TRANSCRIPT OF AUDIO FILE:

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT:

CLIENT: Is it okay if we turn off the fireplace?

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: Sorry.

THERAPIST: That’s actually not the heat coming on right now.

CLIENT: Oh, cool. What’s up?

THERAPIST: Nothing.

CLIENT: Yup. So… I’m broke. That sucks. Um, but I’m handling it a little better. I don’t know. I don’t know how to—you know, it’s like this unemployment thing—not being unemployed, but the unemployment checks, they fuck you up, you know, because you have to weigh what kind—you know what I mean? Like my friend Casey who has—he has two jobs, okay, he works at the airport as well. He’s like, “I can you get you a job at like an airline,” or whatever. And at first I was like, “Fuck yeah, that’s awesome.” And then I can fly wherever the fuck I want and all that. But the way they do it you have to work part time, and they pay something like $11 an hour. So basically I’d make less than I get. You know, I don’t know.

Or like even adjuncting. I ran into this poet I know and he’s like, “Yeah, you should send me your think because we need adjuncts at Loyola College,” or whatever. Not that I want to drive to Loyola College. But then on my way here I was doing the math. I was like, wait a minute, adjuncts, you get paid like two or three grand. Well, that’s—I’m still making more on my unemployment. I just— [2:00]

THERAPIST: So it almost doesn’t seem worth it.

CLIENT: Well, it isn’t worth it.

THERAPIST: [unclear]

CLIENT: It isn’t worth it, yeah. Because then what happens is—not so much with the adjuncting. Well, the adjuncting just isn’t as much money as the unemployment. But let’s say something that’s right around the same amount. The problem is any job like that is clearly not like a permanent job. You know what I mean? How long would I work at an airline, it’s just a job. So then what am I going to do? You know what I mean? Or what if it doesn’t work out or—you know, it’s not worth then having to go through the hell of restarting your unemployment again. You know, like that was a kind of night—at least for me. It wasn’t a very fun experience even doing the whole process, you know. So that’s just—it just fucking sucks. That’s why tutoring would be so great, you know. But there’s just no—it’s just unbelievable. You know, it’s just cash, something that’s cash.

THERAPIST: Sure. [3:00]

CLIENT: But, you know, I went on Craigslist again last night. It’s like, oh yeah, like 15 bucks, $17 an hour. I’m an Yale student, 17 bucks an hour. It’s like, well… I’ll go down to 45 bucks or something, but I can’t—I’m not going to tutor for $15 an hour, you know. Anyway, something will work out.

THERAPIST: When’s your unemployment up?

CLIENT: I think in the Spring. I think April or May. I think there’s an extension. I think you get like one extension, or something like that. I don’t know. I don’t know. So I mean something’s got to happen before then I hope. But yeah, I mean, the weeks fly by very quickly.

THERAPIST: Yeah, it’s not that far.

CLIENT: No, it’s not that far. That’s why the condo thing is very important. You know, because that would make a difference. You know, again I’d have to crash with my mom. Then all that—my mom’s pension and our rental income. The rental income would just be—it’s 20 something grand a year. Yes, part of that you’re going to pay to other things, but whatever. Even if it’s 10 grand a year you know that you have actual income from there, you know. [pause] I’ll figure it out.

THERAPIST: [unclear]

CLIENT: Yeah, it’s like you’re kind of… You know, instead of saying you can still get your unemployment for a while until like—there should be some other way to measure—you know what I’m saying? [5:00]

THERAPIST: Mm hm.

CLIENT: Like I’m penalized because I’m making $600 a week. Like as if that’s a shitload of money. Like it’s just—it’s a really shitty system, you know. It’s like first of all that’s my money. I should be able to opt—or there should be something that says, “You know what, I want to keep getting my unemployment and working until—” Like there should be some, I don’t know, like get you back on your feet month or something, I don’t know. It’s just silly. It’s like, well, what the fuck does that mean? So then why—of course why would I give that up? I mean, it’s giving me more than most of these other—I mean… I don’t know. But, you know. [6:00]

And I was like, well, you know, yeah, I could suck it up and move back down with my mom and rent out the third floor, you know. But I just—I refuse—I just won’t do it. I just—that’s one thing I won’t do, you know. I just keep—I can’t. Considering emotionally how—like that would be a nightmare. I just can’t do it. It’d be different if she had a big single-family home, where somehow I could really have a little bit of a corner. I mean, this is a—it’s just a three-family house. I mean, there’s no escaping— It’s just I can’t, I can’t. Even in a single-family home I can’t. It’s just—you know. There’s got to be a time when come hell or high water you just that’s it. Like I’m not—you know.

THERAPIST: How is it—it sounds like that feels different to you then selling. The condo you were selling, if I remember. [7:00]

CLIENT: Yes, because remember I was saying once that condo is sold it’s not just—because let’s say right now I crash with my mom, right. What’s going to happen? Like, yeah, that’s a little bit more money per month, but we’re still plugging holes. Like in other words nothing major’s going to—so I’m going to be stuck there. But when that condo is sold, and now those two units have no mortgage, that’s a—now you’re talking $700,000 equity. That’s all equity, right. So then it’ll be much easier to borrow $350,000—to borrow half of that—

THERAPIST: On the reverse mortgage you mean?

CLIENT: On a regular, even a regular. At that point we’ll try to get a regular home equity. Say like I’m buying another property, I want—you know, because now there’s—now we don’t have to try to find other ways, it’s all equity, there’s no mortgage, we’re more qualified.

THERAPIST: They’re not going to run a credit check to do that though you don’t think.

CLIENT: I’m sure they—no, no, I’m sure they will. Well, I mean, my credit’s improved. It’s not great, but it’s improved, yeah. And again, now it’s different because that’s a much more—your collateral is all cash, you know. [8:00]

THERAPIST: Mm hm.

And you have rental income that’s actual income. You’re not spending that on the mortgage. But regardless, even if we did do a reverse mortgage. Whatever we did. In other words, there will be a way to take that. Yeah, then it really is a temporary situation. This would not be temporary, I would be fucking stuck there. And even if I got a full-time job I’d be stuck there. It’s Darien, you know. You need thousands of dollars to get an apartment. It’s not like, “Oh yeah, I have a thousand dollars, I’ll get a—” No. They want first, last, this that.

THERAPIST: Of course. Of course.

CLIENT: You know. So I’d rather suffer through this and at least have some refuge in my apartment than—

THERAPIST: Mm hm. [9:00]

CLIENT: I wish I had someone else, like a good—like somewhere I could crash. That would be ideal, if there was someone that just had a bedroom, and if I said, “Listen man, I’m in a bad way, if somehow I could stay here for six months.” You know. But I don’t really—I don’t have that. So. [long pause, one minute] In the meantime I was hanging out today—yesterday actually, and today, at the Assyrian newspaper where I used to be an editor. There’s this guy from Cairo, journalist from Cairo, two separate friends who we are from the same circle, but these are, you know, slightly older Assyrian guys. They both called me yesterday, they’re like, “There’s this guy we want you to meet.” I was like, “Why?” They don’t really do that, you know. So—and we hung out and he’s awesome, what a sweet guy. Like he’s totally from like our—sort of very, very nice—like immediately very warm. Our families are both from the same city in Turkey. And yeah, really, really sweet. So I was just there, I’m definitely go back from here. So it was really—like that—see, I love that, they’re always like—I mean, in some ways I so don’t fit, I’m like way younger, and I was born here. But it’s just so awesome. It’s very comforting and it feels very—I don’t know, I just like that feeling, it’s a very comforting feeling.

THERAPIST: [unclear] somebody who felt like family though. [11:50]

CLIENT: Yeah, that’s—yeah, it feels like family. And plus they’re interesting guys. I mean, they’re journalists, they’re this, they’re that, so they’re—you know, it’s both comforting, but also just very interesting. I just like hearing kind of them talk sometimes, listen to their conversations, and the stories they have, and the insight they have into certain things.

THERAPIST: They’re friends who you would click with.

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah, it was cool. And today I was just there and he—at first I thought he was joking, okay, he was like, “I have to—” In Assyrian he was like, “Listen, I’m going to have to tell you something very important.” And so a couple guys were all sitting around. And he proceeded to tell me this very, very heartfelt comments about my uncle. He’s like, “Your uncle is the—” Oh, how did he say it? He was like, “At the worst moments—” other the genocide, he’s like, “At the worst moment in Assyrian history in the 20th Century,” he’s like, “your uncle was like a saint,” and he basically like martyred himself. You know, he let himself die. It just—you know what I mean? It just so got to him. And he’s like, “Don’t ever—” You know, he’s like, “I’m sure everybody tells you something when they know that he’s your uncle,” or whatever. But he’s like—you know. It was just very, very sweet. I’d never heard someone say it quite that kind of—and he said it very articulately. It wasn’t just like—you know, a lot of them will say like, “Oh, your uncle was like a saint, he was a great man.” But he’d really like—you know, it was very sweet.

THERAPIST: It sounds very powerful.

CLIENT: Mm.

THERAPIST: And like being known by someone who hardly even knows you in a way.

CLIENT: Well, that’s the thing with Assyrians, yeah, I do—it’s weird, I do get that with older—the younger people they kind of—you know, they just don’t—

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: Yeah. It’s like asking someone, “Now, who was the pope in 1965?” I have no idea, you know. So… Well, although I guess it is different. I mean, it is more shameful that they don’t know, because he wasn’t just a—you know, he was one of the most important figure—you know, so it’s kind of shitty that they don’t know. But whatever. But yeah, people that are over like 40 or 50, they know.

THERAPIST: Know. [14:30]

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah. So yeah. [pause] But it’s also—you know, the thing is with these guys it’s also just—like [unclear], the guy from the airport, yesterday night he was like, “What’s going on with this check engine light in your car?” And I’m like, “Dude, I—” You know, because I got a rejection sticker thing. I was like, “That’s just what it is, I can’t afford to—” You know, I was like, “I gotta take care of it by the end of December,” you know. But I was like, “Whatever, I just can’t deal with it right now.” He’s like, “Dude, what is it? Let’s just go and take care of it.” Like basically he’s saying, “I’ll just pay for it. What’s the big—what’s the hold up?” You know. I’m like, “Dude, what? What the fuck are you talking about?” He’s like, “What the fuck? You can’t drive around like that. Let’s just take care of it,” you know. And then I was like, “Dude, you can’t just—I can’t let you do that.” And he gave me this whole spiel about—he’s like, “Brian, listen, you get to an age where it’s like fuck everything.”

THERAPIST: [laughs]

CLIENT: He’s like, “Well, what, so what? What is it, $200, $300, what is it?” He’s like, “What’s the big—one day you’ll do that for me. When I need you to help me you’ll do it for me.” It’s like that’s—I don’t have any non-Assyrian friends who talk like that, you know. That’s not a very American—I mean, Americans are there for each other, but not quite in the way. You know what I mean? Where someone’s just there not only offering, they’re almost like pushing you to like, “Let me do this,” you know. “What’s the matter with you?” you know. That’s pretty special. Without making you feel bad, you know. [16:10]

THERAPIST: Mm hm. It’s very paternal too.

CLIENT: Oh yeah, definitely. Yeah, yeah. Well, it’s like family, yeah. Like uncles, or like my dad’s, or like an uncle kind of thing. Yeah, absolutely. And it’s also all the ways my uncle isn’t. You know, they’re very hot blooded, and very jovial, and they smoke, they drink coffee, they swear. You know, my uncle’s very—like a little bit too nice and soft kind of. Not nice. Just a little too soft and kinda—you know, it’s just personality. He actually just doesn’t have a particularly interesting personality. He has a very nice person—he’s very nice, but—you know what I mean? He doesn’t have that extra kinda— So. [pause] I don’t know, so at least that’s nice.

THERAPIST: Mm hm. It’s someone taking care of you for a second.

CLIENT: Yeah, but you know, also it’s like—it’s both ways. Like then I feel that way towards them. You know what I mean? I’ll pick him up from the airport, I’ll—it just feels—

THERAPIST: But that’s what we were talking about yesterday. You know, you were saying, “Uh oh, I don’t also do that towards women,” right. Because the idea, you know, when they’re going on about a story and they’re just complaining too. Like you do feel that in return when it’s being given to you.

CLIENT: Yes, yeah.

THERAPIST: You know what I mean?

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah.

THERAPIST: Someone’s actually said, “Let me take care of this.”

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah. [18:00]

THERAPIST: Then you can actually genuinely feel like you want [mileage of that for another taking from whomever?].

CLIENT: Right, right.

THERAPIST: Because you’ve been taken care of.

CLIENT: Right, right, right.

THERAPIST: That makes sense.

CLIENT: Yeah. You know, it’s unconditional. There’s a real unconditional thing about it, yeah.

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: That’s not with strings attached.

CLIENT: No.

THERAPIST: Or begrudging or—

CLIENT: No. [pause] I don’t know. [long pause] I think—hopefully I think I’m getting a little bit better at just focusing more on like—or just accepting that, yeah, like, you know, I’m broke, but it’s not immediately making me like angry and frustrated or whatever. I mean, maybe I just got used to it now. But I think it’s also that now I’m trying to—I’m realizing, well, no, you know what, like I’m writing—recording a new record. Like I’m doing stuff, you know, and it’s—yeah, it’s gonna suck for now, I mean, I’m just broke. But yeah, I’m kinda—it’s as if I’m kind of okay with that for now, just because…

THERAPIST: It’s also not no income. [20:00]

CLIENT: Right, yeah. It’s not that it’s no income, it’s just some weeks are worse than others.

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: Yeah, some weeks are worse than others, yeah. Yeah, like I haven’t had to ask my mom for anything in quite a while now. But like now I’m gonna have to for just a little bit to get to next week. But yeah, no, it’s actually… It hasn’t been bad. Not great, but… [pause]

THERAPIST: It’s another way I think it probably weighs on you. You hate to admit it. Like I’m the masculine man in the family, and in the culture. Your father’s the one that gave you sort of rough tough early [unclear], and so that loathe being an artist.

CLIENT: Right, right.

THERAPIST: It really doesn’t quite fit in with stoic, touch.

CLIENT: Right. Well, it does, but then I’m real—I’m realizing now that it actually does. You know, because I’m not a hobbiest, you know.

THERAPIST: Oh, I don’t mean that.

CLIENT: No, no, I know you don’t mean that, I’m saying for myself. Like now that I’m more and more it’s just who I am. So I realize, no, you know what it is, it’s hard work. You know. And yeah, it doesn’t mean 8:00 to 6:00 five days a week, whatever, but it’s hard fucking work, you know. So in that way it is like anything else. I mean, it’s—you know, it’s just a different kind of hard work and toughness. And in some ways you have to—

THERAPIST: And you know that now. [22:00]

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: But I don’t, you know, [overtalk]—

CLIENT: Oh yeah, no, I didn’t know that before.

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: No, no. That’s very— And even now, yeah, like I’m still in the process of accepting that, or embracing it. It feels good though. You know, it feels—it’s like, wait a second. I mean, yeah.

THERAPIST: And there’s a way I think you might have grown up idealizing your father’s kind of stoicism, if the alternative was your mother—

CLIENT: Yes.

THERAPIST: —and worrying and complaining.

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

THERAPIST: Like he was preferable. But there’s another way he’s his own extreme.

CLIENT: Oh, are you kidding?

THERAPIST: Like his not complaining might have killed him, you know?

CLIENT: Yeah, of course. Well, not only that, yeah, looking back on it it’s like, you know, big deal—mean, you know, he should have never sold his gas station. I mean, there was a lot of things he did that weren’t—I don’t know what the fuck he was thinking.

THERAPIST: Yeah. [23:00]

CLIENT: Someone with that personality could have done really well in business. If he had opened his own garage, are you kidding?

THERAPIST: Mm hm, mm hm.

CLIENT: Because he—it wasn’t in him to kind of rip people off or—you know what I mean?

THERAPIST: Mm hm.

CLIENT: So that’s when you start really doing well, because everyone’s going to go to you. So I never understood that. Never understood—you know. So—you know.

THERAPIST: Why he didn’t open a garage?

CLIENT: Why he wasn’t more ambitious. Like working in factories and for others. I never understood that about my dad.

THERAPIST: How have you understood it when you think about it? Was he scared, was he—what comes up in your mind?

CLIENT: I don’t—you know, that’s the thing, I don’t know. I wonder if like he… Honestly I don’t know. I’ve tried to think about it, I don’t know. I can’t say that he… I mean, he was such a hard worker. So you can’t be like, “Well, he didn’t want to start his own business because he just wanted to just punch in, punch out.” But even with punch—that was hard work. I mean, he would work late night shifts, all kinds of fucking thing. So the guy was a hard—

THERAPIST: It can even be harder.

CLIENT: Exactly!

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: So I don’t—that doesn’t make sense. I don’t know. Scared? Worried that he would fail? I don’t know. I do not know. Because there was absolutely the money to do it. I mean, those were the days where like my uncle would show up and he would need 25 grand to finish his condo project, and dad would just write him a check. And when he sold it he would just pay them back. And they did that several times. I mean, we weren’t rich, but we were okay. So I don’t understand. I don’t know. Never understood. And then when we were gonna—right before he died, that store that we were gonna buy. Then he seemed like he kinda didn’t want to do it or something. I don’t know. [25:20]

THERAPIST: Have you ever asked your mom more about—

CLIENT: No, because she—I don’t trust her version.

THERAPIST: Uh huh.

CLIENT: I never trust my mom’s version of things. Anything she’s gonna say I’ve already thought. Like, “Oh, he was a hard worker. He was worried we’d lose everything.” You know. Yeah. [pause] But yeah, I mean I know what you mean, there’s definitely a putting on the pedestal of that. I mean, that’s why even like with this Assyrian circle, I see that. You know, these last few years there’s plenty of times when I don’t feel like hanging out with these guys. I’d be like—before I’d drop everything because I wanted to hang—you know, I just wanted that feeling. But now it—you know. There’s no perfect—you know. It’s very close. I mean, I’ve never had this kind of, you know. But I also see, you know, they’re just people, and they’re struggling too, and—yeah. [long pause] [27:00]

THERAPIST: And his kind of toughness may actually have been quite a difference of [inaudible].

CLIENT: Oh yeah, yeah.

THERAPIST: Very self-protective.

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: In a way that was—

CLIENT: Unhealthy.

THERAPIST: As you said, unhealthy.

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: And it doesn’t cross your mind that it could be strong, actually it’s almost strength to feel and to—

CLIENT: Oh, right, right.

THERAPIST: Whatever falls into the groove you’re describing as complaining.

CLIENT: Right, yeah.

THERAPIST: Actually knowing one’s own inner life—

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah.

THERAPIST: —and working that as—

CLIENT: But that’s—you know, that’s his—a lot of those guys, that’s what they are. So that’s—it was easy to kind of—it was as if this like—I don’t know. It’s like a posse, you know.

THERAPIST: Yeah. [28:00]

CLIENT: Like I think of them as like this cool gang of guys that are just like—you know, just drinking whiskey, and kind of like something about them, you know what I mean? Like it’s like a—you know, even the way they would dress. Like a lot of them would not—no sneakers, no fucking jeans or whatever, they always looked kind of sharp. Even sitting in like a mechanics—you know what I mean? It’s like it’s the ultimate kind of cool. So… Because it would different if he was that way and then other guys were—

THERAPIST: Yeah. No, it’s like whatever they are.

CLIENT: It’s like his friends are like—yeah, yeah. I mean, he was the coolest of all of them, you know. I think even they would agree about that. But still, they all had this fuck the doctor, I don’t need doctors, no talking about any emotions or anything, no—you know, no real taking care of yourself or whatever. Or they think they are by, whatever, eating an apple. You know what I mean? But, you know, they’re smoking, they’re drinking a lot of coffee, they’re not expressing themselves, you know, who knows—yeah.

THERAPIST: And so there’s not a lot of real emotional contact happening with each other either.

CLIENT: No.

THERAPIST: Lots of just like surfaces thing.

CLIENT: Well, that’s the thing, it’s surfaces, but it’s not. They’re weird this way, this group. Like these are all—they’re very tight actually. But they don’t—it’s like just a given. You know what I mean?

THERAPIST: Mm hm.

CLIENT: If there was a real crisis they’re there for each other.

THERAPIST: Mm hm, mm hm.

CLIENT: But, you know, when they’re hanging out there isn’t a lot of, you know, “I’m having a fight with my wife. I feel like we’re not getting each other.” Are you kidding? There’s none of that. Or, “My boss is a fucking asshole. I don’t know what to do, maybe I need to find another—” No. You know, they don’t talk about any of those things. This guy is in his 50s. He works two fucking jobs. I mean, not one… Or even if he does it’s just very like, “Uh, I don’t know. It’s all bullshit, fuck it.” Like there’s just a very—you know what I mean? There’s no getting into it, or like, “I wonder how I could change my situation.” You know.

THERAPIST: It’s again like it’s all bullshit, that reminds me of putting it into a nice neat little container and it’s gone.

CLIENT: Yeah. But the thing is, you know, I don’t know, it works for them kind of I guess. I mean, even if it didn’t—yeah, my dad died young, but most of them didn’t. So I don’t know. I mean, I think it somehow works in their—I think. I think. [31:00]

THERAPIST: Yeah. And it’s not even a general of whether it works or it doesn’t, but it’s like a particular way of coping, right?

CLIENT: Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

THERAPIST: And not letting things come up [unclear] too much.

CLIENT: Right.

THERAPIST: Most people spend their life doing that actually, and it works well.

CLIENT: Right, right.

THERAPIST: They don’t know it’s possible that you didn’t have to do that.

CLIENT: But you know, I think with my dad—I mean, I think with a lot of these guys, but in my case, you know, I’m sure my dad, there must have been some kind of depress—I think my dad—both my parents I think were kind of—have a depressive side. But my mom, because of her father, it went more into like the humorless side, you know what I mean? My grandpa just didn’t—I mean, he would just get so worked up, and he just didn’t have a sense of humor about things. I think my dad’s was more this kind of cover it with humor and take things a little—try to take things lightly or whatever. And then he would like explode, he’d have times when he kind of, you know, explodes. So I’ve wondered about that too, that maybe he just wasn’t more ambitious because he was just kind of depressed. I don’t know what he felt—I mean, never knew what he felt about his brother dying. I mean, you know, he’s lost his brother when he was, what, 20? 34, 63. Twenty. Wait, no, no. 34—I can’t do the math. Twenty-nine. Right? 34 to 63 is 29?

THERAPIST: Mm hm.

CLIENT: Yeah. Yeah, so he—right? Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, so he was, you know, a young guy and that was his oldest brother. So I don’t know. Who knows what happened to him. Then he left the country, never saw his family again. I mean, that’s some depressing shit.

THERAPIST: Yeah. [33:10]

CLIENT: And then my mom’s family, you know, he got stuck with these clowns. Like that wasn’t always a cakewalk, a lot of times it was really shitty. So who knows, you know.

THERAPIST: I think you’re hitting on where there’s at least a possibility that it worked only so well for him.

CLIENT: Right, right.

THERAPIST: Or even like what’s possible if there actually is more access to your own inner life, your dad’s, and whatever was holding him back from doing what—maybe fulfilling his potential in some way.

CLIENT: Right.

THERAPIST: Could have gotten stuck with what else was under the rug.

CLIENT: Right, right. And they both have that, right. My mom clearly, okay, didn’t even touch her potential.

THERAPIST: Yeah. [34:00]

CLIENT: Yeah. But it was just two different approaches of how to mask that.

THERAPIST: Mm hm, mm hm.

CLIENT: Well, no, see that’s the thing, in my mom’s case there was no mask at all, just complaining and just this kind of anxious complaining kind of stuff, you know.

THERAPIST: And it’s still masked, because it’s not a productive complaining.

CLIENT: Right. Right, right, right.

THERAPIST: It’s not like a really getting to know one’s own stuff.

CLIENT: Right, right, right.

THERAPIST: In her life what was holding her back.

CLIENT: Right, yeah, because all the complaints are superficial.

THERAPIST: Right.

CLIENT: I don’t have enough money, the roof’s leaking.

THERAPIST: They don’t go anywhere either.

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: Nothing really changes—

CLIENT: Right, right.

THERAPIST: —about the complaining. There’s not an introspection about what’s stopping me.

CLIENT: Right.

THERAPIST: And your dad in his own way, like bottling something up too quickly and putting it in the nice neat little box on the shelf.

CLIENT: Right.

THERAPIST: It looks stoic, but then it never get—like you never get to look at what’s inhibiting him.

CLIENT: Right, right. [long pause, over one minute] But it’s funny, his brother was like that too. He got a better gig, because he went to St. Louis. But still, it’s like what is that? Why the fuck are you moving to—I mean, weird, I just don’t get it. I’ve never understood that. That, you know, two brothers that could have—that seemed like the obvious—who get along so well and who love each other so much, like why would—it just doesn’t make any fucking sense.

THERAPIST: Why did they even separate. [37:00]

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah. I’m like— Like it’s not—it’s very passive. I just feel like there’s a lot of passivity. It’s like, oh, go to St. Louis, and just secure a good— Yes, it is a secure great job, but you have to live in St. Louis alone, you know. And then died, right. He just did it, moved to Oregon, barely lived another two or three years and then died. So what— No, I don’t get it.

THERAPIST: I mean, that could be a piece of what you could be feeling quietly could—rebelling against the same easy secure pathway that leads to death.

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: And no actually living for the next day.

CLIENT: Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That’s true, yeah. That’s why I don’t—I mean, obviously I work, I’ve had a lot of jobs, whatever, but I never—but that can’t be it, ever, even if it is a good job. There’s something about going to someone else’s company or whatever it is that doesn’t work for me. You know. [38:15]

THERAPIST: I mean, it’s certainly of course be [unclear]. It’s a different pathway you’re on, but you also see the [unclear] your parents, and probably have feelings about what are they doing, who are they really? Look what they’ve been.

CLIENT: Right. Oh yeah, of course.

THERAPIST: What fear is holding both of them back. Even though your mother talks about her fears or doesn’t—

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: —it’s palpable that he had something happening inside him too.

CLIENT: Of course. [long pause]

THERAPIST: So tomorrow.

CLIENT: 2:20? Okay. Thanks Claire. Have a good day.

THERAPIST: You too.

END TRANSCRIPT