Normal Gossip - Family Lore Drop with Hrishikesh Hirway

Episode Date: December 4, 2024

Gossip skeptic Hrishikesh Hirway joins us for a deep dive into the history of a (close) family full of secrets, lies, and prophecies.Follow Hrishi on Instagram @hrishihirwayGet tickets to Kelsey's book tour here!Pre-order Kelsey's book, YOU DIDN'T HEAR THIS FROM ME, here!Subscribe to our newsletter for writing from Kelsey and Alex, blog recommendations, and bonus secrets!You can support Normal Gossip directly by buying merch or becoming a Friend or a Friend-of-Friend at supportnormalgossip.com.Our merch shop is run by Dan McQuade. You can also find all kinds of info about us and how to submit gossip on our Komi page: https://normalgossip.komi.io/Episode transcript here.Follow the show on Instagram @normalgossip, and if you have gossip, email us at [e-mail] or leave us a voicemail at 26-79-GOSSIP.Normal Gossip is hosted by Kelsey McKinney (@mckinneykelsey) and produced by Alex Sujong Laughlin (@alexlaughs), Ozzy Llinas Goodman (@ozzy_llinas), and Jae Towle Vieira (@jaetowlevieira). Abigail Segel (@AbigailSegel) is our intern. Justin Ellis is Defector's projects editor. Credits read by Sean Conard. Show art by Tara Jacoby.Normal Gossip is a proud member of Radiotopia.

Hello, it's Kelsey McKinney from Normal Gossip. And as you may have already heard, it is time for Radiotopia's annual fall fundraiser. Radiotopia is the parent company that helps us make this podcast. And they're the home to a lot of guests of the show that you know and love already. Avery Truffleman, Ronald Young Jr., Zakiya Givens, and more who you'll meet this season. Donating to Radiotopia gives money to help all of the shows in this network make money. Like our podcast, their shows take a ton of time and energy and money, hours of work on every episode, and the money that's given in this drive will help our peers do better,

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Thank you so much. Hi, and welcome to Normal Gossip. I'm Kelsey McKinney, and in each episode of this podcast, we're going to bring you an anonymous morsel of gossip from the real world. I am so excited to welcome to the show friend of the podcast Rishi Kesh here way. Rishi is a singer and songwriter and the host of Song Exploder, which is an award winning podcast and Netflix series where he interviews other musicians about how they created one of their songs. Rishi co-hosted the award winning podcast Home Cooking with chef and previous normal gossip

guests, Amin Nosrat, and he hosts the podcast, The West Week Weekly. Rishi has also composed original scores for film and TV, including the Netflix series, Everything Sucks, and the video game, The Red Lantern, and the upcoming sci-fi thriller, Companion, which comes out in theaters in January. It's a little rude for him to be this talented. Rishi, welcome to the show.

Thanks so much. Thanks for having me. I'm very excited to be here. I'm so excited you're here. How are you feeling? I'm feeling a little stressed right away, but excited still. Okay.

I feel like part of my stress is definitely because of the topic of this podcast. Okay, well, let's talk about it. Tell me what your relationship with gossip is. Why are you feeling stressed about it? I think that I've been conditioned to be stressed out by gossip from birth. My family's Indian and my mom had a real sort of what would the community think aspect to, I don't know, the way that she raised my sister and myself.

Mm-hmm. my sister and myself. You know, just making sure that you don't give any fodder to this sort of vague idea of an outside world so that they might have something bad to say about you. You also don't want to be too showy or look too good because you don't want people to give you the evil eye. Like you just need to ride a sort of, somewhere in the like the high middle

where people will talk about how good you are at school and where you ended up going to college, but not so much that people will give you the evil eye and not so badly that people will be like, did you hear about their daughter? Okay, this is so funny because I feel like I was raised in a really similar way. Like my father was a pastor. I was very aware of like the way that I was perceived in the world and the way I needed to behave to like make sure that no one thought I was either bad or too good. Right? Like I feel the

same about that. But how did gossip play into that? Like, were you told not to gossip? You know, I don't even think that the term gossip was really used. It was just the way that people talked about each other. But sometimes that information would be good. And sometimes that information would be negative. And I was just deathly afraid of anybody saying any anything negative about me in a way that I find, you know, like I can joke about it a little bit,

but I actually think that it had serious kind of crippling ramifications for me as an adult and for me as like a professional and creative person. I was gonna say that's something that I imagine is hard if that is a feeling you had as a child that has continued in your profession where you are now public and people are like aware of your existence.

Yeah, I mean, and especially I think as a musician, as a songwriter, it's really hard. I've only recently kind of come to appreciate how much distance I feel between the world of like punk rock and rock and roll and this kind of like, who cares, middle finger to the air kind of attitude that is, I think represents so much of what people love about that kind of music and where that music comes from.

And to try and take this kind of, I'm just trying to be a good boy in school, nobody say anything bad about me and turn that into like some kind of musical persona that is exciting for people to listen to. Hello, welcome to the show. It's me, your favorite boy.

Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Oh, she. How, so there's a difference, right, in people gossiping about you and the fear of gossip at large as something that could affect you and gossiping as an individual, right?

Like doing the gossip creation. Do you gossip? I try and avoid it, I think for all these reasons. You know, like a sort of version of the golden rule and this deathly fear of my own. There's literally only one form of gossip that I believe in, which is when you try and set people up on a blind date. Okay.

Like, I think that's when you're talking about somebody. Yeah, matchmaking, exactly. That is the best kind of gossip, because you're doing it with the aim of benefiting all the parties involved. It's so funny. I feel like you're the second person. We've done how many episodes of the show, right? Like, you're the second person to come in and say like, I actually am afraid of it and I'm kind of against it.

And like, it's kind of like a breath of fresh air to be like, okay, like it's interesting to have someone sitting here saying like, no, I'm kind of against it actually. Like, am I here on a podcast called Normal Gossip? Yes, but that's not my business. Exactly. If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all.

And so I will be quiet for the rest of you. I'm going to tell this story in silence. People will love it. Welcome to Kelsey's monologue. Well, then I feel weird asking you this next question, which is, did you bring a gossip for me? Well, I was thinking about my love of matchmaking and where that might have come from.

Yeah. And there's a very obvious answer, I think, which is that my parents had an arranged marriage. Okay. And that's kind of, you know, the ultimate blind date. Yes. You know, they had went on one date and got married. The date was the marriage.

In a way, they're still on their first date. Exactly. You know, it worked out for them. They were married for 49 years. My mom passed away a few years ago, but they were married for 49 years. They had a wonderful, strange marriage that was my, certainly, primary understanding of what a family looks like.

But it all started with an arranged marriage. And so I love the idea that somebody put them together. There's somebody out there who I've never met. And I was asking my dad recently to fill in some of the details. I knew that they had been set up. I kind of know the story from when they first met, that first meeting,

but I didn't really know how they got there. How did they get there? And so does this count as a gossip story? I'm like, how did they get there? So my dad told me recently his version of this story. There is one person really at the center of the marriage. His name is Srikushin Bhagade. Okay.

And I had heard this name, Bhagade before, you know? And so I was like, can you tell me about him? Like, who was this person? Was it a whole family? And he said, oh, well, my father, so my grandfather on my dad's side used to tutor people in math. He was a math teacher, but he used to also do like,

you know, tutoring. And Sri Kushan Bhagade was one of the people that he tutored. Okay. And I was like, oh, okay, so that's how you met him. He was my dad's student. And then later, actually, when I was older, when I was in school, he tutored me in math.

Huh. And I was like, oh, that's interesting. How come your dad didn't just tutored you in math? Great, good follow-up. And he said, oh, well, he he was older and I was at this school and it was closer for me to just go to his house and get tutored by him. And I was like, wow, that's so cool

that this person who your dad tutored then ended up becoming your tutor. And my dad's like, yeah, also he's also my cousin. What? What? How is that not the, and so then it turns out it's my, he's my dad's first cousin. Okay. He's the son of my dad's sister.

So yeah, these are the kinds of details that like emerge much later. When my dad went to the US to get his PhD, he was studying there and he was in grad school. He got permission from his professor, the one who like ran the lab where he worked. My dad was studying food science. He got permission to go back to India for 30 days.

And my dad thought he would go and, you know, try and look for a job for post-graduation. And so he sent his resume to his family and said like, can you please, you know, just like pass this around and see if there's anybody that is hiring. Okay. Also, if you happen to know of any suitable, you know, marriage prospects, I'd also be open to that. I love the idea of here's my resume, send it to all potential employers and all my wives.

Exactly. Like, oh my God. Yeah. Yeah. Meanwhile, my mom, 24 years old, had just finished her master's degree in literature. She went home to her dad's place, her mom and dad's place, in a town called Osmanabad.

And at that time, Bhagat Uncle was working there as an engineer. Aha! An adult working. And he went with his boss, who was the, I guess like executive engineer of the city or some kind of something. And my mom's dad was a judge. So there was some kind of level of,

you know, city official friendship. I don't know. They were having some kind of party or gathering at their house. And Bugatti uncle went with his boss to my mom's father's house. And they were all talking and his boss asked my grandfather, my maternal grandfather, oh, you know, how's your family?

I think I heard your daughter just finished school. How's she doing? And my grandfather said, yeah, you know, she's good. She's good. We're trying to find somebody for her. It's been a little tough. My mom was very picky. And this was true even then, picky about everything. And so they were having a little bit of a hard time

finding somebody that wouldn't work. So then Bugatti uncle and his boss leave the party. And right as they're leaving, they haven't gone far at all, according to my dad. And then he says to his boss, actually I know somebody, maybe, would it be okay? I actually have this cousin, Oh, actually, I know somebody, maybe. Would it be okay? I actually have this cousin,

or maybe he called him his former 2T. Yeah. And they went back to the house and I was like, oh, the next day, he's like, oh, no, no, no. They hadn't really gone far yet, so they just turned back around. So same day, same night, they turn back around and go back in and say, actually, we know somebody,

he comes from a good family, he's a nice guy, he's coming back to the US in a couple weeks or whenever it was gonna be, soon, he was coming back to the US. And so then my grandfather the next day went on a pre-Google deep dive of my dad and tried to do all the research that he could about the Hirway family.

And then they met my dad at the Bugatti's house when he came to visit. That was sort of like neutral territory, I guess. This man is an icon. Like, to leave a party and then be like, you know what, actually, I have a resume in my pocket from my former 2T slash cousin that I think is perfect for this, is like a matchmaker's treat. Right. It's like, yeah, I have a resume slash dating profile right here. Yeah. And it worked, even though your mom was picky. Yeah, they, they met my dad at the Bugatti house and, and, and so my dad was in, you know,

in India, in India for 30 days. By the end of those 30 days, they were married. That's wild. How long was it between meeting and actual wedding? I couldn't get that information, but we've got less than three weeks to work with. It's so nice that your parents found love and that it worked for them. High stakes first date. But gossip was a necessary component

to this whole thing happening. Wow. Uh-oh, Alex is typing. Who knows what this could be? Wow. Oh, Alex is typing. Who knows what this could be? Wow. She says that she's hearing that Rishi owes his life to gossip and in a way, in a way. Yeah, it's true.

It's, I think that can't be denied. Wow, that was beautiful. Thank you for bringing me that Rishi. I loved it. I love love. I love family. I also think a little bit of a nice continuity to the gossip that I had to tell you. Are you ready to hear? Yeah. Yeah. I'm scared, but I'm ready. Our friend of a friend today, we're going to call her Allegra.

Okay. And Allegra is from a huge Catholic family from a big city in the middle of the country. And this is the kind of family with like stories, right? Like stories about uncles who did God knows what. Great grandfathers who immigrated with suitcases full of cheese. Great great ancestors who had feuds that like lasted generations. The kind of stories that get passed down and down and down forever. The story I'm going to tell you is about like one story,

basically, that Allegra heard when she was in high school and that she thinks about constantly. OK. To tell this story, we have to do some genealogy, you and me, to make sure that we understand the family tree. All right. Can I take notes? Yes, you can. Taking notes.

OK. So our main girl is Allegra. OK? And we're going to be dealing with Allegra's grandfather's family. Okay, which is giant I'm gonna walk you through it. Okay, so Allegra is like the bottom of the tree. I put her in the wrong place Exactly and above her is Allegra's mom the level above that is what I'm gonna call the grand level Mm-hmm, and this is the level where most of our drama is gonna take place. So Allegra's mom's dad, her grandfather,

his name is Enzo. And Enzo is the youngest of 11 kids. Wow. You do not need to know all of them because that's too many people. You only need to know two other people on this level. The first one is Aunt Julia and the second is Aunt Maria. Got it.

Okay, and then the final level of our tree is like the great grandparents, the original matriarch and patriarch of this family. Okay, got it. So Allegra heard this most important legend in her family, when she was in high school, which was like a little more than a decade ago. And at this point, Grand Aunt Maria and Grand Aunt Julia

were in their early 80s. Grand Aunt Maria is a character. We're talking like always in a fur coat, always in pearls, always in skin tight leggings. Going out to the grocery store, fur coat. Exactly. Where did her long dead husband's money come from? Don't ask that question.

I didn't say anything about that. That's a different episode. That's not our business. Okay, so Grand Aunt Maria lives in this giant house. Like sweeping staircase with a metal railing, a driveway that's a whole loop, like a big bathtub that can fit a whole adult. Like there's a fountain somewhere.

Gotcha. And she lives there with her sister, Grand Aunt Julia. Oh, that's nice. You like it when sisters are friends? I like it that she has all of this luxury around her and she shares it with her family. Yeah. Grand Aunt Julia's whole thing is that she is

the most dramatic woman to ever live. Like something gets spilled, she's crying. She hears a couple fighting, she assumes they're getting a divorce, right? Like she has to do laundry, it's the worst day of her life. Yeah, yeah. The sensitivity level has turned all the way up. Exactly, exactly.

Okay, so in high school, Allegra goes over and her grand aunts tell her this story, which I will now tell you. Okay. Great grandma matriarch had 10 beautiful children. Her youngest was six years old when she decided she wanted one more child, an 11th child. That's just exhausting to think about. It's exhausting just to hear. It's so many children. I don't know that I've ever had 11 of anything.

I have four plates. Yeah. Four plates. So she tries to have this 11th child for two years and does not become pregnant. And this is like very hard, right? During this time, she goes on a business trip with great-grandpa patriarch to San Diego. Great. And even though she was a Catholic woman, she was like so stressed and having such a hard time that she said,

you know what I'm going to do? I'm going to see a psychic. PSAN, Diego. Yeah, that makes sense because when you're traveling, you can do things that you wouldn't normally otherwise do. You think it makes sense to see a psychic in San Diego? This is something that is reasonable to you. Did I eat seven desserts when I was in London in two days? Yes. Different rules. Yeah, you're on vacation. So she goes to see the psychic in San Diego and the psychic gives her three predictions.

The predictions are she needs to move apartments. OK, is that a prediction or just advice? Unclear. The second is that she would be pregnant by the end of the year. Okay. And the third is that her eldest son who was engaged at the time must wait to get married until the baby was born. And what's the age difference here between like how old is the eldest son at this point?

At least 20. Man. Well, the whole thing stresses me out. Again, just to think about my own upbringing, because my mom, when I was a baby, she was at somebody's house and there was another person visiting there. And that person was like, oh, you just had a baby. Do you want me to do their astrological chart? Because astrology is really big in India.

Right. And I think my mom was like, yeah, sure. So in any case, this woman did this whole astrological thing where- Reading. Yeah, a reading and like told my mom all this stuff about my life. And my mom, and I don't know how old I was when my mom first told me this story.

I think a teenager or something like that. But my mom started to tell me this and I was like, I don't wanna hear it. Don't tell me anything that she said at all. Please never talk to me about this. I have no interest in this. In fact, I have like an active interest in never hearing this again.

Wow. This is, you have never been farther from me. So you've never seen a psychic. I have never seen a psychic, it's true. And you know what else? I don't watch trailers for movies. As with movies, as in life, I will experience it when the time comes.

It's not your business, so what's gonna happen in the future? Exactly, no. My business is right now. Does this feel like it relates to the gossip thing? Absolutely. I don't want the people at the beginning of the movie to be telling me about the movie behind the movie's back.

I wait outside. The movie did not. No, I wait outside until the trailers are over and then I go sit down. Yeah, she Like do you have someone in there to text you or you well now, you know, you can You can buy your seats ahead of time, which was such a gift for me, right? So yeah, I will just yeah hang out and then you know Okay

I like sort of poke my head and now there are all these long Kind of featureettes between the trailers and the thing where you have Nicole Kidman saying, heartbreak feels good in a place like this. And so that's my cue to go sit down. I love this. So psychic, not for you, the future, not for you,

you reject it. Unfortunately, we have heard from a psychic already in this story. I've read enough Greek mythology. I don't trust prophecies. That is smart. I think it's very smart to not trust a prophecy. Okay, so her great-grandmother matriarch receives this prophecy, these three predictions.

She returns home from San Diego and she's like, it's time to get to work. It's time to put these predictions into action. She immediately finds her family a new, like, bigger place to live to work. It's time to put these predictions into action. She immediately finds her family a new, like bigger place to live. Yeah. They move. She really trusted this psychic. Sure enough, by the end of the year she was pregnant. Okay.

And this is important. She was 48 years old. Wow. So that baby became Enzo, the grandpa. So grandpa's whole life, he was like, spoiled, beautiful, miracle baby. But wait, but what about the third prediction? Did they follow that last one? Good question.

So because the first two predictions came true, great grandmother matriarch was like, well, we are absolutely following this third prediction because safety first. Like we don't wanna offend the psychic. And so the eldest son did postpone his wedding until after the baby was born. Okay.

This is the family legend. Do you like it? What do you think? Yeah, it's stressful, but I think I, the reason why I don't want to hear about the future and I don't want to hear about prophecies is because they scare me too much. Does it sounds like my life is really ruled by fear? And maybe I guess it is. I'm just coming to, I'm learning this about myself.

But I, because I think I respect them too much. You know, I'm too scared of the idea of like, if this is what is supposed to happen and you try and either thwart it, are you gonna head into disaster? Or are you going to somehow find yourself fulfilling the thing that you're trying to avoid? Yeah, and I also think in a family like this, right?

Like, because the psychic was right, this becomes lore. Yeah. Like, were the psychic wrong, we would have never heard this story and it would have disappeared forever, right? So this is a story Allegra hears from her grand-aunts. She loves it. She ends up going to college in California

and she's like seeing psychics constantly, like going down to San Diego to see psychics because she's like, maybe I can find one that will give me the same kind of guidance, but never any luck. Like never got a psychic that gave her anything good or just nothing that came true or just simply wasn't able to find a psychic.

Just like never got this kind of psychic that would be like, here are things you should do. Everyone was going vague mode. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You will meet a mysterious stranger. Exactly, exactly. You will find fulfillment in your life. You will find a career that you like.

It's like, bomb perfect how. Um, okay. You had to hear this whole story because it is important to our main drama, which takes place like ten years after Allegra graduated from college. Wow, this is an epic story. We're spanning, this must be close to a century. And importantly, in that ten years,

because the grand generation was all very old, most of them have died. Okay. Aunt Grand Maria has died, Grandpa Enzo has died, like a bunch of people in the generations above her have died. No weird prophecy related tragedies. No prophecy related tragedies.

And what our story is concerned with is the death of Aunt Julia. Yes, yeah. The most dramatic woman to ever live. Because Aunt Julia is the last one of that grand generation to die. She died at a glorious age of 99 years old. And were she and Allegra close?

Yes, like Allegra would go over to her house and gab. Like she had a very good relationship with Allegra's mom. Like they were close in a way that like families who are big and live in the same city can be. I wish I had that. I wanna have, I mean, I really love my aunts and I really enjoy spending time with them. And I'd love, like when we do all hang out,

that is my information gathering period. You know, my sister and I will just be like, okay, tell us about this and tell us about that. But none of our aunts or uncles live anywhere close to us. Most of them for most of our life, they didn't live in this country. So that sounds really nice. I think you like gossip so much.

I think you do. Like, seeing your aunt's and being like, what were you doing in 1985? Okay, it's winter when Grand Aunt Julia dies. It is cold. Everyone is sad, but they are also like, we loved our Grand Aunt Julia. She lived to 99 years old.

She had this great full life. Did she continue to live in Maria's house? Yes. Oh, great. Yes. She dies in Grand live in Maria's house? Yes. Oh, great. Yes. She dies in Grand Aunt Maria's giant spiral staircase home, which is beautiful in a way. Everyone's doing the stuff that happens after someone's died, right? They're telling stories, they're showing photos of them when they were 25 and being like,

look how hot she was, right? That whole rigmarole. And one day Allegra's mom is like, hey, will you go with me to do like the funeral arrangements? And this is a family that like knows how to throw a funeral because there were 11 grand generation people. And almost all of those people got married and had kids. So they know how to throw a funeral. So Allegra goes with her mom.

She helps her pick a coffin, helps her pick flowers, helps her do the obituary, all the normal stuff. They go to the funeral place. And the man at the funeral place is like, I'm so sorry for your loss. And they're like, thank you so much. And they're like, it's okay. You know, like she lived such a long life. She was almost a hundred years old. And the man is like, what? And they're like, what do you mean? What? Yeah. And he's like, what do you mean what? Yeah. And he's like, uh, well that, that is going to be a problem. Okay.

What? Yeah. They're like, what's going to be a problem, man? Like, what do you mean? And he's like, well, the problem is according to the government records that we have, she was about to turn 94. Wow. Which is much younger than 100.

You know, I don't actually know how old my dad is. Mystery is abound. Yeah, he might be one year older than or younger than what he is because sometimes in India they would just send kids off to school to just like get them out the house and go, you know, because he's one of seven kids. And so I think there's a chance that they might have said

that he was a year older than he was so that he could start school. And now nobody has any way of verifying. So I like this very much. Incredible. The thing is no one in this family knew that this was a controversy, right? Like they all were like, Grand Aunt Julia is almost 100. And now they have this man in the funeral parlor being like, I don't think so.

So Allegra and her mom are like, okay, whatever. Like we don't care that your government records say 94 and- Right, at this point it's moot. Like whatever. don't care that your government records say 94 and we say it's 100. Like, whatever. Yeah. She's dead. And the man is like, not whatever. The government documents say one thing and you're saying another and there are like logistical

rules about dying. And we cannot finalize her death certificate until we know how old she was. And Allegra's mom is like, I don't care. This does not matter to me. I want this over with. And the man is like, I'm so sorry. That's not how this works. You have to get a birth certificate.

Oh my gosh. You can't just be like, yeah, fine. You're the government. Okay, fine. We'll go with 94. No, you cannot. Or at least they weren't allowed to. But the problem is they don't know how she was, right?

Like she's dead, her parents are long dead, her siblings are all dead. So there's no one to be like, when is your sister's birthday? So they're like fumbling around in the dark, right? They're like, can we order a new birth certificate for this dead woman who was either 99 or 93, it's unclear. Yeah. And because this is a big family and things are moving and a funeral is planned, they are on a time crunch. People are coming from out of town and it takes time to get a birth certificate for

someone that old. What do you do here? Oh man, I mean, do they know where she was born? Yeah, they know where she was born? Yeah, they know where she was born. You know, even without the actual birth certificate, maybe there's other kinds of records that you can access, like at a hospital or something like that, if you know the hospital.

Great idea. Everyone in this family is like, we're looking for evidence now. Like we are going through the hundreds of drawers in Grand Aunt Maria's house that haven't been opened in decades, and we are going through the hundreds of drawers in Grand Aunt Maria's house that haven't been opened in decades and we are looking for anything that is like an official document.

High school graduation. Exactly. They're finding scrapbooks from a million years ago and folders and like tons of receipts that Grand Aunt Maria just like kept in bags for some reason. And they come up with two pieces of evidence. One is a scrapbook with like a picture of baby grand aunt Julia that has the

date of her birth written, making her 99 years old. Oh. The other is a tattered piece of paper that's like 70 years old with the names of everyone in the family in cursive and their brand new social security number and their ages. And this puts Grand Aunt Julia as younger. So you have two conflicting documents. And both of them are handwritten.

And both of them are handwritten. This is juicy. Do you know anything about the history of social security numbers? No. Okay, great. I'm going to tell you because I looked it up. Okay, great. Social security numbers were introduced by the Social Security Act in 1935.

They began in earnest in November of 1936 with FDR's New Deal. And what we did as a country, I guess, was we converted a thousand post offices into typing centers, and then they just like made cards and shipped them to Washington. So that means that everyone who was born before 1936 did not have a social security number, right? Someone was like coming to your house and being like, who lives here? What's their name? How old are they?

Writing that down on a piece of paper and then getting you a card with a number on it. So the document that they have in the house is this document that is like from the family's social security numbers being assigned. Got it. What? You're like scratching your head. Yeah, just thinking about, you know, like the way names are changed at Ellis Island. You know, just the way that like one person who might have been sleepy, one social security, newly minted social security worker might have not had their coffee that morning

and, uh, Oh, the way a four might look. I'm just thinking about all the ways that things could go wrong with the system. Yes. And there are like a couple of real problems with this document, right? Like people's names are spelled wrong. Like the handwriting is borderline illegible. Yeah. document, right? Like people's names are spelled wrong. Like the handwriting is borderline illegible. Grandpa Enzo's quote middle name is just the letter D. And sure enough, Julia's

age is five years younger than the family thought it should have been. Here's a question I have for you. If some guy came to the door and he was like, what's your name and your birthday and your age? Is it possible she just lied? I don't think so. I don't think that, especially at that time, it would be lying about a child's age. In my imagination of this, it's the grand matriarch, and she's giving the information.

And you know, like a proud mom might say, these are my children and these are their ages. And you would just tell the truth. You would just say, yeah, I have these 11 kids and here's how old they are. So I'm thinking about this as if I answered the door and I'm like, I'm 35 years old. Oh, and it's about your own age.

Yeah, I'm like, if a government officer asked me my age, one, I might forget, right? I might get it wrong, who's to say? And two, the temptation to be like, I'm 28 is certainly there. Right? Like. But then would you,

would you not think of that as your escape route? Yeah, like to be like, hey look, government document backs us up, I'm only 28. Yeah. Yeah, then you should change your age for everyone. But then she continued to say 99. So I don't think the error lies on the family's part.

Okay, I love this read. Everyone in the family in present day, like post Aunt Julia's death is like mystery solved. Somebody wrote down the age wrong. Maybe she lied. Yeah. Doesn't matter, right? Like they're like, we have a document that says she's 93, which is what the government

thinks she is. That's fine. We accept this false narrative, get her buried. Priorities. But at this point, Allegra's own mother is like, huh, I just like really thought there was going to be a bigger reveal here. Why? Yeah, everyone's like, why would you think that?

And Allegra's mother is like, well, right before Grandaunt Julia died, she said something to me. And everyone's like, what did she say? And she's like, well, she told me that her whole life was a lie. What? Way to bury the lead, hunty. Huge news.

I wrote a whole book of beautiful essays about gossip. It's called You Didn't Hear This From Me, and I'm so, so proud of it. It's about how we use gossip. It's about Britney Spears and West Elm Caleb and Gilgamesh and Picasso. And it's so, so fun. And I think it's about Britney Spears and West Elm Caleb and Gilgamesh and Picasso. And it's so, so fun. And I think it's really good. It comes out February 11th in hardback and a sexy audio book, which I read. You can buy it wherever you get books. You can go to kelseymckinneybook.com to see all the retailers where you could possibly buy a book from and to buy tickets for the

upcoming book tour, which will be really fun and really exciting. That's kelsemckinneybook.com. ["The New York Times"] What do you do with this information? Yeah, how do you hit pause and be like, I need a lot more than that? Everyone in this family is like, did you ask her follow up questions? Like, what else did she say? And Allegra's mom is like, to be honest, I just assumed she was being dramatic.

Oh, fair. Which like is a possibility, right? Because like Grand Aunt Julia was the most dramatic woman who ever lived. And so she could have just been saying this because she like learned that someone was a fake blonde. Yeah. What's your instinct here? Do you think it's just dramatique? I feel like a bad relative.

But yes, I think that she's just being dramatic. From everything that I know, the whole, all the time that I've spent with Aunt Julia, I feel like she's an unreliable narrator when it comes to statements like these. She certainly is. I think that's a great read. Everyone in the family is like, whatever, right?

Like this is becoming a whole thing. The funeral needs to continue. So they like go to the funeral guy, they're like, so sorry, our bad, we were confused. We accept whatever the date the government has. Here's this document they have. Like, is this a lie? Yes, whatever.

He's like, great, things are being sorted. Like, sure, the date on her headstone is gonna be wrong, but whatever. They're like, it's probably what Granda and Julia would have wanted anyway. Oh my gosh, Kelsey, I just remembered the seed that you have planted however many minutes ago, now I'm full of dramatic tension.

In the lead up to the funeral, TikTok releases a new filter. Despite the compliment I just gave to your storytelling technique. Worst transition ever. Is it? No, no. We're going somewhere. That filter is a filter. Go ahead. So much disrespect on Julie and her funeral. I'm so sorry.

Pause on your dramatic love of life and your impending funereal rights. TikTok just dropped a new filter. Yeah. Pause on your dramatic life of a life and your impending funereal rights. TikTok just dropped a new filter. Yeah, yeah. Okay, and that filter, this is gonna connect, I promise. That filter is the filter that makes you look old. Do you remember this? I'm not on TikTok yet, maybe I will be someday,

but I remember that people were posting all these aged up pictures of themselves. Exactly, yeah. Allegra puts this filter on her beautiful 30-something face and it's like a jump scare, right? And she's like, oh my God, okay, I need more retinol, I need sunscreen, I gotta take care of myself. But she's also like, I need sunscreen, I gotta take care of myself, but she's also like,

wait a second, I look exactly like Grandad Julia. Okay, okay. I mean, could be fine, sometimes familial relations, you know, whatever, there's, yeah, who knows, sure. Genetics can be weird, right? Like I look like my dad's sister, for example. That's weird. So she has this picture of herself

that looks exactly like Granddad Julia. She takes a screenshot and she sends it to the family chat. And everyone's like, oh my God, that's crazy. You look just like her. That's so cute, right? Cause it's like, oh, adorable. And then suddenly Allegra is like looking around at everyone in her immediate family. And she's like, we all kind of look like Grand Aunt Julia.

Like, we all have her eyebrows and her hair. And we love to be dramatic. Do you have any thoughts on this? You think she's reaching? I mean, again, genetics are weird. I'm not on board with any conspiracy theory yet, yet. Allegra is like ready to pull out the like red string. Yeah. Right?

Like she's ready. She's on a mission. She's like- But what's her theory? Okay. She's like, okay, my whole life is a lie, right? 93 or 99. And then she's like, wait a second. The legend. The legend.

Do you remember the legend of the psychic that I told you up top? Yes. They said to move houses. You were going to be pregnant by the end of the year. And your eldest son needed to postpone his wedding until after the baby was born. Vinko, okay, wow, great memory, incredible. Allegra is like thinking about this legend and she is like, the part of it that just like never made sense to me is like why he moved the wedding. She's like, why would that wedding need to be moved?

She's like, sure, the mom saw a psychic and the psychic told her to, but like, it's a baby. Like, what does that matter? You're a mother of 10. Like, it's not scandalous to be pregnant with your 11th child at your son's wedding, like, even if you're older. And then she's like, wait a second.

She was like so much older when she had Grandpa Enzo. Like her 10th kid was born a full eight years before Allegra's grandfather. 48 years old, yes, right. And suddenly she's like, how old was Aunt Julia when Grandpa was born? Okay. Wow. Allegra is like, I'm going straight to my mom, right? She goes straight to her mom. She's like, how old was Aunt Julia when Grandpa was born? And her mom is like, ha ha ha, who's asking?

Because famously she has two ages and Allegra is like, mom, not now. Like how old was she? And her mom is like, well, 20. She was 20 years old. Why? And Allegra is like, and she wasn't married, right? And her mom is like, yeah, she was never married. And Allegra's like, okay, hear me out. What if Aunt Julia got pregnant out of wedlock at 20 years old and had a secret pregnancy and a secret baby and that secret baby was Miracle Baby Enzo, your father? And what did the mom say? She's never considered this possibility.

The mom is like, what, like, where is this coming from? But Allegra is like on a roll, right? She's like, and great grandma matriarch lied to cover for her so that her reputation wouldn't be ruined. Now the two of them are cooking. The mom's like, oh my God, the my whole life is a lie thing. It all makes sense, right? She's like, my aunt always doted on me more than my other cousins. She's like, this is nuts. She's reeling. Allegra's like, yeah, I was always closer to Aunt Julia than all my other cousins.

Like, what does it mean? They're like, this would make the wedding move make sense because it would be scandalous to have a pregnant Julia at the wedding. At the wedding, right. Or scandalous if she wasn't at the wedding. Right, right. Wow, okay, but I'm still a little bit unsure at the wedding. At the wedding, right. Or scandalous if she wasn't at the wedding. Right, right.

Wow, okay, but I'm still a little bit unsure how this plays into the age change. Allegra is like, well, she could be lying about her age because if she's five years younger, she couldn't be her brother's mother. Oh, I mean, she could be, but but certainly it would be a different kind of story. Yeah. She's like, it all makes sense. Yeah.

Even if she's not the one doing the lying, like this is a conspiracy between her and her mom. So there's a concerted narrative that they're presenting. And so regardless of who's answering the door for the social security person, they could say, here's the story that we're telling and we're sticking to it. Yep. Wow. Are you buying this?

Do you think that this ties up all the parts of the legend? I do buy it. Yeah, I buy it. And my heart breaks for everybody. For the line for Julia never being able to be the mom to her son, for Allegra never to get to relate to her as her great-grandmother. It feels very tragic to me. To lessen the tragic a little bit. The nice thing is that this is a very close family where like they were close.

Yeah, yeah. Everyone was close. So it's like it wasn't that she was like disconnected from her family. It was just that everyone was doing a lie at the grand level. Wow. Nice pun there. Okay. There's one piece of the family legend that Allegra's like, this doesn't make sense. Allegra's like, why tell them to move apartments?

Right. So Allegra's like, okay, I'm convinced now that like she was pregnant, that grandma lied that they moved to the wedding to hide her pregnancy. Is San Diego even a place? Right. She's like, is the legend even real? She's like, and why move?

And this piece like grates on her, right? Like she's not sleeping in the lead up to this funeral because she's like, why would they move? Like why would the psychic tell them to move? Right. The funeral comes. It is like both a joy and a pain to celebrate the life of Julia, who was either Allegra's great aunt or great grandmother.

But like when you loved someone, it doesn't really matter exactly what their relationship was to you. So she was like, I have all these beautiful memories with her, I loved her so much, I will miss her. Great thing about funerals is it's also a time to like riff with people that you love about the person who has died. So they're riffing, Allegra's chatting it up with one of her mom's like random brothers time to like riff with people that you love about the person who has died, right? Right.

So they're riffing. Allegra's chatting it up with one of her mom's like random brothers and she's telling him all about this situation, right? She's like walking him through. She's like, I think the legend is wrong. I think da da da da da da. And drama famously is one of this family's most dominant traits. So he's like locked in.

And suddenly this guy is like, oh, you know, there's another weird, like funny thing here. And Allegra's like, great, gimme, I'm looking for evidence. And this guy's like, your grandpa had a weird middle name. Oh, the letter D? And Allegra's like, the letter D, exactly. And this guy's like, yeah, I think it was for Diego. Huh. This is a strange middle name for this man to have, right?

Like this is a family of Donnie's and Dino's and Marco's and that type of name. Yeah. Good old Italian names. Yeah. And Diego is like just off enough. Right. And Allegra is like San Diego,

like he was named after the psychic city. Yeah. And her uncle, casually, is like, oh no, I don't think he was named after the psychic city? Yeah. And her uncle, casually, is like, oh no, I don't think he was named after the city. I think he was named after the neighbor boy. And Allegra's like, what? And he's like, oh yeah, like, when your grandads were growing up, there was a family next door and the kids were like the same age and the oldest was named Diego. Wow. That's a real clue.

That's more than a clue. Drama. Yeah. Allegra's like, oh my God. That's why they had to move. Oh wow. Grand Aunt Julia got knocked up by the neighbor boy. I forgot about the moving part.

I was so excited about the discovery of Diego. They had to keep them apart. For me then, you have to track down Diego, right? Does she try and find out who Diego is? The first thing she does is like run around and tell everyone, right? She's like, oh my God, guys, guys, guys, I've like figured it out.

Yeah. And a bunch of the people who like knew the grand generation really well are like, oh my God, guys, guys, guys, I've like figured it out. Yeah. And a bunch of the people who like knew the grand generation really well are like, oh my God, that makes so much sense. Like he was always around. Yeah. Like he like loved your grandfather. Like he was kind of like an uncle to a lot of us.

Like that's crazy. Well, it sounds great. Why would they have to move away? I don't know, unfortunately. We are at the end of this story. How do you feel? Whose side are you on? First of all, I was riveted.

I would absolutely watch this prestige drama. I'm imagining the period piece costumes and it's just great. It was, thank you so much for letting me hear this story because I loved it. It was- Thank you. Great, wow.

So exciting. Please bring me back for the sequel. When we find Diego. When we get more information. I need to complete my red string board here of genealogy. Yeah, I know it's infuriating. Do you feel like you can take a side in this story? Yeah, I'm on the side of the truth.

And I don't care who I have to go through to get it. I do like that you're like knowing about the future, not my business. I reject it. Knowing about the past, I must know. Exactly. Yes. Yeah, because those are facts. I do have like one very final update for you. Okay. Which is that like ultimately there is no way to know if she lied.

Like everyone who would have known the truth took it to their grave with them. Right, yeah. But someone did find a photo of Diego in one of the family albums and he looked exactly like Grandpa. Wow. Oh, beautiful.

And a tragedy. I mean, just poor Diego and Julia. Star-crossed lovers. But I also love a tragedy, so. Rishi, thank you so much for coming on the show. It was a delight to have you. Thank you so much for having me. This was really an epic saga and thanks for, you know, Thank you for listening to Normal Gossip. If you have a gossip story to share with us,

email us at normalgossip at defector.com or you can leave us a voicemail at 2679 Gossip. If you love this podcast and want to support us, become a friend or a friend of a friend at supportnormalgossip.com. You can follow the show on Instagram and TikTok at normal gossip. You can follow Kelsey on all social media at at McKinney Kelsey. This podcast was produced by Alex Sujohn Laughlin, Ozzy Linus Goodman and Jay Toelviera. Justin Ellis is Defectors projects editor. Jasper Wang and Sean Kuhn are Defectors business guys. Alex Sujohn Laughlin is Defectors supervising producer.

Tom Lay is our editor-in-chief. Abigail Siegel is our intern. Dan McQuade runs our merch store, which you can find at normalgossip.store. Tara Jacoby designed our show art. Thank you to Rachel Hampton, Brandy Jensen, Sabrina Impler, Dave McKenna, Chris Thompson, Heather Chen, Ray Rado, David Roth, Catherine Hsu, Jasper Wang, Israel Deramula, and Patrick Redford for your help on this season, thanks to the rest of the Defector staff. Defector Media is a collectively owned, subscriber-based media company. Normal Gossip is a proud member of Radiotopia.

Normal Gossip is hosted by Kelsey McKinney. I'm Sean Conard. And remember, you did not hear this from me. RadioTopia from PRX.