51. Damned If You Do, Damned If You Don't

ep 51 is the mental gymnastics episode — the full olympic floor routine your brain runs to make his behavior make sense. this week: a situationship texts "happy birthday" and she convenes a four-person panel about it (the committee was compromised. the committee wanted to believe). a man who's "just bad at texting" posts his lunch AND an introvert meme mid-ignore (the irony). a girlie builds her boyfriend an alibi — in heels, at her own award night — and nearly loses it at the cheese table. a 1am google doc with sections, built to prove the red flags don't apply to her situation (babe, you gave your denial a header). and a nine-years closer about how loud the defending was, and how quiet it gets after.

next week: friendship breakups. there's no language for them, so we're writing it. send yours: ihearyoubabepod@gmail.com

full-time feeler, part-time hater. let's get into it 🍋

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hello, everyone, and welcome to I Hear You Babe. My name is Dino Malvone, and I'm your host. Thank you so much for being here. We've got a great episode for you today. It's a bunch of emails that you all sent into IHearYubabepod at gmail.com. And a bunch of little things that are going on here in New York City. It's kind of dumb stuff, actually, in order to make the dumb stuff in your life feel a little less dumb. You know what I'm saying? And I have to tell you, girls, it's been a whole two weeks since you've heard from me last. And I have to apologize. I in the heat here in New York City for the past, I don't even know, has been over like about a hundred degrees. The real feel with the humidity is like insanity. Plus, like yesterday, even the air quality was like freaking zero. And what's a girl to do? I mean, I'm already like, you know, teaching fitness left and right, climbing stairs hundreds at a time here. Plus, it's gonna be 100 degrees. Plus, I live on the top floor of my apartment. So I want you to know that for days now, finally it broke, but for days it was just cooking up there. Because you imagine on top of my apartment, there's like black asphalt, you know, and not to mention there's probably freaking black mold in my apartment too, but we're gonna save that discussion for later. Okay. Today I'm having what is this flavor? Cherry cola poppy. Sometimes the can that's like the fake Dr. Pepper one, the doctor, whatever, who's the what's it, is it's almost the same, but the the cherry cola one is so good too. It's pretty good. So uh what else? Also, yeah, so anyway, it was moving like soup, and it was like swimming to the train. And so anyway, I every time I try to pick up the laptop to do it, my brain would shut down, and my hand would automatically shut the computer down. Can you imagine? So we're gonna pick up right where we left off, and don't worry. Also, don't yell at me because when you yell at me, it makes me feel incompetent. Okay, let's all calm down. The heat the heat broke and everyone's okay. But a little quick catch up since the last time we talked, okay, because the girly's been asking. So last time we spoke, it was before uh New York City Pride. So last week for the on for the day of the actual Pride Parade, we all hang out here at the Salt Drop Studio and we watch a beautiful performance that happens right outside the windows. And we get to sit on the fire escape, and it's just about a floor and a half, two floors from the sidewalk. So, and they set this huge stage up. The whole street is blocked off. Fourth Avenue is entire, all of it's blocked off the entire way to Union Square. And it was just so freaking cute. And we, you know, Darius and I sat up there on the fire escape looking down like a uh Ava Peron, you know, like waving down like the gay popes, you know, with our fingertips closed, like the the holy wave. And like we were the two coolest, smartest gays on the entire planet. Plus, in the room was a bunch of friends that were playing with glitter crayons and gay coloring books. Can you even imagine? Me and Darius were hooting and hollering at all the girly pops that were out there in the little tank tops and their flip-flops and their little half shirts, their cute little skirts. But very brave to wear flip-flops out and about on a day like that. I'll wear them, you know, to and from work if I'm feeling lazy about my footwear. But there, it's brave, I think, to wear flip-flops to an event where people are gonna be, you know, dancing around like a bunch of crazy people, you know, stepping on your little toes, and you know. So anyway, very cute, very brave, very that. Okay, very gross. And Darius and I are up there like, God, wonder what it's like to be a peasant. Like, like, you know, waving down at our little peasants at the very, you know, but whatever. I got a little bit of sun, and that's all that matters because I haven't been to the beach in like two years. Meanwhile, my mom called me the other day and said, I heard there was a shark attack in in New York. I think the lady got bit on her foot or something. But I'm like, well, it happens every year, to be honest. And I don't really like going in the water too much. It's kind of dirty here. That's also kind of gross. And then the day after that. Thirsty. My day after that, my man and I went to go see the Steel Steven Spielberg movie, like this disclosure day. And it's like the alien one, the one with Emily Blunt, and then the little dude from Challengers, and like a backpack full of flash drives that have all of the secrets, all of the alien secrets in the little flash drives. And the aliens, they speak in math. So everybody was wondering, y'all have been wondering for the longest time, why did why do I have to take calculus B C? Why? And I'll tell you why. Because later on in life, the people who are putting together your curriculum, okay. Can you follow me on this conspiracy theory? The people who put it together your curriculum knew that one day you were gonna have to with the aliens, and that's math. So that's why Calc BC, that's why you have the TA 82. It all makes sense now. And but honestly, the movie was cute. I got I laughed and I cried, and I was scared, and I like grabbed Darius and I jumped jump scare. I got mad at the dude next to me because he was on a date with this cute blonde girl, and he kept being like that, that doesn't make any sense. And then and then he would laugh or whatever, and it was all like kind of sarcastic and shit. And it's like, girl, can you suspend disbelief for five more minutes, please? Like while you're at the movies, like it's not being presented as fact, even though probably some of it is, you know what I mean? So anyway, but here's the other thing. Two couple days ago was the 4th of July, it rained. That's how the weather broke here in New York City. It broke with by way of the rain, and it rained on the 4th of July, and I didn't care because, girl, first I know I'm like becoming my mom more and more every day because whenever I was walking home from Ashley's place, because I I I was cat sitting, and so on my way back from Ashley's place, I was just keeping my eyes peeled because God, all the idiots come out on holidays. You know what I mean? And walking down the street, and people were giving you like weird stares, and it's like everybody's out, and crowds are just like not my freaking thing anymore, you know? And so anyway, I basically I was like we made it home safely, but I spent like two days, the the 4th of July, and I think the day after, the day before, at Ashley's place. No, the day of and the day after at Ashley's place because I was watching like 48 hours on a loop. So I probably watched like 16 episodes, and I had the best time. You know what I mean? I feel like I learned, I feel like I'm safer now, and I didn't have any nightmares. So wait, and also let I don't want to lie. I also probably sprinkled in a couple episodes of 2020 and/or dateline if I ran out of 48 hours episodes. Because if I haven't listened to it on the podcast, I on their podcasts, then I I watch them. Sometimes I do both because I want to see what they look like. My mind, I I I although the podcasts, I will say, have begun to exercise my level of imagination, like my own internal creativity. So yeah. But anyway, there was like all kinds of murder stuff. There was like definitely some like insurance fraud stuff and a lot of snacks. I got some barbecue from Dallas BBQ. That meat was falling right off the bone. Made my mouth water a little bit. And then I'm not kidding. And then after we ordered that, I also ordered two gluten-free pizzas with pepperoni because I was hungry. And what else? All those stories come from like Iowa, I Ohio, you know, it's all those like weird four-letter states. But but, you know, one time one of the murders was like the stepdad, one of them, you know, one of them was like this crazy dude. Most of them are some crazy dude, but like, man, also I watched some of the son of Sam interview stuff. I think it just came like a documentary that was out. Maybe it didn't just come out, but it just came across my desk. So I watched some of that. He was a creep. But uh okay. So then, but like, here's the other part about watching 48 hours, like 16 of them in a row. And then we're gonna get to these emails because wait, also today's episode is about you're damned if you do, you're damned if you don't. You know, when people make you do like mental gymnastics and shit, that's what we're gonna be talking about. But I have to tell you, because right after we watch Disclosure Day, of course, we're babysitting the cats, and so and I swear on Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from the city of Nazareth that at one point Ashley's cat like jumped onto Darius's lap and was like fully obsessed with him. And I swear, because his eyes are really big, it they it was like they turned from from like regular cat, like regular cat eyes, and then somehow it was like maybe the angle that I was looking at, or I don't know, whatever it was, but then it went to like these two sort of like hazy marbles, and it was almost like he couldn't take his eyes off Darius, and I was like, what in the gosh darn heck is going on? I don't understand. I I I felt like I've said it before, and I'll say it again cats are cuckoo crazy banana pants, but I I wasn't ready. I wasn't ready for that. I wasn't ready for that. And I was like, nope, I think he was trying to talk to us. It was like he's already uh like he's already like a chirper, but then he started to like click a little bit, or maybe that was just me, but anyway, the the just be cautious whenever you're watching a bunch of that stuff, you know, the 48 hours, the datelines, and the and the 2020s, because some of that crap will go and get you all the way down. Anywho, girls, let's get into these emails. I said again, today's episode is all about you, and it's kind of about me too, a little bit, obviously, because it's always a little bit about me, but mostly you. So again, it's called Damned If You Do, Damned If You Don't. And again, it's about the mental gymnastics. It's like the thing where somebody treats you like a little crazy, and your brain, like you're because it's a traitor brain, it immediately gets up and does a full like Olympic floor routine just to make sure that it makes sense. And you were right, you had every reason to be upset, and somehow, somehow you ended the night like saying that you were sorry, and like you know, you you buy him his pizza and and that. So we're doing that show today. Okay. And you know the deal. I never I love saying it just to remind you guys, but I I have not read these emails yet. I I never read them first, and the the email stays or the inbox stays sealed until this moment. I just go in and right before I begin to record, I copy and paste them into a document so that I don't even have to open the email. And I also, by the way, remain anonymous. What the hell? I remain anonymous. So, and if you leave your friends' names in there, I usually try to take them out, unless they don't really mean too much to the story. Because, girl, the the viewership here isn't isn't that big. So, how do you know that she's not listening to the to the podcast? And then if she listens to the podcast, she's gonna get mad at me, like from you. You know what I'm saying? And so, like, until then, everybody's anonymous, the names get changed, nobody's getting clocked in here. Okay, it's a safe space. It's a sealed envelope, it's a freaking, it's just whatever it is, okay? Anywho, girls, let's go. This first email says, Hi, Dino. I found you a month ago from a TikTok clip, and I have since listened to everything while walking around my neighborhood looking deranged. Well, what other way is there to look whenever you're walking around your own neighborhood? You're supposed to get dressed. What am I, my mom? She won't leave the house or like even go get the mail if she's like not dressed. It's crazy. Well, not like she's going out in her underwear, but I mean, like, she's not. Anyway, she does she will not look deranged in her neighborhood. But anyway, the email continues by saying, My neighbors think that I'm in a I'm a very animated phone fight. I'm not. I'm listening to you. Oh. I hope you're like yelling back and forth, like, girl, don't do it. Ditch his ass. But okay, so the thing is, my situation ship texted me happy birthday, and that's it. That's the whole text. Happy birthday. One exclamation point. And I screenshotted it and sent it to four separate people going, he remembered question mark, question mark. Girl, he has my birthday in his phone, and that his phone remembered. I celebrated a calendar notification like it was a love letter. Uh anyway, I don't even have a question. I just needed to confess to someone who wouldn't make it weird. My co-worker is walking over. I gotta go, Hierako, Javito. Well, listen, kudos to the deranged neighborhood walks, babe, because that's not deranged, that's the girly pop commute. You know what I'm saying? And I feel like half my my viewers or half my listeners are power walking in a circle right now, looking like they're arguing with the mayor. You're welcome. You're home, and the boys say hi. Rocco and Vito do not love fireworks. That is absolutely clear at past after this weekend. But anyway, okay, so the four you sent it to four people, meaning like you convened a whole panel. So, and what happened was like the man's phone is what happened. He he his phone, you just got a reminder, basically. And and but also the the job of the assembly or the panel that you assembled, was it bipartisan? It doesn't sound like it's you probably said that right to the people who you know exactly. We're gonna say something, right? The committee said, Oh, he remembered. And but the committee was compromised, babe. The committee wanted to believe, but here's the whole thing. And and then I'll let you get back to work because your coworker can see you over your shoulder and they know you're not actually, you're not on, you're not on the slack right now. Get back on the slack. The the but the but the bar you raised for this guy is like it's literally in hell. It's like the sub basement of hell where it's doing laundry down there, and it didn't forget. It it the calendar reminder is it's automatic, girl. The calendar app automatically sends it. So gold gold medal for the screenshot distribution, though. Because and nobody noticed. Anywho, let's get on to this next look look look run from him. Don't text him back. Okay. I hope you didn't text him back. Anywho, next one says, Hi, Dino. Okay, first I found you through the pandemic in 2021 IG Lives when you were teaching salt trap out of your apartment. Those were the days I was doing them in an apartment I don't even live in anymore with a cat who has since passed. Oh, RIP noodle, who treated the Matt like a personal enemy. I watched you go from your living room to a whole actual studio. Oh, thank you. And honestly, I feel like I'm a proud aunt about it. Like I was actually there. Oh, I knew him when stop at anyway. When we go way back, uh is what I'm trying to say. You just don't, you don't just, you just don't know me yet. So, okay, this is gonna sound so stupid. No, we're best friends by by the way. Okay, so this is gonna sound so stupid when I type it out, which is maybe why I need to type it out. There's this guy, and he takes like six, seven, eight hours to text back every time. And I brought it up once gently. I was very chill about it, I think. And he said, I'm just really bad at texting. And honestly, I was like, okay, question mark, question mark. Like, is that fair? Question mark, question mark. And my dad's bad at texting, my family's bad at texting. Some people were just bad at texting, right? So I let it go. Except here's the part, and this is unrelated, but not really. We were supposed to hang out Saturday, and he went quiet Friday afternoon, like fully quiet. And I'm sitting there, not spiraling, parentheses, spiraling. And then I opened Instagram and he's posted on his story twice. One was his lunch, who cares what you're eating? Thanks for showing me your hot dog. Uh and then one was a meme about being an introvert, which the irony, and I just sat there, the irony, right? Like he's such an introvert and he's posting what he ate. Like, what is he, an influencer? So I just sat there, and then this is the thing I actually can't stop thinking about. I said out loud to my roommate, he's just bad at texting. I defended him to her face, and she didn't say anything. She just looked at me and went back to her laptop. And that silence has been living in my body for four days now. So much can be said in silence. It's insane. Am I right? Ladies, am I right? Anyway, it is is it me? Am I the crazy one here? Or I don't know. Sorry, this got long. I'm at work and clearly should be working. Love to Rocco and Vito. Here's another girly who's at work, a boss girl winning, who's slacking on her slack. Okay, first, 2020 live IG girl, a living room salt drop era girly. Babe, you were in the trenches with me for sure. Because if you watched me teach cardio, like next to my radiator, you seen different colors of paint on my wall, and also RIP, my cat, dude, because he used to try to, first of all, he'd get mad whenever I would teach because he used to hate the speakers. It was loud and he hated it. Because I needed it to be loud for me to be able to give you guys energy. And anyway, and now you've seen me as you like to say, as a proud aunt. You are, you're like a founding, a founding salt dropper. So you knew you knew my studio when it was just a blank wall and one mat. Oh, and some color lights. So thank you for still being here. And I'm not gonna read your own email back to you, like you've already lived it, you typed it, and you know, I want to talk about your roommate though, because your roommate, when she said nothing, and that thing has been living in your body for four days. Like, babe, she could have written you a whole paragraph and it wouldn't have done. For you, what that silent moment did for you. Because, like, and because in that moment when it got silent, you got to fill the silence up yourself, which means you already knew what was gonna fit in that silence if she were to say something. And the introvert meme. I can't. I mean, he posted a meme about being an introvert during a window that where he was ignoring you. And that's not bad texting. Like bad, bad at texting is bad for you know anybody can be bad at texting. Like, usually it's like the boss, your mom, your dad, your cousin, or what you know, there's a there's there's a person in your life that's bad at texting. That's not a communication style, what he did. That's a decision. It's just it's the same animal, like a different color. And you know, you're not crazy. I don't think I would say you've never been crazy. What what happened is you like you said it out loud, you heard it in like the open air, and like your body was like and that's the ick getting a reception. You know, it's like the ick antenna went up and it's starting to it's dinging. So four days of you know, no bars, and then one text come through, like from your gut, and your gut's being like, girl, pick up the phone. So anyway, this next email says, Hey Dino, so my sister used to take your bar three classes back in the day, back in the day, buffet, like 2018, the before times. And when she found out you had a podcast, she lost her mind. Oh, thank you so much. She sends me clips constantly with no caption, like just the clip. And that's how I know she loves me. This email is honestly her fault. Oh, well, thank you so much, sis. My so my boyfriend forgot my work thing, and I don't mean like happy hour, I mean the night I got recognized in front of my whole company. That's a good one to rem that's a good one to try to remember. So I told them about it for weeks. I bought a dress, they printed my name on a little card. Oh not a little card. That's cute. And he said he'd be there, and then he just didn't come. Texted at 9:40 that he lost track of time at his friend's place. Who's his friend? And here's where I need you to sit down. Oh, thank God I'm already seated. I was standing there in my dress holding a warm glass of wine, and people kept asking, where's your boyfriend? And instead of being upset, I started defending him out loud to my coworkers. Oh, he's been swamped. He had a crazy week. Honestly, it's my fault. I should have reminded him this morning. I built the man an alibi. Talk about 48 hours dateline and 2020. You cannot be providing, you cannot be providing an alibi, okay? Because the truth will come out. In real time, in heels, while I was the one getting hurt, one of my coworkers, and she doesn't even know me that well, touched my arm and said, You don't have to explain. And I almost lost it in front of the cheese table. Terrible place to cry. Or maybe one of the best, because at least you could eat some cheese. That makes me happy. And then when he finally texted to I apologized. I said, sorry for making it a thing. I apologized. To the man who didn't come. I don't even know what my question is. I think I just need someone to tell me what I already know. Okay, love to the cats. My sister says hi. And also Paige Destorbo says no, period, is a full sentence. I know that's right. Which she made me type. So, okay, first bar three sister from 2018. That is like for sure the before time. That's like an it lives like an artifact in my brain, babe. It's like car it, that's like a carbon dating. It goes back so far. But anyway, tell your sister that I say hi and that she has excellent taste in workouts and podcasts. But also sending clips. I just figured out how to do that. That's uh for sure, I think, a love language. So and also correct, Paige DeSorbo says no is a full sentence, and I will stand 10 toes and I'll die on that hill. Okay. Can I stop at no? Probably not. I'm Italian, we can't really say things in just one syllable. No, you know, even that would be too. So but okay, so I'm gonna slow this down because I think this isn't isn't even really funny, even though like part of it is, and like when the coworker, the part about the coworker touching your arm, that's like the line that's hard to get past because you know, when there's like a woman who barely even knows you, and she like she clocked what it was happening in real time, and like she was like watching you run defense in a pretty dress and heels that you bought for like the night that you were gonna be awarded for your work, and she said the thing that your body needed, which is like you don't have to explain, and you know, babe, whenever like strangers can see it before you do, like I sometimes they can just do that. I don't know why. It's like they can see how loud the routine is, and then maybe it was like just standing near the cheese table, and like that the visual of that like makes me kind of want to cry too. Also, it makes me kind of want to eat. But you know, the the thing that sucks is like someone was trying to be kind to you in the exact moment that you were realizing that you were being mean to yourself, and so and then the apology you got went and you went left there, you know. You were there, you got recognized, the little name on the card, which is so freaking cute. I hope you took it home with you. And by like 9 30 p.m., you're one saying, I'm sorry. And like, do you see the physics of that? It's like because he's the one that lost the track of the time, the track of the time. You lost your whole night. So, you know, he stood you up and took and took your apology at the end, and you can't get both, you can't be late and then get an apology too, not show up and get an apology too. That's not a relationship, that's a one that's very one-sided. And I think here's the thing that you kind of already know already, and like said out loud as he said he lost track of time on the night that they print your name on a small card. Like, hello, that's the night that you need to be there. Like, you need to be the one to put that card in your jacket pocket and take it home with you and give it to me, you know, a year later on the anniversary of that day, to be like, I took this because I want, you know, something cute. I don't know if that's exactly it, but anyway, I think it's a priorities problem, not a scheduling problem. You know, and you saying like sorry for making it a thing is you because it was a thing. And even more than it was a thing, it was your thing. And you know, when's the last time you missed something that was important to him? So, you know, you're allowed to go back to that feeling, like run it, run it through. God, what do they say? You're supposed to like execute things in the same like manner that you learned it. So, like throw that dress on, run around the house in those heels, feel the feelings, set something of his on fire, and then be done with it. You know, that's my advice. Don't set anything on fire. Anywho, girl. This next one says Dino. Okay, I'm a 7:30 a.m. girly, one of the deeply unwell women working things out to house music at 7:30 in the morning. You made us this way. I know that's right. Also, sometimes I'm like, if I moved it to 7 a.m., would I attract even more unwell women? Because I'm ready. I've been coming since like six months after you opened an Aster Place, and I walked in because I like the I like the way that you play music. I stayed because you yelled, you can get it again in the middle. You wait, you can start again in the middle at me during a plank when I thought about it, and I've thought about it for three days. Oh my god, you can start again in the middle anytime. You know what else I like to say? Take messy action. Okay. Here's my thing, and I already know you're gonna get me. I know all the red flags, I know them. I could honestly teach the class. I've heard every single episode, some twice, one three times, the pedestal one, don't ask. That was a good one, too, right? And I'm seeing this guy who does, and he does literally all the time. The future talk with no plans attached. God, don't talk to any men anymore, anybody, okay? Just be done with that. We can't be out here losing the good ones to these these battles that are insurmountable. So okay. Okay, but and the I'm so bad at this right after doing the bad thing. The disappearing for like four days and then coming back with, hey stranger, like I'm the stranger. Hate to see it. So typical. And every single time my brain goes, yeah, but my situation is different because, and then I list reasons. Dino, I'm not kidding. At 1 a.m. on Wednesday, I opened a Google doc and I made a pros and cons doc. I don't think that's bad. I think being prepared for the conversation is the way to go, girl. We love, we love a girl who's prep who's got the preparation done. You know, what did they say? What's that saying? Hold on. I can't remember. Prior proper preparation prevents poor performance. God, that's a mouthful. I don't even know if I got it right. So the pros and cons doc. It has sections. I gave it a header. Okay, good. I was building a whole presentation for an audience of one. Not you on the Excel spreadsheet building. You're building graphs. Grab that TI82 girl at graphs. I'm building a whole presentation for an audience of one to prove that the rules that apply to every woman I've ever given advice to somehow don't apply to me. Present company excluded, you know? Don't I know it? Okay, wait. That is is that the trap? Is the doc the trap? I think I emailed myself into realizing it. Should I still send this? I'm sending it. See you Tuesday. Love the boys. Well, love you right back. Kiss you right on the lips. So, anyway, my deeply unwill women, thank you for being a part of that experience because getting here is so hard. But the, you know, the ones who choose violence and like a narrow V before 8 a.m., babe, you came for the music, you stayed for the vibes, and the ass is just the icing. And that's the whole business model, and I'm framing it like that. So, okay, you caught yourself mid-routine, which is genuinely like elite. Like most people for need me for that part, and you did it on your own girl. So I'm clapping my my thumb and my middle finger together, as the gays have taught me. And at 1 a.m. in a Google Doc with sections and a header. That sounds listen, I think sometimes the thing that separates me from like people like you, I used to love making lists and like organizing them by color. And like I can remember during the pandemic, my bestie would like she had just the most gorgeous list of things that she wanted to do, you know, just like notes to herself to try to keep her. It was just so great. And I literally I tried it. I girl, I ordered the I ordered the markers, I ordered the calendar and the notebooks and all that stuff. And I think I got like I to the part where I used the ruler to to make the boxes or whatever, and then I never filled it in. So but you know, I feel like you are outlining your day of things to do and like tasks you want to achieve. You were like, you gave your you were like you gave your denial a header. And here's the physics of the doc because this is the whole thing. Like, you don't need to build a presentation for something that's good. You know, good doesn't need you to build a deck. I mean, you've never opened a Google Doc at 2 a.m. to prove that the sky is blue or that like flowers are pretty. That that comes out when your gut is like, girl, we've already voted, the election's over. He lost. You know? And like the prison company excluded piece, like that's the exception trap that we do to ourselves. Because it's, I mean, why would why wouldn't we? It's there's that that's the government name. Okay, the rules are real, you know the rules, you could teach the class. I have no doubt. But and but but your rules are special. You're you you have context around your rules. Not everybody, you know, you're thinking to yourself, I have slides. Conventional wisdom can only say so much, but the rules apply to you too, girl. You know, you're not not because you're not special, because you are. All of you are special cutie baby angels. But the rules were written for the special people, the cutie baby, sweetie, cutie angels. The smart ones who are like the ones who can like argue their way around them. That's why the trap works on you. Dumb people don't make you know spreadsheets and decks. So anyway, close the laptop, it's past 1 a.m. Delete that doc. No. Wait, I keep the doc as like put it in a folder and mark it as evidence. Like, what do they call it? I'd like to show you, you know, evidence piece number five. Put it in a manila folder, exhibit A, and I'll see you next time you're here for 7:30. And just remember, we're gonna be doing high reps. Okay. Wait, also, so because we've been talking about salt drop for a second, I just wanted like people have been bringing it up and it's making me insane. It's like you you poked something because I just remembered, and I don't even have a dock, and I started salt drop, and I don't even know how to use PowerPoint. I don't had I had some decks that I tried to make, but they definitely didn't have sections. I couldn't figure that part up. That's very, that's very I'd have to use AI to do that now. But you know, I quit bar three in September of 2019, and then I, you know, I didn't have I had a plan, but I wasn't really sure how it was gonna how it was gonna execute, right? I had a MetroCard in a dream. And in October, I opened in this place called Gibney, which is a it's a dance studio that I rented, and they had, you know, Tribeca, and I was renting by the hour. And imagine the classes back then were a full hour before the pandemic happened. And so I was renting the space for two hours, teaching my little workout to whoever would show up in that weird little area of Tribeca. And, you know, I was like dragging, I dragged all my mats there. Thank God they let me keep it there. But I would every time I would go, I would have to like set up all the speaker stuff. I would have to set up all the mats. So I would give myself like 15 minutes to set up, and then like, you know, a half an hour to finish up at the end or whatever. And I was just running around the whole time. And then fast forward to March 2020, and I was like five months into the business and the whole world closed. But I didn't make a pros and cons doc. There was no time for that. It was like immediately I went into teaching on Instagram, and there'd be like a hundred people in the room on Instagram at one time, and you know, people were like doing it in their kitchens, and like dude was on the mat there with me, and I was doing literally everything. Sometimes I was like teaching two, three classes a day. And you know, when you're doing it in front of a camera like that, you're doing the whole thing. So anyway, I signed this lease in Aster Place on tw in 2022, and so I listen, there's shutters on the windows from 1840. There's a tin ceiling that's the original one. And I'm not bragging about any of this kind of stuff. I'm telling you because I was like scared as shit the entire time. I'm still scared. Every single step of the way is frightening. And there was never a morning where I feel ready. You know, I was ready, it wasn't coming. It's not, and it's not here yet. And ready is not in the mail. If I had been waiting for that feeling, I would still be at bar three making someone else's dream come true on someone else's schedule. So you start before you're ready, you take messy action, or you don't start. And yes, you can start again in the middle. I and I'm not yelling at you because I told you whenever people yell, it makes them feel incompetent. But it's just because, you know, I just this is the you just gotta be ready and go. Okay. Or not be ready and go. You know, put on your business costume, put on your most competent looking outfit and just go. Anywho, girls. This last email says, Hi, Dino, I don't really know how to start this, so I'm just gonna start. My best friend told me about your show after my breakup, and she said, This man will make you laugh and then say the thing your therapist has been trying to say for a year. Oh, thank you so much. Which is both a compliment to you and a read of me. And she knew that. So here I am. Hi, well, hello back. Also, I've started this email four times and keep almost deleting it. So if so, if the rhythm is weird, that's why. Well, girl, don't worry about it. You all are scholarly to me. I feel like these emails are always so profoundly so sweet. I was with him for nine years. Oh boy. Nine. And the whole time I had this system, and that's the only word for it. It's a private internal system for making everything okay. He'd cancel and I'd go, well, he's under a lot of a lot of pressure right now. He'd snap at me and I go, he didn't sleep well last night. He gets like this when he doesn't sleep. He forgot, he forgot that the anniversary of my mom's funeral was a hard day for me. Not the funeral, the anniversary. I wasn't even asking for the big one. And I went, he's just not good with grief. And that's not his fault. Some people aren't. I had an explanation loaded for everything. And I was never caught without one. I know that's right. A woman who's always prepared. I got really good at it, Dino, and that's the part that scares me. I got so good at explaining him to myself that I stopped hearing myself do it. It wasn't even a thought anymore. It was just the background noise of my whole life translating him, softening him, rounding the edges before they got to me. So they never technically touched me, making the math work every single day. Not the math, and calling it love. I didn't mean to make a joke there, but just providing some levity. My friends would say that would bother me. I feel, I feel for you, girl. I'm really this email is this is a tough one. And I'd feel almost sorry for them, like they just didn't understand him the way I did. I thought fluency was intimacy. I thought being the only one who could read him meant something. Uh-huh. You were fluent and crazy. So we went, we broke up four months ago. And here's the thing I actually wrote in to say. The weirdest part isn't missing him. I expected the missing. The weirdest part is how quiet it is in my head now. There's nobody to defend, there's no case to prep. I'll be making coffee and realize I'm not rehearsing anything. Isn't that crazy? It frees up so much mental space. Like, what was I thinking about you? Even before all the shit went down, it's so silent it almost rings. I didn't know how loud the defending was until it stopped. Nine years of noises, and I thought it was just what a mind sounds like. I guess my question is, how do I not do this again? Oof. How do I not? Well, you just don't. How do I catch it earlier next time? Because I did it for nine years and I didn't even know I was, it was happening. And not knowing is the part that keeps me up. Okay, that's it. Thank you for what you do. Give me, give those cats a kiss from me. Sorry, this is long. No, that wasn't even that long, babe. The kiss, the kid, the cats kiss you right on the lips. So, okay, first, you never have to apologize again for it being too long because this is just the way I actually like these ones that are like you seem like you guys just let it all out on the page. So keep those coming. The long ones are like why this show even exists. And like your best friend, the one who the one who prescribed me like I was like medication to you, he'll make you laugh and then he'll tell you you're a therapist been trying to say. I'm gonna try to earn that copay right now, girl. Okay. Because, you know, the stay with me and let's see how this works out. Okay. So the you know, the idea of nine years of the system and you never got caught without the explanation, babe. You hear what that is? That's not weakness, you're a master negotiator, girl. I need you to hear that part. That's a skill. That is like a profession that you kind of invented, and you're so good at love that you did both sides of it. So you loved him, and you did this like half marathon of emotional labor, of being like just lovable. You know, you ran that booth for nine years unpaid, no breaks, longest internship of all time. And you know, and and no one actually even knew there there was a booth, even you. You were just manning I don't even know, this dream above a booth, and the part that scares you, and it's also the the proof of how much you had to give, it was like it all just went in one direction the whole time. And that weird part where you're like experiencing the quiet while you're having your cup of coffee, and you realize like you're not talking to yourself and rehearsing anything and thinking, how am I supposed to get out of this one? Man, that's so annoying. That sentence like basically like gave me the hiccups. It took the air right out of me. You thought the noise was just what a mind sounds like. You know, when you do that nine years of running a courtroom in your brain, and you just thought it was like the ambient noise. It's like the, it's the, it's this, it's the emotional hurts frequency that I listen to at night. And you know, and when that and then when you shut it off, it's like the silence is deafening it. That's what rings, you know. So anyway, you just got off the longest shift of all time. It was nine years straight, and you're just adjusting now. So how how do you catch this on the next round? Well, I mean, I think like I said before, the honest answer is you just don't, it's you you just don't do it again. You the your mind, I think, and your heart hopefully have already installed the alarm, and you know what the what it sounds like from the inside. And that means like the first time it the it starts to hum or turn back on again. It's just like you're not gonna do that thing where you were like, oh, he's just stressed out, oh, he's just tired, oh, he's just hangry, you know, whatever it is. You'll hear it, you'll know what that sound is, and it'll tell you right away to put it down and girl, start marathon training in the other direction. You know, you did nine years, you don't need to pick up any extra shifts anymore, you know. So, anyway, nine years of that is a long time. Trust me, it wasn't time lost. And even if it feels like you're unemployed now, and it's it's you're unemployed in the best possible way. Because enjoy those quiet days, go for a bike ride, call a friend, and and anyway, I mean, I to be honest, it sounds like you already knew all this anyway. So I am that's it for this week, babe. I that's the routine. That's every single one of the emails, just making sure that I didn't miss one. Okay. Anyway, I feel so honored that you guys wrote in mental gymnastics are not a flaw in you. It's like, I think that's the gaslighting. That's the that's the that's the story that we're being told. It's not a character defect. It's like what happens when you're a person who loves hard and doesn't really like to get into conflict and would genuinely rather like carry the whole thing yourself than hand anybody something that might be heavy. And that's kind of a nice thing. I mean, that's kind of how I am. I don't know if it's always the healthiest way to go, but it's just it's pointed the wrong way and it's aimed at, you know, defending everyone but you. So we're just gonna turn that around. We're gonna make a big U-turn. We're gonna, what do we call used to call it? We're gonna flip a bitch. That's what we used to call it in Pennsylvania. And that's it. You know, you defend U hard. You build the like 1 a.m. or 2 a.m. Google doc on your side for once. You give that shit a header, and we're gonna argue that case because you are a master negotiator. I, anyways, I am so happy that you guys were a part of this. Next week, we're gonna be talking about friendship breakups. Remember, you guys send your emails to I hear you babepod at gmail.com. Remember that everything is always anonymous. I love you very much. This has been I hear you, babe. I love you real bad. And I'll talk to you next week. Bye.