Let me first just preface this entry by saying, very few podcasts enter my inner circle of favorite podcasts. I’m a lover not a junkie. LOL! I subscribe to some podcasts that I rarely listen to but I’m a faithful listener to my favorites. And I’m never out here looking for my next fave because I feel lucky enough just listening to the few that I do love.

I found The Fckry through Conan O’Brien’s podcast because I was bored, prolly couldn’t find a new episode on one of my faves and saw that Leslie Jones was a guest on one of the “Conan Needs a friend” episodes.

I love Leslie Jones with a love that has grown over time. Her energy reminds me so much of my dear friend Khalilah who passed in 2018 and I really feel like I’ve been needing that energy in my life right now for many reasons. And of course, I love to laugh so I tend to have a special place in my heart for comedian podcasters. But I mean hardcore stand up comics, preferably seasoned, because…I’m…seasoned. I could write a whole separate entry about how much I love, respect and am inspired by truly funny women.

*note to self write a whole separate entry about how much I love, respect and am inspired by truly funny women*

Anyway, Leslie was funny asf on Conan’s podcast and it was there I learned about her own podcast, The Fckry with Lenny Marcus, and I flipped out. How did I not know this! I immediately found it, subscribed and was busting a gut in minutes. But I’ve also, deeply enjoyed learning more about Leslie, how she got her start, all the things she went through as a broke struggling comedian and much more. She’s the type of person who gives it to you raw and real in a way I have really come to crave and trust. She’s not for everybody and I’m very familiar with that. I didn’t think she was for me either the first time I saw her on the SNL Weekly Update News sketch along with millions of other Americans. But I’ve come to realize that Leslie is at her best when she’s working in a stand up format or in a context where she can truly be herself in collaboration with others who are not afraid of her strength. And I’m familiar with that too. SNL was not it. The Fckry is it.

I didn’t know anything about Lenny Marcus before listening to her podcast but I know that Leslie would never create something this intimate with someone she didn’t trust. And it’s clear to me from listening to the few episodes I’ve greedily binged so far that their relationship as comedians is rooted in the love of building each other up by challenging and sharpening one another constantly. If we’re only looking at things from the outside, which, lets face it, most of us do, it would seem to be an unlikely pairing. But in the realm of comedy, which ranges broadly in it’s collection of uniquely talented, dark, freakish, outcasts, black sheep, oddballs, junkies, loners, creeps and outsiders, the connection between comics is often singular, complex and varied but rarely superficial.

I also introduced my husband to The Fckry last week and this morning as we sat in the car waiting for my commuter bus he told me he loves it! I can’t describe how huge that is for me. We do listen to several of the same podcasts together on our morning commute but I wasn’t absolutely certain he would like this one. I just had to tell him about it because I love it so much. So it makes me happy that we can listen to this together as well.

YAY!

I was in Sephora today, (which used to be my happy place pre-Covid) and ran into the woman who works in perfumes. When I used to go in there with my dear friend and work colleague who will code name Regine, we made really good friends with this lady. Regine is very bubbly and out going and has made friends with people in every store we would frequent during lunch pre-Covid. So I was back there in the scents section spritzing some happy on when she walked up. We chatted for a bit the way we normally do when I see her. She asked about Regine. I told her. I asked her how she was doing and she was like “You know, hanging in there…”

Do you know how may times we’ve concluded conversations this way? And I mean hey, I get it. I’ve been “hanging in there” for longer than I care to say. But today, after I left Sephora excited with a fistful of perfume samples she was nice enough to present to me, I wondered to myself. is everyone just hanging in there right now? And I mean on multiple levels. Emotionally, mentally, physically…

Are we all just walking around the land mines of our unsustainable issues and challenges? My husband, a public school teacher recently told me that his lower back has been hurting for weeks and the only thing he takes to treat is muscle relaxers which made me concerned. No one has cured anything in ages! We’re just walking around treating shit and holding ourselves together with prayers and gauze.

And I mean, I’m no exception. I’ve been walking around (sometimes limping around) with a torn meniscus in my right knee for several years now and nothing but KT tape to help support it. I suffered a random bout of frozen shoulder in my left shoulder during the pandemic shut down and even after months of PT I’m still not able to fully lift my arm up above my head. I need to reschedule a dental cleaning and get a crown for a root canal I had months ago but don’t seem to be in any hurry to get that going. I could go on.

But I won’t.

I’m just too worn out by other more immediate seeming shit. Although what could be more immediate than your body screaming:

BITCH TAKE CARE OF ME BEFRE IT’S TOO LATE!!!!!

…well, clearly we’ve found reasons to neglect ourselves for some time.

Where does it end?