Speaker 1: Hello, Jackie Cohen.
Speaker 2: In the last fifteen hours, you have sexty more than
Speaker 2: you're sext me in the last six months.
Speaker 3: What's going on?
Speaker 1: Okay, So I got a whole bunch of headshots taken,
Speaker 1: and I need to choose one.
Speaker 4: We're lucky for you.
Speaker 5: I'm doing nothing right now.
Speaker 1: You're in front of your smartphone.
Speaker 2: Right now, my smartphone?
Speaker 4: Well then my smartphone.
Speaker 1: Okay, here's the first one. Kind of a bearded bohemian. Look,
Speaker 1: here we go. Just send it to your cell.
Speaker 3: Oh my god, it makes me look like a bum.
Speaker 1: All right. Okay, how about this one beside a plant
Speaker 1: no denim shirt and denim vest in a cagle cap
Speaker 1: in a law library, sitting in a bean bag chair
Speaker 1: eating a powdered doughnut.
Speaker 4: Of course.
Speaker 1: Okay, all I've got left is this one of me
Speaker 1: in a turtleneck and a pair of overalls.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 1: No, I like overalls from Ghimili Media. I'm Jonathan Goldstein
Speaker 1: and this is Heavyweight Today's episode Mara right after the break.
Speaker 1: Here are some things to know about Mara. She has
Speaker 1: a clock in her bathroom, so even when she's in
Speaker 1: the shower, she can make sure she's running on time.
Speaker 1: When she meets up with friends, she brings along sparkling
Speaker 1: water so everyone stays hydrated. And on her high school
Speaker 1: rowing team, she was the coxin, the one who steers
Speaker 1: the boat and keeps everyone on course. In other words,
Speaker 1: Mara gets the job done, which is why the one
Speaker 1: job she can't get done bothers her so much that
Speaker 1: it pops up in her dreams.
Speaker 7: You know how people have an anxiety dreams, and it's
Speaker 7: like you're naked, or you're in a test room and
Speaker 7: you've not studied.
Speaker 2: I don't know what yours is, Jonathan.
Speaker 1: I've had that stuff happen in real life. Well you're
Speaker 1: talking about dreaming. Oh interesting, Okay.
Speaker 7: So I have a reoccurring dream about driving that I'm
Speaker 7: behind the wheel of a car, and then all of
Speaker 7: a sudden, there's just like this creeping anxiety where I
Speaker 7: realized that I can't drive.
Speaker 1: Mara does not have a driver's license. Her fear of
Speaker 1: driving began eleven years ago because of what happened to
Speaker 1: one of her cousins, one of her many many cousins.
Speaker 2: I have about forty first cousins.
Speaker 1: Do you know all the names of your forty cousins?
Speaker 2: Of course, I do.
Speaker 1: Could you recite all forty.
Speaker 7: Names Dominica, Michael and Catherine, Shana, Ben and Mary.
Speaker 1: As Mara lists, I try to remember the names of
Speaker 1: my cousins, of which there are two. There's Marty and
Speaker 1: a man named Sence. I want to say Benjamin.
Speaker 2: The twins Chris and Kevin, and Tina.
Speaker 1: In my family, cousins are a coincidence a murder of
Speaker 1: Rando's with the same grandparents. But in Mara's family, a
Speaker 1: cousin is a friend. And of all Mara's forty cousins,
Speaker 1: there was one who was her best friend, Shannon Shannon.
Speaker 1: Mara was two years younger than Shannon and grew up
Speaker 1: in Shannon's hand me downs. They celebrated Christmas and birthdays together,
Speaker 1: spent whole summer days at the pool. Shannon was her cool,
Speaker 1: big sister.
Speaker 7: Someone that you always kind of wanted to have in
Speaker 7: your corner, you know. She was the person that I
Speaker 7: got most excited to have play dates with or sleepovers with.
Speaker 1: As they grew older, Mara and Shannon would go on
Speaker 1: long walks together, talking about their families and gossiping about boys.
Speaker 1: In the fall of two thousand and eight, Shannon went
Speaker 1: away to college, and that summer, Mara was looking forward
Speaker 1: to seeing her again at an upcoming family party.
Speaker 7: It was July third, It was a Friday afternoon, and
Speaker 7: it was my brother's graduation party.
Speaker 1: Mara's family was hosting. So the day of the party,
Speaker 1: Mara helped her mom prepare for guests, tidying the laundry
Speaker 1: room to make it into a bar area.
Speaker 7: So I was sweeping the laundry room and I remember
Speaker 7: the phone ringing and my mom picking up, and it
Speaker 7: was my grandfather.
Speaker 2: And I remember my mom.
Speaker 7: Saying Shannon's name in this her You know the sound
Speaker 7: that people get when they're stressed and their voice just
Speaker 7: gets tight.
Speaker 2: It was like Shannon.
Speaker 7: And then she came into the room and she said,
Speaker 7: Shannon's been an accident.
Speaker 1: She's dead.
Speaker 7: With the place still kind of decorated like a graduation
Speaker 7: party with streamers and confetti, you know, my family just
Speaker 7: started rolling in.
Speaker 1: Already turned into an informal vigil, with the family consoling
Speaker 1: each other in small, hushed groups. It was here that
Speaker 1: Mara overheard an aunt sharing the graphic details of Shannon's death.
Speaker 1: These were images that would stick with her for years
Speaker 1: to come. Mara's aunt explained that while driving back from
Speaker 1: the Jersey Shore for the graduation party, Shannon, her license
Speaker 1: barely a few weeks old, accidentally swerved off the highway
Speaker 1: and drove through a guardrail and into a tree. The
Speaker 1: car spun around and hit another tree. It was the
Speaker 1: second tree that crushed her.
Speaker 7: You know, when news like that hits you, it doesn't
Speaker 7: really hit you, you know. I cried a little bit, but
Speaker 7: it was like this kind of sprint and then like normalcy.
Speaker 1: It only began to sink in a few weeks later,
Speaker 1: while MARAA was traveling for a race, she was staying
Speaker 1: in a hotel room with her rowing team. It was
Speaker 1: her birthday, and I.
Speaker 7: Remember like at midnight into the bathroom and running the
Speaker 7: shower and just like sobbing, I think for the first time,
Speaker 7: like realizing that this older cousin who I admired so
Speaker 7: much like I was going to get older than her.
Speaker 2: She was always going to be the same age.
Speaker 1: Crying in the hotel bathroom, Mara turned seventeen years old.
Speaker 1: Turning seventeen in New Jersey meant who was time to
Speaker 1: get her driver's license, and Mara had already begun the process.
Speaker 1: She'd gotten her permit. She'd been practicing or driving, but
Speaker 1: with Shannon's death, maraa couldn't bring herself to actually take
Speaker 1: the final test.
Speaker 7: My parents were pushing me to schedule the test, and
Speaker 7: I was kind of like, oh, I don't know, you know,
Speaker 7: excuse excuse, I'm busy.
Speaker 2: I'm traveling for crew.
Speaker 7: This image of the accident would come to mind at
Speaker 7: even just the thought of getting behind the wheel, but.
Speaker 1: Her parents kept insisting. The way Mara explains it, their
Speaker 1: approach was throw the kid into the deep end and
Speaker 1: they'll learn how to swim. They wanted Mara to stop
Speaker 1: dwelling and push through. So one day after church, Mar's
Speaker 1: father demanded she take the wheel.
Speaker 7: My dad was basically like, you're driving home, and I
Speaker 7: was like, I don't want to, but he made me,
Speaker 7: and we were, I don't know, a mile and a
Speaker 7: half from my parents, and I can remember just being
Speaker 7: utterly terrified and feeling like my stomach was just dropping
Speaker 7: through my body, and my dad being in the front
Speaker 7: seat and like raising his voice and making gasps and
Speaker 7: like pulling in and thinking to myself, I never want
Speaker 7: to do that again. And that was literally the last
Speaker 7: time I ever was behind the wheel of a car.
Speaker 1: Eleven years later, and still Mara's parents see her inability
Speaker 1: to get her license. In practical terms, adults just need
Speaker 1: to drive. They've never been able to see it the
Speaker 1: way Mara does. So at no point were you able
Speaker 1: to say the reason why I don't want to drive
Speaker 1: is just it connects too much to Shannon Oh.
Speaker 2: I have been various rays over the years.
Speaker 1: Has just never been heard, Mara says. Any conversation with
Speaker 1: her parents about driving devolves into a fight. Her parents
Speaker 1: push her to move past her fear. Mara says she can't,
Speaker 1: but they never really talk about what's behind the fear. Instead,
Speaker 1: they talk in circles and everyone leaves resentful. This happened
Speaker 1: most recently last Thanksgiving. Because of the pandemic. Mara didn't
Speaker 1: want to take the train from DC to Jersey. Her
Speaker 1: mother didn't want to make the long drive to pick
Speaker 1: her up. Things grew heated. Mara remembers her mom eventually saying, well,
Speaker 1: you're the one who decided not to get your license.
Speaker 1: It felt like the same argument they've been having since
Speaker 1: she was seventeen, and so now you're twenty eight years
Speaker 1: old and you don't have your license.
Speaker 2: I'm twenty eight years old and I don't have my license.
Speaker 2: Say it out loud. It makes you on a car.
Speaker 1: MARAA is desperate to change the conversation with her parents,
Speaker 1: and the solution she thinks is to get her license.
Speaker 1: That way, they can stop fighting about the license and
Speaker 1: finally talk about why it's been so hard for her,
Speaker 1: about what's behind her fear. The only problem. Mara is
Speaker 1: still terrified of driving, so she's come to me for
Speaker 1: help getting on the road and eventually passing the driver's test.
Speaker 1: I believe I failed the written part a couple times,
Speaker 1: and I wasn't a good driver, and I'm still not
Speaker 1: a great driver, and I don't really like driving. Okay,
Speaker 1: when I play grand theft auto, I can barely steal
Speaker 1: a single auto. But I remind Mara that even so,
Speaker 1: they still gave me a license. I don't have any
Speaker 1: special skill, any great hand eye coordination, and yet I'm
Speaker 1: street legal. Right. I'm just basically like, yeah, any any
Speaker 1: asshole can do it, and I'm that asshole, and I'm
Speaker 1: confident that Mara can be that asshole too. So this
Speaker 1: is what I want to hear. You say, you ready,
Speaker 1: I'm ready. I'm twenty eight years old. I'm twenty eight
Speaker 1: years old and I'm going to get my driver's license.
Speaker 1: And I'm going to get my driver's license. How does
Speaker 1: that feel? It feels good.
Speaker 2: I feel like I wanna cry again.
Speaker 1: Ah after the break, I cox in Mara to the
Speaker 1: finish line. Check this out.
Speaker 3: Port side.
Speaker 1: Raise your arms, stroke stroke, I mean drive, drive tune.
Speaker 1: That radio pumps that as NKO. Get your head out
Speaker 1: of it. You need like your twin brothers. With her
Speaker 1: road test a few months away, Mara will need someone
Speaker 1: to practice her driving with. It's still the height of
Speaker 1: the pandemic, so I can't fly to DC. I'll need
Speaker 1: to offer my tutelage over video. This means recruiting a
Speaker 1: local proxy, some DC based Patsy to fill the passenger seat.
Speaker 1: While holding me aloft on their phone, Mara suggests I
Speaker 1: speak with her friend Joe. Joe describes Mara as the
Speaker 1: kind of person who's always there to help, stepping up
Speaker 1: before you even ask. So she's happy to help mar
Speaker 1: learn to drive. But there's just one problem.
Speaker 8: I hate podcasts. I don't think I could.
Speaker 1: Connect with them. Well, she's inside of one now. Although
Speaker 1: she's known Mara for years, says MARAA only recently told
Speaker 1: her she doesn't know how to drive. Mara's shame about
Speaker 1: not having a license is something she's kept hidden, even
Speaker 1: from her closest friends.
Speaker 8: I was very surprised by it. Burney and a friends
Speaker 8: have gone on tons of trips together, and it had
Speaker 8: never crossed my mind that she couldn't drive the car
Speaker 8: at any point.
Speaker 1: Is it sort of like when you find out that
Speaker 1: a friend is Canadian, like you just thought you just
Speaker 1: thought she was people? What about this lot lesson? One
Speaker 1: the basics? Is it open for her first driving lesson?
Speaker 1: Joe brings Mara to an empty stadium parking lot. My
Speaker 1: virtual self or best self rides along in a phone
Speaker 1: holder fastened above the glove compartment, not unlike one of
Speaker 1: those dashboard hula dancers. Get yourself comfortable so that you
Speaker 1: could reach the gas as well as the break I've
Speaker 1: always feared I lacked any but taking on the aspect
Speaker 1: of a talking car air freshener is a new low. Okay,
Speaker 1: there you go. Mar's hands are visibly shaking. This is
Speaker 1: her very first time behind the wheel of a car
Speaker 1: since her father had her drive home from church eleven
Speaker 1: years ago foot reaches the various petals down there.
Speaker 2: Release, this is the brig and the gas.
Speaker 1: Did you have them confused?
Speaker 5: Yes?
Speaker 1: With the pedals all sorted, Mara takes hold of Joe's
Speaker 1: hand and let's take it.
Speaker 2: Eat breath. Okay, let's jack Oh shit, I'm underverse.
Speaker 1: Mars starts slow, taking a lap around the empty parking lot.
Speaker 1: At first, she coasts too scared to even accelerate, but
Speaker 1: then she's.
Speaker 9: Using the gas. I use.
Speaker 1: Okay, But in spite of her anxiety, Mara takes the
Speaker 1: driving quickly.
Speaker 10: At that when I hit that fifteen miles per hour,
Speaker 10: I was like, I'm capable of anything.
Speaker 1: When she has a feel for the car, she even
Speaker 1: decides to tackle parallel parking with some abandoned cones.
Speaker 8: And between that cone is gonna be where you have
Speaker 8: to parallel park.
Speaker 1: Okay, you can call it Jackie Cone JACKI co But
Speaker 1: unlike Jackie Cohen, this cone doesn't laugh at you or
Speaker 1: bang down the phone when you call it stands tall
Speaker 1: and tribute to safety. And also unlike Jackie Cohen, hits
Speaker 1: orange with a white stripe, though Jackie does have that
Speaker 1: orange sweater vest she wears with a white turtleneck makes
Speaker 1: her look like a creamsicle. But although Jackie Cone is icy,
Speaker 1: she's no treat what she doesn't.
Speaker 7: I'm gonna turn off the car and put my emergency
Speaker 7: brake on with.
Speaker 1: The less an over we said in the parking lot, Joe,
Speaker 1: how do you feel? How do you feel? Mar's done?
Speaker 2: Master level one?
Speaker 1: That's amazing. You've done it all at this.
Speaker 7: Point, except actually like driven on a road.
Speaker 1: Yeah, lesson two the road.
Speaker 11: These quiet neighborhoods are a welcome respite from the normal
Speaker 11: DC bustle.
Speaker 1: This is Mara's cousin, Mike, who's taking her driving on
Speaker 1: an actual street. Mike and Mara grew up together. When
Speaker 1: Mike was overseas and homesick, Mara was the only family
Speaker 1: member who came to visit him. But in spite of
Speaker 1: their closeness, it turns out that, like Joe, Mike never
Speaker 1: knew about Mara's lack of a license. Now that he does,
Speaker 1: though he's offering his full support.
Speaker 3: That's perfect.
Speaker 1: Mike is a staff sergeant in the Army and has
Speaker 1: the kind of can do attitude that must come in
Speaker 1: handy when motivating a cadet off a plane with the
Speaker 1: gentle poke of a bay.
Speaker 11: That driving is possible. Driving is for everyone, So.
Speaker 1: Mara is at ease driving through the streets of DC.
Speaker 1: His mic offers helpful tips.
Speaker 11: Turn signals are a crutch, you don't need them.
Speaker 2: Blinkers are not for you, though they're for other people.
Speaker 11: First of all, it's nobody's business where I'm going. Instead,
Speaker 11: you had to operate in a parking garage.
Speaker 1: Yet, Mara and Mike make a bathroom stop at a
Speaker 1: grocery store, which affords Mara a chance to practice parking
Speaker 1: in a parking garage and Mike a chance to practice
Speaker 1: sharing his heart.
Speaker 11: I think parking was one of the hardest things for me.
Speaker 11: Probably it's hard for me to admit. But after all,
Speaker 11: masculinity is just a cage, not break out of it.
Speaker 1: Wow, what is that noise? Mike's keen military ear senses
Speaker 1: danger in the underground parking garage. That was terrifying.
Speaker 3: It's terrifying.
Speaker 1: Are you getting that?
Speaker 2: It's terrifying?
Speaker 11: No, Maybe she's get out of here.
Speaker 7: In the corner run.
Speaker 1: Creeping around parking garages, laughing with a partner in crime.
Speaker 1: After years of fear and avoidance, Mara is finally catching
Speaker 1: up on what she missed as a teenager, first learning
Speaker 1: to drive from where I said in a cup holder,
Speaker 1: It's nice to hear her having fun. Mara's handling everything
Speaker 1: so well that I'm tempted to suggest we skip the
Speaker 1: rest of our lessons and just go to the movies.
Speaker 1: Theaters have cup holders two, after all, and I hear
Speaker 1: Boss Baby Too is getting good reviews. But there's still
Speaker 1: one lesson Mara needs, which brings us to lesson three,
Speaker 1: The Highway. Mar's road test is only a few weeks away,
Speaker 1: and she still hasn't driven on the highway, so while
Speaker 1: visiting Austin, Texas, Mara calls upon her friend Nora to
Speaker 1: take her driving on a real Texas interstate. Mara's always
Speaker 1: been there for Nora. When Nora's grandmother died, Maras stayed
Speaker 1: up all night with her so she wouldn't be alone.
Speaker 1: Nora's glad to help.
Speaker 5: My hands are sweating mine or two, my hands are
Speaker 5: also sweating, I'll say, just like watching Nora is holding
Speaker 5: the phone up so I can see the highway from
Speaker 5: Mara's perspective, Semi's whiz by making Nora's Mini Cooper seem
Speaker 5: even tinier.
Speaker 1: We're on I thirty five, Austin's only major free way.
Speaker 2: It's chaotic, all right, and you've got the green arrows.
Speaker 6: So ship man, y'all, there's people coming up behind you,
Speaker 6: but you'll get in the cars last to get on,
Speaker 6: so you have to like get over fairly quickly here
Speaker 6: to get onto the highways.
Speaker 2: So all right, we're getting on.
Speaker 1: Mara emerges onto the highway, tentatively a little too slow
Speaker 1: for the flow of traffic.
Speaker 3: Ship Man, I.
Speaker 2: Don't know if I'm ready for this.
Speaker 6: You stand the then stay in the far this right
Speaker 6: lane if we.
Speaker 7: Can get right off this an accent immediately after, I
Speaker 7: have to look, what do I do?
Speaker 6: No? Just stay in the right lane. Oh do you
Speaker 6: want to stay in this? Yes? That's let's I said, okay,
Speaker 6: cant's just say where you are and we're just gonna
Speaker 6: get off at the second.
Speaker 2: Okay, right, okay, all right?
Speaker 1: At okay?
Speaker 9: Right?
Speaker 1: Can you get to the right lane? I don't know.
Speaker 6: If you get into the right.
Speaker 9: Can't go one more?
Speaker 6: There's no one behind you.
Speaker 2: We can go all the way over.
Speaker 1: Once off the highway, Mara finds a parking lot and
Speaker 1: comes to a stop, all told her first ever highway
Speaker 1: drive was less than two minutes long.
Speaker 4: Can you hold my hands?
Speaker 6: Yeah, I'm gonna put you down, John, Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yes, take a break.
Speaker 2: I don't know why I'm crying. I mean, I know
Speaker 2: why I'm crying. No, even regardless of the other stuff.
Speaker 10: That was my first time getting in the highway since
Speaker 10: she died, you know, and like it's like knowing, like
Speaker 10: feeling the like at the speed and which like in
Speaker 10: a moment, like something could happened. Just I felt out
Speaker 10: of control, even though I know I was in control.
Speaker 2: I'm glad it was with you. Okay, I want to
Speaker 2: try it again.
Speaker 1: Okay, yeah, there a.
Speaker 2: Goat, that's just stuff.
Speaker 1: In spite of her anxiety, Mara gets back on the highway.
Speaker 6: Okay, go straight and go kind of left, and we'll
Speaker 6: stay in this lane the whole time until we get out.
Speaker 2: Okay, Okay, now go go this time.
Speaker 1: Mara stays on the highway for a few exits before
Speaker 1: getting off. When I asked her why she felt so
Speaker 1: strongly about getting back on, she says she didn't want
Speaker 1: to let the fear build into something bigger the way
Speaker 1: it has for years. Marra wants to get the job done. Mara, yes,
Speaker 1: how you feeling.
Speaker 2: I'm feeling pretty anxious right now.
Speaker 1: It's finally the day of Mara's road test. She's brought
Speaker 1: along a support group to help distract from her stress,
Speaker 1: her friend Jenna, her cousin Dominica, and of course cousin Mike.
Speaker 1: I'm extremely hung over. Hearing this, Maras springs into action,
Speaker 1: not unlike a thoughtful, nurturing version of the kool Aid
Speaker 1: Man sparkling water.
Speaker 2: Yes, I love you someone, Yes, different flavors like.
Speaker 1: Do you want to back it in? Or I'm gonna go.
Speaker 2: It's fifteen twenty os, so I'm gonna go check in.
Speaker 11: Okay, great?
Speaker 1: Are you here?
Speaker 6: Yeah?
Speaker 9: Here.
Speaker 1: While her friends wait in the car, Maraa heads off
Speaker 1: to the test, where she will adjust mirrors and check
Speaker 1: blind spots. She will signal right, and she will signal left,
Speaker 1: making it everybody's business where she's going. When she approaches
Speaker 1: stop signs, she will slow down one hundred and fifty
Speaker 1: feet before the corner. She'll even deal with a lane
Speaker 1: hopping drunkard on an e bike that feels like an
Speaker 1: obstacle out of a video game, and fifty three minutes later,
Speaker 1: she will emerge, oh my.
Speaker 2: God, look your own Thank you, my gentlemen. Still going
Speaker 2: I still cotton now? Oh god.
Speaker 1: Maara is twenty eight years old and finally she has
Speaker 1: driver's license, like hot mouth. That's for years, Mara felt
Speaker 1: so much shame about not driving that she hid it
Speaker 1: from the people she loved. But now they're all here
Speaker 1: celebrating with her. She says she'd never have been able
Speaker 1: to do any of this without having asked for their help.
Speaker 2: Let me see, Wow, you were so beautiful?
Speaker 3: What like no one ever gets.
Speaker 1: In the weeks after getting her license, Mara tells everyone.
Speaker 1: She calls her sister, she texts her friends, but there
Speaker 1: are still two people. She can't bring herself to tell
Speaker 1: her parents. The driver's license was meant to clear the
Speaker 1: way for a conversation about Shannon's death. But as hard
Speaker 1: as getting her license was, the idea of talking with
Speaker 1: her parents seems even harder. She's worried that she'll try
Speaker 1: to bring up her big feelings and her parents will
Speaker 1: make their here we go again faces and there let's
Speaker 1: put all of this behind us sounds. Then her dad
Speaker 1: will grow quiet and her mom will start to cry.
Speaker 1: Everyone will get upset, and once again Marrow will feel unheard.
Speaker 1: And so she procrastinates for three months, but then one evening,
Speaker 1: around midnight, she sends her parents, Andy and Sue an email.
Speaker 1: In it, she says she finally got her license and
Speaker 1: wants to tell them all about it.
Speaker 3: So we need to hear more detail. How did this
Speaker 3: all come about?
Speaker 2: I don't know where do you want me to start?
Speaker 1: Well, firstly, initially, I mean, how did you feel when
Speaker 1: you when you received Mara's email?
Speaker 3: I was crying, really very excited for you fan you
Speaker 3: were admitting it.
Speaker 1: I'm just so happy for her.
Speaker 3: It was a huge obstacle for her, just emotionally.
Speaker 4: It's a not to be too dramatic, but a demon
Speaker 4: if you will.
Speaker 1: Sue nods, Yeah, I'm sure she probably told you.
Speaker 12: The story of week of her test driving test was
Speaker 12: her cousin's.
Speaker 4: Funeral, who died in a car crash.
Speaker 6: Right.
Speaker 1: Mara had told me that raising the topic of Shannon
Speaker 1: would be a struggle. I wasn't expecting Sue and Andy
Speaker 1: to be the ones to bring it up first, and
Speaker 1: neither was Mara. At the mention of Shannon, she freezes
Speaker 1: us up.
Speaker 7: I am like, very surprised that you have always made
Speaker 7: that association because of the way that me not driving
Speaker 7: has been frequently brought up in our family. It's been
Speaker 7: talked about as this very intentional choice and feeling like,
Speaker 7: in some ways, like not entitled to grieve.
Speaker 2: We even talked about Shannon in years truly.
Speaker 3: I'm sorry that you felt like we were avoiding the conversation.
Speaker 4: Yeah. I think during the experience the following years, my
Speaker 4: recollection is was that that it's something that we we
Speaker 4: tried to acknowledge verbally, but without you know, creating a
Speaker 4: crutch if you will.
Speaker 1: Andy and Sue feared too much sympathy might provide Mara
Speaker 1: with an excuse to give up on driving altogether. But
Speaker 1: Mara didn't want a license to drive so much as
Speaker 1: she wanted license to feel whatever she was feeling.
Speaker 7: This wasn't just a mental block, This wasn't something I
Speaker 7: was overthinking, But this was trauma.
Speaker 4: Yeah. We knew it. Yeah, that's what I was saying.
Speaker 4: Something we do that we didn't maybe do a great
Speaker 4: job of communicating it, but we knew it. We knew
Speaker 4: it all along. We knew it right from that day.
Speaker 4: You know, we heard and this is the roughest thing
Speaker 4: about being a parent. There's no playbook I mean, we're
Speaker 4: at a complete loss.
Speaker 1: No parent wants to watch their kids suffer in the
Speaker 1: aftermath of Shannon's death. They'd wanted to say something important
Speaker 1: and wise, something that might put an end to mars grief,
Speaker 1: But what can one really say? So in the face
Speaker 1: of an unsolvable problem, they focused on a solvable one,
Speaker 1: the driver's license, and talking about the license might have
Speaker 1: also been a distraction for Andy and Seue from their
Speaker 1: own grief. They'd love Shannon. Two, how do you guys
Speaker 1: remember that time?
Speaker 12: If I can ask, I remember it in great detail.
Speaker 12: We were having about eighty people coming to our house
Speaker 12: for my son's high school graduation party, and Maria was
Speaker 12: busy sweeping through the lawn ready.
Speaker 1: Even though Mara and her parents have never discussed that day,
Speaker 1: Sue raises all the same things Mara did. She remembers
Speaker 1: Mars sweeping the phone call, walking into the laundry room
Speaker 1: to tell Mara what had happened. For Mara, hearing Sue
Speaker 1: described that day the same way she always has makes
Speaker 1: Mara feel seen. Sue also brings up things Marara wasn't
Speaker 1: there for, like the day after the funeral, when she
Speaker 1: drove Shannon's mom and brother to the tow yard to
Speaker 1: collect Shannon's personal effects from the crushed car. Sue remembers
Speaker 1: Shannon's purse on the floor of the back seat, her
Speaker 1: phone and flip flops lying amid the shards of broken windshield,
Speaker 1: like Marra's night crying in the hotel room. That was
Speaker 1: when for Sue it all sank in.
Speaker 3: Understanding what grief I was battling, and we were all battling.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean by the time, you know, by the
Speaker 4: time we even digested it, that year went by, you know,
Speaker 4: still stuck in our throats, and everybody dealt with it
Speaker 4: own way, just to try to protect themselves, try to
Speaker 4: protect their own heart.
Speaker 7: And then I left for college, and like, I haven't
Speaker 7: lived at home really since.
Speaker 12: You know, It's funny more, I never really put it
Speaker 12: together till you're just talking now that you're the only
Speaker 12: one of the siblings that was here full time in
Speaker 12: the aftermath of her death.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Mara was the youngest of three siblings. It was
Speaker 1: just her and her parents alone in the house, the
Speaker 1: air thick with the weight of all that was unspoken.
Speaker 3: I meanwhile, you were trying to figure out where you're
Speaker 3: going to go to college. I mean all your senior
Speaker 3: EVENTU rough.
Speaker 2: That was a rough year.
Speaker 1: It's a small conversation as far as conversations go, but
Speaker 1: after not talking about it for over a decade, it's something.
Speaker 12: Maura, think about this. Ten years ago, we would not
Speaker 12: be having the conversation like we're even having right now.
Speaker 7: Yeah, and I just really appreciate you both having this conversation.
Speaker 4: There's so much room for improvement, and I think that's
Speaker 4: the and we're open to that. Yeah, and we're open
Speaker 4: to that. The book isn't written just a series of chapters.
Speaker 7: It's the beginning.
Speaker 3: Absolutely, we're proud of you more.
Speaker 1: Do you want to show them your driver's license? Mar
Speaker 1: holds up her license for her parents to see.
Speaker 7: Ooh, pretty picture, thank you, very nice, and that's me
Speaker 7: in hologram form.
Speaker 2: Ooh, what's a little ghosts like? Ooh, it's a show.
Speaker 1: The license no longer needs to be weighted down with
Speaker 1: implication and meaning. It can finally be a piece of
Speaker 1: plastic with a nice picture on it that gets you
Speaker 1: from point A to point B. One fall Saturday, Mara
Speaker 1: borrows a friend's car a miles She needs it to
Speaker 1: run some errands. No, absolutely, not. It's the kind of
Speaker 1: afternoon people have all the time. Really, what's Chicago like?
Speaker 1: But for Mara, it's an afternoon of first first time
Speaker 1: driving around DC alone, first time hitting a pothole, shit,
Speaker 1: first time driving through a drive through. Mara m a
Speaker 1: U R A where she orders a chicken sandwich and
Speaker 1: a strawberry milkshake.
Speaker 9: You.
Speaker 1: She fits her milkshake into the cup holder and heads
Speaker 1: to her next stop, The Sun's Bold. Mara started this
Speaker 1: trek because of her family, and she finished it because
Speaker 1: of her friends. But today she's enjoying the drive all
Speaker 1: by yourself. Does think.
Speaker 9: Now that the fernitures returning to its goodwill home, Now
Speaker 9: that the last Monsrand is scheming with the damage, the
Speaker 9: Bob take this moment to des.
Speaker 2: If we imagine I.
Speaker 1: Flee to series.
Speaker 9: Felt around Far.
Speaker 1: From Things, Accident.
Speaker 6: Zero.
Speaker 1: This episode of Heavyweight was produced by Khalila Holtz, Mohemy mcgauker,
Speaker 1: Stevie Lane, and me Jonathan Goldstein. Special thanks to Emily Condon,
Speaker 1: Aggie Goldstein, Alex Bloomberg, Bethel hoptay Anna Foley, Lynn Levy,
Speaker 1: Paul Bowman, Zach Schmidt, and Jackie Cohen. Bobby Lord mixed
Speaker 1: the episode with original music by Christine Fellows, John K. Sampson,
Speaker 1: Sean Jacoby, and Bobby Lord. Additional music credits can be
Speaker 1: found on our website Gimletmedia dot com slash Heavyweight. Our
Speaker 1: theme song is by the Weaker Than's courtesy of Epitaph Records.
Speaker 1: Follow up us on Twitter at Heavyweight. This is our
Speaker 1: last episode of the season, but we're already looking for
Speaker 1: stories for next year. So if you have a moment
Speaker 1: from your own past that you need some help with,
Speaker 1: email us at Heavyweight at gimbletmedia dot com. Happy holidays
Speaker 1: to wall and we'll see you next fall. See I
Speaker 1: made a little rhyme there.