April 6, 2022 • 35 mins
Minnie questions Katie Nolan, sports television and podcast host. Katie shares the story of celebrating on the field at Super Bowl 51, what The Matrix taught her about finding “The One,” and the rude awakening of grocery shopping in New York City for the first time.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
I was just texting my best friends also called Mini,
and it's really weird. We got into a mistaken identity.
We're both pretty hardcore surfers and this kind of walk
in Yahoo gotten the way of her kid and was
yelling at her kid, and she got into this massive
fight with him. Anyway, it got back to everybody that
it was Mini and I took the heat. I was
getting the text messages late in the night, like you've
(00:20):
got to dial back the ag row like it's not
cool in the water with the kids, And I was like,
excuse me, you're a good friend, Mini driver. That's a
good friend thing to do. Are you the famous Mini too?
Like I mean that sounds like a ghost question, but like,
if you're the famous Mini of the two Minis, you're
always going to take the heat. That can't be good,
by the way it is. It's true. It's like my
(00:40):
dad said he'd never get on a plane with a
celebrity because if the plane went down, he refused to
be and others. Yep, I always think that when I
see somebody more famous than me on a plane, I'm like, damn,
if we go down, no one's going to remember me. Hello,
I'm Mini Driver Welcome to Many Questions Season too. I've
(01:01):
always loved Cruce's questionnaire. It was originally a nineteenth century
parlor game where players would ask each other thirty five
questions aimed at revealing the other player's true nature. It's
just the scientific method, really. In asking different people the
same set of questions, you can make observations about which
truths appeared to be universal. I love this discipline, and
(01:24):
it made me wonder, what if these questions were just
the jumping off point, what greater depths would be revealed
if I ask these questions as conversation starters with thought
leaders and trailblazers across all these different disciplines. So I
adapted prus questionnaire and I wrote my own seven questions
that I personally think a pertinent to a person's story.
(01:45):
They are when and where were you happiest? What is
the quality you like least about yourself? What relationship, real
or fictionalized, defines love for you? What question would you
most like answered, What person, place, or experience has shaped
you the most? What would be your last meal? And
can you tell me something in your life that's grown
out of a personal disaster? And I've gathered a group
(02:08):
of really remarkable people, ones that I am honored and
humbled to have had the chance to engage with. You
may not hear their answers to all seven of these questions.
We've whittled it down to which questions felt closest to
their experience, or the most surprising, or created the most
fertile ground to connect. My guest today on many questions
(02:32):
is sports analyst and television host Katie Nolan. What's interesting
about Katie is that in the male dominated world of
sports presenting, she is utterly self made. She wrote a blog,
started making videos by herself, and drew attention and then
jobs by carving a space for herself out of sheer will,
knowledge and humor. She's gone on to win a Sports
(02:56):
Emmy and has also been nominated multiple times. Mostly she
hosted NBC's coverage of the two Olympics. In my opinion,
we need more Katie Nolan's in the world of sport.
In your life, can you tell me something that has
grown out of a personal disaster? This question is hard
(03:18):
because I mean, I haven't had a big personal disaster.
I've been very fortunate and very lucky, and I remind
myself of that all the time. But I think the
time in my life where I was going in a
direction and then it stopped was after I graduated college.
Graduated in two thousand nine from Hofstra University. Go Pride
used to be the Flying Dutchman, but they changed it
to Pride as like a group of lions. It was
(03:39):
a mess. Flying Dutchman was a ship. I don't understand
who was offensive to point is. Graduating two thousand nine,
the economy was in a place so everybody was looking
for a job. My cousin from California was moving to
New York City to do teach for America, and I
was like, oh, perfect, she's moving here. I'm not going
to not move into the city with her. So we
were roommates. But I didn't have a job, but I
was always making it work, so I'd make it work,
(04:01):
like I waited tables through college. I had money saved up.
I moved to the city with her. Was out of
my money by the like third month. We were living
in a six floor walk up on the Upper East Side.
I was eating cereal out of bags. I had no
idea how expensive groceries were in the city. Didn't even
cross my mind, walked into a gristitis and was like,
this is how much a yogurt costs. It was insane.
(04:25):
I also bought groceries like I lived in a suburb,
and then when I got to the checkout, they were like,
how are you going to get this home? And I
was like, oh, I didn't think through any of this.
It was a mess. Couldn't get a job. Worked in
Equinox selling gym memberships for six months, and then it
felt like an awful person locking people into a year
contract that was way too expensive that I knew they
were never going to use the gym. Couldn't do sales.
(04:46):
I quit. I moved back home, so I felt like, damn,
there goes my big New York City dream. I'm never
gonna make it in the world. I don't even know
what I want to do. And then I started bar
attending because I was like, I know how to make
money that way. But my mom had always told me.
She was like, you can bartend. You will not bartend forever.
You're going to go to college, you're gonna graduate, you're
(05:06):
gonna get a job. You're not going to fall into
this because it's easy to kind of get comfortable with.
You're getting cash at night, you are social, you're talking
to people, you kind of feel like you're part of it,
but you're not. You're working. It can be very um enticing,
and you can kind of lose years of your life
doing it. I've seen it happen to people, but my
mom always planted in my head, like, don't do that.
So I started a blog. I don't know why. It's
(05:28):
the only thing in my life I've ever like started
on my own and really stuck with because I knew
at that time, if you tweeted your blog at somebody
and they clicked on it and they saw that you
had written like a post, they were going to know
you're not really a blogger. But if they click on
it and they see that you posted four times a day, oh,
this is a legitimate website. In my head, that made sense.
So I was like, let me just make sure I
(05:48):
write four things a day, and then when I want
to send it to somebody is like, check us out.
If they click on it, maybe they'll like the blog.
Nobody was reading it, and then um people started reading it,
and then a come and he asked me to do
videos for them, and I was like I don't do
on camera stuff. I'm very uncomfortable on camera. Which I
was very uncomfortable on camera, but I learned and I
(06:08):
learned to get better at it. And I did that
out of my house for two years. And then somebody
was like, we're launching a sports network. Do you want
to be on it? And even my mom was like,
you don't know enough. You can't do that. And I
was like, well, let them tell me that. Because they
said that, it's fine. So if they think I know enough,
then I think I know enough and I won't ever
go on TV and say something without looking it up
first and familiarizing myself with it. She was like, deal.
(06:30):
So I took it, and my career kind of grew
from there. So I thought my life was done when
I graduated, and it hadn't even started yet. You created
the whole thing. I had a lot of help. I
had a lot of help along the way. Good I'm glad,
But nobody sat down and wrote the blog four times
a day. You put those things together. So it's it's
so cool, particularly when things are not going great. It's
(06:51):
sometimes hard, like in the present moment, when something's not
going great, looking back at an illustration of when that
was also happening, but feeling like, well, there's no way
that could happen twice, you know, but it always does.
It's sometimes it's not on the timeline I think that
we expect and we go, Wow, I'm back in the
shutter and nothing's working out. I do remember when this
happened before, But what are the chances that are happening again?
(07:13):
And that's hopefully when you know someone else goes just
take a deep breath, hang on, write something, go for
a walk, love your dog, Oh my god, that I
can do. I mean, I think that's what I do.
I mean, what else are we supposed to do? Enjoy
it all, because then it's over very quickly. Yeah. Recently
I had a moment where I where like everything was
kind of crashing and falling apart, not going the way
(07:34):
that I thought it was going to go, and I
just remember finally just crying, like losing it, crying in
front of my boyfriend. He was in the other room
and we've been dating for I don't know, six months,
and I remember thinking I was terrified that he was
gonna hear you know when you do that cry where
you're like and you just can't breathe. And I was like,
he's gonna hear you, he's gonna think you're nuts. And
(07:54):
he came running around the corner and he was smiling
and he was like, finally, finally, He's like, let it out.
This sucks, everything sucks. Let it out. Feel sad. You
have to feel this so you can stop feeling it
and get back to the thing that you're supposed to be.
He's like, you are exactly where you're supposed to be.
And I just remember that being so comforting of like, oh,
(08:16):
you're not supposed to not feel it. You have to
feel it, so you can stop. But right now where
you are, stop trying to not be there, be there.
You're exactly where you're supposed to be. I think that's
hugely wise. It's difficult to do, and you do sometimes
you need someone else to say it's all right, this sucks,
and it's allowed to suck for a minute or longer
than a minute. It's allowed to be bad, so that
you can then regroup and figure out what the next
(08:39):
move is and do that from a place of not
feeling hysterical or like you're keeping it all in for
everybody else's because it'll bubble up. Your stuff will always
find you. I think so. But I do think it's
constantly evolving, and I do think whatever looks like it's
not working out, it really genuinely is something else working out.
And just being able to pause in those moments and
trust that. I mean, I don't know. I'm saying this
(09:00):
because it's what I need to listen to. What quality
do you like at least about yourself? I mean, how
much time you got? But the one that will always
I think haunt me is time management. I hate my
lack of an ability to manage time. I get very
caught up in my brain and I'm very curious, so
(09:21):
I follow a lot of paths, Like I could spend
an hour and a half reading about drama between two
people I've never met and don't know and I've never
heard of. Until I see a headline of this drama
that sounds interesting, I can read it and learn everything
about it and then just like not be bored for
an hour and a half and I can learn something
about me during that, And I can, but then I
(09:41):
just lose track of everything else. Scheduling things makes me
so anxious. I was ten minutes late, for this a
thing that was very important to me, and I'm in
my pajamas. I just find a way. But the most
generous reading I've had of that is my good friend
Mina Kimes, who also works in sports TV and is
brilliant and is our future and our queen. She said
she compared me to Andy Reid, and I know that
(10:02):
might not land with many, but I can explain it.
He's a football coach who is very creative in his
play calling, but sometimes he gets so distracted by how
creative he wants to be that he doesn't realize that
the game is about to end, and so he runs
out of time to do the thing he wanted to
do because he was showing off all the things he
knows how to do. It was part of the thing
that's helped me see the good intentions of my weaknesses
(10:24):
and try to do my best at them where I can,
and then be prepared to apologize for them or warn
people of them ahead of time, because nothing's worse than
disappointing people. Oh, but that's just part of yourself criticism.
You know there are things worse than disappointing people. Yes,
probably killing people. I think maybe after you've disappointed them. Yeah,
(10:44):
well then you have to exactly. I like that idea
that there isn't enough time. You can't say if your
best plays for when the clock's running out. It's true.
You just have to do it, you really do, and
you really have to kind of I say this a lot.
It's a soccer term, which is, even if it's going
really badly, you have to play to the last whistle,
like you have to play with everything, which I think
(11:06):
is the other side of like don't save all your
creative play for the last fourteen seconds of a game.
But I'm a procrastinator. That's what I do because if
I as soon as I write it, or film it
or put it on paper, whatever it is I'm making,
then it's going to be done. And I don't want
it to be done. I like living in the part
where you're figuring it out until it's perfect. I don't
(11:26):
want to do it. But what about the idea that
like there's no there there and that it is never
going to be perfect? I know, what about letting go
of the idea of like this constraint you've put on
it and just be in the process, which you clearly
love because God knows you create. Everything is self generated
that you do, Everything is about you creating this content
and offering that up. And people clearly obsessively love what
(11:50):
you do. Even the people that don't get it, they
love what you do. I think that might be one
of the nicest things anyone said to me. That's very calm,
but I do think it's true. It's like I was
looking at the people that haven't necessarily got it. That's okay.
Like again, this notion of time throwing out the window,
it's like you're just waiting for everybody else to catch up.
That's what it seems to me. I hope that you
(12:12):
will be nicer to yourself about whatever you think you're
shortcomings off, because you're great. Where and when were you happiest?
I mean, it's hard. It's also a good question to
think about, if I can just delay answering it for
(12:33):
a second, because it's not the moments I find myself
thinking about the most. Like when I heard this question,
it was like, well, if you ask me sadness, I
could give you top five off the top of my head.
So it's good for me to go back through all
the good ones and think about it. Can I give
you two answers, because I think it shows the two
types of happiness that I value the most. One was
(12:54):
the Super Bowl. The Super Bowl fifty one, which I'm
sure you remember many driver, is when the Patriots beat
the Atlanta Falcons in overtime. It was the first overtime
in the Super Bowl. It was a game that they
were losing in the first half. It looked like it
was gonna be a loss. I'm a Patriots fan. I
had been in Houston for the week hosting my own
(13:16):
show on TV Live, which I had never really done before,
so it was a big accomplishment for me. It didn't
go perfectly, but I at least learned a lot. I
had like, it's a very small appearance on my favorite
show in the world, the reason why I want to
do this with my life, The Daily Show. I had
done a silly like here's what's happening on social media,
but it was my parents saw me on the Super Bowl,
(13:37):
which you know, they were so proud, and I got
to shout out my family on the Super Bowl. And
then I was at the game and the Patriots came back,
tied the game, we went to overtime, we won. I
got down on the field and got to hug a
player on the Patriots who I met through my job,
Martellis Bennett, after he had just won the Super Bowl.
I remember standing there and being like, this is is
(14:00):
the peak of your life. This is the coolest moment
that working and your job has gotten you to this
place where And I don't think I really noticed then
fully the extent of my happiness, but looking back at
it now where we are in the world, everything was
kind of perfect. It was such a celebratory moment. The
second moment couldn't be more different, but feels almost the
(14:22):
same in my heart. It was during the quarantine. I
had woken up early for work. I was filming a
TV show out of a spare bedroom of my house.
I put on a full face and makeup, which I
still have no idea how to do myself. God bless
hair and makeup. That's what I've learned over these last
couple of years. One of the many lessons is that
those people are angels and I need them in my life.
But I just put on this full face and makeup
(14:42):
and done a fifteen minute hit from some room, and
then I came back into my bedroom and my boyfriend
and my dog were cuddled up asleep, and I just
got back in bed with them and snuggled them, and
I was like, this is it's all for this. These
are the moments that I'll look back on and be
like lived I loved. Things were bad, things were bad,
(15:04):
world things were bad, and my job situation was bad,
and it was a time of unrest, but in that
moment we still found peace. I think that's why I
value you know, so when you say happiest, it's like,
not everything was the best, but that was exactly what
my soul needed that day. Well. I do think that's
the bit that we don't talk about enough, is that
(15:24):
happiness is not necessarily qualified by everything being happy. There
at these moments that we recognize happiness sometimes incredibly challenging.
What year was that that they beat the falcons in
in overtime? It was twenty seventeen. It was the before times. Yes, yes,
before we knew well, but we kind of thought we knew,
(15:46):
but we didn't know. You know, well, I feel like,
you know, Trump was the helpful herald of the pestilence
that was coming. So actually your right sort of bang
in the middle of it. That does sound. Even as
somebody for whom football is a completely different game, I
can appreciate how absolutely astonishing that moment must have been.
Oh my god, it was unbelievable. And it's not like,
(16:07):
you know, it would have been obviously a better movie
in the movie version of it. It would have been
like the Patriots first Super Bowl, like they had one,
they had the capacity to win, but it was the
way that they were completely down the first half. It
was awful. Brady had thrown a pick at the end
of the second quarter and it was just like, what's happening?
And then it just it was beautiful. It was awesome.
So let me ask you this, because again with my
(16:29):
whatever the opposite of encyclopediac is, that's my knowledge about
American football. How is it being a fan of a
team that is never the underdog? And I'm I'm assuming
that they are never the underdog soon once it all
wears off, because you know, sports fans memories kind of
linger for a while. We don't like to move on,
(16:50):
is one thing I've learned working in this industry, And
so like that narrative is gonna last for a while,
but they'll be underdogs against soon and people are gonna
love it. But it's funny because I grew up with
my dad complaining about how Boston fans couldn't catch a break,
the Red Sox, the Patriots. It's just like let down
after letdown. He was not a basketball guy, so I
(17:11):
probably back then would have been like, you should have
liked the Celtics that went well, But he raised me
to think that we had been down trodden. And then
sort of by the time I came into my own
understanding of my sports fandom as I'm hitting high school
and then college, we were just winning all the time,
and so it was like I now feel like I
was spoiled, but at the time I felt like I
(17:33):
had inherited my Dad's like, no, no, this, we deserved this.
But it's like, yeah, but I didn't deserve my dad
deserved it. And I'll tell you my dad didn't even
enjoy it as much as he probably would have thought
that he did because he never trusted He never trusted
the Red Sox. He never let them like become the winners,
and then he was like, I can count on them
to win. It was like the second they would lose,
he was like, ah, they stink and would just bail
(17:53):
on him. And it was just this to me, stereotypical
attitude of a person from Boston towards sports that never
fully changed if you experienced the pain of it, because
you always knew it was just around the corner. So
I tried to slow him down and tell him, like,
this is the good. Enjoy the good while it's here.
I know. I think that's what I'm interested in. It's
like the loss of Like I loved my football team,
(18:15):
my soccer team when we were shipped, and then I
loved it when everybody gave us ship for the rich
Russian coming and augmenting our team, and it changed everything.
And now we're back in the shitter with the government
basically taking bids on who's going to buy the team
that I've supported since I was a kid. Like, it's weird,
but I think those vicissitudes as a fan those verse
(18:37):
did you say vicissitudes? Vicissitudes ups and downs in a
ten cent word? I love? What a good word is that?
A C there V I C. You don't have to
know this, mini driver, I'll google it. V I C
I S S I T U D E S. Vicissitudes, vicissitudes,
That's what I would have guessed I would have gotten
that in a spelling ups and downs, Katie, ups and downs, Yes, exactly.
(19:00):
But I think that's part of what is. It's like everything.
It's what makes you appreciate the well being ship made
you appreciate snuggling in bed with your dog and your boyfriend.
And I'd take it any day of the week. If
I could teleport to a place, I think that would
be it, you know, And I try to remind myself
that every time I'm here, I'm like, this is where
you want to be. So while you're here, don't worry
(19:21):
about anything else. Just think about this, because this when
you're out doing all the other stuff, you're gonna want
to be back here. So be here now. Yeah, exactly. Okay.
So what relationship, real or fictionalized, defines love for you.
It's a weird answer, but stay with me because I
(19:42):
think this is what my brain really thinks. It's Trinity
and Neo from the Matrix, a faultless answer. I took
forever to see that movie because I had a weirdly
vivid memory of my dad watching it when it came out,
and so I was eleven, which is probably too old
to be scared. But my dad was watching it really
(20:03):
late at night, really loud, and I just remember gunshots
being very loud in my house and it's scaring me
because it was middle of the night. It woke me up,
and so I was like, what movie were you watching
last night? And he said, The Matrix, Mike, I'll never
see it. I'll never see it. It was so scary.
And then you know, when we were locked up and
I had nothing to do, I was like, let me
watch all this stuff I've never seen. I watched The Matrix,
(20:23):
and my takeaway at the end of the whole thing,
I'm like, I feel like a lot of people missed
the point of this movie. Like it felt to me
like the most obvious thing was Trinity. Loving Neo was
how Neo was able to believe that he was the one,
which is the only way he was able to become
the one. So without love, he wouldn't have known his
own potential. Her belief in him allowed him to believe
(20:44):
in himself because he loved her, and if she believed
in him, then he believed in him. To me, that
is love. Love is finding somebody who believes in you
so much that you couldn't possibly not believe in yourself.
Do you think that that needing self love to be
augmented by someone else? Is like? Is that part of
(21:05):
love you like? Is there a missing piece that, like,
for example, your boyfriend or someone that you love fills
because you that's part of that your foundational understanding of
love is like having something else there to make it real.
It's having a partner to whether any storm with. It's
having a teammate. It's having someone you can always trust
that they're going to be honest with you and also
(21:27):
keep you grounded, remind you of who you are. It's
just an external reflection of your best self to remind you.
You know, when I look at my boyfriend and he
looks at me, I can almost it helps me be
aware of me because I see him looking at me.
Is this making any sense? No, it makes total sense.
I just think it's really I think it's really interesting.
(21:49):
Think it's really interesting because what you're describing really is
like having this coach that you're allowed to be in
love with. It is that bad? Am I finding out
that I'm codependent? No? Not all, are you joking? It
just means that that you're literally like living in the
world that you love being in, which is like, of
course love would have a sports analogy in it for you. Yeah,
(22:09):
that's the word. Is that somebody to imbue you just
say your self love, you are worthy, and then you
yourself see yourself as worthy. Yeah, that's every great teacher.
So yeah, if we need someone to help us get there,
why the hell not? I mean again, for me life,
all bets are off. That's why I hate you know
how to books about certainly the big life subjects, because
it's not one size fits all. It's not if you
(22:31):
do this, then this will happen. It's like read this,
think about this, and then put it into your main frame.
But like you've really identified I like having knowing someone
loves me. It makes me help me love myself better.
So if that makes you feel good, then who's to
say that you're supposed to get the self love first
and then be loved. Everybody says it, But here's the thing,
that you have to love yourself before someone else can
(22:52):
love you. Does still ring true to me because I
think there was a period of my life where I
was The best way I can describe it is like
acting out what I thought I was supposed to be
doing and then I sort of had, you know, life happen,
and recently have come into like just do what you
want to be doing. And I think once I came
(23:12):
into that was when I found I mean, I think
he's the love of my life and you know, have
had this incredible relationship that came exactly when I needed it.
And he sort of helps me remember me as opposed
to telling you know what I mean, Instead of telling
me I'm worthy and so I'm worthy, it's more like
sometimes I forget and he will remind me of it.
(23:35):
And because he exists externally from my brain, which sometimes
I get into situations because of my mental health because
I struggle with depression and I have a d h D.
Sometimes things get a little toxic upstairs and I can't
tell if it's me or if it's real. And he's
sort of just like the what's the thing in in
that movie about dreaming. It's a little token or whatever
(23:56):
that they have that reminds them of an inception. What
do they call it? What is it? Well, it's his
spinning top or whatever. Yeah, yeah, it's he's like my
little like okay, the spins. So it is real, I
have a boyfriend like that too. Oh no, is that?
Did you say you had a boyfriend like this too?
As in like I'm gonna that this is going to
end and I'm gonna go under the next one. No no, no, no, no,
(24:17):
I have a boyfriend like that now, okay, thos it
had damn so it ends? No no, no no, no, no no.
And it's all of that idea that you have to
get there by yourself. Yes, it's a really nice and
great thing. And of course finding self love and yourself
is a really good thing to aim for. Having help
and being augmented by a loving partner or someone who
is more tolerant of your ship than you are of
your own is a really good thing, well prescribed so
(24:40):
many things. It's really you know yourself to know that
he's helping that part of you that is in pain
or is difficult. So that feels a lot like love
to me. But yeah, also Neo and Trinity for sure.
And just as an aside, I met the as was
then witch Howski Brothers now just the Wichowskis for that
part and wanted to in that film. Oh my god,
(25:01):
you would have been great. No, But but there can
be only one. I mean, carry On Moss was who
Carryan's just plays it perfectly. She really is. It's just
she's just the most beautiful and lovely and deep. But
I remember looking at the storyboards of that film and going,
this film is epic. It's very good. I wasted so
many years not dressing up as her for Halloween. I
(25:22):
waited way too long to watch it. That's okay, sort of.
The nineties are really bad. They really are. I've got
like bangs. You know we're doing it. You just don't
plug your eyebrows. No, I won't. Can we never go
back to whatever we were doing? Then? It's just terrific.
It was awful. It really was awful. So in your life,
(25:53):
what person, place, or experience has most altered it? I
want to give credit to the good. But I'm I
can't believe I'm voluntarily bringing up this topic. But I'm
going to say middle school. I think middle school as
a place and as just like an entire chapter of
my life shaped me the most as a person. Because look,
I was born into middle class family in a suburb
(26:15):
framing him Massachusetts shout out. You know, life wasn't hard
by a large metric. But I had a bad haircut
from first grade through eighth grade, and those last three
years there were a real tough time because it was
six seventh eighth, which is when kids like no enough
words to hurt you, and um I was. I wasn't
(26:37):
very popular, but I was such a happy, smiley, friendly
kid and wanted everybody to like me. And I think
I learned in middle school a lot about people, and
a lot about me, and a lot about how little
a lot of things matter, like the opinions of people
whose opinions you, in other contexts wouldn't respect. I think
(26:59):
it taught me the value of being a good friend,
because that was one of the only ways I was
going to make a lot of friends is by, you know,
being there for people who didn't have anybody else. And
so I've always said this about me and never really
understood what it said about me. I used to think
it was a bad thing that if somebody was being bullied,
even if that person had bullied me before, I would
(27:20):
always be like, all right, do you want to talk
about it and be there for them. I always thought
it was a weakness, and I'm starting to see it
as a fundamental part of who I am. It's tough
now because when we get into issues of bigger things
like hatred and race and all the things. I'm not
saying that I'm a person that thinks people can do
no wrong. I'm a person that values holding people accountable
(27:43):
with a loving hand. Does that make sense? I don't know.
I just think people were mean to people and I
wanted to be nice. So let me ask you. Does
that inform dealing with that version of middle school today,
which for me is like certain aspects of social media
and that toxicity that's there. Oh yeah? Was it are
traumatically recognizable for you? Or do you try and deal
with it in the same way? I mean, I don't
(28:05):
think it eviogates maybe easier, but it actually I mean,
in the last few years, I think it has. My
relationship with social media I would not describe as healthy.
I came up through you know, YouTube videos, and when
I was making YouTube videos, I was reading the comments.
I used to run my own Facebook page where I
had like seventy fans and I would talk to them.
I would like post and they would post. I knew
(28:25):
them by name. When one of them just stopped posting,
I noticed, I asked where he was like, I'm incredibly online.
What I've started to look at social media as now
is like, you get to watch people interacting with each other.
Sometimes they're doing it performatively, sometimes they know like somebody
else send a tweet where it's like I feel this
way about this thing, and I've done it all figured out.
That kind of stuff you gotta take with a grain
(28:45):
of salt. But when you get into the meat of it,
when you scroll down through the replies and the conversations
that branch off from the replies, or if you scroll
through Reddit, not at the you know, controversial top pages,
but you go to the pages of things you're interested in,
and why watch people have conversations. You can observe humans
and how they interact and how conflicts happen, and where
(29:07):
the disagreements happen, and when disagreements turn into agreements. You
can be like, oh, that that's how they bridged that gap.
You can learn stuff. And so I started looking at
social media that way. I used to get in arguments
all the time, replying to tweet something You're not seeing
it my way. And I had a boyfriend and ex
boyfriend now who was like, you're not gonna change people's minds.
Why do you care? And I was like, it's a
really good point. But I think the reason I care
(29:29):
is because to not care implies that I think I'm
better or different than anybody else. I think a lot
of people want to be a part of the conversation.
The way that they can do that is social media.
The good of that that we've seen as people and
communities who haven't had an avenue to speak on things
and the way that they receive things have been able
(29:49):
to speak up and and meet each other and sort
of come together and form movements. I think the bad
side of it is that everybody gets to say anything
they want about everything that happens, and everything is constantly happening.
So you get this world where now we have news
organizations that write articles where the headline is blank. Happens
(30:10):
and social media erupts and you're like, yes, something happened
and people reacted, but is it worth writing a whole
article on your website, which then makes it seem like
this idea that maybe seventeen people had is now an
idea that people should pick sides on. It turns everything
(30:30):
into a conversation about the conversation instead of an actual
conversation about a thing. And so like I've tried to,
you know, be the change you want to see in
the world. Blah blah blah. I try to when I
log onto social media. Now, this is so stupid, but
hopefully it will make sense to someone. And I'm not
recommending this, but my approaches. I pretend it's somebody who
(30:51):
loves me, who's joking or who um isn't as good
at communicating as I am, haven't studied and thought about
the amount of words and how to use them the
way that I have. So I give them the benefit
of the doubt a little bit. And then if they
continue to prove and I've got my own little red flags,
and I'm like, all right, that's one. That's one strike.
You're not getting past this. Uh, I will end the
(31:13):
conversation for my own sake. But I've noticed people you
can kind of be like, I get it. I disagree,
but I get it. On like certain things, there are
places they can go that are bad. And like I said,
my privilege has made it so I don't have to
deal with much of that. But whenever I hear people say,
here's the problem with social media like people. It's people.
Heart of it is people. It's just people. Even the
(31:35):
things that are the problem with social media that's engineered
by the social it's made by people. And so what
the problem always boiled down to me, it felt like
was it's people. And as a people, I'm like, maybe
I can find some sort of an answer about how
I think we should use it, and then I can
just start using it that way and see how it works.
You know, yeah, I do. I'm also fascinated by what
was your haircut between first and eighth grade? I can
(31:58):
show you it. I want to see that, because like,
what was that so bad? It was? So I'm Italian,
um like three quarters Italian, a quarter Irish, So that
means I'm furry, if you will, if I can put
that as cutely as possible. And so, you know, going
through puberty, I had this short haircut. So it was
like my mom would do this little swoosh, she would
blow dry this little wave at the front. Uh, and
(32:21):
then it was just short like a boy's haircut in
the back. And so I was, you know, often misunderstood
for a boy because you know, at that age you
see the haircut, you just assume. I played hockey when
I was really little, so I had a helmet and
was called Kyle. I was quiet and speak up, and
I would just let them. I didn't want to have
to explain that I was a girl that felt uncomfortable.
Then as I was getting older and trying to grow
(32:43):
it out, and it was, it went through this awkward stay.
I'll try to find you the worst picture I have many,
it's real bad. I'm sure that your mom was just
being practical, having your happy short na. She was. She's like,
it makes you stand out, it's sure dead it did.
I genuinely think it was because she couldn't find me
on stage at the day's recital because all the girls
had buns, and she was like, just cut it off
(33:03):
and then I can find her by the way. I mean,
I'm not mad at that parenting logic, but I'm sorry
for your trauma. Oh thank you. I walked my dog
during whatever time I was home last some holiday, I
walked my dog in the middle schools right across the
street from my house. I walked my dog there and
we walked around and I peeked into the cafeteria, which
was like my own personal hell, and it just I
was like, ha, I made it, so screw all, y'all.
(33:27):
I made it. My dog was like, what are we doing?
Can I pee? I was like, yeah, go ahead, pee
on the building for all I care. I really have
so loved talking to you. I'm so thank you, Katie.
I'm really, really, really excited for whatever you do next.
I'm telling you, I have a very strong, witchy feeling.
You just feel like the right person who's going to
(33:49):
be able to champion everything that you're brilliant at is
just is right there. Oh many, You're just so sweet.
This is the sweetest. This has been such a joy.
Thank you for having me. There's been a bit of
a sea change in the world of sports and sports media.
With people like Katie in the industry, I think we
can feel comfortable that the future is in good hands.
(34:09):
To stay up to date on Katie's reporting and announcements,
follow her on Instagram at Natie Colon. Yep, that is
Natie Colon, not Katie Nolan. Mini Questions is hosted and
written by me Mini Driver, supervising producer Aaron Kaufman, Producer
(34:31):
Morgan Levoy, research assistant Marissa Brown. Original music Sorry Baby
by Mini Driver, Additional music by Aaron Kaufman. Executive produced
by me Mini Driver. Special thanks to Jim Nikolay, Will Pearson,
Addison No Day, Lisa Castella and a Nick Oppenheim at
(34:53):
w kPr DA, La Pescador, Kate Driver and Jason Weinberg,
And for con cintly solicited TEX support, Henry Driver,
I was just texting my best friends also called Mini,
and it's really weird. We got into a mistaken identity.
We're both pretty hardcore surfers and this kind of walk
in Yahoo gotten the way of her kid and was
yelling at her kid, and she got into this massive
fight with him. Anyway, it got back to everybody that
it was Mini and I took the heat. I was
getting the text messages late in the night, like you've
(00:20):
got to dial back the ag row like it's not
cool in the water with the kids, And I was like,
excuse me, you're a good friend, Mini driver. That's a
good friend thing to do. Are you the famous Mini too?
Like I mean that sounds like a ghost question, but like,
if you're the famous Mini of the two Minis, you're
always going to take the heat. That can't be good,
by the way it is. It's true. It's like my
(00:40):
dad said he'd never get on a plane with a
celebrity because if the plane went down, he refused to
be and others. Yep, I always think that when I
see somebody more famous than me on a plane, I'm like, damn,
if we go down, no one's going to remember me. Hello,
I'm Mini Driver Welcome to Many Questions Season too. I've
(01:01):
always loved Cruce's questionnaire. It was originally a nineteenth century
parlor game where players would ask each other thirty five
questions aimed at revealing the other player's true nature. It's
just the scientific method, really. In asking different people the
same set of questions, you can make observations about which
truths appeared to be universal. I love this discipline, and
(01:24):
it made me wonder, what if these questions were just
the jumping off point, what greater depths would be revealed
if I ask these questions as conversation starters with thought
leaders and trailblazers across all these different disciplines. So I
adapted prus questionnaire and I wrote my own seven questions
that I personally think a pertinent to a person's story.
(01:45):
They are when and where were you happiest? What is
the quality you like least about yourself? What relationship, real
or fictionalized, defines love for you? What question would you
most like answered, What person, place, or experience has shaped
you the most? What would be your last meal? And
can you tell me something in your life that's grown
out of a personal disaster? And I've gathered a group
(02:08):
of really remarkable people, ones that I am honored and
humbled to have had the chance to engage with. You
may not hear their answers to all seven of these questions.
We've whittled it down to which questions felt closest to
their experience, or the most surprising, or created the most
fertile ground to connect. My guest today on many questions
(02:32):
is sports analyst and television host Katie Nolan. What's interesting
about Katie is that in the male dominated world of
sports presenting, she is utterly self made. She wrote a blog,
started making videos by herself, and drew attention and then
jobs by carving a space for herself out of sheer will,
knowledge and humor. She's gone on to win a Sports
(02:56):
Emmy and has also been nominated multiple times. Mostly she
hosted NBC's coverage of the two Olympics. In my opinion,
we need more Katie Nolan's in the world of sport.
In your life, can you tell me something that has
grown out of a personal disaster? This question is hard
(03:18):
because I mean, I haven't had a big personal disaster.
I've been very fortunate and very lucky, and I remind
myself of that all the time. But I think the
time in my life where I was going in a
direction and then it stopped was after I graduated college.
Graduated in two thousand nine from Hofstra University. Go Pride
used to be the Flying Dutchman, but they changed it
to Pride as like a group of lions. It was
(03:39):
a mess. Flying Dutchman was a ship. I don't understand
who was offensive to point is. Graduating two thousand nine,
the economy was in a place so everybody was looking
for a job. My cousin from California was moving to
New York City to do teach for America, and I
was like, oh, perfect, she's moving here. I'm not going
to not move into the city with her. So we
were roommates. But I didn't have a job, but I
was always making it work, so I'd make it work,
(04:01):
like I waited tables through college. I had money saved up.
I moved to the city with her. Was out of
my money by the like third month. We were living
in a six floor walk up on the Upper East Side.
I was eating cereal out of bags. I had no
idea how expensive groceries were in the city. Didn't even
cross my mind, walked into a gristitis and was like,
this is how much a yogurt costs. It was insane.
(04:25):
I also bought groceries like I lived in a suburb,
and then when I got to the checkout, they were like,
how are you going to get this home? And I
was like, oh, I didn't think through any of this.
It was a mess. Couldn't get a job. Worked in
Equinox selling gym memberships for six months, and then it
felt like an awful person locking people into a year
contract that was way too expensive that I knew they
were never going to use the gym. Couldn't do sales.
(04:46):
I quit. I moved back home, so I felt like, damn,
there goes my big New York City dream. I'm never
gonna make it in the world. I don't even know
what I want to do. And then I started bar
attending because I was like, I know how to make
money that way. But my mom had always told me.
She was like, you can bartend. You will not bartend forever.
You're going to go to college, you're gonna graduate, you're
(05:06):
gonna get a job. You're not going to fall into
this because it's easy to kind of get comfortable with.
You're getting cash at night, you are social, you're talking
to people, you kind of feel like you're part of it,
but you're not. You're working. It can be very um enticing,
and you can kind of lose years of your life
doing it. I've seen it happen to people, but my
mom always planted in my head, like, don't do that.
So I started a blog. I don't know why. It's
(05:28):
the only thing in my life I've ever like started
on my own and really stuck with because I knew
at that time, if you tweeted your blog at somebody
and they clicked on it and they saw that you
had written like a post, they were going to know
you're not really a blogger. But if they click on
it and they see that you posted four times a day, oh,
this is a legitimate website. In my head, that made sense.
So I was like, let me just make sure I
(05:48):
write four things a day, and then when I want
to send it to somebody is like, check us out.
If they click on it, maybe they'll like the blog.
Nobody was reading it, and then um people started reading it,
and then a come and he asked me to do
videos for them, and I was like I don't do
on camera stuff. I'm very uncomfortable on camera. Which I
was very uncomfortable on camera, but I learned and I
(06:08):
learned to get better at it. And I did that
out of my house for two years. And then somebody
was like, we're launching a sports network. Do you want
to be on it? And even my mom was like,
you don't know enough. You can't do that. And I
was like, well, let them tell me that. Because they
said that, it's fine. So if they think I know enough,
then I think I know enough and I won't ever
go on TV and say something without looking it up
first and familiarizing myself with it. She was like, deal.
(06:30):
So I took it, and my career kind of grew
from there. So I thought my life was done when
I graduated, and it hadn't even started yet. You created
the whole thing. I had a lot of help. I
had a lot of help along the way. Good I'm glad,
But nobody sat down and wrote the blog four times
a day. You put those things together. So it's it's
so cool, particularly when things are not going great. It's
(06:51):
sometimes hard, like in the present moment, when something's not
going great, looking back at an illustration of when that
was also happening, but feeling like, well, there's no way
that could happen twice, you know, but it always does.
It's sometimes it's not on the timeline I think that
we expect and we go, Wow, I'm back in the
shutter and nothing's working out. I do remember when this
happened before, But what are the chances that are happening again?
(07:13):
And that's hopefully when you know someone else goes just
take a deep breath, hang on, write something, go for
a walk, love your dog, Oh my god, that I
can do. I mean, I think that's what I do.
I mean, what else are we supposed to do? Enjoy
it all, because then it's over very quickly. Yeah. Recently
I had a moment where I where like everything was
kind of crashing and falling apart, not going the way
(07:34):
that I thought it was going to go, and I
just remember finally just crying, like losing it, crying in
front of my boyfriend. He was in the other room
and we've been dating for I don't know, six months,
and I remember thinking I was terrified that he was
gonna hear you know when you do that cry where
you're like and you just can't breathe. And I was like,
he's gonna hear you, he's gonna think you're nuts. And
(07:54):
he came running around the corner and he was smiling
and he was like, finally, finally, He's like, let it out.
This sucks, everything sucks. Let it out. Feel sad. You
have to feel this so you can stop feeling it
and get back to the thing that you're supposed to be.
He's like, you are exactly where you're supposed to be.
And I just remember that being so comforting of like, oh,
(08:16):
you're not supposed to not feel it. You have to
feel it, so you can stop. But right now where
you are, stop trying to not be there, be there.
You're exactly where you're supposed to be. I think that's
hugely wise. It's difficult to do, and you do sometimes
you need someone else to say it's all right, this sucks,
and it's allowed to suck for a minute or longer
than a minute. It's allowed to be bad, so that
you can then regroup and figure out what the next
(08:39):
move is and do that from a place of not
feeling hysterical or like you're keeping it all in for
everybody else's because it'll bubble up. Your stuff will always
find you. I think so. But I do think it's
constantly evolving, and I do think whatever looks like it's
not working out, it really genuinely is something else working out.
And just being able to pause in those moments and
trust that. I mean, I don't know. I'm saying this
(09:00):
because it's what I need to listen to. What quality
do you like at least about yourself? I mean, how
much time you got? But the one that will always
I think haunt me is time management. I hate my
lack of an ability to manage time. I get very
caught up in my brain and I'm very curious, so
(09:21):
I follow a lot of paths, Like I could spend
an hour and a half reading about drama between two
people I've never met and don't know and I've never
heard of. Until I see a headline of this drama
that sounds interesting, I can read it and learn everything
about it and then just like not be bored for
an hour and a half and I can learn something
about me during that, And I can, but then I
(09:41):
just lose track of everything else. Scheduling things makes me
so anxious. I was ten minutes late, for this a
thing that was very important to me, and I'm in
my pajamas. I just find a way. But the most
generous reading I've had of that is my good friend
Mina Kimes, who also works in sports TV and is
brilliant and is our future and our queen. She said
she compared me to Andy Reid, and I know that
(10:02):
might not land with many, but I can explain it.
He's a football coach who is very creative in his
play calling, but sometimes he gets so distracted by how
creative he wants to be that he doesn't realize that
the game is about to end, and so he runs
out of time to do the thing he wanted to
do because he was showing off all the things he
knows how to do. It was part of the thing
that's helped me see the good intentions of my weaknesses
(10:24):
and try to do my best at them where I can,
and then be prepared to apologize for them or warn
people of them ahead of time, because nothing's worse than
disappointing people. Oh, but that's just part of yourself criticism.
You know there are things worse than disappointing people. Yes,
probably killing people. I think maybe after you've disappointed them. Yeah,
(10:44):
well then you have to exactly. I like that idea
that there isn't enough time. You can't say if your
best plays for when the clock's running out. It's true.
You just have to do it, you really do, and
you really have to kind of I say this a lot.
It's a soccer term, which is, even if it's going
really badly, you have to play to the last whistle,
like you have to play with everything, which I think
(11:06):
is the other side of like don't save all your
creative play for the last fourteen seconds of a game.
But I'm a procrastinator. That's what I do because if
I as soon as I write it, or film it
or put it on paper, whatever it is I'm making,
then it's going to be done. And I don't want
it to be done. I like living in the part
where you're figuring it out until it's perfect. I don't
(11:26):
want to do it. But what about the idea that
like there's no there there and that it is never
going to be perfect? I know, what about letting go
of the idea of like this constraint you've put on
it and just be in the process, which you clearly
love because God knows you create. Everything is self generated
that you do, Everything is about you creating this content
and offering that up. And people clearly obsessively love what
(11:50):
you do. Even the people that don't get it, they
love what you do. I think that might be one
of the nicest things anyone said to me. That's very calm,
but I do think it's true. It's like I was
looking at the people that haven't necessarily got it. That's okay.
Like again, this notion of time throwing out the window,
it's like you're just waiting for everybody else to catch up.
That's what it seems to me. I hope that you
(12:12):
will be nicer to yourself about whatever you think you're
shortcomings off, because you're great. Where and when were you happiest?
I mean, it's hard. It's also a good question to
think about, if I can just delay answering it for
(12:33):
a second, because it's not the moments I find myself
thinking about the most. Like when I heard this question,
it was like, well, if you ask me sadness, I
could give you top five off the top of my head.
So it's good for me to go back through all
the good ones and think about it. Can I give
you two answers, because I think it shows the two
types of happiness that I value the most. One was
(12:54):
the Super Bowl. The Super Bowl fifty one, which I'm
sure you remember many driver, is when the Patriots beat
the Atlanta Falcons in overtime. It was the first overtime
in the Super Bowl. It was a game that they
were losing in the first half. It looked like it
was gonna be a loss. I'm a Patriots fan. I
had been in Houston for the week hosting my own
(13:16):
show on TV Live, which I had never really done before,
so it was a big accomplishment for me. It didn't
go perfectly, but I at least learned a lot. I
had like, it's a very small appearance on my favorite
show in the world, the reason why I want to
do this with my life, The Daily Show. I had
done a silly like here's what's happening on social media,
but it was my parents saw me on the Super Bowl,
(13:37):
which you know, they were so proud, and I got
to shout out my family on the Super Bowl. And
then I was at the game and the Patriots came back,
tied the game, we went to overtime, we won. I
got down on the field and got to hug a
player on the Patriots who I met through my job,
Martellis Bennett, after he had just won the Super Bowl.
I remember standing there and being like, this is is
(14:00):
the peak of your life. This is the coolest moment
that working and your job has gotten you to this
place where And I don't think I really noticed then
fully the extent of my happiness, but looking back at
it now where we are in the world, everything was
kind of perfect. It was such a celebratory moment. The
second moment couldn't be more different, but feels almost the
(14:22):
same in my heart. It was during the quarantine. I
had woken up early for work. I was filming a
TV show out of a spare bedroom of my house.
I put on a full face and makeup, which I
still have no idea how to do myself. God bless
hair and makeup. That's what I've learned over these last
couple of years. One of the many lessons is that
those people are angels and I need them in my life.
But I just put on this full face and makeup
(14:42):
and done a fifteen minute hit from some room, and
then I came back into my bedroom and my boyfriend
and my dog were cuddled up asleep, and I just
got back in bed with them and snuggled them, and
I was like, this is it's all for this. These
are the moments that I'll look back on and be
like lived I loved. Things were bad, things were bad,
(15:04):
world things were bad, and my job situation was bad,
and it was a time of unrest, but in that
moment we still found peace. I think that's why I
value you know, so when you say happiest, it's like,
not everything was the best, but that was exactly what
my soul needed that day. Well. I do think that's
the bit that we don't talk about enough, is that
(15:24):
happiness is not necessarily qualified by everything being happy. There
at these moments that we recognize happiness sometimes incredibly challenging.
What year was that that they beat the falcons in
in overtime? It was twenty seventeen. It was the before times. Yes, yes,
before we knew well, but we kind of thought we knew,
(15:46):
but we didn't know. You know, well, I feel like,
you know, Trump was the helpful herald of the pestilence
that was coming. So actually your right sort of bang
in the middle of it. That does sound. Even as
somebody for whom football is a completely different game, I
can appreciate how absolutely astonishing that moment must have been.
Oh my god, it was unbelievable. And it's not like,
(16:07):
you know, it would have been obviously a better movie
in the movie version of it. It would have been
like the Patriots first Super Bowl, like they had one,
they had the capacity to win, but it was the
way that they were completely down the first half. It
was awful. Brady had thrown a pick at the end
of the second quarter and it was just like, what's happening?
And then it just it was beautiful. It was awesome.
So let me ask you this, because again with my
(16:29):
whatever the opposite of encyclopediac is, that's my knowledge about
American football. How is it being a fan of a
team that is never the underdog? And I'm I'm assuming
that they are never the underdog soon once it all
wears off, because you know, sports fans memories kind of
linger for a while. We don't like to move on,
(16:50):
is one thing I've learned working in this industry, And
so like that narrative is gonna last for a while,
but they'll be underdogs against soon and people are gonna
love it. But it's funny because I grew up with
my dad complaining about how Boston fans couldn't catch a break,
the Red Sox, the Patriots. It's just like let down
after letdown. He was not a basketball guy, so I
(17:11):
probably back then would have been like, you should have
liked the Celtics that went well, But he raised me
to think that we had been down trodden. And then
sort of by the time I came into my own
understanding of my sports fandom as I'm hitting high school
and then college, we were just winning all the time,
and so it was like I now feel like I
was spoiled, but at the time I felt like I
(17:33):
had inherited my Dad's like, no, no, this, we deserved this.
But it's like, yeah, but I didn't deserve my dad
deserved it. And I'll tell you my dad didn't even
enjoy it as much as he probably would have thought
that he did because he never trusted He never trusted
the Red Sox. He never let them like become the winners,
and then he was like, I can count on them
to win. It was like the second they would lose,
he was like, ah, they stink and would just bail
(17:53):
on him. And it was just this to me, stereotypical
attitude of a person from Boston towards sports that never
fully changed if you experienced the pain of it, because
you always knew it was just around the corner. So
I tried to slow him down and tell him, like,
this is the good. Enjoy the good while it's here.
I know. I think that's what I'm interested in. It's
like the loss of Like I loved my football team,
(18:15):
my soccer team when we were shipped, and then I
loved it when everybody gave us ship for the rich
Russian coming and augmenting our team, and it changed everything.
And now we're back in the shitter with the government
basically taking bids on who's going to buy the team
that I've supported since I was a kid. Like, it's weird,
but I think those vicissitudes as a fan those verse
(18:37):
did you say vicissitudes? Vicissitudes ups and downs in a
ten cent word? I love? What a good word is that?
A C there V I C. You don't have to
know this, mini driver, I'll google it. V I C
I S S I T U D E S. Vicissitudes, vicissitudes,
That's what I would have guessed I would have gotten
that in a spelling ups and downs, Katie, ups and downs, Yes, exactly.
(19:00):
But I think that's part of what is. It's like everything.
It's what makes you appreciate the well being ship made
you appreciate snuggling in bed with your dog and your boyfriend.
And I'd take it any day of the week. If
I could teleport to a place, I think that would
be it, you know, And I try to remind myself
that every time I'm here, I'm like, this is where
you want to be. So while you're here, don't worry
(19:21):
about anything else. Just think about this, because this when
you're out doing all the other stuff, you're gonna want
to be back here. So be here now. Yeah, exactly. Okay.
So what relationship, real or fictionalized, defines love for you.
It's a weird answer, but stay with me because I
(19:42):
think this is what my brain really thinks. It's Trinity
and Neo from the Matrix, a faultless answer. I took
forever to see that movie because I had a weirdly
vivid memory of my dad watching it when it came out,
and so I was eleven, which is probably too old
to be scared. But my dad was watching it really
(20:03):
late at night, really loud, and I just remember gunshots
being very loud in my house and it's scaring me
because it was middle of the night. It woke me up,
and so I was like, what movie were you watching
last night? And he said, The Matrix, Mike, I'll never
see it. I'll never see it. It was so scary.
And then you know, when we were locked up and
I had nothing to do, I was like, let me
watch all this stuff I've never seen. I watched The Matrix,
(20:23):
and my takeaway at the end of the whole thing,
I'm like, I feel like a lot of people missed
the point of this movie. Like it felt to me
like the most obvious thing was Trinity. Loving Neo was
how Neo was able to believe that he was the one,
which is the only way he was able to become
the one. So without love, he wouldn't have known his
own potential. Her belief in him allowed him to believe
(20:44):
in himself because he loved her, and if she believed
in him, then he believed in him. To me, that
is love. Love is finding somebody who believes in you
so much that you couldn't possibly not believe in yourself.
Do you think that that needing self love to be
augmented by someone else? Is like? Is that part of
(21:05):
love you like? Is there a missing piece that, like,
for example, your boyfriend or someone that you love fills
because you that's part of that your foundational understanding of
love is like having something else there to make it real.
It's having a partner to whether any storm with. It's
having a teammate. It's having someone you can always trust
that they're going to be honest with you and also
(21:27):
keep you grounded, remind you of who you are. It's
just an external reflection of your best self to remind you.
You know, when I look at my boyfriend and he
looks at me, I can almost it helps me be
aware of me because I see him looking at me.
Is this making any sense? No, it makes total sense.
I just think it's really I think it's really interesting.
(21:49):
Think it's really interesting because what you're describing really is
like having this coach that you're allowed to be in
love with. It is that bad? Am I finding out
that I'm codependent? No? Not all, are you joking? It
just means that that you're literally like living in the
world that you love being in, which is like, of
course love would have a sports analogy in it for you. Yeah,
(22:09):
that's the word. Is that somebody to imbue you just
say your self love, you are worthy, and then you
yourself see yourself as worthy. Yeah, that's every great teacher.
So yeah, if we need someone to help us get there,
why the hell not? I mean again, for me life,
all bets are off. That's why I hate you know
how to books about certainly the big life subjects, because
it's not one size fits all. It's not if you
(22:31):
do this, then this will happen. It's like read this,
think about this, and then put it into your main frame.
But like you've really identified I like having knowing someone
loves me. It makes me help me love myself better.
So if that makes you feel good, then who's to
say that you're supposed to get the self love first
and then be loved. Everybody says it, But here's the thing,
that you have to love yourself before someone else can
(22:52):
love you. Does still ring true to me because I
think there was a period of my life where I
was The best way I can describe it is like
acting out what I thought I was supposed to be
doing and then I sort of had, you know, life happen,
and recently have come into like just do what you
want to be doing. And I think once I came
(23:12):
into that was when I found I mean, I think
he's the love of my life and you know, have
had this incredible relationship that came exactly when I needed it.
And he sort of helps me remember me as opposed
to telling you know what I mean, Instead of telling
me I'm worthy and so I'm worthy, it's more like
sometimes I forget and he will remind me of it.
(23:35):
And because he exists externally from my brain, which sometimes
I get into situations because of my mental health because
I struggle with depression and I have a d h D.
Sometimes things get a little toxic upstairs and I can't
tell if it's me or if it's real. And he's
sort of just like the what's the thing in in
that movie about dreaming. It's a little token or whatever
(23:56):
that they have that reminds them of an inception. What
do they call it? What is it? Well, it's his
spinning top or whatever. Yeah, yeah, it's he's like my
little like okay, the spins. So it is real, I
have a boyfriend like that too. Oh no, is that?
Did you say you had a boyfriend like this too?
As in like I'm gonna that this is going to
end and I'm gonna go under the next one. No no, no, no, no,
(24:17):
I have a boyfriend like that now, okay, thos it
had damn so it ends? No no, no no, no, no no.
And it's all of that idea that you have to
get there by yourself. Yes, it's a really nice and
great thing. And of course finding self love and yourself
is a really good thing to aim for. Having help
and being augmented by a loving partner or someone who
is more tolerant of your ship than you are of
your own is a really good thing, well prescribed so
(24:40):
many things. It's really you know yourself to know that
he's helping that part of you that is in pain
or is difficult. So that feels a lot like love
to me. But yeah, also Neo and Trinity for sure.
And just as an aside, I met the as was
then witch Howski Brothers now just the Wichowskis for that
part and wanted to in that film. Oh my god,
(25:01):
you would have been great. No, But but there can
be only one. I mean, carry On Moss was who
Carryan's just plays it perfectly. She really is. It's just
she's just the most beautiful and lovely and deep. But
I remember looking at the storyboards of that film and going,
this film is epic. It's very good. I wasted so
many years not dressing up as her for Halloween. I
(25:22):
waited way too long to watch it. That's okay, sort of.
The nineties are really bad. They really are. I've got
like bangs. You know we're doing it. You just don't
plug your eyebrows. No, I won't. Can we never go
back to whatever we were doing? Then? It's just terrific.
It was awful. It really was awful. So in your life,
(25:53):
what person, place, or experience has most altered it? I
want to give credit to the good. But I'm I
can't believe I'm voluntarily bringing up this topic. But I'm
going to say middle school. I think middle school as
a place and as just like an entire chapter of
my life shaped me the most as a person. Because look,
I was born into middle class family in a suburb
(26:15):
framing him Massachusetts shout out. You know, life wasn't hard
by a large metric. But I had a bad haircut
from first grade through eighth grade, and those last three
years there were a real tough time because it was
six seventh eighth, which is when kids like no enough
words to hurt you, and um I was. I wasn't
(26:37):
very popular, but I was such a happy, smiley, friendly
kid and wanted everybody to like me. And I think
I learned in middle school a lot about people, and
a lot about me, and a lot about how little
a lot of things matter, like the opinions of people
whose opinions you, in other contexts wouldn't respect. I think
(26:59):
it taught me the value of being a good friend,
because that was one of the only ways I was
going to make a lot of friends is by, you know,
being there for people who didn't have anybody else. And
so I've always said this about me and never really
understood what it said about me. I used to think
it was a bad thing that if somebody was being bullied,
even if that person had bullied me before, I would
(27:20):
always be like, all right, do you want to talk
about it and be there for them. I always thought
it was a weakness, and I'm starting to see it
as a fundamental part of who I am. It's tough
now because when we get into issues of bigger things
like hatred and race and all the things. I'm not
saying that I'm a person that thinks people can do
no wrong. I'm a person that values holding people accountable
(27:43):
with a loving hand. Does that make sense? I don't know.
I just think people were mean to people and I
wanted to be nice. So let me ask you. Does
that inform dealing with that version of middle school today,
which for me is like certain aspects of social media
and that toxicity that's there. Oh yeah? Was it are
traumatically recognizable for you? Or do you try and deal
with it in the same way? I mean, I don't
(28:05):
think it eviogates maybe easier, but it actually I mean,
in the last few years, I think it has. My
relationship with social media I would not describe as healthy.
I came up through you know, YouTube videos, and when
I was making YouTube videos, I was reading the comments.
I used to run my own Facebook page where I
had like seventy fans and I would talk to them.
I would like post and they would post. I knew
(28:25):
them by name. When one of them just stopped posting,
I noticed, I asked where he was like, I'm incredibly online.
What I've started to look at social media as now
is like, you get to watch people interacting with each other.
Sometimes they're doing it performatively, sometimes they know like somebody
else send a tweet where it's like I feel this
way about this thing, and I've done it all figured out.
That kind of stuff you gotta take with a grain
(28:45):
of salt. But when you get into the meat of it,
when you scroll down through the replies and the conversations
that branch off from the replies, or if you scroll
through Reddit, not at the you know, controversial top pages,
but you go to the pages of things you're interested in,
and why watch people have conversations. You can observe humans
and how they interact and how conflicts happen, and where
(29:07):
the disagreements happen, and when disagreements turn into agreements. You
can be like, oh, that that's how they bridged that gap.
You can learn stuff. And so I started looking at
social media that way. I used to get in arguments
all the time, replying to tweet something You're not seeing
it my way. And I had a boyfriend and ex
boyfriend now who was like, you're not gonna change people's minds.
Why do you care? And I was like, it's a
really good point. But I think the reason I care
(29:29):
is because to not care implies that I think I'm
better or different than anybody else. I think a lot
of people want to be a part of the conversation.
The way that they can do that is social media.
The good of that that we've seen as people and
communities who haven't had an avenue to speak on things
and the way that they receive things have been able
(29:49):
to speak up and and meet each other and sort
of come together and form movements. I think the bad
side of it is that everybody gets to say anything
they want about everything that happens, and everything is constantly happening.
So you get this world where now we have news
organizations that write articles where the headline is blank. Happens
(30:10):
and social media erupts and you're like, yes, something happened
and people reacted, but is it worth writing a whole
article on your website, which then makes it seem like
this idea that maybe seventeen people had is now an
idea that people should pick sides on. It turns everything
(30:30):
into a conversation about the conversation instead of an actual
conversation about a thing. And so like I've tried to,
you know, be the change you want to see in
the world. Blah blah blah. I try to when I
log onto social media. Now, this is so stupid, but
hopefully it will make sense to someone. And I'm not
recommending this, but my approaches. I pretend it's somebody who
(30:51):
loves me, who's joking or who um isn't as good
at communicating as I am, haven't studied and thought about
the amount of words and how to use them the
way that I have. So I give them the benefit
of the doubt a little bit. And then if they
continue to prove and I've got my own little red flags,
and I'm like, all right, that's one. That's one strike.
You're not getting past this. Uh, I will end the
(31:13):
conversation for my own sake. But I've noticed people you
can kind of be like, I get it. I disagree,
but I get it. On like certain things, there are
places they can go that are bad. And like I said,
my privilege has made it so I don't have to
deal with much of that. But whenever I hear people say,
here's the problem with social media like people. It's people.
Heart of it is people. It's just people. Even the
(31:35):
things that are the problem with social media that's engineered
by the social it's made by people. And so what
the problem always boiled down to me, it felt like
was it's people. And as a people, I'm like, maybe
I can find some sort of an answer about how
I think we should use it, and then I can
just start using it that way and see how it works.
You know, yeah, I do. I'm also fascinated by what
was your haircut between first and eighth grade? I can
(31:58):
show you it. I want to see that, because like,
what was that so bad? It was? So I'm Italian,
um like three quarters Italian, a quarter Irish, So that
means I'm furry, if you will, if I can put
that as cutely as possible. And so, you know, going
through puberty, I had this short haircut. So it was
like my mom would do this little swoosh, she would
blow dry this little wave at the front. Uh, and
(32:21):
then it was just short like a boy's haircut in
the back. And so I was, you know, often misunderstood
for a boy because you know, at that age you
see the haircut, you just assume. I played hockey when
I was really little, so I had a helmet and
was called Kyle. I was quiet and speak up, and
I would just let them. I didn't want to have
to explain that I was a girl that felt uncomfortable.
Then as I was getting older and trying to grow
(32:43):
it out, and it was, it went through this awkward stay.
I'll try to find you the worst picture I have many,
it's real bad. I'm sure that your mom was just
being practical, having your happy short na. She was. She's like,
it makes you stand out, it's sure dead it did.
I genuinely think it was because she couldn't find me
on stage at the day's recital because all the girls
had buns, and she was like, just cut it off
(33:03):
and then I can find her by the way. I mean,
I'm not mad at that parenting logic, but I'm sorry
for your trauma. Oh thank you. I walked my dog
during whatever time I was home last some holiday, I
walked my dog in the middle schools right across the
street from my house. I walked my dog there and
we walked around and I peeked into the cafeteria, which
was like my own personal hell, and it just I
was like, ha, I made it, so screw all, y'all.
(33:27):
I made it. My dog was like, what are we doing?
Can I pee? I was like, yeah, go ahead, pee
on the building for all I care. I really have
so loved talking to you. I'm so thank you, Katie.
I'm really, really, really excited for whatever you do next.
I'm telling you, I have a very strong, witchy feeling.
You just feel like the right person who's going to
(33:49):
be able to champion everything that you're brilliant at is
just is right there. Oh many, You're just so sweet.
This is the sweetest. This has been such a joy.
Thank you for having me. There's been a bit of
a sea change in the world of sports and sports media.
With people like Katie in the industry, I think we
can feel comfortable that the future is in good hands.
(34:09):
To stay up to date on Katie's reporting and announcements,
follow her on Instagram at Natie Colon. Yep, that is
Natie Colon, not Katie Nolan. Mini Questions is hosted and
written by me Mini Driver, supervising producer Aaron Kaufman, Producer
(34:31):
Morgan Levoy, research assistant Marissa Brown. Original music Sorry Baby
by Mini Driver, Additional music by Aaron Kaufman. Executive produced
by me Mini Driver. Special thanks to Jim Nikolay, Will Pearson,
Addison No Day, Lisa Castella and a Nick Oppenheim at
(34:53):
w kPr DA, La Pescador, Kate Driver and Jason Weinberg,
And for con cintly solicited TEX support, Henry Driver,
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