The Moth - You've Got a Deal: Denise Bledsoe Slaughter & Bill Robinson

Episode Date: July 30, 2021

This week, two stories all about striking a deal - or two. This episode of The Moth Podcast is hosted by Kate Tellers. Storytellers: Denise Bledsoe Slaughter, Bill Robinson

Attention Houston! You have listened to our podcast and our radio hour, but did you know the Moth has live storytelling events at Wearhouse Live? The Moth has opened Mike's storytelling competitions called Story Slams that are open to anyone with a five-minute story to share on the night's theme. Upcoming themes include love hurts, stakes, clean, and pride. GoodLamoth.org forward slash Houston to experience a live show near you. That's the moth.org forward slash Houston. Welcome to the moth podcast. I'm your host for this week, Kate Tellers. Life is all about compromises and some are easier reach than others. So this week, our stories are about striking a deal,

bartering, negotiating, shaking hands, all of it. Up first is Denise Bletzos' slaughter. Denise told this at a DC Story's Land, where the theme of the night was beg, borrow, steal. Here's Denise live at the mouth. Okay, first of all, I want to say that I'm going to strangle my friend, JR, who talked me into doing this. Okay. So you all support murder. Thank you.

I am 66 years old. And this brief story is about my time in grad school. In Providence, Rhode Island, I went to grad school at Brown University. I worked very proudly now at UDC. This is the University of the District of Columbia. And I thought that on today, I have a story that reflects both borrowing and begging. And in the spirit of Martin Luther King,

and why can't we all just get along? This is a brief story about Pearl Wolf, one of my two Jewish mothers. Everybody should have a black mother and a Jewish mother. Okay, I have been privileged to have had both. And Pearl was my Jewish mother at Brown for six years. And my last year grad school I had custody of my younger brother, who I might note, I still have custody,

45 years later, you do the math. I was gotten worse with age. But really, he was in the ninth grade. I took custody of him. My brother's gay. And he and his father, my stepfather, were not getting along. I told my mother, I'll take him to school with me for a couple of weeks.

It turned into the whole year. And Providence, whether, there is not that bad, but it can get cold in the winter, and it did. It changed the trajectory of my life in many ways, and one of those was that I had to work. And the money that I made was not enough for that first oil delivery. So we were cold. And I called family members around the country. We were not poverty-stricken, but it wasn't a whole lot of extra money.

I called my older sister. Oh, well, I wish it had called me a couple of weeks ago. I just got back from Nassau. And you know, I don't have any money to spare. I called my mother's famous sister, Val Ma, whose husband's name was Jacques. Actually, it was Jack. When I first met him. And as soon as I mentioned money, she says,

oh, you need to speak to Jacques. Jacques, of course, says, we don't have any money. And I know it was a lie. I needed $180, which today it doesn't sound like a lot, but what's this, 1976? That was a lot of money. So I'm wanting to Pearl with whom I work. And Pearl, you gotta imagine is this short squat woman.

She looked like she was a body builder in her youth or something. And if she had a cigarette permanently glued to the inside of her lip, but she could talk with it like Susan Hayward in the movies. And so she says, what do you need? I said $180. She said, come by the house tonight, I'll give it to you. I said, Pearl, I don't tonight, I'll give it to you.

I said Pearl, I don't know when I'll be able to pay it back. And she said, that's okay, that's okay. And so she loaned me that money, and it got us through the winter. And the point of my story is that at the end of that year, I told her I would pay her back. I still didn't have $180. She said, you got a little refrigerator, right? And I said, yeah, I do as a matter of fact, what are you going to do with it? And this is the end of my grad school years. I said,

I don't know. I said, you want it? She had three children lined up to go to Brown. So she said, I'll take the refrigerator. So that was my introduction to bartering. And I paid off my debt to Pearl in any number of ways. And just as a footnote to my story, my brother, who went on to become a soldier. So thank you for your service. I thank him for his. He also was diagnosed with HIV in 1983.

And he's still alive. He survived all these years. Oh, no. No, that would be too simple. He became a crack addict and an alcoholic. And that is what you should be applauding. He survived that. He finished his undergraduate years and just got his masters

and rehab counseling. So I think Pearl was for keeping us good. That was Denise Bloodsoe's slaughter. Denise was raised in Washington, D.C. and is a proud graduate of McKinley Tech High School and Brown University. She has a son and daughter-in-law who also live in the city. In an email to our podcast team, Denise wrote, take care and keep smiling. You'll live longer and happier.

To see some photos of Denise and her brother, head to the extras for this episode on our website, themoth.org slash extras. Up next, Bill Robinson. Something to note about Bill's story. At The Moth, we are sensitive to when storytellers do accents from places and cultures they're not a part of. However, Bill's version of a Brooklyn accent

didn't feel like punching down or making fun, so this team of Moth New Yorkers gave it the thumbs up. Bill told this at a story slam in Chicago where the theme of the night was business. Here's Bill, live at the Monk. So for the first six years out of college I worked as a youth minister right up the road in Winnettke. And then I got married and we wanted to start a family and I thought okay I'm going

to have to get something that makes a little bit more money. So I took the next logical step and say it with me became the sales manager for a plumbing and heating valve company. So I've been in that job about a year and I'm on my first business trip without my boss and because I was in New York City, I was calling on our largest customer. And he was located in Brooklyn and this was in the early 90s, so long before Brooklyn became the artisan handcrafted trendy place that it is today. And I walked through this door of this big warehouse and it was just chaos. Contractors

everywhere, just a massive people all pushing their way up to the counter. And I'm in my suit and a polite Midwestern guy, so I sort of kind of wait my turn. And the guy right in front of me is yelling at the guy behind the counter saying, you're not gonna spot me credit for one lousy pump. I spend hundreds of dollars in here every day. And you're not gonna spot me credit for one lousy pump.

And the guy behind the counter introduces me to New York customer service, which was, he responded with, okay, I explain it one more time. You give me money, I give you shit. You don't give me money, I don't give you shit. Now get the fuck out. So, so this guy pushes past me, I go up and I say, I'm here to see Warren,

and he says, does he know you? And I said, yes, I have an appointment, and he looks over his shoulder and he says, Tony, this guy says he knows Warren. And Tony, hopefully, yes, I have an appointment. And he looks over his shoulder and he says, Tony, this guy says he knows Warren. And Tony, hopefully, says, and I can't figure out what I'm supposed to do because there's no way to get, the only way to get over the counters either crawl over or crawl under.

So I go down, I crawl under. He walks me through a doorway and then just massive room with dozens you know, dozens of desks and there's one in the middle and he points to the one in the middle. And I go stand there and there's this huge guy behind the desk, not fat, but just big. And he's talking on the phone, eating a sandwich and typing on his computer all at the same time. So I stand there for about 10 minutes without him acknowledging me. He finally puts down the phone and says, what do you want? And I

explain that I'm here, thank him for his business, we have the valves, we can ship him to him, here's the price. He says, oh no, no, no, my friend. And he writes something down in a piece of paper and tosses it on his desk to me and I said, what's this? And he said, I can buy those vows from your competitive for that price. And I said, well, then you should do that because that's a really good price and those are good vows. Which was not what he was expecting to hear.

And that sort of angered him. So I'm explaining to him my rationale. And he keeps scratching his chest. And after the third time I realized it probably wasn't a rash. He wanted to make sure I noticed the gun that was in the shoulder holster that under his coat. So I realized very quickly he's not going to buy anything from me that day. So I said, you know where to find me, you can call me if you change your mind. And I put my hand out to shake his hand. And he starts to stand up. And I think, oh, this is sort of a sign

of respect. I was very proud of myself and tell the realist that he had, he wasn't standing up. What he was doing was he grabbed my hand and then he pulled me so that I fell flat on top of his desk with my legs sticking out behind me. And our noses are this far from one another and he looks me in the eye, squeezes my hand like a vise and says, now what do you want to fuck with me? I'm gonna tell you what's gonna happen now. You're gonna step out the door and you're gonna say, I fucked up.

I should have done business with Warren, but I wouldn't do business with Warren. And then you're gonna get on that plane and you're gonna look down over this fine city and you're gonna say, oh, I fucked up. I should have done business with Warren and I wouldn't do business with Warren. And then you're gonna have to walk into work and Jim's gonna say, hey, Bill, did you get the order? And you're gonna have to say, no, Jim, I fucked up. I should have done business with Warren and I wouldn't do business with Warren. And then you can have to walk into work and Jim's going to say, hey, Bill, you get the order?

And you're going to have to say, no, Jim, I fucked up. I wouldn't do business with Warren. And I couldn't think anything to do a bit to squeeze with what was left of my hand and say, I do want to do business with you. I just can't do it at that price. So I come back to Chicago. A few days later, the phone rings, it's Warren. Still got those valves? Yeah? What's the price? The same price it was before. Okay, would you throw in some humidifiers for my uncles? I weed these humidifiers for like $50. I said,

sure. Yeah, I got three uncles and they need humidifiers. You'll put those in for free. Yeah, OK, then I'll take 80 gross of the valves. Great, that was a big order for us. So I'm writing up the order and he says, you know what, Bill? You're pretty good at this. What'd you use to do for you start working for the valve company?

You wouldn't believe me if I told you. No, seriously, what'd you use to do? I was a youth minister to church. Get the fuck out of here. No, that's what I used to do. And he says, well, you know what? You're actually pretty good this. Next time you come to New York,

I'm buying you some bagels and I'm going to make you an honorary fucking New Yorker. And from that point, he did that the next time it came to New York and from that point on, doing business with Warren was easy. Thank you. That was Bill Robinson. Bill works for the American Dental Association and is currently leading a startup company on their behalf called ADA Practice Transitions.

He credits storytelling as critical to his success in business and in particular for raising the funding for the company he now runs. Bill, as the director of Moth works at the Moth, you are speaking my language. He lives with his wife, Laura, in Arlington Heights, Illinois, where they are grateful empty nesters. Bill wanted listeners to know that even though he and Warren played a hard ball before reaching a deal, they were arguing about a difference of only seven cents per valve. That's all for this week. Until next time, from all of us here at the Moth, have a story worthy week.

Kate Tellers is a storyteller, host, and director of Mothworks at The Moth. Her story, but also bring cheese, is featured in the Moth's All These Wonders. True stories about facing the unknown. Her writing has appeared on McSweeney's and in the New Yorker. This episode of The Moth Podcast was produced by me, Julia Purcell, with Sarah Austin Janess and Sarah Jane Johnson. The rest of the Moths Leadership team includes Katherine Burns, Sarah Heyperman, Jennifer Hickson, Meg Bulls, Kate Tellers, Jennifer Birmingham, Marina Kluchey, Susanne Rust, Branding Grant, Inga Glodowski, and Aldi Kaza. Moth stories are true as remembered and affirmed by storytellers. For more about our podcast, information on pitching your own story, and everything else, go to our website, TheMoth.org. The Moth podcast is presented by PRX, the Public Radio Exchange, helping make public radio more public at prx.org.