Jason Wachtelhausen has lived one of the most unconventional lives of anyone I've interviewed. As I've been living in Mexico this year, I found myself thinking about his years in Guatemala and hearing this conversation a little differently. We talk heroin addiction, punk rock, butchery, religion, travel, and a life that refuses to fit into a box.

(This episode was originally released on 6/17/2025.)

Follow Jason on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/dogmuseum_

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Onefjef is produced, edited & hosted by Jef Taylor.

Well, hello my friends.

How are you doing?

I hope you're thriving.

Very exciting day today.

This is the first ever re-released episode of onefjef.

It's a big step for a podcast, a big moment when you finally have

enough episodes in the can to justify re-releasing any of them, number one.

Number two, when the host/editor/producer/promoter/et

cetera gets a little bit overwhelmed and tired of making these episodes

every single week and decides to do some re-released episodes.

That's also a big moment.

Not as big as the first, but you get it

And what a re-released episode we have.

I believe this is episode number three with Jason Wachtelhausen, who

I honestly barely knew at the time.

I think it was the first time we'd actually sat down and talked.

I talk about how we met in the podcast, so I won't go through that again.

But since I recorded this episode, me and Jason have become good friends.

We hung out quite a bit when I was in Columbus.

He even came to my going away party, like five months ago or whenever that was.

I actually saw him briefly when I was in Columbus a couple weeks ago.

So he's a great guy, and since this episode was recorded

and aired, Jason got married.

So congratulations to Jason and his wife.

Another thing that happened since this episode aired is that I got

a Patreon page for this podcast.

So patreon.com/onefjef.

Please sign up.

As little as five dollars a month, or twenty-five dollars a month,

or nine hundred and fifty dollars a month, whatever you choose.

Help support the podcast.

It's a one-man show here, and every little bit helps, to be honest.

Um, helps a lot.

And it makes me feel good as well.

So please go to patreon.com/onefjef and sign up, and thank you in advance.

And to all my continuing Patreon subscribers, thank you so much.

I love you very much, and I really appreciate your

continued support of onefjef.

And for everyone, Patreon subscribers and non-Patreon subscribers, I

hope you all really enjoy this, the first re-released episode of onefjef

This is the third episode of onefjef.

The number three is the first odd prime number.

Many cultures consider it a symbol of harmony and balance.

It also appears frequently in nature, such as in the structure of triangles.

About a month or two ago, I was hanging out at a local bar right

down the street from me here in Columbus, Ohio, called Dick's Den.

Dick's Den is this iconic little dive bar in Columbus that's known

for its live jazz and bluegrass.

It's got a really cozy wood-paneled interior and a great selection of drinks.

There's a neon sign in the window of Dick's Den that

says, "Why not?" I love that.

Today's guest is Jason Wachtelhausen.

I was standing out on the patio talking to a friend of mine when I

turned around and saw this guy dressed like a rock star smoking a cigarette.

So I said, "Where'd you come from?" And he's like, "From work, man.

I'm a butcher." And I was like, "Oh, my uncle was a butcher." So we got to

talking, and I quickly realized that I'd stumbled upon one of the more

interesting humans here in Columbus, Ohio.

Jason Wachtelhausen is a writer and artist based in Columbus, Ohio.

He's contributed to magazines like Wired and Ready Made.

He's a whole animal butcher, and he's also a musician.

I feel like I could do four or five podcasts with Jason, and

he'd still have more to tell.

But I'm grateful that he was willing to sit down and share some

of his story with me and with you.

Again, I hope that you enjoy listening to this as much as I've enjoyed making it.

Thank you for listening.

Thank you for being here.

Here's Jason.

How was that concert last night?

Was it good?

It was great.

Yeah?

It was, uh, yeah, it was definitely a good show.

Are they, like, old punk rockers?

They're up there with the very oldest.

Yeah.

They are, you know, s- icons, uh, you know, originators of the punk sound.

How old are they now?

Uh, older than me.

And I'm not young, so.

So, um, Jason, what, what's your last name?

I don't even know your last name.

My full name is Jason Norvain Wachtelhausen.

My father was from Germany.

Right.

And, um, my mom's from Jamaica.

Oh, interesting.

Mm-hmm.

My, my father grew up here, you know, since he was a baby in the United States,

uh, and, um, he loved Black culture.

Okay.

You know, he was very interested in it and impressed by it or something like that.

And, um, my mom was just, like, a Jamaican hippie chick, and So they

got together, and now everyone thinks I'm Dominican when they look at me

I didn't think you were Dominican.

I had no idea.

Well, in New York everyone does.

In New York for sure.

Yeah, I could see that.

Uh, so you were born in New York?

No, I was born in Philadelphia.

Brothers or sisters?

Yes.

I had five foster brothers and sisters.

Okay.

Wow.

And, uh, my brother, brother- Your real brother … and I. Yeah.

My father ended up in the, uh, Navy, and, uh, during Vietnam.

Okay.

A bunch of weird shit there I won't get into.

But, um, there was some bar that when they were in port or whatever you call it, and

my mom was like a bar chick around there, and played pool and- Okay … drank beers.

Right, right.

Cussed and stuff.

Right.

And, um, I remember when sh- her telling me the story, and she said, uh, "Jason,

you know, that first night when I met him, it was the most magical night of my life.

It was so wonderful, and then I felt like I wrecked everything 'cause I fucked him.

I knew I shouldn't- … have done that, a- uh, 'cause guys, you know,

they're never gonna come back." And then the next time he came back

around, he did come back, and, uh, they, they ended up being in love.

Right.

Right, right.

How long were they married?

Were they married forever?

Yes.

They, they're still married now?

Yeah, until my father died.

Oh, your father.

Okay.

They both wanted to have kids, and they tried for forever to have

children, and it just wasn't working.

Okay.

And, uh, went to doctors several times, and the doctors said, "You

know, you, uh, there's nothing wrong with you, well, with either of you."

Yeah.

"It's just, you know, not happening." Sure.

Whatever.

"So just keep trying." And, but eventually they, uh, took in some

foster kids and raised, were raising them as their children, and they

act- they wanted to adopt those kids.

But the father wouldn't allow them to be adopted, 'cause he didn't want

his kids being raised by a white guy.

Oh, interesting.

Yeah.

Different times.

Different times.

Yeah.

So then all of a sudden out of the blue, my mom gets pregnant with me, and,

uh, one year and six months to the day later, she gives birth to my brother.

This June 16th and December 16th.

Okay.

So with the five foster kids and the two of us- Mm-hmm … uh, it had been a really

long time since they'd been on a date.

One night Ray Charles was playing at this dinner theater.

Okay.

And they both loved Ray Charles.

Sure.

Who doesn't?

Right.

So they said, "Fuck it. We're gonna get a babysitter to watch the

kids, and we're gonna go." Mm-hmm.

It's this girl who's babysat at, sat us before.

Mm-hmm.

And, um, she, uh, she was incredibly mean.

And, um, as soon as they leave, she starts putting on makeup, and is like, "You kids

better be good. I'll be back in about five hours," or something like that.

Mm-hmm.

As she's walking out, her older brother They lived, uh, right in the house

next door Yeah, yeah, yeah … is, like, coming out and confronts her

about it, and she's adamant, and she leaves, and he, um, decides he's

gonna take over for her and stay.

Anyway, that night, uh, the twins were playing with matches, and they were

burning little pieces of paper, and they were hiding the paper inside this cracker

box that they'd eaten the whole thing of.

And, uh, we were pretty fucking poor at the time-

Right … so that was a big deal.

And, um, they hid all the evidence under my parents' bed,

and the box started to burn.

Right.

And anyway, the house caught on fire.

The fi- and the fire was, like, uh You know, like caught the next two row houses-

Jesus Christ … on fire as well, and it, it was, we lost everything, everything.

I, I remember this so clearly.

I re- like remember the dream I was having.

I was asleep on the couch downstairs right by the front door.

And this, sort of looked like an alien or something like that, but it

was a fireman, picked me up off the couch and took me outside, set me on

the sidewalk, and ran back inside.

And I was like, I don't know if you remember Time Bandits.

Yeah, yeah.

Okay, so that in the end of, the very end of the film when the

guy's kid's parents blow up and all the firetrucks are going by- Sure

it's just, it feels so much like exactly like how I felt.

I was in my footy pajamas and everything like that.

And, um, I had no idea what was going on.

And I saw, we had this white Toyota hatchback, and it like skidded

around the corner and like, you know, you could hear it and everything,

like a show on TV I felt like.

And it like screeched to a halt, and before it was even totally stopped,

my mom's door opened and she like jumped out of the car and boom,

just like straight landed on the concrete, completely passed out.

Jesus.

My dad jumped out of the car and ran straight towards the door,

and almost got like in a physical altercation with this fireman that was

there trying to get into the house.

Right.

And as that was going on, the dude, babysitter, came out of the

house and literally his sweater, his hair, stuff was smoking.

And he had my little brother- Jesus Christ … who was like, you

know, no years old at the time.

Right, right, right.

And, uh, I always think about if that girl had stayed.

Was this in Philly?

Yeah.

Wow.

So what'd your parents do?

Your dad was in the war.

Yeah.

He continued to work for the government- Okay … for the rest of his life.

All right.

And your mom?

She ran a daycare out of the house, um- Sounds like she loved kids … for

years … right, right, right.

She was amazing with kids.

Right.

Really amazing with kids.

Yeah, and she spanked one of them on the legs 'cause she pulled a knife on someone

on the school bus and- The kid did?

The kid did.

Right.

Yeah, and The kid called the cops Mm-hmm.

Can't do that.

And so my mom's not allowed, allowed around kids anymore, basically.

So do you guys get along?

You get along with your parents?

My dad was the best friend I ever had in my life.

No kidding.

Uh, I mean- Oh, I love that … ever.

Yeah, yeah.

Hands down.

Like, it was weird.

Like, my mom and my little brother are just exactly the same.

Like, the exact same type of people.

They're both, like, explosive tempers, and, like, full of love, and just fat.

And, like, wonder if a big- Fat

balloon can float you up.

Like, they're, they have a lot of weird- Fat … weird stuff.

Do you get along with them or not, not so much?

Oh, we get along famously.

I mean, like- Okay … we, I mean, it's that sort of,

like, opposites attract thing.

Right, right.

You know, I can totally understand, like, why my dad loved my mom, and why, I

understand why I love my brother so much.

I mean, he's like the total flip side- Uh-huh … of what I would be.

Where's your brother now?

Is he, or is he around here, or is he…?

He's in Vermont.

Vermont, all right.

Yeah.

All right.

When you were a kid, what'd you think you were gonna do when you got older?

Did you have any idea?

Go to MIT.

Oh, really?

Yeah.

Oh.

That was, that was, since I was a little kid, that was what I wanted to do.

To do what?

And do, did you have a goal after that?

Or was it just I wanna go to MIT?

Yeah, particle physics is what- No shit … I was really interested in.

Huh.

Like, the idea of CERN, like, that that was, like, actually gonna happen, and they

were deciding where it was gonna be built and everything like that, that was in,

like, '84- Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah

or something like that.

And, like, I was so, like, up to date on all- Oh, no shit … that news and stuff.

D- and then I, uh, went to Canada and went to school there.

Okay.

School in Canada was like something, like, in that summer, it's like at,

by the end of the summer you just couldn't wait for school to start again.

No shit.

It was so perfectly administered, and so many sensible decisions

that you don't see here.

Uh-huh.

It was amazing.

It was one of the best chapters of my entire life.

And, um, I moved back to United States, uh, ended up going to four

different high schools, um, dropped out when I was in 11th grade.

I've never been so hurt and dis…

Like, when I lived in Canada- Yeah … like everyone else in the

entire world until recently, I thought like, "Oh my God, I'm going back to

America, the coolest country in the world where everything's perfect."

"Imagine how good school is gonna be there." And it was the biggest letdown-

Right … I've ever experienced.

I, I wish that I would've stuck it out and knew obviously what I know now, that

you do that shit for the piece of paper.

Mm-hmm.

And, um, but learning, you know, and your own personal knowledge is something

you take on yourself as a pastime or whatever the hell you wanna call it.

And- Right, perspective's tricky, yeah.

So you drop out of high school, and then what do you, what do you end up doing?

What do you end up doing after you drop out?

Yeah.

Well, I was trying to figure that out.

I moved into, um- A Krishna temple in Berkeley No shit Yeah, for about

half a year or something like that All right And I've always been interested

in religion Okay And, um, uh, I, I'm not interested in following one.

I don't, I don't beli- I do believe in God.

I do not believe in the idea of religion Right.

Spirituality, not religion Sure.

Yeah, yeah.

And, um But I find that, uh, like television commercials, religion

is like something that just by studying it, it gives me a lot of

insight into human beings in general.

Right.

And so I've always been really interested in it for that reason.

And, uh, I went there, and the guy who ran the place was called Hari Bolas.

Awesome guy.

I told him that was, you know, I'm not, uh, planning on becoming a devotee of

this religion or anything like that, but I'd love to live here and I'll,

you know, take it seriously- Mm-hmm

and work with you guys and just see what you, you know-

Sure, sure, sure … whatever.

Yeah.

And, um, he was super open to it, and so it was a wonderful, uh, experience.

This is in the '90s, right?

Early '90s, mid-'90s?

This was in the early '90s.

Okay.

Yeah.

But I, I tell you, it was in California.

Sure.

And I was surprised to find that even within kind of like a religious context

or whatever, these people were still…

It was more important to them what other people thought of them than what they

were actually doing with their- And you think this is a California-specific thing?

Eh, I mean- I feel like that happens everywhere.

It happens everywhere, but man, I tell you, it's, I've experienced more of

it in California than anywhere else.

Interesting.

Yeah.

Interesting.

Did you become a follower, or did you just kind of like, uh, how did that-

You know, we'd wake up, um, sometime, I don't know, between like 3:30 and 5:00

in the morning and do a bathing ritual.

And people always tried to get there on time because the later you were,

the colder the water was for your-

5:00 AM bathing ritual.

And then- What's a bathing ritual?

Is it just you take a bath or…?

So I think, like a lot of religions, there's a lot of

ritualistic shit that happens here.

There's not much to it other than getting cleaned up.

But are you bathing yourself or other people are?

But if you're doing it with the intent of, you know, like whatever,

then it's- Like a mindful bathing.

Yes.

Okay.

That's a good way of putting it.

Fair, right?

Mon- mindful bathing, yeah.

But we would make prasadum, which was dinner.

Okay.

But again, there's like this whole- Got a fancy word for it, right … ritual.

Right.

But it's not just the word.

This, you know, basically this, you put your full intent into making it, uh,

whatever, as closely divine as possible.

And if you offer the food to a god, they'll eat it.

But because they're on a different plane, the food remains, but now it's blessed,

and it's become prasadum, not dinner.

Krishnas throughout the world aren't all what most people expect here, and

the ones in the West Coast, for the most part, aren't the same as what

you guys have experienced out here.

I mean, yeah, I mean, that's the thing with religion.

Every single, uh, even Christianity has got 18,000 different kinds,

and everybody's like, "My kind's the right kind, and your kind's the

dumb fucking kind, heathen." Right?

Um, so it's funny that that actually happens with the Krishnas as well,

although they're probably not calling each other heathens, right?

I don't know.

They're calling each other, whatever it is, it's just their word for heathen.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You know?

And so all the same.

Yeah.

I remember when I was in college, the, the Krishnas You can go get

the vegan, free vegan dinner.

Yeah.

That was the big thing, yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, we, we used to go and, uh, feed the bums in People's Park and before we ate.

Okay.

It was cool.

That's- And that's, that's, that's where I learned to love cooking too.

Oh, that's cool.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

So you leave the Krishna thing.

Um, any particular reason?

You just got tired of it?

Yeah, I mean, I was young.

I was 16, 17 at the time.

Right, right.

I was just itching to move on- Sure … to some place.

I get that.

And fuck, I don't know exactly where I went from there.

I went up to Sacramento for a while.

Oh, and then up to Santa Rosa- Okay … a city like Northern California.

Right, right, right.

And spent a lot of time drinking on a railroad track up there

with some- … wonderful people.

Like you were, where you run the rails or just drinking on the tracks?

Just drinking on the tracks.

On the tracks.

And the train comes, you get off the tracks, of course, then

you can- Yeah … get on it.

Why on the tracks?

Was that just a place people drank?

It's a classic place to drink.

All right.

I mean, uh- I've never drank on the railroad tracks.

I feel like I should try this.

Have you ever walked over to the tracks?

I've walked on the tracks.

I've just never drank on them.

No groups of people there drinking?

Uh, not that I've ever seen, no.

But, you know, maybe that's a different time.

Maybe.

Yeah.

Could be.

There's a lot of YouTube videos now of like people y- that you

can learn how to actually ride the rails and like s- like- Mm-hmm

sneak onto a train and ride all the way to- Yeah … yeah,

like, like a legit hobo.

I've done, I've done some hoboing- Oh, no shit … before.

Oh, we'll get to that.

Anyway, I eventually ended up back in Ohio.

I came back to Columbus.

Okay, but you had family here still?

Yes.

Okay.

My mom and my brother were still here.

Okay.

So you were in Ohio before?

After Toronto, we moved to Marion while we were having a house built

in the fancy new suburb of Gahanna.

We had one of like the first eight houses, so I lived in this like fully

developed devel- development- Right, right, right, right … with no

one else in it- Right, right, right

for a while.

And my mom was… Uh, she went crazy after my dad died.

Really?

I mean, they were really s- really in love.

Right, right.

And, um- What'd your dad die of?

Eh, mysterious circumstances What do you think?

I think I don't think about it that much All right, fair enough … that much.

Yeah.

But I, I will say this, I did, uh, have an offer from a married couple that

had put out this UFO magazine since, like, the '60s or something like that.

Okay.

And, uh, they said that they would pay for me to go and do some

research into how my dad died.

Oh, really?

So I'll tell you that.

They think that he might have been abducted by an alien.

I don't know.

That's awesome.

He's- Well, I mean, maybe he's in a better place … he gets some

weird shit … maybe he's up there.

Maybe he's flying around the- Yeah, who knows?

You know, who the fuck knows, man?

Yeah.

Your mom might find him yet.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Oh, I imagine they'll bump into each other again in some way.

Yeah, I think everybody does, right?

I, I don't know.

I hope not everybody.

Well, I mean, I think, yeah.

Anyway, so you're back in Ohio.

Uh, between going to New York every other, you know, month and, and

living in Columbus, and it being the '90s, and being in a band that played

at Stashes all the time- Oh, okay.

I didn't know.

How'd you get in the band?

I don't know.

I've been, I've basically been kind of a punk rocker my whole life and- Okay.

Yeah … anyway, between all that stuff, I became got on heroin.

Okay.

And, uh, I was a heroin addict for a few years.

How old were you when you got introduced to, to the heroin?

No, 19, 20 19 and 20?

No, yeah, no, okay, maybe 18, 19 Do you remember who introduced you to it, or?

Yeah, William Burroughs I mean, but so I had sought it out.

Right, right.

Nobody was like, "Hey, you gotta try it." Oh, so you were reading

Burroughs books and you're like, "I wanna try some of this shit"?

Yeah.

Dude, everyone I idolized was a fucking heroin addict.

Sure, sure.

It is.

That's how I got into weed.

But yeah, yeah.

Oof.

Um, yeah, I just didn't take the further step.

Yeah.

So you found somebody, you could just find somebody who would, was,

was- At that time, yeah … okay.

Yeah In that rock and roll scene in Columbus, Ohio, it was pretty easy.

And did you do it by yourself, or did you do it with- All the time.

I've, I've always- No, but the first time we're talking about, like the

first time you get it from somebody.

Do you remember, like- Yeah, the very f- okay, let's see, the

very first time I ever did it.

I think the very first time I did it, I was probably by myself, and then usually

after that I was with my girlfriend, who'd eventually become my first wife.

Okay.

So you get this heroin, it's what, black tar or was it like powder or-

So okay, that's what I was gonna say.

Yeah.

The first time I really remember coming alive from the experience and- Okay

… having that first like- And being like, "Oh, I see it" … "Man, I am gonna be

a heroin addict." Feeling was- Say it like, say it, okay … I was visiting

some friends, uh, in San Francisco, my ex-wife and I, and, um, they got this

black tar stuff and used an eyedropper method where you heat it up and put it in

a eyedropper and drop that in your nose.

Right And, uh, pretty fucking fun.

I mean, better than shooting it up, needles, like, yeah.

No.

Yeah.

Not, no, it's, it's not in terms of fun, but- Well, I mean, better

in, in my, in my mind, 'cause I'm terrified of needles, but yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I can understand that.

Right.

It's all, any way you're doing it, it's… Uh, you know what?

I've n- I have friends to this day who are people that every once in a while, three,

four times a year, they'll do heroin.

Sure.

They'll shoot up.

Most of them sniff it if they're gonna do it now.

But if you can be that kind of person, I highly recommend heroin.

Sure, sure.

If you can be that- It's super fun … if you can be that kind

of person is the thing, right?

But, uh, yeah.

Right And I've been, I, I've quit smoking ci- I've quit everything

in my life, including heroin- Sure.

Yeah … without ever going to any kind of program or anything like that.

Right, right, right.

I've quit everything, but heroin's the only one that ever, I'm still scared of.

That causes- A little bit

yeah, yeah, yeah.

And like, yeah.

Yeah.

Like, oh, I would still like love to fucking get high- Yeah … on heroin

again, and I, I would if I knew I could do it without any repercu- repercussions.

Sure, sure.

I don't feel that way about PCP.

Oh.

You know what I mean?

Like Well, there's another one we can dig into.

So what does that look like?

Like, is it you're good for a while, like you're using it and you're, you think

you're, you're kind of okay, and then you realize at a certain point it's using

you or something to this effect, right?

Yeah.

Whatever, you can slap whatever kind of cliche in there you want.

Right, right, right.

It's gonna be basically true.

Thanks for calling me out on that, yeah.

No, I mean- No, yeah, I, I- … but it's gonna be true.

I mean, they're all, that's really is, uh- That's all there is to it.

You know?

Right.

It's nothing… You know, eventually the lights all go out.

Eventually you take something from a friend that you know you shouldn't

have, and I've never, ever in my life been a thief on any level.

Sure.

And that's something that, uh, you know, I, I never outright stole somebody's

guitar and sold it or something like that.

Yeah.

But I certainly did things where I know I was taking advantage- Mm-hmm … that,

um, I'll never forgive myself for.

Just to get the drug.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

How often were you using when you were, like, in the throe?

How much, how much did you use?

Three times a day.

Huh.

How'd you get off the heroin?

You were on a couple years, you said?

Yeah.

So, uh, this one friend I- Was there, was there a moment

that… Yes, there was a moment.

Yeah, yeah.

Of course, there's always a moment, yeah.

There was… Well, things were getting bad generally.

Okay.

You know?

Uh, in a lot of ways, and I wasn't very fun, cool person anymore.

Sure.

Uh, just a lot of my friends were hurt and upset.

Eventually the drug ends up controlling you.

It's- Yeah.

Another cliche phrase But it's f- it's true.

Yeah.

That's what happens.

Right.

This guy, who was one of my best friends growing up, who went l-

his father went crazy and when we, we were young, and the same thing

happened to, to John, my friend.

Uh- What, what happened?

He, uh, went fucking crazy.

Went crazy, yeah.

I mean crazy like stopped using electricity, didn't believe in

money anymore and- Yeah … his landlord wasn't super cool with

either one of those things.

Well, the money one I think is probably the one that's the

difficult one for the landlord.

That's the one that got him- Landlord could do whatever,

but the landlord's gonna- Yeah.

Right.

He moved back in with his mom, started making his own chocolate bars.

Yeah.

Well, gotta have a hobby, right?

Yeah.

The last time I, uh, heard anything about him, his sister, who was never super

fond of me, gave me a call to let me know that he had stolen his mom's car in

Florida, and the last thing they heard was he was driving to New York to kill me.

Wow.

Yeah.

So this guy- Right … before he went crazy and wanted to kill

me, called my mom and my brother, who had relocated to Missouri.

'Cause he was, like, worried about you?

Yeah.

All right.

He was like, "Dude, he's fucked up.

It's like, I just-" 'Cause he wasn't on the drugs … "tell

him it's not him anymore." Right.

Right.

"And you gotta…" Which is ironic 'cause he l- ended up going crazy

himself and trying to kill you.

Yeah.

So, I mean- Life's a long road.

Yeah, but, uh- I mean … the moral of that one's obvious: do drugs.

Is that the moral?

Uh, let me think about that.

We'll leave that to the listeners to decide what the moral of that one is.

My mom and my brother- The brother … did exactly what

my mom and my brother would do.

They didn't say anything, and they drove from Missouri to my house 10 minutes

after they got off the phone with John.

'Cause they had no idea.

Nah.

Right.

They showed up, and my brother came in with a, like, blackjack or whatever,

ready to knock me out if he had to.

Geez.

They didn't know if I'd be crazed, like trying to bite him.

Right.

Right, right.

And I was like, "Yeah, you guys are right.

I, I gotta do it.

I, I gotta do it.

I probably would've done it myself if I had the cash.

I need about 200 bucks.

That'll get me enough heroin to, for, to get us to Missouri, and then I

won't have any when we get there."

Okay.

"So let's do it." So just left everything in the house.

My mom got me some heroin- Aw … and he said, "Good mom." Aw.

And- I'm a little, tearing up a little bit actually.

We drove out there, and I didn't sleep for like 11 days.

It was, it was- Bad.

Yeah … everything is- I've seen the movies.

Yeah, yeah.

Ugh.

But there's, there's really no explanation for it.

I mean, you cannot describe it to someone who hasn't gone through it.

It's, it's a weird kind of hell.

But on the 11th day, I was laying on the floor And I was reading this book.

It was like some old hard-boiled detective novel- Right, right … kind of novel.

And all of a sudden, I noticed the book was on my chest, and I was like,

"Oh my God, I just fell asleep."

And I looked at the clock, and I'd been asleep for like 45 minutes, and

I have never been so happy in my life.

I was like, "That meant, like, I'm beating it. This is, like, really

happening now." Right, like you're- Like, I'm not gonna feel like that forever.

You're actually, yeah, sleeping.

And I was really, like, overflowing with a kind of joy, and the phone

rang l- at that exact minute.

Uh-huh.

And I picked it up, and, uh, it was my friend Jasper.

And I was like, "Oh my God, Jasper, you're not gonna believe it.

I just fell asleep, man.

This is the greatest day of my life." And Jasper was like, "Uh, yeah, Mike

Dean killed Jay Hitt last night." And that was the guy I was- Right,

right … I was talking about earlier.

Yeah.

So you quit the heroin.

Good job.

You're in Missouri, um- Forever.

For how long were you in Missouri?

Oh, no.

I mean, I quit the heroin forever.

Forever.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I, like, and I literally at one point tried it again to make sure

I was, like, not addicted to it.

Wow, that's a ballsy move.

That really was- That's a ballsy move

the reason.

Yeah.

And I just sniffed it.

But, um, I, and I had a blast.

And I, uh, fucking the next day I didn't feel like any,

like, going back or whatever.

Sure.

But I knew if I did, it's, I was like that, that one time will be enough.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And that's it.

That's, uh, that's all I've done since.

Oh, oh, good for you.

Missouri did change my life.

It, not just getting off heroin, uh, but I got a job in a chicken factory.

Okay.

Okay.

And the first chicken factory I ever worked in was called Petit Jean.

Like a butcher kind of.

Yeah.

Like a, what do they call it?

Slaughterhouse.

It's, a- as, as an actual butcher now, I realize how far that is, but

yes, it deals with- Slaughterhouse

yeah- Right … slaughtering and breaking down meat, basically.

Right.

But, um- Yeah, I got a job, uh, at a chicken plant peeling tenders.

My thumbnails turned black and fell off.

Ugh.

And, uh, the work was fucking insane, and I felt like I deserved

it or something like that, kind of.

And, uh- How old are you?

Uh, 19, I think.

Right, right.

Okay.

And at some point there, I can't remember if it was before this or after that,

but s- at some point in California, I married my girlfriend, Laura.

Oh, all right.

So, and she was there.

You know, she had gotten off heroin too.

She came with you to get off the heroin with you.

Yeah.

Oh, okay.

That's an interesting part.

She did.

She was on, she go- she, did you get her on heroin?

It kind of just happened organically.

Okay.

Right.

I was, I was never like, "Hey, you wanna try some heroin?" I mean, you are married.

If you are married, you kinda gotta do this, you know?

I mean.

Yeah, I don't know.

We did, it, yeah.

Those couples where one does heroin.

She was, she was, she was just a heroin addict type of person regardless.

Right, right.

She ended up staying on it and doing a lot of fucked up things, but, uh, whatever.

Right.

Um, but the chicken factory, man, that, that's was amazing.

Amazing, and it's amazing to me that I could handle it.

But I moved on from there to a larger chicken factory in Buffalo, Missouri.

Okay.

And then I moved on to the granddaddy turkey factory- Oh,

oh, oh, oh … in Springfield.

Your career's,

uh, taking off.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

And by, at that point I was drinking two bottles of gin a day- Oh,

right … to, to, to fit in, I guess.

There was a lot of drinking going on at the chicken factory.

Yeah, there was.

Yeah.

Missouri also is like, uh, I've been a lot of places, and I, and I never

really thought you could actually hate a place, especially one as so

beautiful as Missouri, but there's something wrong with it there.

It's like it makes people into weird, bitter, pinched-up husks of people.

Interesting.

Ugh, God.

I never heard that.

It, well- I mean, I know a few people from Missouri.

They don't, I mean, I'm sure there's exceptions, but yeah.

If you stay, I guess.

These people left.

No, there are people in St. Louis and stuff like that.

Yeah, yeah.

But it really, I guess what I'm talking about is the Ozarks and that southern-

Right, right, right, right, right

you know, part of it.

I've never seen, like, this level of, like, willful ignorance and just You know,

like, girls had, like, genital warts down to their ankles- … until you explained

to them that, like, you could just go to the doctor, and they just never knew.

Sure.

Sure.

Sure.

It, it's fucking- Sure … it's seriously sad.

Right.

Right.

Right.

That's truly… Little bit of, little bit of, like, sex education

or something's really good.

Yeah.

Explaining.

Down to your ankles, though, that's gotta be a long Like, this was- I've

never heard of that shit before.

The specific girl I'm thinking of, uh, was one of the smartest

people I met in Missouri.

Like- And she's the one who has the genital warts down to the ankles?

That she had had them.

You know, she… They… That had happened to her, and, uh,

t- because she just didn't know.

Huh.

Like, she, she said that, "I had no idea that was a-" So smart in some

ways, not smart in other ways, right?

Well, ignorant, you know what I mean?

Yeah, yeah.

Smart, but ignorant, you know?

You can't put the facts together, I guess, if you don't have the

facts, no matter how smart you are.

I mean, I'd be like, "Why the fuck are there warts all

over my pussy?" But- She was.

Yeah.

She just thought, like everyone else there does, that there's something

wrong with her specifically.

Oh, there's a lot of genital warts in Missouri, then.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Like, it's like, of course, duh.

Yeah, yeah.

They used to have on the license plate the genital wart state, I think.

You know, they also, right around the corner from where we lived was Max Creek.

Awesome softball team.

All right.

But the highest, um, incest rate-

in the country.

Wow.

Dead seriously.

Basically, the town is a family, and they got busted, uh, because there's a police

station there or something like that.

They changed a federal law- Mm … because these guys, like, 98% of the income for

the entire town was coming from this speed trap that they set up- Right.

Right … and just giving people tickets.

There's a lot of these in Ohio, too, yeah.

Yeah.

Well, this was… I don't know exactly how- Right … that scam

works- Sure … or whatever.

Sure.

But it was the entire town, and they were all related.

Huh.

And they had a great softball team, so.

This episode's sponsored by the State of Missouri.

Go for the incest, stay for the genital warts.

A- a- anyway, the whole thing that happened there was I started working

on Saturdays doing that job where I'd hook the freshly dead turkeys, and

they'd- Right … spray out, uh, yes, shit onto my neck or chin usually.

But I was doing that because this guy had a white Blazer, uh, that

he would sell me pretty cheap, and my wife's birthday was coming up.

Okay.

And, uh, I was like, "Oh, this is so cool. It'll be perfect," you know?

Mm-hmm.

And, uh, I did it, you know, worked through the whole summer or whatever

the hell it was, and, uh, got the car and everything, and brought

it home on her birthday, and, uh, drove it home from work or whatever.

Yeah.

And, um- She walked out of the house, and I was like, handed her the keys,

and she was like, "Oh my God, this is so perfect because I'm leaving

you," and literally left that night.

Took, took the car?

Took the car.

Jesus.

Took my dog.

Jesus Christ, dude.

I would… Like, did you ever think, "You can't have it if you're

leaving me. This is not, like…" It's not something I would think.

Right.

Yeah.

I, I mean, I love things, like, I like having shit around, but I

don't really care about things.

When s- something like that happens, I was- Yeah, right.

Fair enough.

Yeah.

But, uh, pissed off about it now.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

It's like, it's hindsight.

Hindsight.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

So as a result of that, I decided that- Missouri just had too many

bad memories for me … for me.

Sure.

Like, all of them.

The John awards and the broken leg.

Yeah.

Right.

Time to go.

Moved from Missouri to Minneapolis, moved in with a couple of old

friends, uh, from here, from Columbus.

Okay.

I continued, uh, working in meat, and I ended up managing a Whole Foods meat

department for a while, and then I moved on to this place called The Wedge

that was, like, uh, the biggest food co-op in the United States until, you

know, s- 2000 or something like that.

Okay.

From the '60s it had been there consistently.

Super famous place.

We had, like, uh, Prince's wife shopped there all the time.

Tiny Tim, uh, in his last days- Mm-hmm … was, like, one of my

main kind of clients or whatever.

No shit.

We, yeah, discussed his diet a lot.

And, and his wife continued, uh- Huh coming in after he died

and everything That's crazy.

Laura Dern would come in.

Uh, I remember Fugazi came in one time.

That was pretty awesome.

So yeah, people like… It was a pretty famous place- It was a

scene … in Minnesota or whatever.

I got a girlfriend who worked there- Okay … named Sarah, and, um, she

had studied Spanish stuff, culture and language her entire life, and

she wanted to go to Guatemala, and we decided, "Okay, let's do that."

So we saved up for- Why not?

… whatever.

Yeah … a while, and we put away maybe 10 grand or something like that.

Okay.

So we flew… It was the first time I'd had money again in a while,

and, uh, we flew my mom out to Isla Mujeres, which is a little island

off the coast of- Okay … Cancun.

Right.

You just fly into Cancun.

It's not a Cancun-type place.

It's… It used to be wonderful.

I don't know what it's like now.

Right.

We partied there with her for an unforgettable week, and, uh, then

from there we just started, Sarah and I just started traveling south, and

ended up going through, um, you know, the rest of Mexico, through Belize.

Mm-hmm.

And, uh, then from Punta Gorda, Belize, we took a boat, uh, to Livingston, Guatemala.

Okay.

It's probably where, like, 90% of the Black population of Guatemala lives.

Okay.

And, uh, spent about six months there, and then from there we moved to

Guatemala City for a while, and then from there we went to Todos Santos.

And Todos Santos is, uh, on the west coast of Guatemala, way up

in the mountains, 9,200 feet, and, uh, lived there for about a year.

Okay.

And it was, it was like living in Indiana Jones.

I, I don't even know where you would begin there.

There's, there's a thing they have there called the Caja Real, which

is this box of papers and stuff like that that allegedly came over with the

conquistadors, but there's, like, stuff written on skin and all this, like-

weird stuff, and it's very, very selective about who gets to see it,

that people have tried to steal it back to the United States a bunch of times.

The Smithsonian allegedly has had people there basically trying to take this thing.

Wow.

I got to see that, which was a real honor.

Yeah, that's cool.

Amazing.

And, like, all of these m- meetings and stuff like that would happen in, like,

a dirt floor wooden shack with a fire in it, you know- Huh … on a chilly

night drinking aguardiente and p- venado or- Yeah … whatever with these guys.

It was super magical living there.

There's a famous horse race that happens there every year- Huh

that, um, basically all the men go to the coast.

I have no idea what they do.

I never made it to the coast.

But they go to the coast and work.

That's what everyone says.

Okay.

You know, "My husband's at the coast working." Mm-hmm.

"Come in." But, um, they, uh- come back in November for the

Day of the Dead celebration.

Mm-hmm.

And that's their huge holiday.

Right.

And so there's like three celebrations right in a row, and

one of them is this horse race.

And the horse race is, uh, 100 yards or something like that.

Uh-huh But it's back and forth, and each time you get to the finish line, you

have to drink a shot of Quetzalteca, and you go back and do the same thing.

The year I was there was the first time no one died- … during the race, but

there were some serious, serious injuries.

So they're on the horse drinking while they're on the horse, or?

They, they go, cross the finish line, drink, turn around, go

back, cross the finish line.

But they sit on the horse the whole time.

Yeah, they never get off the horse.

Okay.

Right.

In fact, most of them tie themselves to the horse.

Jesus Christ.

And, uh, which is one of the things that's resulted in a lot- That would do it,

yeah … the deaths and stuff like that.

They, uh, use a rooster for their riding crop.

They tie the rooster's legs to their wrist, so the rooster, it's tied to them,

a live rooster, and that's what they use.

Jesus Christ.

And they spend all the money that they've made at the coast-

Uh-huh … or doing whatever.

Every family buys a cow.

That's, like, mandatory, and, uh, that's parted up and whatever for feasts of-

Right … over the course of that week.

And then the guys all have, the tailors there are famous.

They're, they're most famous for the fabric that they make there.

The guys have these insanely elaborate sort of conquistador disco outfits made.

Sure.

Okay.

And that's it, then they're, everyone's broke again, and all

the men go back to the coast.

Huh, and that's life.

They do it all again, yeah.

Huh.

Wow.

Yeah.

I was a coordinator for a school they had up there called El Proyecto Linguistico de

Espanol y Mam.

Si.

They've never had a written language.

Their Mam is the name of the language.

They've never had a- Oh, right … a written language.

So it's like tribal people sp- They're indigenous people.

Right, indigenous, yeah.

You know, none of the existing alphabets work for some of the

intricacies of the language.

Sure.

It, it is, it's a weird one.

I remember ътскънсич means may I have a cigarette.

Oh.

Well, you got that one down.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And they accepted you as if, like, you, you were accepted in their

friend groups and whatever, or?

I, I'm just not an idiot, and I understand how people work.

Right.

So yeah, they accepted me really well.

But there was an incident very shortly after I left, within a month after

I left, where a couple of Japanese tourists were killed, like, 10

minutes after getting off the bus.

They had gotten, they had made so many mistakes that they had, there was, like,

a mob riot, and they killed this- Jesus Christ … uh, woman and her, her husband.

And, uh, basically the whole thing started because the woman got off the

bus and immediately saw, like, some little kid walking around, was like,

"Oh, he's so cute," and picked him up.

And the biggest fear they have of Americans especially, but anyone

foreign- Right … is that you're there to steal their children's organs.

Oh sh- So I don't know where that came from.

Sure, sure.

But they, they believe it totally, and this, like, foreign-looking

person jumped off and grabbed a kid immediately, and it just exploded.

Jesus.

They both ended up dead.

Wow.

Yeah.

Oy.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Are you still with the woman at this time?

Oh, no, she met some guy, and I remember the guy had a moped too.

It was pretty cool.

Sweet.

And, uh, yeah, he scooted her out of town and, uh- Scooted her out of town.

I left the school, met a kind of a big group of people.

We traveled around to the rest of, uh, Central America- Mm-hmm … mostly,

and had some amazing adventures.

Good times.

Yeah, yeah.

Lots, lots of fun, man.

Right.

Lots of fun.

Then, uh, along the way I acquired this dog that was a, um, a Dogo Argentino,

which is… I don't know if you know them or not, but they're big dogs.

Okay.

They're like all white, super short hair.

People always mix them up with pit bulls.

I was in the Huehuetenango, this town.

I walked by a pet shop and they had a litter, and there was this one that

was like, looked like a little rat, like laying all splayed out- Uh-huh

by himself.

Uh-huh.

And I was like, "Oh, what's gonna happen to that one?" And the guy was like,

"Eh, I'll probably drown him." Mm-hmm.

And I was like, "Oh, I'll take him then." And he was like, "All right, 7,000

quetzales." Which was $13 or whatever.

Right, right, right, right.

And I was like, "Fuck it, okay." Right.

So I bought him, and uh, he was so little.

We used to, I used to carry him in a bag.

For a long time he would fit in that bag.

And um, we started hitchhiking, and we hitchhiked from San José,

Costa Rica to Phoenix, Arizona.

Wow.

Yeah.

It was pretty awesome.

With the dog?

Yeah.

What was the dog's name?

Clavo.

Clavo.

And everyone always made a joke about that because they use a lot

of diminutives and demonstratives in the way they speak there.

Right, right, right.

And so everyone always said, "Oh, right now he's a clavito,"

like just a little Clavo.

But Clavo means nail.

Okay.

But it's also slang for problem.

Oh.

And they were like, "You know, eventually he's gonna become a Clav-

Clavo- That's a good name … and then a clavón," like a huge problem.

Right, right, right, right.

And it happened.

Right.

Well, it's a good name in that case.

Yeah.

Right.

Yeah, he was a great dog.

So you get to Phoenix.

Get to Phoenix, go to California.

Right.

You know, my grandmother dies in Ohio.

Mm-hmm.

I marry in Ohio.

Okay.

And, um, drive back for that funeral, stay here for about six months, go

to New York Really at this point, like it's very culture shock being

back in the United States at all.

Sure.

Yeah.

And, um- You were gone for what?

Two, three years?

Yeah.

Okay.

And New York was just overload.

And I went from there, I texted a friend or called a friend who, um, had crashed on

my couch in Minneapolis for about a year.

Mm-hmm.

I was like, "I gotta get out of New York." My friend lived in Vermont.

I went up there, uh, to stay with him, and if there- if you're ever coming

back from Guatemala and feel- Vermont

culture shocked, Vermont is really, you know- I think Vermont's good for

a lot of different kind of things.

I think it's just- It is … a chill place to, yeah.

They, there's some, uh, soul-killingly awful things about it, I think, as

well, but it's mostly just really- You can say that about almost anywhere.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Sure.

Yeah.

Um, yeah, stayed in Vermont for a while, opened up a record store.

My little brother flew out to help me run it, fell in love with Vermont.

He still lives there now.

Mm-hmm.

And met this girl.

Mmm, had a real textbook affair.

Her husband was like a super rich dude and stuff like that.

Oh, I see.

And, um, eventually she left him and we got married.

How long did it take for like, so she's cheating on her husband for a while, but

how long did it take from the beginning of the affair to the leaving the guy?

Well, when we started, I think we, we kind of like, we think like, if

this is still going on in two years, we gotta get together, and then

it, it became a year and a half.

Then- Mm-hmm … a year.

I think it was about eight months after- And the husband

never knew … we got together.

Never knew until I drove her up to Montreal, um, 'cause he was at

their Montreal house at the time, and, uh, or he was coming back

there from some overseas trip.

Right.

So she, we went back to Montreal the day before.

I helped her pack all her shit up, and then I went and sat in a bar while

she waited for him to come home, and she was like, "I'm leaving you." Huh.

Came down, met me at the bar, and threw all her shit in the car and left.

Wow.

And stayed together for 22 years, something like that.

Wow.

No shit.

No, no, no.

Sorry.

Longer than that.

Longer than that, 'cause my daughter's 22 now, so.

Wow.

And, uh, when she got pregnant, I didn't want my kid to be raised in

Vermont, and I did want- Right … my kid to be raised in New York.

Yeah.

We ended up in Washington Heights, which is probably about as tough

as you're gonna get in- New York, Manhattan anyway Back then.

Yeah, yeah Still, still Yeah, it's cleaned up quite a bit Oh, yeah.

I mean, before I got there, it was really… That's the they

shoot cops up there era Mm-hmm.

Even Harlem's, like, cleaned up quite a bit.

Oh, yeah.

Harlem's, uh- Yeah … right before I left New York, I was in, uh, Harlem,

right on 110th and 2nd Avenue.

Oh, I was right…

We- I think we talked about this.

I was right near there.

I was on- Oh … in East Harlem at, uh, what was it?

116th between 2nd and- Yeah … 1st and 2nd.

10th.

That's right.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, I remember.

They were calling it Spaha.

They were trying to rebrand East- Spanish Harlem into Spaha back then.

Oh my God.

It didn't take.

It didn't take.

Didn't catch on.

No, no.

There was a Spaha cafe near us, which was just like- … what are you doing?

What are you doing?

Spaha.

Yeah.

So you're raising the kid in, uh, in, uh, Washington Heights?

Yeah, and I, you know, I got rid of the record store.

My wife is a medical professional.

She, uh, you know, she- her career was really moving forward.

Okay.

I sold the record store, and I spent… I said, "I'm gonna spend the first

two years of our daughter's life with her every single day." Okay.

And I did.

Sure.

For two years, man, we would, every single day, like while she was

learning how to talk and everything, we'd just walk around New York City.

We'd go to Central Park every day.

We'd go to, you know, took her to see the Met and Ev- like, all that-

That's awesome … kind of stuff.

Yeah.

And she's a very sophisticated young woman with a great palate.

She, uh, loves to eat, and she loves to cook.

It's tons of fun.

She's still in New York?

Yeah.

Right on.

I continued butchering, uh, uh, during this whole time, getting

better and better and better.

Mm-hmm.

And, uh, in New York, I ended up working at a place called Harlem Shambles- Mm

… which at the time was arguably one of the three best butcher shops in the country.

Okay.

And, uh, you know, we had a lot of press and stuff like that.

Sure.

Did a lot of interviews, and I used to speak at, you know, school events

all the time, things like that.

It was- Mm. It was wonderful, like to- That's pretty cool … finally, like,

dealing… I mean, we bought cows.

That was it.

That's how the shop worked.

Right.

We bought cows.

We took 'em apart.

We aged everything.

It was, uh, to- one of the greatest honors of my life.

It's also cool that, like, this thing that kinda started as a

fluke in a way in Minneapolis- Yeah

kind of came full circle in the… Yeah, yeah.

Well, I just became so obsessed with the anatomy of the animal and

learning it and just how, um… The insights you can get, you know, like

your muscles are exactly the same as a cow's except for your collarbone.

Sure.

A whale's the same.

You know, I can take apart any mammal now, and I understand the way, uh, you

know, that all of it functions together, and it's just fascinating to me.

Right.

And, um, anyway, and I was good at it, and I really, really enjoyed it.

Interesting that your, your, your ex-wife's also in, like, the medical

field, which is kind of a weird connection- Yeah … in a way, yeah.

I always refer to myself now, when I'm in pain, I'm always thinking, oh, my eyebrow

hurts- … or my flat iron's killing me.

Right, right.

Like, you start seeing all those cuts and everything.

My, my, my rump roast is, is sore today.

Yeah.

How long were you there for?

10 years, 15 years?

We moved there when Lyla was less than one.

Uh-huh.

And I moved away seven months ago or whatever.

Oh, seven months ago.

All right.

Yeah, so we were there- Wow

for 20, I think 21 years total.

Wow.

A lot of changes in those 21 years.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And obviously, I mean, I've w- worked with the gallery during

the time that I was there.

I was in a great band called Ass Falcon while I was there, and got to

do, you know, a million amazing shows.

And one of the other things I always wanted to do was, uh, I

went and learned kosher butchering in Crown Heights- Oh, no shit

like, in a totally Hasidic, you know- Oh, no shit … neighborhood.

And, um, it was an amazing experience.

I definitely came away from it feeling that, uh, you know, kosher

meat is basically exactly as dumb and wasteful as I thought it was.

But the process is still fascinating.

And the one thing that I respect them for being able to do more than anything

else, because almost no one else can do this anymore, like, they hone their knives

to a sharpness that is something that you've never experienced in your life.

Uh-huh.

Because if the cow flinches, and you have to kill it by cutting its throat.

Okay.

And if the cow flinches at all, if the cow knows it's dying, you throw it away.

Wow.

They throw it away.

That's just it.

Just you don't touch it.

And do they throw away a lot of cows?

Yeah.

And you know what I would do?

Buy them for $1-

as long as I could transport them.

For sure.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

They'd sell them to me for $1, and I'd take them to another shop and either give

it to all the guys or, like, use it for lessons or, um, you know- That's fucking-

… whatever … it makes me a little angry.

You know, do your kosher thing, but you're just wasting life really.

You're just tossing away.

Well, it's not like there's a shitload of food to go around- Right … for

everybody on the planet either.

For sure, no.

Yeah.

And every cow that they, that they touch, they throw away all of the good part.

No shit.

There's no tenderloin.

There's no, you know, all that stuff from the back- What do they,

what do they- Over the back half

what do they even eat?

The shoulder.

That's it?

Yeah.

Interesting.

Uh, well, more than anything, it was just an amazing experience to, like,

be with all these guys that were big- Like- … members of the community.

Right.

To see how the community functioned in general was fascinating.

The whole thing is set up to keep people and money completely within the community.

Right.

And it works.

I mean, it really works.

Is it, uh, like, was it, is this a Hasidic community or- Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Okay.

Yeah, yeah.

The giant hats and- Right … the ropes and all that- Right … everything.

I mean, they also, like, use more social services than almost

any population in the city.

Like, there's a good and a bad side to the whole thing, but, like, uh, the

stories that I hear about the drain on social services and so forth and, and

welfare, I mean, there's a lot of- It fall more into the bad category for me

because as well as a lot of it works, it's so non-inclusive or whatever.

Yeah.

You know what I mean?

Ins- insular.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

It's, and it's, um- Yeah, it just turns it into something that's kinda ugly.

Yeah.

But it is a thing that if the world thought like that, things would be--

Like, if the world thought like that in terms of being a community the way

they view themselves as a community, it, you know, it would be amazing.

It could work.

Yeah.

Yeah.

'Cause it's not really based on just taking advantage of

people or anything like that.

It's, uh, they certainly take advantage of a good deal.

And you can't really leave.

I mean, there's a lot of downsides to that community, but certainly I hear

you on the community, community part.

Your drunken brother always has a job there.

Doesn't matter.

Right.

And they know that they just gonna bounce him from this person to this

person, and he's gonna end up stealing something from there, and they're

gonna bounce him to this person.

But guaranteed.

Always gonna have a place.

Always have a- Yeah

always have a place to go.

And it just kind of works out mathematically as long

as you keep that happening.

Well, they also, they also, like, reproduce at a higher rate than

almost any population in the country.

Like, that's, like, their whole thing- Yeah … is to, just to keep having

babies and- And not vaccinating is like- Well, I mean, they've gone-- I mean,

I've heard stories of them, like, going out of New York and going to cities,

like, upstate and, like, reproducing to a degree, and then eventually just

taking over the whole town- Mm-hmm

of the city council and stuff.

Like, that's the thing.

It's a complicated, it's a complicated- Yeah, it seems like a lot of people are,

like, catching on to the have a bunch of babies idea and use them to take over.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

Little sims- Well, they're doing it real well … to a weird degree.

They're doing it real well.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But I was there for the beef, and it was, uh, uh, that experience was cool.

Is there a, a story or a, or a, or a memory, like, that was, like, the most

fucked up or whatever story that you, that you, in the time, your time in New York?

One of the crazier ones that just comes to mind, and that's, and this probably

isn't anywhere near the craziest, but My wife, she, uh, is incredible at her

job, and for some reason, like, she really cared about working with, um,

gay populations, poor people- Mm-hmm

immigrants, things like that, and re- really has dedicated her life

to it and just done amazing work.

But, um, our house in Washington Heights for about 10 years was the

hospital for people that were gonna get deported if they went to the hospital.

Jesus.

And we had a chick die there one night, and literally Jessina revived her.

She'd gotten coke and heroin mixed up or something like that.

And, um, she left in the morning, like, still didn't even know where

she was- Yeah, yeah … or whatever.

But finally we felt comfortable saying, "Take her the fuck out of here." And,

uh, two days later, I came home from work, and there's this black box sitting

in front of the door, and it was a big, giant tiramisu with a note on it

saying, "Thanks for saving my life."

Oh, the- I mean, I guess, I guess tiramisu's as good a, as good, as good

a prize for that as anything, right?

Why not?

That was the best gift.

I wonder if she thought about it and was like, "Well, what's the, what's a

good gift for somebody- Yeah … who actually saved my life?" Yeah.

Wow, how long was she, how was she- Nah, I mean, she was like, just her

heart stopped or something like that.

Right, right, right.

But it was, um- Wow, that's nuts … it was scary.

I mean, 'cause it was the one that we almost were like, "We, we gotta call

the ambulance- Right … at this point." But then she would've been deported.

Yeah.

Of course, they had a, a scam where when, uh, this used to mean

something, I don't know if it means anything in the government anymore,

but where they would marry people.

Like, they had the whole thing where, like, marrying people to gain citizenship-

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah … or to start the process of- Yeah … whatever.

And like, you know, Caroline's been married to three or four

people, you know, along the lines.

Right, right, right.

'Cause you gotta stay married for a few years.

Right.

Oh, right.

So- And they come and check and everything.

There was a whole Gérard Depardieu movie about that called- Oh … Green Card.

It was awful.

Yeah, but anyway, yeah.

That's my film reference, throwing it in there for you.

That re- just reminded me of something.

Actually That chick Sarah that I went to Guatemala with- Yeah

super smart.

Sure.

But if she didn't remember something, she would always come up with,

like, the most ridiculous cliches.

And we were, when we were living in Guatemala City, we went to the

movies almost every single day.

It was 25 cents.

Sweet.

It's another good way of trying to learn Spanish.

Absolutely.

And we were trying to remember Gérard Depardieu's name.

And I've never forgotten her saying, like, "I know it. Something like Jean Paul

Bordeaux." Like, just- Jean Paul Bordeaux.

Well, I mean, the French part's in there.

Yeah.

You know?

Right.

Yeah, I think he got canceled too 'cause he sexually something with… Yeah.

Yeah.

People are fucking weird, man.

I mean, you dig d- you dig enough into anybody's thing, I think

you can find some darkness.

Um, but yeah.

Yeah.

I suppose that's true.

Yeah.

You know, everybody's got dirt in their past.

Although, but people are pretty fucking weird, man.

There's a- Oh, people are- … lot of stuff that people do that-

No, I mean- … I'm like, "What?

That's how you got in trouble?

Ew," or, "Weird." But I mean, existing on its own is pretty weird.

And the older I get, the more the existence part of the whole

thing, that we're even here, becomes more of a trip to me.

Like, the more I re- realize what actually is happening, I'm more

blown away by the fact that it's happening at all, if that makes sense.

Certainly.

Right?

Like how strange- I, I understand

it is to be anything at all in this entire weird universe that we've ended up.

Not to get too esoteric, but, like- Do you ever listen to Neutral Milk Hotel?

Dude, that's where I came, that's the lines from there, yeah.

Yeah, the lines from there.

Yeah.

Big fan.

So there's a book about them.

Mm-hmm.

I'm in it.

No shit.

Yeah.

Yeah, I've got a copy with it that has- The thing, 33 1/3 book?

It's, yeah, it's that one.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

'Cause we, uh, we spent a lot of time together.

No shit.

Yeah.

Yeah, for a while.

They w- uh, just talk about interesting guys, man.

Yeah, I saw Jeff Magnum at Bam years ago.

I cried.

I cried.

Um, yeah.

Dude.

Love their shit.

Yeah, yeah, those, they're, they're great stuff.

Yeah, I remember when I first heard that album, a friend of mine played

it for me, and I was like, "What the fuck is this fucking n- nonsense

noise?" And then I listened to it again, and I was like, "All right.

There's something more." It took a while to get it, and then once you

get it, I was like, "Oh, all right.

I see what's happening here." Yeah.

There's, there's magic and joy within that.

It's magic.

That's it.

And, and, and just joy.

So what went wrong in, in New York?

So you, with the wife for 20, 22 years, 20 years, whatever it is, and,

uh, is that why you left New York?

Jess and my, I, my wife had been talking about it for a while.

I mean, she's certainly not a very faithful person, and,

uh- Ah, okay … you know.

Well, whatever.

We both love fucking or- Sure … since, you know.

Who doesn't?

We felt like, you know- Lila was grown up Mm-hmm … our daughter,

and we did a fucking rad job.

You know what I mean?

We raised a, like, an amazing kid.

Yeah.

And, um, are both in some ways contributing to the world in a way that

we both feel, you know, happy with.