Longform - My Favorite Podcast has Ended!!
Notes from #584: Ta-Nehisi Coates
The first Longform podcast episode I ever listened to was #127: Molly Crabapple, in Feb 2015. Molly Crabapple was writing for Vice, on tumbler, and had CNN articles about her arrest at Occupy Wall Street - in the liner notes of that episode- but I had been following Molly since I met her at a zine fest and picked up her zine, so long ago, I can’t tell you when. She also had drawing classes quite frequently in Baltimore, where I live. Maybe I had made the connection to her through Atomic Books. I was signed up for her email newsletter, the Ink Vault, which I very much enjoyed. So when I saw she was to be interviewed, I listened, loved it; and have followed Long Form- ever since!
So that means- for the last 9 almost 10 years!!
I remember listening to this podcast in the “book mines” when I listed books for sale in a little back office of an unheated/un-airconditioned warehouse. My co-worker Alyssa and I ate candy and listened to podcasts to help keep us going. We had so enjoyed Serial, the groundbreaking journalism podcast the year before. And were looking for more. Alysa’s picked out a semi-scandalous podcast about sex called “Guys We F****d”. (We would turn it off whenever the boss came in) And I picked out Longform. It was a little boring to Alysa, because she was not a writer, and it was such a deep dive (thats why its my favorite!!!!) on the process behind the stories. I was absolutely riveted!!
So I started listening to Longform podcast at home. And it became my treat to listen to while folding clothes and cleaning up my bedroom, something I didn’t like to do and left big piles of clothes everywhere. (this works great by the way. To program yourself like this)
So I have been a faithful listener of close to ten years. But I never wrote a fan letter, I always wanted too!
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I love Ta-Nehisi Coates and have watched his ascent as a writer. I remember seeing his first book, “The Beautiful Struggle” advertised in our in common home-city publications and radio for a bit before I finally read it. And then - WOW, it said stuff about Baltimore that I felt that I had never heard articulated before. It felt so good to see my own city in a book. Even though his experience wasn’t mine, in a divided and unequal world, it was adjacent, it was local. Something I was excited to read. The slogan “Baltimore: the City that Reads” (often turned around into other kinds of jokes, like the City that Breeds or the City that Bleeds) REALLY was not self-aware, of our own history, and in seeing ourselves, in the media; and I felt so hungry to see that. It was so beautiful and poetic and good, this break through. This Baltimore son. I had a friend, Than, who had worked for his dad, at Black Classics Press. They were respected. So much of Baltimore is beautiful and confusing and painful and not in the media, at that time.
“The Beautiful Struggle” (2008) is the kind of book that inspires you, why you read in the first place, just this fresh coming of age tale. I loved Ta-Nehisi Coates’s writing from the very beginning. And then took note of things he said on his blog, I swear one day he wrote about feeling sorry for the poor white kids in the neighborhood I lived in, but I could never scroll back to find that quote. Reparations, that was something radicals, especially Black radicals, had been talking for forever. But his essay got the world to listen. Thats a pretty wild thing. I don’t think today, people can even really imagine the truth of what things were during the year, of the Baltimore Uprising, in 2015. Like how some would talk and the mainstream media never listened. And then one day, a few different one days, in all different ways, this long cherished flame, burning in hearts and held in hands, spark took off into flames. It was wild to see how Baltimore changed in the perception of the rest of the country and in return how we changed in our own perception. And how many white journalists suddenly could “hear” and take notice of racism where they blocked it out before. (Thats so frustrating to me actually).
I remember hearing Ta-Nehisi read at his “Between The World and Me” book release in the historic Union Baptist church, in Baltimore. Rev Dr Alvin C. Hathaway, Sr. gave such an amazing opening introduction, also sharing the history of the church where Frederick Douglas spoke. With his father Paul Coates, and everyone there. It was a powerful, welcoming space. And somewhat unique that evening as a large mixed race audience in a very racially divided city. I planned the Baltimore book release of a book I co-edited Revolutionary Mothering, (as a local editor, one of three. We had book releases in different cities) release in the venue because of the feeling there, and after talking to Rev Dr Alvin C. Hathaway, Sr., in this west Baltimore location. (But of course it wasn’t the same, LOL. But still good.)
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Welcome to the second to last episode of the long form podcast. I hope I didn’t shock anyone - Aaron. (welp you DID!) From the start of Episode #584: Ta-Nehisi Coates
Anyway, so Ta-Nehisi Coates is someone I am always following to see what he’s doing. So of course I decided to listen to this podcast first (missing some episodes before it when I didn’t fold laundry, I have a few weeks to catch up on.)
And what do I find out? This is the next to last episode of Longform! They are done. After all this time! Something I have loved, my favorite podcast, for almost a decade. DAMN! My journalism school! My reward, even today, for pushing through and cleaning up. And feeling my brain fed and things cleaner in my bedroom. A reward I look forward too. No More? Just like that.
All the times I have taken notes from shows. Learning stuff from each episode. For a dedicated writer like myself who didn’t go to college for writing, for me, it feels like school. It lets me in, behind the scenes, of the headlines. And I love that so much.
So here I am folding underwear (really? Must you fold it. Yes, once I started I like it. I feel together) in an un-airconditioned Baltimore row house, catching up with what Ta-Nehisi Coates
is doing, since he was the second ever interview Evan did on the podcast. (I didn’t realize that. I thought I went back to listen to that one early on. But I’ll have to re-listen again.) Its a great closing note to go out on. I’m having a good time listening, like always.
But in the middle of Ta-Nehisi Coates talking about going down to South Carolina to see a teacher who was in trouble for teaching his book, that they banned. And talking about the very real power of media and books and stories and culture- I started to tear up.
“Cultural issues are very very powerful actually. That books and movies, and tv shows, and monuments, and statues, and art- all that stuff actually really does matter. And has a huge effect on what we consider - actual politics - which is to say legislation etc. Because our whole notions of humanity are derived from these things. They are derived from stories. Derived from the news. Derived from art. Derived from statues. Thats how we decide who is what.” - Ta-Nehisi Coates
I want my Longform! I feel like I’m always, a little bit, on the pulse of issues of our day through listening to this podcast, about writing, talking to writers and journalists about how they did it, and there experiences. I am going to miss these conversations soo much! Its really important. It always was about more than you guys, with whatever weird things that you like or not like, (please take this in a good way and laugh) and your strange feelings that you are getting older (I’m a lot older than you all) - that always apologetic/self-depreciating air- its just that you were being yourself, thats the ticket, and doing good interviews with interesting people- it always was about the interview.
It was about taking the time, a little bit more time and attention then anywhere else. And talking about the things I care about. Even if I didn’t particularly love or not love an episode, I ALWAYS learned something. And also had an internal dialogue on the topic, often taking notes or writing rebuttals. AND being inspired. It was a very down to earth sharing place of people doing things and how they did it. And its been inspiring.
Its been my favorite podcast. And one I always hoped someday I would be on! Haha.
Ta-Nehisi Coates says he’s 48. 10 years younger than me. How I often feel envy or unpleasant jealous feelings to those 10 years younger than me, who always seem to reap so much of the rewards of what older radicals cut our teeth on, without as much validation of our work. I think about how folks in subcultures and circles that I’m familiar with were talking about reparations for so long, and he is the one who blew up saying these things, with The Case For Reparations but the flame was held, by Black radicals, like a candle, for a long time.
I think about how many people don’t seem to realize how there circumstance , in a way, in a way, is random and changes them, encourages them for better or worse and what its like to NOT be encouraged, or not have the ear, not have the tide, to pick you up, after the pain of writing. But to hear nothing back. And be considered a bum for still hanging on to writing. A disappointment, and anger of your family, more than garnishing admiring eyes, instead garnishing disappointment. But either way, I think, and thought early on, and read somewhere, fame or no fame (either thing a problem), the only thing that will save you is the work.
I’m feeling like a writer again. (Because Im writing. And publishing.) That feels good. THAT IS ultimately I think, what I wanted to learn from quilting. How to finish. And go on. And make more. To be a person who can finish what they start. To keep doing it. I didn’t know that. I called it joy. But I think I also wanted this.
It’s exciting to hear that Ta-Nehisi Coates has a new book coming out this fall, about just these kinds of things. And that he has been guarding, and loving, his writing time.
We close up this reflection with the interview, of the last episode, on a very good note, I think. A perfect tying it up moment.
“When we first talked, it was in this moment where everyone was saying: ahhghck*, long form is a dying industry, its not going to happen any more, all the magazines are going away. . . and basically everyone has been saying that every year since.
I tend to look at it like, Yes - no one can deny what’s happening with this industry, I struggle with it, everyone involved with it struggles with it. But I believe in the writers. The writers find a way to do it. And they keep doing it, almost against all odds.” - Evan
*I repeated this 5x trying to get the sound and the spelling for it. Still couldn’t exactly get it . But you know that sound people make, ahh, nahhh uhh uck. Kinda like a sigh and a dismissal and that its no good. Listen to the podcast and tell me if you can spell the sound he made. Maybe the spelling was more Meh! Yeah, I think thats it. “meh” but at this point I’m invested in the journey so keeping this footnote
Forcing myself to finish folding my underwear AND put the clothes away. I can’t stop until the podcast is over. And we are almost there
I love how Ta-nehisi talks about reading:
“there is something pure about reading that really can’t be duplicated. I think when you're reading a really great story, theres just you, and this mind meld between you and the text. And I don’t think that can be duplicated anywhere else. I think there will always be people who want the quiet of it”
Longform has connected me to a larger world. Journalism, getting paid for writing, career issues, experiences, teaching. Long form is my school. The interviewers voice are calm, and just themselves, and ask good questions and promote good conversations.
Evan asks Ta-Nehisi Coates, what if? What if it hadn’t hit the kind of vein that it hit- his book. Ta-Nehisi Coates answers: I’d be doing the same thing.
“I’m gonna write. That’s just it. . . .
At some point you make a decision about your life. This is what I do. And if it goes somewhere big, thats great. And if it doesn’t, I wish it had. But this is who I am and what I am.”
Amen. (with note about all the work I’ve been doing and we have been culturally doing to separate out who we are from our work) (and I think of mom writer issues)
Glad to hear at the end that the Longform guys are great friends. Even though I can’t tell them apart. And I did tear up. And make a sad grimace face. Ack! No more Longform. Thank you guys.
P.S.
“I feel like I kinda tricked myself these last few years, that no one was listening” - Evan
On the topic of Longform hosts: I like that one guy is a father! And it seems that one guy is always off doing something else. And one guy edits? I swear there voices all sound the same to me. Its embarrassing. But also kind of awesome that the emphasis is on interviewing and thats what I remember: great interviews! I could go back and research who is who just like I have to do with other things but I also am just looking forward to listening to the last two shows, the one that comes before it where its announced they are ending, and the final one that comes after. Each of the three guys is doing one final podcast issue, so I’m sure I will sort this out.
I’m glad the archive is up. If you have never listened to it you have quite a bit to catch up on.
P.P.S. On the Longform Hosts: Max, Aaron, and Evan. I went back and looked at the longform podcast site and I can’t find bios or each of the hosts names on each podcast. So I don’t think its just me. They were pretty low key about crediting themselves along this podcast series. The next thing I’m going to do is google for more info on them and the show. Not that its over! Wah!
P.P.P.S.
Now might be a good time to be a FAN of China’s Electric Magazine Land! Some notes about how things are going/ and an email schedule change/and an ask:
I was really proud of “Quilts as Publishing” I published last Tuesday- but originally didn’t have many views without sending it out to the subscribers. (As I promised to only send out one email a week not to bombard my subscribers inbox with my publishing schedule of 3 posts a week) So please bare with me, as just for now, I am going to switch gears and email out every article I write. Just as I’m gearing up. To not be alone in this. I really appreciate YOU, please keep sticking with me, even if you need to ignore some of these too many emails :) I’m growing!
And here also is an ask: I would like to keep the ratio of 1 paying subscriber for every 10 free subscribers. That feels soooo good! This magazine model I am building here is meant to also build concrete support for me as a writer. I mostly want it to be able to be free. But I need paying subscribers too. (Eventually I will have more paying subscriber content, with ALWAYS a lot free too.)
So here is my ask! Please consider being a $5 monthly subscriber (cancel any time) of my magazine. I want to build up this monthly base more. And even if ONE person becomes a paying subscriber, thats my whole, OMG- GOAL of keep growing healthy ratio balance. (you will have increased my monthly subscribers by 50%! Being the second one. LOL) THANK YOU for considering <3 And thanks to my BIG FIVE year long paid subscribers and free subscribers for coming on this rollercoaster with me. Woo hoo.