“Raise your hands above your head, and wave like you’re happy to see me!” she yelled at those of us sitting in the audience. “Wave more! You’re REALLY HAPPY! You’re REALLY, REALLY HAPPY! Tug on your right earlobe, and at the same time, tug on your left earlobe with your opposite hands, while doing the hokey-pokey, and turning yourself around! Jump up and down in your chair but DO NOT stand up, and sing the Declaration of Independence to the melody of Hello Dolly!*

Uh, oh. What did I get myself into? S**t. I hate audience participation exercises. Icebreakers. Warm-ups. Make a decision. Are they cold or are they hot? The audience is all the way in. They’re playing this game and shouting responses; they’re raising their hands and waving like lunatics.

Not me. I’m planted in my seat, arms folded across my chest, resolute in my decision not to play. I paid $25 plus fees to be entertained. I paid $25 plus fees to be a supportive friend. I had no idea I’d be expected to join in. I am not into this. If I want to perform, I’d be on that stage.

I’m sitting in the audience. I want to be anonymous.

I hear my brain yammering away, and I nod my head at my predictable resistance. I smile, and try very hard to surrender. A little voice berates me, Lighten up, Nan. Why is this so hard for you?

I’m not all the way in, because if I was all the way in, I might enjoy myself. Isn’t it enough that I bought a ticket for $25 PLUS fees? I left my warm house on a frigid night, because I love my friend Nancy.

I should have noticed the clues when I first arrived; this wasn’t going to be easy. What do you mean, the theater’s upstairs? There’s no elevator? I eyed the stair lift chair and considered hitching a ride. I don’t need help climbing stairs; I’m just lazy and out of shape.

When I get to the second floor, I’m blasted with music so loud, I want to turn around, run down the stairs, and end the evening before it has a chance to begin. Then I wonder if I really have auditory processing issues. That’s what I tell people when I have an overreaction to noise. It’s possible that I’m just a delicate princess rearing my privileged head.

One small consolation was the dish of mini Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups I discovered just outside the theater door. Chocolate and peanut butter makes everything better.

I grab an aisle seat. The show hasn’t started but I’m mapping out my exit. My go-bag is packed; I can sneak out right after Nancy’s part of the show. I’ll dash for the door, but I’ll be discreet.

I dig through my bag for earplugs, desperate to lower the volume. They’re useless, the music is so loud. I take a deep breath and invite myself to get over it, already. I settle into my chair, open my mind, and remind my heart why I was there.

“My improv show is tonight,” Nancy wrote in an email that day.

“What? How come you didn’t tell me? Can I come?”

She told me she didn’t invite anyone, and then she sent the link so I could buy a ticket (for $25 plus fees) but I don’t think she was happy about it. I want to go and kvell. Kvell? Yiddish. To feel happy and proud. I want to applaud her.

Performing in this show and taking improv classes is a big deal for Nancy. Months ago, she told me over cocktails, that she was failing improv. Her teacher said she couldn’t advance to the next level with her classmates because she needed to loosen up and listen. She needed to relax.

She didn’t graduate from Level One on the first try; so she signed up again. It didn’t make her give up. There’s a good chance if that happened to me, I would have stomped off, my ego bruised. There’s a good chance, I would have been angry, too.

For Nancy, the show tonight is the culmination of months of classes.

Nancy does brave things all the time. Over the years, she’s inspired me to do brave things, too. Those are stories for another day. All I’ll say is there were elephants, 24-hour flights, and a couple of impulsive puppy adoptions involved.

Braving has become a recurring theme in my life. A welcome one, no matter how uncomfortable the process of getting there has been. Braving offers me an invitation to thrive and live a full life.

And still, before I do something new, my first reflex is to feel scared and want to hide. I yearn to come down with a mysterious flu, a sudden high fever, or a sprained lower back. Here’s a good one: a power outage that makes it impossible to free my car from my garage because of my sprained lower back.

It’s always easier in the moment to opt out, to stay home. It has little to do with reality, and lots to do with shame. The old remnants, the “I’m not good enough to…fill in the blank.” But it’s harder in the long run, because just like credit card interest, shame compounds over time.

So, I get up, put my coat on, kiss the pups, and open my f*****g garage door

Even with all the therapy and 12-step work I’ve done, it seems I still need to go through this process before I can get to my yes. And from what I hear, improv is all about the YES.

The phrase “I’m not good enough,” has escorted me through life, saying things likeYou can’t! Who do you think you are? They’ll laugh at you. Sweet little nothings that do so much harm.

When these feelings come up, I can smile at them more quickly. I say, I hear you; I know you, I understand, but it’s time for you to move along, because I have a life to live. I’ve let you run the show long enough, now it’s my turn to direct.

I sit in the audience, grumbly and uncomfortable. I sit in the audience and watch Nancy do her thing. She plays, she imitates farm animals, makes funny noises, and sings. In 15 years of friendship, I’ve never heard her sing. I didn’t know she could. I watch her meet her discomfort and embrace it. I assume that once this performance is over, she’ll move on to her next challenge. I found out later that my assumption was wrong.

Sitting in the audience, I recall the me I used to be when I was young. I performed as a clown and mime in high school. Wearing clown make-up and a costume made it easier to be on stage, because I was playing someone else. I still dress like Marcel Marceau. I did have a larger capacity for silliness and play, in between the bouts of teenage angst and rage.

I’m dealing with the angst and rage. I have better tools. I want to have fun. I want to laugh and play, even though life and our current state of affairs in this country tamp my desires from one minute to the next. That thought, that I shouldn’t be having fun, while the world is on fire.

The other thing that’s kept me back? My old pal, body shame.

I thought about the bigger-than-life improv actors and compared them to clowns. There are a lot of similarities. I thought about my love for storytelling. I pondered the idea of signing up for the Level One class.

What? What am I thinking?

The woman who led the audience through the warm-ups? She’s the teacher. It’s her school. She’s too loud, this is too physical, I’m too fat. Despite my resistance, I had a funny feeling in my belly. The feeling that improv is my next right thing to do. The next brave thing.

I left the show that night with improv on my mind.

Should I do it? Maybe. I’ll sit with it. What if I hate it? What if I suck at it? I won’t suck at it. What’s the hesitation about? The fear?

The fear is that I’ll be awkward in the fatness of my body. Then this thought came next, What a great opportunity to BE in my body. Fully out there, in front of a roomful of people. To let go of the shame, once and for all.

I went to the school’s website a bunch of times but kept stopping when I got to the payment button. It took me seven days to fill out the application, pay the tuition and set up the interview with the loud lady from the show.

I meet with her today. I’ll keep you in the loop.

In the past year, I’ve lost a significant amount of weight. I’m still fat, and that’s okay. This story isn’t about the pounds that have fallen away. It’s about the weight that lifted because of my recovery work. The weight I’ve carried on my body is the metaphor for what I’ve carried around for decades. The weight of shame and fear. As I shed shame and fear, my body sheds its fat, its armor.

I’m not hiding anymore.

Over the past five years, I’ve met myself in the mirror, at my kitchen table, in my car, in bed, and in mindless trips to my refrigerator and pantry whenever triggers arise. And I’ve met myself in my relationships with others.

The weight of resistance, of carrying false core beliefs, and all the ways I’ve hidden throughout my life, has lifted.

When that weight falls away, I’m left with me, and that’s all I need. Me. Because of the work I’ve done, I’m revealing myself a little at a time. I’m coming out to play. I’ve told you my stories, first recording my voice, then, using video to show my face. Those were brave steps. I’ve startedWham! Bam! Thank You! Slam!

And, the next step? The Full Monty. NO, I won’t be naked. I promise it will never go that far. But I’ll be showing all of me, in front of people who are there to cheer me on.

I’m getting on that stage.

*Disclaimer: When I shared this story with Samantha Jones before publication, I asked her if there was anything she’d like me to tweak for the sake of accuracy. She admitted she was slightly horrified at the way I described the loud lady doing icebreakers and warm-ups. Sam wants potential improv-loving audience-goers to be assured that her warm-ups are nothing like the ones I described.

Yes. I was employing that handy tool that writers sometimes use, exaggeration. I’ll do anything to get a laugh. Well, except for the real Full Monty. That’s where I draw the line.

Improv isn’t about being funny, it’s about being free.

Because every human was born to play.

Samantha Jones, Hudson Valley Improv

Wham! Bam! Thank You! Slam!’s next show is February 21, 2026. The theme is The Love Boat, our nod to Valentine’s Day.

Ten great storytellers talk about love in four minutes or less. It’s on Zoom!

The lineup:

Kari Bentley-Quinn, Rachel Kramer Bussel, Sarah Hauser, Amanda Jaffe. Kara Westerman (she/her), Jennifer Silva Redmond, Kelly Thompson TNWWY Janine De Tillio Cammarata 🖊️, Susan Kacvinsky, Irena Smith, Eileen Dougharty

When I was little, I had two nicknames; “Nancy No-No” and “No, No, Nanette.” My folks thought they were hilarious for thinking up these clever monikers, and took enormous pleasure in taunting me with them for years. Backstory is unimportant, so unimportant that I never learned what it was, though I’m pretty certain (because I’m my parent’s daughter and I’m clever, too) that it had to do with me not wanting to be told what to do or how do it. Maybe I just overstayed my terrible twos…until I was sixty-two.

“No” was an immature defense mechanism or a precocious attempt at individuation at a very young age. As I got older, I became a master at digging my heels in.

My reasoning was based on simple logic:

* No one knows anything I don’t already know.

* No one knows what I need better than I do.

* There is nothing anyone can tell me that could possibly contribute to my growth as a human being.

* The end.

This was my stand:

Don’t tell me what to do, think, feel, wear, eat, read, learn, understand, desire, and definitely don’t tell me how to cut my hair. I was a NO waiting to happen because input from others made me feel small, stupid, and inconsequential. The biggest reason for my resistance was that if I was found lacking, it meant I wasn’t good enough. The worst part? The belief that not being good enough was a lifetime sentence. There was no coming back from it.

The chorus of critical voices boomed in my head.

That belief became my excuse for not trying things that scared me, or that I’d have to work for. I’d dip my toe in for a second and if the water was too cold or too hot or the stroke was too complex, I’d signal the nearest lifeguard to rescue me from drowning in water that was only 2 feet deep. If it felt like I might fail at something, I’d abandon the undertaking before I got started. Quitting as soon as I felt challenged was the only coping mechanism I used. One big fat NO, whenever I felt cornered by fear or doubt. For years I avoided pursuing things that I was interested in because I thought everything I wanted to do should be easy or come naturally.

I compared myself to others, obscuring my ability to see my own worth.

I’d lose interest quickly and walk away if I didn’t experience immediate success. When I peeked at a classmate’s sketches and compared them to mine, it never once occurred to me that the reason their drawings were so beautiful was because they practiced; they drew and drew and drew. It was their passion, it was worth working for. All I could see was a finished product. I never saw the hard parts they might have encountered. I filled in the blanks with foregone conclusions that were based in fiction and an affinity for self-deprecation.

The voice in my head would berate me, reminding me that if I wasn’t born talented, I’d never achieve my goal of the minute. I lacked the insight to see that achievement requires commitment, repetition, teachers, helpers, and time. Instead, I stood to the side, safe, sad, and jealous, while I watched others excel, instantly disqualifying myself. I believed in saving time by saving face before my face required saving. Tidy.

It never occurred to me, not once, that I might succeed.

When it was time for me to go to college, I applied to one school. The school had an open enrollment policy. Everyone who applied got in. The idea of rejection was intolerable to me, and if I had to do this thing called college, I’d avoid the stress and worry that came with waiting for an acceptance or experiencing the heartbreak of rejection. I dodged college application essays and getting dragged from one college campus to another with my mother.

Two weeks into my second semester I dropped out. I had no idea what I wanted to learn and didn’t feel prepared for anything. Nobody told me going to college would help me figure it out. I wanted to be in the adult world, making money, and having lots of sex. There’d be no more homework, no more exams, no more papers. Yay!

The idea of writing term papers was daunting and I was embarrassed to ask for help. Me, the one who was supposed to know everything. To avoid dorm life, I purposely applied to a commuter college because I was too insecure and damaged from years of bullying to live with other students.

My social interactions in junior high and high school were pretty disastrous. I didn’t enjoy being around people my age. If I had to live in a dorm, it wouldn’t be easy to hide.

My father was furious when I told him I dropped out. Sitting on his couch, I was stone. My arms locked over my chest, I barely listened to all the good reasons he had for me to stay in school. Throughout his frustrated tirade, I felt nothing except a determination to win. I steeled myself against my quitter shame, I made believe it wasn’t lurking right near by.

My mind was made up. Nothing touched me. Not his words, not his anger. His concern and love meant nothing to me. I just wanted to win. I wanted relief. To be free of the anxiety I conjured while perseverating on scenarios that might never happen. My thoughts were rooted in the past and in the future. I didn’t have a clue how to exist in real time.

My held conviction was that not trying was better than trying and failing.

Don’t tell me what to do.

Relief never came because quitting fired up my critical voice. The sing-song voice that chanted, “see we were right. You are a loser. Now what are you going to do?” To validate my decisions, I had lists of rehearsed excuses on hand. One thing was certain; I was a huge success when it came to failing in advance of an unknown outcome. Call me Nan “Nip it in the bud” Tepper.

Lack of humility and unearned pride drove my heels deeper until I was mired in the quicksand of my self-destructive machinations. I couldn’t admit until my late 50s that maybe I made a mistake, or two, or ten. As a student, I did well without trying hard; I wasn’t into hard. I was into “please make the pain stop.” I was terrified that utilizing the system I relied on in junior high and high school would fail me in college.

I was that student who’d show up late to school the day a paper was due. I’d be late because I’d write the paper that morning. Please note there were never Cliff Notes involved, and AI was 4 decades away. Never. I might have done better had there been Cliff Notes involved. I may have been a procrastinator, I may have been a bit lazy, or just a teenager, but I damn well had ethics.

I said no to travel, to new experiences, to anything, ANYTHING outside of my carefully crafted comfort zone. Not participating or taking risks was the perfect antidote-in-advance for anything I deemed vaguely threatening.

I spent years avoiding writing because I convinced myself that I couldn’t, even though the people in my life experienced me differently. They saw my potential; they took the time to tell me they saw it. They saw talent. Writing the word “talent” makes me cringe. I had trust issues. Now, those trust issues come up less frequently, but there are vestiges that cling. I get suspicious if someone says nice things about me. My suspicion is that although they’re being kind they really feel sorry for me. Or worse yet, they’re trying to humiliate me and laughing behind my back.

What an awful load to carry.

Because of the work I’ve done in therapy and 12-step recovery I recognize my stubbornness, my need to defend, my fear of new things.When that NO wants to pop out of my mouth, I pause and get curious.

When my NO comes up, after some internal kicking and screaming, I’m learning to shift my perspective. I take a deep breath and ground myself, become more present to the feelings in my body, the tightness in my jaw, the constriction in my solar plexus. I talk to the scared little kid who lives inside of me. I tell her, “It’s okay, hold my hand. I’ve got you. You’ve got me. We can figure this out together.”

Calling myself a writer and doing the work is a triumph for me.

My resistance is my opportunity to learn something new, to examine the flip side of my NO. Where is my YES? Why is it hiding? What am I afraid of? I reach for humility. I embrace honesty. I admit that I don’t know everything. There’s a world outside of my safe little bubble loaded with possibility. Taking more risks, jumping in, is something I’m willing to do. I know I can be afraid of doing something new, and then do it anyway.

I just put the finishing touches (maybe) on an essay that will be published in an anthology. A book. In one year’s time, I’ll hold it in my hands, and see my title and my name in the table of contents. I’ve been working on this essay for months. Months. As I churned, I experienced moments of frustration, moments when I thought I’d never get it done, I’d never get it. I told my story fifty different ways. I wrote and wrote until I got to the core of what I needed to say. I worked with editors who taught me craft, and pointed out my strengths and weaknesses. Nothing stung. Gratitude and willingness took the lead even when I felt the old “this is too hard” tug. I smiled and began again. I learned that the process is the real reward. I finally understood what more seasoned writers mean when they say writing is hard.

I learned that something can be hard but it doesn’t mean it can’t be achieved. I’m not a quitter anymore.

Turning my NO into YES is getting easier. When fear arises, I ask fear if there’s something it wants me to know. I ask fear if it’s trying to protect me by keeping me from living. I assure fear that I’ll protect them. I tell fear to get behind me.

Discernment has taken fear’s place, and fear gets to take a much-needed and well-earned break.

As much as I adore and require alone time, I’m not a hermit anymore, I’m not an island. I let people in. I graciously accept their wisdom and guidance. I ask for it. I ask for help. I show up in vulnerability, my belly soft, my heart seeking.

As much as it lacks the fun alliteration and rhythm, Nan Yes-Yes is a potent nickname.

Paid subscriptions are available for those who can and want to support The Next Write Thing. There are no paywalls here and never will be. If you’re not into subscriptions, please consider making a donation from time to time!

Our firstWham! Bam! Thank You! Slam! show was a great success. Our next show is on February 21, 2026 at 5pmET on Zoom. The theme is “The Love Boat.” Tickets are on sale now, or grab a paid subscription, see all the slams for free, and access the videos later. This is what happened when my “No” turned into “Yes.” I’m living my dreams. Come play. Say yes.

February’s event, The Love Boat, will feature Kari Bentley-Quinn, Rachel Kramer Bussel, Sarah Hauser, Kara Westerman (she/her), Jennifer Silva Redmond, Janine De Tillio Cammarata 🖊️, Kelly Thompson TNWWY, Susan Kacvinsky, Irena Smith, Eileen Dougharty, Slamone de Beauvoir. I’ll be telling a story, too.

We have one storyteller spot that just opened up. If you’re a writer on Substack and don’t identify as male (and you’re of a feminist bent), come tell a story. You’ll have fun. You may discover something new about yourself. You might get hooked. Send me a message.

A few months ago I published an essay titled I’m in the Mood for Love.

I wrote it while struggling with the fierce anger I was feeling about the world we’re living in, the apparent future we’re facing, and the thugs who are wreaking a startling amount of havoc in our communities, in our homes.

But now it’s escalating. The haters are hurting immigrants and all people of color are at grave risk, immigrant or not, because how would the ICE thugs know? They all look alike. Right? The haters are oppressing women and destroying lives (otherwise known as murdering innocent people). They operate without an iota of conscience or morality. Those qualities are missing in action for all the players involved. Top down.

The essay I wrote in September reflected my thought process at the time. I opted to turn to love instead of hatred. I turned toward beauty and rejected ugliness. I turned toward building and sustaining community instead of fracture and isolation.

It’s amazing to me how feelings can shift in 4 months’ time. In a week, or a day, or a moment. The moment it takes to pull a trigger. Again.

I’m flooded with feelings right now, and I’m grateful for those feelings because it’s better than shutting down and numbing to what’s happening around us each day. It’s painful and overwhelming. It’s necessary for me to keep feeling. I’m glad I still have the ability to discern, to know that nothing is black and white. I can feel love in an instant and feel hatred just as quickly.

When that happens, I get to decide what to do with those feelings. I’ve noticed the tenor of my behavior this week. My old tendency, my reactivity, is on alert, it’s ramped up, and when I get triggered by the comments of others, my responses are often heated and blunt. The reactivity is rooted in fear.

My connection to Grace becomes as shaky as can be.

I’m overly sensitized to negativity, mansplaining, and nonsense in general. I’m offended by AI images and writing. I worry that a time will come when I won’t be able to detect it, it’s starting to get so good.

I let myself get sucked in, taken over by my emotions and ego. I engaged with male readers after getting a dose…or ten of mansplaining. Yes, those men who think they’re self-aware, so woke. I’ve picked a couple of fights this past week, and I was feeling justified, of course. That behavior woke me up. It reminded me to be on the lookout for emotional imbalance, reminding myself to pause, ground, and breathe before I respond. Sometimes I wait until the following day to reply. And because I’ve waited, sometimes I don’t reply at all. I’m grateful that I give myself a chance to be objective, rather than reacting in a blaze of anger.

When I’m feeling reactive and wait a day to respond, it’s a sign of health.

When I’m awake to myself, I take the time to question my motives.

I’m angry. I’m hurting, and yes, even though I don’t want to admit it, I feel scared. I go in and out of that feeling. But I’ll be damned if I give in to fear. The other day, I was reading the latest news, the heinous comments and threats from the Travesty Called Our Government, and I let fear take over. As a reaction to that fear, I went online and started researching gun shops and shooting ranges in my area. I’ve done this before. The first time was in 2017. Sometimes I surf for real estate in other countries and research immigration requirements to see if there’s another place I can go.

It scares the s**t out of me that I could go to a place of buying in to the violence. So, I paused. I grounded. I took a breath. I pictured myself, standing in the middle of my living room, holding a shot gun against an intruder, an ICE agent, let’s say, and I could see myself trembling and sobbing. Not from fear, but from a place of deep sadness and disgust that this is who we are, who we’ve become. I cannot imagine taking someone’s life in real life. But I allow myself the fantasy. I’m giving myself permission to have all the thoughts, to not judge them.

Because they’re just thoughts. Not actions.

All that surfing is a form of spinning, but it also temporarily soothes a need in me to feel in control of this situation, our situation. Then, I swing back to the real world, to my true self. The self that knows that in the end it’s the fear that will get me, and not the people who use violence and aggression against us. It helps me remember what I can control and what I can’t.

When I’m there, Grace is by my side.

That’s what separates someone like me from someone like the “man” (?) who murdered Renee Good. It separates me from the army of villains. And honestly, I’m nowhere close to being able to extend Jonathan Ross a shred of compassion for the damage he’s most obviously suffered in his personal history. I’ll probably never get to that place. There are certain acts that to me, are unforgivable.

Yesterday morning, I read the thank-you letter that Rebecca Good, Renee Good’s wife, sent out to the interwebs. It was suffused with Grace, it was gentle. She celebrated her wife’s memory; she spoke of the spark that emanated from her poet partner. There was no blame, no anger, it had more dignity to it than anything I’ve read. It’s longish, and it’s worth your time.

“On Wednesday, January 7th, we stopped to support our neighbors. We had whistles. They had guns.”

I’m amazed at Rebecca Brown Good’s equanimity, and yet, I also find it worrying. How do we stay kind in the face of such evil? And should we?

I watched the videos, finally. Is anyone talking about Rebecca Good’s actions that morning? Be clear that this is not about blaming victims. She spoke to truth to power, which can be a very frightening thing to do. I’m sure her words in those moments did nothing to help their situation. The reason I’m mentioning it, is we have to be smart. I’m saying that for me as much as for anyone else.

These men are living examples of short fuses waiting to explode. Let’s not give them more reasons. Let’s be smart.

I have no answer for you today. On Friday night, I got into bed at 5:30, thoroughly and blearily exhausted. I invited my dogs to cuddle, laptop open to Stranger Things. I wanted to see the good guys win against the MONSTERS, even in a fantasy. I needed that. It turned out I didn’t watch much, because I’d posted in Notes that I was going to bed and what time it was and why. The love and witnessing that came back to me was stunning.

The reason I’m telling you this is because instead of isolating and bearing my grief and anger alone, I talked about it with my dear friend Eileen, I wrote about it and shared it in the Substack feed. I reached out and shared the other side of me, the one who isn’t funny, upbeat, nice Nan. I made myself vulnerable.

I am indeed that woman sobbing in the middle of her living room floor.

After a lifetime of choosing to go it alone, I’ve learned that building community is the most self-loving, healthy thing I can do. This road we’re walking down together? It’s hard, we have no idea what’s going to happen tomorrow, or in the next minute, but community is the thing that makes us strong.

We must keep coming together.

I’m publishing this essay early this week, for two reasons. One, because it’s timely, but primarily because I’ll be getting ready for the first Wham! Bam! Thank You! Slam! event on January 17, 2026. There’s still a lot for us to do. I’m mentioning it because this project is my effort toward building community in the world and on Substack. It’s my act of love and resistance. I’m creating this space with Eileen Dougharty and our do-nothing figurehead and feminist inspiration, Slamone de Beauvoir. Oh, and if you don’t know, Slamone’s not real, we made her up, because we think she’s funny.

She’s our version of Vera Peterson, of Maris Crane. And yes, our Ugly Naked Guy.

Not a stitch of AI was used in her creation.

Wham! Bam! Thank You! Slam! is a space for women storytellers and others who don’t identify as male to come tell stories. It’s a space for us to share our lives with others. To share all the feelings. The joy, the laughter, the outrage, the astonishment, the grief.

To say yes to some things and no to others. To be together.

And to those you who identify as male? You’re welcome to support Wham! Bam! Thank You! Slam! as an audience member and donor. Your job is to be there and for once in your life, hold your mansplaining tongues and listen.

xoNan

And, if you want more information about the first story slam, which takes place on Saturday January 17, 2026 at 5pm ET, click the button, claim your seat and celebrate the art of spoken word storytelling.

We’re dedicating our first show to Renee Good’s memory, and a portion of our proceeds will be donated to her family.

When I was a little kid, I learned to be a caretaker. Somehow, I got the message that I existed to help others. An early lesson learned from parents who loved me in a sincere, yet transactional way. If you do this, then, we’ll do this. Cause and effect. Our address was 4 Quid Pro Quo Lane, Anytown, USA.

Generosity that’s conditional is not generosity at all.

When giving to others comes with no strings attached, it’s a beautiful thing. For many years, I gave to others to validate my worth, thinking that if I just did enough––made myself indispensable––I’d be loved. I had no idea I could be loved for who I was, and that who I was and who I am is enough. I didn’t get that message growing up. I became a people-pleaser because making people happy brought me attention, a sense of security (that turned out to be false), and a modicum of love, however loaded.

People-pleasing was my coping mechanism, my survival skill.

There was a girl named Nina in my 1st grade class who used to hand out dollar bills to our classmates. I’d think, “why would she do that?” She was selective about her distributions; I never got one. I remember feeling a flutter in my belly, a sense of unease, as I watched her pluck a single dollar bill out of a little pink wallet to gift to her next new best friend. The flutter, the unease, wasn’t because I felt left out. I felt those things because her actions were too familiar. It was a turn-off, but that didn’t stop me from doing the same thing in more ways than just handing out cash bribes.

I acquired the habit of doing for others, giving to others, not from a place of selfless generosity, but as a cry for connection and safety. The behavior became a regular practice in my life, a knee-jerk response when I saw something that I thought was needed and wanted. I thought my actions were genuine.

Yes, I started young. No, I didn’t realize that beneath my efforts, I had an ulterior motive. I took great pride in being a good-deed-doer. I did lots of good deeds. I raised money for charity. I went door-to-door at 10 years-old, selling raffle tickets to raise money for cerebral palsy because I wanted my neighbor, Mrs. Lingley, to adore me. She lived down the block; her house was my home away from home. She was the person who set me on the road to baby philanthropy, and C.P. was her cause. I would have done anything for her. I didn’t care about her cause as much as I wanted her love and approval.

She already loved me, and all these years later, she still does. I didn’t need to do more.

I was a well-trained, highly-skilled codependent. I became a rescuer. I watched for opportunities to be the helper; someone people could depend on to come through for them in a crisis. I became quite an expert at manufacturing need when none existed.

I lived this way for most of my life, doing for others and then suffering the backlash of my actions. I became resentful of the people I helped, because they weren’t loving me enough or reciprocating.

Helping can be a power play in disguise. A covert manipulation, conscious or not. When my dad died, he left me money. I spent a lot of that money on other people, to my detriment and to the detriment of my relationships with them. I picked up dinner tabs regularly and bought people extravagant gifts. I gave so much away thinking I was helping, but I wasn’t. It wasn’t clean. It wasn’t selfless. I refused to see the discomfort I created for others. I wanted something back. I never got what I was looking for and now the money’s gone. And guess what? My friends still love me, even though I’m not a hot-shot anymore. Fancy that.

In those acts of loaded generosity, I was disempowering others and I wasn’t watching out for myself. I wasn’t thinking of my future; I was desperate to be loved, to be the center of attention. I thought I was being kind. On some level, I wanted to be the hero, when I didn’t need to do more than be a good friend. That’s how little I believed in my own value. And I’d be left grumbling and angry that nothing I did worked to fill the very large hole in my heart.

I’m telling you about my history because of the awakening I’ve had. I’ve changed dramatically over the last few years. I still believe in generosity. It’s one of my core values. But my focus has shifted. I give to give. I check in with myself before I do. Is it clean? No strings? When I released my expectations and gave to others with new clarity and a commitment to my well-being first, I began to receive gifts I could never have imagined. Not material gifts, but the gifts of self-esteem, courage, and an ability to see myself as others do.

To gaze into my new mirror and love the person looking back at me.

Learning to pause and get curious about my intentions has been a miracle. Not saying yes to every demand of my time and resources has given me the freedom to thrive, to not form resentments against others. I’m not being selfish. I’m being SELF-ish. I’m loving me, first. My evolution owes credit to my therapist, the 12-step work I do daily, and my willingness to live the best life I possibly can.

I’m on the threshold of celebrating 2 years on Substack. In that time, I’ve discovered myself as a writer, started a graphic design and tech business, and I’m about to premiere my new stack, Wham! Bam! Thank You! Slam! It’s an online feminist story slam featuring writers who publish on the Substack platform. The first show, January 17, 2026, is on the second anniversary of my arrival here. I can’t think of a better way to celebrate. Not one.

A primary reason for this project is to support women writers in this publishing space. I want to showcase and promote others.

One of the most beautiful things I’ve witnessed during my time here is that true generosity abounds. I’ve attracted like-minded givers. The writers and creators I’ve met here have helped me grow as a person, as a colleague, as a friend. They’ve helped me build my readership. They’ve contributed to my confidence, they’ve boosted me, sharing my writing and cheering me on. The thing I love most is the support I witness every day. People come from their hearts, expecting nothing in return. I want to believe that it’s not transactional. We get excited for one another when good things happen.

How lovely to witness generosity in action during this horrid time when so many seem to only be out for themselves.

When I coach my clients about growth on Substack, the first thing I tell them is to be generous, to promote other people’s work, to always respond to their readers comments. To engage and be real. No one is our competition because we’re unique. We have distinct voices.

I tell my students, my clients to read and recommend the smaller stacks. To restack other peoples’ work, but to take an extra minute to add a comment. To slow down and and take a sec to tip their hats to a writer who’s moved them. To be kind.

The big names, the “stars,” don’t need our help, not the way those of us with smaller followings could benefit from someone else noticing us and sharing our efforts.

I sing the praises of Substack every day, even when I complain about things they could do better. There are a lot of things they can do better, but mostly, they’re doing great. Being here, in combination with the work I’ve done in my 12-Step program has been utterly transformative. I’m living the life I’ve always dreamed of. I know, at last, that I am enough, MORE than enough. I matter and I belong. That’s the crux, isn’t it?

I belong.

I’ve never felt that way before. I’m part of something greater than myself here. All of you, the people who read my stories and comment so generously, the writers whom I’ve become friends with over these last 2 years, the writers I LOVE to read––you’ve been my sustenance. I’ve seen what’s possible when people come together and lift each other up. That’s the work. The love. The relationships. The community. We’re building it together. We’re making miracles here.

I’m so happy to be a citizen of Substackland. It’s a magical place to reside.

I’m clear about what the next right thing is for me.

I’m going to continue the spirit of generosity at Wham! Bam! Thank You! Slam! I hope you’ll join me there, it’s gonna be a helluva great time.

Thank you for the best 2 years of my life.

Periodically, I like do shout-outs for my writer pals, the people who inspire me, who I want you to know, so you can be inspired, too. I’m going to do my best to not miss anyone, but I’m not sure I’ll get it right. So please, if you know in your heart that you’ve touched mine, accept my thanks, my x’s and o’s, and forgive me for my lapses. Or call me out in the comments, that could be fun. Then I’ll add you to this post. If you think you should be on this list, then I agree.

To my readers, I love calling you my readers: Every single one of you. Thank you for your vulnerable and kind comments, your encouragement and your all-around support whether you are a free or paid subscriber. I cherish your interest in what I have to say. I cherish what you have to say. It’s the best gift ever.

To the writers: For inspiring me every day. You make my life rich with your wisdom and humor, with your over-the-top support. Readers, if you’re not familiar with their work, take a look. You won’t be sorry.

Slamone de Beauvoir • Elizabeth Beggins • Kari Bentley-Quinn • Amrita Skye Blaine • Amy Brown • Laury Boone Browning • Eileen Vorbach Collins • Amy Cowen • Rhaine Della Bosca • According to Mimi • Jodi Sh. Doff • Eileen Dougharty • Leah Eichler • Mesa Fama • Amy Gabrielle • Blair Glaser • Jess Greenwood • Douglas Halpert • Amanda B. Hinton • Dina Honour • Marya Hornbacher • Nancy Jainchill • Alisa Kennedy Jones • Cathy Joseph • Susan Kacvinsky • Kristi Keller 🇨🇦 • Dr. Heidi • Rona Maynard • Sandra Ann Miller • Lyns McCracken • Prajna O'Hara • Christina Patterson • Mary Roblyn • Leslie Senevey • Sly • Irena Smith • Chris Stanton • Nancy Stordahl • SuddenlyJamie • Holly Starley • Robin Taylor (he/him) • Untrickled by Michelle Teheux• Kelly Thompson TNWWY • Susan J Tweit Wendy Varley • Kimberly Warner Katrina Anne Willis • Wendy Wolf

And geez…get your tickets to January’s first show! We have 100 seats and they’re going fast. If you haven’t seen Wham! Bam! Thank You! Slam! yet, head on over and take a look. I’m very proud of the work I’m doing with my pal, Eileen Dougharty.

On this night, I’m going to tell you a story. A story about a different kind of savior. One who saved millions of American homemakers (yes, they were women) who wanted to enchant their husband’s palates with something a little more interesting than beef stew. So, they learned to cook with the best. JC, heretofore referred to as Julia Child. And what did those women learn to cook first? Boeuf Bourguignon! Beef stew. Oooh, la, la!

THEN:

It’s 1969, and I run into the den, where my parents are watching TV. I say, “Mommy, I’m hungry, it’s dinnertime!” And in stereo, they “SHHHHHHH!” me.

Oh. Yeah. They’re watching Julia Child. That funny lady who cooks French food on Channel 13, the “educational” channel. The rule was I could hang out with them and watch if I didn’t utter a word.

Julia Child was revered as a god in our house. A very odd god. Her strange voice, her towering height, the way she threw ingredients around and pounded meat and dropped things and made mistakes. She was funny, though I think most of the time it was unintentional. So, I’d sit with my folks and watch. Eventually I came to appreciate how special she was, though she never tempted me to cook. My mother loved her chocolate soufflé. My father adored her cassoulet. I just liked watching, waiting for the next faux pas. She made me laugh.

20 YEARS LATER:

It’s 1989 and I’m working as a server at Union Square Café in Manhattan. It was a dream job in the business. At the time, it was one of the top three restaurants in NYC and was so popular that getting a reservation required luck, patience, or fame. I arrive for a Tuesday lunch shift, and my manager, Bobbie, pulls me to the side to tell me which station I’m working.

“We have a very special guest coming today for lunch, and you’ve got her table.” And I think to myself, it’s about time, I never get the important guests.

“Who is it?” I ask, expecting someone in the book business because the restaurant was in the publishing industry neighborhood.

Bobbie looks at me, a huge gap-toothed grin on her beautiful face, and excitedly says, “Julia Child! Julia Child with a party of twelve!”

I choke and stop breathing.

Julia Child? No way can I wait on Julia Child. She’s JULIA f*****g CHILD. The grande dame of French cooking. I almost throw up I’m so nervous at the thought of it.

I say to Bobbie: “Why me? I’m not your best server. I’ll screw up. Can’t you give the table to someone else?”

She assures me I’ll do fine, and to remember that we’re a team at Union Square Café. I’ll have backup from the food runner, the other waitstaff, and our sommelier. Gaining my breath, I tuck my blue and white striped button-down shirt into my pants, snug the knot of the stunning floral necktie we all sport, and re-tie my white apron at my waist––the uniform––and I start setting the table. I’m meticulous with every detail, making sure that the cloth napkins we folded the night before are flawless. I go into the kitchen to do my butter side work. We cut 1/4” slices from square 1-pound blocks, bisecting each square diagonally, forming perfect isosceles triangles, 2 per dish. The butter is top quality, the best you can get; the bread, fresh-baked.

12 people. That means 6 butter dishes, but I grab 8, because I know that butter is Julia Child’s favorite food group. I lay the dishes out on the table, so that the butter will be perfectly softened by the time of her arrival. I’m told we’ll be offering both menus, lunch and dinner, including the Tuesday night special.

The entourage arrives on the dot of noon, nine men and three women. Bobbie seats the party, with Julia in the middle of the long table, not at the head or the foot. The room itself is lovely, decorated with the most stunning, always-fresh flower arrangements, sunlight flooding the space. Menus are handed out, and I stand slightly behind JC at her left side. I’ve lost the ability to breathe properly, alternating between holding my breath and sipping little wisps of air. I can’t get a good inhale. I can barely make eye contact with the guests. My manner is obsequious and formal, a shocking departure from my usual ebullient nature. I barely recognize myself. I’m nervous and worry that the sweat at my armpits is noticeable, my necktie feels like it’s strangling me. Julia orders the dinner special, a bone-in rib eye steak for two. For two! I think to myself as she orders, that I’m swiping that bone for my dog once she’s finished her meal. It’s a famous bone. The dogs belonging to the waitstaff love Rib-Eye Tuesday. When we scrape plates for the dishwasher on Tuesday nights, we lay aside a pile of bones and divvy them up at the end of the shift. My dog Sophie always loves me, but on Tuesday nights I get extra kisses.

Our sommelier goes over the food order and takes care of the wine selection for the table. All is good. The wineglasses sparkle, spotless in the sunlight. I’ve got the first bottle in hand; a lovely Cabernet. Thank god it’s not necessary for me to decant this one. I pray to the fine-dining angels that I’ll open that bottle flawlessly. That the cork won’t break. That I won’t drip the red wine onto the pure white table linens. I try to breathe, only filling half my lungs, then I pour. She swirls, she examines the legs running down the inside of the goblet with a discerning eye, she sniffs, she tastes, she nods for more. I hover nearby, not too close. JC isn’t terribly friendly––not rude by any stretch, just not as cuddly as I’d hoped for––so no sweet stories from my childhood. No “Oh, Mrs. Child, I used to watch you on PBS when I was a little girl.” She’s there with her people. My job is to wait on her, not make friends. I go into the kitchen to start serving entrees with the food runner, and I grab her rib-eye, taking it to the table and suddenly forgetting if I serve to the right or the left. I struggle for a breath again. Ah, to the left! Right!

I place the rib-eye in front of her with care. I offer pepper, she says yes. As I back away, she does the oddest thing: she leans forward, stretching each of her very long arms to the right and to the left, and enlisting the help of her dining companions, she gathers all 8 butter dishes in front of her, and places those golden triangles on her steak in a neat little overlapping row. She waits a beat or two for the butter to melt. Then she digs in. I stand there in awe, smitten by her appetite. I quickly break the spell I’m in to move around the table pouring wine for her guests.

She polishes off the entire steak, leaving a very clean bone (Sophie will be mighty disappointed). Julia drank two full bottles of the Cabernet with that meat. She completes her meal with creme brûlée. I’ve expertly torched the sugar on top of the custard to a glass-thin, caramelized shell; the best one I’ve ever done. Maybe being in her presence has graced me with culinary skills I’ve never possessed? Nah, just got lucky, I guess.

At meal’s end she rises from the table, dwarfing all of us. She says thank you to me, bending down slightly, a little bow, to accommodate the difference in our heights, smiling most graciously, then walks as upright as can be on low heels out the front door. And I exhale.

And as the great lady would say, “bon appétit!”

Some lovely quotes from Julia Child, the French Chef:

* If you’re afraid of butter, use cream.

* I think every woman should have a blowtorch.

* Always remember: If you’re alone in the kitchen and you drop the lamb, you can always just pick it up. Who’s going to know?

* People who love to eat are always the best people.

* I think careful cooking is love, don’t you? The loveliest thing you can cook for someone who’s close to you is about as nice a Valentine as you can give.

* Drama is very important in life: You have to come on with a bang. You never want to go out with a whimper. Everything can have drama if it’s done right. Even a pancake.

* The only time to eat diet food is while you’re waiting for the steak to cook.

* It’s so beautifully arranged on the plate, you know someone’s fingers have been all over it.

* Fat gives things flavor.

* Celebrity has its uses. I can always get a seat in any restaurant.

And an important tip from Nan Tepper, a former server with savvy:

* If the bathroom in a restaurant is disgusting, you definitely don’t want to see what the kitchen looks like or eat anything that was cooked there.

If you’ve been reading my essays for a while and enjoy my work, becoming paid subscriber may just be the next right thing for you. I’d be thrilled to receive your support.

Here’s another way to send me some love: click the heart “♥️” to “like” my essay, or the speech bubble “💬” to leave a comment, and use the spinny arrow thingy “🔄” to share/restack to the Substack community. Thank you!

The most exciting news? My new stack, Wham! Bam! Thank You! Slam!’s first show is on January 17, 2026, which is ALSO my two-year anniversary on Substack. Join us, on Zoom for an amazing story slam. The gathering is intimate. 10 storytellers, 100 audience members. And if you miss the live show, it will be available on the site for paid subscribers. Tickets are selling, but there are still some seats left…come play!

Eileen Dougharty, Slamone de Beauvoir, and I can’t wait to see you!

I chose to share this story with you for two reasons. Reason number one is I’m on vacation until the first week in January. I’ll be posting from my archive. I’ll also be telling more 4-minute stories because I want you to know about Wham! Bam! Thank You! Slam!, the new project I’ve created with my partner-in-slam, Eileen Dougharty.

The second reason is I want you to know that recovery is possible.

It’s available to anyone who wants it. And while this post was originally about my body shame, now it’s about so much more. I’m not taking a back seat in life ever again.

There was a time when I couldn’t fathom being on a stage in front of a roomful of people. I did it anyway, even when I was uncomfortable. There was a time when I couldn’t imagine being on camera telling you my stories. But I’m doing that from not only a place of comfort but also from a place of excitement. It’s time for me to stop riding other people’s coattails and strike out on my own. I’ll write more about that another time. My body, my size, no longer plagues me as it did before. I’m still fat. I’ve lost a fair amount of weight, but I may always be fat. The difference is that now, I love who I am.

I’m doing the next right thing. I’m celebrating my life and making my dreams real.

The other night, I was in a story slam.

One of the other storytellers shared a piece that included a joke involving a 300-pound woman giving a man a spanking. It was supposed to scare him. Why did that detail need a 300-pound woman to make it funny? The audience laughed and I sat in my chair (on the stage, waiting for my turn), triggered, angry, and feeling enormous shame. I also had one of those moments when I was flooded with righteous indignation. I sat there fuming. I fantasized about contacting her, asking her why using a fat person as the punchline was acceptable? She, of course, was in a slim body. I took a quick mental survey of the storytellers that night. I was the fattest person among the 18 people on the program.

While she was telling her story, these were my thoughts: I was going to EDUCATE her. I was going to ENLIGHTEN her. I would make her face her internalized fat phobia. But how would I do it? Facebook? Find her email address and write her a real scather? Embarrass her in public? I’ve got a vivid imagination when it comes to plotting revenge and rehabilitation. I run scripts in my head. Thankfully, that’s mostly where all these great ideas stay. That’s where they belong, until I can heal enough to stop writing the scripts. Conjuring thoughts of payback only gives me temporary relief, serving as a distraction until I get where I really need to go. Those thoughts? They don’t reflect who I truly am. They only point to how much work I still need to do. Beginning with, but not exclusive to dealing with my own internalized fat phobia.

Her story was 4 minutes long. That 4 minutes took forever to live through. I kept checking in to make sure that my facial expressions were firmly in neutral. It’s the best I could summon. I was incapable of faking a smile.

I spiraled to those old familiar places called self-loathing and shame. In this slam, all the storytellers in the act sit in two rows of chairs on the stage so that they can easily get to the mic when it’s their turn. I choose to sit in the back row whenever I participate in this slam. I once saw myself in a photo from a previous slam when I was seated up front. I was horrified at what I saw. I had no idea how fat I was.

So, I made sure to hide the next time by taking a back seat.

I sat in the back row, feeling exposed, wondering if people were looking at me. I thought about fat-shaming. I’ve defended the so-called president––hard to call him that, but I won’t write his name––when people on social media used the word “fat” as an insult, a way to judge his character. I challenge people when that comes up. It’s not okay. Fat is a descriptor, it’s not a personality trait.

After my internal roil, the stages of rage, the implosion of shame, I turned back to myself, remembering that when I get triggered, it’s a message to heed. A wake-up call. There’s something for me to examine, to take responsibility for. It’s a reminder that there’s a hurt little girl who sometimes takes over when she really needs soothing and to hear from me that she’s safe.

My story was just okay, my delivery was off that night because I was so rattled, so self-conscious. A friend offered to record me telling my story. I said he could if he shot me from the chest up, explaining that I don’t like the way I look because of my size. He sent me the video after the show. I haven’t watched it yet. I may never.

Over the next couple of days, I took an emotional inventory to check in about how my recovery is going, because I know there are things I need to address:

* What have I been avoiding?

* What don’t I want to own?

* What am I still unwilling to do?

* Am I handing this over to my higher power?

* Am I still trying to be in control?

* Am I reaching out to fellows in program and to my sponsor for support?

* Am I remembering that recovery is a long game?

I thought about the full-length mirror that fronts the beautiful antique armoire in my bedroom. The mirror that I rarely use to look at all of me, even with clothing on. I hate having my picture taken, unless it’s by my friend who’s a brilliant portrait photographer, but even those pix? No full body. Chest up, only.

Forget about looking at all of me naked. That one’s way too hard right now.

In my 12 Step program the guidelines recommend that we not weigh, measure, or track anything. No weighing ourselves or our food, no measuring ourselves or quantities of food. No tracking weight, exercise, or calories. We’re encouraged to either hide or throw away our scales.

We avoid these actions because the point of this work is to find balance. Balance with food and balance within. The philosophy makes so much sense to me. When I diet, I don’t trust myself, I don’t learn to listen to my body. I obsess. I think about food all the time, I think about weight all the time. I think if I only weighed “so and so” then everything would be okay.

I know that’s not true. That’s not what recovery from an eating disorder is about. Unlike alcoholics who abstain from drinking, those of us with disordered eating can’t abstain from food, but we can make healthy choices. Recovery is about letting go, telling the truth, and showing up for ourselves and one another. It’s about loving ourselves just as we are. I’m not there yet.

When I was in my twenties, I tipped toward anorexia. I got very, very thin. Too thin. I loved shopping for clothing (I hate shopping for clothing), and I loved looking in the mirror. In the years when I was being a thin person with an eating disorder, I was nearly an exhibitionist, I liked showing off my body. I worked as an artist’s model (nude), I taught yoga, wearing skin-tight leggings and sports bras. I felt powerful and strong. I was powerful and strong, but I didn’t love myself then, either. I smoked like a fiend thinking it would keep me from eating. Smoking was just another avenue to tamping my feelings.

When I moved away from that thin body and got some distance, I looked at old photos. I saw in me a young woman who was emaciated. It was shocking. Body dysmorphia occupies a broad spectrum. I don’t see myself clearly. When people tell me I’m beautiful, that I’m “luscious,” I don’t know what to do with that other than doubt their words. I would hazard a guess that there are people who see the Nan I really am more clearly than I see myself. But I need to see her, too. That’s the work.

I do know that I’m quite fat. I know roughly what I weigh. I know that I don’t take care of myself as well as I could. I barely exercise. I need to do that more. I need to keep going to meetings. I need to talk about deeper feelings. I need to keep unpeeling the layers of dysfunction so that the real Nan can take center stage. I need to love that little kid inside who is so much a part of me, that frightened, tender girl.

Just like at the slam, I’ve taken a back seat too many times in my life and not just when hiding my physical self. I want to sit in the front row more often, but sometimes an unoccupied back seat is what I need more, and giving myself permission to sit there is also a form of self-love.

Living fully, out loud and in full view, may just take some more time.

Do you have questions about Wham! Bam! Thank You! Slam! as a storyteller and/or audience member? Our resident muse Slamone is taking a break from philosophy and cigarettes and would love to set the record straight (or bicurious at the very least) Please submit all of your burning queries below for an upcoming Q&A! You can also message me, if you prefer privacy.

If you’ve been reading my essays for a while and enjoy my work, becoming a paid subscriber may just be the next right thing for you. I’d be thrilled to receive your support.

My little 7-year-old pup, Maisy, raced ahead of me last night as I walked to my bedroom, to ready myself for sleep.

She made the leap onto my freshly-made bed with ease––she’s a high jumper––and planted her butt down on what she thinks of as her side of the bed. She wouldn’t budge. All 15 pounds of her. She sat there, trembling––I think it may be an act–– and made timid, hopeful eye contact with me, her nervous brown eyes asking, “can I stay, can I sleep with you tonight?” If you haven’t figured it out yet, Maisy is the boss of me.

I wanted to say yes to her and to Hugo, my other pup. But I don’t sleep well when they’re with me. I wanted to say yes, because there’s nothing better than little Maisy tucked into my right armpit, her head on my shoulder, her body twitching, ensconced in her dreams and relaxed in the comfort of sleep. It’s completely delicious. For about a half hour.

But not for the whole f*****g night, I like to move around. She’s so much bigger than when she tucked in to me the first time; the day I brought her home, when she only weighed four pounds. I stayed up all night then, but the glow of new love overshadowed my sleepiness, and carried me through the next day. As much as I adore her, that kind of glow doesn’t last forever.

The temptation to let go of my resolve was strong, but when I zeroed in on what I was feeling, “should I give in and say yes?” I was rescued by my wiser self. Wiser Nan answered that question. The yes would be the “yes” of guilt. It wasn’t generosity freely offered. It would be the “Yes, I don’t want to hurt my little dog’s feelings,” or “Yes, I want you to love me, and you won’t if I say no.” Or this one, “It doesn’t matter if I don’t sleep well. It doesn’t matter if I’m tired tomorrow.”

But it does matter. Because if I don’t sleep, I’m not effective doing the things that need to get done. It wasn’t just guilt, I noticed fear was there for me, too, as I processed my dog’s simple request. The “you won’t love me anymore” is grounded in fear.

This is a minor example, but it speaks to a behavior that plagued me for most of my life.

Instead of Ellen, “Ambivalent” should have been my middle name. When faced with a request, a perceived expectation from another person in my life, or a chore that needed doing, I would subject myself to a kind of inner torture as I plodded through a list of pros and cons and would inevitably end up saying yes to whatever was asked of me and pretend to myself and the other person that my choice was as much for me as the person I was serving.

But the time it would take to get to that choice felt endless. It was rarely the truth, and didn’t lead anywhere healthy for anyone involved.

I said yes for all the same reasons as I wanted to with Maisy.

Fear of withdrawal of attention and love. Obligation, because I thought I owed something to the person (or dog) who was making the request, and Guilt because who was I to say no, and attend to my needs first? I got to a point where I couldn’t even name those needs, because I believed I didn’t have any, or worse, that my needs had become whatever that other person wanted.

My worth was dependent on other people’s approval of me.

That’s the way I rolled for more decades than I care to count. What I’m describing is textbook codependence. I’m here to tell you that codependence destroys people and relationships. It almost ground me to dust.

Being codependent is a skill I learned young. It serves as a more than adequate coping mechanism that becomes necessary at times for emotional––and sometimes physical––survival. But using that behavior into adulthood bred resentment, depression, anxiety, and self-hatred in me to the point where I questioned the value of my existence and often thought opting out completely (as in suicide completely) might be a better choice for the long haul. I didn’t know who I was or that what I wanted mattered.

It began when I was a little girl in my relationship with my dad. I adored my father, but I made him into an idol, all-powerful and perfection in my eyes. He wasn’t those things any more than anyone else, but a child’s survival is dependent on the care they receive growing up, and typically that care comes from our parents.

But what happens to children when parents are dysfunctional?

I was hyper-sensitive not just to my father’s moods, but to the moods and desires of everyone around me. I think they call that hyper-vigilance. I was so good at it, I never got less than an A in that class.

I gave myself the job of being his tiny cheerleader. If he was sad, quiet, or angry, I’d get worried and make it my mission to elevate his mood, make him laugh or smile. To distract him from whatever was bothering him. Sometimes it would work, sometimes not. I always assumed that when he was in a bad place emotionally, it had to be my fault, so it was my job to fix it, to fix him. I was wired to believe that if I wasn’t well-behaved, entertaining, and obsessively attentive to his needs, I’d be abandoned. I didn’t make it up, he would ignore me if something I did made him angry. As a result, fear ruled every choice I made. I enjoyed the status of being his favorite child. He’d never say that was true, but I knew it was. And I’d do anything to maintain my special place in his life.

All the choices I made, made me turn away from myself.

Did I say fear ruled every choice? I misspoke. I meant to say terror. Most of the time, I was unaware of the games we played with each other.

My father was a gentle man, mostly; never violent, but often cruel in more subtle ways. I don’t think he understood the effects his covert cruelty had on me. His manipulative nature made an impression. I learned to manipulate him right back, and to do it in my relationships with others. His meanness masqueraded as what he considered playful teasing. It never felt like that to me. His sarcasm stung and when he withdrew his attention, it hurt me more than a spanking ever could.

He brooded like a champion, and when he did, I’d panic, I’d convince myself that his withdrawal from me meant I’d lost him forever. Of course, most of his moods had nothing to do with me.

I learned to put myself aside until I forgot there was a “me.” I disappeared.

Many of you have already met my father in other essays I’ve published here. He was lovely in so many ways. He was generous, talented, smart, and funny. He was also a flawed, complicated person. He was a man with secrets. He was human.

I didn’t know how to sort any of that for myself, to see him clearly, all the parts of him. I was terrified to live without him.

At 24, I tried to leave to start a new life in Los Angeles. I still have the clean handkerchief he pulled from his trouser pocket and handed to me. It was monogrammed with his initials. I blew my nose after sobbing my goodbyes at the United Airlines gate, before I got on the plane to “go west, young Nan.” I lasted 3 months. I spent most of the time curled up on the couch in my sublet, wrapped in a cozy blanket of despair. The minute I returned, order was restored. The depression lifted, but the self-hatred lingered in the background of my life and would multiply every time I tried to cut our cord.

I gave myself over to what we created, the unspoken pact we made that looked more like a marriage than a healthy father/daughter connection. I learned what I imagined was love from my father. I had no clue how to cultivate an intimate relationship with anyone.

After repeating this pattern of people-pleasing in my love relationships, because it was what I knew, I found that the very thing I was terrified of, being abandoned, was the outcome I kept creating. Ironically, in most cases, my partners weren’t the ones who did the leaving. I was.

What I discovered was that I’d abandoned myself so completely, I didn’t have a true self to bring to relationships, in order to find out what healthy love really looks like. I had no faith that I would be loved for me and not for all the “yes, dear, whatever you want” that I was so damn good at. Resentment would take over, only to be replaced with the inevitable–– crushing, disabling depression. I had no idea how to ask for what I wanted, because I had no idea what that was.

Not knowing how to ask for what I needed or have the healthy boundaries that I would later develop was a guarantee that any romantic relationship would end, and I’d find myself alone.

When my dad became ill with the diseases that would kill him, I began to see him more clearly. I saw his insecurities, his vanity, his selfishness. I started to hate him, just the smallest bit. And hating him just the smallest bit got me to see who he was in ways that never came through before; I was so blinded by my devotion to him that, it led to another depression, sparked by the pressure I felt to be his caregiver at a cost that was way too high. The only way I could say no was to become ill, too. It landed me on a psych unit for more than 2 months.

I can’t tell you that the hospitalization led to my immediate enlightenment regarding our dynamic. It didn’t.

But his death created the tipping point, where I would finally begin to understand the damage that was done. To be very clear, we damaged each other, this was not one-sided.

When my father died, the first thought that moved from my head to my heart, as I held his strong, soft, inanimate hand in mine, was, “thank god, I’m finally free.”

Free from my obligation to be his right hand, his confidante, his very best friend in the world, I walked away from the man I thought was my very best friend in the world.

After he died, it took years for me to learn that it’s possible to love a person and see them clearly at the same time. Their gifts and their flaws. One does not have to preclude the other. It’s the insight discernment offers when I’m wide awake to truths I once refused to see.

Codependence squashes the spirit, the true self that lives within us. It sure as f**k almost killed mine. I needed my father to die so I could live.

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You’ll have a ball!

When I was 15 years old, I did something unusual for someone my age. I took the est training. No, “est” is not a typo. It was spelled in lowercase letters with no periods. Little e, little s, little t. It stood for “Erhard Seminars Training” and was founded by Werner Erhard (aka Jack Rosenberg, Svengali-in-training). He came up with a formula, repackaged old wisdom, and gave it a new vocabulary. And, he knew how to sell. “Est” is also Latin for “it is.”

It was the height of the 1970s “Me” Decade and the grownups were signing up for fix-yourself workshops and encounter groups. They were buying––and sometimes even reading––self-help books by the stack. They played wife-swapping games and attended Esalen for naked retreats. They were searching––searching for a magic solution that might cure their restlessness, their bad marriages, and their overall “is that all there is?” dissatisfaction with life.

My parents did the training. Living with them while they basked in the afterglow of personal enlightenment was it’s own brand of teenage hell. My mother was head over heels in love with all of it, including the founder, whom she referred to as Uncle Werner, or Uncle Wernsie. My father was willing, though more reticent than mom. After their trainings they started speaking in code, using annoying est jargon in every interaction. I barely tolerated their newfound cultish euphoria. It was irritating to say the least.

They said things like “I got it! Thank you for sharing.” And then they’d look at me and say, “Did you get it?” “Are you clear?” I’d get agitated, and they’d say "what you resist, persists.”

“Did I get it? GET what??? What does that mean?”

“Oh, we can’t tell you. You have to do the training if you want to find out.”

I thought they were out of their minds, but at the same time, I was curious about this thing they were so excited about. So I said I’d do it, too. I can’t remember exactly why I chose to pay for it myself, but I went to the bank, took out $250 of my hard-earned and carefully saved money. I was left with a balance of $6.13, and a feeling of independence, pride, and the slight suspicion that I’d just been hoodwinked.

At the top of the application for the course, I read a question no one had ever asked me before. “Name you like to be called.” What? Really? YES! I like to be called Nan. No more Nancy, if you please.

It felt like the first tentative step toward freedom. Someone was asking how I wanted to be seen. They were asking, “who are you, really?”

The training took place in a hotel ballroom at the Waldorf Astoria over the course of two consecutive weekends. My parents paid for my hotel room; even in 1976, my remaining $6.13 wouldn’t have gotten me very far. I was determined to find out what all the excitement was about. I didn’t like feeling excluded. My parents seemed so happy. They seemed to be enjoying one another more than usual. They were playful together. I wanted to feel happy with them.

I was not a happy kid.

There’s a story about me when I was a very little girl; crib little. I would hear my parents laughing in another room, and I’d yell out, “stop that laughing!” I guess I felt left out. I wanted to laugh with them.

I was the youngest person in my training. There were rules of behavior, not guidelines; bathroom breaks when they said we could go; you were s**t out of luck if you had to visit the loo before a break. If you wanted to speak, you had to raise your hand and wait to be called on. There was no access to food, water, or watches when we were sitting in the room. I enjoyed the spectacle of 249 irate adults flipping out because they were having their freedoms stripped away, if only for a very short time. Frustration intolerance was at its height. Panic and outrage ensued. The drama was riveting.

The “what-if-I-have-to-pee” hysteria was the most entertaining aspect of those early moments in the room.

What a bunch of babies. When I was 15, my bladder was made of steel, I could go hours and hours without a pee. I have a touch more compassion for the anxiety of my cross-legged elders because today I’m 50 years older, and my bladder has gone from steel to tissue paper in its capacity for retention. I found out many years later that the longest we’d go without a break was about 4 hours. Clearly it was not about peeing, it was about losing control, and the control had nothing to do with their bladders.

The training was mostly fascinating to me. It was clever, built on rules, structured tightly, and the logistics team conveyed a message of perfection in everything they did. Neat rows of chairs, pencils, and registration cards were lined up in rows like soldiers marching in formation. The registration cards were for the next seminar we’d have to sign up for so we’d keep the “it” that we’d gotten. Keep that money rolling in, Uncle Werner. There was an unwavering attention to detail, not a hair out of place. That appealed to me, it was familiar; a mirror of the expectations of the family I grew up in. Not a hair out of place, ever.

After I completed the training and learned the lingo, my little brother followed suit. He was 11 when he attended the children’s training; the est version for kids. After we’d all “done it,” we were roped into volunteering every Saturday as a family. We phone banked to sign up more people. Free labor for the cause. A world that works for everyone. That’s what est promised.

Not long after we’d earned our est diplomas, the pink cloud my parents were living on dissolved into vapor, and they announced they were divorcing. My father moved out, and in an instant, the world I occupied had disappeared. Losing his daily presence in my life crushed me.

My brother and I were left with our mom, and she went missing on a regular basis. She gave her time and energy to Werner and est. She started dating men she met in seminars and would stay out all night; she volunteered and learned how to lead guest events. We didn’t see a lot of her. Gone most nights, we fended for ourselves. Sometimes she’d remember to leave us a cold roast chicken. Sometimes, there’d be beef stew in a pressure cooker, waiting on the stove. We ate a lot of Kraft Macaroni and Cheese.

We despised Uncle Werner. He did this to us. And the truth? The truth is his work set my family free. He gave my mother the courage to end a marriage that was based on a lie, so she could live a full life. She was only 37 at the time.

My brother and I hated Werner Erhard for years.

This essay isn’t about how est ruined our lives (because it didn’t). It’s about something I took with me that’s been in my head for all these years. Amid the jargon, there was one phrase I latched onto.

I used to be different. Now, I’m the same.

When I heard the expression the first time, it tickled me, it was delightful. It felt contradictory and troublesome at first, like a Zen koan that was difficult to unlock; but on some primal level it made sense to me. I didn’t have the words to explain the heart tug I felt.

The phrase was filled with mystery; it made me long to return to my source. I didn’t know exactly what that meant. It was an inkling of an idea.

As the decades passed my life got harder. The blues became my theme song, but I never gave up my desire to heal. I pursued therapy––all kinds, yoga––all styles, meds––the whole damn pharmacopeia. I tried extreme but necessary treatments to alleviate my emotional suffering, my suicidality. Though all of them helped, nothing offered complete remission from my troubles.

When my therapist told me I’d only go so far without making some kind of spiritual connection, I listened, even though it was a subject I felt cynical about and resistant to for most of my life. She recommended I add a 12-step program to the work I was doing with her. I followed her advice and made my way to the rooms that looked nothing like the hotel ballroom of my past.

I was tired of losing sight of my potential every time I got the s**t kicked out of me by life. I was tired of the negative self-talk that swirled in my head, ready to shut me down at the slightest infraction. But I had no clue how to free myself from its hold.

I discovered that a lot the ideas that Werner Erhard taught were also present in 12-step programs. Both shared a happy affinity for snappy one-liners.

Where did they differ? est put great emphasis on managing our lives by using our will, our thinking selves. 12-step was just the opposite. 12-step is about faith and surrender. It taught me how to access my heart. When I found myself willing to cede my ever-present need to control everything around me––which I can’t––that’s when I “got it.”

Getting it had to come from my center. The center that has nothing to with the thinking part of me. The thinking part was where things got messy.

Existing in my upside-down world, I had learned fear and self-doubt. I wasn’t confident, I didn’t trust most people. I lied to myself and others, and fought for every shred of control I thought I needed to feel safe. I evolved into one of those angry adults I laughed at in that 1976 ballroom.

When I surrendered to a higher power––I call mine Grace––is when the light broke through. Making that connection was the missing piece that would enable me to unearth the gifts I possessed from the start. The gifts I lost track of.

That’s when I understood the phrase.

I came into this world in possession of qualities that were my birthright. The joy, ebullience, creativity, self-confidence, and inner spark that were always part of me. I believe we all possess the potential to shine.

Maybe my family was dysfunctional. Have you ever heard of a functional family? If they exist, they must be very rare. My way was paved with obstacles I put there myself and by circumstances beyond my control. All the things that happened to me in my long life contributed to my evolution as a sensitive, curious, and kind human being. Those qualities were always there.

There’s a source that lives within me and without me. It’s not rooted in intellectual exercises and mind games, like the ones I experienced at est. I am part of something greater than myself and when I understood that, it released me from doubt and I became able return to the self I was always meant to be. I discovered that I’m not as alone as I believed. I’m not alone at all.

So, in the end? I got “it.” I got what I needed to get. And it took as long as it took to get it.

Probably a lot longer than Uncle Werner intended. Should I give him credit for planting those two very powerful sentences in my head? Sure. Why not. He did.

But Uncle Werner didn’t do it all. I needed more. I needed to be willing to put myself into the mix and I needed to welcome Auntie Grace to remind me every day that I’ve always had everything I’ve ever needed. I just didn’t know it until now.

I used to be different. Now, I’m the same.

And because my friend, Eileen Dougharty, wins the best comment of the day prize, (so far), and then said the thing I wish I’d said, here’s what she’s talking about.

So much better than the Werner Erhard reel I shared.

If you’ve been reading my essays for a while and enjoy my work, becoming paid subscriber may just be the next right thing for you. I’d be thrilled to receive your support.

Here’s another way to send me some love: click the heart “♥️” to “like” my essay, or the speech bubble “💬” to leave a comment, and use the spinny arrow thingy “🔄” to share/restack to the Substack community. Thank you!

Check out my new stack, Wham! Bam! Thank You! Slam!, a story slam for women writers on Substack. First live show on January 17, 2026 on Zoom.

You’ll have a ball!

“I’m so excited!” he says. He calls to tell me he’s baking popovers this year. He bought a special pan.

Uh, oh, he bought a special pan. It’s September, and Labor Day can still be seen in the rearview mirror and my father is making plans and testing recipes for his annual Thanksgiving feast.

Every September he starts making lists. Lists of recipes and the necessary ingredients––never skimping on anything––no cutting corners with this guy. Referring to the notes he made the year before at his post-Thanksgiving recap of what worked well and what didn’t, he begins to make his plans and a list of kitchen tools he needs.

He likes to get an early start.

I’m about to ask, “what’s a popover” when he reads my mind, explaining to me that a popover is a New England version of a British pastry called Yorkshire pudding, but the difference is the pan that’s used for baking.

Wait, I’m confused. Yorkshire pudding isn’t pudding? I thought it was pudding.

It’s clear he’s done research, a lot of research. He goes on to tell me that a popover is as light as air, it’s a type of roll, it’s a very fluffy and very puffy roll. They’re really easy to screw up. He confides in me that “timing is everything, if you bake them for too long, they’re no good, too short, a disaster,” and “the popovers must be eaten piping hot right out of the pan, before they have a chance to fall, like a sad ruined soufflé.” He’s completely obsessed. Every year brings a new idea, a brilliant inspiration, a special highlight to the meal.

Dad informs me that he’s already baked four test batches, mostly because he’s an insane perfectionist who must get it right; failure is never an option; and partly because he loves to eat. He was inspired to bake them for his boyfriend, T.O.S., a Brit, living in the USA, conveniently situated in the studio apartment right next door. They thought that would be a good idea. “T.O.S.” stands for “The Other Sid,” because my dad’s name is Sid, too. We couldn’t call both of them Sid, that would be ridiculous. The studio turned out to be not such a great idea, but that one’s for another time.

The three or four of us on his guest list are the beneficiaries of his passion and commitment to this holiday. He goes all out. Never just one dessert, or two, or even three. There must be a minimum of four. Three different pies, vanilla ice cream for a la mode, a lot of whipped cream––ask me about whipped cream the next time you see me, I’ll know what you’re referring to and I may fill you in––and there must at least one type of cheesecake, a plate of cookies, and chocolate truffles to finish the meal.

Thanksgiving is fraught for me every year. My mother asks if I have plans even though she knows exactly where I’ll be. She invites me every year––and every year I’m filled with guilt––and say no. I feel like that baby King Solomon wants to keep in one piece. Pulled in two directions, I make the same choice every year. I guess part of the tradition is disappointing my mother because it’s my dad’s favorite holiday and I’m super-codependent. I’m so afraid to hurt him by saying I’m going somewhere else. And he’s a much better cook than my mother ever was or ever will be. I don’t remember a single Thanksgiving at our house when I was a kid. We were always invited somewhere else, and somewhere else is where we went.

From year to year most of the staples of Dad’s Thanksgiving meal remain the same. The roasted brussels sprouts with slivered almonds, the mashed sweet potatoes, the pumpkin bisque, and of course, the turkey. There’s always a turkey, despite my repeated objections, that are often fueled by the fact that I’m a vegetarian some years, and some years when I’m not a vegetarian, it’s because I hate turkey. Hate it. I beg him to mix it up, to no avail. My plea for him to do a ham or a chicken, a pot roast, or maybe a nice piece of fish falls on deaf ears. Most years, I just opt for the vegetable side dishes and his killer stuffing, and for dessert, a slice or two of my favorite, the ever-present pumpkin pie.

He pores over cranberry sauce recipes in The New York Times, assigning this crucial condiment to me as my only contribution to the meal. He prefers a fancy chutney and provides me with exacting directions so I can make it in my kitchen. I effort to stay patient as I stir and stir and stir the syrupy mixture of hard fresh berries, way too much sugar, orange zest, and a multitude of spices, being extra careful not to burn the stuff. I prefer Ocean Spray in a can, that tube of deep red gel that holds it’s shape when un-canned; a throwback to my childhood.

My favorite thing by far is his stuffing. It’s a masterpiece. He knows how much I love it and every year he sends me home with a roasting pan all my own, filled with my idea of heaven. Every year, I promise myself that I’ll savor it slowly throughout the holiday weekend, maybe even into the following week. The stuffing is usually gone by Saturday morning, but only if I’ve exercised restraint. Most often, I devour all of it by Friday night.

My father lives in a small, one bedroom apartment with a micro-kitchen. A tiny galley, even tinier than mine with hardly any counter space at all. He’s methodical in his planning, able to Tetris everything so that it all flows smoothly.

Dad has more kitchen tools and appliances than anyone I know. He’s purchased cookware that he barely uses; a perfect example is the salmon poacher that he used exactly one time for his first dinner party in 1977. It lives in hope underneath his sink, waiting to be brought out of exile to poach once more. There’s the pricey chestnut peeler he happened upon at Hammacher Schlemmer to help with the tedious work of prepping the nuts for their final resting place in my stuffing. That peeler saved his tender fingertips from the cuts he suffered before he found it. Peeling chestnuts is nasty business. I’ll never forget the day he discovered that he could buy already-peeled, jarred chestnuts. He called me just to tell me about it, over the moon at his discovery. Now he can use the extra time he’s saving to attend to other details in the preparation of our meal. But he’s keeping the peeler just in case.

He loves buying new toys, the chance to do it better than he did the year before. He makes his final list of entrees and side dishes, commits to which cheesecake he’ll bake––pumpkin, marble, or maybe just old-fashioned New York plain this year? He strategizes minutely, deciding what he can cook ahead of time and freeze, what he can prep the week before, the day before, and the day of.

He develops a tightly-structured schedule for when to start the turkey. The turkey going into the oven always coincides with the kick-off of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade; it plays in the background on his TV––it’s the soundtrack for his preparations. Dad invests in a couple of extra kitchen timers to automate the workflow. When to brown the stuffing? When to roast the sprouts? The soup gets warmed right before the meal. Should he just nuke the sweet potatoes or throw them into The Other Sid’s oven? He’s not doing marshmallows on top this year, so no need for the broiler. But most important, when to baste, and baste, and baste. His table is set on Wednesday night.

He commandeers my frosty freezer, and between us, the two freezers barely equal one that’s standard-sized. When The Other Sid still lived next door, my father used Sid’s freezer and his fridge, as well. My Sid is meticulous in everything he touches. His attention to detail is excruciating; precision is his middle name.

Should he get new tableware? Maybe not new silverware, but YES, he must have new placemats, napkins, a tablecloth, wine glasses, water glasses, and oh, those crystal candlesticks he’s had his eye on. He assures me he’ll find a place to store them. He’s really good at tucking stuff away.

Dad spares no expense. He delights in all the planning, living in his happy place, surrounded by his careful index cards written in his gorgeous hand, clipped to the fridge for easy reference. Each time he makes a choice or has a new idea, he rings me up to share the news. Watching my father plan the holiday is a spectator sport, and even though I know the menu, the meal surprises me every time. I’m his biggest culinary fan.

This year, the popover year, I’m in one of my vegetarian cycles, and we go around the table sharing what we’re grateful for, and I declare with utmost appreciation––while chewing on a mouthful of stuffing, how lucky I feel to eat that very same chestnut stuffing. I go on to say how kind it is that he sends me home with my own tray of Thanksgiving joy.

He gets a funny look on his face, a semi-smirk, and he tilts his head, looks at me, a mischievous smile playing at the edges of his mouth. I return his gaze, mirroring his head tilt, and say, “What?” he shakes his head, smiling, while considering his options. I repeat, “What?” He can’t wait to tell me, I can see it on his face. That other part of him is peeking through. The-not-as-nice, teasing, troublemaking, mean part.

He says, “it’s not chestnut stuffing,” and grinning slightly, he reveals, “it’s sausage-chestnut stuffing.”

Instead of spitting the stuffing out of my mouth onto my plate, I swallow hard, and look at him, feeling angry and betrayed. I realize that he’s been messing with me for years. “Forever?” I ask.

He nods, less cocky than before.

I throw my napkin down, get up from the table and move five feet away to sit on the couch, not knowing what to do with the onslaught of emotions rising up in me. I feel violated. I feel poisoned.

Uncomfortable with telling him how hurt I am, I swallow again. This time, I swallow the pain, my pride, the rage, and my disappointment. I bury the feelings and go back to the table to eat my piece of pumpkin pie. I take a pass on the scoop of ice cream, I refuse the whipped cream.

And the popovers? They were amazing.

When I go home that evening, I take the tray of sausage-chestnut stuffing with me and finish eating all of it by Friday night.

I loved that f*****g stuffing.

Addendum:

My cousin Steve––who reads my newsletter––has shared my father’s recipe for the sausage-chestnut stuffing. Why does he have it when I don’t?

Oh. I don’t cook. Right.

Uncle Sid’s Sausage-Chestnut Stuffing

Let me know how it turns out?

One announcement today…well, two, because I can’t not.

A lot of you know I’ve launched a brand new stack called Wham! Bam! Thank You! Slam! It’s a story slam for women writers on Substack. Check it out. Subscribe…and if you want to tell a story, DM me! January and February events are already booked with storytellers…so come to a show!

I’m having my HOT PINK FRIDAY sale again this year. But this year, it’s even better. If you can resist supporting my work at $10/year forever (FOREVER!) than you have more fortitude than I. If my writing means something to you, and you’re still here, please consider taking this very easy step to upgrade and show me some love.

If you can’t right now, I get it. You’re always welcome, no matter what. You’ve made the last almost 2 years amazing.

I’m grateful for your presence, your comments, your hearts, and your loyalty.