Intro: looking your best before death,
Let Me Run This By You: On the subject of grit.
Interview: We talk to P.J. Powers

FULL TRANSCRIPT:
Jen Bosworth Ramirez and Gina Pulice. We went to theatre school together. We survived it, but we didn't quite understand it. 20 years later, we're digging deep talking to our guests about their experiences and trying to make sense of it all. We survived theater school and you will too. Are we famous yet? 

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00:00:29

We could do both at once. Yeah, exactly. Okay. That's what I need to hold out for. Just when I need a surgery for something that's. Can I just get the guy from plastics in here? Just give me a little, a little, a little lift. So my mom had this condition where she had her eyelids were drooping, you know, and it was like, and so did all my, all her sisters have the same thing. And so she wanted this surgery that was going to do that. You can't see on the podcast, but it's really funny. I looked insane, but the thing was my mom, and this is sad and funny when she was sort of dying of cancer, decided she wanted all these things done. It was so weird. And the doctors were like, like implants. 

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00:01:11

She got implants right before she died. Teeth implants. Oh, oh, whoops. Oh my God. Oh my God. That would be insane. That would be fantastic. Actually. I want to be the best looking on that fuckable Corp. Yeah, exactly. No boobs, but she wanted, she wanted, she got teeth. I mean, teeth is something you kind of need, so it's not, but I was like, mom, are you sure the ones in the back you need to be getting because you can't see them and you're going through chemo and this is insane, but she wanted it. So she had like 15 grand worth of teeth put in or 20 grand. And then she died two months later and I was like, can we get a refund two months? 

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00:01:51

It was rough. It was rough. But anyway, she wanted to meet St. Peter looking her best. And she wanted that eye surgery done. And they were like, listen, ma'am, you're like literally riddled with cancer. Like I not sure putting you under the knife to get your eyelids is, but she, she was in denial and she didn't want to, of course, who wants to really look at, oh yeah, all this is feudal. Cause I'm going to die soon. So she's like, okay. She was like trying to, she was buying the rebel. She was buying time. I know somebody who had that eyelid surgery done. And then they just look like their eyes are wide open. It's a little startling. It's a little startling. What's happening with your band. 

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00:02:32

So they're in Seattle playing some shows and I did not go with them clearly. And they're, they're doing fine. Their new single came out and they are they're okay. And, but meaning I want it to get into like, I'm really into the informational interview, even though I have to drag myself to go and I I'm the one who asked for it. I'm so dumb. But I went and she was, she was lovely. And gave me the ropes of like, this is what managers actually do. So I'm just educating myself because you know, I'm not going to grad school for music management. I'm not going to do that. And she was lovely. She's an amazing person. 

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00:03:13

And she's a friend of my cousins and she agreed to meet with me and yeah, nothing. I'm just in, I'm still, I guess all this to say, I'm still in the information gathering stage and I'm just seeing what's out there in the world. Jobs. People do like studs, Terkel. I'm just conducting your own research. Let Me Run This By . I really love, I just read grinning about grit. Oh, you did? What was it? I can't remember. Okay. Well, so my thing about grit is I think it's a glamorous kind of idea more often than not. 

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00:04:02

And, and it's kind of part of bootstraps culture and American blah, blah, blah. But I just looked up the definition to remind myself and it means courage and resolve strength of character. I feel like people when they talk about grit often mean, Hm, just muscling through something without, without acknowledging the complexity of it in any way, as opposed to what it really is, which is encourage has a lot to do with it. Oh, I find there's a real lack of courage. 

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00:04:45

I agree. I think that the, the epitome of grit to me is when I'm midway or three quarters of the way up the hill when I'm hiking. And I literally have to, while I'm gritting my teeth and I literally have to pull up from the depths of me, I do anything I can to hold on to just say, keep going up the hill because I want to turn around, like, everything in me wants to turn around. And the thing that keeps me going is encouragement from myself and others, like Gisa, my friend, even though I want to strangle her when she's doing it and a deep well of resolve that, I don't know where it comes from. 

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00:05:33

Like it is, it is, it is like when people talk about marathon running and they're like, I don't know that something kicks in and I, and I have this, it's this courage to just keep going. It is grit is excruciating. It is not like, you know, oh, just give it a try. It is like, it sounds, and I've obviously never, I mean, I've never given birth. So, but like that is to me when it sounds like when you're three quarters of the way pushing a baby out and you just want to die, but you, but you keep going because you have, that's where grit to me that's comes into play. You know, it's a more physiological thing that I think people realize, yes, I agree with you. 

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00:06:16

And also I think it is not so much taught, like explicitly taught behavior as it is people pick it up when other people are modeling it for them. Mostly I was talking to somebody recently who said, you know, I'm just not a soldier. Like this is one of my problems in life is I'm not, I'm not a soldier. And I thought about it and I thought, okay, well I am a soldier. I mean, I will just, I will keep going on, which is not. And it's not always great. No, but it just, that is, it doesn't occur to me a lot of the time to not do something. And I don't really question in the way that I feel like my kids, for example, question, why do I have to do that? 

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00:06:58

Or, you know, I'm back just as a side note, I recently started saying like, you know what, I don't have to give you a reason because I've gotten stuck in this thing of like rationalizing every decision because they, they I've shaped that behavior. And then they say, why, why, why do I have to do that? So if you're, if people in your life don't model grit for you, they don't model sticking things through to the end, having a career, adopting a courageous attitude and then strength of character. I don't know. I D I don't see a ton of it. I feel like represented just in our culture. And, but, or when it is, it's talked about in this like American military, it's a real sort of white dude, John Wayne kind of strengthened character. 

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00:07:52

Yes. A hundred percent. That's what it is. It's the John Wayne. It's the, it's the clinics. What thing? And sure. I ...