204: I Wish I Had Been Nicer to You Before You Died

Andrea Askowitz  0:00  
Music. I'm Andrea askowitz 

Allison Langer  0:05  
and I'm Allison Langer, and this is writing class radio, where you'll hear true personal stories and learn how to write your own stories. Together, we produce this podcast, which is equal parts heart and art. By heart we mean the truth in a story. And by art, we mean the craft of writing no matter what's going on in our lives, writing class is where we tell the truth. It's where we work out our shit.

There's no place in the world like writing class, and we want to bring you in

Andrea Askowitz  0:38  
today on our show, we bring you a story by one of our favorite students, Danielle Huggins, I play favorites. Is that bad? We have a lot of favorites, but yeah, we do have a lot of favorites, and this is one of them. Yeah, Danielle has been taking classes with writing class radio for three and a half years. She is our karaoke champion. We do karaoke at our in person retreats. And that Danielle Huggins, she brings it.

Allison Langer  1:09  
Oh, my God. I, as you said that I pictured the mustache, oh

Andrea Askowitz  1:13  
yeah, yeah, and then for all of us to wear, yeah, that was Yeah. I love it. Love it.

Allison Langer  1:21  
I feel like I know Danielle so well, like she's been in my life first ever. You know? I just

Andrea Askowitz  1:27  
love that. Danielle. Oh, and here's what's cool. This is her fourth time on the podcast, which I think might be a record. She's also very well published in other places. And we'll talk about that at the very end, and we'll put all the links in our show notes to all of her episodes. In this episode, we're going to talk about using the letter form, which is called the epistolary Larry. I love that word. I don't know why it tastes Larry. Specifically, we're talking about not telegraphing without leaving out the reader. Wait What? What is telegraphing? When you're writing a story in the form of a letter, you're writing to someone who knows what you're talking about, because they know you really well. So you can't write things for the reader. But on the other hand, you can't just write directly to that person that you're writing to while leaving out the reader. And our narrator, Danielle Huggins, did that really well. I didn't even know that was telegraphing. That's interesting, you know, like, like, when you were like, hey, reader, listen to this. Yeah, you know, it's like you're stepping out of your form. So this narrator does not do that. Yeah? I'm very proud of her for

Allison Langer  2:44  
that. When you say reader, though you're saying listener, because reader really was, she was writing this letter to her sister, so she would be the reader,

Speaker 1  2:53  
but it's an essay, so we're talking, yeah, talking about the listener, because it's a podcast, or the reader, if it were published, okay, yeah, so not the recipient of the letter, because the recipient, yes, this is not confusing, not at all. People will understand

Allison Langer  3:08  
when we when Danielle reads her story,

Andrea Askowitz  3:10  
yeah, and Danielle is here in the virtual studio. We're recording for the podcast as usual, and we're also doing this new thing. This is our second attempt at recording live to YouTube. Yeah, Danielle will be back live after the

Allison Langer  3:28  
break. We're back. I'm Allison Langer, and this is writing class radio. Up next is Danielle Huggins reading her story called a letter to my sister. I'm sorry you

Danielle Huggins  3:43  
dear Michaela, I can't believe it's already been five years since you died. You would be 45 I'm writing to tell you I'm sorry. I'm sorry I rarely picked up the phone when you called and that I responded to your text with Kurt replies when Daniela texted me Happy Mother's Day. Two weeks before you died, I said, I'm sorry, your mom is so messed up. Two days before you died, I painted sets for the Moana show with another mom for Kate's sixth grade play. I got a text from you when I didn't reply. You sent another I'm sorry. I wrote back in all caps, I'm working my painting partner had a heroin addicted brother in law. So we vented as we brushed swirls of ocean. I called you manipulative and high school dropout. I said you never had a real job. Had two kids by two different dads and didn't even have custody of your girls. I'm sorry I said those things. We talked about how addiction is a disease, one that is nearly impossible to kick. Google says the heroin relapse rate is 85% I understand this, but it is still infuriating. Part of my irritation was mom, the number of times you stole from her made me crazy money her wedding. Wearing the 18 karat gold necklace great grandmother's engraved silver and diamond watch her car. You caused so much worry when you went radio silent and we didn't know if you were dead or alive, mom's insistence on paying for you to have a phone and a plan when you kept losing them drove me batshit, but she always wanted a way to get a hold of you. Now that Kate is 17, I realize I would keep her on my phone plan forever if I had to. When your daughters were both born addicted to methadone, I was heartbroken. I worried about their neonatal abstinence syndrome. I don't know if you were even aware that in the NICU a nurse gave Grace a morphine dose and a little dropper. When I tried to feed her, she wouldn't eat because it made her tiny body so tired. Back when you were like 12 and you started drinking and smoking weed, I never thought you would graduate to shooting up heroin. You told me it started with oxycontin pills you and your friend took from her mother, he said, once you got on the opiate train, there was no getting off, and the last stop was heroin. I'm so sorry you couldn't see your daughters. I know how much you wanted to be in daniela's life. I'm so sorry I sided with Daniella father at the time. I thought his reasons for keeping you away were understandable. Near the end, when she was 15 and you had been clean through methadone, I didn't agree with him anymore. I thought you had done enough to warrant more than just a relationship over FaceTime, it was so big of you to let grace be adopted. I'm sorry that once she was her adopted, parents didn't think it was good for you to see her, either I see your girls every time I visit Pennsylvania. Daniela is 21 and has your thick, dark hair. She is in college for musical therapy and is part of a traveling music troupe. Grace is 11 and has your blue eyes. She's incredibly smart. You would be delighted. They are a walking younger version of you, and I always have to hold back tears. I'm sorry the last time I saw you was just another stop on my drive home. It's only because mom was with me that I saw you at all. When I would leave New Jersey for Pennsylvania, she would say, are you gonna see your sister? I would roll my eyes during that very last visit. You didn't ask for money, cigarettes or a ride anywhere. You were so sweet with Kate, who was 12, talking to her about school, her art and speed skating. I was embarrassed by the quantity of food you ordered at brunch, and I'm sorry I kept track, but you ate two eggs over easy, bacon and sausage, hash browns, toast as well as a stack of pancakes. When you grabbed handfuls of sugar packets from various empty tables and stuff them in your pockets, I wanted to crawl under our table and disappear. I should have been more understanding, because you were clearly hungry when we got back to your building and you pointed to your little tabby cat in the window and said, That's Sadie cat. Do you want to meet her? I'm sorry I declined, as always, I just wanted to get on the road. If I could go back, I would have met Sadie senior apartment and congratulated you. I was proud. You had been in one place so long, you were clean and kicking ass. If not you know, you'd have been evicted. After five years, I realized I was embarrassed. You weren't normal. I wanted a sister with a regular job, custody of her kids and the ability to function like everyone else. I wanted a friend, a confidant, someone with shared history only sisters could have. Only you know the feeling of being comfy, cozy in the back seat of Graham's Christ le Baron driving with her and mom for annual trip to Florida. The 22 hours never bothered me, because you were there and we were surrounded by blankets, pillows, pillows, toys and games. You were the only person who ever played travel Connect Four or travel battleship with me. When I hear songs from a Charlie Brown Christmas, especially Linus and Lucy, I think of you. I remember waking up every Christmas morning, bolting down the stairs and staring not just at the presents, but at the whole scene. I thought the glow from the white lights made the whole room magical. Tree stockings, nativity set, you were the only person I could laugh with about that nativity set so old. There were only two wise men and that sheep with the missing leg. I love that. Mom Let us open our stockings before she was up. We could count on candy cane pens and pencils and these candies and scratch and sniff Christmas stickers. I think my favorite year was when Santa stuffed Nerf guns in our stockings, and we spent the hours before we could open our presents running around the house like army men. I miss us taking turns scratching each other's back while. Watching TV, or laying on the couch with our heads at opposite ends so we could scratch each other's legs at the same time. I do the same thing with Kate. Now that you are gone, I am the last one to know about baby language. I buy try by TV, chibi. Ibit To Bucha, even though I'm allergic. I have Sadie cat now. I have salmon flavored temptation treats and my bedside table. So every night she comes up to get her fixed, sometimes her huge eyes will transfix at an area just above my head. Is that you? I hope so. I also hope taking care of her in some way makes up for my mistakes. Does it a little? I miss you. Michaela, I love you. I'm sorry.

Allison Langer  10:59  
Wow. Okay, so I saw this essay in a much earlier version, and then Andrea looked at it and asked for additions. I think I am in love with all the relationship stuff at the end. I get it. I understood why she was initially upset, why they had a severed relationship, like I got it all at the top, but then all that stuff that the narrator missed about her sister really hit me in this version. I really think that was just excellent, excellent addition. Great at

Andrea Askowitz  11:35  
it. We say this all the time on the podcast. I'm just going to say it again that the specificity of the details makes for the most trustworthy narrator. Right from the beginning, I noticed it when the narrator was like recounting everything her sister ate, and then I noticed it again when she was recounting all the things that she misses about the sister, the Linus and the Lucy, the comfy cozy, only two wise men and the sheep with the missing leg and the army men, because we have the narrator in the studio. The language. What did you say?

Danielle Huggins  12:16  
But baby sobo, I buy seven.

Allison Langer  12:21  
No, but what does it mean in

Danielle Huggins  12:23  
English? Well, okay, so let me, I'll say, I'll say writing class radio and up a baby top of baby. So I buy woman, say Bay, where I buy tea, Bin, clabas, Ray, Bay, TV, oboe with Abbas, gobo, wibbets, Eban, Abba lesbian, Gerber. So every syllable has a B in it, oh,

Andrea Askowitz  12:46  
you becomes you, boo. So what did you say in that sentence to her?

Danielle Huggins  12:52  
Oh, shoot, I am.

Andrea Askowitz  12:56  
I mean, if it's not, if it's not something that like isn't meaningful. No,

Danielle Huggins  13:00  
no, it's I think I said I tried. Think I said I tried teaching it, but, but no, or I tried teaching Kate, but she couldn't get it. Yeah, yeah,

Andrea Askowitz  13:12  
sweet. We said at the beginning that we were going to talk about how this narrator wrote to her sister in a way that she didn't talk to us, the reader or the listener. One of the places where I noticed it just now is she mentioned Kate Right at the beginning. She was working on Kate's sixth grade play, and she didn't say my daughter, because this the person she's writing to knows. And then Kate came up again not long later, and Kate is 17. Now we know, I mean, we had a sense of it, because why would this woman be working on someone's sixth grade play if it wasn't her daughter? But she didn't need to be specific about it, because we got it with context, and then we got it later, because Kate was mentioned a few more times.

Allison Langer  14:00  
It's hard. I think it's a great exercise to write a letter to somebody who's passed, or even just to somebody you love. You had us do that. I think in one of my very first classes with you Andrea, like, I remember write a letter, and I wrote a letter to Gerald. It was a long ass time ago. We were still at u m, like, in a classroom, I think, yeah,

Andrea Askowitz  14:22  
it's good. One of the other things that's really a good reason to write a letter is because you stay true to your own voice. And I noticed that too with Danielle Huggins. And there's two things I want to say about it. She said things like, made me crazy, drove me bat shit. I wanted a sister, I was embarrassed. You weren't normal. So that is totally how this narrator would speak. My tendency as an editor would be to edit that out, especially in today's like sort of sensitive culture, like we're sensitive to saying things like crazy. Z or normal. And I read recently in a really cool essay from the New York Magazine about how to write an essay, is that sometimes we have to be not afraid to offend. And I feel like this narrator, I hope no one's offended, because I felt like she was so true to herself, we get it. That's the way she would talk to her sister. She wasn't going to be politically correct talking to her sister. So she was like, You made me crazy, drove me bat shit. I wish you were normal. So there's a balance between being not offensive to your general reader and being true to your own voice. And I love the idea of of not being afraid to offend, because you value authenticity, especially because this wasn't in my mind at all offensive, but some people might be offended, and we tend to like over Edit.

Allison Langer  15:53  
Can we ask Danielle some questions? Okay, yeah, sure. Me. I just wanted to Yeah. I wanted to know why she wrote the letter, and how does it feel now?

Danielle Huggins  16:04  
So it came about because I was in a class with Andrea on Saturdays. It was called Final Draft, and part of the class was that we would all write to a prompt. We were given a short amount of time, and then we'd read it, and the prompt was write a letter to someone. So I wrote a letter to my sister, and my mom had told me, and my aunts had told me, you know, you might want to write a letter to her, because we had such a complicated relationship that grieving is different than had she been like normal. So I had all this animosity for her, but then I felt guilty about it. So anyway, I did the exercise. I wrote to my sister, and then as we were going through all of the students, my classmates, prompts, prompt responses. A lot of times it was difficult, like we would say, oh, you know, that person would know that already, and it kept coming up. And so when we got to mine, Andrea was like, actually, you really didn't break the rule. Like, maybe, maybe a couple times. I turned it into a full essay and brought it to the retreat because it had worked out. I had gotten good feedback from the group, and then I also did feel good writing it. It helped me. I felt better in my grief writing mode. Can

Allison Langer  17:29  
you just bring us, the reader, the listener, right now, into like, what? What is the process? Because I know it's been through a bunch of iterations. So like, how did it change? And how do you feel about the change in within the piece

Danielle Huggins  17:43  
it started, I don't know. Andrew, what do we get? Do you give us 10 minutes,

Andrea Askowitz  17:49  
maybe 12 Max, so you got to write fast. Yeah.

Danielle Huggins  17:53  
So we did it, and then I had it saved under Saturday final draft. So in that first draft, none of the parts about the memories and your shared experience were in that draft. No, it was just me being it was very, very angry. And I did say, you know, I'm sorry for being shitty, and I hope say me taking care of Sadie makes up for it. So then when the retreat was coming around, I went back and found it. I incorporated the feedback from the class. I sent it to Allison, and she was like, I'm getting the anger, but like, where's the sadness? What are some things maybe that you did that weren't so nice? We changed it for that. And then even at the retreat, or I'm sorry, I incorporated Allison's edits, and at the retreat, it had no memories. It didn't have anything about Florida, Christmas, anything like that. And when I read, I cried a lot, like it was really hard for me to get through the essay in Florida at the retreat, you know, my fellow editors were very honest with me, and they said you were sad, but we weren't like we weren't feeling it. We didn't feel it. Then Andrea saw it too. So I mean this thing, probably this is like a draft six, seven, something like that, between the prompts, response to those edits, first round of edits for the retreat, second for the retreat, and then maybe two through Andrea,

Andrea Askowitz  19:20  
do you feel like you worked through the anger and the sadness, through all those, you know, rewrites? I'm not saying that that it's gone for you, but, yeah,

Danielle Huggins  19:29  
I think it helped a great deal. I mean, I would recommend anyone do this if someone's passed. I mean, I was just watching, you know, you guys know I love the Real Housewives, and one of the house wives, her dad committed suicide, and she remembered the last time that she saw him, and she said she just wish she would have sat down and talked to him for taking the time for five minutes. And the amount of times I hear people who have lost people, and they think of that very. Very last time and how, and it's almost universal. I wish I would have given them one more hug. I wish I would have said I loved you. But you know, you know, you never know. So when you write things like this, you can get that off your chest, especially if you're someone like me who believes that my sister is still somewhere and she can hear me, it's helpful, but I think it would be helpful with someone who's alive that you're never going to read it to. I mean, even just yesterday and first draft, we were having a great discussion about just how valuable writing is in general, how we do work through our shit, through writing, whether it's a letter or an essay or a story or whatever this

Andrea Askowitz  20:40  
essay is about, working through the guilt, that's what I think it's about. And what I love so much about the end is that it's not resolved. The narrator, so Danielle, you're saying, even though I'm allergic, I have Sadie cat now. And then this really sweet thing about this is an interesting line that I want to mention because I heard it. I have salmon flavor temptation treats in my bedside table, so every night she comes up to get her fix.

Danielle Huggins  21:12  
That's good, yeah, it's like a little callback. Thank you.

Andrea Askowitz  21:15  
That's really good. But then I hope taking care of her in some way makes up for my mistakes. Does it like the narrator is still processing, working it out, hoping, sorry, guilty, like there's,

Allison Langer  21:30  
well, there's no resolution. Yeah, you can't resolve the person is passed. And so that's the beauty of this relationship and this letter, is that we have to just live with this shit that happened. Yeah, so it's so honest. I love it. Yeah, I want to say something to our listeners out there who are writers and who are trying to write journaling and the process Danielle went through are two different things. So yes, journaling is really important. That first class that she took where she wrote this thing, but yet the anger was still there, because she's just getting it out on the page, and that is still helpful. But what happens when you have to write a story is you have to do both sides of the story and more than just the surface of the story. So you have to really give details. And when you dig down, you realize, well, I did this shitty thing, or actually, she's got this other side to her too that I'm not looking at. So you're forced to look at all sides of your story to make it a full story. And that is the beauty of storytelling, and that is the beauty of how you heal in this process. And you almost can't get all the way to the healing part unless you do the work, whether it's writing or therapy. So those people who like, bust out a great first draft, like, really, they're doing their emotional selves a disservice. Well, I know you're trying to be funny, but some people, and it's true though you and I have talked about this, sometimes people bust out this insane first draft, but it's because they have been working through this shit for years in various forms, and they finally got it on the page in a way that makes sense. But

Andrea Askowitz  23:08  
most people don't do that. And to your point. I love your point. I love it. It's like, I don't know, whenever I'm, like, sitting down again to, like, rewrite a story, I'm like, what a slog. No, it's gonna take me 20 drafts. No, like, I have to, like, have amnesia to get into a new story, because I know how hard it's gonna be to have to sort of forget it, but you're saying that the process of doing that is what makes the story great and what heals the self 100% that's so cool. And

Danielle Huggins  23:36  
also having editors is so invaluable, and I have the two best editors out there. So thank you guys so much. It would not be what it is without but

Allison Langer  23:48  
you know what I do, think also getting in a class and hearing other voices, because we can tell the writer 100 times like, No, I'm not. I'm not getting this, add more this, maybe take that out that doesn't belong in the story. But when you're in a class and you're hearing feedback from other people who don't know your story, new people, whatever it is, sometimes they say something in a way that hits you differently and makes you finally pay attention. Yeah,

Danielle Huggins  24:16  
and I mean, the class, I think what did we have? Andrea, nine people in the class, or something. We had nine at the retreat. Now, I don't know that there was much overlap, maybe with one person. So between all of that, like, that's almost 20 people that, you know, I got to get this in front of, which, yeah, that's awesome. I

Allison Langer  24:36  
mean, a little, you know, we're patting ourselves on the back, but writing class is like, not only for our students, it's for us. Like, Andrea has been like, I'm in a bad mood. I don't want to teach. I don't want to hate stories. Yeah, and now she's like, Oh, I miss it. I never loved writing class with you more. Yeah, it's addiction. It's addictive to get good feedback or to even get challenged. So. So I think it's, it's just a really healthy place, and we're really happy that you're in in the class with us, Danielle, you not only take advice, you give amazing advice, feedback, excellent

Danielle Huggins  25:10  
feedback. Or Thank you. Thank you.

Allison Langer  25:13  
All right. Thank you for listening, and thank you, Danielle Huggins, for sharing your story. Danielle Huggins is a writer from northern New Jersey, and her mom also writes with us, who's amazing. Danielle has been published in The Washington Post mother magazine. She's been on Huff Post too. No, no, oh, my god. Noah, Noah,

Andrea Askowitz  25:37  
yeah. Rejects us something fierce.

Allison Langer  25:39  
Sometimes it's just what they're looking for. It's just not hidden. Or maybe this story has been published before, so we can't take it personally. Yeah, she's also been published in go mag.com, Danielle is a frequent contributor to writing class radio, thank goodness. And she takes first and second draft final, draft memoir. Retreats like she is a lifer, and she's currently working on a memoir. She's on Tiktok under at bipolar Danielle, and lives with her husband, daughter, mother, a wire fox terrier and Sadie cat. Yeah, Sadie cat reminds me of, like, what was that? Friends? Episode city. Cat.

Danielle Huggins  26:26  
Oh, it was smelly cat, smelly cat, smelly cat. Can't

Allison Langer  26:31  
bring that up for me. If you loved this story and want more, Danielle, you can listen to episode 105. Teach us something we don't know. Episode 139 This is what mania looks like. And episode 152 how music inspires storytelling.

Andrea Askowitz  26:49  
Such great episodes, all of them, Oh, my God, excellent stories. And

Allison Langer  26:52  
all the links will be in the show notes, so you can get that wherever you get your podcasts. Writing class. Radio is hosted by me, Allison Langer and me Andrea askowitz. Audio production is by Matt Kendall, Evan serminsky and Aiden glassy at the sound off media company. Theme music is by Justina Chandler. And there's more writing class on our website, including stories we study, editing resources, video classes, writing retreats and our live online classes. If you want to write with us every week and hang out with Danielle, or if you're a business owner, community activist group that needs healing an entrepreneur, or you want to just help your team write better, check out all the classes we offer on our website, writing class radio, join the community that comes together for instruction and excuse to write and the support from other writers. Go check out our website, or you can just email us. Allison or Andrea at writing class radio.com a new episode will drop the first Wednesday of the month.

Andrea Askowitz  27:57  
There's no better way to understand ourselves and each other than by writing and sharing our stories. Everyone has a story. What's yours?

Tara Sands (Voiceover)  28:09  
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