Memento Stori

<div class="img padding-bottom-small"><a href="http://mementostori.show/"><img fetchpriority="high" decoding="async" src="https://weownthistown.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/s1e06-mementostori-fb-wott.jpg" alt="" width="1200" height="630" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-20994" /></a></div> <div class="content-padding padding-bottom-small"> <p>Jordan was a blossoming singer songwriter who died in a car accident when she was just a teenager. Filmmaker <a href="https://www.instagram.com/diceydycee/">Dycee Wildman</a> thought Jordan was the coolest person she&#8217;d ever met and recently found a homemade CD of Jordan&#8217;s music under her bed. On this episode, we listen to those songs and talk about the continuing impact of their friendship. </p> </div> <div class="content-padding"> <p> Official site: <a href="http://mementostori.show" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">mementostori.show</a><br /> Instagram: <a href="https://instagram.com/mementostori">@mementostori</a> </p> <p class="grey">Show Music: <a href="https://www.instagram.com/ryanbreegle/">Ryan Breegle</a></p> </div>

<div class="img padding-bottom-small"><a href="http://mementostori.show/"><img decoding="async" src="https://weownthistown.net/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/s1e05-mementostori-fb.jpg" alt="" width="1200" height="630" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-20746" /></a></div> <div class="content-padding padding-bottom-small"> <p>Comedian <a href="https://twitter.com/thecroftonshow">Chris Crofton</a> shares the story of his grandfather, former head of the New York Produce and Grain Exchange, Charles B. Crofton. Charles was a flashy, successful man who found it hard to connect to his children and left behind a confusing legacy full of questions. </p> </div> <div class="content-padding"> <p> Official site: <a href="http://mementostori.show" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">mementostori.show</a><br /> Instagram: <a href="https://instagram.com/mementostori">@mementostori</a> </p> <p class="grey">Show Music: <a href="https://www.instagram.com/ryanbreegle/">Ryan Breegle</a></p> </div>

<div class="img padding-bottom-small"><a href="http://mementostori.show/"><img decoding="async" src="https://weownthistown.net/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/s1e04-mementostori-fb.jpg" alt="" width="1200" height="630" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-20422" /></a></div> <div class="content-padding padding-bottom-small"> <p>The first time <a href="https://www.instagram.com/jamiembradley/">Jamie</a> and I hung out we were both in Massachusetts for the wedding of some mutual friends. She and several others had rented this big old house in Salem for the weekend and after the reception shut down, all the Nashvillians went back and partied there. While everybody else drank and played games in the other rooms, we spent most of the night in the kitchen bonding over Yankee Candle hauls on YouTube, the price of trailers in a local <em>Pennysaver</em> somebody had left behind, and our fucked up families. </p> <p>Thereâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />s a kinship between people who have experienced loss. Thereâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />s even more of one between those of us who knew that loss would come but not exactly when. I knew from a fairly young age that my father didnâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />t have so much time. Jamie knew this about her mother. To live with death before itâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />s happened, that will cook into you a dark crust that has to be cut with something sweet. Or at least something palatable. </p> <p>Jamie is funny. Like, really, really funny. The kind of funny that you just have to be born with. Itâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />s in the recipe of your genes. Even when discussing some really dark stuff, she has a sense of humor about it that makes you so at ease about what sheâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />s telling you, even if you havenâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />t lived it. In the early spring of last year, Jamie and I met for brunch, drank about a hundred Bloody Marys and talked about our dead mothers. Actually, we drank about a hundred Bloody Marys, talked about our dead mothers, and laughed hysterically. It was electrifying. Grief doesnâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />t have to be one thing or another. </p> <p>A couple of years ago, Jamie did a stand up routine at Springwater for amateur night. Her set was brilliant. I mean, truly. And so much of it was just about her life, the sad parts, the unbelievable parts, about her dad who at that time was recently diagnosed with dementia. And it was so smart. Thatâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />s key. If youâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />re not smart, laughing or poking fun at the misfortune of your loved ones can come across as well, sociopathic. But this was more Tig Notaro than Jeffrey Dahmer. </p> <p>Before this interview started, Jamie told me she wanted it to be serious, because thatâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />s not something sheâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />s ever really able to be when talking about her family. She didnâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />t want to trivialize the material. She wanted people to understand that some of her experiences have really affected her and itâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />s not funny, even if she makes it funny. </p> <p>Thatâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />s harder to do than it sounds. Itâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />s hard to suddenly let down your guard when youâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />ve processed everything through the lens of gallows humor and self deprecation. If thatâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />s been the crutch thatâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />s kept you from falling apart. Sheâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />s never said this, but Iâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />m willing to bet that Jamie often feels like I do, which is profoundly alone. But loss and feeling alone, it might be the two most fundamental ingredients in the human condition; which is why you add vanilla extract to almost every baked good &#8211; to cover up the dry and bitter. </p> <p>Loss, it happens to everyone. It happened to us, it will happen to you. So you might as well laugh about it. </p> </div> <div class="content-padding"> <p> Official site: <a href="http://mementostori.show" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">mementostori.show</a><br /> Instagram: <a href="https://instagram.com/mementostori">@mementostori</a> </p> <p class="grey">Show Music: <a href="https://www.instagram.com/ryanbreegle/">Ryan Breegle</a></p> </div>

<div class="img padding-bottom-small"><a href="http://mementostori.show/"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://weownthistown.net/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/s1e03-mementostori-fb.jpg" alt="" width="1200" height="630" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-20335" /></a></div> <div class="content-padding padding-bottom-small"> <p>We donâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />t always get what we want. </p> <p>Rachelâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />s grandmother never left the house without makeup. And she used to pull the credit card bills from the mail so her husband, Rachelâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />s grandfather, wouldnâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />t see how much sheâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />d spent on clothes that week. She loved dancing and would throw big parties at their house which had an actual dance floor and bar in the basement. She was the kind of woman that possibly could have only existed when she did. </p> <p>Rachel is a very different kind of woman, and in many ways, also a woman of her time. I met her back when we were both angsty young high school freshmen and her outfit of choice at that time was a Bikini Kill t-shirt, combat boots, tiny plastic barettes in her hair and a padlock chain around her neck. She was a feminist who didnâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />t eat meat. She was cool with a smile that made her small features crinkle up beneath her bleached out pixie cut. Think of a young Renee Zellweger with the Enid Ghost World fashion treatment and that was her. </p> <p>Rachel told me her grandmother would often let her know she did not find her heavy eyeliner, mohawk, or ripped tights at all fashionable, or at all flattering. Itâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />s fascinating, who and what we come from and what parts of them stick.</p> <p>When Rachel was about 11 or 12, her grandmother took her and her cousin to Glamour Shots. For those who didnâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />t grow up with these in every shopping mall, think of them as a portrait studio where you went to get photos with filters before filters were a thing. They would tease out your hair, pile on the makeup, give you a rhinestone necklace and take as many blurry, soft focus pics as you could pay for. Rachel said she went back to look at those pictures and remembered how sheâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />d really loved doing them, no matter how corny they look now. During that session, sheâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />d felt as sophisticated and fancy and as grown up as her grandmother. </p> <p>When Rachelâ€<img src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/17.0.2/72x72/2122.png" alt="™" class="wp-smiley" style="height: 1em; max-height: 1em;" />s grandmother passed, she got something that seemed to encompass all of the elegance she associated with her. Unfortunately, it was also something that she found grotesque and that went against her deeply held personal beliefs. </p> </div> <div class="content-padding"> <p> Official site: <a href="http://mementostori.show" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">mementostori.show</a><br /> Instagram: <a href="https://instagram.com/mementostori">@mementostori</a> </p> <p class="grey">Show Music: <a href="https://www.instagram.com/ryanbreegle/">Ryan Breegle</a></p> </div>

<div class="img padding-bottom-small"><a href="http://mementostori.show/"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://weownthistown.net/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/s1e2-mementostori-fb.jpg" alt="" width="1200" height="630" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-20255" /></a></div> <div class="content-padding padding-bottom-small"> <p>Have you ever picked up a black shaker and turned it upside down over your food only for white salt to come out? Tristan Van had several distinctions &#8211; nurse, bicyclist, curmudgeon with a heart of gold, and the first transgender employee at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville. His colleague and friend <a href="https://www.instagram.com/neilsbear/">Neil Stinson</a> remembers Tristan and the token from him he keeps. We can&#8217;t always know what&#8217;s inside a person or a pepper shaker. </p> <p>If you are moved by this episode remembering the life of Tristan Van, we encourage you to make a donation to the Tennesee Equality Project in his memory. <a href="https://www.tnep.org/tristan_van">This page</a> was set up by his friends and family as a way to honor his legacy.</p> </div> <div class="content-padding"> <p> Official site: <a href="http://mementostori.show" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">mementostori.show</a><br /> Instagram: <a href="https://instagram.com/mementostori">@mementostori</a> </p> <p class="grey">Show Music: <a href="https://www.instagram.com/ryanbreegle/">Ryan Breegle</a></p> </div>