Tag: friendship

40: This Is How We Do It

Posted on by Elise

I did it! I made it to 40! I feel so feted. As many of you probably know, I love a good theme party. In Austin I used to host a Weenie Roast (get your mind out of the gutter, we just grilled hot dogs and sausages), and in DC my most memorable Christmas party was “Deck the Balls,” a pot luck in which everyone had to bring ball-shaped foods. For my milestone birthday I thought, we have to do a costume party, because I believe every party should be a costume party, but how about one that’s reminiscent of the glory days …. the first formative parties of my youth — MIDDLE SCHOOL MIXERS.

Admiring the backpack on Lindsey.

This past weekend, to mark the 4-0, two dozen friends flew in from seven different cities to join my LA homies for totally rad bash, HU40: The Sixth Grade Mixer. (That is, my sixth grade year, so 1994-1995). The period-specific details that friends worked into their costumes absolutely bowled me over: Puka shell bracelets, yin yang chokers, backwards hats, beanies, leather backpack purses, bucket hats, brown lipstick, heavy eyeliner, scrunchies, Doc Martens, a “They Might Be Giants” t-shirt, a Nirvana t-shirt, a Rage Against the Machine t-shirt, a DARE hat, a sunflower dress, the list goes on. I wore a cropped argyle sweater vest with a plaid skirt, knee high socks and Mary Janes, but the real piece de resistance was the wide headband that I used to make that hair bump in the front.

We. Had. So. Much. Fun.

The DJ played all the hits. Wilson Phillips. UB40’s Red Red Wine. A lot of Ace of Base. Rump Shaker. And then my unstoppable, ridiculously talented friend and work spouse for life, Matt Thompson, worked it out with the DJ to break out a serenade-turned-group-sing of “Hold My Hand,” by Hootie and the Blowfish. Yes, yes, it happened. He put his whole heart into it.

Hold. My. Hand.

How long it had been since all of us have been together, and then to be able to sing together, too? It felt like a dream. Then, just as the party was wrapping up, the lights went out in the bar and on the entire block of Abbott Kinney (Venice’s storied and most famous street). Partygoers paid their final tabs by handwriting credit card numbers on Sharpie-drawn forms. What luck though, that the lights went out just as the party was ending instead of the other way around.

Later in the weekend the out of towners joined in for K-town KBBQ (divine), we did “squad fitness” with a hike in Brentwood followed by a trip to the Goop store (an unconventional stop on an LA tour). We have been eating and imbibing and catching up nonstop. No fights broke out, no one got injured, no one got stopped and questioned at the airport (which happened in Costa Rica after my 30th). A success all around.

I am full of gratitude and love and the deepest affection. My squad is the best squad. I’ve added a few photos from photographer Callie Biggerstaff but will update when more are edited and ready.

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My Homie David Greene, An Appreciation

Posted on by Elise

Today my friend David, who co-hosts the program Morning Edition and podcast Up First, announced he was leaving NPR after 16 years. I’m so excited he is joining the ranks of the revenue promiscuous, like me. And his news gives me a reason to give him a much-deserved shout out not just for being a tremendous, curious and thoughtful journalist who I learn from constantly, but a most loyal friend. David is the kind of friend I want to be to others.

But for David, I might have not wound up at NPR West from my posting abroad. As I said on Twitter, he’s a co-conspirator and cheerleader, encouraging me to push for a West coast post, when it was extremely rare for an NPR international correspondent to return to the states and wind up anywhere besides the DC headquarters. David made the NPR West office, and life in Venice, sound so idyllic and collegial. And he was right.

The man doesn’t sleep. He works from midnight until 8am and due to a bicoastal marriage and a relentless wanderlust, he travels every week. But he always makes time for his friends, consistently taking charge on planning drinking get togethers and having people over (his wife Rose is a well-known restaurateur so they know how to host) and just checking in and being supportive, always.

David hooked me up with Howard, his literary agent and now mine, he muled my favorite eye makeup remover pads all the way to Seoul in the first months of my posting there, and he is always available to lend an ear despite a schedule that is more crammed with activities than there are hours in a day.

So cheers to you, David! America will miss waking up to your voice every morning. But for your sake, I’m so happy you’ll finally be able to sleep in.

Interchangeable Asian Party

Posted on by Elise

For the past six or seven years, our colleagues have regularly confused me and fellow female Asian-American NPR reporter Ailsa for one another.

elise/ailsa. for whatever reason the difference is very tricky for many of our colleagues. Oh and the great sage/our pal Kumari is the best part of this photo, obvi.

We would receive the other’s emails and compliments for the other’s stories. I would come into work and people would ask me where my little dog was (Ailsa’s). She got a lot of congrats on my Seoul posting a few years ago. These nagging microaggressions happened so often that in 2013, Matty made a desk sign for me that featured side-by-side photos of me and Ailsa so that people could have a handy visual reminder of who’s who. (You don’t have to point out we don’t really look alike, we are aware.)

Now, I’m one foot out the door at NPR and Ailsa has moved here to LA to start hosting All Things Considered from the best coast. You could say we are … interchanging. So we hosted a little “revolving Asians” party to welcome her, do another bday gorgefest for me and most importantly, to poke fun of our long running plight and the friendship we forged as a result.

I love LA because it takes all comers, people are always here for random reasons and it’s full of friends from so many walks of life. To illustrate, here are people who made it out for boozeday Tuesday, an incomplete list:

— The regular drinking buddies
— My college dorm mate
— The dad I take turns doing carpool with
— My across the street neighbor
— A Defense Department friend who lived in Seoul the same time as us
— A pair of reporters I hired in 2011; one who had just landed from DC
— People who CAME ALL THE WAY FROM PASADENA to VENICE, so they may have started driving last week
— Mari, my Japanese interpreter in Tokyo who is also a working actress now doing a bunch of pilot season auditions in LA
— A civil libertarian I met a party & shared an Uber with two weeks ago
— Husband, armed with cake
— A guy named Bob who I met at a 7 year old’s pool party last summer and confessed he had a big crush on Ailsa Chang. Somehow I remembered this and made sure to track him down to invite him out. This delighted him and and Ailsa both, but especially him.

Welcome, Ailsa! It’s an honor just to be Asian, but also not bad accidentally receiving all the love that’s meant for you. 😉

Very low light on the patio but the point is our friends became friends and that brings me great joy

We’re Lifelong Friends

Posted on by Elise

The trolley! At WQED. (Credit: David Pinkerton)

I grew up with Mister Rogers and PBS in general. PBS played an outsized role in my childhood because my mother didn’t speak English with me at home, so a lot of my early understanding of the world came from what I saw on Sesame Street and Mister Rogers Neighborhood. When I was in elementary school, our family went to Pittsburgh and got a tour of the studio where they make the show. We got to see the puppets from the land of make believe and I was star struck. I think Mr. Rogers was my first celebrity crush, and always in my heart. When he died in the early aughts, I grieved. And since then, I have kept a book of his quotes and wisdom with me wherever I live, so other people can read him when they come over.

Last week while guest hosting It’s Been a Minute, I spoke with Carvell Wallace, the host of Finding Fred, a podcast that deep dives into Mister Rogers’ life and lessons and legacy.

Our conversation brought me to tears. This is the part of the transcript that hit me hard, though, it’s best heard rather than read. The Mr. Rogers conversation is in the middle of the show — it follows the “three words” A segment.

WALLACE: So he was really swimming upstream in almost every sense. And I think people – because we have unhealed children that live in us that we’re not seeing and that are not loved, I think we’re still looking for a child’s solution to being an adult. So perhaps what he might tell us is that – and he said this – this is something that he said in the last thing he ever did in television, which was a PSA after 9/11:

ROGERS (archived recording): I’m just so proud of all of you who have grown up with us. And I know how tough it is some days to look with hope and confidence on the months and years ahead.

WALLACE: And he talked about two very important concepts. One is the idea that – it’s a Jewish concept – tikkun olam, which means to be repairers of the world.

ROGERS (archived): I’m so grateful to you for helping the children in your life to know that you’ll do everything you can to keep them safe and to help them express their feelings in ways that will bring healing in many different neighborhoods.

WALLACE: And the second concept that he talked about is that he spoke to adults. And he said, I’m so proud of you and who you’ve become.

ROGERS: It’s such a good feeling to know that we’re lifelong friends.

WALLACE: And so even there, he’s saying to people, you are free from the burden to have to prove yourself. And so with that out of the way, perhaps you can focus on repairing the world.

GAAAHHH it hit me so hard in the feels when we played the tape of Mr. Rogers in the interview, and then again when I listened to the mixed version for edit/review, I started bawling all over again.