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Chapter 1: What themes are explored in the stories shared on this episode?
This is the Moth Radio Hour. I'm your host, Suzanne Rust, the Moth's curatorial producer. Sometimes people ask me what moth stories are about. I tell them they are really about everything and anything, which explains the title of this episode, Punks, Blessings, Burlesque, and Lotus Flowers. Like this title, moth stories are like life itself, a variety show with every act imaginable.
But what often unites them are common themes, like self-discovery, finding sanctuary, learning to forgive, and acknowledging blessings of different kinds. Our first story is from Eddie Laughter, who discovers just what she needs in a most unlikely place. She told this story at our Moth Teacher Institute. Here's Eddie.
I'm on my way to see live music for the first time, and I'm so much more anxious than I think I have any right to be because this band I'm about to see, I'm completely and utterly obsessed with, and I have seen every interview YouTube will physically let me watch, and I listen to them so much. At this point, it's probably doing something unhealthy to me.
I don't know how that would work, but it's happening. And when I listen to, and this is because when I listen to them, all of a sudden I feel like I'm big and like I'm powerful and like nothing can touch me when I'm walking down the street, which is really not something I feel at this, like ever at this point in my life.
And I feel like so small and clunky and like I don't fit into my own body right. And I'm kind of starting to think that the middle school mentality that I'll never fit into any scenario I go to is just gonna be how I live my life. And I feel like I'm, like I just have to accept this at this point. So it doesn't make any sense that I'm this anxious to see this band.
But I'm trying to think about what I can expect. And I'm just kind of thinking about how in movies, punk shows are always like a bunch of loud, aggressive, intoxicated white boys. And that doesn't really seem like my scene. And I'm spiraling a bit. And I'm looking around on the train. And I see this girl who's about like 9 or 11. I don't know how age works. But she's there. And she's with her dad.
And I'm like, wonder if they're going to the punk show. And then...
and I'm more of a mess, and I'm still spiraling, and then I get off the train, and we get to the venue, and it doesn't look like a venue, but it definitely is a venue, because I get inside, and it's dark, and everyone's bigger than me, and it's really loud, and I pick a direction, and I just start walking, and I see my eighth grade math teacher, and, because of course I see my eighth grade math teacher,
So I go up and talk to my eighth grade math teacher, because that's who he wants to spend his Friday. And I get up to him, and it was a lot less awkward than you would think. And he asked me about music and what bands I listen to, and I forget every single band I've ever heard of ever, and I'm like, this one.
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Chapter 2: How does Eddy Laughter find empowerment through music at a concert?
And then someone kind of nudges me and, like, pushes me out of the way and, like, takes my front middle spot and I'm about to, like, get internally offended because conflict is scary. And... But then I just see that this woman was just making space for her girlfriend to go up next to her and I'm like, this is a room full of punk queer women and I just...
I didn't know that was a thing and I just need a minute to like sit and process that and I look around and I see the girl from the train sitting on her dad's shoulders with like these big clunky headphones so her ears don't get all messed up and I would think that it would be weird for a kid to be here but she looks like she's exactly where she's supposed to be and I feel and I start to realize that I feel like I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be too.
And so I just let myself hold on to that. And the last thing I want to do is run away and hide in a corner. And I really feel like I belong here. And I'm so happy and I've never felt this kind of happy before. And then like the band is still in a show and there's like a mosh pit that's forming next to me, which I don't go over.
I don't go in cause I would get squashed like a little tiny person pancake, but I'm like on the side of it and I can still feel all of like the energy and from it. And I'm just, I'm still like kind of like riding off of that excitement that I'm feeling and that everybody else is feeling as previously mentioned. And then eventually.
the band, they stop playing, and I feel, and I come back to my body, and I really don't want to leave the room, but I realize that I have to, and I kind of look at the front woman, and I'm like, ah, and then I leave and get on the subway, and I'm looking at all these other people who are at the show with me, and I can tell because they're holding little various bits of merch or whatnot, and I'm looking at them, and I'm realizing that they're all like me in some way, and in so many different ways they're like me,
which I really didn't think was a thing and I didn't, I didn't realize that I had something to grow up into before. I don't really know what I thought would happen to me, but I just never had an image that my life could like go somewhere and I could stay being like the weirdo person I am and have it make sense in the world around me.
And I started to realize that the small feeling that I'm holding on to, I don't need it anymore. And I never needed it. And that I'm not that small person. And I'm not going to be small forever, and I don't need to be, and that I'm gonna be okay, and it's just so crazy to think about.
That was Eddie Laughter. Eddie is a Brooklynite and a student at Smith College, where she studies different forms of storytelling, as well as what the moon looks like in low light pollution. We're proud to say that Eddie is also one of the Moth's education program alumni teaching interns. Eddie was just 15 when she attended that concert.
And in case you were wondering, the band was the Screaming Females. I had to Google them. They're still one of her favorite groups, and listening to them brings her a lot of joy and comfort. Here's a taste of their music. To see photos of Eddie on her way to a Screaming Females concert, go to our web extras at themoth.org.
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Chapter 3: What does Christopher Brune-Horan learn about self-acceptance and identity?
You know, she looked like she was a bodybuilder in her youth or something. and she had a cigarette permanently glued to the inside of her lip and she could talk with it like Susan Hayward in the movies. And so she says, what do you need? I said, $180. She said, come by the house tonight, I'll give it to you. I said, Pearl, I don't know when I'll be able to pay it back.
And she said, that's okay, that's okay. And so she loaned me that money, and it got us through the winter. And the point of my story is that at the end of that year, I told her I would pay her back. I still didn't have $180. She said, you got a little refrigerator, right? And I said, yeah, I do, as a matter of fact. What are you going to do with it? And this was the end of my grad school years.
I said, I don't know. I said, you want it? She had three children lined up to go to Brown. So she said, I'll take the refrigerator. So that was my introduction to bartering. And I paid off my debt to Pearl in any number of ways. And just as a footnote to my story, my brother, who went on to become a soldier. So thank you for your service. I thank him for his.
He also was diagnosed with HIV in 1983. And he's still alive. He survived all these years. Oh, no. No, that would be too simple. He became a crack addict and an alcoholic. And that is what you should be applauding. He survived that. He finished his undergraduate years and just got his master's in rehab counseling. So I thank Pearl Wolf for keeping us warm.
Denise Bledsoe Slaughter is a self-described workaholic who looks forward to resting when she retires. But for now, she's a special assistant at the University of the District of Columbia. She also works with a nonprofit that provides education and career skills to low-income residents in the DC metro area. She says that helping people realize their ambitions is what keeps her going.
I followed up with Denise to see how she was doing these days, and she joked that except for the vagaries of aging, she's doing just fine. And while her brother still has his struggles, she is proud of his accomplishments and is still there for him 100%. To see a poem that Denise wrote about Pearl but never got to deliver, go to themoth.org.
Pearl is no longer with us, but all these years later, Denise says that she is forever grateful for the friendship, tough love and guidance she provided, and the belly laughs that they shared. And I heartily agree with Denise. Everyone should have a black mother and a Jewish mother.
I was so lucky to have had the amazing Edna Rust as my mother, and fortunate to have a few Jewish mothers of my own. Sarah B. and Susie S., thanks for being there. Well, that's it for this episode of the Moth Radio Hour. We hope you'll join us next time. And that's the story from the Moth.
This episode of the Moth Radio Hour was produced by me, Jay Allison, Catherine Burns, and Suzanne Rust, who also hosted the show. Co-producer is Vicki Merrick, associate producer, Emily Couch. The stories were directed by Leah Tao, with additional education program coaching by Melissa Brown.
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