Endless Thread - Humans Being Bros

Episode Date: December 20, 2018

A Santa who went above and beyond. Emotionally-exhausted parents who received a well-timed helping hand. A surprising invention that warms the heart... and body. We celebrate the season of giving by highlighting some of the kindness shared on Reddit -- including, the story that actually inspired the creation of Endless Thread!

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Produced by the I-Lap at WBUR, Boston. Emery, what is your favorite holiday snack? Cranberry sauce, ocean spray, jellied, not wholeberry. Oh, my gosh. What? All the time. Yes, you? I think mine is a combination of eggnog, rum balls, and orange-slice chocolates.

Like a milkshake made of all this thing? No, I'm just kidding. Really my favorite is pretty basic. The sugar Christmas cookie with frosting on top. You're a basic Christmas cookie bro. Basic as they come. Appropriate, since today we're doing a bit of a snack time. You know, that thing where we tell each other snack-sized stories found on Reddit.

Today's theme, Humans Being Bros. Yep. Humans Being Bros. is, of course, that subreddit where people post videos, gifts, photos, and stories of humans being nice to each other. And bro in this case, we should say, is gender neutral. Damn right, bro. I'm Ben Brock Johnson. I'm Amory Siebertson, and you're listening to Endless Thread. The show featuring stories found on Reddit.

We're coming to you from WBUR, Boston's NPR station. And we're going to start with a story that was produced back in 2013 for a podcast called Kind World. And this story actually became the inspiration for Endless Thread. And you should totally subscribe to WBUR's Kind World, by the way, if you're You want more stories of goodness. Yes, you should, but first, here's the story that started at all. My name is Sean O'Connor, and I grew up in Massachusetts in a town called Plainville with my grandmother and my mom. And someone who I grew up with pretty much my entire life was my uncle Scott, who this is really about.

My name is Stasia Wydak, and I had six children, but Scottie passed. away, so he's not with us. And I live in Plainville. I've been here 54 years. I love it here, and it was a perfect home for my son, Scott. My husband passed away 20-some years ago. So I was left with Scotty. Thank God I had Scotty. He was my best friend. He lived with my grandmother for his entire life, and he was just, you know, one of the best people I've ever known in my life. He was the most selfless, loving, kind, human being. Oh, he had a smile for everyone. When he met people, he would invite everybody to the house. And I remember in Florida, I wasn't prepared for this, but he went at the pool,

and he said, oh, come on over. My mom wants you to come and eat with us. I had no idea, but that's what it was. He loved people. Some people with Down syndrome, I think that they're explained to what their condition is and whatnot. But my family had an interesting outlook and they tried to treat him as normal as he possibly could be. For a lot of his life, he stayed at home and he had a job downstairs, which is essentially doing paperwork that really didn't have any meaning behind it except for him. he would document like the TV schedule and what shows were coming on. We're in a tri-level house, so he's got his office downstairs. That's what he calls it.

Because we're in business, and I guess he saw the brothers and sisters doing this office work, and he felt that he wanted to have an office. So we set up a computer, and he had his television, and he could watch all his shows. Bonanza was one of the favorites, because he didn't like anything. with violence in it. That he did not like. But he loved Vanna White with the Price is Right and, oh, the Christmas shows. He would cry if things got a little, little sad, he would be crying down there watching TV. He never wanted anyone to be hurt or hurting. He never wanted that, you know.

Scott faced medical challenges his entire life, not having the same amount of chromosomes genetically as as people without Down syndrome and he was always like feeling half and half. It was sort of a slow progression to when he developed liver disease. And the sort of the terminal fate of his medical condition started setting in like two to one year before he died. In the winter of 2012, our entire. family knew his condition was really declining and then he ended up in the hospital he was in and out of the hospital constantly and none of us wanted to leave him at any moment by himself so it was my night to

stay at the hospital all night and i didn't get much sleep he was up all night in pain and i got back home and it was just one of the most stressful depressing days of my entire life and i turned to reddit and i was like Hey Reddit, my 47-year-old uncle Scott Wideck has Down syndrome and is terminally ill with liver disease. He is currently bedridden and living out his last days at home with my 85-year-old grandmother. One of his favorite things to do is open mail. Dot, dot, dot. Anyone feel like sending him a letter or card? There was no mail. And then on the second day, there was about 10 letters that came in. And then, like, the next two days, it all started pouring in

and there was crates of mail from the post office and my aunts would walk it into the house like crates of mail. Yeah, he said something about Reddit and I said, Reddit, I don't know because I'm not a computer person, I'm sorry, but I'm 85 years old. So lo and behold.

Within a few days, we got, I think, a little over 2,000 pieces of mail from all over the world. I think it was up to like 40 countries or something like that. It was crazy. Oh, my goodness. Then Scotty was very sick. He couldn't get out of bed.

But we would all take turns reading letters to Scotty. And he loved his good. How do you get where? And I like it too. That's what people would say, you know? This letter comes from Australia, and he's included all kinds of stuff in here. Five Australian dollars. He says,

Hi Scott, my name is John, and I live in Brisbane, Australia, but we aren't upside down like some people think. Your nephew said that you like to get male and enjoyed country music as well as drawing. I saw some of your pictures, and they looked great. I wish I could draw half as well as you. You may know that we have kangaroos and koalas down here, but we also have all sorts of other animals and plants, including the ten most deadly snakes in the world. I have popped in some goodies for you to look at and keep as momentos. give your mama kiss for me as she's a great lady from the land down under john and they're all

like that honestly every letter has an immense amount of thought put into it if he got this one letter from australia when he was healthy he would keep this for the rest of his life this would be up on his wall he would show people this for years to come like whenever they would come over and he got thousands of these. It's unbelievable. Like about three and a half to four months after the mail came in, he passed away. And the last time I ever saw him walk, or that we know he walked, was we had moved the mail downstairs when he was bedridden upstairs. And he had actually walked down to his downstairs room and got to create a mail and walk back up. Towards the end there, like the last week or so, my grandmother slept on the couch in the living room next to his hospital bed. The hospital bed

couldn't fit two people, but if it could, she would have been right in the bed with him. When he got very sick, then he wanted me close to him. So what I did, I slept on the sofa in the living room, and I said, Scotty, I can watch you. And you. And you're going to be. And you, You can watch me. We can watch one another. And he would go to sleep peacefully, you know, happy that I was nearby. As much as this is about Scotty and the mail he's received and the strangers who sent the mail, it's a lot about her, too,

because she's just, she was his counterpart, and the person who took care of him, his entire life, his best friend, And she deserves all the credit in the world for what she's done. Definitely, it was a pretty unique mother and son relationship, very positive one, very beautiful one. Shout out to Lisa Tobin and Michael May, who produced that story for WBR's Kind World back in 2013. It's a story that warms your heart faster than a Christmas-themed die-hard marathon on television.

Whatever that means. Oh, trust me. the thing. Some more warming of our cold, cold hearts coming right up. At Radio Lab, we love nothing more than nerding out about science, neuroscience, chemistry. But we do also like to get into other kinds of stories, stories about policing or politics, country music, hockey, sex, of bugs. Regardless of whether we're looking at science or not science, we bring a rigorous curiosity to get you the answers. And hopefully make you see the world anew. Radio Lab, Adventures on the Edge of what we think we know.

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Whatever your goal, we can help. Discover how the magic is made at WBUR.org.org slash creative studio. Okay, Ben, I have a story for you. Okay, I got my blanket. I got my hot chocolate and my marshmallows. I'm ready. I'm feeling cozy. Good.

Yeah. Okay. So this is a story from Sarah Grotto. She lives in Mesa, Arizona. Okay. And she posted this story just earlier this week to the humans being bros community. And Sarah has a newborn. Muscle tough.

Yeah. And her son was unfortunately born with a severe heart defect. So he's been in the pediatric intensive care unit this whole time. Wow. Yeah. And Sarah and her husband have spent pretty much every single moment by their baby's bedside. And that's where she was when I called her earlier today. Let me just step outside because I am in a hospital, but I can sit outside real quick.

So Sarah told me a little bit about what the last five weeks of her life have looked like. It's been a really stressful time. There's been a lot of times when the doctor said told us that he wasn't going to make it, but he's still with us and going strong today. And through that, just as parents, we've been completely drained. So even just as a new parent, Ben, you can relate. It's a draining experience. Yeah, I had a kid who was in the NICU for 24 hours, and that was super intense,

so I can't imagine what five weeks would be like. Yeah. And just earlier this week, she and her husband had a really, hard day. So much so that the doctors and nurses finally said, you guys have to get out. You have to get some fresh air, go out to dinner, do whatever you have to do. So they did. They went to a restaurant just across the street from the hospital. Okay. So while they're there, they see another couple that they think is about the same age as them. And the couple has a daughter, a baby daughter. They think the baby's probably about a year old. And they're just watching this couple with their daughter.

And sort of the future they imagined for their own family. Yeah, and they're kind of overcome because they're, you know, they're joking with the daughter and the baby's laughing and cooling. And Sarah started to get emotional. It was beautiful. And so the family saw us looking and they apologized. And we were just like, no, he has no idea. Like, we love that sound right now.

And so we got to talking and we just had a. So while they're talking, they find out that this daughter, this one-year-old daughter, also had a heart defect. Uh-huh. Yeah, so they suddenly feel this connection to them, and the couple leaves with the daughter. They never find out the couple's name or even the baby's name. Okay. And Sarah and her husband go to pay their bill, and they find out that this couple has already

picked up their check. It just really hit us that, like, there are so many good people out there and that we're not alone. and that we do have so much support even from just random strangers. I don't know who they were, but whenever we get an opportunity, we are definitely going to pass that on as well. Paying it forward.

Yeah, that's really nice because it's like you meet all of these people in situations like this and having a couple actually pay for your bill. I don't know. For some reason, it's like nice that you can imagine a couple that is hopefully, your future, this family that you see that is your future, and having those people be really nice and show that they understand where you're at. Yeah, and there were several Redditors who, you know,

jumped into the comment thread and shared their experiences as well. One of them said that they're 20 years old now and they're extremely active, but they were also born with a heart defect. And someone else said, you know, my brother had open heart surgery at just 90 hours old. And now 38 years later, he's an endurance athlete, super fit, and he has, quote, a great scar to show off. So just giving Sarah a little bit of hope. Ben, I'm actually going to squeeze another story in here. Okay, squeeze away. Because this is just, I just think this is delightful.

So I'm going to show you a video. Oh, boy. I'm going to need you to describe what's happening in the video. Okay. Watch as much of this as you need to until you know what's going on. Okay. Okay, there's a guy on a bike. He's in a train station.

He's riding a bike. There's some sort of scaffolding that his bike is on and in front of there seem to be some weird things hanging down in front of his bike. And it says, come make a free scarf. Oh my God, he's knitting a... These people, this has to be Scandinavia. These people are knitting a scarf by riding a bike. And that's beautiful. Yeah, so this is a guy named George.

He goes by the king of God. on Reddit. Okay. He posted this in the woodworking community. Okay. And he goes to the Design Academy in Eindhoven in the Netherlands. He posted his whole process of, look at this. Look at his instructions for how he mapped out how he was going to make this bicycle,

that you pedal the stationary bicycle, and it makes you a scarf in five minutes. And he wrote in the post, imagine it's the midst of winter. You're cold and bored waiting for your train at the station. This is Aintovin Station. Uh-huh. He says this pedal-powered machine gets you warm by moving. You're making something while you wait,

and in the end, you're left with a free scarf that you can decide to keep for yourself or give to someone who needs it more. You know, it's socialism pure and simple. I think it's beautiful. I agree. Happy holidays. Okay.

Amory, this story, our last story today, isn't all warm and fuzzies, though it has a good ending. It comes from an Ask Reddit question. People who have been Santa at the mall, what is the creepiest thing a kid has asked for Christmas? So kind of a strange question.

Yeah. Fair warning, I guess. This involves a Santa Claus. It does. I would like to think of myself as one of Santa Claus is significant helpers. So this is Gary Shelton, 60 years old. He lives in North Carolina. My design trusses for construction, and I'm

a magician. I have no idea what a truss is. I don't know. So like one of those engineering things, you know what I mean? But isn't that a strange combo? Something new every day, yes. He builds trusses and he's a magician.

Exactly. Okay, so this is an odd combination of jobs. And his third job of Santa Ing, Gary says, came to him, not the other way around. I was at a pretty guy's over in the corner. You, the next year I was performing at a dementia clinic. I was actually making blue nowls for people that were in.

dementia clinic. I was wearing a red shirt. My beard was starting to go gray. And one of the little ladies in there said, well, hello. And I knew right there had been tapped on the shoulder. I like Gary already. Nice guy. Going out of his way to do something nice for people. Okay. So a couple of years ago, Amory, Gary was doing his Santa thing at a residential facility for people with learning disabilities. And he was probably about 40 years. She's a very sweet. So Gary knows this woman because she's a huge Santa fan and he sees her every year at this place. In this one year, she asked him, for instance, for a car for her mom, so her mom could visit more often. Her mom is apparently pretty elderly, so that's, of course, tricky.

And Gary, as Santa always navigates these kinds of requests pretty carefully. He says, like, oh, like, Santa may not be able to help, but someone might be able to help, or Santa can do his best to put in a good word or something like that. But on this particular Santa visit... What is she or something she wants for Christmas? Yeah. So here's what Gary does. So, you know, part of it is Santa is you have to realize that some of stuff you hear may not be real or maybe just, you know, something being said, but in this case, significant, it felt the deputy sheriff.

And Tim would have gone on. And he could go ahead and take that moment and intercede. And you got one of the caregivers at the facility. 10 minutes later, he would open up for me better than she would for them. And so she explained what had been going on. That was the last I had heard about it. I think I just had this epiphany about what Santa is supposed to be. Okay.

Because parents don't necessarily know what their kids want, but they tell Santa what they want. And then the parents are like listening in, like, oh, okay, I'll get that. Yeah. And this is kind of a, I mean, it's a more troubling case of that. But, yeah, this woman is telling Santa something that she wants and someone else needs to hear it. And he is the person who can relate.

the message to someone else. Right. And this is really tricky, right? Because on the one hand, Gary is this person this woman feels comfortable talking with. And on the other hand, he's playing a fictitious character. Yeah. So Gary basically does his part. And then, of course, kind of hands it off to the authorities. He, the last I knew, was arrested and actually the facility. She wasn't there when I went the other night. Gary says this touches on this really fundamental idea. Like he had mixed feelings about all of this. And there was a moment when this woman was telling him this shocking thing where he didn't know what to do. But he says that lucky for him,

the deputy was there and he could kind of hand off the situation to law enforcement. And when he was at this facility the other night, he came back for Christmas this year. It was, I think, a little sad to him that he didn't get to see this woman who was such a Santa super fan, but he knew that she was in a better place. And the director of the facility actually thanked him, too. So Gary's still being Santa? Yeah, and Gary's town in North Carolina has been in some need of holiday cheer recently. We were recently impacted by Hurricane Florence really badly. We made all the national news, unfortunately.

Our home came through it fine. We had about 12 extra people and six extra dogs in our house for about six weeks. Yeah, a lot of people lost everything around here. We didn't lose anything, and so we were able to put people up while they were. So Gary's just being Gary. Good guy, Gary. And a good reminder that whatever you're just, doing this holiday season, even if you're just passing on information that can help in a tough situation,

be a human being a bro. If that's not a holiday message we can get behind, I don't know what is. Happy holidays, bros. Endless Thread is a production of WBUR, Boston's NPR station in partnership with Reddit. Our show is a dream realized by Jessica Alpert, who heard that kind world story about Scotty and said, Damn, that's interesting. Iris Adler is our executive producer, and when we told her, her we were doing a humans being bros episode

this week, she said, Perfect timing. Mix and sound design by Paul Vykus, and whenever there's a good deed that needs Dylan, he says, hold my beer. Our web producer is Megan Kelly, who scrolls through humans being bros,

all like. Aw. Michael Pope is our advisor at Reddit, and he likes to bring up all the random acts of kindness he is committed in casual conversation. Josh Swartz is our producer, and his favorite thing about the holidays is Old Ladies, baking pies.

Extra production assistance from James Lindberg. Our theme music is by Squelcher. Thanks to Redditor Majesore for this week's artwork. It is called Best Friends. On Reddit, we are endless underscore thread. If you want to contribute art for an upcoming episode or give us a juicy story tip so that we can tell it like we did today, hit us up there. And when you do, by the way, click that follow button so that we can be in touch. Oh, and remember, if you could use more doses of kindness in your life, just subscribe to WBUR's Kind World. My co-host and producer is Amory Seabretton. I'm Senior Producer,

and host Ben Brock Johnson. I'll let myself out.