Judy Bolton-Fasman, ASYLUM: A Memoir of Family Secrets
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[0:40]Judy Bolton-Fassman is the author of a silent memoir of family secrets
[0:45]Judy's essays and reviews have appeared in major newspapers including the New York Times and literary magazines such as
[0:51]McSweeney's Brevity, Cognizante, The Rumpus, Catapult, Atticus Review, and the anthology The Shell Game
[0:57]Writers play with borrowed forms
[0:59]Two of her essays have been nominated for a push-cart prize
[1:03]Judy also has an essay in the anthology Heroix, Women's lived experiences during the coronavirus pandemic
[1:09]She is the recipient of the Alonzo G. Davis Fellowship for Latinx writers from the Virginia Center for Creative Arts
[1:15]And has been the Aaron Donovan Fellow in Nonfiction at the Mineral School
[1:19]She lives outside of Boston with her family. Welcome Judy. Thank you so much for coming on Moms
[1:25]Don't have time to read books to discuss asylum a memoir of family secrets
[1:29]Thank you so much for having me. I've been so looking forward to this. Oh, yay
[1:34]Well, I loved getting sort of a deep dive into your entire family history
[1:38]I feel like I know so much about you
[1:40]I love how memoirs bring people together before they even met so tell listeners a little about what asylum is about and
[1:48]Was it the fact that you grew up on asylum Avenue that you were like this has to be a book?
[1:52]Well, I have to say the title of the book since you mentioned it was a gift from the universe to grow up on asylum Avenue
[2:00]Everything sort of flowed from there. You know my my mother in particular was a storyteller
[2:05]And I always heard stories from her and she was very as you know as you know from the book
[2:10]She was very charismatic. She was very dramatic
[2:13]Sometimes she was very traumatic and all things kind of flowed from that
[2:18]So I've you know, I've been around stories all my life and growing up in an intercultural house
[2:23]Was also you know was also an inspiration for for stories
[2:28]But since you mentioned the title I did grow up on asylum Avenue
[2:32]I grew up at 1735 asylum Avenue
[2:35]My mother is from Cuba and although she immigrated here in the late 50s her
[2:42]family came here as you know with refugee status in the early 1960s
[2:48]And did indeed seek asylum here. So that's one another level and then there's the the level of you know
[2:56]The connotation of insanity and there was a lot of you know, anecdotally
[3:01]I use the word anecdotally not at all
[3:03]Clinically there was a lot of insanity going on here and
[3:08]Writing you know, I think you know, I just thought of this the other day writing writing the book was a form of asylum for me of taking
[3:15]asylum of having a container of having a place to make sense of these stories
[3:21]So it was a form of asylum for me to write the book. I bet I mean there was so much from
[3:27]Your relationships with your siblings to your parents to all the how you came to terms with this period of time
[3:35]That was missing from your father's life. I mean that is hard to I mean I feel like that was the
[3:41]The genesis for sort of everything that came after that this man who you loved
[3:46]Had this blank space that you could never really fill in and so you were trying so hard and even through the narrative
[3:53]All the way to the end like trying to figure out like who is this woman and what was this part and asking everybody?
[3:59]And you were obviously so thorough about it
[4:02]I just my heart like went out to you because you were clearly just like so in need of this information which ultimately
[4:09]Is not
[4:10]Retrievable ultimately it was and it wasn't retrievable
[4:14]I'm gonna back up a little bit and say that for me writing asylum kind of yielded a speculative nonfiction and what I mean by that was that I
[4:25]had to sort of speculate and
[4:28]Project what I thought what was going on
[4:30]But for me the speculative nonfiction
[4:34]Mixed in with the facts that I have and it yielded this this truth for me that that for me was was absolute and I
[4:43]I never doubted it and I never doubted what my what my hunches were
[4:48]Yeah, I mean there was obviously stuff that you've uncovered
[4:52]I don't know. I really wanted like a conclusive
[4:55]Well, anyway, I'm not to give things away
[4:57]I mean, I know this is part of
[4:58]But this is how we all make sense of our lives right how we make sense of our families and our histories and
[5:03]what information we remember and what we can glean from others and
[5:08]How it makes us feel along the way right?
[5:10]Well, you know everybody in a family has a part to play or is assigned a part to play
[5:16]I was the curious one to the point that my father would say to me
[5:20]Curiosity kill the cat because I always wanted I was always acting asking questions. I wanted to know things and
[5:28]Another gift from the universe
[5:30]My name is Judy Bolton and Judy Bolton was a girl detective in the early 30s and 40s who was the subject of a series of books
[5:40]She was sort of the you know the equivalent of Nancy Drew though not as famous and
[5:46]I think I lived up to my name more felt like I had to live up to my name even if it was subconscious sometimes
[5:53]Um of being that detective and I remember when I first saw Judy Bolton book
[5:58]I was like maybe six years old and I was so thrilled to see my name on the cover of a book and you know
[6:06]I just sort of went with it and you know use that mantle and and and did my detective work
[6:13]But I will say that the first yearings the serious first yearings of asylum were when I was writing a
[6:21]Fiction thesis
[6:23]for my masters and fine arts and I went back and read that thesis as
[6:29]Over the years as I was working on asylum
[6:31]And I really saw the first stirrings of asylum in that particularly in the title
[6:36]Story which I call the 90 day wonder and I explain what a 90 day wonder is in the book
[6:41]It's what men who were recruited to be officers
[6:46]in the Second World War
[6:48]Met young men from college
[6:50]Were the officers in the Second World War
[6:53]Were learned how to do everything
[6:55]In 90 days
[6:56]So at the end they ended up they ended up commanding men
[7:00]Who had socks older than they were so at first I thought 90 day wonder
[7:05]That's like such a wonderful term
[7:07]You know wonder my father was a wonder
[7:09]But it really was a pejorative term during the Second World War
[7:12]But nevertheless that is what my thesis my MFA thesis was called my short story collection was the 90 day wonder
[7:20]And clearly I was obsessed with finding out my father's secrets and finding out who we was
[7:27]That early
[7:29]Well, I have to say when I googled you after I read your book
[7:32]The first thing that came up were screenshots of the covers of the Judy Bolton series
[7:37]So uh-huh absolutely because I didn't even know I had never heard of I had never heard of this book
[7:42]Actually, so anyway, I was delighted to see what you meant right away
[7:47]You know Margaret's Margaret Sutton's daughter wrote to me and told me she was delighted that I had
[7:52]Lived her mom's her mom's work. Yeah. It was really sweet. Oh my gosh. I love them
[7:58]You had one line in here that I absolutely loved and the page was open and then of course this closed and now
[8:04]But it was on the left and it was about you and college. Maybe I won't find it and I could talk about something else in school
[8:10]I searched for what I didn't have but at home
[8:12]I searched for what I didn't know and I just loved that like how you operated through the world and how
[8:18]What you needed to know at home affected sort of everything
[8:22]How did you feel at that time? Well, you know when I was a kid no one really talked to me so I had
[8:28]So I had to sort of I sort of had to fend for myself in terms of finding out stories
[8:34]Even in terms of you know at points making up history
[8:38]My parents were a very unusual couple. My mother was from Cuba
[8:42]My father was this all-American guy from New Haven, Connecticut who went to Yale
[8:48]And there was almost 17 years between them and in that 17 years year gap
[8:53]There's a lot of room
[8:55]To find stories to mind stories to even you know make up stories to sort of fill in the holes
[9:04]So my parents were very glamorous couple. They were very dramatic couple and you know everything stopped with them on Saturday night
[9:13]No matter how
[9:15]Upset they were with each other no matter how much they were fighting on Saturday night
[9:18]There was a truce and they went out as this very glamorous couple
[9:23]And I just you know
[9:24]I loved that and I and I still have very fond memories of watching my mother dress because it was one of the few times
[9:29]She seemed to have been happy in my childhood
[9:32]So that's a very happy memory for me
[9:34]But yes, I wanted to know because they were so as I said
[9:38]There was this age gap
[9:39]There was this cultural gap
[9:41]And I wanted to sort of somehow make sense of it and fill it in with stories
[9:46]Fill it in with my you know with suppositions that I had about them
[9:51]I feel like there should be a collection of like little essays not even full on essays
[9:57]Maybe a little picture with essay about
[10:00]how it felt to have your mom get dressed up.
[10:02]I feel like that is so clear in my mind
[10:06]when my mom would get her ball gown on
[10:08]and I would be so young.
[10:10]And now I think of that when I'm like in my closet,
[10:12]crying, trying to like,
[10:13]I don't think I'm like,
[10:15]is this what my kids are gonna remember?
[10:18]Or is my mom's,
[10:19]like the crinilins were being fluffed out
[10:22]and all this, right?
[10:23]I mean, it's just my kids definitely do not have
[10:28]a memory of me being glamorous.
[10:30]So I'm going to go and I'll tell her the time.
[10:34]Okay, your father going to Yale
[10:36]was a big part of the story and I went to Yale myself.
[10:39]So I felt like every time it said Yale,
[10:41]it was like this little like,
[10:42]oh great.
[10:43]And then I realized that was happening
[10:45]like every other minute in the story, right?
[10:47]The fact that there was such a expectation of him.
[10:50]I think there was someone in there where your mom said,
[10:53]like I've married like the poorest man
[10:55]who's ever gone to Yale or something like that.
[10:57]Yes, Yale was a very big part of my family lore.
[11:01]My grandfather graduated from Yale in 1913.
[11:04]He was an immigrant.
[11:05]He came here when he was two years old from Russia.
[11:08]And I like to say that my grandfather fiddled his way
[11:12]through Yale because he had a card from the musician union
[11:16]and he played at all of the debutant balls
[11:20]and fraternities up and down the East Coast
[11:22]that he certainly would never have been invited to as a Jew.
[11:26]And his classmate, although I'm sure that they did not
[11:30]mingle in any way was cold quarter.
[11:33]And my grandfather was a wonderful musician
[11:36]as was my father.
[11:37]But yes, my father, my father was what they would call
[11:42]like a legacy at Yale and it was very important to him.
[11:45]And Yale football, he was obsessed with Yale football.
[11:48]I can tell you stats from 1970 and 1969 Yale football.
[11:53]I'm sure I'm the only person
[11:55]who's engaged with that at this point
[11:56]because he was absolutely obsessed.
[11:58]He was very proud of it.
[12:00]And it was a very big part of his story.
[12:02]And I think I'm not giving too much away by saying
[12:05]that it became an even bigger part of his story
[12:09]after he served in the Navy.
[12:11]Because yeah, Ivy League recruits were very important
[12:14]to government operations post-World War II.
[12:18]It's amazing that the history of the university,
[12:20]I feel like you should tell, I don't know if you know
[12:23]another author, her name's Margarita,
[12:25]broken silver, and she, I know gold,
[12:27]I know Margarita very well.
[12:29]Oh, you do.
[12:29]Well, I'd literally just interviewed her this week
[12:32]and she's from Russia and went to Yale
[12:35]and there was so much in common.
[12:36]Anyway, I don't know.
[12:37]I thought if you didn't know each other.
[12:39]No, I don't know.
[12:40]I'm sorry.
[12:41]Sorry, anyway.
[12:43]Well, then I won't give away what happens to your dad
[12:45]or what you discover towards the end in that regard.
[12:48]So why don't we talk about your panic attacks?
[12:50]If you don't mind.
[12:53]No, actually, I like to discuss mental health things
[12:56]because I think it gives people hope
[12:57]and I think it gives people a way to identify with people.
[13:00]But yeah, so I'm happy to talk about that.
[13:03]So you said the first time I had a panic attack,
[13:07]I was sleeping next to my boyfriend Michael
[13:09]when surges of adrenaline waves of panic suffocated me.
[13:12]I was afraid to wake him so I rocked back and forth
[13:14]in bed as if in prayer until the sun came up
[13:17]and then I dry heave to the rest of the day.
[13:19]The panic attacks were exhausting
[13:20]and hiding them from Michael more so.
[13:22]It desperately wanted to be the perfect girlfriend
[13:24]composed and supportive.
[13:26]Above all, I tried to will myself to be strong.
[13:28]I could not tell my boyfriend how disabled I felt.
[13:32]So it talked to me about that.
[13:33]I mean, that must have been really difficult to feel
[13:37]cause panic attacks really take over your whole body.
[13:39]It's a very physical manifestation of the anxiety.
[13:43]So talk about how it felt
[13:44]and then how you simultaneously had to hide it.
[13:47]That must have been very challenging.
[13:49]It was very challenging.
[13:51]I think that panic attack was a before and after moment
[13:55]for me and panic attacks have defined my life.
[14:00]I have been very, very lucky that I have gotten
[14:03]really good care subsequently.
[14:05]But it took 20 years to really figure out
[14:08]how to deal with them.
[14:09]It took 20 years to figure out
[14:11]that I needed medication to deal with them.
[14:15]So that's been, you know, I remember when I first met
[14:18]my husband who is not Michael,
[14:21]silently not Michael.
[14:23]I remember telling my therapist,
[14:26]I really want him to meet you.
[14:28]So you can tell him what's wrong with me said,
[14:31]there's nothing wrong with you.
[14:33]I'm not gonna do that.
[14:34]I'm not gonna tell your, you know,
[14:37]has been to be that you're that you need fixing
[14:40]because you don't need fixing.
[14:42]Panic attacks are human.
[14:44]Mental health issues are human.
[14:47]We all have them.
[14:48]We all need to talk about them.
[14:50]We all need to be kind to each other about them.
[14:53]So yeah, I would say that that moment
[14:56]was a defining moment for me.
[14:58]And until I took medication at the age of 40,
[15:02]I struggled at times.
[15:03]I struggled particularly after the birth of my kids,
[15:06]particularly with my daughter.
[15:07]I had, you know, a postpartum reaction.
[15:11]And I worried that, you know,
[15:13]the thing about panic is it's a very sneaky thing.
[15:16]You really feel like you're going to lose control
[15:18]and you're going to die.
[15:19]And those two things don't ever happen.
[15:22]You don't really lose control and you don't die.
[15:25]It just feels awful.
[15:28]And it's something that I share.
[15:30]You know, for years I kept it secret.
[15:33]I never told anybody about them because I was ashamed.
[15:36]And now I feel like I have to tell people,
[15:39]I feel like it's almost a public service announcement
[15:41]so that people understand that they're human
[15:45]and that there's nothing wrong with you.
[15:48]It's something in your, you know,
[15:50]it's brain chemistry.
[15:51]It's the emotional currency of your life.
[15:54]It encompasses your, you know, your history.
[15:58]And I just feel like it's really important
[16:01]for people to know that.
[16:02]So I'm any time, any place I'm happy to talk about mental health.
[16:07]In fact, my daughter and I have permission to write to,
[16:11]to say this because I wrote about it.
[16:13]Also takes an indie deposit for our panic attacks.
[16:17]She comes by it naturally.
[16:19]And she took a gorgeous picture.
[16:22]There was a project that went through to her college
[16:26]about mental health.
[16:27]And there's a beautiful picture of her
[16:29]with the word Lexapro written across her forehead.
[16:34]And that picture just says so much.
[16:37]It says who she is.
[16:38]It says who her salvation was.
[16:41]I mean, we're so lucky to be living in this,
[16:45]in this day and age where we can be helped by these things
[16:48]because I write in the book about mental health.
[16:51]My grandmother Bolton, you know, had a nervous breakdown.
[16:54]And subsequently had what I,
[16:57]what I'm certain was electroshock therapy.
[17:00]And I think she, she had panic attacks
[17:02]and nobody understood what they were in the 1920s and 30s.
[17:05]Don't you wonder what they're gonna figure out
[17:08]in like the next 30 years?
[17:09]Yes.
[17:10]I did.
[17:11]And I go about that all the time.
[17:12]My kids have kids, like, you know,
[17:14]they could be like, okay.
[17:15]So, you know, your grandma's if he had anxiety and this
[17:19]and this and this and like we're gonna test you for this.
[17:21]And now you just put this patch on you
[17:23]and you don't have to worry about it ever again.
[17:25]Wouldn't that be great?
[17:26]You're good to go after that, right?
[17:30]I mean, it'll be, it'll be great to see what innovations come
[17:33]because just being able to manage something
[17:36]that makes you feel so isolated is, is huge.
[17:40]I mean, think about how a whole universe of people
[17:44]entering the world feeling okay versus feeling ashamed
[17:47]and terrible that, you know, it changes everything.
[17:50]So, right.
[17:51]So I also think it's super important to talk out,
[17:53]speak out about mental health stuff
[17:56]because it's so pervasive anyway.
[17:57]And we might as well.
[17:59]Which is why I love that picture of my daughter
[18:01]with Lexapro written across her forehead.
[18:04]I think it's so brave and it's so wonderful
[18:07]that she can express that.
[18:09]It would be really great if she could just walk
[18:10]into the pharmacy and they could scan it
[18:12]so she wouldn't have to get refills all the time.
[18:14]Ah, yes.
[18:15]And you're like, I dream.
[18:19]So what, how long did it take for you to write this book
[18:23]and was there a particular part
[18:24]that made you very emotional reliving?
[18:27]It took me on and off 16 years
[18:31]because it started out as a very different book.
[18:33]It started out as a book about the year I said,
[18:36]the mourners caught us, the Jewish prayer
[18:38]of mourning for my dad.
[18:41]And I worked on that for probably about four years.
[18:44]And I realized that the book didn't have really an arc
[18:49]and it wasn't of interest to anybody
[18:51]but me and my family and what was I gonna do with that?
[18:56]So I was with a friend in visiting her in Israel
[19:00]and she said, sweetie, you have to go out
[19:02]and find someone who knew your father
[19:03]and really figure out these holes in the story
[19:07]that have you so perplexed and have you so obsessed.
[19:10]And that's exactly what I did and on and off,
[19:13]it took me 12 years.
[19:15]I was doing things like raising children, freelancing
[19:19]and it just, it took me a while.
[19:22]And I, and I think that it,
[19:25]I needed every minute of that time to finish it
[19:28]because I learned so much about writing itself.
[19:31]I learned so much about myself.
[19:33]I learned so much about myself as a mother
[19:36]and juggling this very emotional story.
[19:39]And it's funny you ask about parts that sort of move me.
[19:43]One of, one writing teacher once asked me,
[19:46]did any of, did writing this make you cry?
[19:49]And if it didn't make you cry,
[19:51]then I think you need to go back and rewrite
[19:53]until some of it does make you cry.
[19:56]And there were moments that made that,
[19:58]that certainly made me.
[20:00]me cry as I as I revised. I thought about when I was pregnant, my father put his hand on my stomach and he was so ill and, you know, his hand was shaking from Parkinson's, the, the, you know, the Miami chapter sort of made me cry too because my parents were separated that summer.
[20:17]And I remember and it all, you know, all came rushing back to me. How much I miss my dad that summer. And, but that was also a very primary summer for me because it was the summer that I sort of felt very
[20:29]Latinx and understand my mother's, my mother's culture. So it was, it was, it was a summer of growth and it was a summer of of sadness for me, but mixed in. And I guess those two things are not mutually exclusive. It's true. There's a lot of emotion comes with growth. Any big change.
[20:47]You know, I thought of you the other night. I had, I read your book. I don't know a week or two ago. And I went and saw a lemon trilogy. Have you seen that play? No. Okay. Well, it's closing soon. So you better hurry.
[20:57]But I think they're moving into LA, but it's about the founders of Lehman Brothers and it's really about immigration and identity and and family and all the stuff.
[21:09]And the cottage is said throughout the play. They're only three men in the play and the cottage is like the soundtrack.
[21:15]It starts in the beginning and it goes throughout and they, they weave it through and it sort of reminded me the way you will have the cottage. You still have a lot of the cottage in here. So it sort of echoed that same trajectory through the story.
[21:27]You might like it. Yeah. Sounds great. Sounds like something I would definitely like. Okay. Do you have any advice for aspiring authors?
[21:35]I have advice. I for women women my great things. This is my first book. This is my first published book. There are a few that are still in desk doors in the metaphorical desk doors. And I'm 60. It happened at 60.
[21:51]Don't, you know, I know it's easy and fastle to say don't give up, but don't give up the notes that you're taking on your phone in your notes app for whatever ideas you have for writing a book or an essay or even just a paragraph.
[22:07]Are important. Their art. They, they count as writing. If you're an artist and you're sketching, you know, nap and a napkin at Chuck E. Cheese while your kids at a birthday party.
[22:18]That's art. Keep making your art. There's no expiration on it. There's no expiration on your dreams and you know, and I speak for myself, but I also I'm in a writing group and a friend of mine who has been working on her memoir forever as well.
[22:36]And we saw, you know, the umpteen version of her. She brought it to writing group, the umpteen version of her memoir. And we thought, oh my gosh, you find you hit it. You did it. So, you know, the other thing is be patient with yourself.
[22:50]These things take time.
[22:52]Art takes time getting your getting your thoughts together and and sculpting them into some sort of shape.
[22:59]That takes time. Be good to yourself. Keep doing it. There's no expiration. Another friend of mine published her first book at age at the age of 81.
[23:09]So I can't say that enough is to just keep doing it. Keep taking those notes. Keep sketching on those napkins because it is going to count and it is going to be part of whatever whatever art project or final project or book or painting you are going after.
[23:28]I love that. That is great advice. I also, by the way, we have a publication on medium called moms don't have time to write. And I think you should write an essay called it happened at 60. I think you should just tell this what you just said.
[23:39]I would love to do that. I would absolutely love to do that. Yeah, it happened at 60. But, but you know, it was happening all along. I mean, it was like I was in the carpool lane, you know, like making notes on the back of an envelope.
[23:52]You know, I mean, it just, it happens just just keep doing it. And there's no conventional way to do it. There's no right way to do it. There's no formal way to do it.
[24:01]Just keep doing it. If the spirit is there, it will, it will move you and you will, you will achieve what you want to achieve.
[24:11]Perfect. I love it.
[24:13]Judy, thank you so much. Thank you for taking me along and teaching me about your, your family history and everything from your moms moods to your dad's secrets to every all of it.
[24:26]I mean, it was so interesting and I'm really glad you shared your story. So for however many long years it took as one of your many readers, I found it really fascinating. So thank you for doing it.
[24:37]Thank you. Thank you for having me. It was really wonderful to talk to you, Zippy.
[24:41]You too. All right. Have a great day to you.
[24:44]Bye bye.
[24:45]Thanks for listening to this episode of Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books.
[24:49]Don't forget to follow me on Instagram at Zibi Owens and at Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books.
[24:54]Also sign up for my newsletter at Zibi Owens.com and sign up for my virtual book club and meet lots of authors on Zoom every other week.
[25:01]Thanks so much to Steve and Ryan in fact, Texture Sound for the Sound Editing. And thank you to Morning Moon Productions for providing this fantastic intro and outro music.