The Moth - The Moth Radio Hour: Mama Bear

Episode Date: May 13, 2025

In this hour, stories of mothers as protectors, rescuers, and, sometimes, meddlers. This episode is hosted by Moth Senior Director Jenifer Hixson. The Moth Radio Hour is produced by The Moth and Jay Allison of Atlantic Public Media. Storytellers: Donald Harrison plays piano at a gay bar. Luann Sims throws a broccoli-themed party. Muneesh Jain travels to every baseball stadium in the country. Xochitl Gonzalez is a wedding planner tempted to take sides. Podcast # 919 To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This is the Moth Radio Hour. I'm your host Jennifer Hickson. In this hour we'll be hearing stories by and about mothers, the matriarch, your most insightful critic, or your greatest defender, often both at once. Consider the archetype. Mama bear. Fiercely protective, running on instincts, able to fend off your worst enemies and soften your darkest hours. Sometimes the mama bears in our lives are our grandmas, or our sisters, our neighbors. There was a crossing guard in the town I grew up in. I pity the impatient driver who'd honk or inch up while us kids were crossing. Nuh-uh, not on her watch. We met our first storyteller, Donald Harrison, in Philadelphia. Here he is at St. Anne's Church in New York City. The year I turned 30, I decided it was about damn time I got a job playing the piano and

singing in a gay bar. Sometimes you just reach that phase of your life, you know? It wasn't any gay bar. It was a Philadelphia institution called Tavern on Comack. I had always loved Tavern. It is a medium-sized gay piano bar. Back then, every wall and surface was covered in mirrors. There's a baby grand piano off in the corner, and piano players every night accompanying themselves. There's also a guest microphone

next to them, and customers can come up and do a solo with the piano player. It's great. This seemed like the dream side gig for me. I mean, a chance to perform every week, people clapping at me on a regular basis, free drinks, yes please. So I auditioned and to my amazement I got the job. When I first started working at Tavern, I inherited a small crew of regulars. My shift was happy hour on a Friday, which meant that my crew of regulars. My shift was happy hour on a Friday, which meant that my crew of regulars was mostly older gentlemen. Men who had been going to that same bar, though the name and layout had changed over the years, for decades. They

were 20, 30, 40, sometimes 50 years older than me. They could remember when the piano was over here, when the piano was over there, and they could recite the long lineage of piano players who had preceded me, just as you might the kings and queens of France. My regulars terrified me. I wasn't what you'd call a seasoned or very professional singer when I first started working there. In fact, on my third Friday on the job, one of these inherited regulars pity tipped me a single dollar and then stormed out of the bar after he told me that my performance of On the Street Where You Live was perfunctory.

My background in English meant I understood this word. And I understood it to mean that I had sung without feeling. My background in being anxious meant I was rather destroyed by this bit of feedback. However, this man went on to say that my perfunctory performance also proved I had no respect for the American songbook. That's right, I wasn't just bad at a single song,

but I was lousy at the entire canon I was attempting to perform. Cool, I thought't just bad at a single song, but I was lousy at the entire canon I was attempting to perform. Cool, I thought, thanks for the note. I'll just keep going. But what I wanted was to do that job well, and that meant making men like him happy. Because not only was this the generation of gay men who had preceded me, who had spent decades of their lives fighting for our rights and our visibility, living their lives in such a way so as to make comfortable

the life I have today. But this was also the generation of men who had kept alive this grand piano bar tradition, singing the same songs, making the same requests, belting out over the rainbow for the 50,000th time. Holding on to this brand of music and live performance, no matter where the piano was or who the piano player was. Inside those mirrored walls was their space and their tradition, and I wanted to be a part of it. One of these regulars was named Mike.

Do you know that line from the Christmas song, Do You Hear What I Hear, that goes, With a voice as big as the sea? Well, Mike has that sort of quintessential Pacific Ocean kind of voice. It's wide, it's deep, and it's capable of totally drowning out everyone around him. But Mike isn't just loud.

He is also guilty of what I like to call the I could have danced all night power move. The last line of I could have danced all night from My Fair Lady is, as maybe you know, hopefully you know, I could have danced, danced, danced all night. The person performing the song gets to decide how long that little beat is at the end. I could have danced, danced, danced, hold for drama, all night. The I could have danced all night power move occurs when someone who's not performing the song decides that from their spot out in the audience, they will decide when to come in on that final note.

The person who comes in ahead of the piano player does not do it by accident. No, he does it to assert his dominance. This is a type of musical theater conquest. And it's during these moments in so many songs that Mike takes over. But Mike's music is joyful music, and I love him for it. Yes, he overrules my timing. Yes, he sings too loudly. But there's no question that he means well. That it's inside of Tavern that he's living his best life.

So, one night, a few months into my tenure there, it's 7.30 on Friday and I've got one person sitting at the piano with me. The one fan I have earned in all the weeks of playing so far, my mom. My mom was there the first night I ever played there, which was, not incidentally, also her first night in a gay bar. She had been back a few times since, and she would tell anyone who would listen that she was there to hear her baby sing. So there she is, perched alone at the piano when in walks Mike.

These two had not yet arrived there on the same night, but I had envisioned their meeting, and I had envisioned it in much the way an astronomer might the meeting of celestial objects. I watched as Mike crossed the room, got a drink at the bar, and then sat down across the piano from my mom. It was just the three of us at this point. What could I do but begin to play the lullaby of Broadway in my timid and perfunctory way. So I start, Come on along and listen too. And then Mike joins in, The lullaby of Broadway.

I glance over the sheet music at my mom's eyes, and my mom's eyes say, What the fuck? I continue, the hip hooray and ballyhoo, and Mike continues, a lullaby a broad way. I look at my mom, my mom's eyes say, what? This cannot be happening. Are we all accepting this?

Where's the manager? But Mike's still like, "'Milkman's on his way." And I can see outrage really starting to build up in my mom. And she begins by giving Mike a less than savory look, a look I myself have received many times throughout my life. This does nothing, so then she starts gesturing

toward that guest microphone. And the message for Mike is clear. Go up there, do your own solo, then sit down and shut up. I shake my head at her. Please mom, no. This is the way of the world here and so it has been since time immemorial and so it ever shall be. We must endure this." But she persists and before long Mike finally clocks her disdain and he says something like, do you have a problem lady? And my mom says, I'm just trying to listen to my son. And then they start to argue over the piano. I decide my only power in the situation is my ability to overwhelm them with my show tune.

So I play louder, they argue louder, still the lyrics are an absurd mismatch to what's unfolding in front of me. It's all the daffodils who entertain at Angelo's and Maxi's. Through this, I hear Mike say something like, do you know how long you've been coming here, honey? And I think, shit, we have already reached a honey point in this gay bar argument. And I myself am starting to sweat and I'm starting to get very angry because you know what?

It's hard enough to come in here week after week and play these songs for these men and get called inadequate in all manner of vocabulary words that are fancy AF but now now I have to do it with my mom coming in and cause trouble for me so I get angry at her because of course Mike sings too loudly we all know that but he is a regular this is the one place he should be able to go to escape the judgment and scorn of middle-aged suburban straight ladies from New Jersey. On the other hand, Mike does sing way too loudly.

And my mom is in a gay bar for like the fifth time in her life, and she wants to hear me sing and I'm proud of her and she's proud of me and she should be able to do it But still they're going out it over the piano and my lullaby of Broadway is getting really insane I'm all you rock a boy your baby round till everything gets hazy And I'm not wanting the song to end because then what's gonna happen? What's this ridiculous fight gonna sound like when the piano is quiet? The stupid new bad piano player and his mom coming in and yelling at everybody. But then, you know, then I'm worried like is Mike gonna say something truly hurtful to my mom or is my mom who is a personal

trainer going to beat up Mike? I watch as my mom stands up and begins to move toward him. I wouldn't say that she looks like a lioness stalking over for the kill, but you know, I wouldn't not say it. I feel powerless to stop whatever is about to happen, and I reach the end of the song. What else can I do but finish? Two other people clap. My chest is heaving in that way, it does, after the

big final notes of show tunes all up there by myself, like, and my mom gets close to Mike and Mike looks up at her and then they hug. They hug. Now my own eyes say, what the fuck? What incredible transformation has occurred while I was so savagely pounding out the last few lines of the Lullaby of Broadway? In a moment, I would learn that Mike's question, do you know how long I've been coming here, honey, had led them to discuss their respective ages. A very mature place to take this conversation, I might add. But this conversation about their ages led them to discover that they had been born within hours of one another.

My mom and Mike were not two comets doomed for mutual annihilation in the midnight sky. They were birthday buddies. And it was on this common ground that we could all begin to try to get along. It's been almost 12 years since my mom and Mike met that night at Tavern on Kamak, and I've played there almost every Friday we've been open since. A lot of regulars have come and gone over the years. Some are no longer with us. But my mom and Mike are still two of my most faithful. Many times over these years people have come up to my mom and they've told her how awesome it is that

she's there. A mom watching her son play piano in a gay bar. My mom talks to them and she hangs out with them and they tell her their own moms wouldn't come to a place like this. My mom threatens to text them and ask them why. This is a territory she's found for herself around that piano. Mike is still exactly the same. He still sings way too loudly. My mom still gives him the stink eye. But a couple years back, they went out to dinner together to celebrate their birthdays.

Aw. It turns out that there continue to be timeless standoffs across that piano, whether my mom's involved or not. But in the end, keeping that grand piano bar tradition alive is about coming together, this glorious mishmash of ages and generations to make that loud and joyful music together. And for that I'll be home on Friday. Thank you. Applause That was Donald Harrison. In addition to being a pianist, he's a writer who also works in

learning and development. To see a picture of Donald and his mother, visit themoft.org where you can also download the story or pitch a story of your own. Several years ago, Donald's mom started doing her own number at the mic. Her go-to song, When You're Good to Mama. How fitting. Our next story is from mother Here's Luanne. We were sitting around the dinner table trying to come up with a theme for my son's fourth birthday party. He mentioned Star Wars, but I dismissed it. Star Wars parties are a dime a dozen. We need something more original. My dad put a bite of asparagus in his mouth and said,

why don't you have an asparagus party? That's ridiculous. We're not having an asparagus themed birthday party. Eddie doesn't even like asparagus. Yeah, my son said, I don't like asparagus. I like broccoli. And so it was settled. The next day, I photoshopped my son's face onto a crown of broccoli and sent invitations

to all of our family and friends. Please come to a broccoli party. I decorated all in green of course. There was a broccoli shaped cake and a photo cutout thing where you could put your face in, get your picture taken as a stalk of broccoli. There was even a broccoli shaped pinata. The kids were all anxious to hit the pinata but before I let them, I gathered them around to tell them the legend of Captain Broccoli. Captain Broccoli was just a regular guy who wanted to be a superhero, but when he went to apply for the job, he found out that all of the good, important superhero

jobs were already filled. So the only thing left for him to do was to become the superhero for times that aren't that important So if you're trapped under a dresser you want to call for Superman or maybe Jesus to come and help you But if you get the wrong flavor popsicle you want to call Captain Broccoli and The way that you call Captain Broccoli is like this And the way that you call Captain Broccoli is like this. Tiba, tuba, taba, taba, tuba, which is a nonsense phrase from my childhood. Finally, it was time to hit the piñata.

Now, they don't sell broccoli-shaped piñatas, so I had to make it. And apparently, this was a piñata of steel because the kids went through the line three or four times each and Nobody could even make a dent in the pinata and everyone was getting really frustrated So we decided to let the birthday boy my son just hit it until it opened So he hit it eight or nine times and finally there was a little crack at the top and the kids started to get really Excited hit it again. We yelled and they started chanting his name. Eddie, Eddie, Eddie! And he hit it

again and the crack got bigger and the kids got in their ready positions with their loot bags open. Hit it again! And he hit it again and finally the piñata cracked open and the kids were foaming at the math and you should have seen their little faces when nothing came out of that pinata but raw broccoli. I thought, I thought that it would just be funny, but it turned out to be a fascinating psychological experiment. Some of the kids hit the ground immediately and started grabbing as much broccoli as they possibly could. Now these kids might be from vegetarian families, but I think there's a population of children

that no matter what it was, it could be dog poop flying out of that. If it comes shooting out of a pinata, they're going to fight other children for it. Most of the kids stood there dumbfounded, not knowing what to do. My husband's in the background saying, it's broccoli, it's good for you. I saw one little girl reluctantly bend down and fill her bag, only to dump it out again when she thought no one was looking. But I started to feel bad when I noticed that some of the kids were actually crying. And I heard one little girl say, I thought it was gonna be candy, and I thought no kidding, that's the joke.

I thought it was going to be candy. And I thought, no kidding, that's the joke. So I reminded them, who do you call when you need help? And they just glared at me and said, we're not playing this game. You've done enough damage. They said, trust me, who do you call? And one angry little boy said, Captain Broccoli. And how do you call? And one angry little boy said, Captain Broccoli. And how do you call him? Nobody remembered.

I reminded them. Teeba, tuba, tuba, tuba, tuba. Again. Teeba, tuba, tuba, tuba, tuba. Again. Teeba, tuba, tuba, tuba, tuba. And on the third round, Captain Broccoli, the actual Captain Broccoli, in the form of my slightly inebriated brother, wearing green tights, a magnificent cape, a black Zorro mask, and a tremendous two-foot

high crown of broccoli, came running out the back door, leaping off the deck, and spreading candy to all of the crying children. The following year we had a Star Wars party. And the Oscar goes to Luanne Sims for most creative execution of a four-year-old birthday party. Luanne Sims lives in Pennsylvania, where she's an occasional co-host of the morning show at WCHE Radio. Luanne's brother Jim, DBA Captain Broccoli, was so popular that he went on to make appearances

at other children's events. He ultimately retired when no one wanted to store the costume with the giant broccoli floret hat. To see pictures of Captain Broccoli with Eddie at the party, the piñata, and an actual shot of a shocked little girl as she beheld that broccoli, visit themoth.org. In a moment, a story about a son's passion for baseball. I mean, he's really passionate. When The Moth Radio Hour continues. The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. At Radiolab, we love nothing more than nerding out about science,

neuroscience, chemistry. But but we do also like to get into other kinds of stories, stories about policing or politics, country music, hockey, sex of bugs. Regardless of whether we're looking at science or not science, we bring a rigorous curiosity to get you the answers. And hopefully make you see the world anew. Radiolab, adventures on the edge of what we think we know.

Wherever you get your podcasts. This is the Moth Radio Hour. I'm Jennifer Hixson. Next up, Moniz Jane hopes that his obsession with sports can lift him out of a depression. From a show in Traverse City where we partner with City Opera House and Interlochen Public Radio, here's Munish. My parents are from India, so in our house that meant we had a high bar set for academic achievement and a specific type of professional success, doctor, lawyer, engineer.

By the time my sister was 12, she knew she was going to be a doctor, just like my dad. When I was nine, I called the family meeting to let everyone know I was never going to be a doctor, or a lawyer, or an engineer. I was going to be a gymnast. My parents, they tolerated it, but told me that one day I was going to have to grow out of it. But I went to the gym six days a week, five hours a night. And by the time I was a teenager, I was training for the Olympics.

And then multiple injuries ended my career. My folks, they said, all right, you got that out of your system. Now it's time to focus on your education. I needed them to be impressed with me the way they were my sister I just I couldn't wrap my head around doing it their way so I came up with a bigger idea when I was 19 I got a job with ESPN I was producing live segments for sports center ESPN news hanging out with my sports idols my folks they kept reminding me don't let this get in the way your schoolwork all right fine if that fine. If that wasn't good enough, I came up with a bigger idea.

I left the network and moved to Detroit, Michigan, a city that I love, and I started a sports magazine. I sold ads, I found distributors. I built a staff with grown-ass people who had kids older than me. And we were killing it. We were up to 50,000 subscribers. People were recognizing me on the street. Hell, Muhammad Ali said he liked my magazine.

But every time I'd see my parents, they'd just ask me, when are you going back to college? Get that degree. This time, there was no bigger idea. I had to make this work. I doubled down, worked twice as hard, which also meant that I pretty much stopped sleeping entirely and started drinking and drugging the nights away to manage my stress levels.

And when I was 24, my doctor told me that I was six months away from a heart attack. I either had to get rid of the magazine or die. So I gave up, and something broke inside of me. And I couldn't face my parents. I took the money I'd saved from ESPN and the magazine, and I ran away. I moved to New York into a tiny 160 square foot studio apartment where the windows didn't even open.

And it was there that my self-imposed exile began, slowly losing contact with every human I'd ever met. The delivery guy would just leave the food outside my apartment because I couldn't even make eye contact with him. I was a failure. My parents would call and I never knew what to say. My dad would lecture me that I wasn't even a part of the family anymore. My mom would yell at me that I need to get my life together. And every conversation just ended in tears. So I stopped answering their calls. Then they started

sending me money to keep me alive and I took it and that made me hate myself so much more and so I just stopped leaving my apartment entirely. The TV would be on 24 hours a day. I wasn't watching at all. I just needed flashing images and noise to block out the constant stream of shame, regret, self-loathing that was clanging around the inside of my skull. And that became my life every day, all day, living in near isolation for five years. One day a baseball game just happened to be on. Now I hadn't watched a sporting event of any kind since the death of my magazine. It was always just too hard.

But on this day, I was so broken, I just stared emotionlessly at the screen in front of me. And within a couple of innings, something strange was happening. I felt myself sitting up in my bed, engaging with something outside of my own head. I was smiling. I mean, actually smiling for the first time in five years. By the time the game ended, I'd already ordered the MLB TV package and just started mainlining baseball. I was watching every game, reading every article,

going back over the last five years to see everything that I'd missed. In the middle of it all, I remembered a dream I had when I was six. One day, I'm going to see a baseball game at all 30 MLB stadiums. It's one of those silly things that a lot of baseball fans want to do, but few actually get a chance to do it. And the ones who do it, do it over the course of a lifetime, like a normal human person. But in this moment, nobody even knew that I existed. I could disappear off the planet and no one would notice.

So I said, screw it. I'm going to do it, and I'm going to do it in one season. I'm going to drive 17,000 miles in 95 days and go to a baseball game at all 30 ballparks. I started obsessively poring over maps and schedules, planning out my route. Every time I'd go down to the bodega to buy another pack of cigarettes,

instead, I would take that money out of the ATM, go back up to my apartment, shove it underneath my mattress. By the time the next baseball season came around, I'd saved $6,000 and quit smoking. I was ready to go. I called my parents to let them know what I was doing, and they really didn't know what to go. I called my parents to let them know what I was doing and they really didn't know what to say. They were just happy that I was alive and I hit the road. Every 48 hours I was in a new city but I didn't want to just sit in the ballpark alone. I needed a way to reintegrate myself into society. The problem was I had completely forgotten how to even have a conversation with somebody else. So I invented a podcast. I couldn't have cared less if anybody actually listened to this thing. I just needed an excuse to go talk to

strangers. And it was working. People were talking to me about the stats of their favorite ballplayers, the histories of their ballparks. One kid at City Field at a Mets game spent 20 minutes meticulously breaking down. Why it was? That the Yankees sucked. And then I bounced from ballpark to ballpark. I noticed that my conversations, they were evolving. I talked to a father and son in Baltimore, where after our official interview, the father pulled me aside, quietly confided in me that he didn't really have a relationship with his eldest son, but his youngest, his youngest loved baseball, so he knew that

at least they'd be able to talk about that. I talked to a mother and daughter in San Francisco who had been going to games together for 20 years, three generations of women in Texas. The grandmother proudly shoving little Lainey, her nine-year-old granddaughter, in front of my microphone saying, little Lainey, tell the nice man, what do you do all your school reports on? And little Lainey excitedly screams out, the Texas Rangers. And I realized we weren't really even talking

about baseball anymore. We were talking about family connection. By the time I got to LA, I'd already driven 8,000 miles on my own. I was halfway done with my tour, but this, this was my hell week. Because the Angels and the Dodgers rarely play at home at the same time, I had to catch a game in Anaheim, drive 17 hours up to Seattle, turn back around,

drive 17 hours back to LA, then 30 hours to Minnesota. It's 4,000 miles in 10 days, but I was a man possessed, nothing was gonna stop me. After my Angels game, I hopped in the car and headed up north, but about halfway into the drive, my vision starts to get blurry and my body starts to uncontrollably shake. I pull over just in time to open the door and projectile vomit all over the side of the highway. I didn't know what to do, so I called my dad. He just sighed into the phone and said, you had food poisoning,

what am I supposed to do from here? Gatorade and Pepto Bismol. My mom gets on the phone and starts screaming at me. This is ridiculous. You need to take better care of yourself, and I hung up. I wasn't in the mood for another lecture. I made it to Seattle in time for my game by double fisting Gatorade and Pepto Bismol. I was staying with some family friends, so I knew they'd be able to take care of me. The next day I hear a knock at the door. Nobody's home so I walk upstairs and through the glass door I see the silhouette of a four foot ten ninety pound little woman. I open the door and just say, what are you doing here mother? And she says, what are you doing here, mother?

And she says, I'm here to help you drive. Now she must have seen the panic on my face because she followed that up with, and I've been listening to your podcast. I know you don't take bathroom or food breaks when you're on the road, so I'm not gonna take any breaks either. We're gonna stay on your schedule.

I didn't know she was listening to the podcast. And then she said one more thing. I'm driving the whole way, so you've got two options. You sit next to me and you can sleep or we can talk. Now, I honestly can't remember the last time my mama and I had been in the same room together without it devolving into tears. So I said, okay, mama, I got in the car

and I immediately went to sleep. I slept the entire way to LA and when we got there she said, I'm not going to go to the baseball game with you. I said, why not? She said, because you've got work to do and if people see you there with your mother, they're not going to want to talk to you. I said, you're being ridiculous, of course you're going to come. And I got her a ticket.

We're at Dodder Stadium and I start interviewing the gentleman sitting next to me as I've done at every ballpark before. My mom, she moves to the seat behind us to give us some space to chat. And after the interview's over, I can hear her talking to her new seatmate. And her new seatmate's asking, wow, you must be a huge baseball fan

to do this type of road trip. And my mom just answers, no, I really don't like baseball. I like watching my son watch baseball. I pretended like I didn't hear that. After the game was over, we're walking back to the car and she stops me. She wants to show me a picture she'd taken during the game. And I look down at her phone and it's actually a picture of me and the guy that I'd been interviewing.

And she just said, look, you're smiling. I said, when are you going home, mama? And she said, no, no, no, no. I'm going to drive with you to Minnesota, too. This time there was no panic on my face. I said, okay, we're going to split the drive, and let's talk. We're going to split the drive and let's talk. As we made our way out east, I started talking to my mom the way that I've been talking to these strangers at the ballpark these last couple of months, asking her stories about her life. You know, this woman, she survived three wars between India and Pakistan. I didn't know that.

She told me the story of how her and my dad's arranged marriage came to be. I knew they were arranged, I just never knew how or why it happened. I don't know why I never bothered to ask her that. Right before we got to Minnesota, we made a quick pit stop in South Dakota at Mount Rushmore. And as we're walking up to the monument, my mom peeled off to call my dad,

and I was eavesdropping, and I could hear her say, as immigrants to this country we'd always wanted to see Mount Rushmore, we just never found a reason to make the trip. This is all so exciting. I can't wait for you to be able to see our son. He's just so happy. Thank you. That was Munish Jain. His mom flew home after getting him safely to the next stadium, and he eventually finished the tour, fulfilling his dream of seeing all 30 stadiums in one single season. Since their mother-son road trip, Munish talks to his mom or someone in his family almost every single day. Each summer since, Munish travels to ballparks across the country, taking pictures, talking to fans, and eating ice

cream out of a mini helmet. He's currently at work on a memoir on how baseball saved his life. He's currently at work on a memoir on how baseball saved his life. To see some pictures of Munish with his mom, visit themoth.org where you can also download the story. In a moment, the bride and her mother are at a crossroads when The Moth Radio Hour continues. The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. What's better than a well-marbled ribeye sizzling on the barbecue? A well-marbled ribeye sizzling on the barbecue? A well marbled rib eye sizzling on the barbecue that was carefully selected by an Instacart shopper and delivered to your door? A well marbled rib eye you ordered

without even leaving the kiddie pool? Whatever groceries your summer calls for, Instacart has you covered. Download the Instacart app and enjoy $0 delivery fees on your first three orders. Service fees, exclusions, and terms apply. Instacart, groceries that over-deliver. I'm Emma Greed, and I've spent the last 20 years building, running, and investing in some incredible businesses.

I've co-founded a multi-billion dollar unicorn and had my hand in several other companies that have generated hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars. The more success I've had, the more people started coming to me with questions. How do you start a business? How do you raise money? How do I bounce back from failure? So it got me thinking, why not just ask the people I aspire to the most?

How did they actually do what they do? I'm so incredibly lucky to know some of the smartest minds out there. And now I'm bringing their insights along with mine unfiltered directly to you. On my new podcast Aspire with Emma Greed, I'll dive into the big questions everyone wants to know about success in business and in life. Through weekly conversations, you'll get the tangible tools, the real no BS stories and undeniable little hacks that actually help you level up. Listen to and follow Aspire with Emma Greed, an Odyssey podcast available now, wherever you get your podcasts.

This is the Moth Radio Hour. I'm Jennifer Hickson. We're highlighting stories about protective mothers. Sometimes they save the day, and sometimes they mean well, but it gets complicated. Our next story is told by Sochil Gonzalez. You may recognize her name as the author of critically acclaimed novels, Olga Dies Dreaming

and Anita de Monte Laughs Last. But before she was a published writer, she spent some years as an acclaimed wedding planner. Here's Sochil. So years ago I was a wedding planner. Wedding planning obviously requires you to be detail-oriented and have excellent time management skills, but you also need to really learn how to deal with some batshit situations. So this particular batshit happened in 2009, and I remember because it was the end of the recession and I was broke and

I was just finishing up my divorce and starting to date again. And so one day my office phone rings and nothing good starts at the whisper but the woman on the other end says, my daughter's getting married in a few weeks and you've got to save this wedding. And she refuses to give us any more details, insisting that we must come uptown to her apartment, because only then will we understand the scale of her conundrum. And while this sounded crazy, I realized that I was broke. And so I agreed to go.

And as she was hanging up the phone, she says, by the way, I'm very, very rich. And she was, because the way, I'm very, very rich. And she was. Because when we got there, she lived in one of those grand old apartment buildings on Park Avenue, the kind with the doorman with the uniform and the cap.

And he opens the brass door. And they're in this giant lobby. And there's only two elevators, because each elevator goes up and opens into its own apartment. And so we get up to the apartment. And the maid and the maid outfit greets us and takes us down a long corridor into the library that's really just a room for books and there waiting for us alone is the mother of the bride and we're going to call her Mia just for sake of convenience and Mia Mia says, this is dire. She's embarrassed of all of it.

And not the library or the maid per se, but her daughter was embarrassed of being rich. And she had been living as a closeted rich person her entire adult life. None of her friends knew that she was rich. Her future in-laws didn't really have any idea. And so now, this has been driving Mia crazy, right? She's refusing my finery.

She's living in squalor. She's refusing Mia's clothes. She's walking around in Old Navy. And it's just been a nightmare. And Mia, it's the cross that poor Mia's had to bear for the last two decades. Only now, everything is coming to a head with this engagement. Because last year

Mia's other daughter got engaged and Mia threw her a giant wedding at the pier and plastered the ballroom in orchids. And so now this daughter realizes, well, I can't let my mother have anything to do with this. Otherwise the jig is up. Everyone's going to know that I'm rich. And by the way, this impoverished posturing isn't completely new, nor new to me. As long as I've known rich people, I've known people like this. In fact, probably amongst us now, someone just asked you to Venmo them $5 for Starbucks, and next week they'll secretly be skiing with their rich parents in Aspen. But in any case, Mia's daughter decides she's going to take matters into her own hands and

plan this wedding herself, armed, of of course with Mia's checkbook and so she goes along and now the wedding's a few weeks away and Mia finally goes to the tasting and Mia finally sees the venue and Mia finally realizes this is a piece of shit and she turns to her daughter and she's like you could pretend to be poor all you want but I can't have my friends and family coming to this and so they get into a giant fight, and they agree that the only way to resolve this is by hiring a wedding planner.

And the only wedding planner that the two of them could agree upon was my company. Now, I want to say that I was surprised by this, except that at the time, a lot of my competitors were really doing opulence, as in plastering the ballroom of the pier with orchids. And we were known for doing what I like to think of as understated luxury, which in 2009 meant we knew how to make a barn seem like a five-star restaurant.

So that this landed in our lap didn't completely surprise me. And at the time, you know, we would take turns at the bat shit and the turn was mine. And so now it's me. And the reason why the meeting was so urgent was because Mia had to get to us before her daughter did. Her daughter was planning on calling us on the morrow and hiring us for this affair, and Mia was like, I needed you to get here so I could explain to you how things were gonna work, and they were gonna work like this.

You say yes to everything she says. If she asks what it costs, you say it's already included in the contract, and then secretly, you and I are going to plan the wedding that I want. Now, I would have felt badly about this, except that the next day when I met the daughter, she actually did have terrible taste. Or at the very least, mildly insulting ideas of what she thought poor people would do at

their weddings. I mean she would have had everybody sitting at picnic tables and drinking out of jam jars if she had her chance. And so you know I felt like I could do a service here because Mia was kind of a riot and as I said I was kind of broke. Plus Mia took an immediate interest in my love life which I really appreciated at the time because my friends, after having just survived my divorce, were over it. And I had just met this guy. You know, I'd been married to my ex-husband for 10 years, and so I'd never online dated, and I went on the internet and I met this guy and he was charming and he was handsome

and he had a great job. And above all, he had this thing that I used to really look for in a guy at that time. He had a thing that I used to really look for in a guy at that time. He had a sadness about him. And I don't know why I needed that. I just did. And it was so sad. I mean it was so sad. He married his college sweetheart.

They'd always intended on having a big family. Year after year after year goes by. There's infertility problems. Instead of bringing them together, it pulls them apart. And he's so open and he's so vulnerable and he's so sad. And I just was all in. You know, we're texting, we're calling, we're running all over Manhattan, traipsing around it all hours of the night, arguing the existence of God, all in.

And Mia couldn't get enough. I mean, she was making up reasons to have meetings to get me to come uptown and we'd share three bottles of wine and I'd tell her all about it and there we were. And everything was great until everything was terrible because Mia's daughter decides that she wants to reduce the carbon footprint of the wedding. And she wants to do this by having edible escort cards that we don't waste anything. The escort card, for those of you who don't know, is the little piece of paper that's at the cocktail hour that tells you what table to sit at when the dinner starts. And Mia's daughter decides that we're going to save the environment by having bacon wrapped

dates with a toothpick in them and a teeny little tag that has your name and the table number and then you're just going to eat eat it and so I did what I was supposed to do and I said oh yes oh that is a great idea and then immediately when she left I emailed Mia I said what are we gonna do it's gonna look like a table full of floating turds and Mia replies oh Jesus Christ I wish you were my daughter now they say that there is no accidents, but that night Mia forgot to log out of her Gmail, and her daughter went on the computer

and saw the correspondence, and insisted, as one would imagine, that I be fired immediately, except that Mia couldn't quit me, and I don't know that I could quit Mia. And so instead we devised this elaborate ruse, more elaborate than the original ruse. And we were going to have one of my employees, and I'm not proud of this,

but we had one of my employees pretend that she worked for the caterer. And we sent an email introducing them and saying that I was hands off, it's all in this woman's hands. And they go off and she tells her all this when all of her hopes and dreams and nothing that the bride and this woman has say holds any water because the only thing that matters is what happens between me and Mia.

And so they're off planning this modest eco-friendly wedding and Mia and I are planning this lavish. I mean environmentally unsound affair. We are making custom-made furniture, we've got flowers imported from Holland wrapping around the windows of this loft, we're reflooring the floors, we're covering, I mean we're landscaping a deck. It was gonna take three days to just set this party up before it even happens. And in the meantime I'm still dating this guy. Only it's starting to get weird. This divorce is starting to feel very, very complicated. It involved real estate and a soft real estate market and only in New York does somebody say to you, well you know

it's so difficult because of the soft real estate market and you say, of course. But I was starting to feel like I was unwittingly sleeping with a married man and it didn't feel good and so I was like, you know, why don't you get, let things settle, see how long this takes takes let things settle or let the market perk up either one and then call me and let's see where we are you never know and I really was trying to be very zen about the whole thing because I was really into him but it was hard because he was also kind of rich and I was also kind of broke and he never said that he was rich but he said You know, he talked about how he'd gone to this prep school,

he'd had a big wedding of his own at the plaza. I could put two and two together, and so could Mia. And she was really cheering this on. She'd grown up poor, so she was like, marry rich, it's so fun, it's so fun. So... A couple days after this breakup of sorts, Mia calls me as usual frantic, urgent, panicked napkins. We've got to talk about napkins.

You've got to get uptown to this linen store and we need to talk about these napkins. And we are there being persnickety about napkins for like forever until we then go and have our usual lunch where we split a salad and two bottles of wine. And she's asking about the guy and I tell her, you know, about what happened and how I had to make the break and I was like, you know, I'm holding out hope you never know, love finds a way. And all of a sudden I just remember something that I couldn't believe I'd never brought up before and I was like, you know what Mia, it's so funny.

I was like, you know, he actually went to the same prep school as your fake poor daughter. I was like, I wonder if you know him. Know him. Does Mia know him? The elevators, Mia lives on 17 South. His parents live in 17 North. She had just seen him the weekend

prior in the Hamptons with his wife and their six-year-old son. Mia remembered the son's age because she had been at the kid's brisk. There is no divorce. There is no apartment on the market. There is nothing but this guy being a terrible, terrible person, which at this point I'm also not that sure that Mia and I aren't. Because we are still going behind her daughter's wedding back to plan this wedding. We are not only having this adulterous mother-daughter affair, but

we're running a con on this poor girl whose worst sin is that she's got terrible taste in escort cards. I just was starting to feel terrible, but you know I was in too deep. So the day of the wedding comes and I'm there setting up and I'm folding the beautiful napkins and I'm fixing the forks and and and everything is perfect. I mean the flowers are fully in bloom, the hundred dollar bottles of wine are all chilled. I've got five staff members there secretly disguised as waiters and very very nice looking waiters because Mia didn't like the original uniform and so we upgraded

obviously. Now clearly I couldn't be there because the bride never wanted to see my face again so I take myself to a restaurant a few blocks away and I'm calling in orders to my staff and I'm texting with frantic Mia who's like she's gonna find out what we've been up to she's gonna find out what we've been up to and I am assuring her Mia we're almost at the finish line she's gonna find out what we've been up to. She's gonna find out what we've been up to. And I am assuring her, Mia, we're almost at the finish line. It's gonna be a beautiful day, just a few more hours to get through.

She's never gonna find out. Now, I didn't realize that the reason why Mia was so confident that her daughter was gonna find out is because Mia was gonna get drunk and tell her. And so halfway through the reception, she pulls her daughter aside and confesses the entire scheme. And this poor girl on her wedding day realizes that her life these last few weeks has been

a lie. She's surrounded by traitors everywhere she turns. And she of course sees red and who can blame her? Take it from me. Finding out that you've been deceived does not feel good. And she says to Mia, I refuse, you can never see her again, you can never talk to her again. If I find out that you're having any more contact with the wedding planner, I'm cutting all contact with you.

And so Mia acquiesces and she agrees to family therapy and individual therapy and she's never going to see me again and she sends me a dramatic text message that says she knows everything, this is goodbye. Except Mia being Mia, of course it wasn't really goodbye. I still hear from her every now and then, maybe a call, sometimes a text. But you know, in looking back, I sometimes can't help but wonder, was this gorgeous lavish wedding really worth

the culminating in a fight between mother and daughter? Would they have been better off with picnic tables and jam jars and escrow cards that look like turds? Then again, relationships can be mended, but wedding photos are forever. Thank you very much. That was Sochil Gonzalez. Sochil eventually left the world of hors d'oeuvres and seating plans to become a writer, cultural critic, producer, screenwriter, and bestselling author. To all the mothers out there, who fiercely defend and protect, support, and okay, sometimes

overstep, here's hoping your efforts are received as love. I asked my daughter about her earliest memory. She said she was about three and had an ice cream cone and I asked her for a bite and get this, the bite I took was too big. I'm sorry Annabelle, but in my defense, I'm sure I only took that big bite to prevent the cone from toppling over. I'm forever looking out for you, kid. That's it for this episode of The Moth Radio Hour. We hope you'll join us next time. This episode of The Moth Radio Hour was produced by me, Jay Allison, and Jennifer Hickson, who also hosted and directed the stories in the show, along with Larry Rosen. Co-producer is Vicki Merrick, associate producer Emily Couch.

The rest of The Moth's leadership team includes Sarah Haberman, Sarah Austin-Giness, Meg Bowles, Kate Tellers, Marina Cluchet, Leanne Gulley, Suzanne Rust, Brandon Grant, Sarah Jane Johnson, and Aldi Casa. Maltz stories are true, as remembered and affirmed by the storytellers. Our theme music is by The Drift. Other music in this hour from Stan Whitmire, Penguin Cafe Orchestra, Duke Levine, and Larry Goldings and John Snyder. We receive funding from the National Endowment for the Arts. The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media

in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. Special thanks to our friends at Odyssey, including executive producer Leah Reese Dennis. For more about our podcast, for information on pitching us your own story, which we always hope you'll do, and everything else, go to our website TheMoth.org.