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1:32

Welcome to to the moth podcast. I'm Rust, your your

1:34

host for this episode. They say to They say

1:36

to never meet your idols, but I'm

1:38

not so sure. if I mean, if

1:40

you don't meet your idols, you might

1:42

miss out on learning from the people

1:44

you admire most. most. While working at at the

1:46

moth, I've had the opportunity to meet

1:48

some really cool people, cool people, humanitarians, astronauts,

1:50

actors, authors, authors, and have all been gracious

1:53

and kind, exactly the type of people

1:55

I was hoping they'd be. Folks

1:57

like Elizabeth Gilbert, Mike

1:59

Mike Beriglia, DeSheels, were all warm

2:01

and friendly and met my expectations. On

2:04

this episode of the moth, we've got

2:06

two stories about what happens when you

2:08

actually meet your idol and all the

2:11

messy emotions it brings up. First up

2:13

is Harriet Jernigan, who told this at

2:15

one of our open mic story slams

2:17

in San Francisco. Here's Harriet, live at

2:20

the moth. It

2:23

was 1994, and I was in

2:25

charge of the poetry section at

2:27

the Midnight Special, this bookstore in

2:30

Santa Monica that was known not

2:32

only for its leftist politics, but

2:34

also for its celebrity clientele, everything

2:36

from Chevy Chase to Octavia Butler

2:39

to Frank Zappa. And I got

2:41

to meet a lot of celebrities,

2:43

but after a couple of months,

2:46

I was cool. That was cool.

2:48

I used to laugh at the

2:50

rookies who would sit there and

2:52

swoon over the rich and famous.

2:55

So stupid. After all, they were

2:57

only people. But

3:00

there was one celebrity I would

3:02

like to have seen, Maya Angelou.

3:04

She had just written on the

3:06

pulse of mourning and read it

3:09

for the inauguration of Bill Clinton,

3:11

and she had blown up. People

3:13

were buying her books in droves.

3:16

But what really chapped my ass

3:18

was when somebody would come in

3:20

and say, I don't know the

3:23

author, and I don't know the

3:25

title, but it's about a bird.

3:31

I know why the caged

3:33

bird sings. Yeah, that's it.

3:35

That's it. That's it. I

3:37

think. And I thought, if

3:39

she'd only come in, if

3:41

she'd only come in, I

3:44

could show her the appreciation

3:46

that she deserved. I could

3:48

see it so clearly in

3:50

my mind, she would come

3:52

in, and I would make

3:54

this devastatingly insightful comment. And

3:56

then I'd make this mad

3:58

witty remark. And we'd sit

4:00

there and share a laugh.

4:02

we would nod knowingly, and

4:04

that would be the beginning

4:06

of a beautiful lifelong friendship.

4:08

I could see myself after

4:10

her death giving interviews, talking

4:12

about her pension for walnuts,

4:14

or that time that we

4:16

hung out with the rebels

4:18

in Chile. And

4:23

then it happened. My co-worker rushes

4:25

to the back to the poetry

4:27

section. She's here. She's here. Who?

4:29

My Angelou. She needs a poem.

4:32

She needs the poem and it's

4:34

not up at the front. Oh,

4:36

come on. My Angelou would have

4:38

her own poems. No, she's here

4:40

visiting and she's going to give

4:42

it to some friends. I mean,

4:44

come on. This is your chance.

4:46

Get up there. And looked around

4:48

the corner. And

4:52

there she was, surrounded by

4:54

a swarm of people who

4:57

were asking for her autograph.

4:59

Holy shit. This was it.

5:01

This was the seminal moment.

5:04

This was the do-or-die. And

5:06

I looked at my co-worker,

5:09

and I screamed, I'm not

5:11

ready! And I ran to

5:14

the break room, and I

5:16

locked myself inside. He's

5:20

banging on the door. He's like,

5:22

come on, what is wrong with

5:24

you? What is wrong with you?

5:26

She's up front. This is your

5:28

chance. Go, go, go away. I

5:30

wailed in the back. About 10

5:32

minutes later, he comes back, right?

5:34

He says, you can come out

5:36

now. She's gone. And

5:39

I came out and I walked

5:41

the gauntlet of how could use

5:43

and the shaking heads and with

5:46

my tail between my legs, I

5:48

went outside and lit a cigarette

5:51

and crouched down against the wall

5:53

of the building and proceeded to

5:55

beat myself up. After a couple

5:58

of moments, I look up and

6:00

look. behold, there she is. She

6:02

is wearing a t-shirt, sweatpants, and

6:05

fluffy pink slippers. And her hair

6:07

is like all over the place.

6:10

And I'm like, how cool is

6:12

that? And all of a sudden

6:14

I realize I am getting my

6:17

second chance. It is time to

6:19

seize my destiny. So I pop

6:21

up like Jack in the box,

6:24

throw down my cigarette, and I

6:26

run up to her, and I

6:29

realize, holy crap, she's like six

6:31

feet tall. She's huge. And she's

6:33

looming over me, and she's waiting.

6:36

And I realize this is it.

6:38

This is it. And I go.

6:40

Dr. Angelou, Dr. Angelou, I just

6:43

want to tell you! And after

6:45

I finished blubbering, she gave me

6:48

a hug and she moved on.

6:50

And I went and hid in

6:52

the back of the store for

6:55

the rest of the day. So

6:57

like any self-respecting 23-year-old woman, when

6:59

I got home from work, there

7:02

was one thing I did. I

7:04

called my daddy. I said, daddy,

7:07

you won't believe what happened today.

7:09

And he said, you know, it

7:11

happens to a lot of people.

7:14

I'm sure she understands. You know,

7:16

you'll know what to say the

7:18

next time. Just forget it. But

7:21

I couldn't. I really couldn't. But

7:24

about a year later, after the

7:26

shame had finally burned off, I

7:28

got this package from my dad,

7:30

and there was a book inside,

7:32

and it was a little gift

7:34

copy of her latest poem, My

7:36

Angelou's latest poem, called Phenomenal Woman.

7:38

And I opened it up, and

7:40

inside, there was a letter from

7:42

my dad to My Angelou, and

7:44

he had said, about a year

7:46

ago, you had an encounter with

7:48

a young woman. at

7:51

a bookstore and unfortunately she

7:53

became speechless and could not

7:55

tell you that she is

7:57

one of your greatest and

7:59

she considers you a role

8:01

model and would you be

8:03

so kind as to sign

8:06

this book and send it

8:08

back in the self-addressed stamped

8:10

envelope that I've included and

8:12

I open it up and

8:14

on the title page it

8:16

says to the poet Harriet

8:18

Jernigan I join your parents

8:20

in wishing you joy. My

8:22

angelo August 13th 1995 I

8:26

looked at that book a thousand times

8:28

that night. I opened it up again

8:30

and again and again, and I looked

8:33

at that inscription and those 14 words

8:35

just to make sure they were there.

8:37

And when I took it to bed

8:40

with me that night, I held on

8:42

to it like a brand new shiny

8:44

red bicycle that I just gotten for

8:47

Christmas. Thank you. That

8:53

was Harriet Jernigan. Harriet teaches writing

8:56

and rhetoric at Stanford University and

8:58

collaborates with the Stanford Storytelling Project.

9:00

She is also the founder of

9:02

First Person Story, a live storytelling

9:04

workshop that moves voices from the

9:06

margins to the center. She lives

9:09

in San Francisco. If you'd like

9:11

to see a photo of the

9:13

book that my Angela signed, just

9:15

go to the moth.org/extras. Harriet's

9:18

story reminded me of a time

9:20

many years ago, when I was

9:22

the children's book editor for a

9:24

small literary magazine. I got invited

9:26

to a luncheon for Tony Morrison.

9:28

She is the author of some

9:30

of my favorite books. Sula, the

9:33

Bluest Eye, Beloved, Song of Solomon,

9:35

the list goes on. So I

9:37

was thrilled, and a little anxious

9:39

to be in the same room

9:41

with her. Would I have the

9:43

nerve to approach her? Would she

9:46

be nice? Would she eat me

9:48

for lunch? I went for it

9:50

and introduce myself. She thought for

9:52

a moment, smiled warmly, and remembered.

9:54

Oh, you wrote those nice reviews

9:56

of my children's books. Thank you.

9:58

I am pretty sure that I

10:01

died and went to heaven for

10:03

a moment. My literary goddess was

10:05

kind. you for everything, Ms. Morrison.

10:07

Continuing on our theme of literary

10:09

legends, next up is Mandy Gardner,

10:11

who meets their idol in an

10:13

entirely different way. She told this

10:16

at a moth story slam in

10:18

Asheville. Here's Mandy, live at the

10:20

moth. So I'm walking

10:22

through the cemetery, and I

10:24

have been for quite some

10:27

time. I just assumed that

10:29

there would be a sign

10:31

that would point me to

10:33

the where she lay. She

10:35

was a Pulitzer prize-winning poet.

10:37

But I found signs that

10:39

pointed the way to Eugene

10:41

O'Neill, but no Ansextin. And

10:44

I'd been walking around the

10:46

cemetery for quite some time

10:48

when I finally found a

10:50

little guard shack. It was

10:52

actually a little visitor center,

10:54

but it was closed because

10:56

it was Sunday. And the

10:58

cemetery was mostly shut down

11:01

that day. But I walked

11:03

around the outside of the

11:05

building. I had traveled all

11:07

the way to Boston from

11:09

my home in Atlanta, and

11:11

I really wanted to pay

11:13

my respects. But I just

11:15

couldn't find her. So I

11:18

came upon the office, and

11:20

I found a door that

11:22

was propped open by a

11:24

mop bucket. And I am

11:26

not the kind of person

11:28

who just breaks into places.

11:30

I've never done this before,

11:32

but I'm staring at this

11:35

moth bucket and I'm thinking

11:37

about why I'm there. And

11:39

why I'm there is because.

11:41

When I was in high

11:43

school in the early 1990s

11:45

in South Carolina, they didn't

11:47

have a law that was

11:49

about not talking about gay

11:52

people or the existence of

11:54

queer or trans people. They

11:56

just didn't. And the school

11:58

board in my town. banned

12:01

the book The Grapes of Wrath because

12:03

it took the name of the Lord

12:05

in vain. So you can imagine there

12:07

were no queer stories told at all.

12:10

So when I was 15 years old

12:12

and starting to realize that this was

12:14

my life, I thought it was a

12:16

meant that I was going to be

12:19

lonely for the rest of my life

12:21

and then probably hell awaited me on

12:23

the other side of that because I

12:25

had no other stories that told me

12:27

anything different. So like

12:30

many other queer and trans

12:32

kids, I had to go

12:34

looking for my own stories

12:36

that would give me some

12:38

sort of glimmer of what

12:40

my future life might be

12:42

like. And Anne Sexton, who

12:44

was not queer, she was

12:46

a married lady, but she

12:48

wrote poems about lesbian

12:51

desire about love. She wrote

12:53

a poem called Song for

12:55

a Lady and put it

12:57

in a book entitled Love

12:59

Poems. And that little poem,

13:02

that little scratchable poem, was

13:04

so beautiful and it gave

13:06

me a little glimpse of

13:08

intimacy, of actual happiness that

13:11

I could aspire to one

13:13

day. So yeah,

13:15

in my early 20s, when I

13:17

had the opportunity and the money,

13:19

I went to Boston and I

13:21

went to go visit her grave,

13:23

but I could not find her.

13:26

So yeah, I stepped over that

13:28

mock bucket and I went inside

13:30

that little office and luckily no

13:32

alarms went off and I found

13:34

a guidebook and I stole it.

13:36

And I ran outside and there

13:38

was a map in there and

13:40

it told me how to get

13:43

there. So I get to the

13:45

grave and I'm disappointed again because

13:47

she committed suicide in 1974 which

13:49

was one year before I was

13:51

born and her husband had apparently,

13:53

I mean she was a confessional

13:55

poet, she wrote about all kinds

13:57

of taboo subjects. had not put

13:59

a line of her poetry on

14:02

her grave. It's her name and

14:04

her date of birth and death,

14:06

and that is it. I

14:09

recited some of her poetry and

14:11

smoked a cigarette as a kind

14:13

of burnt offering to her. And

14:15

then I was leaving. And just

14:18

as I was leaving an old

14:20

sedan pulled up with four teenage

14:22

boys inside of it, and I

14:24

immediately got tense because I got

14:27

bullied a lot by teenage boys,

14:29

and that's just a reaction that

14:31

I still have. But the driver,

14:33

he jumped out of the car,

14:35

which made me a little more

14:38

alarmed. I thought I was about

14:40

to get mugged or gay-bashed. I

14:42

wasn't sure which. But he just

14:44

said, do you know the way

14:47

to the Sacko and Van Zetti's

14:49

grave? We were here for a

14:51

class project. And I remembered that

14:53

in this group, I was the

14:56

thief. And I gave him the

14:58

guidebook. I had stolen in pennets.

15:03

And then he said, who are

15:06

you here to see? And anticipating

15:08

a blank stare in response, I

15:10

said, Ann Sexton? And he said,

15:13

Ann Sexton, is she here? He

15:15

turns to the boys in the

15:17

car. Hey guys, you remember those

15:19

Ann Sexton poems? We read an

15:22

English class. Ansextin, I fucking love

15:24

her! And I remembered, one of

15:26

my favorite lines of Ansextin's poetry

15:29

is, live or die, just don't

15:31

poison everything. with her

15:33

wife wife Michelle in

15:35

North Carolina. She

15:38

is the Associate

15:40

Director of Marketing

15:42

for the for Investment

15:45

Investment Advisory Firm Varice. is

15:47

proud to be

15:49

a be a multi-story

15:51

teller who has

15:54

competed in two in

15:56

two moth grand in

15:58

Asheville. in Asheville. That's That's

16:01

it for this

16:03

episode. all of all

16:05

of us here

16:07

at the Moth,

16:10

we hope that

16:12

you get to

16:14

meet your idols

16:17

and that they're

16:19

exactly who you you

16:21

them to be.

16:23

to be. Suzanne

16:26

Rust is the Moss Senior curatorial producer and one

16:28

of of the hosts of the

16:31

Moth radio In In addition to

16:33

finding new voices and fresh stories

16:35

for the Moth Moss stage, Suzanne

16:37

creates playlists and helps curate special

16:39

storytelling events. events. This episode of

16:41

the Moth Podcast was produced

16:43

by by Sarah Austin Janice, Sarah Jane and me,

16:45

Mark Solinger. The rest The rest of

16:47

the Moth's leadership team Sarah Haberman, Christina Norman,

16:49

Jennifer Meg Bowls, Meg Tellers, Marina Gluche, Suzanne Rust,

16:52

Leanne Gully, and Aldi Kaza. The moth would like to think

16:54

its supporters The Moth would like

16:56

to thank its supporters and listeners.

16:58

Stories like these are made

17:00

possible by not already member, If you're

17:02

not already a member, please consider

17:04

becoming one or making a

17:06

one at donation At the moth.org/.org Giveback slash Give Back.

17:08

Give Back. All Moth stories are true,

17:11

as remembered by the storytellers.

17:13

For more about our about our information

17:15

on pitching your own story,

17:17

and everything else, go to our

17:19

website, else, go .org. the The Moth moth

17:21

is presented by Pierre by PRX,

17:23

radio exchange, helping make public radio

17:25

more public more .org.