrippling an abnormality. So I asked Joey's oily self
Speaker 1: what he most wants out of all this, and the
Speaker 1: answer he delivers is pretty to the point, almost like
Speaker 1: he's rehearsed it.
Speaker 3: I want to say sorry that that I wasn't able
Speaker 3: to leave my room. I wish they knew how I felt, basically.
Speaker 1: But when I put forward my action plan for Joey
Speaker 1: to fix his bad day by rerollerblading through it, rerollerblading
Speaker 1: back to the pizza parlor to clear his name, and
Speaker 1: rerollerblading to the loft to apologize for being such a creepy,
Speaker 1: sneaky roommate, I can hear the beads of sweat squeak
Speaker 1: out of Joey's hairline and saturate his mullet.
Speaker 3: Right, Yeah, I'm definitely Yeah, I've definitely been meaning to,
Speaker 3: but the prospect is pretty scary. Just mentioning it, I
Speaker 3: got nervous, for sure.
Speaker 1: Joey still wants to be invisible, but decades of experience
Speaker 1: have taught me that oftentimes the more invisible you try
Speaker 1: to make yourself, the more visible you become. So if
Speaker 1: I have my way, Joey will no longer have to
Speaker 1: hide in the metaphorical bush like a young metaphorical Jonathan Goldstein.
Speaker 1: After the break helping Joey to stop spinning his wheels. Okay,
Speaker 1: hold the line for a moment, Joey, all right.
Speaker 3: Sounds good. Hang on, I'm practicing my witty retorts anything.
Speaker 3: Don't do that, Okay.
Speaker 1: During the ad break, while you were loading up on
Speaker 1: unbelievable deals, I was considering the full extent of Joey's
Speaker 1: dilemma as much as Jonathan Debonair Goldstein wanted to help him.
Speaker 1: The truth is, Jonathan Stuart Goldstein is actually a lot
Speaker 1: like Joey, and so I made a phone call to
Speaker 1: an old friend, a man whose example and critical feedback,
Speaker 1: some might say overly critical feedback, have helped me to
Speaker 1: become the animal associate alibis. I am today, happy, confident,
Speaker 1: out of the shrubs and loving it. And I was
Speaker 1: hoping you could work the same magic on Joey. Joey,
Speaker 1: this is my friend Gregor.
Speaker 7: Howdy.
Speaker 1: Hey, So Joey was living in this loft and he
Speaker 1: Gregor is the exact opposite of Joey and me in
Speaker 1: any given social interaction. He's never afraid to stand out,
Speaker 1: never afraid to say the wrong thing. Case in point,
Speaker 1: was Johnny kidding when he said you're wearing rollerblades.
Speaker 7: No, I am a rollerblader, but.
Speaker 5: So you rollerbladed into the store wearing your.
Speaker 7: Rollerblades, that's right.
Speaker 5: I have these very vivid memories of being in Central
Speaker 5: Park and seeing these people, mostly grown men, on rollerblades
Speaker 5: with that folded hands over the lower back and their
Speaker 5: body bent forward like zipping around in like a lycroskin suit,
Speaker 5: the big giant grin as they gasped for breath, and like,
Speaker 5: goggles on.
Speaker 1: You got all that out of your system.
Speaker 5: I hate rollerbladers, and I hate everything about rollerbla but
Speaker 5: I think most people don't have the cardage to ask
Speaker 5: for help. It takes a very big man to ask
Speaker 5: for help. Okay, so the guy wants to roller blade.
Speaker 7: Fine.
Speaker 1: Since Joey feels most comfortable when he's rehearsing social interactions,
Speaker 1: I suggest we do some role playing. Joey plays himself
Speaker 1: and Gregor plays the pizza shop owner. After ten minutes
Speaker 1: deliberating over his character's name, Gregor decides on Carmine, please
Speaker 1: call me Karmi. All right, stop just trying to a
Speaker 1: little depth of the character. Don't do that. Once I
Speaker 1: finish offering some helpful direction, we begin. So Okay, so
Speaker 1: you're you're the owner. I'll do the folly work. I'll
Speaker 1: make any necessary sounds. Okay, Joey, you're coming up to
Speaker 1: the pizza parlor, tingle, tingle.
Speaker 3: Hey, so it's been a long time. I don't know
Speaker 3: if you heard I.
Speaker 7: I had a bit of a.
Speaker 1: Joe trails off even in a simulation. His nerves get
Speaker 1: the better of him. I try to inspire him with
Speaker 1: more folly work. Tingle, tingle. The place is starting to
Speaker 1: fill up a little, so you might want to spit
Speaker 1: it out. Tingle, tingle, tingle, tingle.
Speaker 5: Oh my god, it's like radio lab. Suddenly a monkey
Speaker 5: came in. Gregor call me Carmen the whole duration of
Speaker 5: this shoot. I need to be in character. I'm like
Speaker 5: Daniel day Lewis. I will only answer if you call
Speaker 5: me CARMI.
Speaker 1: Why did I even have you be the shop owner?
Speaker 1: Why wasn't I the shop owner?
Speaker 5: I could be your son who's got like bigger dreams.
Speaker 5: I don't want to spend my whole life singing pizza
Speaker 5: derailing that I got big dreams. I want to get
Speaker 5: into real estate, commercial real estate. I want to least laundromats.
Speaker 5: See I'm not like you.
Speaker 1: You really, I want to.
Speaker 5: Have a self storage unit. They're very profitable, don't you see?
Speaker 5: Now we're gelling as a team right at the very end.
Speaker 5: As you start to fade us down, you can't even
Speaker 5: hear what I'm saying anymore.
Speaker 1: Sure, Gregor was taking none of the work seriously, But
Speaker 1: Joey was enjoying Gregor, and in his own way, Gregor
Speaker 1: was enjoying Joey. It looked like Gregor was in I
Speaker 1: noticed that you like to sit very close to the gate.
Speaker 1: Gregor and I meet at the airport for the flight
Speaker 1: to see Joey in La. While squatting on the floor
Speaker 1: staring fixedly at the gate, Gregor shares some insider tips
Speaker 1: on air travel.
Speaker 5: Because when they say extra time getting down the gate,
Speaker 5: joe Way, you're allowed to run.
Speaker 7: Past those people.
Speaker 1: You're allowed.
Speaker 5: See if like I could easily run outrun that little
Speaker 5: girl in the purple. Anyway, Johnny, stick with me. I'm
Speaker 5: gonna show you how to board this big bird. That's
Speaker 5: where I stay at the pilot when I bought the claim.
Speaker 5: Let's bring this big bird down brother. That way, he
Speaker 5: knows I'm a member of the free Eternity of aviation.
Speaker 7: Cross check at ready to grow accomplies.
Speaker 1: Once we've board it, running down the jetway like a
Speaker 1: couple of giggling idiots, Gregor regales me with stories the
Speaker 1: time lou Reid threatened to put an ashtray through his head.
Speaker 5: No he didn't, Yeah, heavy glass one.
Speaker 1: The time a taxi driver told me he had eyes
Speaker 1: like his dead brothers. That's a terrible story. The time
Speaker 1: all dozen or so members of the Wu Tang clan
Speaker 1: squeezed onto his living room couch. He asked for my
Speaker 1: seat to t Then come the aviation stories, all the
Speaker 1: flights he's been on where people have died.
Speaker 5: But then there was another photos on when someone died
Speaker 5: right next to me, and they were literally doing the
Speaker 5: thing on the PA where they're like there's any doctors
Speaker 5: on board? And I was like, I'm kind of a doctor.
Speaker 1: How are you kind of a doctor?
Speaker 5: I'm a very good diagnostician. Look, we're on twenty five RL.
Speaker 5: It's one of my favorite always.
Speaker 1: Gregor and I rent a car and meet up with
Speaker 1: Joey at his favorite coffee shop. From here, we planned
Speaker 1: to head to the pizza parlor, get him unbanned, and
Speaker 1: then go to the loft so Joey can apologize to
Speaker 1: his former roommates.
Speaker 3: Morning, nice to meet hi.
Speaker 1: How are you Hi?
Speaker 4: How you?
Speaker 1: As well as being rollerblade footed, Joey's just as chopstick legged,
Speaker 1: mustache lipped, and mullet headed, as his sister Relise had cautioned,
Speaker 1: did it take you a while to decide like what
Speaker 1: you were going to wear today? Joey seems anxious, so
Speaker 1: I asked him, Joey, are you anxious? But before he
Speaker 1: can answer, Gregor steps in.
Speaker 5: John, Let's take it from here. You don't want to
Speaker 5: make the guy nervous by asking me if he was nervous,
Speaker 5: why don't you go around in a circle and each say,
Speaker 5: a member of the woutang until we get on.
Speaker 1: With his idiot's game. What Gregor's really doing is distracting Joey,
Speaker 1: protecting him, in this case, protecting him from me. Ready, Okay,
Speaker 1: I'll start the diju. Let's stop just this is the genius, genius? Okay,
Speaker 1: stop number one? The pizza parlor? Is this the place?
Speaker 5: What time they open? Eleven?
Speaker 8: Oh?
Speaker 3: I'm getting nervous. My stomach is jumping.
Speaker 1: Oh wait here, Joey, I have some in the creer
Speaker 1: just in case. As Joey's mentor, I know he runs
Speaker 1: a pretty good chance of choking, so I prepared him
Speaker 1: some notes during my flight. Okay, here you go. Read this.
Speaker 7: Right.
Speaker 3: You guys were like family to me, and when you
Speaker 3: accuse me of theft, I try it slower.
Speaker 1: You guys were like family. Go ahead.
Speaker 3: You guys were like family to me, and when you
Speaker 3: accuse me of theft, I mishandled the situation. I became discombobulated.
Speaker 3: I should have defended myself, told you I'm no thief.
Speaker 1: Although we want to offer for Joey help, it's important
Speaker 1: that he do this on his own. No Gregor, no Jonathan,
Speaker 1: no Elise. We'll be there with Q cards and emotional support,
Speaker 1: but ultimately Joey needs to enter the pizza shop and
Speaker 1: make his case solo.
Speaker 5: We're gonna let Joey shine.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean I think like you bring your shinebox, Joey.
Speaker 1: Are you getting the reference to the shinebox?
Speaker 7: That would be a You guys got a lot of references.
Speaker 7: O don't that?
Speaker 1: Have you seen Good Fellas? Do your joe pesci for
Speaker 1: Joey just to loosen him up a little.
Speaker 5: Ed was one tough irishman. I put his head in
Speaker 5: advice three days until his eyebowl pop.
Speaker 1: That yet, get too vegetarian pizzas stuff. I instruct Joey
Speaker 1: to order pizza and kombucha's for his roommates. This way,
Speaker 1: the pizza parlor crew will see he's not just a
Speaker 1: dollar slice guy, but someone capable of committing to an
Speaker 1: entire pie and a vinegar and bile based beverage. It'll
Speaker 1: show personal growth.
Speaker 5: Just have fun.
Speaker 1: Joey swings open the door and roller blades inside. Remember
Speaker 1: the rollerblading this whole time, Joey's been wheels down wearing
Speaker 1: his blades. You might want to rewind a few minutes
Speaker 1: and re listen with that image in your mind. And
Speaker 1: it's not just the roller blades. Joey is also wearing
Speaker 1: a wire. So standing outside, Gregor and I can eavesdrop
Speaker 1: on how things are going inside the parlor. Do you
Speaker 1: want to hear?
Speaker 4: Wow?
Speaker 1: I can't stand well. Gregor paces back and forth on
Speaker 1: the sidewalk. I cut an earphone and listen as Joey
Speaker 1: rolls up to the counter.
Speaker 3: Hey, how's it going?
Speaker 1: Joey is greeted by a pizza chef.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't know if you remember me, I used
Speaker 3: to come here all the time. I was kicked out
Speaker 3: of your shop a couple months back for stealing slices,
Speaker 3: even like I was accused of slices. No, I totally
Speaker 3: know why you thought it was me, because it looks
Speaker 3: like I mean, I came in.
Speaker 1: Gregor and I watched nervously through the storefront window.
Speaker 7: Oh he's blowing it.
Speaker 8: I rushed him.
Speaker 4: Sat.
Speaker 1: Joey isn't mounting a defense, and he isn't offering a
Speaker 1: counter narrative. Instead, he's exhibiting a level of mealy moothery
Speaker 1: not seen since a young Jonathan Goldstein tried to explain
Speaker 1: to a trolley conductor why he was hiding in a bush.
Speaker 3: And I was kind of hoping I could come back
Speaker 3: just because I love But as Gregor and I bicker
Speaker 3: over whether to walk inside and roll Joey out the
Speaker 3: door like a dessert trolley full of flaming horse manure,
Speaker 3: we noticed something. I know, it's weird that's been so long,
Speaker 3: but I just like felt really bad at me, was
Speaker 3: really embarrassed.
Speaker 7: Really, I'm sorry, she's really nice.
Speaker 1: Saw like someone come in and with like roller seats.
Speaker 1: I remember that day I was recommitting. Not only does
Speaker 1: she remember that day, but she also remembers Joey always.
Speaker 7: A guy who came in like several times.
Speaker 1: Just like, yeah, no, I see, I think that was me.
Speaker 1: Kind of remembers Joeoe.
Speaker 6: I came in.
Speaker 1: I'm a vegetarian.
Speaker 3: I saw that you guys only had Pepperoni slices because
Speaker 3: I was like, oh, not for me, And I just
Speaker 3: turned around totally looks like I just grab one.
Speaker 1: And since he didn't do it, you know, you don't
Speaker 1: have anything to apologize for.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I just want to make sure you, like you
Speaker 3: guys don't think I did a man Okay, okay, cool?
Speaker 1: Yeah, if he was willing to come back to face
Speaker 1: his accusers, she says, he probably didn't steal the pizza,
Speaker 1: and with that, Joey orders his pies and kombucha's with
Speaker 1: her faces pressed against the window. Gregor and I watch
Speaker 1: with amazement as Joey waits for his order while engaging
Speaker 1: in some completely unscripted repartee cool song. He says, totally.
Speaker 1: She says this band is so cool. He says yeah.
Speaker 1: She says, we didn't prepare Joey for any of this,
Speaker 1: but here he was riffing and scatting away like some
Speaker 1: kind of improvisational jazz cat. Carmine would have been proud,
Speaker 1: thank you very much, and tingle tingle. Joey emerges from
Speaker 1: the restaurant holding our pizzas aloft like trophies. Joey, oh
Speaker 1: you did it.
Speaker 7: Oh my god, I'm shake it.
Speaker 1: I'm shake it. You did a great job. Despite his
Speaker 1: fear of saying the wrong thing, Joey had managed to
Speaker 1: put himself out there and stumble his way through. Joey,
Speaker 1: that was great, Like, yeah, you really like and you
Speaker 1: did it by yourself. We didn't have to go in
Speaker 1: or anything.
Speaker 7: That's awesome.
Speaker 3: Oh I really really was nervous that I felt my
Speaker 3: leg completely shaking. I thought she was going to look
Speaker 3: down and just see my leg shaking like it.
Speaker 5: Okay, on one to ten, how do you feel did
Speaker 5: you wrestle the bear?
Speaker 3: Because I know I still have to go to the loft.
Speaker 3: It's you know, the relief has it come.
Speaker 1: But after the break, Joey tries rolling up a much
Speaker 1: harder hill, apologizing to people he actually knows.
Speaker 5: Those people you live with, they actually know the real joy.
Speaker 5: I mean, maybe they didn't like the real joys. But
Speaker 5: they knew who you were.
Speaker 7: No, I don't think they did. I mean I hope
Speaker 7: they did that.
Speaker 1: Do you think it's a good sign that the roommates
Speaker 1: did not respond. No.
Speaker 7: No.
Speaker 3: To be honest, I'm pretty nervous about that.
Speaker 1: Joey had tried to contact his former loftmates via group
Speaker 1: text to let them know he'd be coming by to talk.
Speaker 1: But as we stand on the street in front of
Speaker 1: the building, our kombucha bubbling and vegetarian pizzas congealing, Joey
Speaker 1: checks and re checks his phone, not a single one
Speaker 1: of his former roommates has responded.
Speaker 5: Not even like any response is not a good sign.
Speaker 1: Well maybe that's better than like responding by saying I'm
Speaker 1: not interested. Right, the loft is on the second floor,
Speaker 1: behind the metal gate, and there's no doorbell.
Speaker 5: All right, let's figure out how to get into this fortress.
Speaker 1: There's no drain pipe to shimmy, no fire escape banister
Speaker 1: to reverse oli. All we can do is wait for
Speaker 1: someone to come in or out. Gregor fills the time
Speaker 1: with yet another aviation story.
Speaker 5: When I was going through the TSA, the lady was like,
Speaker 5: could you pull your pants up a little bit?
Speaker 1: You just told me to take my belt off.
Speaker 5: Now my pants are falling down. You want me to
Speaker 5: pull my pants up?
Speaker 6: Which is it?
Speaker 7: You really get told to play an?
Speaker 5: I get told that every time I go through the t.
Speaker 1: Where's a belt with a pair of shorts? You wear
Speaker 1: a belt and shorts?
Speaker 5: Yep, I never heard of that. How do you think
Speaker 5: I keep mouth?
Speaker 1: I think someone's coming. Thankfully we're interrupted.
Speaker 3: Yoh, how's it going?
Speaker 1: One of Joey's old roommates emerges. He's a hip young
Speaker 1: man who, if not wearing a straw pork pie hat
Speaker 1: and carrying a gondola paddle, is certainly giving off that vibe,
Speaker 1: a Venetian boatman vibe. Joey, foregoing all social foreplay, dives
Speaker 1: right in.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm here because I want to apologize. I don't
Speaker 3: know if you've got the group text. Oh yeah, I
Speaker 3: just wanted I felt really bad about how I left
Speaker 3: things here, so I brought some pizza and my friends here.
Speaker 1: Okay, Joey gestures over to his friends, two balding middle
Speaker 1: aged men slumping behind him like bald scarecrows stuffed with
Speaker 1: muse ley.
Speaker 9: Hey, right, okay, all right, well this is really awkward
Speaker 9: in a surprise.
Speaker 6: All right, I was just going.
Speaker 2: Out of my car.
Speaker 7: Okay.
Speaker 1: So the boatman isn't very receptive, but Joey persists, does.
Speaker 3: Anyone else tell him if you want to, like, ask
Speaker 3: if they are okay with me coming up like that?
Speaker 7: Okay, thank you so much.
Speaker 1: It's taken all of Joey's courage to return to the
Speaker 1: place where the coolest art kids in La live, and
Speaker 1: he's still being denied entry. As Joey stares in silence
Speaker 1: at the steel door that's just clanged shut, in his
Speaker 1: mustachioed face, I struggle to come up with something positive
Speaker 1: to say. I think you handled yourself.
Speaker 7: Well, I'm extremely nervous right now. I don't feel good
Speaker 7: about how this is going.
Speaker 1: Upstairs, the gondolier is saying to his roommate something along
Speaker 1: the lines of, Hey, remember that silent roller skating weirdo
Speaker 1: we kicked out of our art loft. Well, he's downstairs
Speaker 1: with pizza and his two gay dads. But then, yo, hey, what's.
Speaker 6: How you doing.
Speaker 1: Zach is the unofficial head of the household, the guy
Speaker 1: who takes care of all the square noormy stuff like
Speaker 1: throwing out expired cottage cheese and paying the rent on time.
Speaker 1: He's bearded and shaggy. He turns to Joey. Joey stares
Speaker 1: down at his rollerblades and starts mumbling explanations.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I just thought, I mean, I didn't think it
Speaker 3: was just like, I just thought, like.
Speaker 1: I haven't heard this much mealy mouthing since I guess
Speaker 1: an hour ago, when Joey was at the pizza parlor.
Speaker 1: Zach looks at Joey skeptically. His arms are crossed. Nonetheless
Speaker 1: Joey's soldiers on, I.
Speaker 3: Just feel really bad about kind of how how I
Speaker 3: left things here. Yeah, I know that I wasn't the
Speaker 3: best roommate, and I feel really bad and just kind
Speaker 3: of uncomfortable about like just you know, even just how
Speaker 3: you guys think about me. But I just wanted to
Speaker 3: apologize and make things right.
Speaker 6: There were things like that bugged me. Here we go.
Speaker 1: Whereas the pizza chef had been impressed with the mere
Speaker 1: fact Joey had returned, for Zach, that wasn't enough.
Speaker 9: You had your headphones on a lot, and you had
Speaker 9: noise canceling headphones.
Speaker 6: You're just like in your world.
Speaker 1: He launches into a laundry list of grievances.
Speaker 6: Didn't clean the bathroom, and I was just.
Speaker 1: Like dude, Joey ignored everybody, never cleaned up after himself.
Speaker 1: I ever even washed a dish.
Speaker 9: The amount of rant or who's paying what? Or why
Speaker 9: are you paying her and not paying Ah?
Speaker 1: The worst thing Joey could imagine was happening. He was
Speaker 1: being seen and told that he'd always been seen. He
Speaker 1: put all his effort into trying to become invisible and
Speaker 1: absolutely no effort into doing his share of the chores.
Speaker 1: That's why his roommates wanted him out. They'd seen him
Speaker 1: visibly not cleaning the loft, visibly not taking out the garbage,
Speaker 1: trying to hide but not really hiding at all.
Speaker 6: He taking an advantage of And that's what I was.
Speaker 1: Like, whoa O If ordering a pizza had given Joey
Speaker 1: the Jimmy legs, facing Zach was giving Joey the Joey
Speaker 1: leg a name I've just coined for a condition in
Speaker 1: which one's entire body becomes one single Jimmy leg that
Speaker 1: is a Joey leg that won't stop Jimmy ing is like.
Speaker 6: A liberty, you know.
Speaker 1: But while Joey is Jimmy ing. He isn't folding, He's
Speaker 1: not running away.
Speaker 6: But it was just the way that it was done. Yeah.
Speaker 1: As Zach finishes speaking, Joey maintains eye contact, and what's more,
Speaker 1: as the la breeze whips up the hindquarters of his mullet,
Speaker 1: he does not fall prey to his lifelong crutch, silence,
Speaker 1: without notes, without wittyish rejoinders. He responds, all this stuff,
Speaker 1: like the.
Speaker 3: Not paying rent on time, and just all the story stuff,
Speaker 3: all that stems from this shyness, this like the weirdness
Speaker 3: and like just feeling uncomfortable to like, I don't know,
Speaker 3: be in the public space kind of just because I'm
Speaker 3: weird and shy. And I can't blame it on anything
Speaker 3: but myself. I mean, it was all It's all me.
Speaker 3: It's like my own things. Zach looks at Joey's I
Speaker 3: wish I was more able to like be friendly with you.
Speaker 1: Guys, sees him struggling, and his face softens.
Speaker 9: I understand like having social anxiety, having like issues where
Speaker 9: you're like you feel something that's like strangling you in
Speaker 9: a position where you have to converse or whatever.
Speaker 6: Like I can understand that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Like I only wanted to just be friends with you, guys.
Speaker 6: I have I appreciate it. Where were you staying now?
Speaker 1: Awkwardness is just a step along the way to vulnerability,
Speaker 1: and being vulnerable, allowing yourself to be seen is the
Speaker 1: only soil from which friendship can grow.
Speaker 6: I love your funky style.
Speaker 1: And what better fertilizer than a mutual love of the mullet.
Speaker 9: I've been contemplating a similar mullet as yours, but I
Speaker 9: don't know if my hair would work as much as yours.
Speaker 6: You have a different volume.
Speaker 1: So as Zach and Joey wax on about the beauty
Speaker 1: of Joey's ape drape, another loft made appears in the stairway. Nice, yeah,
Speaker 1: if that's okay, that's great, Thank you, Holy cow. This
Speaker 1: is a really big space.
Speaker 8: It's good.
Speaker 1: Joey leads Gregor and I on a tour through the
Speaker 1: old audio cassettes and dummy heads, past the kickboxing bag
Speaker 1: and vinyl collection, and ends the tour in a truly
Speaker 1: empty V cribs kind of way at his old bedroom
Speaker 1: where the magic happened. And by magic, I mean where
Speaker 1: Joey slept on the floor wrapped in unwashed blankets.
Speaker 7: This is where they used to stay.
Speaker 1: Did you have a mattress? Joey breaks out the pizza
Speaker 1: and kombucha, and we all gathered by the hot plate
Speaker 1: for a toast.
Speaker 5: You're supposed to actually look up, look at each other's eyes.
Speaker 7: The communication.
Speaker 1: After we choke back our kombucha, I suggest the symbolic gesture, Hey,
Speaker 1: you want to you want to wash all the glassy
Speaker 1: I do.
Speaker 5: This is totally ridiculous.
Speaker 1: You're gonna use soap and everything.
Speaker 5: I don't know if it's good with the vision or
Speaker 5: something that.
Speaker 4: Stop with them.
Speaker 1: Just as we're about to leave, Gregor decides he'd like
Speaker 1: to use the bathroom. And whereas a couple of shrinky
Speaker 1: and sneaky violets like Joey and me might just slink
Speaker 1: off looking for it, Gregor does not.
Speaker 5: It might be too much of in a position if
Speaker 5: I was to leave a little urine in your toilet
Speaker 5: on the way out.
Speaker 1: By embracing the awkwardness of life, acknowledging that we are
Speaker 1: creatures who require toilets, Gregor somehow makes things less awkward,
Speaker 1: at least for himself. Gregor has mastered something that Joey
Speaker 1: is still learning, the art of saying here I am,
Speaker 1: even when ping into a toilet while wearing a lapel microphone.
Speaker 6: You're welcome, Thank you, take it easy.
Speaker 3: Thanks.
Speaker 1: After leaving the loft, there's only one thing left to redo.
Speaker 8: Hello.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Joey phones up his twin sister release and this
Speaker 1: time he isn't crying. It was so good, it was
Speaker 1: so cool. Yeah.
Speaker 3: I think he genuinely forgave me.
Speaker 7: And I did it all on my lone, son.
Speaker 6: No, you did it.
Speaker 7: You needed so much help.
Speaker 3: Well after I got the help, I did it on myself,
Speaker 3: you know, I mean, but now I just feel like
Speaker 3: I can do it on myself by myself.
Speaker 7: I'm very I am really proud of you that I know.
Speaker 1: It takes a lot, it did.
Speaker 3: It takes a lot from me.
Speaker 7: Yeah, you know, more than anyone.
Speaker 1: Your proudness feels good. I'm not surprised that Elise is proud,
Speaker 1: but I'm taken aback to see that. Gregor looks proud too,
Speaker 1: proud of himself, of course, but also with Joey. So
Speaker 1: once Joey gets off the phone, Gregor offers up some
Speaker 1: fatherly advice.
Speaker 5: I understand what it is to be young. It's a
Speaker 5: tough phase until you're about forty five. Life is really difficult, okay,
Speaker 5: and then from there on in it's all just sitting
Speaker 5: in one of those soapbox derby cars rolling down the
Speaker 5: hill to your sinescence and eventual death.
Speaker 1: Gregor, you're depressing the guy.
Speaker 5: I'm coming to my Hallmark inspirational line. I'd say it's
Speaker 5: a tough fifteen to twenty five year period. It's very unpleasant,
Speaker 5: really most of it.
Speaker 7: Could you repeat that Hallmark line again?
Speaker 1: And with that, Joey pulls off his unlikeliest feet, yet
Speaker 1: he gets in a genuine off the cough zinger. Gregor
Speaker 1: and I had brought this big bird down, Guang. There
Speaker 1: we going.
Speaker 8: Now that the fernitures returning to its goodwill home, now
Speaker 8: that the last month's rant is skating with the damage
Speaker 8: to Posle, take this moment to dissolve.
Speaker 2: If we meant it, if we talked, we felt around
Speaker 2: for far.
Speaker 8: Thanks accident.
Speaker 1: Hello Joey, Oh wait, here comes our surprise. Guest.
Speaker 7: You ready for it?
Speaker 1: It comes? Gregor, you look very moisturized.
Speaker 5: Did you have an HR policy where you're not supposed
Speaker 5: to comment on people's physical appearance? Because I think Johnny
Speaker 5: skipped that day when he was getting on boarded.
Speaker 1: Well that, I mean, that's a compliment, don't you think, Yes,
Speaker 1: young lady, you.
Speaker 5: Look great in that druss.
Speaker 1: You really fill it out.
Speaker 5: Well that's a compliment too. I mean, come on, I
Speaker 5: that's time like you had a mullet and were rollerblading
Speaker 5: and eating a slice of pizza and had like eleven roommates.
Speaker 3: Not too much has changed. Some things are have improved.
Speaker 1: Can I see the back of your head and you've
Speaker 1: still got a mustache?
Speaker 7: I do, it's grown in. That's what seven years will do.
Speaker 1: Wow, look at that, you've grown up, just in the
Speaker 1: blink of an eye exactly. So we just wanted to
Speaker 1: check in with you and see how you were doing.
Speaker 5: I want to hear about how now like you were
Speaker 5: sort of pushed out of the nest that instead of
Speaker 5: falling to the sidewalk and getting eaten by a cat,
Speaker 5: you have taken off to soar with the seagulls.
Speaker 1: Bernie and ethel seagull. All right, listen, we're getting off
Speaker 1: track here, Joey. We're here to hear about you.
Speaker 7: I was enjoying this.
Speaker 1: So what's going on in your in your life? Are
Speaker 1: you in la? I?
Speaker 3: Actually I'm in New York and I moved out here
Speaker 3: about four years ago.
Speaker 1: How many roommates do you have?
Speaker 7: This will shock you zero.
Speaker 1: So no, no bed sheet walls, just all you.
Speaker 3: I do live in like a large studio apartment railroad
Speaker 3: style where there's like multiple rooms without proper doors, so
Speaker 3: they are separated by what kind of looks like a
Speaker 3: bed sheet.
Speaker 7: It's like a curtain. I don't know if you can
Speaker 7: tell the back.
Speaker 1: Was that something that you were looking for? You you
Speaker 1: told the real estate agent that you wanted something with
Speaker 1: bed sheet.
Speaker 7: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I don't feel at home unless i'm around bad shoots.
Speaker 1: Joey's doing. Joey's thriving. Look he's got a cow. Is
Speaker 1: that a couch you're sitting on?
Speaker 3: It's a share I don't have a couch.
Speaker 1: Oh are you still rollerblading?
Speaker 3: Of course I still love rollerblading, but I also I
Speaker 3: found that I love riding a bicycle too.
Speaker 5: I have a question.
Speaker 1: Oh go ahead, gregor.
Speaker 5: Not too personal? Are you drinking your own urine? What's
Speaker 5: all right?
Speaker 1: So good talk, Joey. Any thing you'd like to say
Speaker 1: in parting?
Speaker 3: I guess I want to say thank you for helping
Speaker 3: me all those years ago.
Speaker 7: It actually, I do think meant something and it worked.
Speaker 2: Did it?
Speaker 8: Really?
Speaker 7: I think it did? How so I felt a lot
Speaker 7: more confident after that.
Speaker 3: Just yeah, I mean the lessons imparted on the day,
Speaker 3: but also just hearing it back.
Speaker 7: Over the years, I've revisited.
Speaker 3: It and whenever I do, it makes me laugh first,
Speaker 3: but also kind of shows me how far I've come.
Speaker 7: So I'm grateful.
Speaker 5: This may come across a slightly patronizing, but I feel
Speaker 5: like Joey's all grown up.
Speaker 7: I think I am. I think you're right.
Speaker 1: Okay, let's close this out by all together ready. Woo
Speaker 1: tang tang, Woo tang. Thanks to everyone who helped put
Speaker 1: this episode together. We'll be back next week with another
Speaker 1: encore presentation of Heavyweight
Speaker 8: Cont