The Fine Arts of Collage & Making Connections

In this episode, host Kate Jones has the pleasure of having conversations with two creative women about work and life.

In the first segment, Gretchen Bierbaum talks about her "light-bulb moment" that led to her becoming a collage artist. She went on to study Islamic art in Iran, became an art educator and administrator, and has enjoyed doing bicentennial and other commissions, including a painting that hangs in the dining room of one of the Sea Wolf nuclear submarines.

Gretchen is the founder and president of the National Collage Society, the first  organization in the United States devoted to collage, which at the time of the group's founding in 1982 was a misunderstood art.

Gretchen's book, Collage in All Dimensions, published in 2005, traces the history of collage as a fine art. Although collage existed in many craft forms prior to the 20th century, it was not until 1912 that Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque were the first historically significant artists to glue collage pieces into paintings. The art form has evolved ever since.

Collage in All Dimensions is available from the bookstore on the National Collage Society's website, where you also can see the winners of the annual exhibitions.

In the second segment, writer-creator, puzzle addict and enthusiastic connector Susan Terkel talks about having a natural curiosity about people and their stories. And she has a marvelous way of finding commonalities with strangers, usually within 30 seconds of meeting them.

Kate saw this play out not too long ago at PodPopuli, a studio in Hudson, Ohio, just before Susan's recording session. Then, a couple of weeks later, Kate had her own Susan Terkel moment at another studio 19 miles away in Akron. 

When an engineer who lives and works in Akron heard that Kate's from Hudson, he said, "I know a famous author there. Susan Terkel." Turns out he lived in Hudson for a while himself and hung out with one of Susan and her husband Larry's two sons.

Small world, isn't it? Susan comes to this realization on a very regular basis and, yet, every single time she's surprised and delighted. It's magical, she says, and she never takes that magic for granted.

In this wide-ranging conversation, Susan covers a lot of topics including:

- Being a worrier (she's a Jewish mother, after all)
- Comparing life to a puzzle
- Meditating every day
- Writing (plus advice for would-be writers)
- Knitting, sewing and "upcyling"
- Making friends with people of all ages

She also mentions one of her favorite books, The Beggar King and the Secret of Happiness by Joel ben Izzy, and shares her own secrets to a successful marriage and life.

This is Kate Jones. Thank you for listening to The Gale Hill Radio Hour!

The show is available in Apple and Google Podcasts, Spotify and other podcast directories. Also on Substack and YouTube;  Facebook, Instagram  and LinkedIn.

Transcript

00:00:20:00 - 00:00:43:23
Kate
Hello and welcome to the Gail Hill Radio Hour. I'm your host, Kate Jones, about to have a conversation about college with Gretchen Birbhum, president and founder of the National Collage Society. Gretchen thanks for being on the show. When did you start the National Collage Society and why?

00:00:44:11 - 00:01:07:22
Gretchen
Well, it was 1982 and a lot of local artists were mostly the ones I knew were watercolors. And then I was taking private lessons with our really famous guy in Cleveland who one day started gluing some newsprint and some other papers under the surface of the watercolor painting. And it was one of those light bulb moments for me.

00:01:07:22 - 00:01:37:18
Gretchen
And I went, aha! And I started making collage. But then I looked around and any type of competition or exhibit did not have a category for collage, and they wouldn't allow us in any of the watercolor societies, really. Well, I, we're just banned. And so I decided, well, I'm going to start a collage society. I met the guy that started the American Watercolor Society in New York City, he was in Ohio.

00:01:39:03 - 00:01:58:15
Gretchen
And I said to him, I think I'm going to do this. He said, "Well do it before somebody else does." So the National Collage Society is actually the first organized group in this country, and now there's just dozens of them everywhere. And we started out with regional groups, and they've all gone off on their own and become independent and successful.

00:01:59:11 - 00:02:14:01
Kate
So what is the National Collage Society? I mean, I read that you promote the advancement of collage as a major art medium and you assist in educating the public. So what is that basically your mission?

00:02:14:13 - 00:02:25:21
Gretchen
Yes, our mission is education, art education through exhibits, workshops, lectures, publications — any way we can reach the public.


00:02:26:16 - 00:02:35:18
Kate
Grade and you have an annual juried event, the 37th annual jury to event is available still right now.

00:02:35:18 - 00:02:38:07
Gretchen
You know to do its online for a year.

00:02:38:16 - 00:02:51:16
Kate
Oh, okay. So basically you have something up all year long then that's definitely. Wow. Okay. So you so people can go to it from the National Collage Society's website.

00:02:52:00 - 00:02:54:17
Gretchen
Right? National Collage dot com.

00:02:55:00 - 00:03:21:13
Kate
Yes. And that and, and you do have to actually say, you know, look specifically for national collage dot com because otherwise you get all kinds of different things. You know, it's not, it's not, you know, it doesn't just pop up if you, if you don't do it exactly right. So that's that's an important point because I kept looking for and know what am I doing wrong?

00:03:21:23 - 00:03:24:06
Gretchen
Oh, well, I'm glad you found it. There I.

00:03:24:08 - 00:03:32:08
Kate
Am too. At long last, you know, the National College Association comes up to.

00:03:33:02 - 00:03:45:08
Gretchen
Them was a little community college in Stowe, Ohio, really disappeared since then. But any time you want to Google or anyplace else, that's the first thing I had people calling, asking me if they could sign up for classes.

00:03:46:14 - 00:03:47:09
Kate
Oh, dear.

00:03:47:19 - 00:03:52:15
Gretchen
Yeah, that was a mess. But now it's been a few years since they went out of business and things have cleaned up.

00:03:52:23 - 00:04:15:01
Kate
I had no idea that that was going on anyway, but I really like the 37th annual juried exhibit. It's beautiful. There's some incredible work by artists from around the, the U.S. and internationally, from Canada and from Italy. I saw in this particular exhibit.

00:04:15:22 - 00:04:32:21
Gretchen
Well, I hire the best jury you can find. It's all academically based. We always have a professor from a major university and one museum curator and one working artist who's been very accomplished. And then I have a fourth one as a judge.

00:04:33:07 - 00:04:35:12
Kate
Is it a big deal event to get into?

00:04:36:23 - 00:04:52:04
Gretchen
Well, yes, they're usually only professional artists who are really accomplished that can get by the jury to be on the show. And what it demonstrates is a contemporary art has many, many mixed media artists now a lot more than in the last century.

00:04:52:17 - 00:04:58:13
Kate
I That's very interesting. So back in the day when you couldn't even get.

00:04:59:09 - 00:05:01:06
Gretchen
You know, they wouldn't allow us in shows.

00:05:01:07 - 00:05:08:07
Kate
Yes, you wouldn't you couldn't even get into shows. And now, you know, there are so many so many artists doing this.

00:05:08:07 - 00:05:18:17
Gretchen
Right. And the collage is an art historical term. It's just not something you throw around, except that's been used generically for the wrong things. I was told I could never stop that, but.

00:05:19:05 - 00:05:20:12
Kate
Huh. What do you mean?

00:05:20:18 - 00:05:26:02
Gretchen
Oh, there were there was some computer company called Collage back in 19 08 in the eighties.

00:05:26:14 - 00:05:27:10
Kate
Oh, okay.

00:05:27:14 - 00:05:35:14
Gretchen
I talked to the art history professor at the Cleveland Institute of Art. She said, You can't stop that. It's like the word Kleenex. I said, Oh, what is it? Oh.

00:05:36:19 - 00:05:37:14
Kate
And apparently.

00:05:37:14 - 00:05:38:03
Gretchen
It is.

00:05:38:11 - 00:05:39:19
Kate
Kleenex collage.

00:05:40:13 - 00:05:47:22
Gretchen
I know it's also generic or non, but mixed media has always been around. But that's kind of a loose term.

00:05:48:14 - 00:05:49:04
Kate
Right?

00:05:49:08 - 00:05:58:06
Gretchen
Well, all of collage is mixed media, but not all mixed medias collage because you can draw a picture of the pencil and then paint some watercolor over it. That's mixed media.

00:05:58:18 - 00:06:01:01
Kate
Okay. But that's not clear.

00:06:01:03 - 00:06:09:09
Gretchen
Well, the magic word is glue because collages on French through have term from the verb clay, which means to glue or to paste.

00:06:09:20 - 00:06:13:13
Kate
Oh, okay. So would you talk about the history of collage?

00:06:14:03 - 00:06:49:10
Gretchen
Oh, sure. Love to talk about that. Please do. Collage was always an act of craft for hundreds of years. Somebody just had a show in Scotland for a hundred years, collage and, you know, just all types of things. Sailors used to glue seashells together for their sweethearts and Victorian ladies made valentines with lace and different, different materials. So it's always been around, but to be described as a fine art, it had to take Picasso and Braque in 1912 to start doing things on their paintings.

00:06:50:18 - 00:06:53:09
Kate
Okay, so. So then what happened?

00:06:53:14 - 00:06:54:22
Gretchen
Then it became a fine art.

00:06:55:06 - 00:06:55:22
Kate
Oh, okay.

00:06:56:08 - 00:06:58:03
Gretchen
And people still didn't understand it.

00:06:58:11 - 00:07:13:00
Kate
Right? And it clearly wasn't, you know, I mean, it, it was something that was respected if, you know, Picasso did it or Braque did it, but, you know, not so much a regular artist, I don't know. You know.

00:07:13:06 - 00:07:32:23
Gretchen
Or a museum wouldn't accept them at first. And they were in a studio together in southern France, and Braque had to go off the war and had a terrible head injury. And Picasso Spanish didn't have to go to war. Broke was the intellectual. And I always give him credit for actually knowing what he was doing. Picasso was just playing around at the time.

00:07:33:12 - 00:07:37:13
Kate
Well, everybody knows Pablo Picasso, but how about George Braque?

00:07:38:05 - 00:07:42:22
Gretchen
He was French and they had a studio in France. So all of the terms for the larger French.

00:07:43:09 - 00:07:43:22
Kate
Okay.

00:07:45:02 - 00:07:49:19
Gretchen
And that's one of the things I did with my book about contemporary clauses, identify all those terms.

00:07:50:05 - 00:07:55:06
Kate
Okay. So that's the history of collage becoming a fine art.

00:07:55:11 - 00:07:55:19
Gretchen
That's.

00:07:56:06 - 00:08:01:14
Kate
And, and your own history. How did you come to do what you do?

00:08:02:08 - 00:08:24:15
Gretchen
I told you I was studying watercolor I didn't have watercolor in my art degree program. You know, watercolor had to come into its own also because it used to be just considered a sketching medium for all the other paint mediums, and watercolor just wasn't important. But now if you frame a watercolor properly, it will last longer than any oil painting really.

00:08:24:23 - 00:08:49:07
Gretchen
So they were always looking, the archivists were always looking at things, and still designing watercolor was for sketching. But since I didn't have a class in it, I signed up for private tutor after I graduated, and for six years I studied watercolor. And I told you he started gluing things on the surface of one of his paintings one day in class, and I thought that was my light bulb moment.

00:08:49:13 - 00:09:12:06
Gretchen
Hmm. And I just knew I had to do that. And this is like any other time you study with someone, your work looks like theirs. But I. I took it in a whole new direction and started doing commercial. I call it commercial art, because I would have commissions and I would do cityscapes using an local newspaper with their logo type and articles.

00:09:12:06 - 00:09:38:10
Gretchen
And I did one, a bicentennial collage for Cleveland and one for Hudson. And my favorite one is in a nuclear submarine. The Navy League hired me to do a collage of the home city when the submarine was commissioned. Every boat has a home base. Uh huh. And in the Navy, they say that when they leave the Navy, they can go back to their home at home and have a job.

00:09:38:11 - 00:09:48:16
Gretchen
So I'm wondering if there's any sailors in action from that sea World Seawolf series, but the submarine still out there floating around somewhere with my painting in the commander's dining room.

00:09:48:22 - 00:09:52:20
Kate
Oh, that's so cool. What did you do what? Butcher. Oh.

00:09:53:07 - 00:10:11:18
Gretchen
I bet it's not the name of the submarines. Not named after acronym. Like most of them have a name. Our state. And it's called Seawolf and I did us a collage of Ephron, the downtown and the canal coming forward to the foreground. And I put the submarine in the canal Yeah.

00:10:11:18 - 00:10:14:22
Kate
It never actually was in the canal, though.

00:10:15:01 - 00:10:18:07
Gretchen
We don't see it burgled under a parking garage there somewhere.

00:10:19:00 - 00:10:25:20
Kate
That's funny. Oh, my gosh. So these were. These were sailors from the Akron area?

00:10:26:08 - 00:10:35:10
Gretchen
No, no, they're from all over, but all over because Akron hosted the commissioning I was at the commissioning up in Connecticut where the electric boat company is.

00:10:35:18 - 00:10:36:06
Kate
Okay.

00:10:36:11 - 00:10:56:06
Gretchen
They really took me up there, presented my collage to the commander of the boat. It was the mayor of Akron that did that in a museum. Oh, and the sailors then, of course, gone on to other things, probably. But it's still it was the fastest submarine we ever made that's still out there.

00:10:56:14 - 00:10:57:06
Kate
Seawolf.

00:10:57:15 - 00:11:15:13
Gretchen
Seawolf series. Yeah, I saw them building the next two. I got the tour of the Electric Boat Company. It's just so bizarre that they would invite an artist to do all that. But I just loved every minute of it. Looks weird. I was there in The Commander. The boat came up. It was like six foot four. And you think Submarine.

00:11:15:21 - 00:11:39:14
Gretchen
I was going to be little people, but it was huge in their 20 foot ceilings and the in the missile room and came up, gave me a big hug from Washington DC. I said, Okay, who do you know? It was like my high school boyfriend was undersecretary of defense and they were talking one day and the commander said, Oh, we got some artists from Ohio that's doing a commission for us.

00:11:40:14 - 00:11:44:12
Gretchen
Is her name Gretchen Baer? Yeah. You know her? She's.

00:11:45:03 - 00:11:47:01
Kate
That is so funny.

00:11:47:02 - 00:11:50:09
Gretchen
Oh, gosh, you live long enough. All this comes back around, right?

00:11:51:23 - 00:11:58:07
Kate
So anyway, you referenced your, your book, collage and all dimensions.

00:11:58:16 - 00:12:01:19
Gretchen
Right? Yes. That's 20 years of contemporary collage.

00:12:02:00 - 00:12:08:11
Kate
Yes. And, and that came out in 2005. It's available on the society's website.

00:12:08:13 - 00:12:09:22
Gretchen
Yes. We have a bookstore there.

00:12:10:03 - 00:12:15:16
Kate
Yes. National Collage Dot com. What was your motivation for doing that book?

00:12:17:02 - 00:12:58:14
Gretchen
I well, first of all, contemporary collage was not featured anywhere. Know this century. There's a magazine about collage out of Montreal, Canada, and all kinds of publications, mostly how to do it type publications. So you start making your own classes but at that time, I thought that our most accomplished artists should be published somewhere. So we had enough shows under our belt that I just took them images from the people that had won awards in our show or became signature members and decided put them together in a book.

00:12:59:01 - 00:13:09:17
Kate
Okay. And what is your hope for what readers will get out of this book? Or what readers do get out of this book?

00:13:09:19 - 00:13:22:04
Gretchen
Well, hopefully they figure out what life really is. Mm hmm. And the exciting thing is learning the variety of materials the artists use. The images are there with the list of all the crazy things they glue into their artwork.

00:13:22:14 - 00:13:23:16
Kate
For instance.

00:13:24:12 - 00:13:27:02
Gretchen
Oh, jeez. Well, first of all, they.

00:13:27:10 - 00:13:28:02
Kate
Always.

00:13:29:07 - 00:13:30:23
Gretchen
Somebody had a dead mouse, and one I.

00:13:31:06 - 00:13:32:12
Kate
Didn't know is some.

00:13:32:12 - 00:13:57:18
Gretchen
Idea. And then, Lana, to three years ago, you had a guy with a dead frog in his glasses, so that was just gross stuff. Yeah. Mostly it's handmade paper and publications old magazines. You can open a drawer and pull things out and glue them together and collage here in a third dimension as assemblage. So we've got some really creative people out there in Arizona.

00:13:57:18 - 00:14:01:21
Gretchen
We have people go out in the desert and find rusty things and glue them together and make assemblage.

00:14:03:11 - 00:14:42:23
Kate
I had a conversation with another artist a while back. Her name is Theresa Welles stifles she. She is on Etsy and she has a Stifle and the Capra website where she sells different things, but she puts together collages, two paintings with wit with the sort of the she calls it the ephemera of life. You know, like like if people like she'll do commissions where, you know, people have, you know, just things, you know, whether they're concert tickets or, you know, whatever that they care about.

00:14:43:04 - 00:14:46:10
Kate
And she'll put that together which I thought was was very cool.

00:14:46:19 - 00:14:49:18
Gretchen
Oh, absolutely. That personalizes each piece of art.

00:14:50:02 - 00:14:50:16
Kate
Yes.

00:14:50:21 - 00:15:00:15
Gretchen
But that those are good commissions to get because I've had people hand me materials Somebody went on a cruise and they wanted every ticket and every moment in this collage to hang on the wall.

00:15:00:23 - 00:15:01:11
Kate
Uh huh.

00:15:01:21 - 00:15:05:07
Gretchen
That's easy because you know exactly what they want Yes.

00:15:05:10 - 00:15:22:07
Kate
And I think that's a wonderful way to have to display keepsake. I just think that's a wonderful thing to do. And to have art, you know, having somebody and somebody with an artist's. I do it is I just think that's splendid, you know.

00:15:22:10 - 00:15:33:22
Gretchen
Because I'm always amazed, too. Because I'm not very good with the third dimension. But some of our assemblage artists are just genius at what they do. Mm hmm. One of them always says, I have to tell Gretchen there's glue in it.

00:15:35:19 - 00:15:50:10
Kate
So what what makes a genius collage artist? I mean, where do you I mean, it's sort of like, what? What's the the feeling that people get from their, you know, their work, you know, that makes it kind of like a genius piece.

00:15:50:22 - 00:16:09:16
Gretchen
Well, we have to put disparate items together and make them look like a whole and a nice pleasing composition or an ugly composition as it may be, ugly art is still really in. So it's it sounds like it would be easy, but it's not.

00:16:10:03 - 00:16:15:15
Kate
Yeah, it doesn't sound easy to me. To make it pleasing. You know, it's especially.

00:16:16:01 - 00:16:40:10
Gretchen
If they're dealing with metal, you know, there's some could be welding involved and all different types of ways of holding things together. Screw nuts and bolts and screws and collage in the third dimension as assemblage and assemblage as a sculpture, essentially, because it sets out in the middle of the room. Mm hmm. But not all sculpture assemblage. You know, somebody is carving something out of marble.

00:16:40:10 - 00:16:43:11
Gretchen
That's sculpture it's not assemblage. Right.

00:16:43:11 - 00:16:48:11
Kate
Yeah. So what do you love about collage? Well.

00:16:49:03 - 00:17:01:22
Gretchen
It was on a flat on the wall collage was much more visually exciting than just painting. Paint is flat. You add another dimension when you glue collage on there. And that's what's so exciting. About it.

00:17:02:07 - 00:17:04:04
Kate
Okay. The layers.

00:17:05:03 - 00:17:05:15
Gretchen
Slowly.

00:17:06:09 - 00:17:11:15
Kate
Yeah, that's very interesting. That's a lot like life, isn't it? You know, exactly.

00:17:11:16 - 00:17:32:03
Gretchen
It's actually what it's like when you tear a paper, you get a torn edge, and there's all different thicknesses of paper and ways of tearing it. And it's just exciting to see that because no matter what you do with paint, you're going to have an edge. But it's never going to look like that unless it's top floor and you're going to try and duplicate a collage with paint.

00:17:32:18 - 00:17:49:13
Kate
Right. Another thing I think is interesting, we talked about your background and what you and what you're doing now. And I find it fascinating that you consider yourself an art administrator more than anything else.

00:17:49:23 - 00:17:52:01
Gretchen
And educator or I've taught you.

00:17:52:13 - 00:17:53:00
Kate
Yes.

00:17:53:04 - 00:17:55:02
Gretchen
And you are an administrator.

00:17:55:09 - 00:18:08:18
Kate
And you became somewhat an art administrator before art administration was even ever thought of as a degree, much less offered as what?

00:18:09:11 - 00:18:13:08
Gretchen
Yeah. There's you in universities now with a master's in art administration.

00:18:13:09 - 00:18:15:16
Kate
Yeah. So how did you go about it?

00:18:15:16 - 00:18:38:15
Gretchen
Well, I started out with an art degree, and I had a, you know, some basic job somewhere. And then I went back to graduate school and I was in art, and I got a terrible grade in an art history class. And that's a long story that I'm not going to tell you but I had this great assistantship, so I switched over to the College of Education to a university admission administration degree.

00:18:38:15 - 00:18:58:19
Gretchen
Was statistics and tests and measurements because I was always good at math and high school. And I finished that degree, and then I looked around. I had a job with that for nine years at the university. I was writing the scholarship test and the Honors College. Uh huh. And I thought, I'm not going to do this. The rest of my life.

00:18:58:19 - 00:19:15:18
Gretchen
So I wrote a letter to the dean and said, I'm gone now. I'm going to be an artist. That's what started it all. Well, then I discover a collage, and then I discovered the Collage Society, and that's what I needed to do.

00:19:16:00 - 00:19:17:11
Kate
And you were trying.

00:19:17:20 - 00:19:21:11
Gretchen
To combine both my skills to keeping data and knowing art.

00:19:22:01 - 00:19:28:02
Kate
Well, somewhere along the way. And this was early on, you went to Iran. Correct?

00:19:28:03 - 00:19:49:05
Gretchen
Oh, there was an exchange program with 30 students from six different universities in the country, and they hired me to be advisor to the girls in the program of the picked them all up and took them to Shiraz, to the university there in Iran for a year. I got a chance to study Islamic art while I was there, but I was an administrator.

00:19:49:06 - 00:19:50:11
Gretchen
That's the degree I had.

00:19:50:21 - 00:19:55:07
Kate
Huh. And you were teaching the basic Farsi?

00:19:55:07 - 00:20:05:03
Gretchen
Farsi, yes. Yes. I had a tutor a very serious tutor in Ohio before I left, and I was able to teach elementary Farsi to the students use.

00:20:05:08 - 00:20:10:16
Kate
So what do you what did you get from that experience that you spent a year there?

00:20:11:06 - 00:20:31:10
Gretchen
Yes, it was just marvelous because it's the other side of the planet and everything's different. You know, they say the East will never get along with the West, but that could be said about any border. But. Right. That's true. The language, the culture was just beautiful. There was a I've always said I've lived in paradise. And that was one place, that city, the whole city was a paradise.

00:20:31:19 - 00:20:33:17
Kate
So you studied Islamic art.

00:20:33:17 - 00:20:36:14
Gretchen
What was. I was I was surrounded by it. Sure.

00:20:36:19 - 00:20:43:18
Kate
Yeah. So what was particularly appealing to you about Islamic art?

00:20:44:03 - 00:21:01:19
Gretchen
Well, the colors and the language and all the poets lived in Shiraz the tombs were beautiful. It's just so different than anything you can find in this country. I love back then on four continents and about 30 countries. And it just broadens your horizons, and it's better than any formal education.

00:21:02:09 - 00:21:10:05
Kate
Yes. Yes. It does make you grow, doesn't it? Can you and you find out a lot about what you don't know?

00:21:11:07 - 00:21:26:07
Gretchen
And then I came back and I go to the international students office on campus and steal newspapers while I'd ask, you know, but one of the newspapers was in Farsi and one of my biggest first biggest classes had Farsi newspaper glued into it. And it's a Persian market.

00:21:26:14 - 00:21:28:00
Kate
Oh, that's cool.

00:21:28:06 - 00:21:31:13
Gretchen
I know. You just never know. It all comes together somehow.

00:21:31:19 - 00:21:45:21
Kate
No kidding. So do you have any specific work that you did that hang in your home or or hang somewhere else that you particularly love?

00:21:47:07 - 00:22:13:08
Gretchen
Well, I don't like hanging my own art. I like other peoples in my works and all over the country and a couple other countries. The president of Panama, former president and Dhara has one of my pieces I did when we invaded there. It was a military type, but it was a celebration. And I glued a picture of the first woman to lead our troops into combat in Panama.

00:22:13:16 - 00:22:14:15
Kate
Oh, really?

00:22:14:22 - 00:22:35:08
Gretchen
She's front and center in the galleries. I've got prints of it that were handed out and she's popped up in other places. I think she finally has one. But like I said, my commissions were most exciting because I knew where they were going and and all the specifics. I like doing bicentennial collections, too. Well, I did the Cleveland Bicentennial.

00:22:35:08 - 00:22:43:23
Gretchen
I had all the sports team and all the arts. Cleveland is such a strange city because that's all I've got is art and then sports. Nothing in between. Yeah.

00:22:44:18 - 00:22:48:11
Kate
Well, there are things like, you know, the lake and.

00:22:50:11 - 00:22:51:15
Gretchen
That was on the block.

00:22:52:20 - 00:22:56:00
Kate
The emerald necklace of the parks, and.

00:22:57:13 - 00:23:23:06
Gretchen
The landscape was in the glass because it did cityscapes. There's always a horizon line and mostly recognizable things above the horizon line. And then down below, like I did an oil company with their building and all the layers of rocks underneath us. Okay. It's just an amazing medium. You can push it any direction Some of my biographical ones, too, of people that are famous.

00:23:24:04 - 00:23:46:05
Gretchen
There was a lawyer in Akron who founded that. They started that convention center there and he had a big law firm with a spiral staircase. And I had him at the bottom on his bicycle as a paper boy. And at the top he's sitting on his executive desk and, you know, the celebration for these things is even more fun because they had a big luncheon and everybody's dressed up and they unveiled it.

00:23:46:05 - 00:23:54:11
Gretchen
And he and his wife were both in tears because she had to collaborate with me. I don't you know, I can't go directly to someone who's supposed to be surprised. Right.

00:23:54:13 - 00:23:55:00
Kate
Right.

00:23:55:14 - 00:23:57:09
Gretchen
Beth was just wonderful.

00:23:57:14 - 00:24:00:03
Kate
Oh, that that's going to be very moving.

00:24:00:04 - 00:24:04:21
Gretchen
We should always celebrate art. Yeah, I if you can't sell it, you have to celebrate it.

00:24:05:09 - 00:24:15:14
Kate
Celebrate art and celebrate life at the same time. Exactly. Gretchen, is there anything else you'd like to say about life or art or whatever?

00:24:17:05 - 00:24:19:01
Gretchen
No. Life is good.

00:24:19:21 - 00:24:28:02
Kate
Well, I really appreciate you being on the show today. This is Kate Jones with the Gail Hill Radio Hour. Thanks for listening. We'll be right back.

00:24:47:09 - 00:25:00:02
Kate
This is Kate again. Now having a conversation with Susan Terkel author, artist and enthusiastic connector. Susan, thank you for being on the show today. I've been trying to get you.

00:25:00:22 - 00:25:01:09
Susan
It's my.

00:25:01:09 - 00:25:28:04
Kate
Pleasure. All right. One of your many traits that I admire is that you enjoy making connections. You sure do? For instance, when you think people ought to know about something or someone, whether it's information or a particular person. You don't hesitate to try to put that connection into motion. What inspires you to do what you do?

00:25:28:17 - 00:25:56:08
Susan
That's a really good question. And I was I've been thinking about it, and I thought even when I was six, I remember being it was pointed out at how creative I was but also how inquisitive. And I think it's from this an incredible natural curiosity about life. Period. And so if I'm if I'm looking at a topic, for example, I want to know about it.

00:25:56:16 - 00:26:06:17
Susan
But whenever I see a person, no matter who they are, except that I have to admit that I was working in a book, but I'm not working on it anymore, which was the assholes in every family.

00:26:06:17 - 00:26:10:16
Kate
But I'm okay with that. But anybody always having to two titles.

00:26:11:06 - 00:26:32:13
Susan
But anybody else I get along with the weirdest people I meet. I love people's stories and I find them absolutely magical. And so when I'm researching a topic on a book, I want to go all over the place and learn everything about it. But it also applies to people. I meet someone and I think I want to know about your great grandparents.

00:26:32:13 - 00:26:53:21
Susan
I want to know where they came from. And, you know, that's a typical question. But that's not that I ask every time. I just can't believe how many connections I make and how magical they make me feel the universe is. And my husband always says, this, and you're just making the connection. I said, I know, but it's there.

00:26:54:02 - 00:26:54:14
Kate
Yeah.

00:26:54:14 - 00:26:57:17
Susan
It's shocking to me how much it's there.

00:26:57:20 - 00:26:58:11
Kate
And yet, why.

00:26:58:11 - 00:27:14:08
Susan
Do I get surprised when it happens all the time? The other day, last Saturday, I went to a town that I've never been to. It's only a half hour away, and it's kind of an old town that used to be a factory town. And it's like this dead place. So I go there and I make a friend who's 13 and a half.

00:27:14:08 - 00:27:31:04
Susan
I want her to work on a comedy book with me. And to make a long story short, I spend a couple of hours in the town looking at it. I loved it. And then I met her father, who was a tattoo artist. And then we get to talking, and then he said he was dating. And I said, Oh, where does your girlfriend live?

00:27:31:12 - 00:27:34:09
Susan
She lives seven houses away from me.

00:27:34:09 - 00:27:35:08
Kate
No way.

00:27:36:09 - 00:28:00:02
Susan
And I just, you know, and so I kind of freaked out and told my husband, and he said, Susan, that's the way your world is. It's been like that since I've known you, which is 53 years. Oh, my gosh. And it's just to me, it's really magical. It always feels like something else is going on. There's a mystery in the world, and I think that that is one of my attractions to schmoozing.

00:28:00:08 - 00:28:01:01
Kate
Yes.

00:28:01:01 - 00:28:17:12
Susan
You're finding out the mystery. I mean, I'll say to somebody, So where is your family? I was sitting next to someone the other day in Temple and And it turned out he went to the same college I went to. He's lived in town for 20 years. I never knew this. It turned out his great grandfather and my great grandfather are cousins.

00:28:17:17 - 00:28:18:03
Kate
Oh, my.

00:28:18:03 - 00:28:22:17
Susan
God. I'm also a distant cousin of Alan King, which I think is where I got my sense of humor.

00:28:22:19 - 00:28:33:12
Kate
Oh, that's. Oh, he was a wonderful standup comedian. Oh, my gosh. And he was at the top of, you know, the top of the comedy world back in the sixties.

00:28:33:12 - 00:28:49:23
Susan
And he changed his name from Nyberg to King. And Nyberg was my family. Name. And now I recently read a book of his, and when he was older, and he looks exactly like my father. And the irony is, I'm starting to look more like my father is. So it's funny.

00:28:50:04 - 00:28:51:18
Kate
How I see you that.

00:28:51:18 - 00:28:53:06
Susan
I like that I have that in common with.

00:28:53:07 - 00:29:01:22
Kate
Yes. That's a very cool thing. Well. Okay, so what keeps you going all the time? You know, you have you have you have some.

00:29:02:10 - 00:29:02:21
Susan
Quotes.

00:29:02:21 - 00:29:08:16
Kate
You live by. And if you want if you care to share them, you have one of your own that you live by.

00:29:09:10 - 00:29:20:21
Susan
I won't share them. But I will say you asked me what keeps me going. Yes, I'm a worrier. I have to be honest. I'm a Jewish mother and a Jewish grandmother, so worrying goes along with who I am.

00:29:21:09 - 00:29:23:10
Kate
You have how many grown children?

00:29:23:10 - 00:29:43:09
Susan
I have three grandchildren and four grandchildren, and one of them asks me a couple of weeks ago, Bobbie, why are what are you worrying about now? It just finished. Henry said. It's obvious. And she said, What? And they said, I'm worrying about what we're going to eat. For dinner tomorrow night. So one of my top of the list of worries is, will I get bored now?

00:29:43:09 - 00:29:44:09
Kate
Oh, my gosh.

00:29:44:09 - 00:29:46:12
Susan
Not possible when I'm bored.

00:29:46:19 - 00:29:48:08
Kate
But will I get bored?

00:29:48:17 - 00:30:08:02
Susan
Now, what's interesting about boredom is I always have this long To-Do list, and then it keeps getting things added on to it. And so when I get rid of it, I don't worry, because this is one of the quotes that I just love. It's by Robert Browning, and it is a little sexist in its pronouns, but.

00:30:08:02 - 00:30:08:18
Kate
Okay.

00:30:09:03 - 00:30:27:15
Susan
Ah, but a man's reach should be further than his grasp. Or what's a heaven for? And so I always feel that I start a project, I reach for it, and if I reach it, fine. If I don't, at least I tried. Right? Better to have tried and failed than never to have tried it all.

00:30:27:18 - 00:30:37:05
Kate
And if you ask for something like or you submit something, let's say it's a you submit a book proposal and it doesn't get accepted for whatever reason. You don't feel rejected.

00:30:37:13 - 00:30:53:06
Susan
Well, I feel rejected, but they don't feel bad about myself. And this is why I am a P.A. Just does anybody know what a pay is? A P.A. is a puzzle addict now. It's much better than being a cocaine addict. It's cheaper, I suppose.

00:30:53:09 - 00:30:53:16
Kate
Yes.

00:30:53:21 - 00:31:17:11
Susan
But it's spent years a lot of time on it. Okay. When I do, I did this interview where I asked people how they felt if they did a puzzle, and it was missing one piece. Oh, my God. About 80, 85% of the people would be annoyed. And I don't look at it like that. I think life is a puzzle And when it's missing, a piece is just lights.

00:31:17:17 - 00:31:38:15
Susan
When it's missing seven or eight pieces, I throw it in the garbage because it's just cardboard but when it has the piece, I get all excited and I jump up and down. So I don't take it for granted that I'm not going to be bored. I don't take it for granted that I'm going to finish a book. I don't take it for granted that I'll get something published.

00:31:38:21 - 00:31:49:23
Susan
I don't take it for granted that the day is going to be magical. But when it is, it's to me exactly like a puzzle with all the pieces, and I don't take it for granted.

00:31:50:00 - 00:31:50:16
Kate
That's very.

00:31:50:16 - 00:32:05:05
Susan
Beautiful. And because I don't expect it makes it more treasured because I wasn't expecting it. And whether you take something for granted or not is very, very interesting. And it's interesting to see people who do versus seeing people who don't.

00:32:05:06 - 00:32:28:16
Kate
It is this whole you're sort of walking on air or kind of feeling that's when when you feel that magic. And in it, it does come as a surprise. And yet it's such a welcome surprise. And one that isn't unexpected. But as you say, you don't you don't have to have it every time.

00:32:28:16 - 00:32:53:06
Susan
Take it for granted. That's also similar to when people give prayers of Thanksgiving. I have to admit, I meditate every single day. Kurt Vonnegut, son's best friend, is who taught my husband and me how to meditate in 1969. And we've been meditating together, sitting up in bed, meditating every single morning for the rest of our life. And we say that's the most important habit we have.

00:32:53:11 - 00:32:55:23
Kate
And why is that? What does that do for you?

00:32:55:23 - 00:33:25:19
Susan
Well, you started this with creativity. It, it gives you insight right. It helps you talk, but it helps you listen. I get a lot of my ideas during, during meditation. If I'm concerned about something, I'll meditate on it and it's just I'm slowed down, which for me is is a gift to everybody around me. I just told my husband recently, I said, if you want me to be quiet, pay me $2 a minute.

00:33:26:06 - 00:33:28:12
Kate
Okay? I promise I'll be quiet.

00:33:29:21 - 00:33:47:01
Susan
And I don't know how to shut my brain down there and be quiet. And so even when I'm meditating, it's still going, but it's going in a different way. And then I also like to walk I don't like to take walks with other people. I really like to walk by myself. I like to, but I think that's very common of writers.

00:33:47:07 - 00:34:05:18
Susan
I remember once I was well, I went there twice to the little berries writing bread loaf writing. Right. And we had this writers there, and they said if they were stuck on an island, I had to be there because I was going to be the social chair because I, you know, I can't get bored. But when.

00:34:05:18 - 00:34:06:11
Gretchen
You're a.

00:34:06:11 - 00:34:24:15
Susan
Writer, you tend to be writing in your head. You're talking in your head. And so you don't need to be with other people. However, because words are so important and thoughts when you're with other people, you don't shut up And I went to another writer's conference. He was up in the mountains, and it was used to be a Buddhist retreat.

00:34:24:15 - 00:34:43:23
Susan
There was only one. There was one bathroom is an outdoor bathroom. And he said, Don't even use that one. You just go in the woods and we never shut up till two in the morning. And the fellow who ran and he said, I never saw anything like this. I said, It's writers I used to be the social chair of the writing center at Greater Cleveland, and I would just meet in a bar.

00:34:44:08 - 00:35:07:13
Susan
We would talk to the bar closed, and we always surprised everybody because it's one of the attractions. Now, one of the things that's interesting, I am working on a book now about E coming up, talk about later. But anyway, he considered himself a writer slash artist. He did as much art work maybe. I think he did something like 7000 paintings, maybe 1200 poems.

00:35:07:13 - 00:35:34:05
Susan
I don't know. But as opposed to when Picasso was going through a tough divorce in 1937, he got artists block and he wrote poetry and wrote. So some people think they're artists who write and some people think they're writers who do artwork. And I, for the most part have been I would say not a writer artist, I would say writer creative.

00:35:35:02 - 00:36:13:02
Susan
And I live in an old town in a historic town in Ohio it's called Hudson, Ohio, and it is the home of John Brown and it was founded in 1799 and in 1999 they had a 200 year anniversary celebration and they invited about 35 of us to, you know, to be in an exhibit including the fellow who started Little Tykes, you know, and I was there with John Brown and the committee had decided, they told my friend this, that I and when I get down on myself, I remember this I was the most creative person that ever lived in Hudson.

00:36:13:03 - 00:36:13:22
Kate
Oh my God.

00:36:13:22 - 00:36:32:03
Susan
And I don't, I don't forget it. And then my husband always says to me, why don't you have more confidence I'm a writer. You can have confidence as a writer. Or then you won't be able to rewrite, right? You won't be able to see the mistakes. So I think not having confidence is something it was also beat anatomy in college.

00:36:32:03 - 00:36:34:19
Susan
The ratio was four or five guys to one girl.

00:36:35:06 - 00:36:36:18
Kate
Oh, this was and this.

00:36:36:18 - 00:36:37:18
Susan
Is at Cornell.

00:36:37:19 - 00:36:38:05
Kate
Yes.

00:36:38:05 - 00:37:02:10
Susan
Yeah. And so one day a guy in statistics class said, girls can't get an AIDS statistics. I had to get an A-plus to prove it wrong. I was ahead of the curve and women's lib, but it was during the Vietnam movements that we were much more concerned with. Actually, it did a lot of work for one of the professors in making the making the population there more equitable.

00:37:02:14 - 00:37:17:04
Susan
Oh, excellent. 10,000 students. We had 50 black students and they took over the students straight and I was working with professor and a priest who were working on making it more equitable. It was really fascinating how they. This sounds.

00:37:17:07 - 00:37:19:21
Kate
Great. You said they took over the student.

00:37:19:23 - 00:37:21:13
Susan
They took over the student union.

00:37:21:13 - 00:37:22:00
Kate
Union.

00:37:22:01 - 00:37:43:21
Susan
Okay. Then they got alarmed and it was really interesting. And it was during all this protest, these protests, it was 1969. So it was really a big deal. So I stayed there for the summer and I was doing this research and, and then I was invited to a concert and it was going to rain of all weekend. And so I passed on it.

00:37:44:05 - 00:37:45:08
Susan
That was Woodstock.

00:37:45:13 - 00:37:46:13
Kate
Oh, Woodstock.

00:37:46:21 - 00:38:08:21
Susan
You can't say done everything. Oh, well, yeah. So the swami that was on the cover of Woodstock was friendly with the guy I was working with. And so he invited him to the campus, and I was dating my husband, who was a business student, a fraternity guy. I was on the first female cheerleading squad in the Ivy League, so I was kind of straight and I would go.

00:38:08:21 - 00:38:24:15
Susan
People sometimes say, you used to be a hippie. I said, I was never a hippie. I was in SDS, Students for a Democratic Society. I was not dropping out I wanted to change the world, not drop out. So when I would come in sometimes in my cheerleading uniform, they would clap. They'd say, Look, we got.

00:38:24:15 - 00:38:25:20
Kate
Somebody with a straight she.

00:38:25:20 - 00:38:52:16
Susan
Is So anyway, I invited my husband and his poker partner to meet the Swami because I wanted them to think I was cool. Well, Larry is still teaching yoga. 51 years later, and this other guy lives in Woodstock, New York, and sells Buddhist trinkets. He was coming to our house once and he wondered why he was hitchhiking. And the truck driver said, Why are you going there?

00:38:52:16 - 00:39:17:07
Susan
And he said, Why am I? And he went to Nepal, studied Buddhism, was friendly with humor sermons. Father Robert Thurman, who introduced Buddhism to American colleges. And one of the reasons I'm pointing this out is I really love the butterfly effect that one tiny little thing happens and then it something else happens to something else happens. And then it has a major effect on someone's life, not necessarily early yours, but rise.

00:39:17:07 - 00:39:19:03
Susan
I think that's really interesting.

00:39:19:05 - 00:39:25:23
Kate
Right. Wow. So who who was it? Who lives in New York now? Is that the Swami or.

00:39:26:03 - 00:39:27:08
Susan
Oh, it's Barry's friend.

00:39:27:08 - 00:39:32:22
Kate
Larry's friend. And we owe it to him this summer. And he was in his whole life was changed.

00:39:33:02 - 00:39:34:07
Susan
His life the mind.

00:39:34:07 - 00:39:35:09
Kate
Make sure I understood.

00:39:35:09 - 00:39:39:01
Susan
We went and studied with this swami on our honeymoon.

00:39:39:12 - 00:39:42:02
Kate
And in India, did you.

00:39:42:03 - 00:40:01:14
Susan
Know we were in Sri Lanka, which is now okay with Salon then. And there were ten people there and one of them was a singer, Laura Nyro. Another was Alice Coltrane. Her husband was there. Coltrane who died and she became a Buddhist monk. But oh, when the swami told us it was a silent retreat. Can you picture me on assignment?

00:40:01:14 - 00:40:02:19
Kate
You know, three weeks.

00:40:03:03 - 00:40:13:19
Susan
He said, someday you'll appreciate being silent. So I decided I am going to appreciate it. After I die, I'm going to talk for 200 years and being talkative goes, then I'll be quiet. Okay.

00:40:14:15 - 00:40:17:15
Kate
Okay. It's a deal. What were you studying at Cornell?

00:40:17:21 - 00:40:37:20
Susan
Okay. This was fabulous advice, and I really want to pass this advice on. Actually, when I was seven, I wrote a short story sitting on a grade for my table in the kitchen in our little tiny ranch house, and they said, I'm going to grow up and be a writer. I don't have to tell anybody that when I was in high school, I knew I wanted to go to school and study writing.

00:40:38:06 - 00:41:01:15
Susan
And my father's one of my father's friends was the editor in chief of the daily newspaper. And so my father made an appointment with him, and he said, Didn't you already know how to write? Quit cheerleading, joined the yearbook. So you learn about how books are done and then study what you want to write about. So if you want to be a journalist, study political science if you want to.

00:41:01:23 - 00:41:30:09
Susan
And so I thought about it and then I decided I really wanted to be a journalist to look at, which is interesting. This was in 1964. He told me this advice I wanted to do women. I wanted to write about women maybe for a women's magazine or whatever. And so I applied to a number of schools and and the woman who was my, my guidance counselor said, apply anywhere you can get in anywhere.

00:41:30:09 - 00:41:48:18
Susan
I said, come on. I made it a point never to get straight A's because somebody once said my maiden name was Sissy Nyberg. You don't want to be like nerdy Sue Nyberg, do you? Brainy too, Nyberg. I know I don't want to be like myself, but anyway, so I applied to four different schools University of Pennsylvania, Cornell, and two other schools.

00:41:49:02 - 00:42:11:02
Susan
And I got into Cornell's Home EC school and to study women's studies. And then when I got there, then I like to tell the story. I decided I wanted to be a journalist. So I had a food column because I had studied nutrition. I had a food column, but it was more about eating healthy. And this was in 1972, 73.

00:42:11:02 - 00:42:32:01
Susan
So I was told I was the chocolate milk maven for trying to get sugar out of the school system. I, I was against sugar. Anyway, I got my first I got my first literary agent who was a big Broadway star who became a literary agent. She was in New York and she said to me, you know, I'm friendly with Oprah.

00:42:32:01 - 00:42:54:13
Susan
I could get you on the Oprah show. It could make a bestselling author out of you, but I don't have enough people who know how to write about serious topics and that's what you should do. So I wrote one of the earliest books when the first two books that came out on sexual abuse explaining it to kids therapist used it, parents used it, and there was a mother once who told me a story and she told me, I'm going to cry.

00:42:55:00 - 00:43:00:20
Susan
She told me I saved her son's life. And I love that saying to save one person is to save the entire world.

00:43:00:21 - 00:43:01:21
Kate
Absolutely.

00:43:02:00 - 00:43:30:13
Susan
So I spent most of my career writing books that would help children, some young children, some teenagers, some older teenagers help them get through life. So wrote books on custody, cancer, allergies, ethics, sexual ethics. I did read two books on whether or not drugs should be legal, and I was very big on they should be legal for parents who had kids or people who had seizures were nauseous from cancer.

00:43:30:13 - 00:43:50:06
Susan
I felt that at least medically, I couldn't understand why it wasn't legal. And one of the books was put on the 1996 list of the American Library Association list of the top 100 books you should read if you're college-bound and why I made it with Shakespeare, I don't know. And it took a long time to get back to that topic.

00:43:50:14 - 00:44:07:01
Susan
But I spent most of my life, so now that I'm in my seventies and publishing is much more difficult than it was and I'm not, as you know, tuned in to kids I am working on other projects, but I am working on a project, two projects with children. One is had a bug your parents.

00:44:07:06 - 00:44:10:22
Kate
And a bug your parents. Okay. About anything in particular.

00:44:10:23 - 00:44:26:20
Susan
You know how to bug your parents. A bedtime had a bug. Your parents said, you know, a mealtime and I'm just having fun with it. I don't know if it'll get published, but oh my God. And then I told them if you don't do this, if you give this to your parents and you don't bug them, they should reward you for not bugging them.

00:44:26:20 - 00:44:55:23
Susan
So, you know, there's a win win here and and then I do want to work. It got me interested in something that a seed was planted. I would like to do a comedy. So if anybody's listening and has any connections, connect with me. I would like to do comedy as an after school program where we teach kids how to write standup comedy, how to write jokes, how to do a parody, and then have it as a competition has in getting to the state level and even the national level.

00:44:55:23 - 00:44:59:07
Kate
What would that even be? An online program? Do you think?

00:44:59:08 - 00:45:00:10
Susan
No, I wanted to be.

00:45:00:10 - 00:45:01:14
Kate
You wanted to be in person?

00:45:01:14 - 00:45:23:15
Susan
I wanted to be in person. I think something I'm a Luddite. I have a flip phone. If I'm in person, I love YouTubes. And there is a comedian who I'm reading now, and his YouTubes are unbelievable. They make me hysterical. And but someday, coach, it'll be over and I like the idea of sitting in a club and and actually listening to comedian.

00:45:23:22 - 00:45:31:19
Susan
So we used to my birthday, we used to take our kids to a comedy club, and I didn't realize how much comedians didn't want a five year old there.

00:45:33:15 - 00:45:35:17
Kate
So that is unusual. Yeah.

00:45:36:01 - 00:45:55:04
Susan
But I wanted them to see live comedy and, you know, good theater. And I love the I love. I guess that's why I like coffeehouses. I want to talk to people. I want to I want to see their gestures. I want it. I want to see what they're doing with their hands while I'm talking to them. You know, I went to notice the other things besides what people are saying.

00:45:55:13 - 00:46:18:03
Susan
And so I guess that's my interest in writing, too. I want to see the whole picture. Sure. I, I did some serious books like I did. I wrote a book about abortion and I went to one of the earliest pro life conventions and they were talking about bombing clinics. This was way, way, you know, 35 years ago. And I was afraid to put my name on the book, to tell you the truth.

00:46:18:10 - 00:46:42:07
Susan
I wanted to show all sides of the issues. And then I worked on a book on nonviolence, and I studied with some Quakers groups on nonviolent communication. And I do feel that is one of the most important things we've lost today is how to how they hear and how to talk to someone who disagrees with you, who is on the other side of the issue.

00:46:42:13 - 00:46:46:18
Susan
And so I think those kinds of books are probably the most important.

00:46:46:18 - 00:46:47:11
Kate
Right.

00:46:47:12 - 00:47:10:05
Susan
Because they teach kids there's all sides of an issue. Let's look at it and there can be a wrong side. There can be something that's wrong for a particular person. Or wrong in general. I wanted to be a pacifist, for example, when I was writing my nonviolent book, and then I was looking at stories of how is my honeymoon was on a kibbutz before we went to India.

00:47:10:06 - 00:47:36:05
Susan
My honeymoon we were honeymoon on a kibbutz in Israel, and we were right next to the Jordan River and I heard two shots and I said to them, Did you were you practicing? And they said, No, we had two infiltrators. And there were people who were missing legs and the kids slept in bomb shelters. And I think sometimes we look at places in the world, including what's going on now in Afghanistan, or or Haiti.

00:47:36:05 - 00:47:42:10
Susan
And we want to be even when we want to be compassionate, we have no idea what it's really like to.

00:47:42:11 - 00:47:44:23
Kate
Right. Yeah, especially my town.

00:47:45:05 - 00:48:03:19
Susan
I lost my my my purse a couple of months ago. We were getting ready to go out of town and I freaked out. Oh, my God. My credit cards in there, my cash is in there. And some young fellow returned it to the donut shop within an hour and said, Did you find the owner? And I live in a place where you don't really have to lock your doors.

00:48:03:23 - 00:48:05:10
Susan
You know, we don't have that kind of crime.

00:48:05:10 - 00:48:06:22
Kate
We're very fortunate.

00:48:06:22 - 00:48:17:02
Susan
But I think it's important, even though we're fortunate to be in a town like this, to have compassion and to do something to help those who aren't in that position.

00:48:17:02 - 00:48:36:02
Kate
Yes, yes, yes. And one of the things they think we can do is, you know, so often we just feel so helpless. You know, what can you possibly do? But we can start with our thoughts and send healing you know, and meditate on it. Yes. I mean.

00:48:36:02 - 00:48:59:22
Susan
Truly, you can pray, go for a walk and think, here's a situation. How can I learn more? And you talked about the Internet before the Internet makes it so easy to find out who is doing something wrong. They may be contacting them to find out what is being done. And I feel like that's the beauty that we have so much more communication today than we ever had before.

00:49:00:05 - 00:49:14:17
Susan
Now, one of the books I had been asked to write was the right to privacy slipping away. And I worked on it and said, I don't want to do this. I think it's slipping away. And I, I was a licensed private detective for a while. I used to.

00:49:14:17 - 00:49:15:14
Kate
Look, you were.

00:49:15:19 - 00:49:40:17
Susan
I used to look at people's biological parents and I always found them. And this circumstance eating. But I think that our right to privacy is gone. But that doesn't mean that while the right to privacy is gone, other things aren't haven't we? That we've enhanced them? We found cures for certain diseases. We never did. We have more organ transplants.

00:49:41:07 - 00:49:54:03
Susan
Now, I know this is on the radio, but I will donate my organs to somebody. I don't want to be cremated. But I did say that I wouldn't donate them to an uh, Republican.

00:49:55:22 - 00:49:59:08
Kate
Well, that is very understandable if.

00:49:59:08 - 00:50:04:16
Susan
I donated my heart and brain to people who don't think like I do, maybe they'd be more compassionate.

00:50:04:19 - 00:50:08:23
Kate
Oh, and and there are Republicans who are.

00:50:09:08 - 00:50:15:05
Susan
Very much including in my neighborhood. I have one that we joke about it all the time. Yeah, we can talk to each other.

00:50:15:05 - 00:50:17:19
Kate
Which is so, yeah. So absolutely important.

00:50:17:19 - 00:50:20:17
Susan
Willing to listen to each other. And we respect.

00:50:20:17 - 00:50:37:14
Kate
Each other right? And that's the whole thing, you know, that we have so much more in common. I mean, it's a cliche, but it's so true. When 99 point something percent that we share with everybody, and it's this tiny little bit that we kill each other and.

00:50:37:14 - 00:51:03:05
Susan
We share the world. You know, you ask me about connection, and I think we're connected to the world. If people are putting plastics in the ocean, I'm going to eventually be affected or at least know people who are affected. I'm affected by climate change. I have to care about these things. I wanted to talk to Institute a couple of years ago, and they were talking George McCann and was talking about climate change and he is ahead of the curve.

00:51:03:17 - 00:51:18:09
Susan
And everybody was walking back saying, oh, we have to do something, we have to do something. And I thought, oh, God, I was so involved in the peace movement in the eighties and this and that. And then all of a sudden I said, Okay, Susan, if you don't want to do something about climate change, what can you do?

00:51:18:18 - 00:51:43:16
Susan
And I realized that I cared about upcycling and about how much fashion goes into the into the trash. I think less than 5% of the people who work in fashion get paid a living salary, living awareness. And so I got really obsessed with it. And it's a workshop. I'm looking forward to doing. And so I upcycle everything the pants I'm wearing.

00:51:43:16 - 00:51:45:03
Susan
I'm so myself.

00:51:45:06 - 00:51:57:00
Kate
Yes, you do a that's what one of the major arty things you do. You have so much. You always are you still doing different like skirts or whatever on jeans.

00:51:57:00 - 00:52:02:03
Susan
And my jeans, skirts in the wearable art show at the Cleveland Art Museum. I sound like it brag too much.

00:52:02:03 - 00:52:07:13
Kate
I'm sorry. Oh, not at all. Because it speaks to the quality of what you do.

00:52:08:02 - 00:52:09:07
Susan
And thank you.

00:52:10:05 - 00:52:17:02
Kate
You're listening. I, I can, I can definitely vouch for that. And you're famous. You're back to making masks.

00:52:17:02 - 00:52:37:21
Susan
I made 3600 masks, and then I thought for last Passover, I'm done. I'm a slave to this. And I donated all of them. Most of them. And then people are starting to wear them again. And asking me to make them again. And I can't say no again. To save one life is to save the entire world. And I thought, if I make a thousand masks, I know I've saved one life.

00:52:37:21 - 00:52:38:10
Kate
That's right.

00:52:38:10 - 00:52:41:07
Susan
And so I. Yeah, I'm back to sewing them.

00:52:41:07 - 00:52:54:06
Kate
They're great masks. Thank you. You know, I have my favorites because I like the smaller ones, and I always keep my favorite ones. Well, I have three in my purse, but my very favorite one is the one that is my go to mass.

00:52:55:12 - 00:53:10:00
Susan
Yeah. I thought that that was interesting. And then I'm back to listening to the news. So while I'm listening to the news, I have to knit. So I knit. So I think I made 140 or 50 hats, and I did design it myself, four different size heads.

00:53:10:05 - 00:53:14:18
Kate
Okay. And and you sell them or give them or what do you do?

00:53:14:18 - 00:53:39:17
Susan
Mostly I give them away. We might sell them. I was taking cashmere and wool sweaters and I was repurposing them into mittens, especially if they were out of style. And like, I can get five pairs of mittens out of a man's sweater. And I know when Bernie Sanders mittens were being yes, I made masks for everybody in that school from how he got his mask, by the way.

00:53:40:09 - 00:53:59:19
Susan
Anyway, I was making sweaters in Mass and we were selling them at a local coffeehouse for to raise money for an orphanage in Africa. Someone raised a couple of thousand dollars. Well, six 42 $60 pays for the vitamins for the entire school for an entire month. How can.

00:54:00:02 - 00:54:02:05
Kate
Wow. And what's worse in.

00:54:02:05 - 00:54:03:09
Susan
South Africa, South.

00:54:03:09 - 00:54:03:22
Kate
Africa.

00:54:03:22 - 00:54:23:09
Susan
Than the owner of the coffee house had all kinds who were doctors who went there. And so, yes, I do give a lot away. And if I had a lot, would I live in a big house anyway? No, it doesn't matter. And it's not going to help me shop retail because I like to shop at the thrift store and make my own clothes.

00:54:23:16 - 00:54:25:19
Susan
So it really wouldn't change much of my life.

00:54:25:20 - 00:54:26:20
Kate
Right, right.

00:54:26:21 - 00:54:48:12
Susan
I feel like my mother used to say it was superstitious. I feel blessed to have good intelligence, to have good health, to be creative, to have a, you know, an engagement personality. And so I feel like if I was rich, then what would I have to give up there when I get sick? And she used to say, Susan, that's so superstitious, the world doesn't work that way.

00:54:49:00 - 00:55:01:14
Susan
But I remember there was a fellow Jack Mandel from the Mandel Center. He was once listed as one of the top 400 wealthy people in the world. And he was a very close friend of mine.

00:55:01:20 - 00:55:04:18
Kate
He and that's at Case Western Reserve University.

00:55:04:18 - 00:55:27:17
Susan
Used to say if not for myself, who am I for, if not now when? And he says, Susan, your problem is you're always looking out for other people. You're not looking out for yourself. And he had a lot of money, but he said it didn't you know, it didn't necessarily make me happy as he had a son that had died, a daughter that died of leukemia, said my dad and so it made me superstitious.

00:55:27:17 - 00:55:37:08
Susan
So I have to admit that even though I like to be logical when I'm writing a book and looking at a topic where you need to be logical or not always logical.

00:55:37:17 - 00:55:44:08
Kate
You know, who is how are we? You know, we did. Yes. And we just need to go with it.

00:55:44:08 - 00:55:49:08
Susan
I guess my superstar engine is saying, okay, I'm going to the coffee house. I want to meet someone interesting.

00:55:49:16 - 00:55:53:11
Kate
I always do. Well, of course you do, because you're an interesting.

00:55:53:19 - 00:56:11:17
Susan
Well, thank you. One of my favorite books is by Joel. Ben is he is called The Burger King in the Secret of Happiness. And it's about storytelling. It's in how he was a professional storyteller who got cancer the throat and couldn't talk for about a year. He lives in Santa Cruz, and then he was able to be one again.

00:56:11:17 - 00:56:28:10
Susan
And after I read that book, sometimes I'd have people that I'd see in Temple or see at Chautauqua, and it'd be ten people that didn't know each other that well. And they would stay till 11 or 12 talking. Their stories were so magical. You know, if I get in a taxi and ask the taxi cab driver, Tell me a story.

00:56:28:10 - 00:56:42:16
Susan
This, I don't know a story, I said, Well, how did you get here? And they tell me a story that blows me away. And I just think of all the things. I think people's actual stories are some of the most magical moments that I've ever experienced.

00:56:42:17 - 00:56:53:11
Kate
Yes, my motivation for doing this, this podcast is, you know, hearing people and hearing their stories and being at ease with them.

00:56:53:19 - 00:56:57:04
Susan
But then inspiring your listeners to go do something.

00:56:57:12 - 00:56:58:12
Kate
Well, there's that.

00:56:58:12 - 00:57:01:11
Susan
And you don't have to do everything, remember, you only have to do something.

00:57:01:16 - 00:57:15:22
Kate
You do something you care about whatever you whatever you're interested in, because you're interested in that because it speaks to you. So it you know, you don't want to go do something because you have to do it. You're doing it.

00:57:15:22 - 00:57:17:14
Susan
Grudgingly. And I don't.

00:57:17:15 - 00:57:20:19
Kate
Write, can't push me. So what's next for you, Susan?

00:57:21:17 - 00:57:33:19
Susan
Well, I mentioned the comedy, you know, teaching people to laugh more because I know how much laughter affects the brain. I remember hearing Victor Frankel's book about being in the Holocaust.

00:57:33:19 - 00:57:35:15
Kate
Yes. Tell that. Yes.

00:57:35:23 - 00:57:59:16
Susan
Meaning. And when the guards would leave the room, the you would stop guarding and the people would have to write the night. They would close the door and they would do standup comedy. And it was a way of coping. And then I had been working on a book on swearing how to swear in 50 different languages. And the publisher that interested me actually had published a book about nine years ago, and I didn't know that.

00:57:59:22 - 00:58:12:10
Susan
But it's fascinating. They taught chimpanzees how to swear in sign language because you can't teach a chimpanzee to talk. And the ones who knew how to swear had better coping skills. On their brain.

00:58:12:16 - 00:58:15:14
Kate
So it helps stress, it helps alleviate stress.

00:58:15:14 - 00:58:32:13
Susan
Swearing does, but I think humor also does. So when someone's going through a difficult time, I don't make fun of them. Like, God forbid you've lost a child. I'm not going to joke about it, even though this is one of my favorite stories. Little girls crying and her parents say, Why are you crying?

00:58:33:00 - 00:58:33:17
Kate
The dog just.

00:58:33:17 - 00:58:35:07
Susan
Died. The dog's up in heaven.

00:58:35:18 - 00:58:38:10
Gretchen
You still know why God wants a dead dog.

00:58:39:13 - 00:59:01:07
Susan
So there are ways of looking at it. But it's not for me to do that one. But I can do it for myself when I get through a difficult period. But I do think that we are more stressed out as a culture and even in the world, and more people are committing suicide, more people are dealing with stress, more people are doing drugs because they're stressed out drinking.

00:59:01:16 - 00:59:17:14
Susan
And I believe humor can really help them. So if we teach humor as a child, they will they will carry that on it won't help 100%, but it'll help enough people. And I believe it will save lives. And that's why I feel so motivated to do it.

00:59:17:15 - 00:59:22:23
Kate
Oh, that's wonderful. All right. So what else where else do you want to talk about?

00:59:24:12 - 00:59:35:05
Susan
Well, the truth is, this is in the 24 hour I can keep talking and talking. And a lot of the things I was going to talk about, I didn't I didn't get to in the things that I.

00:59:35:20 - 00:59:53:16
Kate
Would you I have a request now. I have a request. Would you give your three secrets to a successful relationship and. Well, and they're okay because I think this is fabulous. And you talked about humor and you start with that one. And this is the truth.

00:59:54:00 - 01:00:05:15
Susan
I have been married 51 years and I don't care who you're married to, you're always going to go through something. The biggest secret to a successful marriage is to continually lower your standards.

01:00:05:15 - 01:00:06:12
Kate
I love that.

01:00:06:22 - 01:00:10:02
Susan
Don't make him paying his code up if he doesn't want.

01:00:10:03 - 01:00:13:20
Kate
Yeah, you go ahead and do it. It's your job that bothers you. Yeah.

01:00:13:20 - 01:00:19:23
Susan
My husband's messy and I'm not. And we're mixed marriage you know, he likes to play coffee. You get over.

01:00:19:23 - 01:00:21:21
Kate
It. Whoo! Right, right. And then I.

01:00:21:21 - 01:00:42:12
Susan
Have this 17 second take it back role. So if I write a poem and Larry wants to correct it, and it just doesn't sound right, I was only reading it to him because I needed to hear it myself. I say, Larry, you have 17 seconds to take that suggestion away. You don't have to apologize. Now, here's the rule of 17 seconds.

01:00:42:18 - 01:00:53:04
Susan
He hears the Jeopardy! Song and said, Take it back to me, not take back, but he usually takes it back. I'm not allowed to bring it up. And because he took it back, it didn't even require it.

01:00:53:05 - 01:00:54:10
Kate
So it didn't exist.

01:00:54:14 - 01:00:56:02
Susan
It doesn't exist. It goes out.

01:00:56:03 - 01:00:57:03
Kate
Yes. Yeah.

01:00:57:04 - 01:00:59:21
Susan
Never happened. So that's my 17 second take it.

01:00:59:22 - 01:01:02:23
Kate
It's a wonderful, you know, and why 17 seconds?

01:01:03:11 - 01:01:04:10
Susan
Because I like quirky. No.

01:01:04:10 - 01:01:04:20
Kate
Okay.

01:01:05:02 - 01:01:09:06
Susan
17 just probably came to me in meditation. I think that's.

01:01:09:06 - 01:01:11:22
Kate
True. It's memorable. Very memorable.

01:01:12:02 - 01:01:13:16
Susan
And now what was the third one?

01:01:13:21 - 01:01:30:08
Kate
Well I. Well, that was the victor having a sense of humor, the Victor Franco important. But I really like something that you sat in is in a book you're working on. It's just I don't know, I think you're starting you're compiling 50 reasons to stay married when you can't think.

01:01:30:08 - 01:01:31:08
Susan
Of it was a book.

01:01:31:08 - 01:01:31:16
Kate
It was.

01:01:32:01 - 01:01:53:07
Susan
Okay. Did write it as a book. So there's many more reasons but it wasn't my editor. My agent didn't think it was funny enough and he wasn't married. So maybe he didn't, you know, deal with it. And the fact that it didn't get published, I don't really care. And I don't feel like self-publishing it. I loved researching it and it helped me and my marriage.

01:01:53:07 - 01:02:06:18
Susan
And my husband performs a lot of weddings. He's performed over 3000 weddings. Wow. Also a licensed minister. And and he always gives people advice, some other advice. I'm not going to put on here because I don't want to be censored by. Right.

01:02:06:18 - 01:02:09:09
Kate
Well, we wouldn't be, but it's okay. That's another.

01:02:09:11 - 01:02:15:15
Susan
One. Never say no. Okay. Right now. Yes. And Rabbi gave it so well.

01:02:15:15 - 01:02:19:04
Kate
Yeah, that's pretty, you know, classic advice anyway.

01:02:19:04 - 01:02:34:16
Susan
Yeah, I love the advice. And I and I have to say, as much as I love giving advice, I think it's very important to have friends who are all different ages. I have friends who are like I said, I just made friends with a 13 year old. They have two 11 year olds that are helping me on that book too.

01:02:34:21 - 01:02:58:23
Susan
And I've had friends who have been my parents age and are older. They have a wisdom. They've lived through different periods, but they have a wisdom that has helped me tremendously. One of them taught me what I call the make a mountain, make a molehill out of a mountain. If you have a big problem and there's nothing you can do about it, then just turn your head away, get find something to do and make a molehill out of that mountain.

01:02:58:23 - 01:02:59:23
Susan
Stop thinking about.

01:02:59:23 - 01:03:01:09
Kate
It. Oh, that's wonderful.

01:03:01:09 - 01:03:04:03
Susan
And it was it was beautiful advice.

01:03:04:03 - 01:03:07:15
Kate
Yes. And turn your attention to something you can do.

01:03:07:15 - 01:03:22:04
Susan
Yes. And it could be something new. It could be something you already do when you do something new. It's fun because it's exciting. To learn when you do something you already know. It's exciting because you're using a skill that you know. But I think it's like I said, I think it's important to have friends of all ages and wisdom.

01:03:22:04 - 01:03:32:11
Susan
And it's why I love reading. I read mostly nonfiction, but they do enjoy fiction. But when they say, what books do you have next to your bed? My pile so big, I.

01:03:32:19 - 01:03:34:21
Kate
Oh, I know. Yeah.

01:03:34:21 - 01:03:47:09
Susan
And I went to the library yesterday and I realized back to we started out with boredom, I will never get bored because now when I started writing, 50,000 new books came out a year, now it's over a million.

01:03:47:10 - 01:04:02:02
Kate
How can you get bored when so many I possibly get through them? I, you know, I know about that stack because I pop into books, but I never I mean, I rarely finish anything because there's so much to take in. Right, right. Anyway, what can you do?

01:04:02:02 - 01:04:04:23
Susan
Thank you so much. This has been a pleasure.

01:04:05:00 - 01:04:06:19
Kate
Yes. It's been wonderful to.

01:04:06:20 - 01:04:14:22
Susan
Everyone who's listened to me. I hope you gain something out of it. And I wish you all the best no matter how you it.

01:04:15:09 - 01:04:34:21
Kate
Thank you, Susan. And thank you for sharing your stories, your ideas, your enthusiasm. Thank you. So appreciate it. This is Kate Jones with the Gail Hill Radio Hour. Until next time. Thanks for joining us. Please remember to subscribe like and share. It's greatly appreciated. Thank you.