883: Call Your Parents
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How did Ira's relationship with his parents change over time?
WBEC Chicago, This American Life, I'm Ira Glass. So when I was 36 years old, the year I started This American Life, my relationship with my parents was not the greatest. I've been working at NPR since I was 19, and they were not into it. at all. They were not into public radio. They were not into me working in public radio. They saw public radio as this sad little backwater when they would listen to all things considered morning edition, which were shows I was working at. I remember they would complain, like, why are the stories so long? They especially did not like that I wasn't making much money. I did not make much money. They were both people raised in families where there was never any money, and they really organized their lives to get themselves firmly into the middle class.
And they really did not understand why I didn't want to make money. And then also, there'd been a period in my early 20s when I was kind of judgy about certain choices that they were making, and I hurt their feelings. And by my 30s, I tried to make amends and fix that, but it still wasn't quite right between us. And really, I felt pretty distant from them.
What insights does Ira's mom share about parenting adult children?
They did not hide the fact that they disapproved of pretty much all my life choices, and I didn't feel a lot of patience for that disapproval. And I didn't have, like, a combative relationship with them, but it was just distant. I would go a month or two all the time without talking to them. And, you know, they were busy people, but I am sure this hurt their feelings. We talked about it later in our lives. And then I started a radio show. I have to say the single most surprising thing that happened in my life because of the radio show is that it fundamentally changed things between me and my parents. It healed things in a way I had not suspected could ever happen. And what I'm going to do today is I'm going to play you four of those conversations that I had on the air with my parents.
I'm going to talk about that change.
What advice do Ira's parents give him about building his radio show?
A lot of the change happened, I think. because I was just including them in this big project I was doing. I would have them on the show, and they were part of this project that meant so much to me. They were on the show five times in the first year that we were on the air. Really, it wasn't even the first year. It was just like the first eight months. And we just got into a rhythm of that, and they really liked it. They liked the attention from me. They liked being on the air. They each, but especially my mom, had a kind of performy, hammy side. I'll play you some of these. I think you'll be able to hear that. And I never asked them about this, but I think they also liked what a kind of like public sort of affirmation it was of them as parents.
Like, oh, see, we're a nice family. Like, see, they were good parents. And it really did change things between us. Like, my parents are both dead now, and it still kind of floors me as this lucky thing in my life that I just stumbled into. And so what I'm going to do today is play some of their appearances on the radio show and maybe jump in just a little here and there to point out things that I am noticing.
What lessons does Ira learn from his father's brief radio career?
And there's one that I'm going to play at the end. This is a conversation with my mom that still, honestly, it makes my skin crawl today the way it did the day we recorded it. This whole episode today, the way this came about is that about a year ago, we started doing these bonus episodes that we put out in our podcast feed. And so I'm constantly trying to think of behind-the-scenes stuff to share with listeners in these bonus episodes. And that led me back to re-listen to these old interviews with my parents. And then a couple weeks ago, I put these four interviews into a bonus episode. And honestly, it came out so nicely that we thought, like, we should put this out as an actual regular episode of our show, one that anybody could hear.
And so that's what you're hearing right now. And where I want to start things, this first excerpt is from an episode that we did called Adult Children.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
How did Ira's relationship with his parents change over time?
0:01–1:09
2
What insights does Ira's mom share about parenting adult children?
1:09–1:59
3
What advice do Ira's parents give him about building his radio show?
1:59–3:05
4
What lessons does Ira learn from his father's brief radio career?
3:05–5:03
5
Why does Ira feel uncomfortable about a specific interview with his mom?
5:03–6:42
6
How did Ira's early judgments about his parents affect their relationship?
6:42–8:00
7
What surprising realizations does Ira have about his parents' perspectives?
8:00–9:19
8
How does the radio show serve as a bridge between Ira and his parents?
9:19–59:00