Fun Facts, Bob Ross, Pipe Organs and why Amber no longer photographs weddings...

Friendship Fridays are here with Gretchen and Amber as they discuss nothing in particular and everything fun. It's unrehearsed and un-planned just like their friendship.  Fridays are for fun as they lay down the heavy conversations BRAVE embraces and we celebrate the lighter side of life.  Thanks for joining!

Welcome to the BRAVE pod

Where we have conversations that matter to grow a task force that fights against the spiritual trafficking of our girls. We are Bold Redeemed Anointed Victorious and Eternal and it’s race against the enemy for her heart. The time is now to go on the Great Rescue, I am your host Amber Johns, let’s talk about it. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:24

Okay, guys, so Friendship Friday is a little tainted by a sinus infection, but it's okay. I'm I'm a dog. I'm gonna work through this. So benefits from working from home or working from home, not benefit from working from home is you can basically still get your work done whilst also feeling like death. So no boundaries around sick time.

SPEAKER_01 0:48

No when you're working from home. No.

SPEAKER_00 0:49

So if you guys haven't been on these before, Gretchen and I do friendship Fridays because Fridays are fun and nobody wants heavy things on the way home. And we do tend to discuss a lot of heavy things, but not on Fridays. They're not allowed. Never on Fridays. No, so and we do have we have some big stuff coming up, but they're powerful things. But they're not excited, they're not comedy in any way, shape, or form.

SPEAKER_01 1:14

We will not be wheeze laughing during these things.

SPEAKER_00 1:16

So I actually had someone tell me today, and I'm acting, and I know we talk about food a lot, but I we're a foodie family, and really talk and disgrace that potatoes weren't good for you based on their starchiness. Yeah. I mean came at me. Yeah, I don't want to name names because I want to protect the not so innocent, but can you make up a name? I would say I can't because I'm afraid I might actually name somebody. And then they're gonna be like, no, who do I Roy. Roy. I don't know personally a Roy. And if I do know a Roy and you're listening to this, I'm really sorry. I have forgotten about you. That's a big whoopsie daisy, if that's the case. I know. So there were a little bit of argument there. I understand the derivative of the potato might not be healthy, such as your tots.

SPEAKER_01 1:59

Like, I understand deep frying potatoes isn't necessarily healthy, but like a potato is a good healthy starch.

SPEAKER_00 2:10

And it's from the ground.

SPEAKER_01 2:11

For the record, my personal trainer told me to eat more potatoes. What's your name? What's her name? Her name is Julia, and she's a box star. So thanks, Julia. Yeah, I will eat more potatoes.

SPEAKER_00 2:22

Maybe we get her on the podcast only to advocate for us.

SPEAKER_01 2:25

Honestly, all day, every day. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 2:27

We were trying to think of stuff to talk about, and I always used to joke because I used to photograph weddings, that there were so many stories from weddings. Not just entertaining, also horrifying. And if I never ever wanted to work a getting a wedding again, I would talk about them. And it's tempting because there are some life is fun. People are funny.

SPEAKER_01 2:46

And like high str weddings are so high stress, and there's like so much money and expectation that people get crazy around them. I used to, you know this, but fun fact about me is that like one of my first jobs at in college was selling wedding dresses at David's bridal. And so, like, all the worst. I think you basically only get the worst parts of humanity when you're selling bridal gowns and bridesmaids' dresses. Like, you don't get the fun parts. You at least got like some fun parts. Well, usually because there's alcohol involved. Alcohol, and like we have to smile so everyone pull it together. Yes.

SPEAKER_00 3:21

But not at the bridal shop? No. Did you have more problems with mothers or daughters?

SPEAKER_01 3:27

Mothers are a huge problem. Mothers were a huge problem, but also sneakily, like best friends. Oh yes. Like best friends thinking that they have more say in a in their friend's like bridal look and like what should be too many women who saw, and this was also at the height of like say yes to the dress craze. Okay. So people had like ideas of what the appointment should be. It was just a nightmare.

SPEAKER_00 3:50

Yeah. I left on the on the the upward trend of Pinterest and Instagram really determining like what was to be photographed in a normal eight to ten hour day, and expectations were so high. I can't imagine it was. I was like, I think, I think we're done. After delivering, I mean, I was published several times nationally. After like getting a national publication, the bride didn't like that she looked tired. So after that, I was like, I think, I think I might be on the downward trend of being able to understand.

SPEAKER_01 4:22

I love that a woman sees her wedding pictures and is like, oh no, I look tired. And her her first response is not like I was tired. It's like, how dare my photographer show the truth of the day now that I was truly exhausted?

SPEAKER_00 4:39

I don't know, but it was actually a beautiful wedding. And truth be told, I do like try to make sure I've always got the best light on them. Anyway, so I remember like looking at her photos and being like, and beautiful, naturally beautiful. So I was like, I think we might be heading out of the scene real fast. So props to all the wedding people who still are in the in the business. Yeah, it was 11 years for me, and I was like, I think I think Pinterest and Instagram for sure.

SPEAKER_01 5:06

Who was like as far as like members of the bridal party, who were your problem people?

SPEAKER_00 5:12

Um, I did pretty hardcore interviews like with brides and if their mom was involved. I had some flags that if if I flagged these things in a conversation where I started dealing only with the mother and never the bride, I would I would say I don't think um I'm I'm the person for you, usually because the bride and the mother did not agree. Sure. And there was expectation, not always, but many times. Um, but it would be the day of, and like you said, the surprise maid or matron of honor who was like super on me about every single thing. Yeah, and I had one wedding in particular, why by the end of the day, if I never saw her again, I would have been okay. So it was wild. Like, and I I clearly remember her face, can't remember her name, but she was very intense with everything. And then like everything I did, she was questioning it and like even light and shadow to the point I was like, Do you just want my camera? Right, you can go do the thing. Yeah, you know, so that stuff exhausted me. Like, I didn't mind, I didn't mind the bride being emotional, I didn't mind certain things happening because it is a highly emotional day, and I'm not like I don't react well, like I don't react highly to things.

SPEAKER_01 6:20

Well, you're gonna be in the middle of the emotion of it. You're working, this is a job, like this isn't your wedding, you know.

SPEAKER_00 6:27

Yeah, but after the whole I'm tired, then I think I delivered somebody like a thousand pictures of a gallery, and I missed one thing, and I got this long email about it, and I was like, You have a thousand images, like crazy stuff. So I there were several things that led to like I think I'm done. I mean, obviously a new job presented itself, but right weddings are wild. I've had fights, I've broken up fights, I've had crazy things happening the night before, things breaking, rings being lost.

SPEAKER_01 6:59

Some of the, yeah, some of the stories you've told me, I'm like, I truly don't know how I would respond in the moment.

SPEAKER_00 7:06

It's crazy, like you have to deal with some crazy stuff. Yeah, there's some there's some not so great moments, but there is a there's a lot of funny stuff. Like I said, most of the time people are funny. Like, I mean, usually I had a great time with the bridal parties and stuff. So it was just probably in the last year or two where I think expectations were rising, especially with the rise of social media and what's comprehendable on an Instagram post versus what's actually able like to pull off, like you know, to go to the mountains for a rainbow shot, to come back down to the valley to walk through some daisies, to ride a horse. You know, also have like a one of those live painters and an ice sculpture, all of that. Are you telling me that Instagram and Pinterest lie? I'm telling you there might be a social contagion of expectation. Okay, this is rock in my world. Fun fact. I know this is shocking to everybody listening, but social media doesn't always influence us to be better people. Crazy.

SPEAKER_01 8:03

Crazy idea. I've never heard that, nor have I considered it before.

SPEAKER_00 8:07

That's why I'm very particular about my algorithm. It's almost all funny. Oh, I don't anything serious on Instagram. I have built that algorithm brick by brick. So, what are some things on your Instagram that you have curated to make it a safe and happy place for you?

SPEAKER_01 8:24

Well, I'm a fun fact scrolly. So, like most a lot of it is like neurodivergent content creators being like I don't know, Amber. Maybe because my love language is telling you things that I learned from random about random stuff. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 8:40

I'm trying to actually think of one of the most random things, and I'm like, why do you know that? I'm gonna think about that while you tell you Instagram. Yeah, like I I mean I love comedy.

SPEAKER_01 8:50

Um I I do so I do have a lot of like gym content that's a lot of like cool body positive gym content. So like girls just rocking it in the gym with like different body sizes and shapes and journeys, and so that's really encouraging to me. I love that showing up on my algorithm. Because you're a gym girl now. I'm totally a gym girl now, six days a week, baby. That's crazy good. I know that's impressive, I know, including Wednesday mornings. 5 45 Wednesday mornings, like an insane person. That is insane, and like for the record, you know I don't want to, I don't, I am like the I don't want to get up out of my cocoon bed until at least 9 a.m. Oh, don't force me. The fact that I have to work a job that I have to be at at 7 30 in the morning is so mad so mad. But you know, I keep getting, I'm also I'm training for a Hyrux race in June with my dad. Well, we're training separately, we're gonna run it together. What's a Hyrux? It's like I I guess it like kind of came out of the CrossFit space. It's a you basically run it's eight kilometers in total, but it's broken up into one kilometer, and then you do like a a strength-based thing, whether it's you're doing the rowing machine or like you're pushing or pulling a 230-pound sled for 25 meters, or carrying 50-pound kettlebells around like crazy people, and and so I get a lot of that content because now Instagram knows for some reason that I'm training for this race. And so it's like, hey girl, here's some high rocks content, and some of it's really inspiring. Like, I saw a post, a video of a a c a duo of um brothers who had Down syndrome who did it, and so like I'm like weeping watching this video, but then most of them are these like really insanely fit people who are doing it like professionally, and I'm like, this is not this is neither encouraging nor uplifting nor funny. Get this off of my algorithm because it's freaking me out, because then I'm reminded that I'm so much less physically fit than those people, yeah, and they are visibly struggling with the task at hand, and so I am just reminded almost every day that I'm I'm probably gonna die on June 4th, on June 4th in New York City, okay, doing what I hate. And you did not run up a room. I'm gonna run. You also don't many people, right? So oh my gosh, I didn't even think about that. I'm gonna die in the middle of a gazillion people running. Truly my nightmare. Truly my nightmare.

SPEAKER_00 11:30

Is this what people do when they choose to do something that scares them? Is how it feels?

SPEAKER_01 11:36

Yeah, it does. Yeah, for the record, I like to be like, oh, you can do hard things. Like, you can do hard things is my favorite pump-up slogan for myself. But ladies and whoever gentlemen are joining us today, um, doing hard things actually looks really scary and really horrible. And it feels horrible in the moment. Like to inspire you when you do the hard things. It is really like it. I look back at the the hardest things that I've done, and I'm so proud of myself, and it gives me fuel to go forward into the next hard thing. But the immediate in the moment reality of choosing to do hard things is so painful and so scary. Yeah, that's why it's so rewarding at the end of it, though. I get that, I get that, but the reality is horrible. No, it's hard, and like it's why a lot of people don't choose to do really difficult things because it feels really bad in the moment. Yeah, but then they miss out on the hey, I just did that like proud moment that you accomplished something, and the resilience that it builds, like doing and I'm not I'm not just talking about like physically hard things, like emotionally hard things, mentally hard things.

SPEAKER_00 12:46

They build resilience and and give you more fun facts, and give you so many more fun facts. Like I have yet to discover a topic that we've talked about that you're not like, hey, did you know? And then I'm like, okay, it's a tick.

SPEAKER_01 12:59

Like I like tick, like fun fact. Like I got in try, I I didn't get in trouble, but like I stepped a bit on a on an emotional landmine the other day because I couldn't I couldn't stop myself from sharing a fun fact about outer space, but the people were talking about like a political thing. I'm like, hey, fun fact, did you know? And I ended up getting pulled into that conversation. I was like, I don't want to be here. But you if people talk about outer space, you can't there's no what am I supposed to not share?

SPEAKER_00 13:25

So for your birthday, we're gonna share. Like, I don't know if anybody has seen the PowerPoint parties. I love them. Hilarious, love them so much, and so we had to give a PowerPoint convincing everybody at this party they might never come to a party of ours again.

SPEAKER_01 13:41

My birthday party was so well attended last year, it was just you and me next year.

SPEAKER_00 13:46

It will because they're like, is there gonna be another PowerPoint? But they were hilarious.

SPEAKER_01 13:49

So you did like a super serious PowerPoint on outer space. I'm gonna be honest, I sat down and tried to do there were like five iterations of like funny ones.

SPEAKER_00 13:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:59

And I just kept being like, but I want to talk about planets. You're getting cooler by the talk about outer space and the beautiful planets of our soul artists. And everybody said everyone was so kind and generous, and like your dad's face was like, what?

SPEAKER_00 14:19

But look them up, they're funny, like convincing people of stuff.

SPEAKER_01 14:22

I just you know, for a funny person, I wasn't very funny.

SPEAKER_00 14:24

No, you took that, you were like to test. You were the birthday girl, you could do whatever you know.

SPEAKER_01 14:27

I'm gonna teach you about the planets and you're gonna listen. Everyone's gonna sit down, shut up, and listen.

SPEAKER_00 14:33

I learned stuff, I didn't want to, but it was your birthday. But share what you did. Your birthday, and I still have it, and I still pull it up once in a while, and I'm like, that was good. So, and I didn't realize other people, this was already a theory. So once I learned that other people had kind of thought about this, I'm like, oh, there's other weirdos out there like me. So I I had to convince everybody that Bob Ross was actually a serial killer, painter and good guy, painter and beloved by children and families through his time on television, but that his paintings were actually clues to where bodies were buried. And I'm telling you, the deeper I got, the more I started.

SPEAKER_01 15:19

It was very convincing. This was an extracurricular project that we took on in our in all of our free time. Yeah, we have but there was a part of me leading up to the day that really hoped that you had gone the one next step of like finding pictures of places that looked like Bob Ross paintings. Yeah. Being like friends and family, we come to you today to say that this spot in Yosemite National Park is where Bob Ross buried a victim.

SPEAKER_00 15:47

And there's like all there's more out there because the more I kept digging, this is how you go down a rabbit trail and destroy your algorithm. But then it was like happy little accidents, and I'm like, oh no. It's perfect. It's perfect. It's perfect, yeah. But now every time, if not every time, it's not like I see Bob Ross everywhere, but like if he gets brought up, I'm like, I have reservations now, I have concerns, right?

SPEAKER_01 16:12

Red flags, and it's not fully red orange flags, yeah. Like, have you considered? Have you considered maybe not family friendly? Have we considered that Bob Ross American treasure was actually an American villain?

SPEAKER_00 16:30

Yeah, I'm telling you guys if you want to see my PowerPoint presentation, please feel free to comment. You should upload it to the specifically to the Brave pages.

SPEAKER_01 16:38

I think it's it is content appropriate.

SPEAKER_00 16:41

I think it is brand appropriate for Brave. Yeah, if I'm canceled from Ministry Forever because they're like, she's crazy. But it was really fun to do. Like that was a unique. I've seen other parties where they've done them, and at first I was like, hmm.

SPEAKER_01 16:54

I just think that I it was so fun for you and me, but no one else bought into it. Well and no one else did it with us. I think there was like, come on.

SPEAKER_00 17:05

I think there was deep concern and conflict over Bob Ross Happy Painter. Like, I think I might have tainted a dream for some of them over their Mexican food. But you know what?

SPEAKER_01 17:15

Then have another, yeah, I don't know, have another chips in queso or whatever.

SPEAKER_00 17:30

It wasn't even that funny. But I knew is what I was trying to say. Okay. Anyway, I just highly suggest have you considered a PowerPoint, a PowerPoint party. There's another one too that I was looking at that like, that's a fun I saw one that I was like, I want to do this with Amber.

SPEAKER_01 17:49

It was like hook your phone up to your TV and scroll through your Facebook page all the way to the beginning of your Facebook page and give context for pictures on your early Facebook page. I was like, that is so funny because I know for a fact, I know for a fact that there's a picture in my early Facebook history of me in like Marilyn Monroe sunglasses wrapped in a shawl looking like I'm kissing a Zach Ephron poster in my friend's bedroom. Yeah, that exists out there on the internet, yeah. Am I proud of it? No, but it's part of my story, yeah. It's part of my testimony.

SPEAKER_00 18:27

I'm so unrelatable now. I mean, how long ago did I join Facebook? I can't even I definitely you don't use it for much anymore. Like, but when it first came out and there was like 30 people on it, well, it's a cool thing. It was more personalized, like your status messages were just like to your 30 friends. But now I'm like, I wouldn't never why would you ever say that? Why would you act why would you post that? That's what threads is for now.

SPEAKER_01 18:51

Yeah, I do have fun on threads, they're very helpful over there. Do you want to know why I was able to convince my parents that I should join Facebook? I would love to know why. This is I mean, this is going in the bucket of reasons why Gretchen is really cool. Yeah. One summer before junior year of high school, I went to pipe organ camp in New In New Hampshire. Let's go back to the sports curling out. I met people there and wanted to maintain friendships from pipe organ camp. And so I convinced my parents, mom, dad, please let me get Facebook so that I can stay friends with my pipe organ camp friends. There's no safer place to be than with your pipe organ.

SPEAKER_00 19:40

With my pipe organ camp friends. No one ever says that about athletes, so it's what?

SPEAKER_01 19:49

Uh-huh. Yeah. Well, yeah, I took I took pipe organ lessons from my We don't have you, you don't, you know, you might not want to.

unknown 19:57

No.

SPEAKER_00 19:58

No, go ahead.

SPEAKER_01 19:59

No one's no one's excited about me taking lessons from an 85-year-old.

SPEAKER_00 20:03

I am church. But for those of you who don't know you, that you're an extremely accomplished musician and vocalist. So it's funnier because of the depth and like width of your talent that you went to pipe organ camp. Yeah. So yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:20

Because I loved playing the pipe organ. Hey, like what? Am I gonna go to band camp or am I gonna go to pipe organ camp? Right. Or sport camp. What? Am I gonna go to an FCA sport? Those athletes training like that? What? Honestly, truly, if I were to be sitting down with my 15-year-old self and tell her that not only am I best friends with a division one athlete, I also work for a sports ministry, she would laugh in my face. She'd be like, What what happened? How what who broke you? Who broke you? What happened? She wouldn't understand. That's fair.

SPEAKER_00 21:02

Like does not compute. That's fair. And I I also would sit down with myself and be like, by the way, Pi Porkin friend is in your future. I fun fact, friend. Fun fact, friend. Like everything. She knows everything about everything. And she's gonna be fun fact. Yeah, you to death. There was something you said last week, and I was just like, why do you know that? And I cannot remember what you said. But I looked at you like, okay, strange, beautiful friend. Why do you know that? And I still don't know. I'll think of it after we're done. I'll look at it.

SPEAKER_01 21:37

I did find it really interesting to see how they work out on the International Space Station, though.

SPEAKER_00 21:41

Okay, so thanks for joining us.

SPEAKER_01 21:44

And we'll see you on next Friday. Okay. Bye.