TRANSCRIPT OF AUDIO FILE:

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT:

CLIENT: So date number one is in the books. Didn't get laid. You know why?

THERAPIST: No, I don't.

CLIENT: (chuckles) Because I bought condoms, that's why. Have you ever bought condoms recently?

THERAPIST: I'm not going to answer that question.

CLIENT: (chuckles) Because, you know, a decade ago, however long ago when I last bought them, you had condom, lubricated, and then quantity. That was it. Now it's like there's a whole – you know. It's crazy. But, yeah, it went well. It was fun. [00:01:00] She's kind of (laughs) – psycho is not the right word, but she said she was a little buzzed and started going on about how her job, everything is uncertain and she's starting to get a little depressed. I'm like hey – you're preaching to the choir here. (both laugh) She was worried that I was like oh, no, not romantic. But it went well. She wants to hang out. Wants me to call her. Whatever.

THERAPIST: Cool.

CLIENT: We kissed. We had peppermints from the bar and I tried to slip it in her mouth.

THERAPIST: It wasn't happening?

CLIENT: No. So tonight – no longer no name. Rory. [00:02:00] I've been guessing. I knew it was an "R". I knew it was either Rory or Renee. She really didn't seem like a Rebecca. Definitely not a Rose. We'll see how that goes. I'm overwhelmed. I'm broke. (laughs) I can't afford this shit. My dad sent me some money for my birthday, which he hasn't done in years. I was joking that I was just going to sign it over to the pharmacy. He's like, "No. You need that for your dates." (laughs) I've got to e-mail my tenant, who should be giving me some money. That will make a big difference. [00:02:59]

One of the things I thought I was going to have to come up with, my office insurance. The last time I got it I needed to do everything so quickly because the accounting center wanted me to sign that day, so I just went downstairs to the insurance place there, talked to the son, gave him a check, and I have insurance. Well, I didn't give him a check, but – you know. I never heard from them. Never got a policy. Didn't know my limits. I didn't know any of it, I had insurance. It was $500; $520 because I had a late fee. So I get my renewal and it's $577. I go, "You know, there's an insurance lady in my B&I group." So I e-mailed her and she was like, "What is your coverage?" I don't know. She was like, "Can you send me your policy?" I was like, "I don't have it." She was like, "How much personal property do you have in your office?" Maybe $1,000. [00:04:05] She's asking me questions what she should insure. And this was kind of the reason I didn't call her last year. I knew that it would be difficult to get it really quick with her because they're very thorough. They're very thorough and very customer-service oriented. She gives me a quote of $450. So I still have to come up with $450 by the end of the month. She sent me the application yesterday and she was like, "Yeah, Safety Insurance will take it in five installments." That's what $90? So that's one less thing I have to worry about. Still... I'm going to e-mail and see if I can get them to spread out the payments for Ian's summer camp. Jess's going to send her portion so they're going to get a chunk of hers. I don't know what they're going to do. I can only ask my dad for so much money. I have to pay almost $1,000 on Monday for my estimated taxes. Health insurance – all that's coming up. [00:05:19]

THERAPIST: I'll probably charge your card this weekend.

CLIENT: $200? Oh – good luck with that. Do you charge a bounce bill when you know there are no bounce fees? They charge me for that if it goes through. I'll make sure there's some money in there for you. Have I caught up yet? I think not. (laughs) Yeah, if I can get the $1,500 from my tenant and I can get the camp to spread out the payments and I have a closing by the end of the month, I might be okay. [00:06:08] A lot of big stuff. I've got to talk to my mortgage guy. There might be two closings because they are streamlines. They're FHA and VA and you don't get to do appraisals. They just go through really quick and they both have to close at the end of the month or else it's a whole other month of interest. So if you don't pay it off before the first of the month... So there's a chance that I'll have two closings. He posted on his Facebook page that he has purchases, purchases, purchases, so maybe he's starting to get some purchases, which would be nice because I make more money on those. They're very good at basically talking the buyers into title insurance, which is a good chunk of the money. [00:07:05] That would make things looking good going forward. I don't know when I start asking these women to cough up some money. Luckily we didn't drink that much last night. It was like $50. I got some macaroni & cheese fritters – really good. They were huge. I still have some in the frig. So, yeah. The woman last night, Marcia, she kind of talks fast. At one point she was like, "You haven't asked any questions about me." I was like, "I don't have to. You've been telling me everything about you." She was friends with Mosby for a long time and she now walks dogs for Kerry and Mosby. [00:08:07] Apparently we talked about a lot of stuff that I don't remember. She was like, "Yeah, you already told me that." "Well, you already told me that." (laughs) But she was like, "Don't mention to them that we're going out." I'm like, "What's the big deal? Mosby will stop Kerry from firing you. Don't worry about it." She was like, "Well, it's just Kerry's been really different since – you know." Because I was like, "What was Kerry talking to you about?" She kept whispering and she looked uncomfortable and Mosby mentioned something, not to worry about it. She was like, "I didn't hear from Kerry until like 10:00 in the morning and she just texted me about the dogs. Usually she calls me early." I was like, "She was too drunk to drive me to the square at 7:30. I don't think the problem was you." (laughs) So I don't know. Weird thing. It always kind of bothered me about Jess. One of her good friends is this guy, Ray. [00:09:23]

THERAPIST: Marcia?

CLIENT: Yeah. He's an unbelievably good musician. Jess used to date him. We used to go see his band, whose base play she also used to date. He ended up moving to Asia for a while and then Oregon. It was always uncomfortable for me. Normally in that situation I'd talk to everybody else there, but I'd never really talk to him. It was creepy that way. Now it's funny that she's really good friends with him. (laughs) I think she thought I was serious when I called her a dirty hippy. [00:10:16] She said, "Well it's not like when I was following the Grateful Dead." Then she started talking about how she went on a couple of tours. I'm like, "You were following the Grateful Dead." I did attend shows, I just played rugby so I couldn't follow them. I went to shows, unlike Jess who just drove around the country, occasionally going to a show. I've got a – I don't want to use the word conundrum. I guess that's how I approached Marcia. I said, "You know, I've got a conundrum." And she goes, "That's me. I'm Marcia Conundrum." Marcia Dunne. Now I can't say conundrum without thinking about that. [00:11:10]

(sighs) On May 11th there's a tournament in Needham with the team I just played with, but Ian has soccer that day. The following weekend I thought I had a tournament. It's like I have to play in that tournament, so I can't play both tournaments. It turns out that the following weekend I'm not going to be able to play in that tournament because Ian and I are doing a Cub Scout sleepover on a battleship. In fact, they sent out an e-mail last night saying it was this weekend. I was like what the fuck? It can't be this weekend, you know? I'm thinking that May? Someone sent an e-mail, "Isn't it May?" And she's like, "Oh, yeah." So I might be able to play in that, which makes me want to play in the other tournament; but I would miss two weeks of soccer. But only one of the weeks would be with Ian, so it's not... [00:12:07]

THERAPIST: Right. [...] (inaudible at 00:12:09) ?

CLIENT: Yeah. One of the things they stress is that we're volunteers, we have lives and if we can't make the practice and we have to cancel the practice, then cancel the practice. I've got a good assistant coach and I've got another dad who actually plays ultimate and who seems interested. I'm thinking I can rope those two because one of the weeks they have a premier soccer running a clinic. So on one field are the games and on the other field is drills and stuff like that. So it's like yeah, I should be there for the clinic to learn all the drills and everything like that, but Davis and – I don't even know the other guy's name – they can learn the drills and help with practice. So I'm thinking about playing in the tournament in Norfolk and doing the battleship thing and just missing two games. If I wasn't doing one of the things with Ian – I wouldn't miss two games because that would upset Ian, like if I played in both Frisbee tournaments. I wasn't going to do that because... [00:13:21]

THERAPIST: Right, but you're doing the second thing together, so it's different.

CLIENT: Right. Yeah. So I'm thinking about doing that. I'm committed to doing that. I'm going to do that, so it's not a confusion any more – or a Marcia conundrum. She lives in Watertown (ph?), though. She likes it. She grew up in Walpole. Something about the suburbs. People like the suburbs. [...] (inaudible at 00:13:51), the land. You can walk to [...]. (chuckles) Who knows? Rory messaged me, "Are we still on?" and I'm like, "Yeah, sure thing. Whatever. I was kind of shocked that you actually told me your name. I was thinking it was either Rory or Renee." She was like, "Excellent." These women act like they're excited for these things. I don't know. I guess they wouldn't go on them if they weren't. I think they have enough options that they wouldn't waste their time, right? At least this woman. She's attractive – or, at least, appears to be attractive. [00:14:34] The thing I'm wondering is she's a law student. Do you think I could write it off as a business expense, like mentoring? We're going to talk about the law. You know it's going to happen. Actually, I was worried because I had soccer practice today. Soccer practice is going to end at 6:00 and I've got to go and get cleaned up and get to the commons by 7:30 which I could easily do, but I don't like those – rushing and rushing. It's supposed to rain all afternoon, so there's not going to be any soccer practice, I imagine. I need to do laundry really bad, so I can do some laundry. I've got to have lunch with a financial planner. Have you ever been for Turkish food? That's it. See you Tuesday. [00:15:38] I told Marcia – not the full-blown – but I told her how crazy I was; I mean jokingly, that I'm crazy. So every time she kind of brings up crazy, she means it like fun and she thinks she's offending me. I'll let her keep thinking that. I told her I'd never been convicted of killing anyone and I've never killed myself. Add a little mystery. She has Crohn's Disease, too. She doesn't like to take medication, though, so I think her stomach was bothering her last night. She also said she has ADHD, which she talks pretty fast. She moves her hands. She doesn't take any meds for that. She's like one of these mind-over-matter, dirty hippy people. [00:16:52]

THERAPIST: She's got [...] (inaudible at 00:16:53) for it?

CLIENT: Yeah. They wanted her to take medicine for the Crohn's. I think she did it for a little while and stopped. I don't know. Crohn's pain for me was like barreled-over type of pain, intense pain.

THERAPIST: You kind of have to.

CLIENT: I took pain meds and, of course, when my intestine perforated I really didn't have a choice. As intestine fluid is leaking out of my body... I was in the hospital for a month.

THERAPIST: When was that?

CLIENT: It was like ‘91, roughly. Originally I was sick when I was 12 for like a month and missed like a month of school. I had a fever of unknown origin. They gave me an upper GI, but they missed the end of my intestine. When they were about to take me back for a second upper GI I got better, so they never did the second upper GI. [00:18:04] It turns out that area that they missed was where the Cohn's was. Nine years later, they figured out I had Crohn's and it was probably stress-related, whatever. I could eat anything and it never really seemed to come about by food. I didn't want to go home. It would be stressful at home. In college I just didn't like going home. My parents weren't getting along that great. So I stayed up at school, but I didn't withdraw because if you withdrew, you couldn't get your football tickets once you were no longer enrolled. So I wanted to stay to get my tickets, which is the Saturday after Thanksgiving. [00:19:05] They were like, "Come down for Thanksgiving. Fly down. Jeff (my brother) will drive you back up on Friday and you can go to the game on Saturday." So I go, "All right." I go home for Thanksgiving, eat the Thanksgiving dinner, as usual. I eat too much. I wake up in the morning. I'm fetal position on the floor because my intestine perforated. I go to the hospital. They want to put my intestines at rest so they put me on TPM. You know what that is? Total Pulmonary Nutrition, where, basically, you're being fed through a vein that goes into your heart. They did that for a couple of weeks and it wasn't getting better. That's when they figured out I only had one kidney. [00:19:49]

THERAPIST: You only have one kidney?

CLIENT: Yeah. Well, I might have another one, but it just never grew. They don't know. So it might be there but – you know. My brother only has one kidney and he has Crohn's. So they took out the last 18 inches of my intestine, which is a pretty important area of your intestines where you absorb B-12 and bio-salts; and the Cecal valve, which regulates everything going in and out of there. So I don't have that. It ended up being a month that I was in there. They sent me home on Christmas Day. I was kind of tearing up, emotions just releasing, leaving. Everybody was like, "Oh, you're going home for Christmas." They had a little turkey lunch. And I'm like, "I'm Jewish." (laughs) So, yeah, and then I got Crohn's when I was in law school. But when I got my grades, it went away. It would come back a few times. When I got a real job it came back. That's when I quit and did the dog walking and started building my own practice. I really haven't been sick ever since. [00:21:18] I haven't gotten sick in the last five years. My Crohn's is gone. I don't even go to my doctor anymore. I've never been on medication for it because when I had it in ‘91, there was no medication for Crohn's. They might have just been starting to experiment with medication back then or they were experimenting. But basically you had Crohn's and they put you on steroids, Prednisone, which, of course, your face blows up, you get acne, you get irritable. Like I needed to be more irritable. (laughs) So the steroids just sucked. They really sucked. I didn't like being on the steroids, and pain medication, which I liked. A nice little buzz. [00:22:18]

THERAPIST: Obviously you weren't being treated all the time, through school and law school, for the ADD and any depression.

CLIENT: I think law school was like the one time when the ADD didn't affect me because I enjoyed law school. I was like, "Oh, my God. There's this thing called a library." I went there and I studied and I read. I enjoyed it. I was good at it. I was like top twenty in my class, Law Review, and I was one of the first persons to finish the bar exam. You walk up to the front. I don't know where it is now, but it used to be at the convention center on the seaport. You walk all the way up to the front of the room and you give them your little essay book and you have to walk all the way out to the back. The looks on people's faces was just horror. "Oh, my God. This guy is done." That's helping the curve. [00:23:20]

THERAPIST: I see. So most people don't finish the exam?

CLIENT: They do, but I finished really early. This is why I was good in law school because I said what I had to say and that's it; where a lot of people try to use legalese and flowery sentences. They don't want that. They want short and to the point. Take the facts, apply the law, move on. And once you do that, you can be a lawyer. A lot of people didn't understand that. What I did was I took the facts, I applied the law, and I tried to work in other law that I knew didn't apply but explained why it didn't apply. When I was done writing, I was done. So I left. [00:24:04] The same thing worked in exams. One of the guys who was top in our class was the first one done with the exam. I don't think ADD was really bothering me at all then. Probably the depression a little bit. I was kind of alone. It was the first time I'd lived alone. (pause) First year exams, my dad had a heart attack and they didn't tell me until I finished exams. I found out 30 days after he had a heart attack that he had a heart attack. The same thing happened second year. He had a heart attack right before exams and they didn't tell me which, I guess, was thoughtful. I guess it was a tough call on their part, but you kind of want to know when your dad has a heart attack. [00:25:31] So I'm completely just out of my element here, a bit overwhelmed with – you know. We were at the Union Street Newton last night and Marcia goes to the bathroom, so I check my phone. There's a message from Rory. (laughs) I'm just like, "What am I doing?" On the one hand I'm like, "This is cool." And then on the other hand, I'm like, "I'm just so out of my element here." I have enough trouble handling one woman at a time. What if it works out and she wants to go on a second date? Now I've got two women I'm technically dating. What happens if Sunday works out? Then there's the potential for three. [00:26:28] This summer I've got Frisbee a couple of nights a week, Ian on the weekend. I guess the first one I have sex with will... will wise up and leave. Whenever I went to the bathroom last night I kept asking Marcia for her keys or her driver's license so she didn't leave.

THERAPIST: Did she think that was funny?

CLIENT: No. (pause) You were going to say something before I cut you off, as usual. [00:27:29]

THERAPIST: (pause) I think it's feeling like you're in over your head.

CLIENT: Yeah, I totally am. But you know the bizarre thing? I have no anxiety about it whatsoever. I did maybe last week. Last night I felt fine; I felt comfortable. I'm not anxious at all about tonight, I guess because there's no pressure anymore. If tonight doesn't work out, no worries. Something doesn't work out, no worries. I already knew that Marcia liked me. She hunted me down. I can tolerate it for a little while. (pause) [00:28:40] Maybe Micah will start getting me off of the Wellbutrin. She was weaning me down and then she stopped. (pause) I was talking with a family law attorney who just joined B&I and who I'm going to use in the divorce. Her husband has ADD. I ran out to the car to get a pill because I was so totally – couldn't pay attention at all. She was asking me what I'm on because she deals with this with clients all the time. I was like, "Yeah, I'm on Prozac." She was like, "Oh, you're going to need Viagra." (both laugh) What the fuck? I wish I had Viagra now. I don't know what I'd use it on, but... [00:29:52] I'd like to get off the Wellbutrin. I don't think I need to be on two. I don't know if it's true, but Micah thinks that helps with the anxiety as well and that's one of the reasons she's keeping me on it. I'm not anxious about the money. It's been a pretty stress-free week as far as... I mean it helps that I'm working out and I'm playing Frisbee. There are women who are interested in me.

THERAPIST: Yeah, and I think Olivia was kind of keeping you off balance. It was exciting, but she also had a way of keeping you off balance. [00:30:47]

CLIENT: She's fucking crazy. She's going to resurface; I know it. It's bizarre. (pause) Even before Olivia I was pretty freaked out about the first date with Rory. It was like what the fuck? I wondered if I didn't have the date with Marcia if I would still be anxious about tonight. It was kind of the same thing with Olivia. I didn't feel anxious about it. Technically we were supposed to do something Saturday, but it never happened. I wasn't anxious about that, except wanting to meet her. [00:31:46]

THERAPIST: That really helps you feel on more footing.

CLIENT: We talked about a lot of silly things, so we had a lot of things to talk about. I guess I've got to ask more questions about the woman. I guess I'm not good at that, probably because I don't give a shit. What's that look for? (laughs)

THERAPIST: (laughs) I think you're being provocative.

CLIENT: (laughs) I don't know. I've got a buddy, Tim. I was always intrigued by how interested he was in people. Everything about him, he asked a lot of questions. It seemed like so much fucking effort. I guess I've got to fake it a little bit. (pause) [00:32:57] It's going to be raining, so I'm not going to have to worry about my hair being fucked up. I can't control it anymore. I should probably just shear it all off, but I've got tattoos in the back of my head.

THERAPIST: Yeah? Really?

CLIENT: I don't know. I'm bald, you'd see it. (laughs)

THERAPIST: Well, I don't usually see the back of your head.

CLIENT: Yeah, I busted my head open out in Oregon when I was little. I rolled down a cliff.

THERAPIST: How did that happen? [00:33:54]

CLIENT: We were going down to this fault where there was an earthquake many, many years ago. We were going down there and I started going down and I started going faster and then I started going faster and then I fell and I just rolled over these rocks. I look around and they're like, "J, let's go home." I'm like, "Okay," so I start climbing back up and then my two cousins and my brother looked horrified. I go like this, see the blood, and I'm like, "Aaahh." (laughs) I still tell that story. I probably have a gash on my head somewhere from that. I had the chicken pox when I was a senior in high school, so I think I have some scars up here from that. I don't know. (pause) [00:35:08] B&I is turning out well. We're getting new people joining every week.

THERAPIST: Good. The new location is working out?

CLIENT: Yeah. Because they told us, "You've got to get members in here or we're going to shut you down and re-kick off." It's not like I was really concerned about my position. I'd fucking sue them if they got rid of me, you know? But who else was coming in? We've got a core group of people who, the ones that were left, were good. We asked for referrals and got rid of all the riff-raff. The reality is that when you get people joining, a good number of them are riff-raff. The family law attorney is really good. She was in B&I before. She's trying hard. She's already sent me business. She wants to get me involved. [00:36:05] With her clients, there's a lot of banking with the local bank, Essex. Her daughter or her daughter-in-law is like an assistant manager at one of the banks there. They're going to try to get me on the lists. I'd love it if I could, you know? I'd even get a business ID and pay a couple of hundred buck s to pretend like I have a Essex office with that, which would be awesome if that ultimately happened. But it's hard to get in with these local banks – any bank, really. There's the manager of a bank branch in our group and she's like, "Yeah, they're just not accepting attorneys right now." She thinks they're going to open the list, but I don't know if she's just blowing me off. I guess if she could get me on the list, she would get me on the list. [00:37:05]

I'd like to build back up where I have more than just one reliable source of business. Ray did a lot more business than Harry does. Harry will one day. He's definitely building it up, but I think he's actually going to do better than Ray did in the long run. Claire was sending me a lot of business. The two guys in Massachusetts were sending me... the business they sent equaled one person. It's funny that the realtor in B&I has sent me more landlord-tenant stuff. I've gotten one or two closings from her. I really can't complain. That's almost as much as I got in seven or eight years with the other realtor. I'm just more concerned about the now. My dad understands, though, that he doesn't want me going where I was before. [00:38:31] I know he will help me. He's like just like don't tell Flo, my stepmom. He runs out of money at the end of the year and they kind of split – I'm thinking I should just borrow the money from Flo and I'll pay her back. She loaned me $10,000, but I gave it back to her. (pause) So many things came up at once between preschool and Harry's tickets and the baseball tickets were in December, summer camp and estimated taxes – just a bunch of shit. I seemed to be keeping up with it and then, all of a sudden, April has been dead. I've got so many people who owe me money. Small dollars are coming in. I had a client send me $150 for reviewing their refi paperwork, which I've done closings for those lenders so I'd seen every paper; so I really didn't have to do much work on that, just look at the numbers. [00:39:53] They're like, "Oh, my God. There are 76 pages." Why didn't you guys come to me for the refinance? I did the purchase. I've got to figure out a way to impress that upon people, maybe like a closing letter that if you need an estate plan, if you need a refinance in the future, if you need help with your taxes – something in that regard. I've got to be more pro-active in my customer management. Right now I have the time to do it. I should be doing it and I'm a little bit more motivated than I have been. I might as well. I've got to do thank-you cards for my birthday donations. It's at least $6 700. Plus the mortgage company bought an ad for $500. Margaret doesn't want to count that as my birthday money, but I count it. I count it. (pause) [00:41:11] Ray and I always used to talk about how we needed to market to our clients. You really kind of need a full-time assistant doing that stuff. This one lawyer in Plymouth, who ended up joining the firm, so I don't know how things were working out for him, but he had his wife make contact with all the realtors and following up. The problem is, that costs money. The bank called me yesterday with all the shit they want for the modification. This might be a surprise to you, but that was a 30-minute phone call.

THERAPIST: I'm stunned. [00:42:01]

CLIENT: (pause) It's the same guy I dealt with on the other modification, Mark. Mark Bowers. He was like, "I don't remember if me." I'm like, "Mark, I remember you." He called me every freaking week. I want to sell the property, but I don't want to lose that $1,500 a month and I'm not getting what I should be getting. (pause) Hopefully, the growth in B&I should help me out with more referrals for Harry, more referrals for the realtor. Having attorneys in the group makes a big different because they need title exams. We've had attorneys in the past, but they sucked. They all sucked. This woman, Barbara, is really good, really good. She knows her shit. [00:43:21]

THERAPIST: Yeah, overall you have people who are there for you, more so than you thought the last few years, whether it's your dad with the money or the dating or B&I.

CLIENT: B&I has kind of been just sitting in the bottom pit of my stomach since it's presence – two or three years. Finally, that's starting to go up instead of down.

THERAPIST: Yeah, it's been like a pervasive feeling for you the last few years of just not having enough and getting into this kind of anxious, whirl windy state of not having enough of this and not having enough of this – getting very detailed and obsessional. But with the feeling of just not having enough and being in a kind of desperate state. We should finish up for now.

CLIENT: Big weekend.

THERAPIST: Hope it goes well.

CLIENT: I'm just worried about my liver.

THERAPIST: Don't treat it too badly.

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