Mentally Oddcast Transcript: Caryl Hallberg
00:00:01.12
wednesdayleefriday
Hey friends, you are listening to the Mentally Oddcast. My name is Wednesday Lee Friday and today we have with us Caryl Hallberg. She is a ah who wishes's a U.S. citizen who actually lives in Portugal and she's been writing fantasy fiction since the 70s under a pseudonym but has recently raised her first released her ah first fiction novel under her own name. It's called A Brush with Mortality, and it's a psychological suspense mystery. Carol is actually quite fascinating and eclectic. She has degrees in psychology, landscaping, visual arts, and mythology, and is a fan of dragons, steampunk, witchcraft, and ritual-based oral traditions, which is something I enjoy as well. Hi, Carol. Thank you so much for being here.
00:00:51.03
CarylHallberg
Hi, Wednesday. I am so excited to be talking with you today. Thank you for having me.
00:00:55.23
wednesdayleefriday
Yay! Oh, our pleasure, our pleasure. um So unlike a lot of our guests, Carol actually does not have a mental health diagnosis of her own, but her work involves helping those who do. So I think this is going to be pretty interesting. um But you know, before we get started on the heavy stuff, We like to talk to our guests about the first horror movie they ever remember seeing. I'm a horror person myself. And even people who are not horror people often have a good story about their first horror movie. So let's have it!
00:01:31.13
CarylHallberg
Well, that's such a cool question. And I honestly, horror movie, I love horror movies. And so it's hard to remember what might've been my first, but I will tell you that what my earliest memory is watching Twilight Zone, as far as entertainment, is watching Twilight Zone on television.
00:01:52.58
wednesdayleefriday
Mmhmm.
00:01:56.23
CarylHallberg
But for a movie, I can tell you it's not maybe a horror movie, but it was a horrifying movie experience. um
00:02:06.55
wednesdayleefriday
Okay.
00:02:08.00
CarylHallberg
I was raised Catholic, went to a Catholic school taught by nuns who in those days wore habits, you know, the black and the white and all that.
00:02:15.74
wednesdayleefriday
Wow. Mmhmm.
00:02:18.39
CarylHallberg
And they had in those days very strict codes about who could see which movies and from the Catholic church, right, and the school.
00:02:26.70
wednesdayleefriday
Okay.
00:02:26.97
CarylHallberg
And whatever happened to baby Jane came out.
00:02:32.02
wednesdayleefriday
oh
00:02:32.78
CarylHallberg
And our mothers used to just drop us off at the theater. Some mom would drive a pile of us to the theater, kids, all little kids, right? And with the bags of homemade popcorn and some candy. And we'd go to the movies all Saturday. And I don't know what our mothers did during that time, but they were free. um And so we all went to whatever happened to baby Jane, not really knowing what we were getting into. And we're sitting in the theater and the lights are just going down when in walks six nuns from our school.
00:03:13.65
wednesdayleefriday
Oh no, busted.
00:03:15.99
CarylHallberg
And then when they walk down and they go all the way down to the front and they sit in a row in the front seat for this movie.
00:03:23.24
wednesdayleefriday
Wow.
00:03:25.40
CarylHallberg
And we were terrified because what if they saw us, we were breaking every rule that we knew of to be in the movie in the first place. What if they saw us and then told our parents or got us in trouble? I mean, it's horrifying. And we were afraid to move or make a sound. And then the movie started and we were scared to death by the movie as well. it was it's ah It's a scarred scarring episode in my young childhood.
00:03:45.02
wednesdayleefriday
Yeah.
00:03:50.62
wednesdayleefriday
Wow. Yeah, I would think so. that that That kind of fear, especially when you know you did something wrong, even though, you know, seeing a movie should never be wrong, especially that one. um Wow. What a great story.
00:04:05.11
CarylHallberg
You know, and nuns are scary, especially when they travel in packs of five, five, six.
00:04:05.30
wednesdayleefriday
um
00:04:09.91
wednesdayleefriday
I have to agree. I actually have an aunt who was a nun for a while, but is is not any longer. um But they didn't wear the habits. When I went to Catholic school, I was only in Catholic school for two years, and there were not very many nuns. I think there were two. And they did not wear habits anymore, but they certainly had a lot of uptight feelings about things that they could not adequately explain.
00:04:36.95
CarylHallberg
Oh my gosh, yes.
00:04:37.15
wednesdayleefriday
um Because I'm actually low-key autistic, and one of my ah one of the ways that that presents is that I don't want to do anything if it doesn't make sense. you know like You could probably make me do something, but if it doesn't make any sense and I don't understand, that's just not the way to get my best performance.
00:04:48.50
CarylHallberg
Right.
00:04:57.47
wednesdayleefriday
And yet in in Catholic school, or particularly in in catechism, um Any questions were perceived as, why are you such a smart ass?
00:05:08.04
CarylHallberg
Yeah, the answer is always just because it says so, or just because I say so.
00:05:08.20
wednesdayleefriday
And, you know, ah right. Like you're telling me a talking snake made a lady eat an apple and that's why God's still mad at us. Yeah, obviously I have follow up questions.
00:05:18.20
CarylHallberg
but
00:05:20.90
wednesdayleefriday
um Um, so I'm aware that you are involved in cognitive behavior therapy.
00:05:29.44
CarylHallberg
Yes, that's my primary therapeutic form.
00:05:30.31
wednesdayleefriday
And I, okay. And I understand that as being like a ah very solution based treatment and not necessarily, well, I don't want to say it's not about finding the root of your problem, but it is, it's largely focused on moving forward, right?
00:05:38.71
CarylHallberg
Thank you.
00:05:46.13
wednesdayleefriday
Am I, am I understanding that correctly?
00:05:48.58
CarylHallberg
That's essentially it. it is about It's about identifying what is like what you're experiencing now in this time, in this moment, in this part of your life, and then how to move forward from there and how to deal with that. So yes, there is some elements of traditional talk therapy, but it's really based in finding positive solutions. And it's entry I was drawn to it because I like practical things. I like problem solving.
00:06:17.52
wednesdayleefriday
Mmhmm.
00:06:19.60
CarylHallberg
And I'm not saying that all therapeutic needs can be solved with that. But I it i was drawn to it. And a good CBT therapist, and um you are going to get all kinds of comments on this statement, um you should be pretty much done with whatever original problem your your client came to you with in about 20 sessions assuming they're doing the work right um and and then you can move on to another issue or another problem but but cbt is a very figure it out teach the tools and move forward
00:06:49.94
wednesdayleefriday
Right, okay.
00:07:03.22
CarylHallberg
And I find that doing that and also using more traditional and other modalities of therapy work. So talk therapy is important, but I don't personally, I don't like just, you know, going to a therapist for 40 years, once a week, and you're telling the same origin of my trauma story over and over and over again, which is the Freudian mythology, right?
00:07:31.28
wednesdayleefriday
Well, yeah.
00:07:31.28
CarylHallberg
um I think that there's just, ah I think that psychology has come such a long way. There are a lot of things that work for different people. And, and I think that that from a therapist point of view, as the provider, you want to find the type of thing that works for you to deliver, right? What are you going to be good at delivering? And that's what I'm good at delivering.
00:08:00.43
wednesdayleefriday
That's awesome. That is amazing because I do know people that have been in therapy seeing the same therapist because I know switching therapists can be a hassle and could really disrupt things in in your treatment. but But people that have been seeing the same therapist for years and years and years and not really like getting anywhere like they don't feel that overall their life has improved they don't feel like they're breaking patterns and i mean when i hear that my advice is to find a different therapist because that's you know it's clear it's it's not supposed to take that long
00:08:33.41
CarylHallberg
Right.
00:08:37.93
CarylHallberg
Right.
00:08:38.39
wednesdayleefriday
And I think, well, because people look for different things in therapy. Some people really just want a sounding board or they want someone to affirm, like, you know, you describe the way your partner is treating you and then say, am I supposed to be mad about that? Is that okay that I'm mad? You know, that sort of thing.
00:08:54.15
CarylHallberg
Absolutely. and Yeah, don't get me wrong. I'm not saying there isn't a place for talk therapy. And I think that therapy is probably a good idea for literally everyone.
00:09:04.81
wednesdayleefriday
Mm hmm.
00:09:05.63
CarylHallberg
At at least at some point in their life, if not, it's to have a non-judgmental person with no skin in the game, so to speak, right?
00:09:15.90
wednesdayleefriday
Mmhmm.
00:09:16.80
CarylHallberg
To go and talk to, to to to bounce your ideas, your thoughts, your feelings off of, That's a very useful thing to have in your life. um But if you're talking about specific issues like depression or anxiety or PTSD or any number of other things, I think that then, when we're talking in psychology, that different modalities work for different people different and better than some others.
00:09:27.31
wednesdayleefriday
Yeah.
00:09:46.21
CarylHallberg
And you have to find the one that works for you.
00:09:49.31
wednesdayleefriday
and OK, so like with that in mind, ah do you utilize EMDR therapy?
00:09:54.87
CarylHallberg
I don't, however, that doesn't mean I don't appreciate it. So I knew you were going to ask this question, and I don't want to get down a rabbit hole here. But EMDR, in case your listeners don't know, is using it's a type of therapy where eye movement is employed in a very strategic way.
00:10:17.23
wednesdayleefriday
Mm hmm.
00:10:19.56
CarylHallberg
That's as deep as I'm going to go in that. But what it's doing is working your right hemisphere and your left hemisphere in a particular way. And that is the same thing that tapping does. There are therapies where you hold a little electrode in each hand and the therapist is having them go off at different times, right, left, right, left.
00:10:40.28
wednesdayleefriday
Mm hmm. Yep.
00:10:45.45
CarylHallberg
There's all of these different um therapeutic
00:10:53.20
wednesdayleefriday
Mm hmm.
00:10:53.29
CarylHallberg
practices that have you doing something that is tactile or movement related that's working your right hemisphere and your left hemisphere. And what science says, and I really like science a lot, so I go to science all the time, what's the empirical evidence, right? What science has shown us is that when you do anything that does that back and forth, whether it's sound, touch, movement, whatever it is, That creates a a environment in your brain to begin to rewire your neural pathways. And that's what you want to do is get your get these new, more positive neural pathways going. So for someone that suffers from anxiety, for instance,
00:11:51.30
CarylHallberg
If you can do the ah good with a good practitioner, do that left hemisphere, right hemisphere thing, whether it's EMDR or any of a number of other practices, that will be make it possible for you to change those neural pathways. and
00:12:14.33
wednesdayleefriday
Mm hmm.
00:12:14.43
CarylHallberg
and step out of the anxiety, step out of the trauma reaction to things. So it's actually science based and really good. And it's again, I'm going to say it again, whatever works for the individual, that's the thing to use.
00:12:32.32
wednesdayleefriday
Yep, absolutely.
00:12:33.85
CarylHallberg
I
00:12:34.14
wednesdayleefriday
I
00:12:35.39
CarylHallberg
I had a traumatic episode, oh gosh, when I was in my 50s. I'm really old listeners, so let's just do that. When I was in my 50s, I had a ah rather traumatic incident that hit me harder than any other thing that I'd ever had happen to me. And I and i did have a trauma reaction to that. What worked for me was a type of sound therapy where I went in, they were met, you could see my brain on a screen, right, how it was firing.
00:13:09.17
wednesdayleefriday
Mmhmm.
00:13:09.79
CarylHallberg
And then I had things attached to my head and they were playing sounds into my brain. And they literally turned off the fight flight portion of your brain, which is back behind your ears on either side. And to mine were kind of permanently turned on, if you will, which happens with a lot of PTSD people.
00:13:22.73
wednesdayleefriday
Wow!
00:13:25.85
wednesdayleefriday
Mmhmm.
00:13:29.78
CarylHallberg
And they were able to redirect that, but it was the sound going back and forth in a very specific way that helped my brain retrain its neural pathways. That's what happened. It flipped switches, right?
00:13:44.10
wednesdayleefriday
Yeah, well, that's that's my understanding. um I had EMDR for ah a few times a year for several years. um I had like a violent childhood. So I was one of those people that was like fight or flight all the time.
00:13:59.72
CarylHallberg
Right. Yeah, because it's turned on.
00:14:00.72
wednesdayleefriday
And then I Right, right. And then ah I started dating a man that I actually didn't have to be on guard with all the time. But I was like flinching and I didn't like being touched. And, you know, a lot of those kinds of things were just bleeding over into my relationships. And I thought, you know, I'm gonna I'm gonna lose this guy if I flinch every time he tries to touch me.
00:14:22.53
CarylHallberg
Yeah.
00:14:24.41
wednesdayleefriday
It's making him feel bad.
00:14:26.08
CarylHallberg
Yeah.
00:14:26.33
wednesdayleefriday
And And I had really good luck with with EMDR and basically what what I was told and what I kind of experienced was that it teaches it gets rid of those like visceral, instinctive reactions and lets you ah deal with things you know logically, rationally.
00:14:46.03
CarylHallberg
Ring,
00:14:46.77
wednesdayleefriday
So, you know, I mean, well, and it's interesting to me because it kind of takes me back to the, you know, the old school alienist philosophy of ah that that people are alienated from their true self by something and then you just find that thing and get rid of it.
00:14:46.73
CarylHallberg
right
00:15:03.42
wednesdayleefriday
Like it's it's pretty simplistic, but I think in ah in a larger, like more general sense, that's that's still kind of apt today.
00:15:13.09
CarylHallberg
It is. I don't disagree with you. And what's lovely about our technology today is we actually can look at the brain working as we're doing things, right?
00:15:24.91
wednesdayleefriday
Yep.
00:15:25.12
CarylHallberg
And that fascinates me a lot. I love that. and um I certainly haven't studied it enough to call myself an expert, but ah it fascinates me so that you can look at a brain and see that the fight or flight is turned on and it's not turning off. you can see that other parts of the brain are on or off or not operating correctly. And it's just like, OK, we're going to rewire this. We're going to change the pathways. We're going to flip that switch. And and all of that is just really a lovely.
00:15:56.82
CarylHallberg
um ah It's very mechanical, right? That's the problem solver in me.
00:16:00.42
wednesdayleefriday
h
00:16:02.53
CarylHallberg
But um but it also relates to what you're talking about, of just finding a different way of thinking about it.
00:16:10.75
wednesdayleefriday
So let's say a person doesn't see the point of therapy or maybe they've tried therapy and it hasn't worked out. um What would you say to someone to convince them of the value of of not giving up on therapy to to keep trying?
00:16:29.05
CarylHallberg
Yeah. Well, i'm gonna um I want to preface this that when we're talking about this, we're talking about people that are in a, no matter what else is going on, they're in a state where they're able to still make their own decisions and to make reasonable, thoughtful decisions.
00:16:43.46
wednesdayleefriday
Mmhmm.
00:16:48.28
CarylHallberg
So here's the thing. yeah You think therapy is one thing or another, it's not. It's many different types of ways of approaching mental health. There's so many different therapeutic models now and they're and most of them are valid. And what you need to do is find the one that works for you as an individual because there's no one size fits all. it's It's really up to the therapist and the individual.
00:17:19.41
CarylHallberg
So if you go to a therapist and it doesn't work, that's okay. Might be a very good therapist, just not the right one for you, not the right mentality for you.
00:17:27.52
wednesdayleefriday
Mm hmm.
00:17:29.63
CarylHallberg
Find someone else, a different kind of therapy. I think there's a place for all of them, Jungian, Freudian, all of the different things.
00:17:39.22
wednesdayleefriday
Yep.
00:17:40.58
CarylHallberg
Most modern psychologists use some stone soup mixture ah practices, right, that works for them. and they pull up and this is certainly what I do they pull up and out of their knowledge base what they think's gonna work for their Client that's in front of them. They don't have one Oh, this is my we're gonna do this and then this and then this and then this no they listen to the client they try and figure out what it is that's gonna work and then do that with them and if you find somebody that only has one way of being and
00:18:19.41
CarylHallberg
And one way of working for all their clients, I would say that's the person to avoid.
00:18:25.10
wednesdayleefriday
Right, right.
00:18:25.23
CarylHallberg
And in someone, right,
00:18:25.98
wednesdayleefriday
So a good therapist is going to tailor their therapy to the specific needs of of each patient. And if they're not doing that, then probably best to look elsewhere.
00:18:32.16
CarylHallberg
right.
00:18:36.03
wednesdayleefriday
that Yeah, that makes sense.
00:18:36.41
CarylHallberg
good But yeah, every, a friend is not the same as a therapist.
00:18:42.65
wednesdayleefriday
Right.
00:18:42.73
CarylHallberg
Friends are wonderful. And you should also have friends that you can just dump on that are going to say, yeah, guy sucks.
00:18:48.18
wednesdayleefriday
but
00:18:48.19
CarylHallberg
Or you're absolutely right.
00:18:49.32
wednesdayleefriday
Yeah.
00:18:49.79
CarylHallberg
Let's go slash some tires, whatever they you need your friend to say. Right. But a therapist can't is it not going to say that. The therapist is gonna question you and make it hard. Your friend's gonna say, oh, I really feel for you and I understand where you're coming from and that's horrible or that's great or whatever. The therapist is gonna go, so what do you think about that? And what do you well what do you think that means, right? And they're gonna drill down and they're gonna ask questions that make you realize that you're not thinking about everything.
00:19:22.64
CarylHallberg
having to do with whatever your subject matter is.
00:19:24.77
wednesdayleefriday
Mmhmm.
00:19:25.61
CarylHallberg
So I really think having a therapist is such a healthy way to move through life. Whether you think you have an issue or not, I think it's helpful.
00:19:40.24
wednesdayleefriday
Oh, I would agree. I think so many of the people that, I mean, I'm not a therapist, but I can pinpoint people and say, you know what, you would probably benefit from therapy. And it's it seems like so many of the people that are the most resistive to it are the ones that I don't want to say need it the most, but that's what I mean.
00:19:49.96
CarylHallberg
Yeah.
00:20:00.72
wednesdayleefriday
I mean, they need it the most.
00:20:02.75
CarylHallberg
Yeah.
00:20:03.67
wednesdayleefriday
It just seems smug to say so. Um, um okay. So if we could actually, uh, change topics for a second, I know that you have a cat, but also you have a Pedango, which I love.
00:20:11.95
CarylHallberg
Sure.
00:20:16.20
CarylHallberg
Yes, I did.
00:20:16.94
wednesdayleefriday
I wish I could have one. I live in an apartment, but they're like a super ah active rambunctious dog. They like to hunt. Does yours hunt?
00:20:26.86
CarylHallberg
Well, yes, I My Padango is a breed native to Portugal. And it was bre there there's two types and three sizes. So there's a wire hair, which is not really a wire hair at all, and a short hair, Padango. And then there's a small, medium, and large Padango.
00:20:46.77
wednesdayleefriday
Oh wow!
00:20:46.93
CarylHallberg
And mine is a medium wire hair. So think of a small, medium-sized dog that's going to a punk rock concert and that's what she looks like because her hair just goes every which direction and it's just and she looks like she might have some disease but no that's just how their their coats grow it's all weird and patchy long hair and short there and it's just crazy I'm one of these days I might have give her a mohawk and
00:21:00.29
wednesdayleefriday
Nice.
00:21:20.90
CarylHallberg
make it blue.
00:21:22.68
wednesdayleefriday
Awesome.
00:21:22.85
CarylHallberg
um So yeah, they're bre and the different sizes are bred to hunt different things. So my dog Rosie, um her size is bred for rats and midsize vermin, if you will. There is an Egyptian mongoose in the park where we walk every morning. I have to have her on leash when we're in that part of the park. for sure because she would just disappear up the hill and be gone until she found the mongoose. And I'm not sure who would win that particular discussion.
00:21:59.39
CarylHallberg
um
00:21:59.54
wednesdayleefriday
Right.
00:22:00.51
CarylHallberg
So I guarded very carefully. They're incredibly sweet dogs. They're not Border Collies or German Shepherd Smart. They're sweet. um and they're And they can hunt, but they're not.
00:22:14.01
wednesdayleefriday
Ah.
00:22:19.41
CarylHallberg
She's not the brightest bulb I've ever had. so She's not the dimmest either by a long shot. They're not stubborn. They're they're just very sweet. But boy, if they get a scent or they see, they're both scent and visual dogs. If she gets some idea that there's something to go after, she'll just go and forget about it. i'm I no longer exist for her. um When I got to Portugal, I decided I and got settled in my home. I thought, OK, now I can get a dog. So I went to the local rescue.
00:23:00.54
CarylHallberg
And I asked for their oldest dog that had been there the longest.
00:23:05.62
wednesdayleefriday
Uh-huh.
00:23:05.70
CarylHallberg
And she had been in the kennel for three years and she was 10 years old. And I thought, well, this is perfect because I want an old dog because I'm old.
00:23:09.60
wednesdayleefriday
Oh my
00:23:14.17
CarylHallberg
So I want a dog that's going to die before me so I don't have to worry about what happens after I'm gone.
00:23:18.86
wednesdayleefriday
goodness.
00:23:19.26
CarylHallberg
I know this is crazy thinking, but this is how i this is how my mind works. And so I got 10 years old, great. And I got her home and fell in love with her. And that's all great until I learned that Padangos live to be 20.
00:23:33.52
wednesdayleefriday
oh my goodness
00:23:35.73
CarylHallberg
So they they have much longer lifespans than the majority of dogs out in the world, dog types out in the world. So now I don't know. Luckily, she has quite a few boyfriends at the cafe next door, so I don't look better.
00:23:46.56
wednesdayleefriday
ah
00:23:49.43
wednesdayleefriday
Wow.
00:23:50.41
CarylHallberg
She is very sweet, though, and she's and and because she is middle-aged, she's lively when she's lively, but when we're home and I'm working, she's just asleep under the desk.
00:24:00.72
wednesdayleefriday
Ah, that's sweet. um You know, around here, we actually talk about how um physical challenge is... Oh, for heaven's sake. um
00:24:12.94
CarylHallberg
Okay.
00:24:13.09
wednesdayleefriday
we We talk a lot ah around here about how physical challenges can create mental challenges, even in those who are neurotypical. And I understand that you have some experience with this. What would you like to tell us about that?
00:24:26.55
CarylHallberg
Well, it actually relates to my novel that came out a brush with mortality. Because this novel, in part, not in total, but in part, is kind of a
00:24:42.03
CarylHallberg
love note, if you will, or a thank you note to the LGBTQ community. um I was born with a compromised immune system. So everybody's heard about the boy in the bubble, right?
00:24:58.75
wednesdayleefriday
Mm hmm.
00:24:58.81
CarylHallberg
Everybody knows that urban myth.
00:24:59.31
wednesdayleefriday
Yep.
00:25:01.31
CarylHallberg
I was kind of like that. I was the girl in the bubble, except I didn't have a bubble. And they didn't know why I kept getting sick. I just kept getting sick. So my entire childhood, I was sick. I missed so much school. I would catch anything that came around. I would get sick with mystery diseases. but um But medicine at that time didn't know how to figure out what was going on. And then I ended up in the hospital
00:25:37.35
CarylHallberg
at UC Medical Center in San Francisco in 1981, I think it was. I might have the date wrong.
00:25:46.61
wednesdayleefriday
OK.
00:25:48.72
CarylHallberg
And they didn't know where to put me because they didn't know what was wrong with me.
00:25:54.81
CarylHallberg
And it was pretty bad and it was pretty ugly. So they put me on an award that they had created And I was the only woman on that ward. And I was the only ambulatory person. So I would walk around that ward with my little, you know, trundling my little IB poll.
00:26:13.91
wednesdayleefriday
Yep, yep.
00:26:13.88
CarylHallberg
mean And visit the other people. And what that was, is that was the first AIDS ward before AIDS had a name. Before HIV had been admitted identified.
00:26:29.06
wednesdayleefriday
Wow.
00:26:29.11
CarylHallberg
And all the young men that were in this ward with me were very quickly dying of AIDS.
00:26:39.00
wednesdayleefriday
Oh my gosh.
00:26:39.42
CarylHallberg
And of course, I survived. I had three or four surgeries that go around and I survived. um But because of the HIV AIDS epidemic, and because of all of those in the early days, young men dying and then other people, a lot of research was done on immune systems, immunology.
00:27:06.05
wednesdayleefriday
Mm-hmm.
00:27:07.10
CarylHallberg
And because of that, by the time I turned 30, I was diagnosed as having, and then DNA was kind of discovered or solidified.
00:27:12.39
wednesdayleefriday
Aha.
00:27:19.64
CarylHallberg
They were able to determine that I had a genetic immune system issue that And that's why I would get these really strange things happening and get sick all the time. The only reason I'm alive today and I'm 100% convinced of this is because of all of those young men dying.
00:27:35.39
wednesdayleefriday
Wow.
00:27:44.23
wednesdayleefriday
Wow.
00:27:44.33
CarylHallberg
And because of the research that occurred because of that.
00:27:49.92
CarylHallberg
And so I've always felt this very bizarre Like, I'm very grateful, but I'm very sad. i That's not how I would want the world to be. It's just how the world is.
00:28:05.80
wednesdayleefriday
Sure.
00:28:05.99
CarylHallberg
And this book, A Brush with Mortality, has in it um the protagonist is a menopausal white woman who's straight. But the other primary character in the book is a bisexual gentleman. Horace Cosgrove Drucker III. And they have a lot of dialogue and there's a lot of discussion about practices around the gay lifestyle during that period of time and and then into the year 2000. And in that character, Drucker, is dying of AIDS. And so they're at his deathbed having this conversation.
00:28:54.01
CarylHallberg
That's the part of this book that for me is sort of like a ah testament or witnessing, let's call it that, I like that word, witnessing, of of what was experienced and and my gratitude for that horrific thing making something positive happen.
00:29:03.30
wednesdayleefriday
and Okay, yeah.
00:29:15.88
CarylHallberg
And clearly not just for me, but for all the other people in the world that have any form of genetic immune issue that made all the difference because it created an entire science that didn't exist before. um
00:29:33.23
wednesdayleefriday
that's That's huge. That's just incredible. Now, I would think that being sick a lot as a child would be very isolating.
00:29:42.50
CarylHallberg
Yeah.
00:29:42.59
wednesdayleefriday
um And so I wonder when you're in the hospital and you're really the only patient who can can walk around, I mean, were you talking to the other patients?
00:29:51.67
CarylHallberg
Yeah, I visited them, I sat with them, because nobody knew what it was, first off, right?
00:29:52.03
wednesdayleefriday
Were you like...
00:29:55.74
wednesdayleefriday
Mm-hmm.
00:29:56.03
CarylHallberg
Nobody knew what was happening, something horrible was happening. they was in At that point, they were trying to figure it out. So I was walking around, and a lot of these young men were already comatose or whatever. I would just sit with them, ah because no one was visiting. Everyone was afraid. So they they had no visitors.
00:30:13.63
wednesdayleefriday
Yeah.
00:30:15.14
CarylHallberg
It was this quiet, empty ward with just me and a bunch of young men that were dying. There weren't even a lot of nurses around because it was well they Exactly Right Well, I'm craziness right not unlike what we experienced in 2020 by the way I
00:30:25.55
wednesdayleefriday
Why? I was a kid during the beginning of AIDS, but I do remember that if you had it or if people thought you had it, they didn't want to hug you. They didn't want to shake your hand. I mean, it was the the ignorance just led to so much just self-protection and shunning of of people.
00:30:49.59
wednesdayleefriday
yeah
00:30:50.88
CarylHallberg
Um, a lot of, because when something's just beginning to happen, nobody knows. And so all the precautions have to be taken until they figure out what's happening, right?
00:30:58.73
wednesdayleefriday
Mm hmm.
00:31:01.50
CarylHallberg
But, and when you have to do that, then all of the hatred and all of the fear bubbles to the surface as well.
00:31:06.89
wednesdayleefriday
Yep, yep.
00:31:07.70
CarylHallberg
And so there was literally no one visiting this ward at all. um And yeah, as a child, I had a lot of free time on my hands. So guess what? I read voraciously. I wrote, I come by my authorship, honestly, that way. um I had a lot of other things in my childhood that could have caused me to have different mental health or trauma related things. But because I had so much time to sit and read and be quiet by myself,
00:31:43.29
CarylHallberg
I was able to go deep, especially as I was older, I was able we to go deep into thinking about spiritual things and reading everything and studying everything and and figuring it all out and being left alone, which I really love. I'm an introvert, so that worked out pretty well for me.
00:32:02.42
wednesdayleefriday
nice nice yeah i used to get that a lot of why are you always by yourself well because you can't read in a group like what what are you asking me um so i i do definitely get the sense that you are focused on giving voice to unheard demographics um which is is wonderful obviously
00:32:10.59
CarylHallberg
Yeah.
00:32:13.11
CarylHallberg
hahaha
00:32:24.91
wednesdayleefriday
I wonder though, particularly in the socio-political climate that we're living in, it seems like a lot of people are ready to call out things that they don't agree with and that can get a little obnoxious, I think. And I think it it also um can, it just feels very accusatory at times toward people that have good intentions. So I just wonder, if you've been challenged yet on any of your portrayals of characters that are in demographics that you are not.
00:32:53.77
CarylHallberg
Oh, well, this is it's interesting because um this novel is what's called literary fiction, which means it doesn't fit into a particular genre. But the way that books are sold is by putting them into the little tiny, very tight little boxes, right?
00:33:18.86
wednesdayleefriday
Yep.
00:33:19.50
CarylHallberg
and And so literary fiction is about the words, it's about the craft of writing more than it is about a plot or whatever. And so it's very hard to categorize that for distribution by booksellers, to booksellers and to libraries. And so it's funny, I can put down what I think and other parties within my publishing stream can put down what they think and then it gets to the bookseller or the library and they make their own decision right and this book has erotica in it but not it's not an erotic novel it just happens to have two scenes and some dialogue that are erotic
00:33:50.16
wednesdayleefriday
Mmhmm. Mmhmm.
00:34:05.92
wednesdayleefriday
Okay.
00:34:06.03
CarylHallberg
um But it's also got suspense. It's also got a lot of psychological stuff. might I have a lot of things going on in this novel, and it's hard to classify it. So libraries, some libraries have rejected the novel because they think it's erotica, even though it's not.
00:34:27.30
wednesdayleefriday
Oh my.
00:34:30.04
CarylHallberg
and And it's been classified as a mystery in some places, but it's not really a mystery because mystery is a very specific kind of genre that certain things happen to have to happen and there has to be a detective and there's no detective in this.
00:34:47.71
CarylHallberg
So.
00:34:47.86
wednesdayleefriday
It's interesting because what I'm waiting for is for what happened to movies to happen to books. Because back in the day, you know in the 80s and beyond when you had video stores, a movie had to be put in one category because you had so many copies.
00:35:01.73
CarylHallberg
Right. Oh, yeah.
00:35:03.77
wednesdayleefriday
And so you had to pick something. And that would lead to all these arguments about why is psycho and drama and not horror? Why is Jaws in horror and not the action so section? and
00:35:13.87
CarylHallberg
Yeah.
00:35:14.01
wednesdayleefriday
And it was because we believe that every movie, every book, every show was one thing.
00:35:20.54
CarylHallberg
Yeah.
00:35:20.75
wednesdayleefriday
And anybody that consumes a lot of content knows that, no, of course it's it's not. You know, like I would call the Lovely Bones a horror story and not everyone would.
00:35:27.23
CarylHallberg
Yeah.
00:35:31.76
wednesdayleefriday
Did I say, my God, look at what happens in it.
00:35:32.21
CarylHallberg
There you go. That's it exactly. That's it exactly. The Lonely Bones um is not ah what they call a cop to my novel, but but in a way it is, because it does have all these layers of different genres inside of it. But it's really about the language and the premise of of the book, not about these genres and these tropes, right? um so and And every person that reads that book comes away with something different.
00:36:06.81
CarylHallberg
That's what I love about literary fiction, actually. And that's what I hope happens.
00:36:09.43
wednesdayleefriday
Yep.
00:36:10.37
CarylHallberg
And I think that's what's happening with a brush with mortality. because I'm looking at people's reviews and I'm looking at people's, I'm actually have more people sending me personal messages than writing reviews, which I find interesting and a little frustrating and also really nice.
00:36:23.03
wednesdayleefriday
Oh.
00:36:25.78
CarylHallberg
So it's like, I don't know how to feel about it, but yeah.
00:36:25.96
wednesdayleefriday
but Thanks for reaching out. Please put it on Amazon.
00:36:32.11
CarylHallberg
um But what's what I find fascinating, and this always just fascinated me about any kind of art, is that once the artist hands off the art, whether it's writing or sculpture or a painting or whatever music, whatever it is, what the person experiencing the art sees or hears or feels is not necessarily what the artist intended or even thought of themselves.
00:36:56.80
wednesdayleefriday
Oh, absolutely.
00:36:58.34
CarylHallberg
And it's so It's so fascinating to me to have someone come back and say, oh, and this blah, blah, blah about your novel, blah, blah, blah. And I'm going, oh yeah, huh. I didn't think about that.
00:37:13.14
wednesdayleefriday
yeah
00:37:14.63
CarylHallberg
You know, um the premise of this particular novel is that everyone is judgmental, including the reader.
00:37:27.72
CarylHallberg
And that 99.9% of the time our judgments are incorrect.
00:37:28.12
wednesdayleefriday
I see. Well, that's certainly an important lesson.
00:37:38.35
CarylHallberg
So there's a lot in this novel and what I have loved consistently is that the reader feedback I'm getting is when they get to the end, they go, oh, wow, huh, I was completely wrong. And they have to make a decision.
00:37:55.97
wednesdayleefriday
Wow. that
00:37:57.42
CarylHallberg
They have to change their judgment or make a decision about how they feel about the different characters in the main characters, right? About how they feel about those characters in the book at the end when kind of all this stuff is revealed.
00:38:15.62
wednesdayleefriday
Well, that is my favorite thing when I don't see the ending coming and it still works.
00:38:16.02
CarylHallberg
and Yeah.
00:38:21.23
CarylHallberg
Yeah.
00:38:21.61
wednesdayleefriday
Because I always want to be I guess I don't need to be shocked, but I always want to have some like something emotionally impactful at the end. And it's always best if I if I don't see it coming.
00:38:32.56
CarylHallberg
yeah
00:38:34.92
wednesdayleefriday
Now, you mentioned actually ah mystery versus suspense.
00:38:36.19
CarylHallberg
Yeah.
00:38:38.60
wednesdayleefriday
Now, as I understand it, in a mystery book, the identity of the villain, you know, or the the antagonist, so to speak, is a secret until the end. Whereas in a suspense book, we know who the villain is and we just wait to see if they're going to be consequences.
00:38:49.62
CarylHallberg
Right.
00:38:54.95
wednesdayleefriday
So so which one of these is yours?
00:38:55.81
CarylHallberg
Well, i it's not a mystery because ah the other thing about a mystery is there's somebody trying to solve the mystery.
00:39:02.87
wednesdayleefriday
Mm hmm.
00:39:03.92
CarylHallberg
And nobody's trying to solve anything in my novel.
00:39:08.94
wednesdayleefriday
Interesting.
00:39:10.65
CarylHallberg
so And it's not truly suspense either. It just ah happens to be one of the categories it falls into because you have to put it in a category and because there is a secret through the whole thing. So if I can be a little bit disingenuous, I will say that the protagonist in the novel is also the antagonist.
00:39:35.39
wednesdayleefriday
I see.
00:39:35.59
CarylHallberg
and you're just gonna have and you're just going to have to read it.
00:39:39.44
wednesdayleefriday
Wow. So what a what genre readers um are you are you thinking are are going to be most interested in this book?
00:39:49.30
CarylHallberg
I think, okay.
00:39:49.40
wednesdayleefriday
I mean, obviously you want everyone to read it, but but who in particular?
00:39:53.25
CarylHallberg
Well, first off, you have to be comfortable with LGBTQ conversation.
00:40:03.97
CarylHallberg
And so that that I think is right off but for just a general readership I think if you liked lovely bones, that's gonna work um If you liked where the crawdad sing I Can't believe I'm comparing myself to those two books, but there you go um You'll like this book if you liked
00:40:33.60
CarylHallberg
any of those more modern literary novels that have a little bit of perhaps surrealism in them, you'll like this.
00:40:43.13
wednesdayleefriday
Is it going to make me sad?
00:40:45.22
CarylHallberg
I don't think so.
00:40:47.90
wednesdayleefriday
Okay.
00:40:49.25
CarylHallberg
There's no violence in it.
00:40:49.68
wednesdayleefriday
thats
00:40:50.53
CarylHallberg
There's no overt violence in it.
00:40:52.67
wednesdayleefriday
Okay.
00:40:54.46
CarylHallberg
um
00:40:54.66
wednesdayleefriday
Well, it's just, you know, i'm I'm pretty moody and I think a lot of our listeners actually are neurodivergent people. So we try to be kind of careful. Like ah somebody handed me a copy of Into the Wild one day and said, oh, you should read this. You'll love it. And I did read it and I did love it, but my God, it's so, so sad. And you you can't just hand people a book that sad.
00:41:16.30
CarylHallberg
Yeah. No, this is i think I think it isn't sad because this book has a lot of discussion about life, death, love, and meaning in it. And so one of the the things that these characters talk about, particularly Horace Cosgrove Drucker III of the San Francisco Druckers, um he's dying. He's on his deathbed. And he's having this conversation with our protagonist and he's talking about how for him and he thinks for most people that death is not about a cessation of your body and it has more to do with your relationships when you're alive and what you leave behind.
00:42:05.45
wednesdayleefriday
Okay.
00:42:06.35
CarylHallberg
And it has more to do with with how you feel about things and how others feel about you. Um, so I don't I think it's it's not that it's it's not a funny book It's not joyous, but I also think it's just a thoughtful but not sad And the other thing I didn't do it on purpose but i'm realizing now as i'm on a new project I have another work in project or work in progress And I have realized that one of the key characters in my next book has
00:42:44.46
CarylHallberg
mental health diagnosis. And the protagonist in a brush with mortality suffers from disassociative um amnesia and has a mental health issue. It doesn't bother her, but might bother other people. um
00:43:07.70
wednesdayleefriday
Eh.
00:43:09.47
CarylHallberg
So I have realized that I've come to a place in my own evolution as an author and as an individual, that I am putting people with mental and emotional health issues or problems or challenges, however we want to say that, into the position of being the protagonist, of being the person that the reader cares about.
00:43:39.19
CarylHallberg
and i'm
00:43:39.29
wednesdayleefriday
Well, that's really powerful because its I think that far too often when we see depictions of neurodivergent people, they are written by neurotypical people based on things that they've read or maybe ah a person that they know.
00:43:53.30
CarylHallberg
Yeah.
00:43:55.83
wednesdayleefriday
And as such, they are wildly inaccurate and often insulting. um People misuse terms a lot, things like sociopath, psychopath, you know terms like it that get thrown around and they're not
00:44:06.33
CarylHallberg
yeah
00:44:09.85
wednesdayleefriday
they're not used properly. ah Don't even get me started on like dissociative identity disorder and the ridiculous stories that have come out of that. Well, you're, you're a little older, so you probably remember Sybil ah about as well as I do, you know, the novel and then the the Sally Field, you know, the TV movie.
00:44:23.13
CarylHallberg
Oh yeah. know Yeah.
00:44:28.25
CarylHallberg
Yeah.
00:44:28.44
wednesdayleefriday
And I as a kid, I was just entranced by that story. And and I,
00:44:32.77
CarylHallberg
I think we all were. We all thought it was possible.
00:44:36.06
wednesdayleefriday
Yeah, well, I kind of low-key wondered why it hadn't happened to me because my...
00:44:40.35
CarylHallberg
and Me too.
00:44:43.10
wednesdayleefriday
Like, well, wait a minute, I've been through it. Why? Where are my protective identities? I didn't even have an imaginary friend. I'm like, come on, this is bullshit. These people are way less messed up than me and they're their mental health issues are fascinating.
00:44:52.79
CarylHallberg
but
00:44:56.19
CarylHallberg
Right. Right. And so there is.
00:44:57.33
wednesdayleefriday
Nobody's writing a book about my crazy ass. um yeah
00:45:01.75
CarylHallberg
So there is that. and And you asked earlier about, you know, standing up for for voices that are not heard as much or are able to speak for themselves.
00:45:10.76
wednesdayleefriday
Mmhmm.
00:45:13.77
CarylHallberg
So I'm 73 years old. I'm straight. I'm pretty, I'm not vanilla by any stretch of the imagination, but I kind of am. So I'm like a fancy vanilla. um But I'm an old straight white woman. And I think that that accidental thing, I have, you know, ah says I was born and I grew old enough to be an old woman. So that's no accomplishment there, right? It's just who an accident nature and, but it gives me great power because I can say literally anything.
00:45:45.14
wednesdayleefriday
Oh, I don't know.
00:45:56.61
CarylHallberg
I can stand up for anyone. ike And no one, what are they going to say to an old white woman?
00:46:04.57
wednesdayleefriday
Yep.
00:46:05.33
CarylHallberg
I mean, seriously, really, right?
00:46:07.54
wednesdayleefriday
yeah
00:46:07.70
CarylHallberg
So I i see it, and I'm a little bit of a do-gooder. I worked in nonprofit and stuff all my life. And so I have that aspect of my personality. I've been standing up for people for a long time. But now I feel like I can really just, yeah, don't screw around with somebody in front of me. Don't be a hateful individual. Don't think you know stuff when you don't.
00:46:37.76
wednesdayleefriday
Yeah, you know, when ah when I was younger, I think I kind of fell for that, like, you have to be nice if you want to change anyone's mind.
00:46:37.94
CarylHallberg
and
00:46:41.98
CarylHallberg
And...
00:46:47.15
CarylHallberg
Yeah, no.
00:46:47.36
wednesdayleefriday
And it occurred to me right around like my mid 30s that, well, wait a minute, if asking nicely for people to treat you right worked, everybody would have their rights and everybody would be treated well. Obviously, there are plenty of people who don't respond well to, hey, can you please stop being such a dick to this particular demographic? you know and And once you realize that you got to get loud.
00:47:09.45
CarylHallberg
Right. Right. Well, and that in the and the given. Yeah, the the given demographic, a lot of times cannot necessarily speak up in a given situation without taking great risk.
00:47:22.38
wednesdayleefriday
Well, yeah, exactly. It's not even so much that people can't speak up for themselves. It's that they can't do it safely.
00:47:28.31
CarylHallberg
Right.
00:47:28.40
wednesdayleefriday
They can't do it and keep their jobs or be safe in their homes.
00:47:28.87
CarylHallberg
And so
00:47:31.52
wednesdayleefriday
or you know So it it does become incumbent on people who are listened to to step up and and say the things that need saying. So it's really awesome that that you do that.
00:47:42.05
CarylHallberg
that
00:47:44.64
CarylHallberg
That's it's absolutely right. And I want to address another thing because ah one of my goals is also to be a really good ally. um So there are several multiple LGBTQ characters in my in my current novel, A Brush with Mortality.
00:47:52.04
wednesdayleefriday
Mm-hmm.
00:48:02.07
CarylHallberg
I am straight.
00:48:02.24
wednesdayleefriday
Yay!
00:48:04.48
CarylHallberg
There is a very huge section of the book that is discussing the art of spanking. as a sexual practice, um because the character Drucker learns that he has HIV, gears a long time ago, right?
00:48:25.21
wednesdayleefriday
Mm hmm.
00:48:25.68
CarylHallberg
And wants to be safe, but wants to still have fun, let's say.
00:48:29.13
wednesdayleefriday
OK.
00:48:32.06
CarylHallberg
So he develops, he he discovers that he's he has a thing about spanking, and that he's very good as the spanker.
00:48:36.41
wednesdayleefriday
Oh,
00:48:39.57
CarylHallberg
He develops it into an art form.
00:48:39.93
wednesdayleefriday
nice.
00:48:42.94
CarylHallberg
and um And so there's a lot of a lot of talk about that. Well, what do I know about a gay man spanking another gay man? i know
00:48:58.43
wednesdayleefriday
Well, you know, there's lots of movies online that you can check.
00:49:01.42
CarylHallberg
i know but i yeah And the movies are movies. They're not what really goes on inside the person, right?
00:49:06.03
wednesdayleefriday
Right. Yep, yep.
00:49:08.07
CarylHallberg
So what I did when I was writing this book,
00:49:12.85
CarylHallberg
There's this Italian restaurant, which I'm not going to name, but it's on 24th Street in San Francisco. And I, at their request, or at my request, they gave me a table in the back of the restaurant in the afternoon between lunch and dinner.
00:49:19.85
wednesdayleefriday
and Okay.
00:49:29.90
CarylHallberg
And not unlike a mafioso boss, I would sit at the table, looking at the front door, through the dark, you know, it was a dark Italian bar or restaurant thing. And um this is before the internet as we know it, but there was internet. I am recruited, I advertised for and got a number of people to come and who practiced the act of spanking as a sexual practice.
00:49:55.89
wednesdayleefriday
Um hmm.
00:49:59.30
CarylHallberg
And they came one at a time. into that Italian restaurant where there was no one else, right, except me and the waiter, the staff was told to stay away from the table. And we would have a conversation and they would tell me their entire history and they would tell me how they felt about things and they allowed me to record their sessions. And I did that with a pretty significant number of of men of different ages and backgrounds and built
00:50:31.38
CarylHallberg
that part of this novel from all of those conversations.
00:50:36.46
wednesdayleefriday
Awesome.
00:50:36.48
CarylHallberg
So i I did my very best to kind of try and make sure I got it right. And I do that kind of due diligence with all of my characters because I write some pretty bizarre old characters and I want to get them right. And I want to get them to be human. So even if they're weird over here from a literary standpoint, I want them to be human as characters and relatable. And I want if they're representing some demographic of people, I want to make sure I've got it right. So i I went to a lot of trouble with that.
00:51:12.50
CarylHallberg
And I do that with with everything that I write. My current work in progress is going back to fantasy. And it's probably going to be a series. And it's actually a fictionalized rendition of um a someone I know. it's there They gave me all their journals.
00:51:36.44
wednesdayleefriday
Oh wow.
00:51:37.43
CarylHallberg
And they talked to me at great length. and and and And we were going to, I was going to help ghost drives or co-write their life story. And I went to them and I said, this is not going to work as a memoir. It's just, it's cool, but it's not cool enough. You're not different enough. But I think I could make it into a great fiction series. And so she gave me permission to do that. And what she is, is she is currently alive still. She's third generation Sicilian witch in Massachusetts.
00:52:11.09
wednesdayleefriday
Oh my goodness.
00:52:12.97
CarylHallberg
So I've started with her birth. This is the first book in the series. She's just a baby in this book. And it's her sister or her mom and her aunt and her grandmother and her great aunt. And so the other generation before her of women, Sicilian women who happened to be witches. But um I've got all, um everything's coming out of her journals. And then I'm adding all the fantasy part in, right?
00:52:42.44
wednesdayleefriday
I see.
00:52:43.83
CarylHallberg
And she, you know, future books in this series will have her living in the woods of Vermont and and then settling into a beautiful Victorian house in Massachusetts with a very wonderful gentleman. So there's a lot there. I can write books for decades, probably using her story.
00:53:05.63
wednesdayleefriday
Sounds like my goodness. Um,
00:53:07.81
CarylHallberg
But I'm going to a lot of trouble to make sure I get the witchiness of it right. So my house right now, I live in an 800 year old stone house in Portugal that was originally a stable until 1996 where they made it into a house. um It's set up as a Sicilian witch's house.
00:53:32.31
wednesdayleefriday
Okay.
00:53:33.28
CarylHallberg
I have the have the correct herbs and things hanging in the correct places. I have the correct images. I have a little pantry of witchy stuff that I need so I can refer to it when I'm writing. Yeah, I've gone to a lot of trouble.
00:53:48.12
wednesdayleefriday
so So let me ask now, is that, do do you have any supernatural beliefs or is this strictly for the writing?
00:53:54.43
CarylHallberg
I think it's strictly for the writing. However, I don't have any disbelief.
00:54:04.62
wednesdayleefriday
Mm-hmm Yeah, I'm kind of in the same boat like I I don't just accept darn it I I don't just accept supernatural things for the saying But I'm also like first of all, it's it's just fascinating how humanity got there
00:54:06.39
CarylHallberg
I'm open.
00:54:22.05
CarylHallberg
Right.
00:54:22.18
wednesdayleefriday
you know like those traditions how they've continued because obviously so many religious things began as where does the sun go at night what makes the rain come and you know now that we know all those kinds of things the fact that that those types of witchcraft and and rituals and you know nature magic and all that is uh it's fascinating that it remains i think that some of us just really want to feel like
00:54:32.86
CarylHallberg
Right.
00:54:49.58
wednesdayleefriday
We have more control over our environment, but also so much of, of ritual witchcraft is especially the, some of the more modern stuff has basics in, in psychology, you know, like a spell where you would write down all the things that are bothering you and then burn it or tear it up or throw it in the river.
00:54:52.77
CarylHallberg
Mm.
00:55:09.13
wednesdayleefriday
Like that sort of thing that I think it endures because maybe it just makes people feel better.
00:55:17.69
CarylHallberg
Well, you're right. And that's very insightful of you, Wednesday, because you're there's a lot of things that are used in psychology that can easily be traced back to um the traditional wise woman or witch, right, from different cultures, guided meditation.
00:55:32.88
wednesdayleefriday
Mm hmm. Yep.
00:55:38.69
CarylHallberg
There you go.
00:55:38.82
wednesdayleefriday
Yep, yep.
00:55:39.50
CarylHallberg
I mean, there's just so many things. And and a lot of the spells, if you wo will, that use herbs and things, those herbs actually do have the medicinal properties that are going to help someone feel better or feel worse or whatever, right?
00:55:50.99
wednesdayleefriday
Mm hmm.
00:55:58.02
CarylHallberg
and And there's lots of science that backs up that if you believe something enough, you can make it happen. Not not the not the positive thinking thing, but just it moves you in the direction of getting what you want, right?
00:56:12.62
wednesdayleefriday
Yeah, that it's interesting because i always I've actually written about this and in one of my ah collections, it's in the intro, but the the idea of the the difference between wishing and and wanting.
00:56:13.03
CarylHallberg
and
00:56:16.53
CarylHallberg
Mm-hmm.
00:56:25.92
wednesdayleefriday
And you know wishing is just sort of this passive, like, oh, wouldn't it be neat if you know I had a million dollars or whatever, whereas wanting something implies an an intent and that you're gonna make some effort to to get that thing.
00:56:37.81
CarylHallberg
Mmhmm.
00:56:42.41
wednesdayleefriday
And I think um it's it it it also that presents itself in the different types of magic because some types of magic are just you beseeching the gods for something as opposed to, you know, give me the strength to do these things I need to do.
00:56:54.66
CarylHallberg
Right.
00:56:59.99
wednesdayleefriday
I mean, it's it's a subtle thing. And obviously that sort of thing is going to be different for everybody. But I think that the connection between, like,
00:57:05.53
CarylHallberg
Right.
00:57:08.75
wednesdayleefriday
mythology and i don't have you ever read um The Goddesses and Every Woman by Jane Shinoda Bolan?
00:57:17.18
CarylHallberg
I don't think so, no.
00:57:18.72
wednesdayleefriday
It's a mythology book that she actually wrote for her doctoral thesis.
00:57:22.78
CarylHallberg
Right.
00:57:22.92
wednesdayleefriday
And what it does is it breaks down different types of ah people, you know mostly girls. It's it's ah mostly about ah you know AFAB cis girls and how they're raised and how your personality can be impacted, like if you're an Athena type, but your parents want you to be a Heratype and just grow up and get married, like how that might affect you. and it goes through all the different archetypes and combinations of archetypes.
00:57:46.46
CarylHallberg
right
00:57:50.37
wednesdayleefriday
It's really fascinating.
00:57:50.89
CarylHallberg
Yeah.
00:57:51.13
wednesdayleefriday
I should actually send you the link after the the interview because I think you would dig it.
00:57:53.57
CarylHallberg
Yeah, you i would appreciate it. Thank you. You know, there's a there's a really old joke that I think kind of sums up what you were saying. and And you probably know it about the guy and there's a big flood like Hurricane Katrina or something flood. And the guy is in his house and the police come by and they say, Come on, everybody has to evacuate. and He goes, No, no, no, God will save me. Have you heard that joke?
00:58:21.14
wednesdayleefriday
I have, I have. And then, uh, you know, somebody, he ends up on the roof and there's a car.
00:58:22.41
CarylHallberg
Yeah. And so, you know, so the flood.
00:58:26.51
wednesdayleefriday
Yeah.
00:58:27.07
CarylHallberg
Yeah.
00:58:27.87
wednesdayleefriday
There's like a boat comes by and he says, no, no, God will save me.
00:58:28.13
CarylHallberg
and Right, right. The waters rise up and hit somebody comes by and says, Jump in the boat, come with us. No, no, no, God will save us. And the waters rise and he's up on the roof now.
00:58:38.66
wednesdayleefriday
Yep.
00:58:38.65
CarylHallberg
and And somebody comes by and again and says, come with us. And he goes, no, no, God will save us. And then a helicopter comes by and and he and they say, here, gra jump in the seat, we'll haul you up. And he goes, no, no, God will save us. And then he drowns and he goes to heaven and he says, God, why didn't you save me? God says, I sent you three boats and a helicopter. What do you want from me? right You have to take action. You can't just want something. You have to take the steps. and And so if there is magic, it's in it's in setting yourself into a position to be able to see the opportunities that are there and take advantage of them.
00:59:17.67
wednesdayleefriday
Yep. Yep. Well stated.
00:59:21.15
CarylHallberg
So yeah, i then that joke always makes me laugh when I hear people say, oh, I'll just but just send out the thoughts into the universe and I'll win the lottery. And I go, no, you gotta buy a lottery ticket.
00:59:33.30
wednesdayleefriday
Well, you know, here in the States, people have been wishing thoughts and prayers every time there's a mass shooting and ah they have not curtailed.
00:59:39.07
CarylHallberg
Oh, God, don't even.
00:59:41.26
wednesdayleefriday
I mean, we're we're still having them.
00:59:42.28
CarylHallberg
Yeah.
00:59:42.82
wednesdayleefriday
The thoughts and prayers have been ineffective to date. So there's that.
00:59:45.97
CarylHallberg
yeah
00:59:48.37
wednesdayleefriday
We're actually um nearing the end of our time. um I do like to ask, some of our guests actually have questions for me. So if you have any questions for me, you should ask them now.
00:59:59.93
CarylHallberg
Well, I appreciate that opportunity. I don't at this moment, though, I would like the link to that the book that you just mentioned, I would appreciate that.
01:00:07.82
wednesdayleefriday
Oh, I definitely will. I'm not very interesting. So, you know, I can understand not having a question.
01:00:11.61
CarylHallberg
ah I'm sure that's not true.
01:00:14.38
wednesdayleefriday
ah
01:00:14.79
CarylHallberg
I'm 100% sure that's not true.
01:00:17.17
wednesdayleefriday
Well, the good news is at the end of every interview, we do a Mad Lib. Are you fans of, are you a fan of Mad Libs at all?
01:00:25.09
CarylHallberg
I don't think I played Mad Lib since my son was in high school. and That was a long time ago.
01:00:31.47
wednesdayleefriday
Yeah, I mean, ah we we played them in school, and oh, please, and, ah you know, I actually am known for having these at my at my parties when I have you have, ah you know, gatherings of friends to come by just for conversation and weed smoking and such.
01:00:33.01
CarylHallberg
But I'm willing to give it a shot.
01:00:46.69
wednesdayleefriday
um But yeah, we had Mad Libs at our wedding. we That's how known for them we are.
01:00:52.21
CarylHallberg
Oh, that would be hysterical at a wedding.
01:00:53.42
wednesdayleefriday
Because it's such a... Oh, yeah. And and it's just it's such a fun... yeah I mean, you don't have to be especially smart to play it. It's fun to play with with really smart wordy people. But the thing is, anybody can play it. You know, people bring their kids to the kids, you know, they think it's so funny to have like a dirty word. Oh, no, the noun is poop. ah So... I don't know if if Mad Libs is actually cool with me doing this on my show, but I'm sure they'll tell me if they're not. So let's get started with some nouns.
01:01:25.96
wednesdayleefriday
I need one, two, three, four, five singular nouns.
01:01:36.57
CarylHallberg
Okay, let's see if we can we can stick with some of the things we've talked about so pizza
01:01:46.05
wednesdayleefriday
Okay.
01:01:47.79
CarylHallberg
Dog.
01:01:51.09
wednesdayleefriday
Mm hmm.
01:01:54.24
CarylHallberg
Hemisphere.
01:01:58.27
CarylHallberg
That's three, right?
01:01:59.76
wednesdayleefriday
ah Two more.
01:02:01.23
CarylHallberg
Yeah, yeah, yeah. um Book. There you go. And, oh, because you said it's psychopath.
01:02:16.22
wednesdayleefriday
Alright, I also need some plural nouns. Looks like one, two, three plural nouns.
01:02:25.61
CarylHallberg
Three plural nouns. Trees.
01:02:32.05
CarylHallberg
I'm trying to be as random as I can possibly be.
01:02:35.14
wednesdayleefriday
You know, a lot of people just look around the room and start yelling stuff out, so that's an acceptable way.
01:02:38.02
CarylHallberg
Yeah, yeah. Let's see. Trees. Bananas. That kind of goes with trees, though. And buses.
01:02:53.83
wednesdayleefriday
Okay, so one of these is person in room female and traditionally that is always the guest and It looks like they need another person in room later. So that will be me just cuz that's tradition um So I need an adjective Actually, it looks like I need four adjectives Mm-hmm
01:03:07.93
CarylHallberg
Okay.
01:03:16.41
CarylHallberg
Four adjectives. Oh, God.
01:03:20.13
CarylHallberg
See, now you do this with writers all the time. And I bet some writers just rattle stuff off.
01:03:23.32
wednesdayleefriday
if
01:03:26.46
wednesdayleefriday
Uh, no, actually, usually it's a lot of long pauses that I have to take out in post.
01:03:30.08
CarylHallberg
Oh, good.
01:03:32.54
wednesdayleefriday
Because, you know, writers, well, that's just it.
01:03:32.80
CarylHallberg
Wait, what's the right word? um
01:03:36.00
wednesdayleefriday
Because if you're not a word person, you have no issues with just looking around the room and yelling stuff out, but writers want to choose good words and that takes longer.
01:03:42.04
CarylHallberg
Yeah, no, no, it has to be the right word. It has to be the okay. So, uh, correct. I think that's an adjective. Yeah.
01:03:50.23
wednesdayleefriday
Yep.
01:03:51.02
CarylHallberg
Um, Oh God, you're going to run out of time. Um, you, you give me one Wednesday.
01:04:02.15
wednesdayleefriday
Nope.
01:04:04.94
wednesdayleefriday
Oh, um well, you know what? When I'm stuck for an adjective, I always use a color. So I'm going to say chartreuse.
01:04:10.40
CarylHallberg
Ooh, I love chartreuse. Okay.
01:04:12.19
wednesdayleefriday
Right.
01:04:13.58
CarylHallberg
Yeah.
01:04:15.03
wednesdayleefriday
And so, yeah, I need two more adjectives.
01:04:15.32
CarylHallberg
um Okay, so dim, D-I-M.
01:04:21.70
wednesdayleefriday
OK.
01:04:22.79
CarylHallberg
And stinky.
01:04:27.71
wednesdayleefriday
Wait, was that stinky or sticky?
01:04:29.30
CarylHallberg
Stinky, as in smells bad.
01:04:31.10
wednesdayleefriday
OK. Okay. All right.
01:04:33.02
CarylHallberg
Stinky chartreuse.
01:04:33.26
wednesdayleefriday
I need a, I need a number and a part of the body plural.
01:04:36.98
CarylHallberg
12.
01:04:44.13
CarylHallberg
So something that we have more than one of on our body.
01:04:47.63
wednesdayleefriday
Well, I mean, it can be, uh, not necessarily.
01:04:51.64
CarylHallberg
Well, it's use noses.
01:04:52.65
wednesdayleefriday
I mean, it could be like noses.
01:04:57.06
CarylHallberg
So we'll use noses.
01:04:57.42
wednesdayleefriday
Okay. All right. And then I need part of the body singular.
01:05:04.70
CarylHallberg
Butt cheek. That's one butt cheek, not two.
01:05:11.58
wednesdayleefriday
All right, yes, just the one. All right, that's what we need. So here we go. This is TV guidance pick of the week.
01:05:16.83
CarylHallberg
Okay.
01:05:20.74
wednesdayleefriday
ah So Thursday at 8pm, my adventures as a foreign pizza. This is an exciting and correct made for TV movie that takes place during the time of World War 12. We give it a rating of three trees. Friday, 7.30. Happy bananas! When an old high school dog welcomes him with open noses and throws him a chartreuse party, this puts Carol, his former hemisphere friend, into a bad state of butt cheek. Saturday, 10 p.m. Where have all the buses gone? In this dim thriller by the stinky director
01:06:00.76
wednesdayleefriday
Wednesday is about a Manhattan book searching for a missing person in a small psychopath. Here, Reverend.
01:06:12.89
CarylHallberg
That's hysterical.
01:06:14.28
wednesdayleefriday
Right? Right?
01:06:15.49
CarylHallberg
Yes.
01:06:16.08
wednesdayleefriday
So thank you so much for being here.
01:06:17.48
CarylHallberg
You know what you could, instead of Mad Libs, you could just call it AI writing.
01:06:24.08
wednesdayleefriday
Well, no AI writing would have to actually take jobs away from people who would normally do Mad Libs.
01:06:29.33
CarylHallberg
Oh, there you go.
01:06:30.25
wednesdayleefriday
yeah
01:06:33.33
wednesdayleefriday
So if ah if people want to find your book, where do they find it?
01:06:37.46
CarylHallberg
Well, it's for sale ah on Amazon, of course, and booksellers online everywhere, some bookstores, but not broadly distributed. You can also visit my website, which is my name, Carol Hallberg.com. And you can buy it directly from the website. And there's also a whole bunch of links to all the places that it's, or to many of the places that you can buy it.
01:06:59.75
wednesdayleefriday
Great. We'll have links in the description, too, if anybody wants it. um thanks Thanks for being here. we were i mean this This was just a lovely talk. I'm so glad that that we were able to schedule this, because I know it's it's tricky with the the time difference and all.
01:07:16.40
CarylHallberg
Yes.
01:07:16.54
wednesdayleefriday
So thank you so much. um And for everybody else, we will see you next week. um We are sponsored by sometimes hilarious horror. and we can be found on Ko-fi. So check us out, give us money, because this isn't cheap. Alright everybody, see you next week.
01:07:37.79
CarylHallberg
Thank you so much Wednesday.
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