In this episode, Hope talks about her strange relationship to her body, asexuality, being single, and her struggle with illness.

Content Warnings for mentioning war and homophobia.

This episode was originally recorded on August 1, 2023.

The next episode will be released October 11, 2023.

References:

"Be humble, for you are made of earth. Be noble, for you are made of stars." - possibly a Serbian Proverb, but origin is unknown

Brothers Karamazov, book by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Mysterium: cooperation board game found here https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/181304/mysterium

“Never tell a child: you have a soul. Teach him, you are a soul; you have a body." - Quote often misattributed to C.S. Lewis, but in fact said by George Macdonald to people he viewed as mourning too much at funerals. Found in The British Friend, Volume 1, a collection of monthly Quaker journals

"The Aunties" short story from Traveling Mercies, book by Anne Lamott

"The Time I have Alone," poem by Hope:

something sharp sits within me;

a longing without direction,

a dream I crafted without meaning to.

the love I picture is so beautiful:

perfect in its blur, a lovely and uncertain shape.

I believe in it whenever it seems

not wholly impossible

keep it small:

a hand that holds mine,

somewhere for my loyalty to land.

.

I know I'm not the only one

whose potential for romance is still a seed

It's not heartbreak, but

our hearts continue to ask without receiving

as we grow, we find we are not promised

a particular happiness just because

we can imagine so vividly its sweetness

.

I pick up the lonesomeness

and put it down again

there's still life to be lived (not said in the interview)

Definitions/Acronyms:

CRC: Christian Reformed Church, a Calvinist Christian community