Here's Where It Gets Interesting - Humor, Grief, and Modern Motherhood with Taylor Wolfe

Episode Date: August 28, 2023

Today, Sharon welcomes back comedian and writer Taylor Wolfe to discuss her heartwarming memoir, Birdie & Harlow - Life, Loss, and Loving My Dog So Much I Didn't Want Kids (Until I Did). You might know Taylor from following her online at The Daily Tay, where she’s known for her entertaining videos and impressions of influencers, along with characters we’re all too familiar with from everyday life. Together, they discuss the nuance of modern motherhood when everyone has an opinion, the need for laughter even among deep grief, and how everyone is their own kind of weird. If you have a pet you love dearly or if you’ve faced the challenges of navigating what a chosen family may look like – all with a dose of lighthearted humor – this is for you. Host/Executive Producer: Sharon McMahon Guest: Taylor Wolfe Audio Producer: Jenny Snyder Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Red One... We're coming at you. ...is the movie event of the holiday season. Santa Claus has been kidnapped? You're gonna help us find him. You can't trust this guy. He's on the list. Is that Naughty Lister? Naughty Lister?

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My guest is my friend, Taylor Wolfe. She has been on the podcast once before, but I'm thrilled to have her back so we can discuss her brand new book, Birdie and Harlow, which is a story about life and loss and loving your dog so much you don't want kids until you do. You might follow Taylor online at The Daily Tay. She is a comedian. She's hilarious. And I cannot wait to share this conversation with you.

So let's dive in. I'm Sharon McMahon, and here's where it gets interesting. Oh, I am really excited to have my friend Taylor Wolfe back on the show. Yay, welcome. Thank you. I'm excited to be back on the show. My voice just on the show. Yay. Welcome. Thank you. I'm excited to be back on the show. My voice just went so much higher showing my excitement. Yay.

If you are not currently following Taylor Wolf on Instagram, first of all, you should be. Her Instagram channel, The Daily Tay, is hilarious. She is well known for her impressions of influencers and her impressions of somebody you might see at a party or like a relative. They make me laugh all of the time. You naturally have a gift for comedy. Thank you. I enjoy doing it. It keeps me entertained because I don't socialize with real people, just the people in my head. So I'm very social in my head. with real people, just the people in my head. So very social in my head. I have a lot of thoughts and ideas I want to express, but not to you in real life, only online. Just on my phone. I very

much relate to that. I read your new book and it was so good. Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you. That means a lot. I'm very excited to talk with you about it because not many people have read it so i know i know i'm special i got an advanced copy of birdie and harlow which is a memoir a very very funny memoir that i love the subtitle which is life loss and loving my dog so much i I didn't want kids until I did. Until I did. Until I did. That's right.

And now you have two of them. Yes. Birdie and Goldie. I would love to know, how did the seed of this book get planted in your mind? Where you're like, you know what? I really need to write the story of Birdie and Harlow. I need to write this memoir. How did you conceive of this project? So it began as essays about motherhood. It kind of started from, I used to do this character called Mom Troll, where it was based on real messages I got on Instagram, a lot to do with breastfeeding. People have a lot of opinions about breastfeeding, my breasts, everybody's breasts. I would get some nasty messages. And the way that I dealt with them

was by turning into a character, obviously, and just kind of belittling these mean things people would send. So my agent was like, you should write a funny collection of essays on motherhood, on these messages you get, things like that. And I was like, yeah, that sounds great. And then about two months into writing this, Harlow died and the grief consumed me. And I was like, I cannot write anything else except for I need to get through this grief. So I spoke with my agent and I was like, I'm getting nowhere on these funny mom essays. And I'm like, I'm writing about

my boy Harlow. I'm like, cause that's how I work through things. And so I was like, I don't know if this is going to be the book, but I have to write this right now in order to like breathe in order to move on. Cause grief is just so consuming. And it was my first experience with a big loss. And I thought like the grief would go away. And once you experience grief, you know, it doesn't go away. So anyway, I'm not going to pitch you every time something terrible happens in my life. But right now I was wondering, can I write instead about motherhood and also loss? I was wondering, can I write instead about motherhood and also loss? And so then that's how the idea kind of came about.

And then as I was writing it, I learned that Harlow led me to motherhood. Even though we discussed Harlow did not call me mom, but you mother your dogs. And so he led me to realize I did want to be a mom because I had heard people love their kids as much as their dogs. And even though I was skeptical, I was like, there's no way it could get any better. But maybe we should try. Maybe we should see if it's true. So that's kind of how the idea was born for it. This is an idea that requires further investigation. Is it possible to love a child as much as I love Harlow?

I didn't think it was true, but it is. I learned it is true. And so much so that we had another kid and another dog. Now we have two kids, two dogs. What are your dog's names now? So we adopted Gunny, full name Gunner. That was his name he came to us with. He's 10. And then we got Vinny. His full name is Vincent Carlito. Vinny, Vinny, Vinny. If anyone out there is pregnant and thinking about getting a puppy, I do not recommend it. If you are very emotionally unstable, I extra don't recommend it.

But there's a whole reason we got Vinny. That's revealed more in the book. But there's a whole reason we got Vinny. That's revealed more in the book. You know, one of the things that I loved about this book is, first of all, as I mentioned, comedy is your thing. You naturally are very funny and you found a way to write about topics that can sometimes be really challenging, heavy, emotional. Motherhood is emotional for most people, you know, and sometimes those highs are very, very high, and sometimes the lows are very, very low. But often it doesn't feel funny, or it feels wrong to think something is funny. It feels wrong to laugh at something that is challenging. And I have often thought that using humor to cope with difficulty

is an extremely useful tool. I think so too. And that people who insist on being serious all of the time are actually not doing themselves any favors. Now I'm not saying laugh at people's misfortune. I'm not saying like kick someone when they're down and tell them they look ugly when they're covered in mud. That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying laughing at yourself, laughing at your own situation. How has using humor helped you cope with the difficulties of adjusting to motherhood and the difficulties of losing your beloved friend? Oh, that's like comedy is my crutch. That's how some of my best characters are born. Like I said, mom troll. I think relying on my standup background has helped me a lot. What I think of as one of my most meaningful stand-up sets. I performed it the night before I had a DNC surgery. I didn't know I was about to have, which is kind of ironic to me thinking back,

but the entire set was about my miscarriage and the stupid things people say when you have a miscarriage and just how people act. And they're so common, unfortunately. And in talking about it, so many people have said, I miscarried and I didn't talk about it or I didn't know how to feel about it. I'm more comfortable talking about these harder topics through comedy. And it's transferred into even like now with a toddler who goes without saying,

we love our children, but toddlers are hard. Oh my gosh. So even like bringing up the highs and lows of how can I like miss these days with my toddler, even though I'm like, oh my gosh, this morning was brutal. Just getting to this show felt like it took hours and tantrums, but still she's gone. I'm like, oh, I miss her. It's like, that doesn't make sense.

But for some reason, knowing it doesn't make sense to anyone else and we're all in this boat, that's comforting. Tell me more about your comedy background, because I'm so curious, how did you get into stand-up? How did you even get into doing all of these sort of like sketches with all of these different characters? How did that happen? It requires, first of all, a lot of courage to get up on stage and do stand-up. So much courage. How did you get started doing that? So when you live in Chicago, it's such a comedy hub. I lived there for like a year and thought about taking second city classes for an entire year.

But then I was like, I don't know if I can afford it. Like I had all these reasons not to do it. Because like you said, it's very scary to get on stage and put yourself out there. But I'd like to thank wine for pushing me into that. Because I remember it so distinctly sitting at my little desk in my room, pulling out my credit card after a few drinks. And I was like, I'm signing up. We'll just see, I'll go to one class. And then one class led to me doing like their entire like program for two years. And then you meet like-minded people. And so then I started to meet people who were like, yeah, I do standup. And I was so intrigued by stand up. I didn't know anyone who really did it. You know, I would watch like specials and like, to meet someone who actually

like in person did stand up. So my first stand up night was at the Second City again, on like a Saturday night in a brightly lit classroom, like 6pm, a terrible stand up situation, but that's where everybody starts. And the first time I did it, I completely blacked out. It was the weirdest feeling of like floating away, but your voice was still like going and talking. And then I sat down next to Chris and he's like, people laughed. And I was like, I blacked out, but also I want that feeling again. And it was just so crazy. So I pursued it for a few years in Chicago, but the standup world is you grind super hard. I know that's like the truth for a lot of things, but it's late night world. And that's just, I'm a tourist. I'm so sleepy. So I was like, I can't be a late nighter. after a few years, even though I really loved it. I was like, I miss my couch. And so that's when I was like, I wonder if I could do standup ish from home. And this is like right around when Instagram stories came out. I am the age of someone who was on Instagram before stories. I don't know if

anybody else remembers that era. Oh yeah, I do. I do. Yeah. They just came out one, one night and I was like, what are these? And so I started kind of doing videos on my own terms. Now it's come full circle in that with my book tour, I'm hoping to do a little stand up with it as well because I missed the stage. But the difference is I'm setting the time. It will not be 10 p.m. It will be 6.30, maybe 7 if I'm feeling crazy. The sun will still be in the sky-ish. Yeah, I totally can relate to that. That first of all, I'm not going to do standup. I don't have that skillset.

But secondly, even if I was going to, there's no way I could live that life. I'm toast by 9 p.m. There's just no chance that I could be like, my set starts at 11.45. I hosted an open mic that started at 10 on a Monday night. And that's just not me, but I tried. I really tried bless my heart, but oh my God, I just not a late nighter. It just is not, I could never do it. I totally can relate to that. But I love that you found

a vehicle for your work, which is again, so funny. You found a vehicle that perhaps reaches more people than your standup. I mean, it definitely does. Cause a lot of times these open mics, when you're starting, there's 20 other people in the room, they're all comics. Their faces are all in their notebooks, reading their jokes. Nobody really cares. And then I was like, but at home, I can reach hundreds of thousands of people on my couch. I'm going to choose home. It also seems to be true that people who are comedians or people who have a natural bent towards comedy, that people expect to be able to walk up to them and demand that they be funny.

Have you ever experienced this where you get on a podcast or somebody meets you in person and they expect every word out of your mouth to be a hilarious joke? And when you are like a normal person and you're just talking in a normal tone of voice, have you ever experienced that? And do you find that people are then like disappointed that you're not walking down the street wearing a wig in character? Oh my gosh. That's why I don't leave my house. You don't wear wigs to the coffee shop? No. Oh my gosh. It was worse, I feel like, when I did stand up because people would be like,

oh, so you're a standup? You're listening to us then. You're getting jokes from us. Like, don't come around us. We're tons of material for you or stuff like that like I'm not I'm not always okay like sure yeah you know so they just they do act differently not everybody or they kind of they go into show mode I don't know if you've experienced that where I can tell someone's like putting on a comic show and I'm like you can you don't have to do that we're just here hang it yeah you don't have to yeah. So it's either they want you to be a show pony or they're going to be one. And it's just so uncomfortable. Yeah. It's almost like a kid coming up to you and like poking you and be like, tell me a joke. Tell me a joke. And that's just not how it works. That's not how it works. Yeah. Adults do that too. Or I've had people that can you just do like a quick five minute thing here? Usually that's my mom when she has people over. She's like, will you just do stand up for five

minutes? I'm like, no, I won't mom. Like, thank you for asking. And I know she's my biggest fan, but it's like, I'm not just going big. Hey guys, what's the deal with house parties? Right. But this book on the other hand does allow you to just be funny on demand. See how that worked? Now you have opportunity to be funny on demand because people can just read it and find it funny and also heartwarming and touching. It's a tricky balance to maintain in a book. How did you decide how much of this is supposed to be funny and how much of this is supposed to be like real life or like a heartwarming story? You figure that out. I didn't necessarily go in with a formula. Perhaps I should have, but

that's just kind of me, I suppose. I'm a little bit funny, a little bit heartwarming, Me, I suppose, you know, I'm a little bit funny, a little bit heartwarming, like mix of everything. I will say the harder chapters were easier to write. Like I've had my blog for 10 years or like 14. When something like I said in the beginning, when something is hard for me, I get through it through writing. And so as soon as Harlow died, I just started writing immediately because I'm like, I cannot keep this in. And that I feel like really flows. I almost don't know how to feel about something until I've written it out. And then, you know, you trim it back a little bit. So I'm not going to all in, but I could have written about my grief forever, but nobody wants to read that. So many chapters about me being sad about my dog dying. But I also, for instance, my birth story was a

little bit of grief, but not really. And that's where I feel like I really got to be let some of my humor out because what's going on with childbirth? What's going on with that? I think every woman held out on me. Like some people talk about it, but no one is really telling me the real truth here. So I did not go in prepared. You did not go in prepared? No, no, I did not. Did you think it was going to be the movie nine months or like, what were you picturing? I thought it would be a combination of every rom-com I've seen about birth where I was like, I'm not going to have her right away, but maybe an hour or two in. I said to Chris, I was like, gosh, I just hope I'm not here like for a full day. And then it was five.

Five days. And I was already a week past my due date. They gave me everything possible to induce labor. Got the full buffet of things, fully built, Pitocin. I don't even know all the things. By the end, I was like, yeah, try it. And nothing worked. So they just, they did a C-section then, which I was like, why did we not just do that from the start? Let's just do that. So I did the C-section with my second, with Goldie. And again, I was not prepared because people told me, they're like, your second C-section? Someone actually said,

it's a piece of cake. And I'm like, ma'am, what cake are you eating? Because that was not a piece of cake. It was not delicious. It was not. You are a liar. It was not a walk in the park. I've never had cake or park walks that felt like my body was being, you know, ripped apart. Like I shouldn't, it wasn't ripped apart, but it was harder than my first C-section, which I was led to believe it wouldn't be. I was just like more awake for it. And I was like, oh, I do not like that feeling. Like you guys are breaking my ribs.

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Dairy Farmers of Canada. I would love for you to tell people, what was it that changed your mind about having children? Because in the subtitle of your book, I didn't want kids until I did. What was it that made that shift in your mind? This is a big question. I will say I used to Google, why do people have kids? say, I used to Google, why do people have kids? Why do people like kids? What's the good thing about kids? Google doesn't give you a lot of answers for that one. So I was like, what's going on here? Because I would just see a lot of tantrums in public and Har and I would look at each other and be like, oh my gosh, like, no, thank you.

I also mentioned a lot in there. I never got baby fever. I think some women do get that. I know they do, but I didn't. So not everybody gets that. I'd like to make that point known because I kept being like, okay, it's going to happen. It's going to happen. I'm just going to wake up and be like babies, but I never did. And, and I'm still not totally like babies. I like my own babies. And I do like babies more than I used to, which is a good thing, you know, being a mom and having to be around other babies, but the switch, which I write about this in my book, it happened in Hawaii, which the Mai Tais played a part. Usually I'm like drinking and looking for dogs, you know, like I don't want to pet that dog. There were no dogs on the beach and said what

I saw was like a really intimate moment with this sweet couple and their little baby. Chris saw it too. It was so weird how it just hit both of us. And maybe this restaurant is set up to make people want to have kids. So we keep coming back. They get more customers. Anyway, it's Mama's Fish House. Ironic. That's the name. I've been there. Did it make you want to have kids? No, I already had a bunch by the time I went there, but it is a really, really unique and special restaurant. It is. And they're breeding customers. So anyway, it was just like a moment where this kid wasn't being a monster and the parents were so engrossed with their little daughter.

And then they walked like out on the beach. They had the coveted spot in the restaurant, which makes me think now they were planted. But anyway, the way that they interacted with her and they loved being with her so much. And for some reason, Chris and I could not look away. We weren't creepy. This is hard to tell out loud because it sounds like we were being very stalkerish and creepy. But then eventually after they were done, Chris is like, you were kind of staring at those people quite a bit.

And I was like, you were too. And something about that, we're like, that didn't look so bad. It wasn't just that one moment. Obviously, you know, there were a lot of moments leading up to that where I felt like we got a behind the scenes glance at more of the tender sides of parenthood. You don't have to see that because when kids are out in public, they can be kind of a nightmare. And if you don't have kids, that's all you witness, you know? So it's like, why is anyone doing that? Oh, it's super hard. And it is super hard, but there's those tender moments that people that don't have children don't often get

to see. And they're very hard to put into words because I've tried. I think about it every single day. Like, man, kids are so hard, but yeah, we could have another. The pros outweigh the cons. For me, I'm not trying to convince anyone to have children. I want to make that clear as well. There's a lot of people on this earth. We are not telling anybody to go out and have kids. But also the biggest part was probably how much joy Chris and I got from Harlow. Like my heart still flutters thinking about the camping trips we'd take him on where he would like run up ahead and look at us with this big smile. And we got so much secondhand joy from Har. We're like, do you think a kid could give us this? And again, that's where we were skeptical, like no way,

but what if a kid could, or even more? So it's just like getting to experience like that joy through something else. And then it makes like your heart feel all full and happy. I hear what you're saying. It is difficult to describe the secondhand joy that you get from your children, from your pets, et cetera. You can't really quantify what that is like, what it's like to watch your kids have so much fun at a birthday party or Christmas, or what it's like to see how much they love it when their pet dog gives them kisses on the face. You know, like the secondhand joy that you get from watching your children or your dogs enjoy something. It's a different kind of feeling that you get from just, oh, I'm having ice cream.

It's so delicious. Enjoying it yourself. It's hard to put into words. Like it's people can be like, oh, you'll enjoy it. It's so wonderful. You're going to love it. But until you experience it, you can't really understand. It's difficult.

It really is to put into words because I try so hard. I try to do my best to do it. I'm always analyzing it. Like, why is this so great? Like, she's just riding a scooter, but it looks so like, look at her ride that scooter. Like, I like watching her ride a scooter more than I like riding a scooter. Yes, exactly. You know, me watching you enjoy this thing is way more fun than me enjoying it on myself. And I agree with you. That's not to say that everyone

needs to have kids. This is not a condemnation of people who are like, you're going to regret it. If you don't, I don't think that I I don't think that. I think not having children is a perfectly legitimate choice. And that research shows that single childless women in their forties are the happiest demographic. So there's no shame or shade to people who choose not to have children. That should absolutely not be the takeaway. I feel like I touch on that in my book a lot. And it was important to me because people would say to me, like, I know you love your dog, but you just don't know true love until you have a child. And it's like, really? No, no, no, no. You don't get to tell me how I know true love. Like, that's great if that's your situation. Although I feel a little bad for your dog, but you don't have the right to tell anybody else how to love or how we feel love. Who do you think this book

is for? Who do you hope will pick it up and that this book will reach? Well, I only think about this every single second of my days right now. It's all I think about. And I like to imagine you picking it up in the airport and I'm like, who is this person reading it? There's a lot of different people I know this book will appeal to. First and foremost, if you have a pet that you love deeply, this book is for you. A lot of times people would ask me, do you ever worry you're

too over the top with the way you talk and treat and act with Harlow on Instagram? And I would say, no, I don't worry because that was us. I am an introvert. I don't make friends easily. I'm not good at it. I get tongue tied when I talk, I get anxious, but not in front of dogs. They're just the best. So my relationship with Har was, I'm realizing now, like, I mean, I knew it then it was special, but we had a very real, he was my best friend. So for anyone who has a dog or any type of pet, whatever it is that you are just so intertwined with your life. Like I was with Har more than any person. This book's for you. And then if you have lost that pet and you're like, how do I go on? Or I mean that it's just really hard to move forward without your best pet friend when a lot of people don't tend to

understand it. Cause you kind of feel like you can't talk about that grief because there feels like there's an expiration date for animal grief. Get another dog. You don't get a funeral. Just get another dog, and then you'll start being sad about the previous dog. I thought you were really telling me that. I was like, well, Sharon, that didn't work for me. No, that seems to be the attitude of a lot of people, that you need to spend eight weeks being so sad,

and then get a new dog, and the grief will be gone. Yeah, and then they're like, are you going to get another puppy? And it's like, I don't want another puppy. I want Harlow. Har wasn't just a dog. He was my Harlow and we were together so much. And so I think if you are looking for a book to help you feel less weird, if you have a very intense relationship with your pet, or if you're going through some grief, I talk a lot about that and the hierarchy of grief, you know, pets just aren't at the top. And so you feel like you have to keep that grief in. So there's one part. It's not all sad though,

I swear. If you are like, Hey, I don't know if I want to be a parent. Like, where is my baby fever? I worked through a lot of those things too. So I'm taking on some heavier topics, but in a lighthearted way. If you've gone through pregnancy loss and that in itself was, that's such a hard thing to go through for so many reasons. For me personally, it was because we didn't know if we wanted to have kids. And then when we lost our first, I felt like I didn't deserve to grieve like those who did know, because I was so uncertain of this pregnancy. And then I lost it and it just crushed me.

And I would spend so much time in my head being like, you don't deserve to feel like this. Like there's women who have been trying for years. They deserve to grieve more than you. So there's a lot of touching on the like grief part of who deserves it when it's like, you can't compare grief. We all have our own that we carry. And the only grief we know is our own. So there's no sense in comparing it, whether it's, you know, you missing your dog, or you wondering why you're grieving pregnancy loss when you weren't even sure and you know, other people have tried longer and just so many things we think about. There's me talking about doing standup in Chicago and also like these meaningless jobs I had in my twenties where I was constantly thinking, is this life? Like I just have to be in this cubicle

forever. I love all of the little sidebars that you have in here that made me laugh, like things I often wonder about cavewomen and motherhood. I have had all of these thoughts. How did they do it? Like, I know how, but also how? I've had that exact thought many times. How did they maintain a 67 to 72 degree temperature in a cave nursery? There's just so many things to wonder about.

I love the rundown of your jobs where you're like, I'm a recruiter for a culinary school. Highs, I set my own schedule and learned killer knife skills. Lows, I walked through high school hallways dressed like the Iron Chef and encouraged students to, quote, live their dreams by enrolling in a for-profit college that was insanely expensive. I also really liked how you were an HVAC recruiter. An HVAC recruiter. That one only lasted a week. A week. Okay. Highs, the Whole Foods was across the street. Lowe's, literally everything else. You've had a lot of recruiting jobs and you found a job on Craigslist selling restaurant coupons. Actual coupon books. Also, you set your own schedule. books. Also you set your own schedule lows. I sold actual physical coupons door to door.

Listen, I have had a couple of door to door jobs. That is rough going. That's some rough, those rough terrain, rough, rough seas ahead. Yeah, they really are. They build character. Were you successful in that endeavor? No, no, I really wasn't. I'm not great in sales, believe it or not. How are you at recruiting? Because you've done that for a while as well. Not good. Not good. I was not good at any of these jobs.

I either quit them, I was laid off, or I was just fired sometimes. I mean, hey, it happens to the best of us that we're fired from something we're actually really terrible at. Exactly. I was like, but why? They're like, because you're not selling. Oh, okay.

Weird, weird. Yes, the part about the cave women giving birth, I was like, these are all actual legitimate questions. How did you do that? Because even with highly educated professionals, a lot of people still have trouble. I loved your acceptance speech for winning an award for earliest epidural given.

I thought that was hilarious. A prestigious award. It is. So few of us are able to bestow that award upon ourselves. I would just, I'll go ahead and explain. I was 0.00 centimeters dilated. And I said, yes, I will take that epidural. Thank you.

And I do not regret it. Most people would not be able to talk people into giving it to them. Most people would be like, you have to wait until you're four or in active labor in order to get this epidural. I had a wonderful nurse who she's like, you can have that whenever you want it. And I was like, I want it now. Now, please. Now. And you won an award for it. So it ended up working out. It did. What do you hope somebody feels when they finish reading this and they close the book? What do you hope they take away from it? My goal in writing this is I want people to feel seen.

I want them for a lot of different reasons. Obviously, like with their love for their pet, I want them to put it down and maybe think about memories of when they had a pet they loved or think about early motherhood what that was like for them I want them to put it down and like this sounds cheesy but smile and maybe continue thinking about other things and how it relates to them like how this book is the story of Birdie and Harlow but how that transfers into everyone else's story, you know, the relatable topics in there. Also, I want it to make people feel less weird about maybe some of the things they have going on in their own mind. Something

I touch on in there is my anxiety for different things, my intrusive thoughts in motherhood. my anxiety for different things, my intrusive thoughts in motherhood. As soon as I learned those had a name, they made me feel so much less alone. So I'm hoping if there's another mom out there who reads this, they're like, okay, so it's not just me having these terrible worries. And someone feeling, like I said, it just goes back to feeling more seen, less weird, because we're all weird and we all have, you know, the things we go through. So I think I've heard people are worried. It's a super sad book and I don't think it's not, it's not a super sad book. It's funny and heartwarming. That's how I would describe it. But also the sad parts are what make it heartwarming. That's the

kind of the definition of heartwarming is that there has to be like a, oh, in order to feel like it's a heartwarming story, right? If it's, I bought a sweater on sale at the mall, there's no sadness there. There's no, there's no counterpoint to the happy ending. So you need those sort of like, oh, moments to feel the heartwarming story. So no, I did not put it down and feel like, oh, wow, devastating. What a devastating book. No, it made me laugh. It made me smile. And I think you were successful. It makes you feel less alone in your weirdness because everyone is secretly weird. Whether they wear a wig on the internet, everyone is secretly weird. And it's just better if you embrace your weird and don't

keep it in, you know, put it out there. I totally agree. Absolutely. Thank you so much for being here today. I loved seeing you again. Congratulations on your book. Thank you for having me. And you haven't let me tell you congratulations on the millions of things on your upcoming book, on the grants that you just finished. Like that's incredible. Oh, thank you. Taylor Wolf's book, Birdie and Harlow, is out on September 19th. So you can pre-order a copy today or go ahead and pick it up at your bookstore or at bookshop.org. I'll see you soon. The show is hosted and executive produced by me, Sharon McMahon. Our audio producer is Jenny Snyder. And if you enjoyed today's episode, please be sure to subscribe on your favorite podcast

platform. And if you could leave us a review or share this episode on social media, those things help podcasters out so much. Thanks for being here today.