Mike Birbiglia's Working It Out - 6. David Sedaris: Mike Trades Funny Stories With His Comedy Hero

Episode Date: July 6, 2020

Mike talks with his literary hero David Sedaris about clocking 90 thousand steps, dressing like a clown, and walking through Times Square after midnight in the pandemic. Please consider contributing to: Feeding America https://www.feedingamerica.org/

Hey everybody, it's Mike Birbiglia. We are back! We are back with another episode! I couldn't be more excited. My voice gets higher and higher. Another episode of Working It Out. When I came up with the idea for this podcast, I thought, I'm just going to ask some of my dream people

if they'll come on. And last week we had Hannah Gadsby. This week we have David Sedaris. So we're going to keep asking. I've been a fan of David Sedaris for, you know, over 20 years. I recommend all of his books. He's the funniest person. He needs no introduction. This is our chat. You said this thing to me over email the other day and it made me laugh so hard. I thought, you must be putting that in something in a book because you and I both count our steps on our Fitbit, but you're much better than I am. Like a few years ago, we went for coffee and you said, how many is the most steps you've ever done?

And I said, in a day, I don't know, 25,000. And you go, I've done 90,000. And I said, in a day? You said, oh, yeah, yeah, in a day. And then you said something over email the other day, which is that about, I said, do you still get your steps in? Because that's what I was thinking about with you in New York City. Like, how would you possibly get your steps in? And you said that you walk around after hours.

Well, after hours is easier because you don't have to wear a mask if you're out after midnight because you're not running into anybody. after midnight because you're not running into anybody. And I mean, it used to be in New York that one out of every 500 people you passed was crazy, but now it's one out of every two, especially when it's after dark like that. But I just spent two weeks in North Carolina on the coast of North Carolina where none of this ever happened.

Nobody had a mask on, not at the grocery store. And I went to Dairy Queen and there was some lip service to social distancing, but then they would say next, and then you go to the counter and you're right up against the other person who's ordering. And I would see articles in the New York Times and I would think, why are they still talking about that? Isn't that over? And then I returned yesterday and then just got right back into it, you know, with a checklist before I left the apartment, you know, do I have my mask? Do I have my hand sanitizer? But in North Carolina, I could walk day and night. The problem was the heat and humidity. And then it rained a couple of times. And so my feet got wet and now my feet are destroyed it's like i'm walking on hot

holes but i still have to you know i have a fitbit friend who i'm deeply competitive with and so i can't not so last night after midnight i walked six hours oh gosh. So I could wake up with those six. I mean, I'm sorry. I mean, I walked six miles. Oh, okay. Okay. But hobbling the entire time. Oh, my gosh.

So what are your feet look like? Like, what's your deal? Everything is blistered that can be blistered. And then the balls of my feet feel like they have metal plates in them. And that's from walking on sand. Huge mistake to walk on sand. My gosh. Huge mistake.

You said this thing over email, which is that you were in Times Square at 1.30 in the morning. And there was a guy pushing himself along barefooted in a wheelchair. And he shouted, look at that fucking clown. You clown, fucking clown. And you said, I thought he was talking about me. And I followed his eyes and saw an actual clown with turquoise hair and a red nose. It was an actual clown. It's really interesting to go to Times Square like at two o'clock in the morning now, because it's as weird as it would be. It's like daylight. That'sclock in the morning now. Because it's as late as it would, it's like daylight.

That's how many lights are there. But it's just, you know, it's just kind of street people who are out. And they'll run over to you now from the other side of the avenue to ask you for money. You know, because they've been there all along asking for money

and usually there are crowds and now there's nobody. Right, there's fewer customers. And you, I think when I met you, it was at this American Life Live event where you were dressed as a clown. I loved wearing that clown makeup. No kidding, really? Mm, it was fantastic, yeah, and I just felt so great.

Do you like the anonymity of it? I just thought, you know, it's my face, but it's a completely different face. And it's not horrible. Sure. And I look at clowns' clothes, too. Oh, you do? Yeah, when I look at clowns, I like I don't what's why are people laughing I think you know the big collar and the and the you know the one piece kind of like a puffy

jumpsuit with diamonds on it and the long shoes and I'd see I see nothing there to criticize. It is an incognito move also, because like I remember I was talking backstage with you at the This American Life live event. You were a full clown. And and my wife, Jen, was there and and she didn't know it was you. And and and then we walked away and she goes, was that clown a friend of yours? And I go, that's no clown. That's David Sedaris. She said, what? That's a great title. That's no clown.

That's David Sedaris. I like that. You and I are both live performers. You have actually sort of a reverse process to typical authors. Like, I feel like most authors, they write the book and they go tour the book, then they read pieces of the book. But when you go tour,

you're touring what you're workshopping for the next book. Yes. Because I remember when my first book came out, a lot of those stories and essays were written maybe when I was a student, you know, somewhere homework. One was, a couple of them had been read on stage, but back then I would get the opportunity to read. I was living in Chicago, and I would always write something brand new for every reading so yeah basically i would just read it one time and whereas now i might read something

40 times before it's published but then i would just read something one time and then i would move on to the next piece and when the book came out and i read it out loud uh you know when i book tour and i thought damn i wish that i'd had the chance i would have known to, you know, when I'm book tour and I thought, damn, I wish that I'd had the chance. I would have known to cut, you know, these two paragraphs. Yes, of course. Of course, because you can see in people's faces almost, or you can hear it in their responses.

You can just feel, you hear yourself saying words that aren't necessary. Yeah, absolutely. And you feel the audience skimming. That's exactly right. And that's my exact process, except you do this, you take it a step further, which I really admire,

which is you literally, I saw you at Carnegie Hall, literally striking things out in real time on the page. Well, because, and I always hope it's not too distracting, but what better time to do it? The extraordinary thing that you do that I feel like I don't have the endurance for is you talk to your audience members afterwards and they tell you jokes.

And you have these long, what, by all accounts, because you and I play a lot of venues, people tell me that you'll sometimes be there for three hours afterwards. My record is ten and a half hours. Oh, my gosh. I have ten and a, that was my record, and then I had. Ten and a half hours? Ten and a half, and then I had several ten hours, but those were usually on book tours, you know, where it just takes longer. In a

theater, probably my record is like six hours. And we're going to do a thing called the slow round where we actually like a series of, of prompts about things. One of the prompts is like, what do people underestimate about you? And I feel like with you, it's like, it would be energy. Like, that's an extraordinary amount of sustained energy. Well, but I feel like the rest of it doesn't require much energy. You know, I mean, you know, if I'm doing a theater tour, then I get on stage and I'm on stage for an hour and a half and I'm reading. I'm not reciting things that I've memorized.

And so on a scale of one to ten energy-wise, that's maybe a two. No kidding. You know, if a signing goes on for ten hours, there comes a point and I feel like, wow, this is pretty long. But otherwise, I look at my watch and I think, wow, really? That much time has passed? I enjoy it. It's a perfect sort of way to talk to people, especially when you're a bit socially awkward. Like if I had to go to a party, it would be torture. But if I'm seated at a table and somebody comes and they hand me a book. The encounter ends generally when I hand the book back. You know, if I sat there and I said nothing, then the person who would hand me their book and said, oh, I first read your book and I really liked your last book.

And then they're going to walk away and think, damn it, why did I say that? But plus, I've just been on stage for an hour and a half. Enough about me. You know, and so it's time to talk about them. And I don't, people tell me fascinating things. You know, but something happened recently and I, this guy told me a story on stage at a book signing, right?

And it was about something he'd shoved up his ass and I mentioned it on stage a week later and it got back yeah I didn't name him there was nothing that would have let people in the audience know who it was and he was furious and he said how dare you you have no right to repeat stories that people tell you. I thought, well, you know, I was on stage that night and I read this long essay that was about things people tell me on book tours. So you can't say you weren't forewarned. And I'm actually not going to feel bad about that at all. I didn't steal your identity. I didn't expose you. Yes, the audience laughed,

but the audience laughed because you show something up your ass, you know? I mean, and a lot of people find that funny. When you're doing those signing lines, do you take photos also? People must ask, right? Yeah, and I just say, oh, you know, I'd rather not. I'd rather, I'll draw a picture of the two of us or I'll, I just don't, I just don't get the camera thing.

Especially I don't get the selfie thing. Can we get a picture of ourselves together? Yeah, yeah. I don't, I don't, I don't't know maybe because i would never ask somebody for that yeah um but and i and i might have mentioned this i know i mentioned this somewhere before but i went on uh whatever show jimmy fallon is host of yeah yeah the tonight show and reese witherspoon was a guest and whenever i go on a television show i always bring my friend andy's daughter daughters he has two daughters and i've known them since they were

born and so they started when they were like six you know coming and you know they give you a bag of food and gifts and i always give it to the girls the girls. And I don't want to go on TV without them there with me. And now they're 17 and 18. But at this point, they were maybe, I don't know, maybe like 12 and 13. And Reese Witherspoon came to my dressing room door with, they'd given us all up, there was a bowl of nuts in everyone's dressing room and she brought hers to me as if it was a gift that she had brought from home and she saw the girls like looking at her with big eyes and she said girls do you think we could get a picture together and i thought that is so classy because they were too well-mannered to ask and she could tell how much it would have

meant to them and then for the rest of my life i'll think you know whenever i hear anything someone wants to say anything bad about reese witherspoon i'm like no no no you don't you know you don't that kindness that she showed the girls was and it was just so i don't know another word it was just classy my uh i saw amy my sister amy last night and she had just watched that michael jordan documentary yeah yeah i've seen she had a friend who she was at second city with named greg holloman and he was michael jordan's body double for this was like ages ago like i don't know like in the mid 80s for a commercial like a nike commercial uh i don't know if those were the sneakers he i don't know, like in the mid 80s for a commercial, like a Nike commercial.

I don't know if those were the sneakers. He I don't know anything about sneakers or basketball. And but it was like they were like Greg's hands touching the basketball. And, you know, he was a body double form. And he said, wow, these are great sneakers. And Michael Jordan said, well, why don't you take them? Right. And so Greg took the sneakers with him at the end of the shoot.

And then they said, oh, no, you don't. You can't take those sneakers. And then he walked out and Michael Jordan was in his limousine and he said, hey, where are the sneakers? And Greg said they took them away. They said I couldn't have them. And Michael Jordan got out of his limo, went back in there, got the sneakers, came out and handed them to Greg. So whatever they say about him being temperamental or him being an asshole or him being, it's like he went out of his way to make

sure that Greg had those sneakers. I mean, by the same token, people remember it, really remember it, you know, if you're a dick to them. Sure. And sometimes it takes all you have to be patient with somebody. Let's say if somebody says we're going to get a selfie and you say you know what actually i got a better idea why don't i do this no i want to no i want that no i want you to do this and you're trying to talk to them in a way that they can hear but they're just not going to hear you, right? And then they leave and they talk about what a dick you are. And it's like, no, I'm not a dick. You're crazy.

You know, I tried everything with you. And I guess I could have done exactly what you wanted me to do. But I'm doing this thing that I love doing. And you're making me not love it. And that's not fair to me. One of the other questions is, do you have a memory that's never made it into one of your books that's just on a loop in your head, but it doesn't land anywhere in anything? Yeah, I remember somebody told me a couple of years ago that they took a

writing class and their teacher told them to write about really the most embarrassing thing that ever happened to them. And with a lot of people that might be, oh, I farted in class or something like that. But that's sort of kind of a tame version of embarrassing. Like, sure, if you're talking about really embarrassing, you know, like sort of, you know, sitting in the back seat of a car when you're 19 with some friends driving back from uh you know to kent ohio from new york city and it seems like everyone's asleep except the guy who's driving and you kind of jerk off through your pants. I just remember doing that. It's really bad.

I mean, I didn't pull anything out of my pants. Frotage, is that what it's called? You're just kind of rubbing yourself. But that's not even the thing I was thinking of. But you know what I mean? Most people would, I think they would say, oh, I farted in third grade and and and not really talk about what it really was that they did that was terribly shameful and there's something I did and I always I thought I can't possibly write about that there's no way on earth I can write about that but then it's always the things that are

most embarrassing that most people can relate to. And I know I feel that way, too. I mean, in comedy, I feel like with what you do, there are moments when I think, oh, my God, we're the same. Because you made me think of something that I did that I thought it was just me. Do you have a skill that no one knows about? Yeah, guessing people's ages. It's like, it's my superpower. Oh, yeah. It's my superpower. No kidding. I meet somebody and I say, are you 58? Then they get a look on their face and they're shocked.

Because most people round up. Yes. And I just kind of look at somebody and kind of take them all in. And then I'll say, do you like being 47? And they act like I just took their wallet and looked at their ID. But it took a long time to hone that, and I honed it while signing books because I would look at somebody and I would think, I bet that person's 23, and I would say, how old are you? And they'd say 23.

So, and then I learned over time, you know, over a certain age, you can't do it because nobody wants to be. And then often you'll get people and everyone thinks, you know, everybody thinks that I'm, you know, that I'm only 42. And it's like, well, you're 51, you know? And I know that, but I don't want to hurt. And people have been hurt before. And I said, I'm sorry. And I could see how people would think you were 41, but I'm a professional. And, you know, I- That's so funny because I literally, one of the new jokes I'm working on for my show is is a joke where I say I'm I'm 41, but I'm a hard 41. I'm a 41 where people say, I thought you were 51.

I'm like, oh, thanks for adding a decade of decay and no wisdom to my life. That's very generous of you. Are you really 41? 41, yeah. Is that what was going to be your guess? Well, it's a little bit different because you're not in front of me right now. Yeah. You know, it doesn't work like if I look at a picture of somebody or if I see someone on television.

They'd be right in front of me and I have to feel it. And sometimes I think I'm going to say that this person is 38 and then I open my mouth and instead 39 comes out and I was right. It's the same thing when I meet somebody and I say, are you from Illinois? Oh, what part of Wisconsin did you grow up in? Wisconsin did you grow up in? Yeah, yeah. And I'm right about that a lot of the time. And that was frustrating about moving to England because I had to start over. Yeah, I talk a lot about age in my new show

that I'm developing right now. The new show is tentatively titled, barring a legal dispute or objection, is called The YMCA Pool. Because as a kid, I went to the YMCA Pool and I sort of vowed I would never return. And then here I am at age 41, back at the YMCA Pool, kind of doctor's orders, swimming. And I actually have a lot of jokes about age. And I say, I'm 41, I go exactly halfway through my life. Not technically.

Not everyone dies at 82, but no one's ever like 80 through 100. Those are the years. They're more like, I was 83. I reached for a grape and I never walked again. I like a YMCA pool. I do too. I do too. You know, I learned to like it again. I like a YMCA pool. I do too. I do too. I've, you know, I learned to like it again. Well, I started swimming when I turned 50 and then I would go on tour and I would look for the YMCA. I like the adventure of finding a YMCA and then getting into the YMCA because they wouldn't always sell day passes. Sure. And then because the swimming part is so boring.

Yes, yes. The swimming is boring and repetitive. Yeah. The thing about swimming to me is there's so much anxiety attached to it. Right? Yes. Are there going to be a lot of people there? Am I going to have to share a lane?

And the pool I would go to in London, you know, they want you to swim up in one direction and swim back in another direction, like clockwise, right? But then you get there and there's one other person in the lane and they say, let's both just take our own lane. But that's not fair to a third person who comes along, right? That's right. And so I say, well, no, I don't really think that's fair to some. And then you're in it with somebody. You know, then you're having a disagreement with a stranger. I hate conflict.

I hate it. It has the YMCA pool, you know, YMCA pool, it has a lot of conflict. And also, in a city setting, it's an equalizer. Like, I saw a well-known actor in the YMCA pool in Brooklyn, and he was in the lane next to me, and he crashed into a lady who was also in the lane. It was a head-to-head crash, and she didn't know who he was. I knew who he was.

She yelled at him. She was like, what are you doing in my side of the lane and he goes i didn't know i didn't you know and it was it's very awkward there's a lot of conflict in that pool at the pool that i would go to in london i cannot tell you how many times the lifeguard would blow his whistle because somebody had shit in the pool what is? Is it true? Yeah. And you know how you go to the pool and then there's a woman with a baby in the pool?

Yes. How is a baby not going to shit in the pool? It doesn't know. Yes. It doesn't know not to. I mean, I'm not putting the baby, but it doesn't, it's not toilet trained.

And you brought it into a huge pool? Yeah. I have a joke in the new show where I go, I walked to my local YMCA pool. I didn't need directions. I just followed that famous chlorine smell. I said, I don't know what the hell kind of heinous crime they're covering up at the Y,

but something has gone down. Like, I don't know if there was a mob hit in the middle of the night. They're like, do we dig a ditch or bring a body down to the YMCA pool? We drop them in the deep end, you know, et cetera. And it's like, because there is that much chlorine, it's outrageous. Because of the exact thing you're saying, because people shit in the pool. Babies shit in the pool. You know, you find the, you go to the deep end of a YMCA pool,

and you'll find like a paper-thin little disc, and you realize, oh, that was a nickel yesterday. You know, like somebody put a nickel into the pool. And you know how when you're staying in like a really shitty hotel, and you can smell the pool when you check in? Oh, the moment you check in, I know it very well. But Hugh and I, we just got a pool at our house in England, our own pool. Oh, wow.

And it's a lap pool. And it's the first time that I've been able, there's no anxiety involved. Yeah. And so you're just back to the boredom because Because my God, is it boring to swim laps. Yeah. Are you a good swimmer? No. No.

Hugh is. Hugh, it's beautiful to watch him swim. And he can swim for a mile without stopping. But because I smoked for so long, I splash awkwardly from one end to the other, and then I grab onto the edge and I pant for a little while. And then I turn back. Yeah, I'm in the same boat. You know, when he and I came back to New York,

I looked for a fitness center, you know, to join. And there are any number of them, you know, like... A New York sports club or Equinox or whatever. But I don't want to be next to that person. Do you know what I mean? Who has an amazing body and all of that. Yeah, yeah, sure. And so you're right.

That is a good thing about the Y because there are older people there and there are like, you know, kind of fat kids who have been forced to go there. Sure. Just a better feeling, I think. I have this flash memory always of, not always, I sometimes have this memory, flashback to childhood of going to the YMCA with my mom. Because when I was, I was like probably five years old, she took me into the women's locker room and I had never seen a vagina.

And then I saw 100 vaginas. And then when I was six, she sent me to the men's locker room. And the only thing more shocking than 100 vaginas is 100 penises at eye level. And that was something I think about when I go now as a grown-up to YMCA is like, That was something I think about when I go now as a grown-up to YMCA is like the locker room shower is very exposed. I mean, there's no real privacy there. I met somebody at a book signing once, and he saw his mother naked by accident when he was young. And he had a number of brothers, and he saw that his mother didn't have a penis, and he panicked for years

because he didn't know there even were vaginas, and she thought she had lost her penis somewhere. Oh, my God. That must be interesting. I mean, for you, you know, who's a public person who people recognize at a, like a YMCA dressing room, you have to be afraid that someone's going to take your picture

when you're naked. It's definitely crossed my mind. I've thought when I'm in the shower, I hope I don't go home and fish around on YouTube and go, oh, no! I was in Switzerland and I met a woman and I said, she has two daughters, and I said, do they take showers after gym class? And she said, that is so mean.

It was in Sweden. I said, do they take showers after gym class? And she said, oh, my God, why would you ask that question? She said, how did you know? So apparently kids don't anymore because they're too afraid that someone's going to take their nude photo with a phone oh gosh in the locker room after gym and post wow yeah oh dear you know that's one thing i hate is a sneak with a phone yes i do too you know when you see somebody taking somebody's picture without them

knowing it, and it's the look on their face while they're doing it, and just the thought that they have a right to do it. And sometimes there are people that you know, and you love, and you think, oh my God, you're that person? Yeah, my wife and I always talk about that with like, with like our, our, our journals or our diaries, you know, it's like, if, if we, if there's ever a betrayal of trust of like me reading her private journal or reading her emails or something like that, or her reading my journal,

like that's, that's more of a deal breaker than anything. I got an email from a friend the other day, and he was, every now and then he'll send me things that he wrote in his diary like 20 or 30 years ago. And it's always really interesting to me. And he's a good writer. But he had sent me something from like 20 or 30 years ago that his girlfriend at the time read his diary. And he had said, you know, that he'd criticized her his diary and he had said that he'd criticized her looks or he had said that she was dull or something. And he said, to this day, I feel so horrible about what I've written.

And I said, you don't have to, I'm sorry, but you don't have to feel bad about that. She read your diary on your computer, knowingly read your diary on your computer, knowingly read your diary on your computer. And if she was hurt, that's her problem because that's what you get for reading somebody's diary. And you're allowed to think, wow, that person looks 10 years older than the last time I saw them. You're allowed to think that. Why would you be allowed to write it in your diary?

You know, I always say to Hugh, my boyfriend, when I die, you're going to, if you read my diary, you're going to find something bad about yourself. Keep reading because the next day, the next day you're going to hear something really good about yourself. Oh, that's so sweet. I just got back from North Carolina, and so I was trying, usually when I go to the beach house, I try to write an essay about the beach house, like what went on at the beach, what's the story of the beach house now? Sure. Because there's always a story there, but it was just Hugh and I, and then my sister Gretchen came down. But anyway, when I was there, it was just the story seemed to be nature, and I kept finding all of these turtles turtles so i kind of found a baby snapping turtle kind of marching furiously toward

the grocery store like it was going to fly or everybody who worked there and it was just and you know how they always look so angry too and so i brought it to the creek to let it go. And there was a guy, a young woman with one leg and a guy there, standing there. And he turned the turtle upside down and he said, see, it's a female. You can tell by the shape of the shell right there. And so I reluctantly let it go. But I was thinking about all the kids who I know. You don't want to give it to like a five-year-old,

but like a 12-year-old would be a good custodian for a snapping turtle. Because, you know, they can bite your finger off. But I thought, if I kept the snapping turtle, I kept thinking, what would I name it? What would I name it? Mary Catherine. Don't you think that would be a good name? Sure, that's a good snapping turtle name. Such a good name for a snap it would just

change your attitude towards it completely if you named it mary catherine so it's so funny because you said this thing and i i recommended to a lot of people that you did a master class um we're talking about writing and you said this thing in the master class. I think it's so simple, but it's true as a recommendation for writers, which is like stories aren't happening in your life on your phone or on apps or on whatever. They're just around you. They're just observations. Like the snapping turtle is like a perfect example of that. But it was crazy. The next day I found a baby painted turtle.

Oh, wow. Yeah. And then I saw a lot of turtles that had been hit by cars. Did you say painted? I think that's what you call it. It's a water turtle. Oh, okay. And I want to say it's a painted turtle.

And they live in harmony with snapping turtles. And they don't get as big as snapping turtles but they get pretty big and that was another case where i thought okay i picked it up because it was on the sidewalk and it was going to get hit by a car and it was headed toward this toward the road and so i took it to let it go but i kept hoping i would find a child along the way and i could say look i found this would you care to take it and i did find a child and his could say, look, I found this. Would you care to take it? And I did find a child and his, and I said, look, I just found this painted turtle. I was wondering what to do with it. And his mother looked at me like I was wearing a prison uniform.

And if I had a kid, I, I think I would reserve that. Yeah, yeah, sure. If, you know, for when the man said, uh, do you know what a grown man's dick tastes like? I would save it for that. But if he's trying to give your son a turtle, and you're right there, I wasn't trying to lure a kid. You know, I didn't

go up to a child alone. I can't stand that, you know? Also, I was just curious, is your bladder okay now? Yeah, I go for the cystoscopy every year or so, and it is. I mean, nobody knows. It could come back, you know, the cancer could come back at any point. But if people don't know this who are listening, I had a bladder tumor at 19, and I go for regular visits to the urologist and David had an eventful visit

to the urologist recently as well. But yeah, that was just this fluky thing. It's so funny. I was talking to my friend Seth Barish today about that because I was thinking about how when I grew up, I grew up next to a cemetery that was on one side of me. My whole new show is about my preoccupation with sort of death and hitting this age where I'm thinking about middle age and natural causes. And I said, I grew up next to a cemetery. And on the other

side of me, down the road was the Worcester Foundation where they had a lot of sort of chemicals and testing. It's actually where they developed the birth control pill. And there was a really high incidence of cancer in my neighborhood. And so when I developed a bladder tumor when I was 19, the doctor said, were you around toxic paint or chemicals? And I said, well, I don't know. I mean, I was around this place with chemicals and I don't know. But, you know, who's to say? But that's because I went to the worst doctor really imaginable.

I really did. This guy was just worthless, you know, especially because they did the cystoscopy and I had to wait months for the results, you know? Oh, really? Yeah. Yeah. And so, and I kept contacting his office, you know, he was in England and kept trying to contact him and no answer, no answer, no answer. But, and I had a bladder, a urinary tract infection, and I went to him, and he said, oh, you have cancer. He said you have prostate cancer or you have bladder cancer. He led with that with no evidence whatsoever. Wow.

But, you know, for years and years and years, I worked with chemical stripper, you know, stripping woodwork on furniture. Sure. And I never wore a mask. And so I've always been waiting for that to come back and get me. Because my plan was to make, I thought, okay, if I have cancer, there must be a way to make a new bladder out of one of those goatskin sacks that people used to buy when they would go to Greece in the summer. And I'm just going to make my own out of a goatskin sack. And they're going to say, oh, my God, this works perfectly. Why didn't no one think of this?

You're a medical genius. Why didn't no one think of this before? What is your health currently? You know, my feet are a mess but i mean other than that i i mean i'm not on any medication i don't gee i don't i don't i don't have anything i don't yeah uh i don't have any chronic you know uh condition or i went for a physical and everything was fine. And I didn't think anything of that until I had to go to the doctor for something.

And he said, oh, come on, really? You're not on any medication? That's when, like age-wise, age-wise, it's like I'm at the point now where I go to the airport and I go through security and they say, is there any reason why you can't go through the medical detector? And they yell it at me. Oh my gosh, is that funny? That's what happens when you hit 60. They start doing that.

Oh my gosh, is that funny? Well, do you have hair on your back? Do I have what? Have hair on your back? Do I have what? Have hair on your back? I have, let's see, on my lower back, but not really in my mid-back. Okay, all right, that's good. You can still swim then. Do you think once you have hair on your back, you can't swim anymore?

You can't swim anymore. Yeah, you can't do it. Because you've seen the werewolf. Do you ever go to the Y and then you see the werewolf, you know, and he's got. Oh, yeah, sure, sure. Yeah. But do you have hair on your back? Yeah.

There was a kid, there was a man at our pool when we were growing up at the country club. And we used to call him the werewolf. And from making fun of him, then now I have hair on my back. And it's just because I made fun of him when I was a kid. That's all right. Of course, of course. I had it waxed one time, and it just came back with a vengeance. And I know somebody who, he was like, he was a gorilla, this guy.

And he had so many treatments to have his hair removed, electrolysis. Yeah. Oh, wow. And he did. And he, it was the most satisfying thing he he he ever did because he was like i said he was a gorilla and he said when you have hair on your body like i do he said uh you know wiping your ass is like a huge production. And it gets everywhere. Sure.

And I hadn't thought of that. I mean, I don't have a hairy ass. I just have it on my back. I had it when I was in high school. It started coming in in patches on my upper face above the shave line, which I think is sort of an Italian quality. And my friend Jordan, he had it too.

And he's also Italian. And so we found these wax strips that they have at the pharmacy where you can rip the hair off your face and we would do it to each other. And we would have like this signal it would just be like you want to do you want to do the wax strips we go yeah yeah let's do wax strips and we would do it to each other it was a very intimate relationship we had that's a that's

really sort of beautiful you know when you when you tell me that the intimacy is really beautiful because it's you're both going through the same thing and you're helping each other out and you're young like that. That's really nice. I had written down a couple of things today. I feel like you have so much great stuff about your siblings over the years. And so I just jotted down a few memories because I had I have three older siblings and my sister Gina uh was the oldest and there was always conflict in the house growing up between her and my parents because she was a terrible student like she would in high school

she'd get like a report card where it would say like geometry and then it would just say the number 40 but and it would just be like out of out of what and it was out of a hundred um and it was that was not for a test that was the whole semester and that failing starts at 60 she was 20 points short of failing if she had tried a little harder maybe she could have failed and uh i'm comfortable telling that story because she's very smart. And high school wasn't her groove. And then the other thing I wrote down about conflict, because I had older sisters in high school.

And when I was between ages of five and ten, and so I would always see these wild conflicts. And when I was about five my mom got so angry at Gina and Patty because of their their clothes all over their floor of their bedroom and so my mom took the clothes and threw them in the sewer across the street from our house and and uh that she it's you she snapped. She didn't know what, you know, that seemed like the right course of action was to move children's clothing into the Worcester public sewage system. And I can only imagine, I wrote down, I can only imagine what might have

happened when a sanitation worker came across some of those items and looked at a dark blouse and thought, that is a huge shit. And so my sisters enlisted me to help bring their clothes back from the sewer to their bedroom. So it was me, Gina, Patty, carrying clothes from the sewer to the bedroom while my mom carried the same clothes back to the sewer. It was like this weird assembly line of clothing, sewer to bedroom to sewer. and said, I hate you. And I've never gotten that out of my head. It's just one of the reasons I never wanted to have a child for all those years. This idea that you work so hard to raise these children

and when they're 15, they just go, I hate you. I just thought, that is a bad deal. That is like a Ponzi scheme. Do you, but you don't have any brothers. I do. My older brother, Joe. Okay. Was, but he was sort of a closer in age.

So he was like five years older than me. So we were, we were sort of buddies and I looked up to him and he taught me a lot of things. But then my sister, Gina, she was 11 years, she's 11 years older than me. And so it was almost like she was like a second mother. Like she had, in some ways, like she had me on as her personal assistant in some ways like i would she'd be like you can do you can be in charge of laundry you're very good at laundry and i'd be like yes i am very good at laundry you know and i was very proud of it i like that there was an adam sandler movie and he played a guy who had three sisters yeah punch drunk and i so often don't believe siblings in movies and television shows.

Like, I just don't. And it's not that they don't look alike. They talk in a way that, hey, bro, hey, little sis. Yes, yes, yes. Nobody talks that way. And I hear the wooden brother-sister dialogue and I hear if if I would if you and I were in a movie and I wanted people to think that you were my brother I would say did mom call you last week that's all yeah that's all I would have to do that's all you need instead of saying hey bro

we've been brothers for as long as I've been alive you know I remember sharing that sharing those bunks the whole time we were growing up. If someone were recording, like my sister Amy and I last night, you would know she's my sister. The other thing was when I was a kid, I remember my older sisters, when my parents went away, they had like an 80s movie level party, house party, like a full hundreds of people at the house.

My parents didn't know about it. They sent me and my brother, this is my teenage sisters, they had the gall to send me and my brother to our friends' houses for the night. That was smart. That's smart. And so we left. And in true, this is the most 80s high school movie part of it,

they invited their teachers. And the teachers showed up. Wow. And they had a bartender. I mean, they hired a bartender. And at one point, they, at one point, there's like hundreds of people at our house. At one point, I was at Michael Kavanaugh's house,

and we prank called the house, and we said, hey, it's the Shrewsbury Police Department. We're coming over. And that would have been funny, except the Shrewsbury Police Department was on their way over. They came over three or four times and somehow were convinced

that everything was okay by my sister Patty, who was 14 years old. That is, again, that was so smart of them. Yeah, they're brilliant. They're brilliant. And then, so the next day, there were tire tracks all over the lawn

and I came home from Michael Cavanaugh's house. My brother Joe came home from Mike Flynn's house and we saw the tire tracks and we thought, well, the jig is up. They're gonna get, they're toast. And my parents are coming home that night and then in true 80s high

school movie fashion, it snowed. That's perfect. And it covered the tracks and my parents never found out until this podcast. The thing we've been ending on recently is we created a section called Working It Out for Charity. Is there any nonprofit or anything that you're familiar with or you've contributed to in the past that you feel like is doing a good job right now?

Well, you know, I was looking around for people to give money to recently and i feel like one of the problems is you give somebody money and then five minutes later they're like can we have more money and you think yes that's a big part of that's a big part of it yes i just gave you a lot of money do you know what i mean well why don't you give us more but why don't you give it to us every month why don't you give us have you talked about your will have you thought about your will? Have you thought about your will? And the thing is, if you give over a certain amount, then it's always going to be that way. But Feed America seems like a pretty good thing. Yes. So I gave them a lot of money and then I immediately unsubscribed because I didn't want them. I didn't want to be disappointed when they got back to me saying, can we have more money? Can we have more money?

Because again, I want it to be my idea. I'm going to give you the best of all worlds. I'm going to contribute to Feed America, and I'm not going to give them your mailing address. That's fantastic. This is a dream come true. It really is. This is a dream come true.

By the way, this is a dream come true. It really is. This is a dream come true. By the way, this is a dream come true talking to you. When I became a fan of your books and have read all of your books over the years, I feel like one of the rare lucky things I've had in my career is I've been able to talk to some of my heroes, and you're one of my heroes, and so I really appreciate knowing you, and I appreciate you being on the podcast today. Oh, gosh, Mike. Thanks so much. That means so much to me. Working it out, because it's not done.

Working it out, because there's no hope. Wow. So that was another episode of Working It Out with the great David Sedaris. If you haven't read his books, I would try Me Talk Pretty One Day. That makes me laugh out loud. Naked, the recent one, is Calypso, and it's great. Everything he's written is really extraordinary.

The producers of Working It Out are Peter Salamone and Joseph Birbiglia, consulting producer Seth Barish, sound mix by Kate Balinski, assistant editor Mabel Lewis. Thanks to my consigliere, Mike Berkowitz, as well as Marissa Hurwitz. Special thanks to Jack Antonoff for our music, and as always, a very special thanks to my wife, J-Hope Stein.

Our book, The New One, Painfully True Stories from a Reluctant Dad, is in your local bookstore, curbside. As always, a special thanks to my daughter Una, who created a radio fort. And once again, our thanks to Sam Adams, who's presenting the Restaurant Strong Fund. Join them today at SamuelAdams.com. And thanks, most of all, to everyone who listened. Tell your friends, tell your enemies, we're working it out.