Audacious with Chion Wolf

Some rituals are spiritual. Some are silly. Some are inherited, and some are self-made.

Casper ter Kuile, author of The Power of Ritual: Turning Everyday Activities into Soulful Practices, walks us through how we create all sorts of meaningful, grounding rituals.

And you'll hear clips from past two years of Audacious guests who have shared the rituals that matter most to them, from morning journaling and bedtime affirmations to pre-show sign-slapping.

Whether you've already got your rituals down pat, or are still developing your own special routine, this episode shows you how to honor the sacred in the everyday.

This episode originally aired on May 17, 2025.

Suggested episodes:

• Forgiveness: How we define it and how it defines us 
• Life advice, one Audacious guest at a time
• Kitchen objects with a story. Listen at your own whisk
• Why you so salty? The anger episode
• Change Of Art: Stories About Tattoo Coverups
• Awe yeah! Exploring the magic of mind-blowing moments

GUESTS: 

• Casper ter Kuile: author of The Power of Ritual: Turning Everyday Activities into Soulful Practices. He holds Master's degrees in Divinity and Public Policy from Harvard University, and is a co-founder of Sacred Design Lab. He also co-hosts the podcast, Harry Potter and the Sacred Text
• Audacious guests who shared their personal rituals (in order of appearance): Dean Edwards, Jessica Jin, Kristen Geez, Anna Holland, Lena Khalal Tuffaha, Chris Crowe, Bruce W Brackett, Moon Ribas, Azie Dungey, Pony Tromper, Mary Elizabeth Kelly, Paul Marcarelli, Brad White, Begoña Gómez Urzaiz, Dr. Gale Ridge, Mehdi Hasan, Stephanie Courtney, Rosanna Ramos, Sonya Horton, Greg Viloria, Ronnie “Woo Woo” Wickers, Zarna Garg, Jada Star, Luis Mojica, RoseMarie Wallace, Mindy Glickman, David Roche, Paul Gladis, and Arwen, Aidan, and Willow Gladis Perez-Sauquillo     

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What happens when a mother can’t raise her children? Not out of neglect, but because systems, partners, and survival leave her no real choice?

This episode challenges the assumptions we place on “non-custodial mothers.” Rebekah Spicuglia explains how immigration rules, economic pressure, and unequal power led to her relinquishing custody of her son, Oscar, and how she channels her grief after his murder into research on gun violence and family separation.

And from Cameroon, Marie Abanga shares why escaping abuse meant leaving her three young sons behind.

For a full transcript of this episode, click here.

Suggested episodes:

• Life after Parkland: A victim's dad turns to art and activism
• The weight of family secrets: Finding freedom in the truth
• The reality of 'Forever Parenting' when your child needs lifetime care

GUESTS: 

• Rebekah Spicuglia: bereaved mother, writer, advocate, and PhD student in Health Policy & Management at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. She focuses on gun violence and family separation, drawing on her own lived experience to inform her work
• Marie Abanga: Cameroonian author and mental health advocate whose 2011 decision to give up custody of her children guides her mission to support others facing loss, stigma, and recovery

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Step into the technicolor world of PEZ!

We tour the Connecticut factory where more than 12 million tiny candies are pressed each day, guided by archivist Shawn Peterson, whose personal collection helped shape the Visitor Center.

Meet Brian Trauman, the Guinness World Record holder whose thousands of dispensers trace a lifetime of joyful obsession.

Hear Emily Tracy’s tender, funny, heartbreaking story about the PEZ tattoo she got to honor her mother.

And the hosts of PEZamania, the world’s largest PEZ convention, talk about how nostalgia and candy become community.

 

Suggested episodes:

• Discovering delight - and despair - in dumpster diving

• We have to talk about cuddle parties

• Take a tour of the John Zaffis Museum of the Paranormal

• Pawn queens: Tales and treasures from women pawn shop owners

• Audacious at sea: Wisdom from strangers on a cruise ship

 

GUESTS: 

• Shawn Peterson: Company archivist and historian at PEZ Candy, Inc. in Orange, CT. He manages the PEZ Visitor Center, where much of the collection on display comes from his own personal archive. He is also the author of PEZ: From Austrian Invention to American Icon and Collector’s Guide to PEZ: Identification and Price Guide

• Brian Trauman: Owns the world's largest Pez collection and holds the Guinness World Record for “largest candy dispenser collection.” He has been collecting since 1999 and owns more than 6,400 dispensers 

• Morgan Rhinehart and Landon Proctor: hosts of PEZamania in Ohio – the longest running collector convention in the world, established in 1991

• Emily Tracy: Manchester resident who memorialized her PEZ-collecting mom with a tattoo of her head on top of a PEZ dispenser

Support the show: https://www.wnpr.org/donate

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A wise woman once said, “You can tell the ocean anything, but it has to be the truth.“ 

Chion Wolf boards the MSC Meraviglia expecting a week of small talk and sunscreen. But the farther she gets from land, the more people become willing to hang out in the deep end to talk about love, loss, faith, sobriety and stories they’ve been holding onto for years.

When they speak, the ocean listens. And in this hour, so do you.

Listen to a BONUS track featuring more voices from the ship: Latisha from the Bronx; Vincent Ferrito and Lauren Englemann from Brooklyn, NY; Brittney and Jeana Lockhart from New Bedford, MA; Henry Armbrister, Barbara Williams, Dellie Maycock, and Giovanni Ferguson from Nassau, Bahamas.

Suggested episodes:

• The Big E: What it takes to create 17 days of magic
• Life advice, one Audacious guest at a time
• It's A Brand Nude Day! 
• Discovering delight - and despair - in dumpster diving
• Welcome to the Punderdome! We're entering NYC's punniest pun competition
• SOLD! Audacious Auctioneers

Plus, Advice on Amtrak’s Southwest Chief, a project Chion did interviewing passengers on a 48-hour train ride

GUESTS: 

• A segment: Keith Miller from Long Island, NY; Kevin Luong from New York, NY; Vin Panday from Ontario, Canada; Jessica Struble from Holly, PA; Ruby Selver from Turks and Caicos; and Marty and Mary Pasternak from Buffalo, NY
• B segment: Mike Turner from Levittown, PA; Brian Martignetti from El Paso, TX; Darrell Floyd from New Haven, CT; and Randy Deveaux and Sylvia Wilson from Nassau, Bahamas
• C segment: Joe and Valerie Leone from Blue Bell, PA; Tommy and Cindy Lazarz from Ware, MA; John and Ada Sue Siler from Richmond, VA; and Javier and Angela Mahon from Brooklyn, NY

Support the show: https://www.wnpr.org/donate

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Ahoy! Here’s a little bonus treasure from our episode, Audacious at Sea: Wisdom from Strangers on a Cruise Ship. 

Chion spends a blissful vacation week aboard the MSC Meraviglia with about 5,000 fellow humans, sailing from Brooklyn to the Bahamas and back. And because we couldn’t fit everyone she talks with into the on-air version, this bonus gives you even more of their voices and stories.

Somewhere in between sunrise coffees and late-night pizza buffets, Chion asks passengers - and a few locals in Nassau, Bahamas - to share their favorite piece of life advice.

That opens the door to conversations that go way beyond advice, and into the values that people have carried with them much of their lives.  

GUESTS:

• Latisha from the Bronx

• Vincent Ferrito and Lauren Englemann from Brooklyn, NY

• Brittney and Jeana Lockhart from New Bedford, MA

• Henry Armbrister, Barbara Williams, Dellie Maycock, and Giovanni Ferguson from Nassau, Bahamas

Support the show: https://www.wnpr.org/donate

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Would you leave your family, friends, home, and job to move over a thousand miles away to take care of a pet squirrel? Meet two people who did just that for 8 year-old Thumbelina.

Then, meet a birdkeeper at the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute who was chosen by an endangered crane to be her life partner for almost 20 years.

This episode originally aired on September 13, 2024.

Listen to an updated conversation with Chris Crowe, including his experience getting his first tattoo - a giant portrait of Walnut.

Suggested episodes:

• Wings, pouches, and snouts: The world of uncommon emotional support animals
• Birdwatching legend Peter Kaestner's journey to 10,000 birds
• Audacious kids: Stories of courage, conservation, and compassion

GUESTS: 

• Christina and Michael Reyes: The human parents of Thumbelina, an eight-year-old squirrel who has more than two million followers on social media
• Chris Crowe: Birdkeeper at the Smithsonian’s National Zoo and Conservation Biology Institute’s campus in Front Royal, Virginia, and caretaker of Walnut, an endangered white-naped crane from 2004 until her death in January 2024

Support the show: https://www.wnpr.org/donate

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We recently rebroadcast our Audacious episode featuring Chris Crowe. He's a bird keeper at Smithsonian’s National Zoo and Conservation Biology Institute’s campus in Front Royal, Virginia. He spent nearly twenty years as the chosen partner of an endangered white-naped crane named Walnut. She was one of only 5,000 in the world, but to Chris, she was one of a kind. 

Walnut's life expectancy as a bird living in captivity was 15 years. But she died at the age of 42 on January 2, 2024.

In that original episode, just five months after her death, I spoke with Chris about their life together. And from the responses we got, their life together deeply resonated with you. 

Which is why we decided to rebroadcast it! But then something remarkable happened.

A few hours after we decided to publish that rerun, I saw a post from Chris on Facebook: He just got his first tattoo - a giant portrait of Walnut.

When the universe lines things up that precisely, I pay attention. So I reached out to him. I wanted to ask what moved him to get this tattoo now, how it feels to carry her on his arm, and how he’s doing as the two-year anniversary of her death approaches.

Photo and tattoo by Maggie Cho.

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Some people “age gracefully.” These three women age audaciously!

91 year-old comedian, D’yan Forest, commands the stage with her ukulele and sharp wit, spinning the stories of her long life into laughter.

Family law attorney Harriet Newman Cohen, 92, is the kind of lawyer who changed history for LGBTQ+ families and plans on never stopping.

And Charlotte Guttenberg, the 77-year-old Guinness World Record holder for most-tattooed female senior citizen, started inking her body in her fifties and turned herself into a living, breathing work of art.

Suggested episodes:

• Audacious Elders
• Change of art: Stories about tattoo coverups

GUESTS: 

• D’yan Forest: 91-year-old Guinness World Record holder for oldest female comedian, just released her new full-length solo show, A Gefilte Fish Out Of Water
• Harriet Newman Cohen: 92-year-old founding partner of Cohen Stine Kapoor LLP, where she is a negotiator and trial attorney who handles all aspects of matrimonial and family law. She is the author of Passion and Power: A Life in Three Worlds
• Charlotte Guttenberg: 77-year-old Guinness World Record holder for most tattooed female senior citizen

Support the show: https://www.wnpr.org/donate

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Who rejoices in making a bad episode of public radio? We do! But only the best kind of bad. 

On this episode of Audacious, meet Jon from Jon Breaks Bad News, who delivers other people’s worst messages for a living. Then, the co-founders of the Golden Raspberry Awards - also known as the Razzies - celebrate Hollywood’s most spectacular cinematic failures. And finally, a few listeners share their stories of terrible dates, followed by a conversation with Rachel Lithgow. She shares her memoir, My Year of Really Bad Dates.

Suggested episodes:

• I snuck my incarcerated boyfriend out of prison in a dog crate 
• Nothing goes as planned: A first-time offender’s prison story from arrest to release 
• How regret teaches us to live 

 

GUESTS: 

• Jon Breaks Bad News: Creator and host of the Jon Breaks Bad News Show, delivering difficult or awkward messages on behalf of others
• John J. B. Wilson and Mo Murphy: Creators of the Razzie Awards
• Michelle Horsley, Maria Grove, Lindsay Ewing: Audacious listeners who had really bad dates
• Rachel Lithgow: Author of My Year of Really Bad Dates

Support the show: https://www.wnpr.org/donate

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What happens when a Brooklyn woman who identifies as queer, liberal, vegan, and an atheist donates her kidney to a conservative Christian man from Virginia?

Kerry Kennedy and Joey Shervey tell the story of what it looks like when compassion outvotes everything else. Their transplant crossed party lines and personal beliefs to create an unexpected friendship.

Then, Lindsay Vigue describes how a small flyer on the wall of a diner led her to become a living kidney donor, and then to becoming the executive director of Donate Life Connecticut.

Resources:

• Donate Life Connecticut
• National Kidney Foundation
• National Kidney Registry
• OrganDonor.gov
• Former Middletown mayor Dan Drew's TED Talk about why he donated his kidney 

Suggested episode:

• The Story Of The First African American Face Transplant 

GUESTS: 

• Joey Shervey: Kidney transplant recipient from Moneta, Virginia
• Kerry Kennedy: Living kidney donor from Brooklyn, New York
• Lindsay Vigue: Living kidney donor and the executive director of Donate Life Connecticut 

Support the show: https://www.wnpr.org/donate

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.