EP. 103 — Brady Bunch Wedding / Ron Paul’s Baby Returns

CHRIS [00:00:48] Hello to everybody telling secrets at our wake, it’s Beautiful Anonymous. One hour, one phone call, no names, no holds barred.

CHRIS [00:01:10] Hello, everybody Chris Gethard here. Thanks for listening to Beautiful Anonymous. You may notice a weird tone right now in the intro here that is not the same room. We’re not in studio right now. We’re at the offices for the Chris Gethard show. We’re actually in a dressing room just off in the studio. The show is coming back, baby. March 20th, back on Tru TV, switching to tuesday nights, 11:00 p.m. It’s coming back. Just a quick reminder. I’ve mentioned this on the show before. The paywalls coming. Any episode older than six months, it’s gone behind the paywall few weeks from now. So anything older than that that you want to keep and have on your hard drive download away? Don’t say I didn’t warn, you wanna get those oldies but goodies. Go grab them. Keep them. Last week’s episode was our live episode at the Bell House with the guy who went from being a drug dealer to a, he claimed a brain surgeon. I’ll tell you, this was a divisive episode. Got a lot of tweets about this episode. The Beautiful Anonymous Facebook community, which you should join, blew up, blew up. I mean, a lot of people really did not love the graphic descriptions of what happens to animals during lab testing, which I understand a lot of people felt like the caller was a little flippant about that. Caller, though, let’s let’s everybody remember the caller went vegan. The caller was profoundly affected by this to the point that the caller made a profound lifestyle change. Caller actually showed up in the Beautiful Anonymous Facebook community, offered up some explanations. You know, I think I think the caller it’s funny the caller was reading some of these emotional reactions and some of the criticisms and said, you know, I was nervous. There was a live crowd. So I was trying to sell it and perform a little bit. And I was I was as freaked out as anybody by the animals. All that said, you should go in that group, join that group. You read that response. It’s really nice. I enjoyed the call. I enjoyed the drama that surrounded it because it was civil and it was kind. That’s what I love about the Beautiful Anonymous community. People disagreeing, people criticizing, people questioning. But almost always, respectfully, not so many comments that are like laced with curses and accusations. Good, kind people listen to this show. Thank you, guys for being out there.

CHRIS [00:03:21] This week’s episode, I tell ya, I planned a wedding once and it was a nightmare. My wife and I both agreed planning a wedding. Anybody out there has been married. I got to say, I know some friends of mine who have been like, oh no planning my wedding was a breeze. I’m like how’d you do it? And they’re like, ugh we our parents helped us pay for everything and we got a wedding planner. It’s like, well, that’s easy. You had it easy. Mine was a real sucessful DIY affair. Caller, our caller today is about to get married. Tells us about all the stress of that. We reminisce, bounce off each other with those opinions, those experiences. And I tell you, I mine was a nightmare. I didn’t have anything close to the family drama that the caller had. Fills us in on a lot of stuff about her dad revelations along the way. Think you’re going to enjoy it. It’s like a nice laid back one with some some drama dropped in. And at the end of the call, listen, stay tuned. You’re gonna have outro. You’re gonna have all the music, the stuff you’re used to. Lot of you guys are accustomed turning off the show. Don’t do it because it’s our two year anniversary, two years of this show. I feel very lucky. And our old friend Ron Paul’s baby from the first episode, we had a follow up call a year ago. We’re not doing a full follow up call this year because we had a mini call live at the Bell House in Brooklyn one of the weeks. The third week there. Ron Paul’s baby, we actually called in, checked in with him live in front of a crowd. It’s about maybe, what, five to 10 minutes, Jared? And yeah probably 10 to 15, actually. Maybe. But you get this little mini call with Ron Paul’s baby. It is well worth listening to. Ron Paul’s baby was so funny that night, so hilarious. Worked that crowd and such a good time, such a, such a great thing to hear from our old pal. So a lot of the people found the show when Ron Paul’s baby was featured on This American Life. You want to hear how our old friends doing? Stay tuned after the episode. Long intro today. Sorry about that. Some people don’t like them, but a lot of info to share. Anyway, let’s get to the call.

PHONE ROBOT [00:05:18] Thank you for calling Beautiful Anonymous. A beeping noise will indicate when you are on the show with the host. [BEEP]

CHRIS [00:05:26] Hello.

CALLER [00:05:27] Hello this is [BEEP] and I just said, my name.

CHRIS [00:05:30] You’re not supposed to do that.

CALLER [00:05:33] Again, I did it to the producers. Is this Chris?

CHRIS [00:05:37] It is. Now, we gotta bleep, we gotta bleep something in the first line.

CALLER [00:05:41] I’m so sorry. I’m a failure.

CHRIS [00:05:45] Yeah, so am I in my heart.

CALLER [00:05:47] We can be pals, though, we can be failures together.

CHRIS [00:05:52] I’d like to think we’re pals.

CALLER [00:05:54] Oh, that’s so nice. I think we’re pals because I listen to you all the time. And that’s probably a little bit creepy for you that people think that.

CHRIS [00:06:04] It’s nice. It’s it’s nice. Sometimes it’s a little intense. Sometimes I’ll meet people in person and they’ll start telling me things as if we are, you know, a long time tried and true friends. And I try to remember that that’s an honor, although sometimes I’m hearing things that social norms would dictate I shouldn’t hear.

CALLER [00:06:27] I can understand that. How are you doing today?

CHRIS [00:06:30] I’m good. It’s very early in the morning. I am. I’m getting things going and I’m glad this is the way we’re starting. But, you know, I ate a kind bar. No, an RX bar. I ate an RX bar and I took my vitamins. I’m feeling good.

CALLER [00:06:46] It’s very important.

CHRIS [00:06:47] Yeah. Yeah. They put the ingredients right on the front. RX bar.

CALLER [00:06:54] Excellent.

CHRIS [00:06:55] Yeah. Yeah. How are you?

CALLER [00:06:58] I’m good. It’s an it’s an interesting week.

CHRIS [00:07:02] How is that?

CALLER [00:07:03] I’m getting married this weekend.

CHRIS [00:07:05] Oh, congrats.

CALLER [00:07:07] Thanks. And then I’m getting my gallbladder out right after that. A few days after that. Very exciting.

CHRIS [00:07:13] That sounds like a nightmare.

CALLER [00:07:17] It’s fine. It’s very funny. We keep saying these are the memories.

CHRIS [00:07:21] So were you planning a honeymoon right after the wedding yet, delay or no?

CALLER [00:07:26] No, we were. I mean, you know that the hated word staycation, that’s what we were planning. So it’ll be like that. Only maybe a little less sexy.

CHRIS [00:07:36] Yeah, I’d say so. I’d say so.

CALLER [00:07:39] Yeah.

CHRIS [00:07:39] Now wait what’s––

CALLER [00:07:40] And it’s a second marriage. We both have kids. We can’t just like leave in the middle of the school year.

CHRIS [00:07:44] Oh, that’s very pragmatic. That makes sense. Yeah, I was gonna say a February wedding, huh? February wedding.

CALLER [00:07:50] Yeah. That’s what you do when you are A) trying to save money and B) trying to save money.

CHRIS [00:07:59] Oh. Yeah. Yeah.

CALLER [00:08:02] So, yeah, a February wedding in a not tropical climate on the East Coast.

CHRIS [00:08:11] So an indoor affair.

CALLER [00:08:13] It’s an indoor affair. It’s a Sunday brunch because waffles and oysters.

CHRIS [00:08:20] Those don’t always mix.

CALLER [00:08:23] Oh, I think they mix. I think it’s brunch.

CHRIS [00:08:26] Really? I’ve never. I tell you, I’m a New Yorker and people are brunch obsessed. Never been totally sold on brunch. I’m not trying to make you overthink your wedding, but you have never been totally sold on brunch.

CALLER [00:08:40] It’s too late anyway. Yeah. So here’s the deal. I like dinner food for breakfast.

CHRIS [00:08:48] And I like that, I do like breakfast food for dinner. To me, it’s more the timing. It’s more like. To me, it’s more you’re eating a lunch, you’re eating a meal at a weird time that throws off the rest of my clock for the rest of the day.

CALLER [00:09:03] Oh, I can see that. So I guess it’s probably good for Sunday’s when it’s kind of timeless and you’re just kind of lounging around anyway and you eventually get out to breakfast. But some people eat lunch, you know?

CHRIS [00:09:15] Yeah. I do understand. I do understand the roots of the word brunch.

CALLER [00:09:18] Practical meal.

CHRIS [00:09:19] I also think that as someone who doesn’t drink, I do think it’s a good excuse to have a mimosa or Bloody Mary to kick things, to kick the day off. I get that. That’s not my bag.

CALLER [00:09:29] Um, our Bloody Marys are going to be pretty rockin, Chris. I got to tell you.

CHRIS [00:09:33] How can you make that guarentee.

CALLER [00:09:36] They’re gonna have a crab claw and a shrimp.

CHRIS [00:09:39] Oooh, now you’re talking my language. So the Bloody Mary itself serves as a sort of a base for something of a traditional seafood cocktail.

CALLER [00:09:51] Yes. It’s gonna be pretty great. I’m excited.

CHRIS [00:09:54] Classy move, classy move.

CALLER [00:09:56] My fiancee says I’m most excited about oysters like oysters first, then marriage.

CHRIS [00:10:02] Wow. So second marriage for both of you. How many kids do you each have?

CALLER [00:10:08] We each have two, his are teenagers and mine are in elementary school, they’re twins.

CHRIS [00:10:15] Twins? So this is something of a real life Brady Bunch situation.

CALLER [00:10:20] It is indeed. Yeah. And we’re lucky because the kids are all great and get along. Well, they get along best with the ones who aren’t their, you know, blood siblings.

CHRIS [00:10:32] Oh, that’s funny.

CALLER [00:10:34] The twins are still young enough that they bicker all the time.

CHRIS [00:10:38] Are they identical twins?

CALLER [00:10:40] No, they’re not. It’s a boy and a girl.

CHRIS [00:10:41] Oh a boy and a girl. Well bickering is to be expected.

CALLER [00:10:48] Yes, I feel like I’m the most boring caller so far.

CHRIS [00:10:51] No not at all. Not at all. I can think of at least ten off the top of my head that have been more boring than this. One hundred percent.

CALLER [00:11:01] I’m sure I didn’t listen to those.

CHRIS [00:11:03] No, you didn’t, because we haven’t released them.

CALLER [00:11:05] I’m just kidding.

CHRIS [00:11:11] Oh no I feel bad. Hold on. Anyone who’s listening, who called through, who hasn’t been released, I promise you we’re probably just waiting to release it. I’m just kidding. There have not been dozens of boring ones. There’s only been one or two. One or two.

CALLER [00:11:25] He just feels guilty, he’s not going release them.

CHRIS [00:11:26] Yeah, that’s okay. It’s all right. Somethings hit the cutting room floor. It’s the hard truth of this entertainment biz.

CALLER [00:11:36] Excellent. So, yeah. So my friend sent me a Facebook message yesterday and he’s like, are you ready for a new Facebook obsession? I’m like yeah, I’m totally ready for a new podcast obsession. And I was like, yeah I’m totally ready for a new podcast obsession. Always. And he’s like, you might have already, listened to it, because it’s like, you know, 90 some episodes in and I was like, oh, what is it? And he was like, it’s Beautiful Anonymous. And I was like, that’s my favorite podcast.

CHRIS [00:12:11] Oh awesome.

CALLER [00:12:11] So it’s very exciting. Yeah. So it’s kind of strange that I made it through today. I’ve never even got past the busy signal.

CHRIS [00:12:19] Look at that. And here we are.

CALLER [00:12:24] What would you like to talk about today, Chris? Would you like to talk about my Brady Bunch situation? Or would you like to talk about family history. Would you like to talk about politics, I bet you like talking about politics with guests.

CHRIS [00:12:39] Sometimes that leads to big time fights.

CALLER [00:12:42] Yeah, I bet. Then I don’t want to talk about politics.

CHRIS [00:12:44] Oh, you don’t. You brought it up but you were lying.

CALLER [00:12:49] Oh, yeah, I’m totally progressive. I’m sure we would have a great conversation, but I’m sure you would lose some listeners.

CHRIS [00:12:55] Yeah, that’s fair. That’s fair. Well, let me think of it. OK. So I had some bullet point questions first. One, what is it that causes a gallbladder to need to be removed?

CALLER [00:13:06] Oh, this is so good. Are you ready? I have sludge in my gallbladder. That’s a medical term.

CHRIS [00:13:11] Ew, come on no.

CALLER [00:13:14] It’s on the report.

CHRIS [00:13:15] It’s 9:49 a.m. where I am. What are you doing to me?

CALLER [00:13:19] It’s 9:49 am here too.

CHRIS [00:13:24] You got sludge. What is sludge? What is sludge composed of?

CALLER [00:13:28] So what they said is that it’s sort of like stones that haven’t fully formed yet. So they’re all like mini things. I don’t know. It’s gross. It’s on the report, though. My doctor apologized. He was like, I’m sorry. It’s a medical term, but you have sludge.

CHRIS [00:13:44] And what? You feel pain, do you feel stomach pain? Is that.

CALLER [00:13:49] Yeah, it’s kind of like under your right rib. It’s sore. Not really having any attacks right now. Cause if you don’t eat any fat, it’s not going to act up too much. So it’s like tender to the touch right now. But it doesn’t really [coughs] pardon me. But it’s funny because I have Crohn’s disease and you had another guest with Crohn’s disease. I remember. So I think I might have ignored the pain for a while, just thinking it was normal. Normal for me. So, yeah.

CHRIS [00:14:17] And does this count as a major surgery? Is this a major surgery?

CALLER [00:14:21] No, I think it’s going to be laproscopic.

CHRIS [00:14:23] What’s that mean?

CALLER [00:14:24] I’ll be out the same day.

CHRIS [00:14:25] Oh, you get to go home that day.

CALLER [00:14:27] Yeah. But the timing is funny.

CHRIS [00:14:30] Yeah, it is. So how long you been with this guy?

CALLER [00:14:35] This guy four years.

CHRIS [00:14:37] Four years. And how long were you with your ex?

CALLER [00:14:41] Fifteen years. I started dating him when I was 19.

CHRIS [00:14:45] Wow. And you were dating all sum total together that long, or married for 15 years?

CALLER [00:14:52] We were married for 8. We were together for 7 before that.

CHRIS [00:14:57] What happened you just got together when you were too young?

CALLER [00:14:58] Maybe that should have been my clue.

CHRIS [00:15:02] You married too young. You realized that it wasn’t it wasn’t a lifelong match. Or was there more to it than that?

CALLER [00:15:11] There is more to it than that. Yes, there is more to it than that.

CHRIS [00:15:16] Bad dude?

CALLER [00:15:20] He’s just. He is. I don’t know if he had a mental breakdown or if, he has a personality disorder. So it’s really difficult to handle. Yeah.

CHRIS [00:15:34] Yeah, that’s very tough. I would imagine that.

CALLER [00:15:37] Yeah gets tough.

CHRIS [00:15:37] That can hit a point where you need to take some distance for you and the kids, I’m sure.

CALLER [00:15:42] Indeed.

CHRIS [00:15:42] Yeah. So are you still in touch?

CALLER [00:15:45] Yeah, I don’t want to, yeah. I mean, we have kids and you know, he gets them every other weekend.

CHRIS [00:15:52] So he’s still trying.

CALLER [00:15:53] He does the best he can, I guess. Yeah. He does the best you can.

CHRIS [00:15:56] Ok. Well, this all sounds very diplomatic.

CALLER [00:15:58] Yeah, I’m being very diplomatic.

CHRIS [00:16:00] Yes. Yes,.

CALLER [00:16:01] I might. You know. Yeah. Cause I’m on the phone with Chris Gethard. On the phone with my girlfriends, I’d be like, oh my God. Did you listen, listen to what he just did. He’s so ridiculous.

CHRIS [00:16:12] So you talk shit. You’d talk shit if this was––.

CALLER [00:16:14] But when I’m on the phone with you.

CHRIS [00:16:14] You you feel like you have to be a little more prim and proper.

CALLER [00:16:18] Yeah. I mean, you know, and if anybody listened to this and said, oh, I recognize your voice, I know exactly who that is. Then it would seem like I was trashing him.

CHRIS [00:16:27] Yeah, you know, I’m not looking for you to trash anybody.

CALLER [00:16:29] Maybe one day it’ll be archived, and my kids will hear it.

CHRIS [00:16:34] Yeah the twins.  I’m not looking for you to trash anybody, but I just wanna put it on record that I’m always down for a gabfest. I want that on record.

CALLER [00:16:42] Oh, I got lots of like get lots of juicy stuff. We can talk about some juicy stuff.

CHRIS [00:16:47] What’s the juicy stuff?

CALLER [00:16:49] Oh there’s so much. OK. So. All right. So my dad is my stepdad who adopted me. But he’s always been my dad. He’s the guy who took care of me when I was sick and watched movies with me. He’s my dad. He taught me to ride a bike. You know, he’s my dad.

CHRIS [00:17:06] Yes. Everything.

CALLER [00:17:07] My biological dad.

CHRIS [00:17:08] Okay. Yes.

CALLER [00:17:09] What?

CHRIS [00:17:09] No, I was going to say he’s everything but biological. But he is your dad.

CALLER [00:17:13] Yeah. Like he’s going to meet me. I’m going to go see the surgeon today before surgery. And he’s gonna meet me there.

CHRIS [00:17:19] Mm hmm.

CALLER [00:17:20] He’s my dad.

CHRIS [00:17:21] Yeah.

CALLER [00:17:21] But my mom my mom actually was married twice before. Her first husband died when they were very young, tragically. And then her second husband was my father, my biological father. And he left before I turned two. So I don’t really remember having him around. But he was in my life and I would see him, you know, every other weekend or so growing up. And she kept me close to his family because he was not super involved. So I would, like, go to my grandparents’ house every day after school. And I think my grandmother, you know, was really on top of making sure that he got me when he was supposed to. Because they really cared about my mom and me. And they died about nine days apart when I was 10, and then after that, he kind of dropped off. I didn’t hear from him. And like through middle school, it was kind of difficult trying to get like, trying to get him to talk to me and like, tell him like, hey, why don’t we talk anymore? Even before that it was awkward, but we didn’t have like a a bond. You know what I mean? He was always very distant. And he’d done some awful things to my family, like his parents.

CHRIS [00:18:44] That’s not good.

CALLER [00:18:44] And the way that he treated them over the years. Besides the stuff he did to my mom, which was just awful. He was just nasty and mean and just awful. Anyway, so I didn’t see him for years and years. You still there, Chris.

CHRIS [00:19:01] I am.

CALLER [00:19:01] Excellent. So I didn’t see him for years and years. And then I saw him at a cousin’s wedding when I was in my 20s before I got married the first time. And he wanted to dance. And it was like trying to ask me about my life. And I was just like he’s just, he and my ex have this thing in common where they like, they’re kind of showy, you know, like. But just not authentic at all. So I made it pretty clear I did not want to talk to him and I didn’t want to deal with them because he was obnoxious. Anyway about 2014 December of 2014, just before my divorce was finalized, I got a letter from him in the mail and he said that his life was full of regrets, lies, and he’d made all these mistakes in his life. And at this point, he’d been married like thirty years and he decided he was coming out as a gay man in his 60s.

CHRIS [00:20:09] Oh wow.

CALLER [00:20:10] Yeah.

CHRIS [00:20:11] Now, how did you take that? How would you take that? Yeah.

CALLER [00:20:15] My mind was blown. I mean, first of all, because it was just like what? After all these years, you’re contacting me. He’d also sent letters to his siblings and I reached out to them like, hey, did you get a letter? Because I’m still you know, I’m still close to them. And he’s not it’s a weird situation anyway. So I basically wrote him back a letter that just said, you know, first of all, congratulations on coming out. You know, it takes a lot of bravery. I know, that’s difficult. And also. You know, you made, you did make mistakes. You’re right. You made a lot of mistakes and you treated people poorly. And I said, you know, it’s a real shame that you didn’t do this before because, as you know, a bisexual theater major in college, I’m sure that I would have benefited from an LGBTQ parent. And think of all the annual viewings of The Birdcage we could have done.

CHRIS [00:21:22] You wrote that in the letter?

CALLER [00:21:24] Yeah. So I’m a writer. So there’s that.

CHRIS [00:21:39] The birdcage, wow. Now do you think the fact that he was closeted maybe, do you attribute some of his, why he was like pushing people away or disconnecting? Do you feel like that maybe––

CALLER [00:21:51] Sure.

CHRIS [00:21:51] was rooted in his struggles or discomfort with with embracing who he was?

CALLER [00:21:57] I’m sure that’s part of it. But at the same time, being in the closet is not an excuse for abusing people.

CHRIS [00:22:05] Right. The Kevin, Kevin Spacey, as it’s called, you can’t.

CALLER [00:22:10] Yes.

CHRIS [00:22:10] Coming out the closet doesn’t excuse bad behavior.

CALLER [00:22:15] Exactly. Exactly.

CHRIS [00:22:18] So you kind of you it sounds like you held your head up high and both both congratulated and said you understood and embraced it. But also said it doesn’t let you off the hook for just kind of being a shitty dad.

CALLER [00:22:31] Yeah. And a shitty person to his family in general. And I also did something that was not entirely ethical. But I when I first got the letter, I was like, shit, is this a suicide note? So I was like, I don’t want that on my end. So I started calling mental health facilities in the state where the letter had come from. And no one had talked to him anyway, I found a phone number for him and called and left a message and he called back and I set up a time to talk to him. And at that point, when I talked to him, I know, I knew that he wanted to talk to me about who I was and what my kids were like. But really, all I wanted to know was some stuff about my grandfather’s World War II service. So I definitely entered into that conversation wanting to get something out of it for myself.

CHRIS [00:23:34] You were just looking for a little family history about World War II.

CALLER [00:23:38] Yeah, well, my grandfather was at Normandy.

CHRIS [00:23:42] Wow. That’s cool. Now has this led to any sense of reconnection with your dad? Has it allowed him to maybe apologize or show some humility? Or was it just kind of a major a major blip on the radar, but a blip nonetheless, in your fracturing relationship?

CALLER [00:24:01] I think it was a blip, I mean, I told him if he wanted to talk again, that he would he would need to apologize to my mom. He’d already apologized to his siblings or I would have included that. But he said, wow, that’s a lot. And then never did. So that was the end of that. Boundaries Chris, boundaries. It’s a lot of therapy that gets you to boundaries.

CHRIS [00:24:21] Yeah, for sure. I know. Yeah. And it’s it does also sound like like, you know, you had some lines in the sand and he’s picked maybe picking and choosing. You know how upfront he wants to be with different people, and I can see how that’s a big how that’s a deal breaker for you. I can see that.

CALLER [00:24:40] Yeah.

CHRIS [00:24:41] How much of a surprise was it when he came out?

CALLER [00:24:46] I think I was more surprised, honestly, not that he was gay, but that he had done some self-reflection and did humble himself enough to write a letter. That surprised me.

CHRIS [00:25:01] So the actual sexuality of it, you were like, I could see that. But the fact that you’re being open and honest, that’s blowing my mind.

CALLER [00:25:10] Yes. Yes, exactly. And I really liked my stepmother. I actually missed her.

CHRIS [00:25:17] Yeah.

CALLER [00:25:18] Because I’d spent so much time with her as a kid when he was very disconnected. And she was very sweet. She was always kind to me. And so I was really glad that I got to talk to her on the phone. So that gave me the closure that I needed with her. It was nice. So I hope she’s doing well.

CHRIS [00:25:39] I’m gonna go ahead and say, you said you had some juicy family history. You weren’t lying.

CHRIS [00:25:48] Let’s go ahead, take break there and say I love it. I love it when a caller calls their shot and then follows through with the big swing. Oh, yeah, that was some juicy family history as promised. All right. I’m sure there’s gonna be more juicy family history. But before we get to it, got some ads coming up. Check these things out. Use the promo codes, if you like. And it helps the show when you do. Be right back.

[00:28:40] [AD BREAK]

CHRIS [00:28:41] Thanks again to our advertisers helping bring this show to the world for free. Now let’s go ahead and get back to the phone call.

CHRIS [00:28:48] I’m gonna go ahead and say you said you had some juicy family history, you weren’t lying.

CALLER [00:28:54] I wasn’t lying. It’s funny, like. Family history stuff I find so interesting. So you know, nobody ever wants to hear about your dreams or your genealogical research, but every time I find something about an ancestor, even a recent ancestor that I’d never heard of, I’m like how did this never, how did it never come out?

CHRIS [00:29:17] Oh, yeah, I know that feeling as a.

CALLER [00:29:21] It’s crazy right?

CHRIS [00:29:22] Well, being Irish Catholic means that there are many stories hidden.

CALLER [00:29:26] Me too.

CHRIS [00:29:26] Yes. So, you know, you don’t, tell me this is your experience. I feel like there’s an Irish Catholic tradition, which is people live lives that are pretty plain and small and noble in in in that. And then they die. And at the wake, everybody’s kind of sad for the first hour or so. And then people start joking and then people start drinking. And then by the end of the wake, you know like three mind-blowing things about this person that are completely fucked up and out of character that you never would have predicted that are, I mean, bizarre doesn’t begin to describe and clearly just suppressed and hidden until death at which point they’re mumbled about it, laughed about it, and celebrated. Would you say that’s true?

CALLER [00:30:14] I think that’s pretty accurate. It sure as hell is going to happen to me. Chris, my poor kids.

CHRIS [00:30:18] Oh my. I learned some things about my grandmother upon her, my grandmother was the sweetest little old Irish lady you ever met. She passed away. Turned out she had lived quite a life. Quite a life. She was a nun at one point and then left. Yeah, we learned that.

CALLER [00:30:39] How did you not know that?

CHRIS [00:30:40] Not even all her kids knew it. I don’t, I forget how my mom knew it. I think maybe only my mom’s older sister knew it. But then they had her rosary beads. I guess she had some rosary beads that were very clearly special and issued by convent of some sort. So there was proof she was buried with these rosary beads. What else? Found out all sorts of stuff, all sorts of stuff that I’m not certain my family would be comfortable with me sharing. But who cares? We learned out, I learned that she was apparently friends with Eleanor Roosevelt, that Eleanor Roosevelt. Now, apparently, my grandpa.

CALLER [00:31:13] What?

CHRIS [00:31:13] Yes. Apparently my grandmother during the Depression was, she was living in Brooklyn. And as a child, I guess a lot of city kids were sent upstate to camps where they learned home skills. And Eleanor Roosevelt had a personal stake in running her camp and met her as a teen and befriended her and would check in with her from time to time throughout her life. That was mind blowing.

CALLER [00:31:34] That’s so cool.

CHRIS [00:31:35] And there were a couple others there. What were the other ones? There was the big one. Very Irish Catholic story is apparently that her own grandparents held her as a servant against her will for a number of years early in her life.

CALLER [00:31:50] What?

CHRIS [00:31:50] Yes. And then her uncle stepped in and said, this is insane. And basically freed her from having to be what sounds like an enslavement. Who knew, who knew. Learned all that when she has passed away. I love my nan and maybe lover even more because I never knew about any of that.

CALLER [00:32:13] So here is the thing. OK. So was she. OK. What’s the timeline here? When was she the nun, like was that before?

CHRIS [00:32:19] I don’t know.

CALLER [00:32:21] Her parents were holding her against her will. I’m just wondering how sorted it was, like would your grandfather steal her away.

CHRIS [00:32:26] No she was a child. I think she was I think she was 4 years old when her grandparents were like, hey, so she’s going to live with us and do the cooking and cleaning. And the rest of her family was like, wait, why. And then it just happened. But it was actually very sad. So my grandmother never, she would give me cards for my birthday. She never knew how to spell my name. She would always spell my name incorrectly. And this was always something.

CALLER [00:32:55] Chris is not a hard name for somebody who is Irish to spell.

CHRIS [00:33:00] It is a very Catholic traditional name, I think. Right? Christ is the first syllable. But I only.

CALLER [00:33:07] You would think she could spell Christ.

CHRIS [00:33:09] Yes, but I always attributed it to my grandmother, moved to this country when she was extremely young. She was an immigrant. Maybe her schooling wasn’t great, but then it was later revealed to me that she didn’t have schooling because during this stretch she was not allowed to go to school. So it’s actually very sad.

CALLER [00:33:26] And now I’ve been mean to Nana.

CHRIS [00:33:28] Well, you kind of, you did kind of shit on my grandma a little bit.

CALLER [00:33:32] I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I love grandmas. I love old people in general.

CHRIS [00:33:37] Yeah, me too. I love a good grandma. You said your kids are going to find some things out at your funeral. What are we talking here?

CALLER [00:33:45] Oh, you know, nothing. I want to tell you Chris.

CHRIS [00:33:51] Damn shut it down.

CALLER [00:33:51] Maybe when we’re not on the phone anymore.

CHRIS [00:33:53] Shut it down.

CALLER [00:33:54] Well, then I couldn’t tell you so that sort of defeats the purpose. I don’t know. Just I’m sure they’ll find out about, you know. Just like we do with her parents. You know, other relationships and stuff.

CHRIS [00:34:11] Yeah. Yeah.

CALLER [00:34:14] I don’t have anything too crazy.

CHRIS [00:34:16] Well, you did. You did drop in a very slick fashion that you’re bisexual as well.

CALLER [00:34:20] Yes.

CHRIS [00:34:21] How’s that?

CALLER [00:34:25] It’s, uh, I don’t know. It’s it’s. What is it like to not be?I don’t know. You know, here’s the thing. I’m not attracted to very many people in general. Like it has to be like a really strong connection. For example, I don’t have real celebrity crushes the way some people do, like I can’t I’d like I would never go to see, like, Magic Mike or whatever that stuff was because that doesn’t do it for me. I actually have to have a conversation with the person before I feel the connection. Does that make sense.

CHRIS [00:35:03] It does, although I have to say magic, Magic Mike is a confusing cultural touchstone to explain your entire sexuality.

CALLER [00:35:16] Well I was just saying like I wouldn’t go to see like a movie because it has a bunch of attractive people there. Like objectification or something that’s part of my sexuality.

CHRIS [00:35:25] Right.

CALLER [00:35:25] I’m not hugely visual. So it’s really a person thing. Probably I’d be better described as pansexual. But does anybody really use that in the real world, use that term? Well, I guess they do, probably in New York, where you live.

CHRIS [00:35:43] Well, let me just for the sake of our listeners and myself, I understand that these are things that are often viewed as related to each other. But maybe you can explain the differences just for anybody who might be curious.

CALLER [00:35:55] Oh, gosh. Well, I don’t know that I’m like the right person to be that spokesperson.

CHRIS [00:36:01] No, I’m not asking I don’t want to. Yeah we’re on the same page.

CALLER [00:36:04] From my understanding and the way that I would define it for myself is bisexual you’re saying, you’re attracted to both men and women and pansexual, you are attracted to people who identify with all sorts of genders.

CHRIS [00:36:21] Right.

CALLER [00:36:24] That makes sense. Yeah.

CHRIS [00:36:24] Right that you kind of don’t see the spectrum in the way traditional people might. Would that be fair to say that it’s not really a concern or?

CALLER [00:36:35] Yeah I think that’s accurate.

CHRIS [00:36:39] OK. And are you open with who had mentioned your father was, you know, that might have helped your father, if your father had been open with you, it would have helped. Are you open with your family about this side of yourself?

CALLER [00:36:50] They are not that open to hearing it. I mean, like my younger family members. No. I mean, that’s like it’s no big deal. But I never had a really serious girlfriend, so. Because again, I got together with my ex-husband when I was 19. So I had girlfriends, but they were never, like, serious enough to take home to mom and dad. And I’ve told my mom before, but she hasn’t really reacted at all. So I don’t even know, like, I don’t think she cares. I don’t think my parents would be like, upset or shocked. It’s just I think my dad might actually know. I might have told him. They don’t care. They’re very open minded.

CHRIS [00:37:36] Sure.

CALLER [00:37:39] So, I mean, and that’s sort of like the bisexual privilege, right? It’s like you know, I don’t have to come out.

CHRIS [00:37:46] But, well, I’ve read it, I’ve read a lot that I’ve read that the B in LGBT often. They often there’s a lot a maybe resentment or anger towards bisexuals from what I’ve read amongst the community, because for a few things, I feel like there’s. First of all, there’s that stigma of like you can kind of pick and choose how much of a part of a struggle you want to be. And that’s a thing that’s held against the bisexual community. And then I’ve also heard that there’s they’re kind of viewed as stereotyped as maybe as people who just don’t want to settle down or or people who you can’t trust commitment from. I know that that’s another very stereotype that drives people nuts.

CALLER [00:38:34] Oh yeah. Like, you’re, you’re not monogamous or whatever. And then there is. I had one girlfriend who was just like, you’re either a lesbian or not. So that clearly didn’t last long. So, I was like, no, actually, yeah. And then yeah. And then another one who used to complain about straight girls all the time and always lumped bisexual girls in with straight girls. And I was like, well, then don’t date bisexual girls if you don’t like them. So that one also didn’t last long. You see how this didn’t go well. I was not choosing good women. But

CHRIS [00:39:19] Been there.

CALLER [00:39:19] Yeah. Right. OK. I think I did. I think he did a good job this time. This one’s pretty good. This guy. This is a guy.

CHRIS [00:39:25] Right. Right. Did you date women between your two marriages?

CALLER [00:39:32] So in the end of my toward the end of my marriage, my ex-husband was unfaithful, a lot in a couple of different ways. So we tried polyamory, which is totally a disaster. It will not save your marriage. I think if you go into a relationship as polyamorous, it’s probably easier.

CHRIS [00:40:00] Right.

CALLER [00:40:02] Yes. So I dated a little bit during that time, but it just everything just felt awful. The marriage, the other relationships, it was awful.

CHRIS [00:40:12] Yeah.

CALLER [00:40:13] The only thing that I got out of it, I will say is that his other is now a very close friend of mine. And she’s wonderful. And I’m so glad she’s in my life. And I almost forgot to say that because sometimes I forget how we met.

CHRIS [00:40:24] Wow. You’ve got a surprising number of very layered relationships.

CALLER [00:40:34] I know this is not what I wanted to talk about, Chris.

CHRIS [00:40:36] Well, hey, welcome to the Chris Gethard experience. You come in with the bullet points. I say tear em up, throw them in the trash, baby, because we’re going to go where the winds take us. All right. We tell the lighthouse, turn off the light. This ship is sailing in the dark. Baby. Anyway. But it is, you have know a number of people in your life who you have met and have warm relationships with despite the fact that you have met them via other relationships that were toxic.

CALLER [00:41:05] Yes.

CHRIS [00:41:06] Not many people have that.

CALLER [00:41:07] I really love my friends. I love my friends so much. I’m so. I’d like if you knew my friends, you would know how lucky I am. Like I have the best people around me. They’re just wonderful.

CHRIS [00:41:21] I get that.

CALLER [00:41:22] I’m really lucky to have them.

CHRIS [00:41:23] Yeah, yeah. That’s cool. I do understand what you’re saying because we’ve talked to some polyamorous people on the podcast before.

CALLER [00:41:32] And they were like, this is how it really is. I think it’s just any other, just like any other relationship. Every single one is different.

CHRIS [00:41:40] Of course. But I do feel like what you’re saying is something that I’ve read frequently, which is that trying to use it, trying to use what is a lifestyle commitment as a band aid to fix preexisting thing is a recipe for disaster very often.

CALLER [00:41:57] Yes, indeed. And often I think as in my case, it was already a disaster. It was already going to be, it was already on its way to the end, it probably should have ended years before. Here comes my fiancee like a tip toeing into the kitchen to get a granola bar.

CHRIS [00:42:16] Tell him I said, what up? And congratulations.

CALLER [00:42:20] Chris says what up? And congratulations. Thanks.

CHRIS [00:42:25] That’s cool.

CALLER [00:42:26] He doesn’t talk much. That’s why I love him.

CHRIS [00:42:32] That’s always good, strong and silent they say.

CALLER [00:42:34] He is. He’s wonderful. He used to be my boss.

CHRIS [00:42:38] Come on. OK. We’ll get into that in a second. I just wanted to echo on the, in the polyamorous stretch, I did just want to say we’ve all had sad sex. Right. Anybody who’s gotten out a little bit has had some sad sex. And I would have to imagine when it’s when it is sex aimed at fixing a relationship and it’s not fixing it. I would imagine there must be a feeling of loneliness in that in the in the bedroom that is insurmountable.

CALLER [00:43:07] Yeah. I mean, I think, you know, now being a full blown grown up with a real relationship with, you know, good intimacy and passion, you know, I now see that’s something that we didn’t have.

CHRIS [00:43:24] So you got what you were missing then and you hit the jackpot?

CALLER [00:43:27] Yeah, I hit the jackpot. I’m so lucky. But his memory is really bad. So I think that’s why you still love me. So I think I really hit the jackpot.

CHRIS [00:43:37] That’s amazing. That’s amazing. So wait, he’s your boss?

CALLER [00:43:42] He like forgets everything. I’m like, don’t you remember that time that I was like, really awful? And he was like, no, no.

CHRIS [00:43:46] So you wake up every day and you’re like, I just want to remind you that I’m a pain in the ass. And he’s like, I don’t know what you’re referring to. And then you just move on.

CALLER [00:43:55] It’s like 50 first dates. Pretty great.

CHRIS [00:43:58] Very nice. So he was your boss? Scandalous.

CALLER [00:44:02] Scandalous. Well, he was my boss years ago. And then we reconnected because I needed a conference speaker for a job that I’d had at the time when I was going through the divorce. So I was like, I want a speaker from the type of business that he’s in. I almost let it, almost let it slip, Chris.

CHRIS [00:44:23] Yes, I noticed.

CALLER [00:44:25] So I contacted him. You know what? What would you say?

CHRIS [00:44:31] I said, I noticed that you almost slipped.

CALLER [00:44:33] I almost slipped.

CHRIS [00:44:34] So when you reach out for a speaker, do you have it in the back of your mind of like, oh, that boss was kind of a hotty? Do you have that in your mind at all?

CALLER [00:44:43] I mean, not really. Kind of. I mean, I really, really respected him. And I knew that he was divorced, but I was really just reaching out for professional reasons. But I was happy to reconnect.

CHRIS [00:44:59] Right. Because I would imagine as someone who’s not attracted, as someone who’s not often attracted to people, I would imagine when someone when you are attracted someone, it must stand out and stick in your guts.

CALLER [00:45:09] Yeah. So I was attracted to him when I worked with him. Right. Sure.

CHRIS [00:45:13] So that stands.

CALLER [00:45:13] We never crossed any lines at all ever.

CHRIS [00:45:17] So you reconnect.

CALLER [00:45:19] Yes. So we reconnect. We meet at this restaurant and the restaurant’s closed on Sundays, which is when we were supposed to meet. And we both live in this, we have, we live in a really small town, one restaurant and the subway at the gas station.

CHRIS [00:45:33] That’s not really where you met, is it? You didn’t really go meet,

CALLER [00:45:37] So we met. No, not at the subway. Not at the subway. At the little restaurant. It’s like a little greasy spoon. Like a little diner.

CHRIS [00:45:42] I was about to say, how small is this town.

CALLER [00:45:44] Yes. It’s small, 700 people.

CHRIS [00:45:47] Is that true?

CALLER [00:45:48] Yeah. Small.

CHRIS [00:45:50] So everybody knows everybody’s business.

CHRIS [00:45:55] Let’s go ahead and pause here, because we got ads. That’s how the show lands on your inbox every Tuesday. But here, here’s a teaser of how how did this new love come about? Find that out. We’ll find all that out and much more when we come back.

[00:47:25] [AD BREAK]

CHRIS [00:47:42] Thanks again to everybody who sponsors this show. Hope you use those promo codes and help out the show while enriching your lives with their products and services. Now let’s get back to the phone call.

CALLER [00:47:54] Yes, small.

CHRIS [00:47:56] So everybody knows everybody’s business.

CALLER [00:47:59] Yeah, well, he is related to like a million people around here. I’m not. And so I was really used to being anonymous, Chris, and no longer, no longer. There are lots of family members around. So I kind of have to watch. I mean, he went to like he grew up here, so he knows of people he went to school with. Anyway, so, yes, we met at his restaurant, but it’s closed on Sundays. And I was like, well, I guess we could meet at my house. It’s just down the street. And he knew where I lived because I used to bring his kids trick or treating through town. And we came back here and I offered him a glass of wine and he asked where the kids were. And I said I was getting to divorced. And they were with their father. And he said, Oh. Which is not a normal reaction, Chris, when you tell somebody you’re getting divorced.

CHRIS [00:48:51] Mm hmm. Yeah. I’m so sorry. Or oh, my God. What happend?

CALLER [00:48:54] Right. How are the kids? How are you? Is everything okay?

CHRIS [00:48:59] An eye opening, exclamation, an exclamation that eyes are opening here.

CALLER [00:49:03] Righ. And I was like, that was an a usual response. Anyway, we talked for four hours about the conference and about life. And then he started texting me, which he had not done in the years since I had worked at the place of business where he also works. So I was like this is unusual. And then a while later, he asked me to dinner.

CHRIS [00:49:35] At the restaurant. He said it’s it’s.

CALLER [00:49:39] At a different restaurant, a better restaurant.

CHRIS [00:49:41] A Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday or maybe Saturday. Shall we try the restaurant again?

CALLER [00:49:47] Oh, it’s open during football season Sundays.

CHRIS [00:49:50] Oh, that’s OK.

CALLER [00:49:53] I think actually they have breakfast on Sundays now.

CHRIS [00:49:57] Well, good for the restaurant. Sounds like business is good. That sounds like business is good. That’s good. OK. And then he gets there. Now, how do you feel about the fact that you’re about to have teenage kids out of nowhere?

CALLER [00:50:08] Oh, well, we moved in together a couple of years ago, so they’ve been around. But I’ve you know, I try out to be their parent because they were so old when we started dating and getting serious. I just feel like that would have led to a lot of resentment. So I just try to be a trusted adult friend.

CHRIS [00:50:27] Look at that. You got a real head on your shoulders. You’ve got a real head on your shoulders.

CALLER [00:50:35] Aw, thanks. Yeah, they’re great kids. It’s not really hard. They make it easy.

CHRIS [00:50:41] That’s good.

CALLER [00:50:44] And they’re funny and weird and interesting, just like all kids.

CHRIS [00:50:54] You’ve got a you’ve walked an interesting path, my friend.

CALLER [00:50:58] I didn’t even talk about what I was going to talk about.

CHRIS [00:51:00] Where are you going to talk about? We got 18 minutes left, let’s sink our teeth into this shit.

CALLER [00:51:05] Oh, we have 18 minutes left. All right. OK. All right. So did you, I don’t want to identify me. Let me figure out how to say this in a way. So I am. I have a close female relative who was a is a survivor of the abuses at Keele High School. Did you see the keepers?

CHRIS [00:51:39] Oh wait, about with the Baltimore area?

CALLER [00:51:43] Yeah.

CHRIS [00:51:43] With with the with the nun who died and in the crazy priest.

CALLER [00:51:48] Yeah that was her teacher.

CHRIS [00:51:49] No way. I was obsessed with that. That’s a series on Netflix.

CALLER [00:51:54] Yeah, it is the series on Netflix and it’s fantastic.

CHRIS [00:51:56] So just to give anybody who hasn’t seen it background, this is a story about a Catholic school in the Greater Baltimore area where one of the nuns who was a teacher there was murdered. And as soon as you start to look into her living situation, you realize, well, that’s not how Catholic parishes, she was living in an apartment on her own. That’s you’re supposed to live in a convent. And all the other nuns associated with the school did. What was going on there? And then it came out that the priest who ran the school for many years was accused of abusing a lot of women.

CHRIS [00:52:32] And it was it was a pretty intense but beautiful thing that a number of the graduates of that school, many of whom had been abused and all of whom I think who had heard about it, decided that they were basically going to become detectives and try to solve this woman’s death, because they really strongly believed there was a cover up by that priest and maybe the Catholic Church as a whole. And the series is insane and intense and gripping.

CALLER [00:52:59] Indeed, agree very much.

CHRIS [00:53:01] So someone in your life was involved.

CALLER [00:53:03] And it was hard to watch.

CHRIS [00:53:04] Yeah, I can imagine even harder than it was for the rest of us for you.

CALLER [00:53:08] Yeah. Well, I mean. This is going to be hard not to identify the person, but this person’s mother told and had they listened, it would have saved a lot of people, a lot of abuse.

CHRIS [00:53:31] Wow. So part of the cover up. Someone in your family part was covered up.

CALLER [00:53:36] Yeah. And she. The thing was, she was tipped off by another priest. Like don’t let your daughter be alone with this priest. There’s something wrong with him. And then she found out that he was pulling her out of class when she found out he was pulling out of class for counseling. She called the school and was like, this will never happen again. This is what’s going on. And nothing was done.

CHRIS [00:54:07] Wow.

CALLER [00:54:14] So yeah, hats off to Abbie and Gemma. They’re amazing. They’re the sleuths that.

CHRIS [00:54:20] The two central, the two central amateur detectives at the core of the keepers.

CALLER [00:54:26] Oh, my God, aren’t they so great?

CHRIS [00:54:27] Yeah, they’re bad asses, bad ass.

CALLER [00:54:31] And also let’s let’s give a little shout out to Teddy, Gemma’s dog.

CHRIS [00:54:36] OK. OK. Wow.

CALLER [00:54:41] You remember the dog?

CHRIS [00:54:42] Can’t say I remember the dog. Not gonna lie.

CALLER [00:54:47] I’m gonna tell her you said that.

CHRIS [00:54:49] Okay. Do you know the dog personally?

CALLER [00:54:51] No, I don’t know the dog personally.

CHRIS [00:54:53] Alright then I don’t, I don’t fear. I don’t fear retribution. I do not fear your ability to actually put me in the hot seat on this one.

CALLER [00:55:01] I don’t. I don’t think that she would be cruel. I don’t think there’s a cruel bone in Gemma’s body anyway. Yes. So I am no longer Catholic.

CHRIS [00:55:11] Yeah, that’ll that’ll chase you right away from that church.

CALLER [00:55:14] Yeah. So. How about you? What’s your what’s your Catholicism like these days?

CHRIS [00:55:26] I would say very evident culturally in the amount of guilt and shame I fear, I feel every day in the way that I constantly think people are mad at me and the way that I can’t do simple things like if a waiter brings me the wrong order, I’ll just eat what they bring me because I feel like they’ll be mad at me if I send the order back. Extraordinarily Irish Catholic in that sense. I don’t. I don’t want to bother anybody. Yeah. Things like like. Yeah. Like like for like.

CALLER [00:55:54] That’s the life that that’s Irish Catholic life. That’s exactly what it is.

CHRIS [00:55:58] It is. And I tell you, like. And again, like I’m not a fancy guy. And also very Irish Catholics to reject the idea that you could be fancy or should be fancy in any way. But like on my TV show, the TV show’s named after me. Yesterday we started the writers room up again and someone had stored a treadmill in my office. I don’t I shouldn’t have, it’s not a big office. And I personally, I was people witness me personally trying to drag it out by myself. This is a a minimum two man job. And they were like, let me help. And I was like, no, I don’t want to. I don’t want to put anybody out. They were like we have, there are people hired specifically to carry things on on television show productions. You don’t have to carry the treadmill yourself. I’m like, no, I don’t want anybody else to have to do a thing

CALLER [00:56:43] So how many injuries have you gotten over the years from that level of guilt?

CHRIS [00:56:47] I mean, a number of physical. Yeah, I was i-. If we’re including emotional scars, then I would say many of them are rooted in Irish Catholicism for sure for sure.

CALLER [00:56:57] Certainly emotional scars as well.

CHRIS [00:56:59] Oh, yeah. Things that. The things that the things that are coming up about me at my funeral are, you know. Yeah, yeah. They’re gonna blow people’s minds.

CALLER [00:57:09] Yeah, what’s good?

CHRIS [00:57:11] Look, I live very publicly so you can imagine any secrets I’m keeping are pretty choice. Pretty choice. I mean, I said my whole career is public appearances and talking to people an hour at a time on the phone. You can imagine the secrets that are gonna come out. Juicy. Juicy, indeed. No, I don’t have many juicy secrets.

CALLER [00:57:34] Yeah. I should read more tabloid articles about you.

CHRIS [00:57:37] There’s it’s nothing. There’s nothing very tabloid articles about me. It would be, you know, guy who lives in Queens.

CALLER [00:57:47] Oh, I meant to tell you, I really love listening to your music before the show started. I love listening to Hiccup and Billy Bragg. I’m missing someone. Levinson. Right? Stevenson.

CHRIS [00:58:01] Laura Stevenson.

CALLER [00:58:02] Yeah, I wrote it down so that I wouldn’t remember.

CHRIS [00:58:06] Now some prior a previous caller told me, okay. Laura wrote me and was like, I heard a caller on your show said that there was a marriage pact where I suppose marry her. Which episode was it? And I was like, I am so sorry. There’s been 100 of these. I can’t recall off the top of my head. If anybody remembers which episode Laura wants to listen to the one where somebody talked about wanting to marry her. Let me know. Here’s a thing I noticed about you, my friend, is that you’re someone who says that you don’t react to visual, how would you phrase it like your sexuality is not rooted in, you know, maybe like visual cues or or or lustfullness in that traditional sense. And yet and yet I notice about you that.

CALLER [00:58:52] The lust follows.

CHRIS [00:58:52] Well, yes, but it’s something that you have to maybe unlock a little bit more than than the traditional. And yet many of your defining life experiences have been defined by sexuality, sexual choices.

CALLER [00:59:12] You know, I never really thought of it that way.

CHRIS [00:59:13] Look at this, your ex-husband’s efforts towards polyamory, your father coming out of the closet. A relative who was abused. Sexuality has played a major role in your life.

CALLER [00:59:25] Yeah, I mean, I think they have. Sometimes I kind of feel like I’m like this really normal, everyday person who is like living in a soap opera. Like somehow I stumbled into it. Someimes things seem like really weird around me, even though I feel pretty oK.

CHRIS [00:59:44] Yeah, you landed on your feet somehow.

CALLER [00:59:49] Yeah.

CHRIS [00:59:51] Now, when you have a second wedding, do you invite everybody who went to the first one? Or do you cut some people off the list?

CALLER [00:59:58] Well, I didn’t invite my ex-husband’s family.

CHRIS [01:00:00] Right. I’m speaking more about your friends because I know my only wedding. I’m at one. And I think it’ll stay at one. I feel very good about it.

CALLER [01:00:10] Let’s hope so.

CHRIS [01:00:10] Yeah, I feel great about it. My wiife is incredible. But I know there was a thing where I you know, you’re looking at the lists and you’re like, I think I’m not going to invite this person. I think I don’t. I think I’m not friends with this person anymore. I’m not inviting them. Do you have to do that a second round? Where you go, I’m now down, this person was wedding quality a few years ago and is now no longer wedding, a wedding level friend?

CALLER [01:00:31] Yeah. Yeah. It was kind of sucky, well I mean, it’s a smaller, smaller crowd anyway.

CHRIS [01:00:38] Yeah.

CALLER [01:00:38] But you know, having an Irish Catholic family, you know, it’s a lot of people right of the bat.

CHRIS [01:00:44] Indeed.

CALLER [01:00:44] By default. And I’m not cutting out family. I’m not causing anymore family drama than they already have.

CHRIS [01:00:49] Right.

CALLER [01:00:51] My fiancee is trying to close my car door like gently so that you don’t hear it. We’re going to couples counseling or premarital counseling right now.

CHRIS [01:00:59] Oh, wow.

CALLER [01:01:02] So we invited we basically did one of those things where we were like, let’s invite people who are family. So it includes family. I’m sorry for all the noise, it includes, you know, family and family like friends. You know, like if we were going to have a holiday, these people might come over for a holiday meal.

CHRIS [01:01:28] Sure. Sure. Holiday inclusion level.

CALLER [01:01:32] Yes. Holiday inclusion level, exactly.

CHRIS [01:01:34] And the people who got your presents before are they getting you presents again?

CALLER [01:01:41] We said, well, first we were gonna say no presents. But then we said presents optional because people get kind of mad about me.

CHRIS [01:01:47] It’s true, isn’t it? And you know what? You know what I found in my wedding? You know what I found at my wedding was that especially for people of a generation prior to my my my my parents, friends and older, not only our presents, they’re like, no, we’re getting your presents. They don’t like.

CALLER [01:02:03] Yeah.

CHRIS [01:02:03] Registries and they don’t like donations like we did one of the things where you can donate some money towards our honeymoon activities and the young people love that.

CALLER [01:02:13] Oh yeah those are cool.

CHRIS [01:02:14] Young people love that. I mean, you go on a website, send you some cash, you use it like you want. Great. Other people are like no we’re getting you a thing I’m handing it to you. I’m leaving it on the table. That’s how weddings work. Getting you some crystal and it’s a wedding.

CALLER [01:02:32] You must have crystal or you’re not a real married couple.

CHRIS [01:02:35] Somebody gave us crystal and it was lovely. And if that person’s listening, thank you for it. But I tell you, I’m now I’m just so anxious about I’m going to break the crystal. Now, I got this valuable thing in my life. I don’t quite know what crystal’s for. I don’t know.

CALLER [01:02:50] What kind of crystal, what kind of object is it?

CHRIS [01:02:53] Glass it was two glasses, it was two crystal glasses. So I guess.

CALLER [01:02:57] You should drink out of them.

CHRIS [01:02:58] I’m gonna sit here and drink my my fancy sodas out of crystal?

CALLER [01:03:05] Yes, you should. You should absolutely drink your fancy sodas out of crystal.

CHRIS [01:03:08] You said you were Irish Catholic. I would sit there feeling like, well, I think what am I think? I think I’m better than everybody now.

CALLER [01:03:16] No. It’s that you are making use of a gift that somebody gave you and wants you to enjoy and so you should feel, your should turn your guilt into a sense of obligation to this person.

CHRIS [01:03:29] Maybe I’ll drink, I got a salted caramel pepsi in my fridge. Maybe I’ll drink it out of the crystal. That’s what I also noticed, I think I think for the prior generation, I think for a prior generation, having some crystal and the good silver was like a really big deal. The good silver and the good China. I don’t think my generation cares as much about that stuff. That was like you’re building a home now. You got your good silver.

CALLER [01:03:51] Yeah. I mean, we’re in the same generation ish. I’m in that in-between generation that doesn’t really exist.

CHRIS [01:03:59] I’m I’m an X ennial myself.

CALLER [01:04:02] Yes. Yes. Although I did like the article that called it Generation Catalona.

CHRIS [01:04:10] Oh I haven’t read that one. After Jordan Catalano of My So-called Life?

CALLER [01:04:13] Yes, exactly.

CHRIS [01:04:15] See, he’s got the reference because that’s an exact show that x ennial locked on to when I think the Generation X was a little too old. The millennials were a little too young. That’s our show for X enniels.

CALLER [01:04:26] That’s our show. It is.

CHRIS [01:04:27] Here’s another way I define x ennials, when I read that, I was like, yeah, that’s me. Because here’s the thing. Generation, like like we are also people who probably used the Internet prior to the World Wide Web, but became most acquainted to it by being the first generation to really lock into the World Wide Web like we were on BBS systems and AOL and CompuServe and Prodigy, but we weren’t overwhelmed and confused by the existence of the worldwide web.

CALLER [01:04:55] Oh yeah. I just remember like these weird chat room kind of things that you can go into.

CHRIS [01:05:00] Oh I got myself in so much weird trouble in Internet chat rooms in the pre World Wide Web era. Holy shit the things that went on on the Internet before the web. You think the web’s bad now?

CALLER [01:05:09] I’m sure my mom thought I was doing homework, ooh i’m just typing with these other idiots online.

CHRIS [01:05:13] Well, there was an era where you had to hook your phone into your computer and dial into just some other random lunatic’s computer who was a weirdo weird enough to set up his computer that you could go download files from it. Those were bad people with like those.

CALLER [01:05:27] That’s what I did.

CHRIS [01:05:30] The BBS era is a quiet. The things I saw, the things I saw. Many pornographic games you could play on those. Did you did you ever run into those?

CALLER [01:05:40] Oh, no, I didn’t see those. ANd actually it was just a bunch of local teenagers. I think I think.

CHRIS [01:05:45] Yeah, a lot of local teens calling into the same computers, talking smack about other local teens.

CALLER [01:05:52] Yeah, it was usually like a trail of people writing L-O-L which for years I thought that meant lagging online because it would just clog everything up and take forever.

CHRIS [01:06:06] Cause you were on a 2600K.

CALLER [01:06:07] And then yeah, I didn’t know that it was laugh-out-loud. But now I do.

CHRIS [01:06:11] Yeah. We’ve caught up. Up to the lingo. So as, are people gonna give you like another crockpot, and you’re like I already have a crockpot, I use it once every two years.

CALLER [01:06:24] Well being a mom, I use my crock pot sometimes. I used to use it more. But now I work from home so I like, I use it like when I have to do like a kid friendly event where we to bring a potluck or whatever.

CHRIS [01:06:38] So that’s how you sit on the phone with me for an hour at 9:00 in the morning. You work from home?

CALLER [01:06:42] Oh, well, actually, I’m off today because I’m going to the surgeon.

CHRIS [01:06:45] Right.

CALLER [01:06:46] We’re going to counseling and then we’re going to the surgeon. So I took off because I was like, there’s no way I can handle work today. And all of this. So I was like, I’ll call Chris Gethard and see if I can get through. And I did.

CHRIS [01:06:57] You nailed it, and I drag some stuff out of you that you never thought the world would know.

CALLER [01:07:00] Yeah. So I’ll never tell anybody that I was on here.

CHRIS [01:07:03] I’m good at my job. Yeah.

CALLER [01:07:07] You are good at your job.

CHRIS [01:07:07] Yeah I’d hold this one close to the vest. Keep it close to the vest as far as telling people.

CALLER [01:07:13] Yeah. So for gifts, we did what we said was you, please these are optional. And if you really want to get get us a gift, we would love a copy of an essay that you love or a poem that you love or the rules to a game that you enjoy, pictures of your spouse being funny, your dog being cute would be great. Like things that we can frame or we can press in a book. And then we did a normal registry. We just put it on Amazon so everybody could look at it and see and then we did like our favorite charities.

CHRIS [01:07:48] That’s nice.

CALLER [01:07:49] So people have a whole bunch of options.

CHRIS [01:07:51] Yes. And people of different generations and interests can still prescribe to wedding traditions as much as they choose.

CALLER [01:08:00] Exactly. So we went to we went the safe, let’s not offend anyone irish Catholic route.

CHRIS [01:08:05] Yes. Well done. Covered all your bases. Now is eating oysters with a bad gallbladder a good idea and Crohn’s disease. Oysters and Crohn’s disease sound like they don’t mix well.

CALLER [01:08:18] My Crohn’s is probably not affected. It’s not affected by food as much as.

CHRIS [01:08:23] Stress.

CALLER [01:08:23] Some other people’s mine is usually affected by stress.

CHRIS [01:08:27] Yes, raising twins as a single mom must not be good for Crohn’s disease.

CALLER [01:08:34] Probably not, going through a divorce was really bad for Crohn’s disease. My body didn’t like that.

CHRIS [01:08:41] Yeah. Yeah. That’s not good.

CALLER [01:08:42] But no. You know, it’s pretty good. The gallbladder. You wanna avoid fat. So the wedding cake is probably not going to be great, but the oysters will probably be OK.

CHRIS [01:08:55] Now we got 30 seconds left. How do you want this thing to end? We gotta stick the landing on this one.

CALLER [01:09:00] Oh Chris, I love your show. I love that you advocate for good therapy. And I think that what you do is just lovely and wonderful in the world. And thanks for spreading beauty and joy.

CHRIS [01:09:11] Thank you. I’m lucky I get to do it. Congrats on the wedding. Congrats on finding such a good partner. Good luck to you both, raising your kids and your wonderful new permanent family.

CALLER [01:09:22] Oh, thank you so much.

CHRIS [01:09:29] Caller, thank you for calling. Good luck with the wedding. I mean, it’s happened already. I hope it went great. I hope the oysters were everything you dreamed of. And I hope the surgery went well. Oh, nice. You’re still here, you didn’t forget I promised you extra content and Gethard provides. I don’t make promises about extra content that I can’t keep. Ron Paul’s baby. Just a reminder, this was our first ever caller, frustrated man working at bank tech, screaming into the void, trying to change his life. Second call. A year later, not much had changed. Let’s go ahead and see. You got a little mini call from Ron Paul’s baby, our old friend and I was so psyched to talk to him again. And the crowd at the Bell House was hot. Happy to hear from. And I tell you, killed it. Killed it this year. Let’s check in with our old friend, Ron Paul’s baby.

CHRIS [01:10:24] Ron Paul’s baby, are you are you on the line?

CALLER [01:10:28] Hello New York. How’s the crowd Gethard?

CHRIS [01:10:37] I tell you, we got a hot crowd tonight Ron Paul’s baby. We got a hot crowd tonight, me and you. How you feeling?

CALLER [01:10:45] I’m pretty good, a little sick. I’m kind of tired.

CHRIS [01:10:48] Little sick. Kind of tired. Perfect. Perfect.

CALLER [01:10:52] I’m getting a little bit of an echo. Like Lou Gehrig’s speech.

CHRIS [01:10:57] Oh, wow. Oh, wow. That’s grim. Is that due to the technology set up here that I’m onstage and their speakers or are you having like a medical emergency?

CALLER [01:11:10] No, no, it’s the speakers.

CHRIS [01:11:12] Yes. Yeah. I apologize for that. You can hear the speakers going back into the microphone is what’s going on.

CALLER [01:11:19] OK. Yeah, that’s fine. It seems to be clearing up. Can everybody stand up and put their hands over their heart.

CHRIS [01:11:28] You got to do what the guy says. You got to do what the guy says. Ron Paul’s baby, you now have close to 400 people in Brooklyn standing up with their hands over their hearts. And I have to say, all these liberal Northeastern heathens are very concerned with where this is going.

CALLER [01:11:43] OK. Can everybody repeat after me now.

CHRIS [01:11:49] They’re nervous, man.

CALLER [01:11:49] My soul. My soul is not a timid spirit.

CROWD [01:12:00] My soul is not a timid spirit.

CALLER [01:12:01] Only time can die.

CROWD [01:12:07] Only time can die.

CALLER [01:12:07] You’ve all been initiated now. You’re what I’m calling Ron Paul’s baby’s babies.

CHRIS [01:12:19] Wow, are they allowed to sit down?

CALLER [01:12:23] No now everybody’s gonna need to file out out of the building.

CHRIS [01:12:30] I can’t allow that to happen. I’m sorry.

CALLER [01:12:34] Chris flew me out to New York. He chartered enough buses. We’re all going out for milk and cookies.

CHRIS [01:12:45] You are nailing it. My dude, you are nailing it right now. I want to be clear. That’s not true. I have bought you people nothing. I have rented no buses. Everyone’s sitting down, killing it, having fun. Now, Ron Paul’s baby, when we checked in a year after your first call, from what I remember, you had changed some things in your life. You seemed to have a lot of the weight was off your shoulders. You hadn’t made any of the major changes that you were seeking in the first one, though, outside of the job. Right. You left bank tech.

CALLER [01:13:17] Yeah.

CHRIS [01:13:19] I guess my big question is now. Have you. Have you done the open mic yet?

CALLER [01:13:26] No, I haven’t. I’ve been hanging out with people doing open mics.

CHRIS [01:13:29] You son of a bitch. How many years in a row are you going to break our goddamn hearts?

CALLER [01:13:40] A wizard is neither late nor early. Chris.

CHRIS [01:13:46] You sound like you’re in good spirits, man.

CALLER [01:13:50] Yeah, I’m doing well.

CHRIS [01:13:51] That’s good. Yeah. What’s new? Give us the update. Give us the bullet points.

CALLER [01:13:55] All right. Well, I wanted to, let’s recap. This is gonna seem like a sad story, but I think it’s got a good punch line. From now, I’ve listened to the first episode I did. But I never listened back to the second one I remember at the time I was doing better, but I was very sad.

CHRIS [01:14:15] OK.

CALLER [01:14:16] I think that came across, right?

CHRIS [01:14:18] Yeah. Yeah.

CALLER [01:14:20] Okay. At the time, this was what had happened. My mom had been living with my grandma for a while and my mom had been psychotic and violent. And she attacked my grandma.

CHRIS [01:14:34] Oh, no.

CALLER [01:14:35] And my grandma punched her right in the face and knocked out her teeth. And then she, like, ran away and disappeared. So I was kind of broken up about that. But when I talked to my grandma about it, because my mom had been a drug addict, my grandma had spent a lot of money getting our teeth repair, repaired. You know, from drugs. So when I talked to my grandma about it, she had told me that the thing she was most upset about, she said, like, I paid for those teeth and then I knocked them out.

CHRIS [01:15:16] Wow, and just so I’m clear your grandma knocked your mom’s teeth out?

CALLER [01:15:20] Yeah. Yeah.

CHRIS [01:15:22] That is a question I never thought I’d ask. And has everything calmed down a little bit since then?

CALLER [01:15:28] Yeah, everything’s calmed down.

CHRIS [01:15:30] That’s great. That’s great.

CALLER [01:15:33] But it’s something that was weighing on me at the time, but I think it’s a decent story, right?

CHRIS [01:15:40] Yeah. I mean, I’m glad I’m glad you got a good sense of humor about it. And and and your grandma is making some cracks as well about it. That’s awfully nice.

CALLER [01:15:56] Oh, I thought, cause I mentioned my grandparents, but I didn’t really talk about them. And I feel like that’s one story that helps kind of summarize who I was raised by to be who I became.

CHRIS [01:16:11] Yeah.

CALLER [01:16:13] So I wanted to give a few details about my grandparents. So that’s a pretty good grandma story, my grandpa he’s the one who named me. I was named after a cowboy. He taught me to shoot with a six shooter like out in a field when I was pretty young without ear protection and my ears rang for like weeks. And then he his only excuse was that cowboys didn’t wear headphones.

CHRIS [01:16:46] All right.

CALLER [01:16:46] He was also he was Cherokee and he was in the Navy and he had a lot of tattoos. The best of which were over each nipple one said sweet and one said sour.

CHRIS [01:17:13] OK. OK.

CALLER [01:17:15] So I just wanted to give those details.

CHRIS [01:17:20] I think that’s awesome. I think people are psyched you did. Now, I have a question for you before we go. You know, we have it we have it set up here where people can tweet thoughts and questions at me to make it a little interactive. And someone just put a very interesting thought out there. I’m not going to put pressure on you, but someone someone named James asks, can Ron Paul’s baby just do his tight five? Do you want to use the Bell House crowd tonight?

CALLER [01:17:49] I think I just did.

CHRIS [01:17:51] I think, I think you just did as well.

CALLER [01:17:57] I think if I’m workshopping, that material’s probably something to go with.

CHRIS [01:18:03] Oh, so is that stuff that you have, are you still thinking about doing the open mic? Is it still a thought or have you gotten to a place in your life where it’s

CALLER [01:18:10] Oh yeah, and I definitely, cause the open mic, that scene’s kind of been opening up here when it used to just be Dallas.

CHRIS [01:18:20] Yeah.

CALLER [01:18:21] And as you may have experienced, Denton is a little more of a bizarre place than downtown Dallas is. So I feel like the type of things I’m interested in doing will go over better here. But what I think I am less interested in stand up and more interested in what would probably be considered some sort of off putting performance art.

CHRIS [01:18:53] Well, I mean, the Bell House crowd has no problem with that.

CALLER [01:18:57] I just talked to some of my friends recently about things I was planning on trying to do at open mics and asked if anybody in Denton was doing things like that. And the response I got was that the only person they could think of was G-G Allen.

CHRIS [01:19:20] All right. So you go put on some G-G Allen material. I think that’s a great idea. And I’m going to make you this promise as we wrap up, my friend. We’ve now done three calls, three check-ins. And you say you still want to do the open mic every time. I will not stop doing this podcast until you do an open mic. I went not. I will not. We have to give these people what they’re asking for, which is that an anonymous man in Denton, Texas, does the open mic already.

CALLER [01:19:52] Yeah, I mean, I couldn’t just lied the first time and said I did.

CHRIS [01:19:55] You could have you could have lied so many times to get me off your back.

CALLER [01:20:00] Save save me some grief.

CHRIS [01:20:03] Well, that’s awfully true, isn’t it? I can finally stop bothering you.

CALLER [01:20:09] But I’m confident I’ll get it done at this point. I don’t I don’t feel like I’m living like a coward.

CHRIS [01:20:19] No, I don’t think so. And I’ll tell you this. I don’t know if I talked about this on the podcast when I did a live show in Denton, I met you and you didn’t come off like a coward at all. You came off like a real nice guy.

CALLER [01:20:33] Thank you. Yeah, you seemed in a bad place that night. You were exhausted.

CHRIS [01:20:43] I want to thank you so much for checking back in with us. You’re the best. You are the foundation that built this show. And I will always appreciate that. Thank you so much for talking to us tonight, my friend.

CALLER [01:20:56] All right. I love you all. Can we can we end with something?

CHRIS [01:20:59] Yeah, whatever you want.

CALLER [01:21:01] Okay. Well, I know we’ve done a lot of screaming. That’s been the traditional way to end the call, and I see that you’ve done some Billy Bragg sing alongs and things. So and I know your band is The Smiths that kind of seems to define your youth and how you felt about.

CHRIS [01:21:25] Where are we going with this?

CALLER [01:21:28] Well, I don’t know if we do a song or are there copyright issues.

CHRIS [01:21:32] I don’t care.

CALLER [01:21:35] All right. Well, I. I also think my youth was defined by a band that also has a troublesome front man. So I’d like to start singing this song. And when you know it you can chime in and then we can scream the chorus.

CHRIS [01:21:59] OK, OK. Everybody’s waiting to see.

CALLER [01:22:07] The world is the vampire, secret destroyer, hold you up to the flame. And what do I get for my pain? Betrayed desires. And a sense of change, even though I know I suppose I’ll show all my cool and go like a job. Despite all my rage I am still just a rat in a cage. Despite all my rage I am still just a rat in a cage.

CHRIS [01:23:09] Ron Paul’s baby everyone. Wow. Nailed it.

CHRIS [01:23:17] Thank you, Ron Paul’s baby, for the call, for the openness, for the career, for the career boost that you personally handed me. I personally thank you and all of our listeners thank you for always being so open and honest and charming and fun. Funny. Talk to you next year. Callers, listeners, talk to you next week. Keep your eye on the Twitter, on the Instagram. I’ll plug the phone number. I’ll see you soon. Thank you to Jared O’Connell and Harry Nelson in the booth. Thank you to the Reverend John DeLore, Gretta Cohen helped build the show in the early days. Thank you Shellshag for all the great music. Want to know more about me? Chrisgeth.com is the website. Go there for touring dates. All that stuff’s up there. You like Beautiful Anonymous? You can really help if you go to Apple podcasts and you rate, review, subscribe. That helps so much more than you know.