Breaking Bread with Tom Papa - Episode 315 - Annabelle Gurwitch

Episode Date: April 2, 2026

Happy surprise Thursday episode! We welcome Annabelle Gurwitch to the table, and she and Tom chat all about fun topics such as Cancer and Death. Seriously, though, it's a great discussion. Enjoy! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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to pay some responsible. The conditions is applicable. She is fantastic, funny person, an actress, a writer. I would like to say comedian, but she hasn't done stand-up comedy, but she is a very funny person. You know her from dinner and a movie, which ran forever on TBS. She's been NPR. She's been in films. She's had six books, I believe it's six.

She was on the New York Times best-selling author. She has a new book that we're going to discuss today. and it's fantastic. It's called The End of My Life is Killing Me, The Unexpected Joys of a Cancer Slacker. And she has this amazing story you're going to really, it's going to knock you out. She got this diagnosis for stage four lung cancer during COVID.

It just came out of nowhere. There was no, nothing, no signs, no nothing. Like one of those scenarios. that, you know, we all walk around thinking, is that going to happen to me? And it happened to her. And you don't want to say, you don't want to, you don't want anyone to go through this. But the great thing that came out of this is that you have someone who's a great writer and is able to really take that situation and put it into very thoughtful words. It's a very hopeful, fun book. and as soon as you meet her in the interview,

you understand exactly what I'm talking about. This is a special person, a really nice light out there in the world. And we had a great conversation, and I really hope you enjoy it. So enjoy my time with Annabelle Gerwitch and read the book. It's breaking bread. Thank you for being here. It's so nice to see your face. I'm so happy to see you.

I know. I don't know when the last. I saw you when it's... It's decades. Decades, easily. But let's not even count. Yeah. But it was the bread.

They got me here. Oh, I made this for you literally minutes ago. I'm just so excited. Minutes ago. I'm so excited. I was so excited to read in your book. It starts with bread. Absolutely.

It's so beautiful. When I saw that, I was like, oh, now I really can't wait. This is going to be. So I really took care to make sure that you got a good one. Oh, are there bad ones? Why, yeah. Really? Yeah.

Really? And what do you do? Who do you voice those off on? There was a picture of me during the pandemic, giving one to Jeff Garland in his driveway. Oh, sure. He does not get the good one. It was like a frisbee. And I remember being so proud of it.

And he was excited. I think we're just, you know, that whole thing. Oh, that's super good. But yeah, they've gotten a lot better. But thank you for being here. And this book is beautiful. Oh, thank you. You're such a great writer first off.

You're so kind. Yeah, no, you really are. Really sweet. I really went for this book. Can I just say that? Yeah. I wasn't sure I was going to live long enough to see it publish. And so I thought, well, I'll just go for it.

Yeah. And just like really, like, you know, like write about things I hadn't given myself permission to. Because maybe I won't have to be here for it was published. In what way? Like, go for it. So, first of all, there's a lot of sex in the book that I, You know, maybe that's not so well advised if you're going to be around. If you're going to be around.

One thing is, I'm so lucky. My kid who's 28, he doesn't read me. He says he's never reading me. So then I'll go, okay, well, that's good. Don't. You don't want that. And then I had to tell my partner, Jeremy's children, you're not allowed to read certain parts of his book.

They're 27. So I was like, okay, can't do that. But there was other things like, you know, Tom, like being a constant. comedy person. There's a lot of art in this book. And, you know, I'm not an art historian. I love art, and I've always thought about seeing my life through art that I love. But I just felt like, well, I'm an idiot. Am I allowed to write about this? And I thought, I'm going to write about it from being an idiot, but just loving art. Just loving it. Yeah. I just didn't feel like I had permission to, I felt a little nervous, like, am I going to sound like the idiot I am,

which is fine. I just don't want to sound pretentious like I'm not an idiot. Right. Well, to give you, to give you some peace of mind in that regard, uh, I'm not an idiot. I'm an idiot, but not an idiot. Well, but I, but you know, but reading, you know more about the art than I do. So I, so I'm sure there's people, really what really learned people about art, looking at your stuff and going, well, that's cute. Yeah. I'm reading it. Welcome to it. I'm reading it going, thanks for the tip. I got to, I'm, I'm behind in the world. Well, you know, it's funny. I mean, the book is, as you know, it's about these very small rescues, as I say, like this idea of making these small gestures to make your life better. And one of the things that I think is just, it's such a funny thing.

Like you think about like, oh, I should go and see art. Okay, I'm going to make a date in a year where I have time for an entire day and set aside for the museum show of this and this. And, you know, like it becomes that Bob Mankoff cartoon. House Never has never worked for you? You never get there. So I have this new strategy, which is like to go. And it seems almost, it seems almost like it's like obscene to go to a museum and see one thing. I know.

Just see, like, it's not right, but art, but it's. It is. I think it's so much better because you go to these things. We went to the, the brood downtown. I love the bird. Yeah. It's great. It's actually, I feel like it's, you know, you know that it's like the only building in that

area that's not Frank Gehry that was designed by a woman. And the idea behind it, I know, I know just a little about everything. I just want to say, I know really very little. Again, more than me. But, you know, the Frank Geary building. the Disney Hall is made of panels and they're square. Right. Right.

There's a lot of angles. So the brood was meant to be round like a woo. And then you go up to the entrance through this on this escalator, and it's like the vaginal canal, like you're being born. That was the idea behind it. And then you get up to the first level where the art is, and then the light comes out, but it's dark in the way out and mysterious. and one can only imagine that's what the birth experience is like.

That's beautiful. It's kind of amazing, right? Yeah. So you were saying you went to the boat. It gets overwhelming. It's overwhelming. You're like, let's go. And one more wing?

All right, let's go. And it's too much to take in. And you literally are mentally and emotionally tapped by the time you leave. But you did it. To walk in and know, like, let's go check that one out. Let's go check that painting out and spend some time. I think that's a good way to go at it. You know, in a way, it's so counterintuitive that you think of that as, well, that sounds like a luxury.

But in fact, it's actually the thing that isn't the luxury. It's like you could potentially spare one hour if you're working on a really difficult schedule as opposed to an entire day. Yeah, yeah. And there are days when museums are free. And then it's just the quality of time spent with. a piece of art versus the exhaustion that you come to feel is the appropriate exhaustion. I appropriately exhausted from my visit to this museum. I feel like I got an art overload. And it's like this like recognizable thing. And you do that to your children. I'm going to make you

visit this art until you're exhausted until you collapse where you're standing. So this this is about like, well, what if we think differently about love? What if we think differently about art? And every little experiment in the book, every chapter is about some different way of thinking. Yeah, it's, well, let me set it just for our listeners. Because I want to get to that part of it. Because as an excellent entertainer and writer and funny person, and the way you come at all of these different,

you just had another subject to go after. And that kicked you off into looking at the world this way. Yeah, I did. And this was your diagnosis of stage four lung cancer out of nowhere during COVID. Was there any, were you feeling funky at all? Not at all. Not at all.

And that is one of the things that, you know, it was sort of the beginning of this, idea of rethinking how we think about things because there's a cognitive dissonance that we have, right, to how we feel and how we look to necessarily how we actually are that I hadn't really considered. I'm not like a mysticism person. I'm not that person at all. But this idea of, and so the idea of like, oh, you can think your way and things, this is not what I mean. But like, I just thought I knew based upon how I felt and how I looked, and also going to the doctor every year, but there are things that can go wrong and, you know, getting a diagnosis of stage four lung

cancer. It happens to be the kind that I have is undetectable by the immune system until you're really wrecked. And so you can have this and your body just doesn't know it. It's no clue. You're just living your life. You're good. You're solid. And you're just living. You're good. You're solid. And you're you go for a COVID test. I go for a COVID test and I add an urgent care. Which we all did. You painted that picture so great after leaving Dodger's Stadium. I remember like, right, we were all just like, my friend knows a guy who has a shop.

Go to that shop. You can drive up. You don't get out of the car. Right. And the thing is like this is where that kind of serendipity exists and I totally believe we live in a random universe. I just happened to be in the right random of the universe because if I had gone to Dodger Stadium and weighted the weight, I wouldn't have gotten this x-ray that I got talked into because the doctor was cute. I thought he had a thing for older women. I thought he was flirting.

Who the fuck gets, who gets an x-ray at an urgent care if you haven't broken your arm? Yeah, or been shot. Or been shot numerous times even because like, you know, maybe not even just shot once. Yeah. I mean, this is the place is like next to an olive garden. and an ultra beauty place. Why did he suggest an x-ray? Well, I said, he said, do you have any COVID symptoms? We were, my kid, my son and I were just there because we were doing the COVID test because he had come home from college.

And so live in the dream at home quarantining with mom during a pandemic. After graduating, it's just, it's just, sounds. I mean, we didn't have to do that, right? We got the launch into the world. It was really sucky for the COVID class of 20 and 21. So we were just getting a perfunctory test. And I said, well, I have a little cough. Like, who doesn't have a cough?

How long have you had a cough? I just had, I don't even know. I really, I just said I had a, I didn't even, wasn't even thinking. It was just like, you know, if someone says, do you have any symptoms? Well, my nose is, I don't know. It was, I wasn't paying attention. And he said, well, you should have an x-ray. And honestly, he was just cute, which is clearly the way that we can solve all of our health problems.

Every urgent care should have a really cute doctor's. Yeah. Like, people will pay attention. Yeah, absolutely. So, because I, apparently, I had this for years and I didn't know it. How many do they ballpark? They don't even know. No idea.

Because then they would know how fast it progressed. They don't actually know. I'll never know because. There was no reason to ever have, and actually I never felt anything. And then he read it wrong. He read it wrong. He said, go on your way. You're good.

My car broke down on the side of the two freeway, not even a better freeway. Like it was like an inconsequential freeway in L.A. You know, like it's sort of like, you know, like being a D-list actor in L.A. You're on the two freeway. The two thought he was going to be big. Two thought it was going to be big. Two had a moment. He did, but then nothing, right?

The two, like, leads nowhere exciting. It's like a lost highway. And there's no traffic, zombie apocalypse. It's COVID. Car breaks down. Now we're in a Tarantino movie. I mean, it goes from one movie horrible genre to another. And then the worst movie genre, the disease movie genre.

I'm laughing at this now because it was just so absurd, right? So I'm with my kid, the doctor calls, and he says, are you alone? Do you want to take this call separate from your son? And I just said mouth to my son, still got it. This is it. I'm like, he's hitting on me. He's totally asking me for a date.

And then he says, I read the wrong results. It's just so shocking. Shocking. You know, and when I describe what happens next in my life that gets me to the point where I'm trying these frameworks for thinking because I got this reprieve from death. I was so, I still didn't have symptoms of this disease, but it was like there's this word in Spanish zozobra, which translates to mean shipwreck and can mean like shipwreck of the soul, right?

I couldn't even, I lost confidence in my ability to walk, not because I was sick or had symptoms, but I felt like everything had been washed away. Yeah. In that instant, I was speaking at the wrong speed. It was, I was calling my son. I would go to the grocery store, which I walked to from my house in Los Phyllis,

and I'd be two blocks and away, and this makes me cry. I would call and say, I'm lost. Can you come and get me? Wow. Like I was like five years old. Because everything you knew, you thought you knew. Was wiped away.

It was like my neighborhood had shapeshifted. My whole sense of myself, it was like a complete Peter Sellers in being there, like, wash of like Chauncey the Gardner, like total view of the world of like leaving the garden and being in this unknown, you know, it was so crazy. What was so eerie about it? was we what you're describing at that time, we all went through. Yes. All of that loneliness and isolation.

And we all thought for a minute there, like this might wipe us all out. We were wiping off our groceries. We all, like we all did that COVID thing, which you describe and we can relate to. Then you throw this other layer on top of it. So, yeah, how they weren't just taking into the grocery store in a wagon. I don't know. There was a chance at that. Yeah.

There was like a real chance I thought I was losing my mind. Yeah. Because it all seemed totally surreal. And the only way I can describe it because this is what I go to is like, oh my God, I'm living and waiting for Godot. My life has gone Samuel Beckett. Yeah. Like when your life goes Beckett, you're in trouble. Right.

Like it was just totally absurd. Even Beckett didn't understand it. It was totally absurd. And there were these two lines that kept playing over and over my head from this play of his, which they, I can't go on, I'll go on. And I would repeat those, for some reason, that just like popped into my head of this play. And I, and I had this sense that like these two sentences, which were separated by a period. I can't go on.

I'll go on. had like the space had grown between them. This is how I felt like how can I get from one sentence to another? How am I going to move forward in my life? It's COVID. I have this deadly disease hanging over me. It was truly amazing that I probably would have ended up like in some sort of a ward in a hospital if they had been open,

But they weren't even open. I couldn't even go away for like the mental health retreat. Did you feel, I mean, you describe a couple moments of laid out on the grass and like, but did you feel like that you were losing your mind? Like did you feel like, oh, this is what it means to lose your mind? Yeah, I did. And in some ways, there was like this almost mania of elation. So what happened is pretty quickly, I found out it's my mental health provider calling to say,

we're convinced that Annabelle needs more help now. And they're waiting for me. So the thing is, I got my health stabilized through getting on this drug that turns off one gene in your body that's driving the cancer. So I still have this, I find out, you know, over the next few months, I'm stable with my health and I'm still on this drug. I'm an outlier now for how long it lasts. Yes. You're at five.

But five years, the average time someone gets is 18 months. So it's really quite extraordinary and it's like this reprieve from death. Now, I will have to, when the drug stops working, things will get to a different place for me and I'll have to do some kind of more intense treatment and that just hasn't happened yet. Is there a chance of you ask, like, can you ask that if the drug stopped working? It stops working. It will. But I mean, you're five years as opposed to 18 months.

That's true. But even there are small genomic changes now, but I'm still having this great response. And so this became, so it's been five years now, so I've had five years to have this reprieve where I still live with this existential dread, sort of Damocles, but I've had this second chance to rethink how I want to live each day. I honestly don't think too far into the future. Still, that's part of my sort of approach to living.

Yeah. Is to not think in these really big chunks, but it really transform my life. Now, the first thing I had when I got this reprieve was a complete, a kind of mania of like, I'm going to carpe every DM. I'm going to carpe the shit every single day. My fingerprints disappeared from the medication. And so naturally, I considered a life of crime.

This was a firm. I was like, oh, my husband. I emailed friends. I said, do you need someone murdered? I mean, for a good reason. I mean, it had to be a really good reason. I'm sure there's a good reason. I tried to steal art from the walls at Cedarsite.

They've got some great art there. And I'm like, this is, why not? What's the worst that can happen? I got a life sentence. I mean, I tried twice. I got caught twice. I like testing the fastenings on the wall. Checking what tools you'll need.

Because I was like, maybe I didn't try hard enough the first time. You know, I was like, maybe I was tired that day. I really and truly, I felt this freedom. And then I decided, maybe I should, I was getting divorced. Also, COVID, divorce, and this diagnosis all at the same time. So then I decided maybe I should try like one less fling. And then I was like, let's too much think of falling in love. So I decided to be in it just for the sex.

Right. At 60. Of course. Why not? I haven't done this since. my 20s. I mean, come on, people. I mean, but these things were this beginning of an opening towards thinking about life differently. Now, that whole like Carpe DM thing, it crashed and burned. How quickly? It was about a year and a half into 18 months. When I hit the 18 month mark, I totally exhausted myself. I went on. Was it in sync with what you thought the medicine was

going to do? Yes, because I was, it was, I was like building up to this moment. And I went on the great goodbye tour. So I flew to New York and I just got in the vaccine. I waited, you're supposed to wait 14 days. On the 14th day, I got on a plane and I went to say goodbye. I thought, this is it. So I have my closest friends in New York, live in L.A. But again, I'm sorry to interrupt, but didn't you, when you're in the airport, you still had that kind of loopiness. I miss my plane. And you were on, you had your friend on speakerphone. I had my sister on speakerphone.

I mean, I was still in this, I can still get a little confused. There's some things that are still a little brain that are hard for me, brain foggy wise. And this is not, this is not a physical manifestation of what you have. This is literally the mental reshuffling. It's a mental thing. And also maybe a little bit of the medication I'm on, which is pretty strong. Everyone gets a little bit of brain fog.

And certain things are hard. Like writing is not hard for me, but navigating the world is sometimes hard for me. Yeah, yeah. So you get on a plane and get to New York. To get to New York. I spend a day with each friend meeting. We have these like amazing, celebratory, funereal,

branches. You think they're goodbyes. I think they're goodbyes. There are also reunions during COVID. The cherry blossoms are blowing through the air in the upper west side. It's, I'm just, I do the goodbye scene from Emily, Emily's goodbye scene from our town, we're, we're corners, but in New York. So I'm like, goodbye 191st Street, Rattiest Street in New York. I mean, I'm like going to like the worst places. But again, it's that euphoria that we all had. When you saw people for the first time after that shutdown and we thought we were going to be okay. Yeah. And getting that vaccine and getting back out.

Yes. But then you have this whole other layer on top of it. And then the sadness. And so then it all really crashed though when I agreed to go on this tour of Europe, a van tour with a heavy metal band. I have to stop me just for a moment. Okay. that goodbye in New York is so beautiful. The way you wrote that is so beautiful.

And if anyone who stumbled around in New York and had multiple apartments there, just the way you're like this neighborhood, that neighborhood, I could see it being on that Christopher Street Station. All those things. It was such a love letter. And the amazing thing about the book, and I'll just use this as the example, and we'll get to the heavy metal people, it's the end of my life is killing me. It's, you would think we all have that thing of when's it going to happen. One day we're going to get, one day the news is not going to be great for all of us at a certain point. We all live with it.

So to read about it or to watch movies about it, sometimes you're hesitant to do it. because you don't want to make it real. You don't want to be like, oh, no, that cough is something different. But the reason you're such a great writer is that you can take someone who is scared of that stuff and take us through this goodbye tour. And it's hopeful. It's a goodbye, but it's hopeful and it's humorous. And I'm not saying it to say, oh, guys, this is funny too.

it's just there's a human element to your writing that even this subject you want more of it. Oh, that is so kind. You know, I mean, I'm trying to capture the only word I could think is absurdity. I mean, we're all living in this absurd situation of being sentient and so therefore knowing a future is coming at some time or other. And the thing is, you know, when I started writing this book, I didn't think about the time we were living in as much as like now I feel like, oh, you know, my intention was to write a book about everyday joys in extraordinary times, like living through this administration. Yeah, the onslaught. The same approach for how do we survive our time right now in this, you know, administration and in this world, I think is the same approach. I'm writing about, which is if you want to be engaged in life, you can't then just like what's

tempting when there's something extraordinary happening. And I mean extraordinary. I mean in the terrible sense of the word, right? Is to close down and shut down. So I know there are some people who is reaction right now in the world. It's like, okay, I just can't, I'm just going to go into this bubble. Yeah. But if you want to stay engaged and I want to stay engaged in life, I want to stay engaged and outwardly focused. How do I do that? Well, the world feels like I'm being assaulted all the time. And my own health situation can feel like an assault

because there's news that will come in and I know the news is going to come and it's not going to be good. Right. So what do you do? If you try to live with that knowledge, then you're not going to end up being like, oh, it's puppies and sunshine all day, but maybe it's puppies and sunshine for like an hour a day.

So to try to find these moments of joy, you know, it's funny. Like this book was not what I thought it was going to be when I set out to write about it because my whole approach changed. I started out with this, I'm going to hit everything really hard, which is how I ended up saying yes to travel with the heavy metal band around. Europe because I just started sleeping with their manager. And when he invited me on this trip, I thought he was saying, do you want to go on like a bucket list trip to Europe? Yeah. Because I said, yes. And then he said, oh, it's with a heavy metal band that I manage and they're, I'm saving them money by driving the van. And you can come if you'll sell merch. And I'm like, wait, I saw this movie. This is almost famous. And that character did that when they were like,

Yeah. What? But I honestly, first of all, I didn't think this would actually happen. Yeah. So when I agreed to do the tour, I thought, okay, this is never happening. I'm just like, sure. And then I also had this fantasy of like, he said, we're going to the Netherlands to this music festival. And I'm Googling spas.

And he's sending me pictures of tents. I'm like, wait, tents, port-a-potties? Wait, this is not thinking. Yeah. And then the day actually arrives when. I'm going to go on this trip. And I still don't think I'm going to make it because, first of all, I entered the wrong name of the air, my, that direction thing.

The Uber's going to the wrong airport. I'm just like, I can't, I get lost in the airport. I actually didn't write this in the book, Tonks. I thought this is, people are going to think it's too much. I got lost in the airport. Had to call another friend who Googled the map of the L.A. airport for me. On the L.A. side.

The way side of it. I mean, I'll give you the Netherlands. I'm in the L.A. airport that I've been in for 30 years and I get lost and I think I can't get to the flight. I just keep thinking it's not going to happen. When I land in Europe, it suddenly hits me that I have not managed to get change my cell phone service, to get international service. My phone carrier doesn't have it anyway. I'm an idiot. I've gotten my phone service is like this like woke phone service. that contributes to like good causes but has no cell towers. There's a price to pay for that. There's a price to pay. So I was off internet, off my phone for an entire week, riding bitch, which means sitting on the hump between seats because I'm the most inconsequential and smallest person.

That's where the merch goes. Yes. And, you know, the band didn't just not pay attention to me. They were actively ignoring me. Oh. But you see, it was. It turned out to be so great because we think when we are going through something really difficult. And it's not to say that it's not nice to be coddled sometimes.

But what was actually the gift they gave me is right in the book, I sold $1,400 of their merch and they gave me the gift of indifference, which is something I never know I wanted, right? I mean, like totally. Why did you want it? Because their indifference to me meant for one week, it was my first window into not being a person with this terrible disease hanging over my head. No one cared about me or what I was going through. They were on a tour.

They hoped would change their lives. They were 27. They were stinky. They wanted to eat meat on a stick and get kebabs in Europe. We went on a shrooms run for them. I mean, they're just all about their lives, and no one gave a shit about me. And it was fantastic to have this relief

of being this person going through this difficult thing. And that is actually when I changed this approach to think about small moments where I could, in some sense, not be me. And I think in terms, of like the way we are living now in the world, finding small moments of joy, of respite from the, you know, doom scrolling. That's, that's what we can do to be replantished to have resilience. You know what I did right before I came here? There's an Italian deli next door. Right.

And I was hungry. I just didn't have time to eat. And so I thought, oh, I'll get some bread and I'll bring Tom some bread. I ate your bread as well. I got two rolls and they put them in the oven and they were really warm. This makes me happy. And I was like, I'm going to bring one for you and one for me. And I actually ate yours. It makes me very happy. So I had not just one, but two.

I was like, oh, so good. So we described what the bread thing was. Describe why bread was. Yeah, because that was very early. I mean, that's how you used to pick off the whole book. Yes. You know, well, in one of these moments of mania, right, at the very beginning of the diagnosis, and like just trying to inhale the pleasures of life, what is the great pleasure? Bread. And I realized,

my God, I've been an actress. I had been an actress. And even when I was a writer, I'm a vain writer, I'm still, let me just say, I'm still very vain. I've just said, fuck it. I'm just a little, I'm vain, but I weigh a little bit more now. I just can't. I can't. I can't. I can't do it. Like I realized I have not eaten bread in like 30 years. I had half a bagel at this bakery that's famous for its bagels in Ann Arbor like 20 years ago. I'm like, what was I thinking? I left half that bagel.

I had this fantasy of like going to like a landfill and find to find that bagel. It's amazing. I was just like, what am I doing? So the first thing I did that was my mania was eat like an entire loaf of French bread. And it was amazing. It just compressed right in there. I went to my local French bakery. I was like, okay, I got to be a little more circumspect than this.

But the idea of enjoyment, my first step was reintroducing bread. And I just haven't. I mean, just don't skip the bread. Don't skip the bread. You know, it's too good. It's too good. Life's too short. And there's something, there is something truly magical.

about it in the same time that the gases were intoxicating the brains of these women. People were making bread. Yeah. It's, it is that pleasure that you describe is centuries, centuries old. It's so funny. I got this wrong because I had thought you had taken up sourdough baking during COVID. You had actually started before then because I had heard about that. But instead of doing something useful, and I write about this in my book, my friends and I took ukulele classes.

And I write about it because it turned into, again, this like super small pleasure of ours. We had this idea that we wanted to do something together, but we weren't talking because talking got depressing at a certain point during COVID. And even now, like sometimes you want to be with people, but you want to do something and not be just. Rehashing your day. So doing like, so this was this idea, we take ukulele lessons, but we made a pack that we weren't allowed to practice and we didn't have to get better. And sure enough, we not only didn't get better, we got worse. Like you think there's just four strings on a ukulele.

How bad can you be? Terrible as a matter of back. Our teacher quit. We started calling our band The Flowers for Algernon Band, because. we regressed like the little rat and Algernon in that terrible book in the 70s, we all had to read. And it was just so much fun. It's great. I mean, and so this is another, like, little joy. It's a, again, to do the parallel with COVID and what you're still going through, we all had those moments of trying to get those little things out of life and what's

important and, you know, people were baking bread. People were doing these things. People were trying to kind of reorient. And there was that, there was that quiet guilt for people who weren't afflicted by the disease of the virus of, am I allowed to enjoy myself? Because these small moments with my family and things are really special. Right. That's true. But once everything started to kick off again, and I remember being conscious of it, even with my act, I was like, we're not going to have that purity. It's going to pile up and we're all going to go back to that wave. Well, luckily, it's a really crappy time in the world right now. Well, that's what I was going to ask.

So, yeah, I think this is important. Yeah. Do you think that it's a different, what do you think is different about the anxiety of today? It's like when you look at like our grandparents, you know, dealing with World War II and all that kind of. Well, I think it's always scary. It's the attention that we have. Our attention now. we are in the distraction error and we don't have the break.

Not that, yeah, there's always, it's, there's always been incredible challenges and even existential threats like I am just old enough that we, I got the very end of the duck and cover. Right. We were still doing that in Florida, even after the rest of the nation gave that up with school children. We had to do that because we lived near K. because I was down and we, I was growing up in Miami.

Right. And so there was this perceived or real whatever, I don't know, threat. Yeah, nuclear Armageddon. And I think now the only difference in, I mean, because there are so many things that are improved about our lives that were worse back then you could get a bacterial infection and it would just kill you immediately. I mean, you could get that now and it would, but yes. Right.

I mean. Instant death. Right. Like, when did that come out? This drug became, it was started to be developed in the early odds, but it wasn't standard protocol till 2017 and everybody died. Jeez. Everyone, no one survived this.

So it's pretty amazing. It's really new. But in terms of the world, I think really the difference is the 24-hour news cycle and the sense that you cannot get away from it for one second. and that we are keenly aware of every single disaster man-made and natural. And so it can- Non-stop. And it competes for our attention. And the thing you were saying earlier,

like you don't want to just go in a bubble and pretend it's not happening. Right. But now you have to, well, if you didn't open up your phone, you wouldn't know this stuff was happening. And then if you have empathy, you feel like, well, then I should check it. Right. And then you end up a crazy person. It's crazy making.

And so the idea of trying to manage it, though, I think, you know, one of the things I do in the book, I write about books that I was reading while I was writing this book. In the end, I have a little list. And it's not only about, you know, direct quotes, but also about just ideas. And one of the, and I did this because I think there's just so many great sources of, you know, like go to the source. don't just read me, but I was reading a lot of Jenny O'Dell, who wrote how to do nothing and how to stop time, I think is her second one.

But she writes about the competition for our attention and the distraction error that we live in and trying to manage that. And I think, I mean, without being that person who says, because this isn't also an action to say, well, I remember when, you know, well, we would have to make up stories at night because there was no internet. The news was a half hour a night. Yeah, but to actually try.

And it's really hard. It's just really hard. It's just like turn your phone off. I just moved Instagram from my opening page to the fourth page. I have to swipe three times to get to Instagram. Yeah. That is literally had an effect on my life. Nervous system.

It's just jangling. And so, you know, how do we counter this jangle, whether it's the news of the world or the news of your own health and whatever it is you're going through? Yeah. So this is my book is this little attempt. And just, you know, I wanted to write about things on different levels. I mean, there's a story about how this kind of thinking of like, oh, my God, every action I take. My whole life depends on it. There's a story about putting my laboring over this decision

whether or not to put vintage wallpaper up in my house because I'm like, I'm not a person who should be putting up expensive wallpaper. I have a death sentence hanging over me. And then I put up this wallpaper with the idea, not that I was going to enjoy it for the next five years of my life, but that I would enjoy it tomorrow, just for one day. And that's why I could only afford one wall of this paper because it's so fucking expensive.

But it makes me really happy. That's so nice. If you want a little taste of the book, that chapter's up at McSweeney's, which is actually like one of my favorite chapters in the book. It's called Blossoms. It's not like, oh, one of my favorite. Like, I also, I just, but I really,

I wanted to go like that small. Yeah. What's the pleasure in one wall of vintage wallpaper? As a writer, when you go through things in your life. Let me just laugh for a second because I don't know about you, Tom, but I never had intended to be a writer. Yeah.

I was just a, I was an actress with no thought of writing. And so when you just said that, I was like, are you talking to me? I've written six books now and I've written for a lot of publications. Yeah, no, you're a great writer. Well, that's very kind. You are a great writer. It still kind of makes me laugh. Yeah.

You know. But there's a thing that happens in that change. from being the actress running around and starting to write. No one knocks on my office door at home and says, do you have time to try on a cute skirt? Right. Which I really loved. Is that just like, I really love being an actor

and like doing the great works of Shakespeare. I like to trying on cute skirts. Right. Yeah, it's like, it's fun. What do you think about this hair? Yeah, it's really fun. New lipstick, yeah. There's an isolation to writing.

Yeah. And you start to write. to, you start, you have to be alone. It's actually the opposite of what you're trying to do as an entertainer. Yeah. And, you know, the more you're alone, the more you're analyzing your own thoughts. And when you go through changes in your life, or you get further on in what you're writing, how many books you've written, you start to, you almost need a pause between what's happening in your life and the next book because you have to kind of digest it. You really didn't have time to digest this?

Well, you know, the funny thing is, is that's true and it's not true. I had, I was ready to, I thought, and I wanted to publish about two years ago. Okay. Two years ago. It was going to be a different book. Yeah. It was going to be a book that ended with the trip, with the trip, with the band. Uh-huh.

And that book was a book about making peace with the idea of dying. Mm-hmm. And then I was, it took me a longer, it takes me longer to write now. And then I was writing these new pieces about making peace with living after thinking you're going to die. And so then the book changed. But there's really, and it's true, there's some material that's current in there. but it was reth it's it's it's it's it this is the danger like how much how much time passes time plus tragedy equals comedy also that's a rule but in this case I I I'd lessen that a little bit

yeah um I try not to make assumptions about where the future goes in this book but the book ends with something that I felt was a good landing spot. And that was, you know, part of my trying to recapture my own attention from the world of the screen, I write about looking to the ancients not only for bread, but to Greek mythology. And so I felt like whatever happened in terms of time in my life that I was writing about, I end on the book about contemplation. of, and this is the, it's hilarious of Daphne and Apollo. I just want to mention it's really, because I'm like, oh my God, is this funny? No, but it's thinking about who Daphne was in Greek mythology.

And there's this really interesting little bit. And let me just say, I really don't know very much about this, but I did study this one thing enough to write about it at least three pages in a book. I know three pages of material about this, which, is that this Daphne figure, when she's trying to escape the clutches of Apollo in the Greek myth of Daphne and, it's really Apollo and Daphne, but I prefer Daphne and Apollo as a feminist. But she is the only character in metamorphosis, and Offutt's Metamorphosis, who exercises agency in her transformation. It's all a book about transformation. She cries out to be transformed

into a laurel tree. And this really stayed with me. And when I think about her, is like instead of looking to people, the real housewives or whoever is on Instagram these days. Yeah. But I think, oh, to look at Daphne, this figure who is rushing from danger

and accepting change, metabolizing transformation, I thought, Well, that's an ending that I can, that isn't, even though I'm writing about like what's happening in my life, I end on Daphne and sort of using her as a role model because that's an eternally, I think, inspiring idea. Right. You know, and in fact, my book cover, which is not Daphne. Which is so great.

Who did the cover? Someone, my publisher, Grasa. I think it's Tika, no, Tito Grasa Tico had thought of this. So the funny thing is I'm terrible at book covers. And I knew for this book cover it should be Apollo and Daphne, though. I was absolutely sure. I was sending pictures of this Bernini sculpture that I had seen in Rome of Daphne and Apollo.

And I was sent by my publisher, this email that said, oh, we have your cover. It's not what you're going to think it is, but just keep an open mind. And I pulled up and it's a chicken doing yoga. It's so great. And I burst into tears and I thought, this is just, no, this is terrible. What the fuck? What have you done to me?

My high art. And then I thought, oh my God, this is what the book is. It's about the absurdity of life. You think you want Baroque art. Life gives you a chicken doing yoga. And so I did exactly what I didn't think I wanted to do, which was I emailed back. Yes, it's great. I love it when I thought, why you're ruining my life.

That's great. And now I love it, although my son and I have this ongoing debate you can weigh in here. Does that chicken need pants? Should that, is that chicken a little exposed? Well, your son's 28. Yeah. Yeah. I can see him.

I can see 28-year-old version of me saying that. I'm not thinking that. No. I'm thinking about, no, I'm thinking about mortality. I'm thinking about it. Okay. Yeah. Not worrying about the...

If the kids start picking up the book, they might ask that question. Yes. Well, you know, so that's how I ended up with the cover. But that's how I do, I feel like I'm sort of skirting the issue in terms of, like, how, you know, where do you end me? Where do you end a book? Where do you start a book? These are always the really big questions.

Right. Because you don't want to box yourself into something you haven't thought about enough. And I also thought, because I know my life and experience will change, that this would just, this would live as a book, as a, as a chronicle of this particular experience of reprieve. and I was hoping that I would get to write the whole book before things in my health change because I felt like that would be a different experience. And I had to think about that and I thought, well, if that happens, I'm going to still end with this experience because I think those are very different kinds of things. And so this is a book and it is about a long game of like dealing with something.

that's a continuum, it doesn't have a beginning, middle, and end. I'm not like, and now I'm cured. And so now I'm going to move on. No, I live with this. So it's a book about how to keep some joy in a long game. And then if I live long enough for another book, I don't know that I want to write that book. Because I don't, I've read a lot of books about, I don't know, suffering.

And I don't, I mean, Christopher Hitchens did a really great book on mortality. This is a book about strategies for living. So I don't know if I'm going to, I might just take up bread making. I can help you out. I can get you some starter. It'll be great. Is there, have you hung on to being able to dismiss petty grievances?

Oh, God, no. I feel petty grievances are like my core value. Are you kidding me? No, it's funny because I think, you know, there's a sense of like, oh, I am a saint now. I'm a saint of being and cancer as a teacher. You know, I just hate all those things. I think petty grievances are what make life fun. In fact, my favorite kind of petty grievance is about something I know nothing about, right?

My favorite split second judgmentalness is to hate things I know nothing about. Like, ask me about like the movie Hamnet, didn't like it, didn't see it. But you know what? It's so popular. I also like to take on things that everyone else loves because I'm not punching, I'm not punching down. I'm punching up. I'm like, I have a rule in comedy. They need to be knocked down of Pegger 2.

Punching down is like a no-go for me. Punching up, sure, everyone loves Hamnet, except me. It's just too, I've seen the poster. People like it too much. People like it too much. I'm suspicious of it. I just know that I'm just not, I'm going to be disappointed, so screw it, never seeing it. And I held out.

That's good. It's good. Because no, bitchiness, judgmentalness, being angry at usernames and passwords. Oh, still so angry about it. Yeah, I'm sticking with that. Yeah, giving someone the finger on the freeway where they can't come and road rage you, but yelling at them, sure, in the safety of my car, absolutely. I'll take it.

This might be a strange question, but I was curious. At one point you say that you were in a way glad that your mom didn't have to deal with hearing this because she had passed before all of this. How do you look at what's the difference between the death of your loved ones? And you know it's coming, like, and your own. Oh, you know, it's interesting. You asked that because I do think about that. Like, you know, here's a weeper for everybody.

I, my own death as terrible as that is in the sense that no one in the world cares. I'm just one little person. But like I want to be around for my kids' whole future. and it's so much fun to grow a human. And also just the world I'm interested in the world, as terrible as it is. And I love pleasures of the world. Bread, things are just great.

That doesn't bother me as much as death of loved ones. I've lost some people recently. It's crushing. The grief is just crushing. And I don't think there's anything that can miss. mitigate that except to just feel all the feels. Yeah. You know?

And just ride through time with it. Yeah. Yeah. No, but I feel very, I feel like those two events are very different. They are. Much rather exit that lose certain people. Right. You know.

Yeah, when you say goodbye and you have to, you have to walk by the empty room. Yeah. Yeah. That is, that is, that's the whole. that's the hardest thing I can think about. Yeah. Well, that's good to know. Yeah. Is it? It is. Yeah. Yeah, it is. I get it because there's, you know, there's, yeah, I think it's, it's, there's so much pain to it. But your own experiences, you know, you see people who, we have some people in our life who are older. And we all know any phone call could be the one. Right. And, and watching them, go through it, there's that thing. Like when you're young, it's like, there's that stage where it's impossible to even think about.

Right. Then you think about it in real terms. Then you think it'd even heightened terms. Yeah. And then if you live long enough, it's almost like you run out of steam and you're just like, I think we're good here. Yeah.

I think, I think. You know, it's funny. Why do we remember certain things? Yeah. So Sarah Silverman used to have on her Twitter account. I don't think she's even on Twitter anymore. I'm on Twitter because there's medical Twitter and I got very involved in cancer advocacy and they're on Twitter. But at one point, she had this little line where she wrote, it's so silly, it just stuck with me. We're all just

molecules, cutie. And I just love that. Now, I have a harder time with other people's molecules disappearing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. My little tiny space in the the universe. I'm very aware of this insignificance. But I like those other people to be out there. Yeah. Even like the famous people who leave us. I know. The memoriam. My God, it's gutting. Because I just like a world where I never, I don't think I could tell you a Chuck Norris film. But I like a world that Chuck Norris is in. Yeah, exactly. Just to have a world. that he is still there. And so these sort of fixed beings,

but of course we are not fixed beings. No, we're not. But, you know, there are these sort of people who, it seems like, you know, you have a relationship with Chuck Norris, but yeah. You know, this sounds petty, but you love Patty. I love Patty. I'll go to Patty for just a little bit.

you get a diagnosis about something or you have an accident or something happens in your life where you have to deal and you've got it and you're going to be dragged into the system. Is this a game or is this a real question? No, this is a setup. Okay. This is a setup. It's not going to land on you. The like getting a, getting a, getting a horrible diagnosis is a horrible thing for all the existential reasons.

It is. Yeah. It's also like, oh, shit. Like, as if I didn't have enough to do. Now I have got to make phone calls. Now I have to fill out paperwork. It's like a job. It's like having that job thrust upon you.

That has got to be just the most, not, yeah, it's got to be the most annoying part. Can I just say, is that a pillow or a, a provolone? A provolone. This is a pro alone. And I like playing with the strings. Okay, sure. Because who wouldn't? Is it annoying?

No, no. It was just, I was just wondering if it was an actual, you know, pro. You take it. You'll see what happens. Oh, it's just like something to. It's kind of tactile. and the rope is, it's got its texture. I'm getting nervous talking about deaths.

So I'm going to hold on to it for a minute here. I'm going to have my little parvalon. So, you know, now I've forgotten that I had a good answer. I did have a good answer. All the phone calls. All the phone calls. Well, so the thing is, it's a small part of the book, but it's a big part of my life.

I wanted to write a book that was funny because I really felt funny was needed right now. But it was impossible to not write about the job that it is. So I've tried to corral it in one chapter. Yeah. Which I call the wall of no. Because it is like the wall that they, it's less, it's actually less porous than the wall

that they built between the United States and Mexico. The wall of denials from your insurance company. And also just this insane system that we have, keep going in the, I like now, I'm going to give you this thing. In the United States for health insurance, the hurdles they make people jump through. And some of this is my experience, and some of this is just the experience

of other people who are going through things. I didn't know when I was diagnosed and I was told about this amazing medication that if I got tested through this biopsy, if it showed I was eligible for this medication, I didn't know that there are people in the United States who can't get this medication who also have insurance or who have Medicaid

and Medicaid doesn't cover it in every states. The testing. Because it's like 17 grand a month or something? That's the actually medication itself. But we don't actually know what drugs actually cost. It's difficult we talk about cost of drugs. We know it's an expensive class of drugs. But just to get the testing, there are 28 states in the United States

where the laws in the individual states don't require an insurance company to cover this testing. So what does that mean? It means that you could unknowingly sign up for an insurance, which really shouldn't even be on the market, that isn't really worth the money that you've paid. Right, not going to cover you.

Because if you don't have the testing to know if you're eligible for this medication, you can't get on this medication. So people can die without knowing there was this medication, because you might not be told if you didn't get the test. This is how unequal the care is in this country. I was just shocked because I was like, oh, this is standard protocol, this medication on mom, this is amazing.

And then to know that people aren't getting it in other states and even in California, there are people who aren't getting it. And so that's just, that's, that's, That's the not funny part. Yeah, when you think about people who get a diagnosis who are maybe, you know, who don't have a lot of money and are still taking the bus to work every day? Like, where are these people going to have the time to do all of that? That's insane.

It's a whole other job. Right. You know, I do a lot of advocacy in the cancer world, right? So I work with oncologists and researchers on giving feedback to their research, but I also meet with people who are in treatment. all over the country and actually all over the world. It's really one of the amazing things, and this makes me so happy, is, you know, I'm, like I said, a little bit of an idiot, definitely an idiot in science.

I was a C-mino science student. But I've managed to learn a lot about this science because when people talk to me about science as a story, I can understand it. I just don't know why I ever had to learn the periodic table. How many people in life need to know that, right? But so I meet people all over the world. And, you know, the United States just has so much more inequities than other Western countries. And like I was in South Carolina and I was at a patient summit.

And, you know, I'm talking with someone who works as a waitress at a golf club and she makes drinks off the back of a cart. She actually loves a job. Yeah. It's a very social job and it's a stable job. She's in treatment. And I'm like, how do you do this? Yeah. I will spend an entire day on the phone with denials of insurance claims or something that was

misprocessed or once an insurance company took $4,000 out of my account accidentally. And I weathered that, but that could wipe someone else out. Completely. Tirely. And how do you have the time when you're in treatment and you're working as a waitress on your feet all day? It's so horrible. I don't have compassion for people in this country. It's such a shame.

Yeah. Yeah. They list in the back of the book of like things you should do to plan and is like, yeah, I mean, just that, just to get your stuff in order and just to keep an eye on stuff, it's while you're being, have the tsunami of the news. Right. And I think, you know, when you're, when we say get your stuff in order, we don't, I don't mean just things like get wills and advance directives.

No, I just mean like your daily care, where you're going to get. it's your medication and then your insurance policy changes. And then one day the doctor you're seeing is in network and one day they're not. I mean, it's so crazy. You really do feel very Samuel Beckett waiting for Godot. Yeah, it really is. It's insane. It's insane.

I love that you're still alive. Me too. It's really great. I feel pretty good about that. Yeah, it's pretty great. Of course, I haven't made it home on the freeway today. Well, yeah. Here's the hoping.

You're just hoping it's fast. What do you call it in the book of The other ways to die? Oh, double die? Double die. Yeah. Well, the thing is, is that when you get this diagnosis, people do say weird things to you. Yeah. And they don't mean to.

Right. You know, first of all, they'll say to me, even now, like, are you sure you have cancer? Right. Like, I wouldn't know. Because you don't look cancer-y. You know, like, okay. And then there's always someone who, loves you so much that they feel they need to remind you that actually, you know, they could get hit

by a bus today. And no one wants you to say back, well, I could also get hit by a bus. So it's like, I'm going to double die. My chances of dying are doubled. Like, you want people to hate you? Say that. Yeah. Yeah. But it's hard because people don't know, people don't know what to say. And actually, I have some advice about that. If someone comes to you with really bad news of any kind, I now say, well, that sucks. That I, yeah. Just leave it at that.

That's terrible. That really sucks. It's so much more comforting to just have your terrible news affirmed. Right. Then, well, maybe this is. I have a solution. And you're going to, you could get hit by a bus. Yeah.

Just no, no, let me live with this. Let me feel this. It sucks for a minute. Yeah, it sucks is actually the right answer. And it's so simple. Yeah. Well, I don't know how to wrap up. By just saying that it's really funny book. Oh, well, the book is super funny. And to come out and see me. You know, where are you going? I'm going everywhere. You are. People will have me. Yeah. I am going. Dutore by yourself? As opposed to with a manager.

or somebody that goes with you. No, it's me. But actually, what I'm doing on this tour, I'm calling it, it's so crazy, because I'm starting tomorrow. Tomorrow. Tomorrow. It's called the Comedy and Cancer Center.

Unexpected Joy's tour. And I'm doing this crazy thing, which if you see me, just hand me caffeine on the road, I'm doing talks and lectures at cancer centers, like when I'm up in New Haven, I'll be giving a talk to a palliative care doctors at Yale. And then I'll be doing a reading at night with Iliata Douglas.

So I'm doing the moth. I'm doing symphony space with Lori Anderson and Bob Odo Kirk. All these like friends are joining me on comedy events and readings all over the country. And then I'm doing talks with patient summits. and with doctors during the day. So it's kind of this crazy mix of entertainment and education. And it's taking me to three different continents. I'll be in South Korea.

I'll be in Australia. Wow. How long? When do you come back? A couple years from now. I mean, I have this really big stretch from now through, like, from now through like June. And then I have a little break,

and then I hit the road again in the fall. and that's when I go to Australia and to South Korea and a lot of other cities in between. That's fantastic. It's really kind of an amazing thing to get to speak to these two very different constituents. Yeah, yeah. And I've started this little pre-chorn, and it's been really great. That's fantastic. Just need coffee.

Yeah, a lot of coffee will be like just handing you like a marathon. You can take the provolone if it'll help. And a coffee. I feel like he's like, I'm sitting out on the road down on my cancer tour with wine and cheese. Hold on. I have to take a picture of that. That's too. One of the things I really love about the book is that you have, and I love when people who know more than I can write these kind of books where you're referencing a lot of literature, a lot of art, a lot of great things that meant something to you throughout the book.

And I think that adds to the joy of it. You just start to see like the fabric of life and why art is important. And I feel like you've added to that with this book. It is a, it's a really nice, artistic piece. Thank you, Tom. And it leaves questions unanswered. Like, is chicken a theme in the book? Yeah.

Where's the chicken? Does he need to wear pants? Do I have to do it? You don't have to do a word search on chicken. There's still some mysteries in life that I leave unsaid. You've always been beautiful. I've always during our careers, we've crossed paths,

and you were always like a bright light, and we continue to be. Thanks for being. When you were little, you've been braced, you're in class of recreat, always in trying to negotiate and do fair deschanges.

The appellee-tit-tit-tead you're making this instinct, with without operation gratuit, No, no amount of minimum, and no free mensual. You're made for negotiate. And the TD is there for you help.