Hey, it's Chloe Salmon from The Moth. As a story director, I talk to a lot of people who say they want to tell a story but don't know where to start. A tip I give them, get specific. What's a moment that meant something to you? Your first home run, that road trip with your dad, the time you bombed at the talent show. Start there, then build on that foundation. You can find tips to help you identify those moments along with prompts to inspire them in The Moth's new guided journal, My Life in Stories. Whether you want to find your own story, reflect on your life, or even give it as a gift, you can order your copy at themoth.org forward slash my life in stories. That's themoth.org forward slash my life in stories. Welcome to The Moth, I'm Emily Couch. Meow. Meow. Meow. And those absolutely adorable sounds you're hearing right now are from my cat, Potato. Say hi, Potato. Meow. As you might be able to guess, I am a cat person. I was born into a family of four cats and two human parents. I'll let you guess who was more important. I had no choice but to be a cat person, but that said, I have just continued to fall more and more in love with these fluffy little weirdos throughout my life. But even if you're not as enthusiastic about cats as I am, you have to admit they're interesting creatures. I mean, there's a reason cat videos dominate the internet. So to celebrate both cats and cat people, we've got two stories all about cats. I know Potato is excited. Pry. Or maybe she's just hungry. Meow. Meow. First up is David Rodriguez, who told this at a Berkeley story slam where the theme was love hurts. Here's David, live at The Moth. Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! For a man, a miscarriage is a particular kind of pain. And if anyone is thinking like, for a man, really, well, that's kind of the point, because even as I'm going through one of the most painful experiences of my life, I'm very aware that my wife is going through more pain. Physical pain, the same loss that I'm feeling, and also just society and gender things. I don't really understand, but I know how real they are. And the ticking clock, it doesn't help. They call it a geriatric pregnancy either. I don't know, the medical field needs like a marketing person or something. And she didn't want to talk about it. And you know, that might serve a lot of men very well, but I'm a Berkeley beta male. Like, I talk about it. That's how I go. This isn't Iowa where she grew up. And she's a stoic person. She just conquers life, and she didn't want to talk about it. So I couldn't talk about it, because I didn't want her to see me cry or anything like that. And then you go into this like post-miscarriage purgatory period where you can't plan anything. You don't know what's going to happen. You don't know if it's forever, what it means, and the doctor kind of doesn't give you good information. It's all mystery. It's like no science. It's all painful. And you know, we just kind of went back to our life and kind of pretended that being able to drink champagne again was this awesome thing when it really wasn't. And one day I was laying in bed, and I was thinking about my childhood, and I said to her, I'd really like to get a fish tank. And she turned to me and said, that is a terrible idea. You're not going to clean it. You don't know anything about fish. And she got up and she stormed off and slammed the bathroom door behind her. And you're probably making the connection that there was a larger thing going on here. But at the time, I was just pissed off that she didn't like my awesome fish tank idea, and I didn't put it together. And then she came back and she looked at me and she said, I want a cat. And we had had that conversation before, and it was, I'm allergic to cats. Like there's nothing to talk about. Like this is one argument I should win. And she said, are you really allergic to cats? Is that the truth? I was like, I think it is. Yeah. And I just couldn't say no. But I had a plan. Okay, we'll go to Cat Town. I'll play along. She'll see me have this terrible allergic reaction. She'll know that we can't do this. And then maybe we'll have that other conversation we're not having, and maybe I'll get a fish tank. Instead, we left Cat Town with two cats. And at Cat Town, they kind of counsel you like you're a criminal. They're like, are you ready for this? These are feral cats that we recondition and they're not going to love you. And are you ready to not be loved? And I saw she was not hearing any of this. She's like, those are those people they don't love. They're going to love us. But when we brought them home, one of them kind of was comfortable. The other one hid. And it's just like you would just hear a hiss as you were walking around the house. You didn't know where it was coming from. And my wife, Ruth, she just took it on. I would come home and there'd be piles of boxes of toys and cat trees. And I'd be like, we already have a cat tree. She's like, we have one. But mostly I would come home and I would go into the bedroom, not even realizing she came home from work, didn't come say hi to me. And she would be half under the bed because that's where Hemlock hid. And she would spend hours inch by inch building trust with this animal until one night Hemlock jumped into the bed and snuggled with her. And she put her forehead against hers. And I've never heard her do a voice before. It was very jarring. She went, hey, baby, hey, baby. And then we fell asleep. And I woke up to Hemlock ripping my feet to shreds. And this every day, every night, no sleep. And when you're half awake, it is actually terrifying. But I couldn't bring myself to say, let's not have Hemlock sleep in the bedroom because of this larger thing we weren't talking about. And I guess that's chivalry, I guess. I don't know, letting Hemlock shred my feet. And then one day at work, I was in a meeting with my manager and he had actually had a baby recently. And he had actually named her, but we were going to name our child. He didn't know that. And he was distracted the whole time because she was doing adorable things. And after the meeting, I went to my bedroom and I just sobbed uncontrollably and was confronting that I don't know if I was ever really honest myself about how badly I wanted this. And I laid in bed and I just sobbed deeper and harder and louder than I ever had. And Hemlock jumped on the bed. I hid my feet out of instinct. And he laid on my chest and just started rubbing his face against mine. And so now I was crying tears of joy and sadness at the same time and petting Hemlock and then also reaching my phone for one hand to take a video because I know the rules. And I wanted to show the people at Cat Town that they were wrong about us. Because they would send us like these shaming pictures of Hemlock in the laps of the volunteers. We'd be like, oh, it worked for us. I recently read some research that, you know, my allergy, it just went away. I don't know how she does it. She's right about everything. She wins every argument. She still thinks I was lying. And I was like questioning, like how did she win that argument? And like, what did I ever have an allergy? Like, who won the election? Like, what is truth? Like, you know, like, what's going on? So I don't know how she did it, but she wins everything. That's, the wife is always right. That's the lesson. Get two cats. And I read this research that people that grow up with animals are less likely to have allergies. And that made me so happy because when our son is born in a couple months, he's going to be a cat person. Thank you. That was David Rodriguez. David lives in Oakland, California, where he is the education director for St. Vincent's Day Home, the nation's oldest nonprofit childcare center. His husband, Taru, and father, too, in order of appearance, felines Hemlock and Bergamot, and humans Gilbert and Harron. David told us that he still dislikes cats in general, but he does like their cats. And he's still mystified why his cat allergy mysteriously disappeared. If you'd like to see some photos of those cats, we'll have them on our website at themoth.org slash extras. They're really cute. I named my cat Potato because like an actual potato, she is round, typically sedentary, and therefore perfect for me. I enjoy knitting, reading, and being in a reclining position. I am an indoor person. When I moved to an apartment with a balcony, however, I was excited to offer Potato a semi-enclosed outdoor space. She was initially nervous, but quickly became obsessed with being outside. As soon as she heard the knob turn, she'd shoot like a rocket out the door, immediately flopping down and rolling around in the dirt. As any cat owner knows what the cat wants, the cat gets. To make sure she was safe, I'd supervise her, so that meant that I, too, had to be outside all the time. I mean, I did not fully anticipate the level of commitment this cat would have to the outdoors. I'd sit with her in 90-degree heat, dripping sweat, or bundled in sweatshirts in November, sometimes for hours on end. And I started loving it. Sure, it takes a little more effort than a lazy day on the couch, but it's so worth it. Making her happy makes me happy. And I also started to fully appreciate the joys of basking in the sun, being surrounded by greenery and feeling the breeze. So now Potato and I lay around together, both inside and outside. To see a photo of Potato enjoying the sunshine, you can visit our Instagram or Facebook, and I'm not the only one who loves cats here at the Moth, so we'll have even more cat pics from everyone here. Up next, another cat story from another very reluctant cat dad. Back in a moment. Are your ad campaigns lighting up the dashboard? But not the pipeline. That's bull spend. And marketers are calling it out in... Dashboard Confessions. My boss asked for results, so we opened my dashboard for the only positive-sounding metric I had. Impressions. Cut the bull spend. See revenue, not just reach. LinkedIn delivers the highest return on ad spend of major ad networks. Advertise on LinkedIn. Spend 200 pounds on your first campaign and get a 200-pound credit. Go to LinkedIn.com. Terms and conditions apply. Welcome back. Our next story is from Gianmarco Sarezi, who told us in a New York story slam where the theme was outnumbered. Here's Gianmarco live at the Moth. Here. Hello. Thank you very much. So the way I tell this story really depends on one quick thing. Could I get a round of applause if you're more of a cat person? Okay. All right. Could I get a round of applause if you're more of a dog person? If you're more of a bird person, sorry. No vote tonight. But great. So, I feel kind of safe to say, I hate cats. I hate them. It's not their fault. It's not their fault, per se. It's just that my first memory, and I've done a lot of therapy, but my first memory in this world is when I was three years old and my mom and I were moving into her new boyfriend's house and he had a cat named Smokey. I went to Pet Smokey and asked cats are apt to do when you show affection. Smokey scratched my face. Eyes, nose, mouth, there's blood. It was so bad. So that's a backstory. My first memory in this world is my soon to be stepfather's cat, Wounding Me, which obviously carried a lot of metaphorical weight as well. And I thought that my girlfriend knew this. I thought we were on the same page about this, that I wasn't really into having cats, until one day we were coming home from our weekly pay what you can yoga class, or as I call it, our weekly free yoga class. And we're walking home to my apartment and we turn a corner when there was a man there, crumpled gray suit, holding a cardboard box, and in the cardboard box were five kittens. And entirely unprompted, he launches into a monologue basically, he says that he's a funeral director and he was leaving a service that morning. He heard some meows by the steps, saw the box, no note or anything, and he thought they were adorable, but his wife was very allergic so he simply could not keep them. And I could see where this was going. So I said to my girlfriend, let's go. We need to go home, I have a business meeting. And she said, you know, can I pet them? And I said, okay, fine. So she starts petting them, then she starts holding them, then she starts naming them, and I'm like, all right, we gotta go. So we turn to leave and that's when this guy says to no one in particular, though very clearly to us. Well, if no one adopts them by the end of the day, I'm going to have to drown them in my pool. You know, because those are your only two options in that situation. And without saying a word, my girlfriend turns, grabs the box and just gallops off into the sunset, not even in the right direction, just like a mother lioness with her cubs. And when I found her somewhere in the heights, she swore to me that she would have them in a shelter by the end of the week. Long story short, I'm living in a litter box on the upper west side. And I want you to know that I tried. I tried really because I love this woman. I love the impulse that she had to take these. I think it's the same impulse that made her like me because in many ways I think maybe one of the reasons I don't like cats is maybe I'm a cat in the sense that I am also an asshole. But I was doing okay because there was this one cat that I really liked that she had named Baby, which again, a lot of metaphorical weight with these cats. And the reason that she named Baby Baby was because he or she, I didn't check, but Baby was the runt of the litter, which meant that Baby didn't really move very much. And I find out that's the one state that I can enjoy a cat in is when they're borderline comatose. And I used to put, I loved Baby. I would lie down, I'd put Baby on my stomach, I would just pet Baby for hours and it was just like, I really enjoyed Baby. But of course Baby, as babies do, grew older and started moving and running around. And one day I went to pick up Baby and Baby scratched me right on my face, eyes, nose, mouth, there's blood. And so I said to my girlfriend, I said, look, Baby, I love you, but it is either me or those five cats. And I really miss her. And sometimes I miss those goddamn cats. Thank you guys. That was Gianmarco Sarezi. Gianmarco is a standup comedian and host of the Downside podcast. His comedy special, Thief of Joy, is now available on YouTube. Funnily enough, this story slam was the reason he pivoted to standup comedy full time. We asked him about his feelings towards our feline friends these days, and he told us that he's still terrified of cats, although he did recently headline a furry convention and is considering a cat for Sona for the next one he does. Please do it, Gianmarco, and send us photos. That brings us to the end of our episode. To all of the cat people out there, I hope you feel seen. And to all of the holdouts, I hope you now realize what you've been missing. Thanks so much for joining us, and big thanks to my co-host, Potato. From all of us here at The Moth, we hope you and your cats have a story worthy week. Emily Couch is a producer on The Moth's artistic team. She loves to work behind the scenes to spread the beauty of true personal stories to listeners around the world. Emily's co-host, Potato, is a cat. This episode of The Moth podcast was produced by Sarah Austin-Genez, Sarah Jane Johnson, and me, Mark Solinger. The rest of The Moth's leadership team includes Gina Duncan, Christina Norman, Marina Cluchay, Jennifer Hickson, Jordan Cardinale, Caledonia Cairns, Kate Tellers, Suzanne Rust, and Patricia Orenia. The Moth podcast is presented by Odyssey. Special thanks to their executive producer, Leah Reese-Dennis. Our Moth stories are true, as remembered by their storytellers. For more about our podcast, information on pitching your own story, and everything else, go to our website, TheMoth.org.
