After a ten-minute chat on why we love boobs (any size), Nancy gives an update on the Vicky White/Casey White jail break, and Sarah brings us up to date on the Johnny Depp-Amber Heard trial, with an eye on Heard’s small-town Texas past and her first appearance on the stand. But the story of the day is Roe v. Wade, which Sarah knows particularly well, since the case started in Dallas. Nancy admits to agreeing with the politically unpopular Bill Clinton dictum that abortion should be “safe, legal, and rare.” Sarah tells the story of her own abortion at age 30, how it changed her life in ways that can never be measured, and remembers what Milan Kundera wrote in The Unbearable Lightness of Being: “We can never know what to want, because, living only one life, we can neither compare it with our previous lives nor perfect it in our lives to come.”

Episode notes:

Debbie Harry white dress

Cheryl Tiegs (not Christie Brinkley, whoops) in a white mesh swimsuit

Running tab on terms Nancy did not know: Queef, keg stand, motorboat

Nancy’s review of the book Breasts: A Natural and Unnatural History

Vicky White and Casey White have been on the run 7 days!

Amber Heard on the stand, 4/4/22 (video)

“America’s Girls” podcast, hosted by Sarah Hepola

Amber Heard stole my sexual assault story, ex-aide tells libel trial (Guardian, July 2020)

“We Do Abortions Here,” Sallie Tisdale (Harpers 1987)

“The Dishonesty of the Abortion Debate,” Caitlin Flanagan (Atlantic, 2019)

“The Brilliance of ‘Safe, Legal, and Rare,’” Caitlin Flanagan (Atlantic 2019)

“Roe v. Wade’s Secret Heroine Tells Her Story,” Joshua Prager on Linda Coffee (Vanity Fair, 2017)

“Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s Warning About Roe v. Wade Came True,” Ewan Palmer (Newsweek, 2022)

“Things Fell Apart” podcast, with Jon Ronson

David Foster Wallace on Abortion

The Unbearable Lightness of Being, by Milan Kundera

Outro song: “Here Comes the Sun,” the Beatles

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit smokeempodcast.substack.com/subscribe