Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:00 Adrian Potter author of the new poetry collection, everything wrong feels right. Adrian is also the author of the fiction chat book, survival notes, and his writing has appeared in the North American review obsidian and other publications, Adrian lives and writes in Minnesota and on Josh Webber
Speaker 1 00:00:16 In the last part of the hour. And he speaks with Tiffany McDaniel, a novelist poet, and visual artists born and raised in Ohio. She's the author of Betty and the summer that melted everything, all this and more. So stay tuned to write on. Right?
Speaker 1 00:00:34 Well, hello everyone. This is Dave and we're here speaking with Adrian Potter author of everything wrong feels right. Hi, Adrian. Hi, how are you? Great. Welcome to the show. Thank you. Great to have you congratulations on the book. Thanks. I'll tell you what, before we get started with a reading from you, let's find out a little bit of a little bit more about you. Um, you're in Minnesota right now, but, uh, tell us where you're from. And, uh, I got started in poetry urea back in the studio. Yeah, I was so, uh, yeah, originally I'm from Iowa and I grew up there, but most of my family lives in Chicago and I kind of moseyed on up to min, Minnesota toward the, uh, 2000. And I've lived up here ever since I, my background is more actually into the sciences, which I know is an odd thing for a poet and a writer.
Speaker 1 00:01:33 Yeah. I'm actually a traffic engineer at a consulting firm and that's my day job. And the writing thing is a side hustle. I went to also the schools with, for, to get my MBA and I had to make a promise to myself because I loved writing and it was the deepest thing in my life in order to get those degrees, I made a promise to myself to stop writing for those years after about six years of not writing and I had to hold myself to it because my mind would wander and I'd never get my schoolwork done. Wow. Two weeks after I got down in graduated, I started riding again. So I buckled down and sort of self taught myself. And obviously I don't have the pedigree of a person who graduated from an MFA program, but I've worked and, and, and got published in small journals and kind of work my way to the point that finally got a book published.
Speaker 1 00:02:27 So that's where that, that's my short and sweet story. Wow. That is one of the most amazing stories I've heard about a writer, I think ever, uh, to turn it off for that long when something you really need to do. That's, that's amazing. Uh, boy, and congratulations, uh, good for you to come back to it. This is really good stuff. Um, uh, to get, get people feel for your work. Adrian, how about we have a reading? Do you have something in mind? Yeah. Um, I'll just read one of my favorite poems in the book. Uh, it's called tell me lies in a dead language.
Speaker 1 00:03:02 Perhaps it starts with genetics, the knack of the body to remember what the mind disregards, gloom, heartbreak and black eyes to routinely, to routinely recall the verb. Forget soon after a drunken argument, leans in close and shout sinister advice in your ears each day, less of you survives and what remains seems fragile and disposable have healed bones and broken China, a pension for a shoplifting sex and scotch before noon scattered scars that outline your wrists and brews at eight disappear then return. So you say that your husband is nice in his own way. A statement as undecipherable as to me as Sanskrit, you tell me lies in a dead language, and I answered them with the comforting way to silence. I can only think of how it dusk as night closes around our world like a fist. He will strike you behind drawn curtains and locked doors. If I believed in apologies, I'd give all of mine to you. Mumbled like unanswered prayers, floating aimlessly toward heaven.
Speaker 2 00:04:24 Thank you, Adrian. That's a pull my marked up a lot. Uh, that's a great introduction to your poetry for our listeners. Uh, you, uh, don't pull any punches when you tell your stories in your poems and stories. That's how I'd like to begin. So you're a writer of fiction also, and a number of your poems are in terms of form they're in paragraph style, if you will, free verse. Uh, and then, uh, other poems are more traditionally laid out in the way in manner of which we might imagine a poem to be laid out. And in terms of stances, uh, before we dig deeper into some of your poetry and your themes, um, tell us about why some of those poems look the way they do, because they feel story-like to me when I'm reading them, was that the intention,
Speaker 1 00:05:14 You know, that's a great thing. I, I've always kind of been tinkering with my style and I'm a firm believer that nobody has one style that they do. I think you're always kind of dabbling and you're influenced by the music. You listen to the other people you read and all these, all of those things. So when I first started writing, a lot of my writing was a lot more like spoken word, but written on paper. And that was my style for many years, maybe with a little dabbling of a lot of musicality to it. And as I grew and got older, one of the bigger things that happened was I had a kid. And so my writing time was truncated. So I'm always getting tidbits and my style changed because of it not in a negative way, just a little different. So I meandered from like the conventional narrative to something, a little disjointed and less linear.
Speaker 1 00:06:16 And that's where some, the mag I gravitated more to this private prose poem action is that I would write just bits and pieces as I could, and still try to get 200 to 300 words in a day, no matter what, even when things were tough and then kind of build it together. So it almost became like a mosaic and are piecing together a story or finding things that were related in different parts of my notebook. Just kind of blending them together. And a couple of words, even in that poem, for example, these could have been thoughts from three or four different months, and then they kind of glanced off each other and then became, uh, uh, triggered a memory of somebody that I knew that faced that kind of, uh, abuse, for example. And then I sort of formulated it and stitched it together, maybe like a quilt, but it seems like a corny metaphor, but
Speaker 2 00:07:09 It's a great metaphor. It's a great metaphor. Well, it's a powerful poem. And, um,
Speaker 1 00:07:13 That, that kind of style then.
Speaker 2 00:07:15 Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you for that. And a lot of these, um, pros, palms, they're almost identical length. It appears to me, I almost, I had to stop myself from actually counting the words to see if, if you were actually trying to, you know, um, do something special with the size of the poems, but, but they really feel, uh, they work together well. And you know, you mentioned, um, poems coming together over time. Some of these poems, the way they're lined up, they feel like they're part of a series a to me, it, that feels intentional to me. Um, it was that true. Like these foams, they maybe resonate with a particular time of your life or that sort of thing.
Speaker 1 00:07:56 I think like a lot of the writers, I tend to come back to the same subject matter. You're kind of good at what you write and you end up moseying back to it, even after you maybe experiment. And I'm definitely not a sunshine and butterflies writer by any way, shape or form. I think I had, um, somebody I dated a long time ago before I was married, who always said I had my writing, had a talent for sadness. And I liked that phrase. In fact, I think I stolen throwing it on a phone somewhere, but that is what I'm good at. I'm good at writing about things that are heartbreaking those things. And so, although some of them seem like they're in a series, it's probably me double-dipping and revisiting certain subject matter. That resonated that I, that made me feel some type of way that that triggered a feeling enough that I would come back to it or come back to different portions of it in order to, uh, reiterate and find my entire thoughts on it. So
Speaker 2 00:08:58 Yeah, just to give the, don't give, we don't want to give the readers too strong and impression the talent for sadness is a lovely phrase, but it's really, there's really some beautiful language in here too. You clearly do love to write. I'm looking at pages eight and nine right now, just quieting uses and allure. And with the alliteration all over the place, coddled, crewing, contemplating committed creativity, concept, outcome to case cliche. That's just in a few lines of one poem. Is that intentional? Adrian?
Speaker 1 00:09:27 Yeah, I'm definitely a huge fan of alliteration. It, I, I try, I actually have to try to force myself to not do it. And there's times of course, that you do, but it is it's, it's a reflex for me, for sure.
Speaker 2 00:09:41 Well, it's beautiful and it's spot full. And as a reader, you know, the writers taking time to craft something there's beautiful metaphor throughout. Um, the work also, I want to jump to, um, a couple of poems pages, 14 and 15 exquisite wreckage and giving up is un-American. Um, as a theme of America exists on both of these pages, this is one of those groupings of poems, which I, in my mind, when I'm reading it sort of, you know, pair it up, um, and made me think about America. This is a particular time in America where, you know, a lot of thoughts come to mind and they're not necessarily good. Um, but what did you have in mind when you were thinking about these poems, Adrian, and writing them in terms of America, and I'll just ask you directly know your relationship to America. What does this tell us about you, um, the poet and, uh, your, your, your relationship to America, if you will.
Speaker 1 00:10:39 So it's interesting because definitely have a complex relationship with America being African American, that, that doesn't necessarily scarily shine through with this book. Although this is my first published book, I've written long enough that I probably have five or six manuscripts. So when you break this down, this is like, if you think about in terms of like the music that is when somebody is on their fourth or fifth album, they start getting experimental. And that's where I was with this in terms of using the prose poems, kind of going with something a little disjointed yet still telling a story. I was playing around with my style and a lot of my other work, if you, if you happen to be able to Google any of my work, I touch on the social issues a lot. Whereas to some extent, although I talk about strife and some things I don't really go in depth with race discrimination, those things in this book, it's something that I write about a lot.
Speaker 1 00:11:41 So I flirt with a little, probably in both of these poems, uh, gender roles and trying to, uh, live up to a certain form of American manhood and wreckage. And then, uh, let's say just, uh, I don't know, the, the inequities of how we say we're something that we're not in, in, uh, giving up is on American. And I, I, I, so I flirt with those things in a few of these foams, but they don't dive in as much in this collection. Cause I think I was really going for an aesthetic with this as I collected these and brought these together. So
Speaker 2 00:12:21 Yeah. Yeah. Great. That's well said, I'm going to ask you a little, little bit more about that, but we're already coming up to the halfway Mark. I can't believe it. I'm going to remind people that were shocking to Adrian Potter as Potter about his book, everything wrong feels right. A collection of poetry. It's, it's really a powerful stuff. Uh, can I suggest, can I suggest a poem for you to read to us? Sure. I have a warm list here, but a brief history of man as kindling 31 in the volume. Uh, it's one of many that, uh, kinda got me, but to, if you would please me and then we can talk about it.
Speaker 1 00:12:59 Awesome brief history of man as King, the Ken link, the blues they say are personal tailored to fit your pain, like a suit prone, the night sweats and hysterics crusades of sorrow and smoldering silence. Frayed ends of ragged dialogue. So often everything wrong feels right? Common sense, unravels. As I struggle to follow life's syllabus and grow obsessed with explanations, giddy, with hope, flush with jubilation. I hope for one last big score to finally hit Peter. I can go on for years like this, scraping myself up after each beat down with confidence made of paper and twigs. I catch fire, like nothing you have ever seen.
Speaker 2 00:13:56 That's good stuff. And you know what, for all the darkness, if you will, and here there's some, uh, there's some hope and optimism in, in, in, in this one, right? Uh, it's a, it's a wonderful, beautiful metaphor. Um, Adrian, would you consider yourself a confessional poet? These poems are about yourself? Um,
Speaker 1 00:14:18 Yes, I would say so. I was actually just having this conversation with my mom, because as you hand that to a relative, you always have to tell them the difference between Nair, narrator, and author. And that the eye in a book is not always directly me, but there's no way that bits of me aren't in that. So there are definitely parts of this that are purely, that are confessional or relate to a time on my life or relate directly. And then there's times where I twist the narrative for poetic license, of course, or want to drive a point home a little stronger than it is. So, you know, there's definitely a percentage that is confessional and definitely some of these definitely relate directly to my life or tell stories of people I've been around or, or, and, and, uh, witnessed firsthand some of the strife that they faced, if it wasn't my own.
Speaker 2 00:15:16 Yeah. I think to be a poet, you have to be an empathetic person. And I think that just comes through in your poem, Adrian, when I read it, when you're talking about other people, especially women, I think it's hard and I'll speak for myself. It's hard to take ourselves out of our own understanding of what it means to be human. In my case, a white male, whatever, you know, whoever you are and then to write about women, it's real confidence. Um, I think that's pretty impressive. Um, I, it's not much of a question there, but, uh, I tell you what I noticed is how do you do that?
Speaker 1 00:15:50 I, you know, one thing I can say is, and I don't want to get on a list of naming off influences or anything, but I read a lot of women's work and portions of their experience resonate with me as an African American male, the days they described discrimination with a different angle than I might. And, but then I can see a relation to it. And it, a lot of times in reading a work where they talk about the challenges they face as women, it triggers something like I can relate to that in this angle of me being an African American man. And, and, and so there, there's not a one to one relation, but I think that that's where that comes from is I've read a fair amount of, of female writers. And so on that level, I'm not afraid to delve into that. And I think that part of the experience discrimination is discrimination and overcoming things is overcoming things. And I think we all do it in a similar way. And so maybe that's a little bit of what shines through with that.
Speaker 2 00:17:02 Yeah. Right. Great. Nicely said, um, I would describe you as something of an urban poet. There just feels like there's city life in here on the one hand, on the other hand, um, there's equally some really nice pieces on what being a Midwesterner, if you will, the disease show up in here. Um, uh, what, what's your relationship to space or geography as a poet? Uh, do, do you walk outside and, you know, dig nature and get something from that, or it's things happening inside your head or the streets, city streets, where you get your inspiration, where does it come from?
Speaker 1 00:17:38 Not to hedge my bets, but both for sure. I'm definitely, you know, the intention of this book, this came out of a call poems from a place, a Portage press. And there the university press of Carroll university in Wisconsin, they re, literally were looking for a manuscript that spoke to the Midwestern experience. And that was the start of me. It triggered me a bit to looking at, I have a lot of these urban poems that describe the Midwest in a level that I seen it and also these rural ones. And considering, although I said, I'm lived in Iowa for some of my life and then Minnesota I've always lived in a city or a suburb, but yet definitely am not afraid to go hiking, go to a Lake. My first job down in Iowa was going out in corn detasseling for crying out loud. So I'm not afraid of the earth.
Speaker 1 00:18:42 I'm not afraid of the rural, but I definitely am a city dweller or suburban dweller. And if you know, not really been a foreign guy. So it, it, there, there's definitely an appreciation to it. And, or I've never been afraid to go do a little work at a farm. So I've touched both of those things. And I think they both have an impact on me. I'm not as much of a nature person. It inspires me and it, it comes through. So I'm in my writing, but I'm far less to sit there and describe how a field of flowers looks as long as, as much as I probably use it to use spin it for a metaphor or something like that.
Speaker 2 00:19:26 Right. Right, exactly. Um, I asked you to read a poem last time. I'm going to ask you, if you have another one on your list, maybe you could read for us. I tell you I'd love to hear poets read their stuff. Poetry is making me read a lot, right? Yeah. Yeah. So if you have one handy, it's here.
Speaker 1 00:19:42 All right. Um, I'll do the first one in the collection. Cause I kind of feel like it's the introduction to everything it's for reading.
Speaker 2 00:19:52 Okay.
Speaker 1 00:19:53 Stay cautious or courageous. Recognize the gleam of the lure, the hazard of the hook underneath the body's broken jazz, the Verity of bruises fall open like an unlaxed suitcase. Your interior tousled chaotic remain guarded like a drunken relatives, rant, inappropriate things maybe mentioned at inappropriate times, discover something divine or damaged or dirty. If offended, turn left at the expressway slip past the graveyard and the nudey bar sneak up on the blind side of sin, just in case bring a credit card, an Almanac, a loaded handgun start slowly finished with theory. Believe everything is a metaphor for regret, a fist full of flowers, apologizing for an argument, believe everything is a metaphor for sex. Even the flowers heed the warning signs skulking in the background. It's all very melodramatic. The click of a wife's tongue in discuss melodramatic, take context into consideration, especially when the narrative on your breath smells like schnapps or tobacco decipher the hidden meaning of the commonplace, the faltering soprano of a fan belt squealing its existence during a night drive, be critical, but gentle.
Speaker 2 00:21:38 Thank you. That was Adrian S Potter reading from his collection. Everything wrong feels right. That was the introductory poem instructions for reading these poems. I love that. I've got a number of things underlined in that point too. Um, Adrian, so you're a writer of fiction. We've talked a little bit about this and poetry. How do you know when's a poem, a poem, or a story, a story for you when you start kicking ideas around?
Speaker 1 00:22:03 That's a great question. And it's funny because I think it's an ever changing thing there's in the end, like I said, a lot of my writing style into piecing together, things comes out of writing in a hurry, whether it's a pre COVID, obviously on a commute, maybe putting some stuff into my phone or just trying to squeeze in a little time between the time my daughter goes to bed and I go to bed and simply put, I don't always know right away. Or I discover later that what I was trying to cram into a poem needs to be short story. And I was trying to make a 2000 word story, really can get distilled down to a page and a half phone and cut away the fat. And so I've been surprised at some things that I've written as stories and came back to him years later, knowing yeah, this story was something was off by it.
Speaker 1 00:23:11 Come back to it with a different view and hack away at it and come out with a poem that gets published. And then at the same time, maybe something's missing out of a poem and not explaining it. So I think it's a changing thing. I think I recognize it later, usually during the editing process and I'm, I'm have as much time as I spend trying to choose my words perfectly take them. The bulk of the work comes in editing. And for sure, that's when I kind of discover, okay. I think I thought this was a poem, but, uh, it's really a story, but the most part 80% of the time, I usually kind of come up with the right one, but here and there, I get surprised. So
Speaker 2 00:23:51 Yeah. Yeah. It's kind of inspiring to hear you talk about jotting down ideas whenever you can. Life's busy, life's crazy. And, uh, uh, to just squeeze some writing in and then pull it together. I think that's what a lot of people try to do. So, uh, it's always good to see someone pull it off, uh, which came first for you, Adrian in your life and your writing life, uh, poetry or fiction.
Speaker 1 00:24:18 Well, you're making me go back to grade school on this, but I'm going to say fiction, but boy, those stories were horrible. I paint myself into a corner with applied and these, again, this is elementary school stuff. I wouldn't know what to do. And so then it would be like standard ending would be, and then he wake up and it was all a dream. Then I know how to end it and would not have that cliffhanger. And I did not have that in me. So as always, it takes that work portrait kind of came to me more in my teenage years. And again, if I look back at those poems, they were probably pretty rough too, but there was something that I enjoyed and out of the people who were on the basketball team as I was a basketball player in my high school and that stuff, I was probably the only person who really liked English.
Speaker 1 00:25:13 And there was all because of the writing part of it and reading, reading art writers said, yeah, maybe I didn't like a lot of what they wrote because they were a little antiquated, but I could seize on the like, Hey, that guy really turns a phrase with the metaphors or I like how they were able to paint a picture with a certain, you know, setting, setting the stage a certain way. And so I would steal from that. That's what writers do. We all steal a little bit and, and by all means I took from that and enjoyed it. So then I'd had that hiatus through college where aside from a few times, and maybe just kind of working through struggles in life, I really tried to not write because I would never finish my degree came back and it just all dumped on the page. So in the end, I'd say poetry came second. Just kind of, but I think poetry is probably where I reside a little more than fiction, but I oscillate. And right now I am probably working more on fiction. I dwell more in the short story flash fiction.
Speaker 2 00:26:20 Got it. Is there a novel coming out from Adrian Potter? One of these days?
Speaker 1 00:26:25 I always say it like most writers do, but I've never had the, uh, attention span to go with it. So yeah, the poems and flash fiction thing is a reflection of the fact that I'll have ideas and I'll run with stuff for a little bit. And then I fall apart. This is, it's something that I want to do for sure, but
Speaker 2 00:26:44 I haven't found the, uh, haven't found the resolve to do it yet, but it's something that I'd love to be able to do at some point. And I bet you will. Uh, so, uh, I haven't asked another writer a question I guess before, but I keep thinking about your, the other half of Adrian would, you know, the scientist, the engineer, the day job guy, we all got the day job. Um, there must be some writing involved. Maybe it's pretty technical in your day job, but, but, but does your, your life as a poet and a fiction writer inform, uh, Oh, we were getting the wrap up sign Adrian. So does it, yeah, I think, you know, with engineering and business, it kinda keeps me grounded in things that can be documented, studied compared. And I think that comes through in my writing. I think overall you're dissatisfied with superficial explanations.
Speaker 2 00:27:37 And I think that does motivate a lot of my writing and dives into the detail of what I try to pack at. As, as I pulled together a poem or a story while your colleagues are lucky to have you there writing the reports for them or with the, uh, w we've been speaking with Adrian S Potter author of everything wrong feels right. You want to Minnesota zone one of our poets, a great stuff. Thank you for Adrian for joining us. Please keep us informed about your work going forward. We'd love to have you back on the program. Thank you. And people can Google you. Maybe you have a website. They can read more about you. Yeah. I have a website it's www Adrian S pottered.com and yeah, definitely Google me. You can find a lot of work that I do and, uh, fiction poetry as well as some self help articles on a few things. So that was a little everywhere. Yup. Pleasure to meet you. Yeah. Thank you. Wish you all the best Liz, back to you in the studio.
Speaker 3 00:28:35 Hi, this is Annie. I'm so excited for the interview. I'm about to share with you. Uh, I just want to offer a quick content warning. I'm the author of this next work speaks frankly, about experiences in her family about child abuse. Um, and if you'd rather sit this one out, that's cool with me, but I can't wait to share the story with you. Thank you. You're listening to KF AI, 90.3 FM and streaming live on the web at <inaudible> dot org. I'm Annie Harvey with right on radio. And I'm here speaking with Tiffany McDaniel, the author of Fetty and the summer that melted everything. Hi, Tiffany, can you hear me okay? I can. Absolutely. Can you hear me? Yeah, you sound great. Thanks so much for joining us today. Thank you so much for having me. It's such a pleasure. I'm so I'm really excited to be talking about your newest book Betty today. Um, could you, uh, read for the audience, a passage of your choosing and maybe give a little brief explanation to kind of what the book is about? Absolutely. So, um, Betty is book I wrote
Speaker 4 00:29:42 Nearly 20 years ago. It's, I'm inspired by the life of my mother and our family. And this passage that I'm going to read is a part in the book where Papa Landon, who was an avid gardener and passionate about plan C have built this stage in the garden where he really felt liberated the voices of his daughters. And he told them, you know, their thoughts matter. And that the stage was just for them to sort of embrace who they were embraced their gender and embraced our identity. And so this is a little passage about that. Me and my sister's name, that stage of far away place, because even though it was in our yard, it seemed to be so far off in the distance. We were bound by no one and nothing. It was our world. And if you would have heard the language we spoke there, it would have sounded like English to your ear, but we would square it with something and compare in our language.
Speaker 4 00:30:35 We told stories. It didn't end and songs were always an infinite courses. We became one another until each of us was as a storyteller, an actress as singer songwriter who measured the things around us until we thought as though we had mapped out the geometry from the life, we had to likely felt certain we were destined for in many ways, a far away place was our hopes and desires, manifest it into four corners of wood. I sold this and the way each one of my sisters would stand on the edge of the stage, the wind whipping their hair as they stood ever. So still, they never seemed so tall to me before, is they each planted their feet at a distance that felt powerful to them. One hand would be benching the fabric of their skirts, the other place out in front of them feeling the wind against their poems, the way they looked out from the stage.
Speaker 4 00:31:21 It was as though they'd been alive so long, they were already women. Yet we were still children there too. We would run around the stage, never been trained beyond its edge is that the whole world was right there. And it was large enough where they dreamed the three girls. We pretend to be shot in the heart only to rise from the dead. This guy turned upside down and an ocean. We swam and kicking our lives and water. As we kept one hand on the flooding stage together free to splash and play or reach toward the whales swimming by at night, when we thought the hardwood, it became the soft, warm body of a bird, large enough to break from the earth and fly so high. There was snow and happiness to tell up thoughts, you would run out onto a wing and say she was going to die into the stars or become one. We shared one imagination then when pure and beautiful thought that we were important. And that anything's possible. Thank you so much for that passage. Um, that really brought out the creativity that I love of the children in this book. Um, the level of animation and personality that you give each of the children in the family. Um, thank you. In terms of research for this book and planning for this book, be it, the characters, the setting, et cetera. Um, you mentioned in your introduction to the book as, as on the jacket
Speaker 3 00:32:40 Copy for the book, um, that this story has roots in, um, the life of your mother and the lives of your family members. Um, but in terms of creating a comprehensive story, what types of research, uh, did you use and sort of, how did you mesh it together? So family interviews, um, more traditional book and newspaper research, um, and how did those intermesh with kind of just more traditional creative writing and making things up?
Speaker 4 00:33:11 Yeah, I think to kind of talk about the research, I need to kind of go back and speak a little bit about the origin, that story with pitch, which is that, you know, nearly 20 years ago, mom had shared with me that family secret, and there were things I'd already knew about the family. You know, mom was one of three sisters, she had three daughters, so I'm one of three daughters. And she raised us in the three sisters gardens is as Papa land and had raised her and my aunts. And so I knew of our Cherokee ancestry is that's the culture that, that mom raised us. And I knew how supportive and, and loving other figure pepper Landon had been in her life, especially to, to all the children, but especially to mom and her sisters in a time when girls were really, you know, facing more stereotypes and we do today.
Speaker 4 00:34:00 So these things I'd already known, but the secret she shared with me really shed a light on a whole different side to the family that I thought I had known. You know, I had grew up with these family members had been by my mom outfit side and the kitchen. I remember, um, the butterscotch candy is philanthropic and me how, uh, Flossie would be in the background, you know, dancing and, and putting on makeup and, and Frey would be there smoking and kind of looking off into the distance. And so I knew these family members and yet, I didn't know everything sort of all the dark bits they had experienced. And so once mom shared that secret with me, I sat down to do Q and a sessions with her kind of digging deeper into the sexism and the racism she'd faced taking deeper into her relationship with her father and relationship with her mother and her sisters. And, and this led me to have Q and a sessions with memoir out the, and my aunts and my uncles. And so for this book, the family members really the most valuable research. So
Speaker 3 00:35:06 Would you consider this then, um, more of a family story than say a work of historical fiction,
Speaker 4 00:35:12 Jim, very much look at this as, as a family store because, you know, I, I had used fiction as a vehicle in which to bring these things to the page, also using, uh, fiction to, to, you know, evolve the scenes or bridge them. And, you know, also using fiction allowed me, for example, to give a kid, some of the characters are happier ending, and then they would have had in reality. And I think of the character of lent, you know, I have fond memories of my uncle. He could be really funny. He was so smart and so creative, but I also knew that he was dealing with mental illness and through talking with him, I understood more what it was like for him to be a child coming of age with mental illness. And, and do you know what I left out of the book that was from reality where all those doctor visits was the medications he was prescribed from an early age that he was giving from doctors and, and, you know, these sorts of things that I was able to use fiction as a way to emphasize the relationship, the Kappa lands.
Speaker 4 00:36:16 And, you know, for example, when we talk about, um, you know, how importantly I didn't have been in his eyes, he would say nights were especially difficult for him. You know, the dark, the nerves, it all became too much. And he said that bill Landon would go into his room, sit in his bed, um, sit in a chair by his bed and tell him stories and, and talk to him. And eventually he found that that coffee helps to lens. And so certain nights of coffee and, and stories and talk, or for path on my uncle. And, you know, years after Pat ball's death lent would died and overdose and he would die alone, which was something I knew that he feared. And so in reality, he had an ending that I knew he wouldn't have one they'd put in the book by using fiction. I was a dibble to write him a happier ending where he was taking the ring of the family business and really following in his father's footsteps. I knew he had wanted to. So it's very much a family story that fiction allowed me to insert certain things that, that might've been a happier and Diener happier path or some of the characters
Speaker 3 00:37:20 That is beautiful. Um, I'll try not to keep this overly specific, but to dive a little more into some of the more challenging topics in the book, the family secrets you were referencing too. Um, but a big awakening happens for Betty when her mother Alka gives her a very detailed description of being assaulted as a young girl. Um, and for me it felt like there was a strong tie between Alcoa's depressive and kind of post-traumatic seeming behaviors and this assault experience. Um, and Betty, the protagonist of the book, um, was quite frightened. And as a reader, I was pretty frightened too. Um, did you ever consider telling this story without the same level of explicit trauma featured, um, or, and why did it feel important to you to go into detail about the particular traumatic experience? Um, especially as a book that centers around kind of nonfiction and really
Speaker 4 00:38:22 Experiences within your family? Yeah. Yeah. What is it? It's quite a scene in a book. And, um, it was, it was such a moment to sort of hear that in reality. And I really wanted the experience to echo in the page. And as I had conducted these, I'm doing eight sessions with, with Malmo and she spoke about the sexual abuse. She had suffered as a small child, you know, it started when she was eight years old and it was at the hands of both her father and her mother, and, you know, those things as you're sitting there, it's so incredibly difficult to hear and to hear the details that she told, you know, how her own mother had picked her up, like she was a baby and carried her into the brother's bed. So that wasn't a detail I made up for the book that, that actually happened.
Speaker 4 00:39:08 And I really wanted to preserve that or for mama for her experience and, um, to have it. And I never heard of an infused story that also involved the mother to that degree. Usually it's the father in sexual abuse cases, rarely, both parents. Um, and memo said, she didn't say anything about this abuse when she was a little girl, because it was both her mother and her father. And so she thought, well, this is normal. This is what happens to every little girl and boy. And, you know, I imagine her looking out on those houses as a child and there's other children and thinking that same thing was happening to them. It's such, it's such a thought that puts an abyss in you. And as an adult, she, you know, really became an advocate for speaking about abuse stories, because in her mind, if there had been someone in the family or in the community who had spoke about this abuse, it might've saved her.
Speaker 4 00:40:01 And let her understand that this doesn't happen in every family. And, um, you know, for the book, I, I actually had diluted her abused in reality, you know, male mom had had brothers who were actively involved in her rapes, but I, I knew that would be too much for readers because it was coming at Malmo from all angles. But I mean, imagine living that life though, it just, it made me respect, mammo, strength, even more. And I know how much you wanted the story told. And then this experience shared, and I really wanted to honor her experience by telling it in that raw form that it had happened to her, you know, same with the answers they spoke about the abuse they suffered. It allowed me to, to see that she had openly spoken about these things earlier. She might've been able to save her own daughters from the same fate.
Speaker 4 00:40:46 And so, you know, it's one of those perceived generational views. And, and manta told me they hadn't spoken about the abuse danger because, you know, the abuser had told them if they said anything, he would help pack all. And so that that's sort of the abuser skillset, and that's sort of how the generational abuse breeds within a family. And it's, it's all reliant on violence. And so, you know, ma'am on the women, they really became scores. It's speaking about these things and, and they wanted their stories told, and I felt that to honor them was to preserve those gritty details of what they had experienced.
Speaker 3 00:41:22 Um, yeah. Well, thank you. I think that it was really challenging to read, but it must've been infinitely more challenging to live. And, um, it's so powerful that you are joining former generations in your family and trying to, um, acknowledge these experiences as real and, um, things that people survive and, um, things that people can try to help others out of. Um, contrary to, um, some of them, a lot of the masculinity in the book is very, very, as we say, nowadays, toxic, um, abusive tendencies and harmful behaviors and such, but, um, Landon carpenter Betty's father, um, puts a very different spin on masculinity as was kind of referenced in the passage you read at the beginning. Um, Landon is a gardener and someone who respects and engages in work, that's traditionally seen as feminine. He gardens, he does healing work. He does medication and such, um, holistic medication.
Speaker 3 00:42:27 And he spends time with his children and he referenced his stories from his Cherokee family that really reinforced the importance of women's work and women in society. Um, but it was very interesting to see that despite having this nominally feminist father, um, Betty's mother and also her sisters, um, really struggle with self worth sometimes with will to live, um, and really struggle through what women's options are in society. Um, how was it to write a family where in some senses, the man is the firmest believer in feminism and, um, what forces societal internal mental illness otherwise. Um, do you think that, um, continued the weight of that suffering on the women in the family, despite patriarchy? Not necessarily always coming from the patriarch?
Speaker 5 00:43:25 Yeah, I think it goes back to, you know, couple lands and he had been raised with several generations of his family in the household and, um, the elders, they only spoke Cherokee and of course Pathwell was of that generation where he had to learn, um, not only the language of his ancestors and his elders, but also the English that was being brought to his doorstep. And so something that, uh, his mother and his grandmother made sure to do was to instill, pop off with the historical framework of the Cherokee society, which was historically matrilineal matriarchal, which means that they really leaned on, on women as leaders and thinkers, you know, within the charities society, it was the women who would own the houses and the land. Um, you couldn't be concerned Turkey, and once it was through your mother, it was through birth plan that it was determined.
Speaker 5 00:44:13 And so women really had a presence within that society. And that was something that, you know, the female elders and Landon's family had instilled in him. And so he didn't have the same views as a Christian household where men weren't about the women, because once Christianity moved in, that was really what that historical Cherokee framework and really removed women from a power of equality to a place that was then a lower or below man. And so what I think may pop off such a great man was that when he became an adult, he didn't turn away from his teachings, but rather keep embraced them. And he became an ally for his daughters, you know, who was facing the sexism of their day. Of course we still face sexism today, but back then it was even more so, and, you know, and, and Al cascades and embrace days case, we see the men around them having taken power from them, you know, and I think a mammal, I see her as that little girl, having her power stripped away each time the father was raping her in it, it's difficult to feel worse or to feel as if, you know, you have any sort of confidence or self worth.
Speaker 5 00:45:23 Anytime that type of abuse is happening to you. And then I'll get carried that with her, her entire life. And, you know, it's shaped the way that, um, she was a wife and a mother and shaped her as a person and as a woman. And, you know, when I was a child, I knew that mammo could be really sweet and loving one minute, but very distant the next, and as a child, I didn't understand why that was until I was older. And I learned about her abuse. And so, you know, you look at that dynamic, you look at back households that mom and her sisters were raised in the girls that both their father who was champion or boys, but also their mother who was dealing with her own identity and her own feelings of word and society. And the girl was, you know, they also had the voices of the community telling them that they were less than I remember, you know, no sessions.
Speaker 5 00:46:12 Now my mother spoke about, um, you know, in school, the girls were only allowed to wear skirts or dresses. And, and we have a scene within the book that served, reflects that and sort of reflects the, the, the mentality and the reasoning behind that, uh, because, you know, to wear pants was, was gainers, trying to be a boy or trying to step into their power. And, you know, I remember when mom was talking to risk career day in high school, and, um, they were all supposed to go to the gymnasium for the career fair. And the teacher had told her, no, you stay behind because you're not going to do anything with your life anyways. And so when you have one voice like Landon, that's sort of against that, that tide, of course, the tying them, they weren't worth anything that they weren't important to wait those voices matter. And it affects how we see ourselves no matter, um, how much of a champion house supportive a Papillon and have been in their lives. It would still go in against this overwhelming tide of voices that was trying, and that they weren't anything that they weren't important in that other thoughts and voices didn't matter
Speaker 5 00:47:19 Out of the sisters, in the family. It seems that Betty feels most strongly about her personal rights and autonomy. And she's also very upset
Speaker 3 00:47:30 To see her sister's rights be violated. Um, do you think this is because of her earlier and stronger connection to her father? Um, I additionally see other factors like she's, she's the one who, um, for those who haven't read the book yet, she's the sister in this mixed race family who looks the most Cherokee. So she has been, um, exposed to being ostracized from an earlier age. Um, how do you think Betty sort of became the champion?
Speaker 5 00:48:01 Yeah, I mean, um, through those sessions, you know, and, um, I remember mama outpatient though. He's saying you and your mom was a daddy's girl and mom was very much, um, you know, so in love with your father and he with his children, and I remembered them and it's in the book, but when it came time for school to start, even mom had said, I don't want to go. Um, and she would have been a little girl, you know, but she fished out my go cause she didn't want to have to leave her father and pop lens and, you know, let her stay home and start a year late. And so they didn't have a very special bond. And she really looked at her father as the source of wisdom and knowledge and, and strength that sheltered her in many ways, but it also allowed her creativity to bloom.
Speaker 5 00:48:46 You know, I still have the typewriter lands and I give him my mother. And so he wants to support it, but he was also not just supportive of mom and, and her talents, but also my aunts and my uncles, you know, it was a very creative family, lost. They wanted to be an actors, right thing like Loretta Lynn and, and were my uncles were visual artists and Landon supported that. And I think it was, um, his encouragement, but it was also the fact that mom was the youngest of the daughters, that she was able to escape, for example, the threat of the eldest brother. And she learned things from her sisters and mom was also the only person ma'am okay. His first told about, um, her own sexual abuse. She hadn't even shared that with Landon. And, you know, I looked at that moment that mammal shared that story with mom.
Speaker 5 00:49:35 And I don't see it as a way for her to shop for dark, but as a way to protect her, to tell her these things happen in the world. And when they happen, they are wrong. Because up to that point, you know, you're looking at a father figure like Landon, who was so different from Alpha's own father. And she understood that, that, you know, Betty and stuff would not have that sort of saying you on the world. And I see her as someone who just felt Betty was strong enough to learn from that and to grow from that. I think what has made ELCA, um, uh, a mother that was greater than her own was that she had sought out Pat Bowman's in as a father who was so different than the one that she had been raised in. And of course, all of these things, the sibling relationships, the relationship with your father, the relationship with her mother, no matter how complicated all of these things impacted mom and a great deal.
Speaker 5 00:50:26 And, um, you know, she was also the child who had taken after Papo. The most that she had, um, his color of skin, the black hair, the features that really made her a target in Selena. She talked about that bullying. She faced the racial slurs that she was called. You knew, she talked about how Papa Landon had been beaten up by groups of white men and these communities that need to try to work and live in. And so all of these things, especially when you're witnessing them as a child will really shape you and shape your path forward. That is
Speaker 3 00:50:59 The amount of thought and detail. And, um, I'd assume a combination of listening and observation that you've, um, given to the dynamics that led to the way your family is and the way your family lived is truly remarkable. And I was just wondering, um, as our final question, if for those listeners who may be thinking about writing a family story, particularly a challenging family story, um, do you have any advice or thoughts or lessons learned that you would like to share?
Speaker 5 00:51:34 I knew, yeah. I mean, I, you know, what's important that every family has its story and each of those stories is important and, you know, we have to listen to our elders, I think back on this story. And if I hadn't been writing it, uh, all of these things, they would have kind of died with this generations. And, um, you know, it's so important to listen to the experiences of the family members that we think we know. And as you're setting out to document this family, maybe it's not, you're not documented for the public consumption, but maybe you're just wanting to preserve those stories for the next generation, which I think is so important to write them down for that next generation and, and recognize that we all have a story to tell and, you know, try to remain, um, if not truthful, but at least running the forest.
Speaker 5 00:52:22 But those stories that you're hearing, I think back to, uh, the journey with this book and, you know, it was them nearly 20 years to sort of get a publisher interested in, you know, they said it was too female it's too risky. The women are this, the women are that, you know, I should change that into a male narrator they'll sell better. And, you know, I was like, no, I wanted to stick to the, for that story, which is about a girl's coming of age. If it's about, I'm a girl on the cusp of womanhood. And so when you set out to tell these families stories, make sure that you're writing all the complexities of, of what it means for each of these family members and kind of don't be influenced by an external drive, especially if you're writing the story for a publication. Um, you know, if I had listened to these agents over the course of those two decades, who said, you know, change that into a man, give the women romantic relationships, see them, you know, um, and watch more passionate affairs.
Speaker 5 00:53:19 It would have been not the family story would have been something that was sort of modeled after this industry. So my advice, if you're writing family sorted for publication, is it stayed true to the boys that you want to champion. And if you're just writing these family stories down to document them for the next generation to take value in the experiences of our elders, you know, I remember when I was a kid, my mom had gotten remarried several years after Pappa died and her husband, a gentleman, she had married, used to work for the railroad and he would, when they would come to her house, you know, he would sit down, he would talk about for hours, his life story. And, you know, as a kid, I wouldn't be outside playing or reading or being on my cats or my jobs. But the great thing that mom taught me as a child was to have the respect to listen to your elders.
Speaker 5 00:54:11 You know, she, she told me one day, if I was lucky, I live as long as him, I would want someone to listen to me. And I think that's the value and power in family stories is that if someone's speaking and we sort of owe it to them to listen and to acknowledge that we all have that story to tell, it really sounds to me like your, the times had to catch up with your story. Like, it's good that you didn't alter your story previously because, um, when agents or others were asking you to, because now that I'm publishing in general is more ready for, um, women's stories, multiracial stories, um, et cetera, though, there's still a lot of work to do in that area. Um, the story was perfect, intact just the way it is, um, more true to the way it was. Um, and I just really want to thank you for coming on this show and, uh, discussing with us, um, for those who started tuning in a little late, uh, you're listening to Tiffany McDaniel, uh, discussing her latest book, Betty Tiffany, and has been such a joy and an honor to have you on the show.
Speaker 5 00:55:18 Um, and I can't wait to hear, uh, read whatever you're writing next. Oh gosh, it's been incredible. And thanks so much for having me. It was great. Thank you. Take care. You too. Bye. Bye. You're listening to K F AI 90.3 FM and streaming live on the web at <inaudible> dot org.
Speaker 6 00:55:37 <inaudible>
Speaker 5 00:55:52 You are listening to right on radio on KFA 90.3 FM and streaming live on the web at <inaudible> dot org.
