Joanna Guest, FOLDED WISDOM
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[1:22]I'm here today with Joanne Guest, who's the author of Filter Wisdom, notes from dad on life,
[1:27]love, and growing up. A graduate of the University of Arizona with a master's in public policy
[1:31]from George John University, Joanne left her career in politics to write this book.
[1:35]She currently lives in New York. Welcome to Anna. Thanks for coming on mom's
[1:39]don't have time to read books. Thank you so much for having me. It's so much fun. I know.
[1:43]Can you please tell listeners what folded wisdom is about? Of course, so folded wisdom is a
[1:49]illustrated story. I like to throw in the word illustrated to give people a sense of how much
[1:54]color is in the book, but it's an illustrated story. Did you get that? There's a lot of color
[1:58]It's illustrated. It's colorful. And it's the story of the morning notes. My dad wrote to my
[2:03]brother Theo and me every morning before he went to school. So the notes started in 95, not to give
[2:09]our ages or anything, but they started in 1995. My brother was in preschool and I was in the second
[2:15]grade. Oh my gosh. So old right now. So sorry. When they continued every morning, every school
[2:21]morning from then until we both graduated from high school. And I think the book is obviously
[2:26]centered around my dad and kind of the story of how he managed to write these notes and what
[2:31]the lessons were inside. But I would be remiss if I didn't shout out the unsung hero of the whole
[2:36]thing who's truly my mother who managed to after all these years save them somewhere in the house.
[2:43]I think that, you know, you send kids off to school with a piece of paper. And if it's like for the
[2:47]teacher, you still don't think that they're going to like get it to them. And you certainly don't
[2:51]think that a piece of paper folded up in a lunch box is going to make it home, but make it home
[2:55]they did. And they were in our backpacks and our pockets and my mom sifted them all out. And somehow
[3:02]I think my like back of the envelope math says that he probably wrote us like 4800 notes. And
[3:08]we have a little more than 3500 amazing. Very wild. And tell me how you decided to make this into a
[3:14]book. So it all started actually in 2009. My dad's best friend from college just got
[3:22]is an artist. He's an illustrator. And he has a good friend who writes or kind of publishes this
[3:28]art magazine called a soapist. And a soapist is very cool. It's like no editorializing. There's no
[3:33]ads or anything like that. It's just presenting creative expression. And Scott was like talking to
[3:38]Todd one day and was like, Hey, I've got this friend Bob who writes these morning notes to his kid.
[3:42]And like God bless Scott, because I don't think he had ever seen our notes. Like it's not like my dad
[3:47]was like, Hey, Scott, check out this note. I wrote to Joanna. Like this was not a thing that he knew.
[3:51]But but he believed in my dad and knew my dad and knew that he was committed to this process.
[3:57]And was like, I think that they would be really cool. So Scott asked my dad if like we could get a
[4:01]collection of them. And my dad then of course had to go through and ask Theo and ask me and ask
[4:07]my mom if we were all okay with it. And I think that I was in Australia at the time. I was studying
[4:11]abroad. And my dad called and was like, So what would you think if like a couple of your notes
[4:16]and I was like, my notes and he was like, Yeah, and I was like, Well, sure, but like, do we have
[4:21]any like are they around? Do you know where they are? And like would anybody want to read my notes?
[4:26]And he was like, I don't know. Scott has this idea about it. And so, you know, one thing led to
[4:30]another. We started talking to Theo about it. Theo was still receiving the notes. So I think for him,
[4:35]it was like definitely more of a hurdle to get over. And you know, he talked to my mom and he was like,
[4:40]do you have some? And so the sign-off happened, obviously. And next thing I knew I got this copy
[4:46]of this magazine when I was in college. And I opened it up. And there were like notes from 1995
[4:52]in it. And I was like, Where did these notes come from? My parents live in old house in Brooklyn
[4:57]still with a very precarious basement. And I was like, Mom, like, Are these safe? Like you have
[5:03]these somewhere. We don't have like safes in the basement that she's like storing them in. So I
[5:06]I was like, Where are all these pieces of paper? And she was like, Oh, you know, I just I have
[5:10]them. And so I was like, Okay. And so it was a really like surprising moment that we had these
[5:17]notes going back. And I think that that was what sparked the fire of hopefully doing something with
[5:23]them someday. But I truthfully thought that I would just digitize them and organize them. And
[5:28]that would kind of be it. And then I would have like peace of mind that they weren't going to get
[5:31]lost in a fire. And then fast forward to 2016, I took a leave of absence for my job. And I went
[5:38]out to Nevada. And I worked on the presidential election as people may remember there was a big
[5:43]election in 2016. And so November 2016 came about. And morning after the election happened. And
[5:50]I met my mom actually it was the evening after the election. I met my mom for like three bottles
[5:54]of wine at the local bar. And I was trying to figure out what I was going to do next and trying to
[6:00]figure out what I felt was good still in the world. And I was just trying to understand what was
[6:08]happening around me. And I was drinking. And I was like, Mom, I just like, I just want to note from
[6:13]dad, like I just like need need some reassurance that everything's going to be okay. And so I'd kind
[6:19]of say that's what pushed the idea. I was over the edge to be like, You know what, if now is not
[6:25]the time when? So I decided to pack up my life in DC, I moved back from Nevada to DC,
[6:31]pack up my life in DC. And I moved into my parents house. I was like 30. So it was a move. But
[6:36]I moved back in and I started organizing the notes. And I started reading them and realizing
[6:41]how much of them had these ideas that were, you know, universal and important and comforting
[6:47]and felt like they were worth sharing. So the book kind of became something that went from a,
[6:53]you know, digitizing project and organizing project to something more.
[6:58]Did you talk to your dad in the aftermath of the election? Did he end up giving you any good
[7:02]advice at the time? It's funny actually after the election, he's big on Instagram, not like he has
[7:07]a big following, but he's like really into it. And he did like a series of drawings after the
[7:12]election of like him processing his thoughts, sort of like seven stages of grief in way almost.
[7:18]But there his classic drawings are very like, as opposed to the colorful drawings in the book are
[7:22]very black and white kind of cross hatch style pen and ink. And so he did a bunch of those.
[7:28]And I think that, you know, he has an unshakeable sense of optimism which comes across throughout
[7:33]the book. And yes, of course, I talked to him after the election. And he was scared. And he
[7:38]was nervous. And he was sharing his love with me and telling me that we were going to get through it.
[7:44]And that was the message that kind of permeates throughout the book as well, you know.
[7:50]The part about the book being illustrated was, I know you mentioned it right away,
[7:54]because it is so important. Even with us saying it, I feel like it isn't conveying how beautiful
[7:59]the book is because when you were describing even in the book, I didn't realize that the cover
[8:04]at first was the folded up versions of the notes. I thought it was like, oh, this is a pretty cover.
[8:08]But your dad's notes, not only do they have lovely insights and you categorize them by
[8:14]events and by emotions and advice and all these other ways that you have found to organize
[8:19]like structure the book, which I found very interesting too. But just the visual element alone
[8:24]was so unique. So just describe how his artist background and how he folded up the notes to make
[8:32]them so visually arresting and how a pile became such a beautiful work of art.
[8:37]So the notes actually, they started for a number of reasons. And I can go into the many theories.
[8:43]I have as to why this was a perfect storm that worked for my dad. But one of the main reasons I
[8:48]think is my parents met at Pratt, which is a art school in Brooklyn. And after college,
[8:53]they did a lot of different things. But I think that ultimately they ended up opening this
[8:56]exhibit production business and they're still doing it to this day. And what they do is they build
[9:01]exhibits that focus on other people's art. And I think it pulled both of them away from focusing
[9:05]on their own art. And I think that there is a part of him that is, that was at the time,
[9:10]especially feeling a little disconnected from his own art. And he's always been someone who
[9:15]drew in sketchbooks and expressed himself that way. And I think he was looking for that. I
[9:20]think the notes ended up getting folded because they started off when we were young and we brought
[9:25]lunches school. So they were just folded in half for a couple times and put in our lunch boxes.
[9:30]But then when we started fifth grade, we moved into a new building and there was a cafeteria at
[9:34]school. And so I no longer had a lunch box to bring with me. And so my dad had to figure out a way
[9:39]to give me this piece of paper, which again is like a very scary thing to send your kid off to
[9:44]school with. And you don't really necessarily think that they'll read it, that they'll keep it,
[9:48]that it'll survive. And so he figured out this way of folding it so that I could just kind of
[9:53]throw it in my pocket or put it somewhere and that it would be this process of unfolding it. And it
[9:59]was just kind of creepy.
[10:00]packaging it. You know, it couldn't be in the lunch box anymore. So here it is. And it was a clever
[10:05]way to do it because it I think actually preserved a lot of the notes in many ways because they
[10:10]weren't open to the outside elements. You know, I would fold them back up after I finished reading
[10:15]them. And it's basically like origami. It's very origami. I mean, it's a it's the way it's
[10:21]folded is a work of art in and of itself. Plus the colors. Yeah. And so in the back of the book,
[10:26]there's actually like a section that teaches you how to fold the notes. I know, I was thinking,
[10:30]should I try this? I could try it now. Yeah. It's not with like necessarily any piece of paper,
[10:36]but you know, you can pretty much be a certain size. It's sort of the size of the
[10:39]voice very well. Yeah. You know, I like scroll them and note to my daughter on the only
[10:44]note that I could find this morning, rip it off and like shut it in and I'm thinking, oh my gosh,
[10:48]Joanna's dad is like making works of art and it's like all I can do to say, have a good day
[10:53]and stuff it in a lunch, but he definitely kept these CVS tablets like in business for a while
[10:58]because he was buying them like nonstop. We have tons of these CVS tablets. But anyway, getting back
[11:04]to kind of the color and the illustrations of it, you know, one of the other reasons the notes
[11:09]actually started was because my brother was in preschool. We went to a Montessori school for preschool
[11:14]through kindergarten. And you know, Montessori school is like so funky and different. And my brother
[11:19]was really obsessed with the metal insets table, which is like this table where you basically use
[11:24]like various protractors and different shapes and you like outline them and you color in the layers
[11:30]and stuff. And what he was not interested in was going into the reading corner. And so his teacher
[11:37]was like, you know, Theo, they were trying to figure out ways to kind of push him into this corner
[11:42]and get him interested in reading. And so and Prescott, who was my brother's teacher at the time,
[11:47]said, you know, Bob, I know, I know you're an artist. Like what would you think about just every
[11:51]once in a while writing a little note to Theo and putting it in his lunch box. And maybe we could
[11:56]use that as like that. Hey, Theo, let's read the note from your dad today. And that would kind of
[12:01]start to push him towards reading. So I think, you know, Theo at the time, it would push him
[12:06]towards reading, but it was also because Theo couldn't read yet. You know, he was so young, he was
[12:11]learning how to read. And so many of those notes are just filled with drawings and drawing
[12:17]sometimes that have a few words on the page and drawing sometimes that are centered around,
[12:22]you know, there's like the classic note that says go Theo go. That's like a secret code that
[12:27]he actually did at school. So there are all different ways that he was trying to put words on the
[12:32]page, but also make it interesting because he was like five or whatever. And so I think that then
[12:38]as he started writing to me because he was like, well, if I'm writing the Theo, I have to write
[12:41]to Joanna. This is like ridiculous. I can't just send Theo with something. I think I probably
[12:46]found one note and was like, dad, I need these. What about me? And so he started writing to me too.
[12:52]And I think that, you know, I was only in second grade and I wanted pictures too. I wanted drawings.
[12:57]And so then it just kind of evolved. You can tell as the notes get older that they're much
[13:02]more word heavy, but he never stopped also, including illustrations every once in a while.
[13:08]there are notes with that illustrations. But for the most part, it was just part of the
[13:12]expression was drawing a heart somewhere on the page. She drew a lot of owls. There's a lot of like
[13:17]faces of his and Theo's and stuff. And so your dad should really sell these as templates because
[13:24]I buy sometimes I buy these with a lunchbox note. So like each day it's a little different.
[13:28]He should take the drawings and like X out the note so you can write your own note and then sell
[13:34]Monday through Friday. I have a friend that was like, maybe you could just find like the best lines
[13:41]from every note. And you could just put them down on a little piece of paper so I can just take
[13:46]them out every morning and give them to my kid. It's like great idea.
[13:51]Yeah, it has like a little quote at the bottom. Yeah, I like the parents are at home. Love you.
[13:57]Let's just make things easier for months. We use like, no, I think that there's, yeah, there's a,
[14:02]I mean the book is is so colorful and fun that I think there are a lot of places to go with it.
[14:08]You know, one of the bigger hurdles to get over when we started this was that like
[14:13]nobody knows who I am and nobody knows who my dad is. You know, he's not somebody that has
[14:17]a persona out there. And so it was about getting people to care about who we are and why they
[14:24]should, you know, give a crap that this guy wrote his kid's notes. And so I think that there
[14:29]was a level of, as I was pulling the notes together, realizing that I had to do a little explaining
[14:35]so that there was a person behind there and there was a story behind it that made it compelling.
[14:40]And from here who knows, you know, we'll see. Did you get pushed back from the publishing
[14:45]world about the fact that nobody knew who you were in your dad where I feel like there's all this
[14:49]focus on having a platform and yeah, I know. I was like, I don't have 20,000 Instagram followers.
[14:57]Like am I going to be able to make this work? No, nobody really pushed back too much. I think that
[15:02]there was the notes speak for themselves. So it's really about being able to just get them in front
[15:08]of someone. And once they see it, I think they're like, Oh, this is incredibly interesting. And like
[15:13]it's almost made for being such an extraordinary task. It's almost made more human and possible
[15:20]by it being someone who's just like your average everyday guy. He's above average in my eyes.
[15:26]But like, you know, he's just a guy. And so I think that there's something compelling to me about
[15:32]that. But yeah, it was, I think it was a factor. It's probably a reason that it maybe took a
[15:38]little longer for it all to come about. But no, it wasn't incredible. But here it is. Which is great.
[15:44]I just wanted to read one of my favorites from 1998 from your dad. Every day I tried to be the
[15:49]kind of guy worthy to be called dad. And when I sometimes fail, I stumble and flail. You know,
[15:54]I'm feeling sad. We're only human you and me with all our problems here to see. So no use
[15:59]getting mad. I'll try to understand you. If you try to, we'll both be really glad. That's so cute.
[16:05]I love it. I love like sometimes he rhymes. Sometimes he doesn't. How he mixes it up. And just
[16:12]so honest, you know, there's all this focus. I feel like now and parents being able to say, Hey,
[16:17]you know, I messed up this morning and parents mess up too. And it's okay. And I'm sorry.
[16:22]We're only human. We're only human. Yeah. This is perfect. So I would put this on my little
[16:26]on your little card. And my little card. Yeah, I think it's, you know, there are a lot of
[16:31]notes that that again, we're part of the reason why I ended up deciding that this was actually
[16:37]something I could share because they felt so universally appropriate and applicable and important
[16:45]to think about. I think that we live in a time where we all look for like the differences
[16:50]among each other. And I'm as guilty of it as anyone that, you know, you're always you learn
[16:55]something about someone and then you're blocked off from them or you don't think about what you
[16:59]could possibly have in common. And I think so many of his notes were grappling with and talking
[17:05]through the idea that there are so many human qualities that are very universal and are very much
[17:11]things that we all are struggling with or thinking about or working through. And I think there was a
[17:16]a little bit of a hope, especially as we got. I mean, I think we were pretty young when that note,
[17:21]usually some of the cuter rhyme ones are we were pretty young. But I think there was a little bit of
[17:26]a hope that we that we understood that he was going to make mistakes too and that we were just
[17:32]like you said, like, you know, I screwed up this morning or there are a lot of notes that talk
[17:36]about that stuff like that. But, you know, that that he was putting his best foot forward. So he
[17:40]would hope that we would too and that it could kind of push us along. And so yeah, I think that that's
[17:47]that's a perfect example of a note that is is just kind of at the core, the heart of the whole
[17:52]thing. You know, it's just this guy who is trying to express himself, trying to say, I love you
[17:57]and trying to be like, listen, I'm a human. I'm doing the best I can. Thank you for doing the best
[18:03]you can. I love you. There's also something nice. And I don't know why, but there's just something
[18:09]particularly nice about it being from a dad versus a mom. I don't know why. Not that this book
[18:14]wouldn't also be great had your mom illustrate it. Yeah. I don't know. There's something so special
[18:18]about that. I mean, I don't think you always see men as often being so vulnerable. You know, I think
[18:25]about a lot when we started this process, you know, and like the soap is conversation getting the
[18:30]notes published in general that was like, do we want to share them at all? And then this became
[18:35]even sharing even more. You know, there was like, am I sharing too much by sharing all of these
[18:40]notes? And I think that my dad had no, he had no plan for writing these with any thematic organization.
[18:47]He had no plan that they were going to come home. He had no plan that they were going to be saved
[18:50]and shared. And I think that is one of the many reasons why he was so open every time he started
[18:59]writing. He was very vulnerable. He was very just top of mind. He was very willing to express himself
[19:06]in a way that maybe you wouldn't if you knew that they were going to be shared someday with the
[19:10]public. And maybe that's something that, you know, you think of women journaling maybe more than you
[19:15]think of, you know, young guys journaling. And that also probably really stemmed from art school.
[19:20]And from the fact that Pratt, he was always carrying around a little notebook with him. And he
[19:25]was drawing and he was writing about, you know, I don't know if this is going to work out for me.
[19:29]And I'm in love. And what do I do now? And, you know, he was writing those things down in a very
[19:34]diary-esque form. And so he was comfortable with that in a way that I think that, you know,
[19:39]I'm not even comfortable with often.
[19:42]There's also something I know so much of our communication these days is electronic. And we have
[19:47]all these emails. But I don't know about you for the people who I've loved and who I've lost in my
[19:51]life. The first thing I feel like I do is an inventory of what notes or letters or cards.
[19:57]Yeah. And I like frantically like stuff.
[20:00]file them and be not not not a shrine of but you know I like what do I have what's left
[20:05]of what's evident you know and so there's something about these notes in particular that speaks
[20:11]to that sort of longing for the connection that you can only get with something like I don't
[20:16]go and print out emails from people who have passed away do I yeah it's not the same I don't
[20:20]know where to find them I don't understand you know it's in the cloud I don't know I don't wear
[20:25]emails from like you know 1997 I'm no idea where they are but a birthday card that you know
[20:31]a dear friend wrote or my grandmother's letter when she told me I was like getting too much
[20:36]weight or like I love having them I want to have them so it's so special he did this and I think
[20:42]it's such a good point of encouragement for us all to like take the extra few minutes and do
[20:48]something with our you know with our hands enough like with the text or I don't know I mean I cherish
[20:55]not even people who have passed away like my own parents are alive and I love finding postcards
[20:59]my dad and me when I was at summer camp yeah it's just so nice there's something very sincere
[21:04]about like writing on paper I think I was talking to a friend about how in high school we all knew
[21:10]each other's handwriting because like you know what you were changing notes with each other
[21:15]whatever or like you were writing notes to each other in class or anything like I could tell you
[21:20]fought in the lineup all of my best friend from growing up handwriting and my friends today
[21:25]I don't necessarily know all of their handwriting so I mean I think I know some of them but not
[21:31]all of them and it's because we don't write as much right we don't put that down on paper and
[21:36]there's something very sweet about even an email you know they're edited you can edit it
[21:42]and the written word you can't always I mean I'm every once in a while I'm sure he started
[21:47]writing and crumpled up a piece of paper and threw it away but most of the time like there's
[21:51]misspellings words are crossed out things are changed around thoughts change mid sentence you know
[21:56]and it's because you can't go back and change things you're just putting it down on paper and
[22:01]sometimes that means it's very you know stream of conscious and sometimes they're a little bit
[22:06]more put together but it's a really sincere form of expression that I do think is is maybe making
[22:13]it come back but definitely an important one to cherish and so crazy to think that all literature
[22:19]was written by myself so no even a typewriter is different because even that you couldn't make
[22:25]as many mistakes whatever so it's just recently I wonder if there will be some essay in the future
[22:30]the effect of modern day computing on literature output yeah I mean I can't imagine writing this
[22:36]book without a computer and a process like that I know have to involve this whole complicated
[22:41]software system to categorize yeah so my yeah it was crazy one of my dad's friends actually
[22:46]built us a software program that was like very specific I mean it's not like you know it's not
[22:50]for sale anywhere it was like just for us it was very simple but it allowed me to scan the notes
[22:57]transcribe them and then tag them in different ways so I like that not a business I have bags of
[23:04]butters from camp in my closet on the floor I mean we should probably be doing it with other
[23:09]things in my life but for now I just have the notes in the system but it's true it's a very
[23:13]good organizational thing and now I can open up this program on my on my computer and I can type in
[23:20]you know weather or I can type in tough loss or I can type in Joanna you know 1995 to 1999
[23:29]because they're all dated and and so it's this really amazing way to sort through the collection
[23:35]and it was super helpful as I was writing because it allowed me to sift through these 3500 notes
[23:42]in a way that was like plausible do you feel that having a dad like this has made you
[23:49]have really high expectations for the type of dad if you want to have kids and I know you don't
[23:54]have kids yet but assuming you know do you have now escalated expectations if anybody you're with
[24:00]yes all this has to be my dad no you know I think that a lot of times when I would show the book to
[24:06]someone or if I'm talking to someone about it they're like very focused on the idea that they
[24:11]could never do that or sometimes parents are like I should have done this like why didn't I do this
[24:17]and I think that again there there's a very specific set of circumstances that led my dad to
[24:23]writing these notes he is an artist by training he was comfortable writing on the page he grew
[24:28]up in a family where he had one conversation he remembered having one-on-one with his own father
[24:34]my grandfather died when my dad was 23 he had like you know a deep desire to have a relationship
[24:40]with us that was more than that and he loves the morning he loves being up before everyone else
[24:47]he loves having that time to himself and thinking and and just being by himself so he would wake up at
[24:53]like 5 a.m. when the rest of us were still asleep and and so he had this time where he was able to
[24:59]waste an alarm clock or that's when he wakes up just wondering I think he had a like I feel like my
[25:05]parents had one of those old alarm clocks that turned on NPR anymore so like I would sleep through
[25:11]that today but like I think that that's what works for him so he would wake up like that although
[25:15]now I think he pretty much just he's like he's a routine guy like wakes up when he wakes up
[25:20]whereas I could sleep if nobody woke me up I would like wake up at noon you know like I'm
[25:23]just like I could sleep the whole day and so it really worked for him and it was something that
[25:28]was was important for him and became a part of his life and an outlet for him it was like
[25:33]it's been important for him to write as it was for us to read them you know like he felt like
[25:37]it was such a big part of his day and so I don't necessarily have any illusions that anyone I
[25:43]meet is going to be able to do this you know my my partner currently does not plan on writing
[25:49]notes to our future children but that said I think that I value creative communication and I
[25:56]value the willingness to be open and vulnerable and whether or not that means that you have
[26:03]a tough conversation or you write really amazing birthday notes or you are good at going
[26:08]on long walks and expressing yourself you know whatever it takes I think that it's really important
[26:14]I'm better for instance like I'm more vulnerable if I write if I write myself you know if I'm
[26:20]typing or if I'm writing down things like that is how I'm better at expressing my feelings about
[26:26]any given situation if I get in the fight I do way better if I like text things down on a note on
[26:32]my phone or something and then have that as like a resource to look at otherwise I feel like sometimes
[26:37]I my thoughts get jumbled and so that's better for me but other people like they can't do that at
[26:42]all they they're much better just talking and flowing through their ideas you know and so yeah I
[26:47]think that I never shied away from introducing significant others to my parents it was always
[26:53]something that happened early on because it mattered to me that my that whoever I was with had a
[26:58]good relationship with them and you know I was like check out my cool parents they're not embarrassing
[27:02]they're fun and you should meet them and don't be intimidated by them because they're great but
[27:07]no I don't have any expectation that notes are in my future or my husband's future or anything
[27:12]like that and what's coming next for you are you inspired to write another book after doing this
[27:17]this is like a one and done type of thing you're going back into on the campaign trail.
[27:21]I'm not having a campaign trail currently I work in the city I work for a company called GLG which
[27:27]is a business-to-business platform that connects professionals who have questions with experts who
[27:32]have the answers I do comes for them it's been a really nice return to just like a normal job life
[27:39]for two years of my kind of prime age of working I was at home with my parents writing and so
[27:46]I'm happy to have health insurance in a 401k again I have so much hope for this book I feel like
[27:53]you know it's a it's an evergreen as they say in the industry I believe that's the term
[27:59]type of book it doesn't it's not about a specific time and hit I mean it is about a specific time
[28:03]in history but it's not only applicable to a specific time in history and so I think it can grow
[28:08]and I look forward to watching it grow it's coming out actually I just finished yesterday
[28:13]editing the galley for folded wisdom in German which was a fun process because then I'm
[28:18]speak German so it was really like kind of some details here and there and every once in a while
[28:23]I'd see something that was like still in English like I texted my cousins who live in Iowa
[28:28]or who are from Iowa that they they kept in English farm in Iowa and I was like no no there's not
[28:34]there's not a specific place called farm in Iowa my cousins grew up on a farm in Iowa so you
[28:39]can lowercase that f and probably translate it but anyway edited it so it's going to come out
[28:45]in German in April it's going to be called Pausenbrough to Vai Staiten I think is the name of the book
[28:50]rolls right after the time and so I'm looking forward to watching it grow and seeing what's next
[28:57]I think that if you asked me five years ago 10 years ago if I would be on a podcast talking about
[29:03]the notes that my dad wrote I would say you know not a chance and so life has been unpredictable
[29:08]and exciting and and I'm you know I have no idea what's to come do you have any advice to aspiring
[29:13]authors well as someone who never expected to be in author I remember I was talking when I when I
[29:20]first met with the publisher who runs sell it on which is the publishing house that did the book
[29:26]she was like have you ever written anything before and I was like well in college I had to write
[29:30]a thesis and in grad school I also had to write a thesis they were pretty long like they were like
[29:36]50 pages there's something you know but that was kind of like it and so I don't know I feel like
[29:42]I'm in no place to really give give advice to anyone because I didn't go to school for this and I
[29:47]I didn't you know I don't have any background in it but I I remember when I was writing my thesis
[29:52]in grad school thinking that the most important after having you know remember my experience
[29:57]and undergrad that the most important thing was to write
[30:00]something that I wasn't gonna be bored by,
[30:02]because if I got bored with the topic,
[30:05]then I was gonna be like totally screwed, right?
[30:07]Like there was gonna be no way to get through the process.
[30:09]And so I remember thinking,
[30:11]like I just have to come up with something
[30:12]that like will keep my interest
[30:14]because there's going to inevitably be parts
[30:16]of this process that really suck.
[30:19]And like, you know, there's gonna be red lines
[30:20]and edits that are really difficult to handle
[30:23]and there are gonna be parts where I'm like,
[30:24]oh my God, am I still talking about this?
[30:26]So I have to have my core really like what I'm doing,
[30:29]otherwise it's never gonna work out.
[30:31]And I'd say that that's what happened with this book.
[30:33]This book was natural to write.
[30:36]It was it flowed very easily
[30:38]because it was something that I cared so much about.
[30:40]And you know, I think in the beginning,
[30:42]I had friends who were like,
[30:44]you have to think about like why, you know,
[30:45]that same question, like why was anybody gonna care
[30:47]about Bob Gest's writing his kids?
[30:50]And I had to have faith that like,
[30:53]it was interesting to me
[30:54]and maybe that would make a book
[30:57]that became surprisingly interesting to someone else.
[31:00]And I wasn't gonna tailor it
[31:01]to be the type of book that someone else wanted to read.
[31:04]I was gonna make it the book that I knew
[31:06]that me and my family wanted to read.
[31:08]My family and I wanted to read and go from there.
[31:12]Well, it's great.
[31:13]And it's a gift and it's beautiful in and of itself,
[31:17]but also a great reminder to all of us parents
[31:20]that something so little we do can have so much meaning
[31:23]in your kids lives.
[31:24]Yeah. Yeah.
[31:24]Anyway, so thank you so much for coming on.
[31:26]Thank you so much for having me.
[31:27]It's a joy.
[31:28]You've been listening to Moms on Have Time to Read Books
[31:31]with Zippy Owens.
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[32:06]You can always email me at zippyowens.com.