Podcasting, Parenting and “Play Aunties” with Amena Brown

Carol joins forces with poet and author Amena Brown, host of the podcast HER with Amena Brown, to talk about their journeys as Black women in the world of podcasting. In this poignant, revealing, hilarious joint interview, they talk about the power of being raised by Black moms, how to parent artistic kids, the perils of performing, the importance of “play aunties” and the need for self-destructing journals. And that is just a taste of this delightful convo. Tune in for new and surprising insights on Carol and to meet the amazing Amena!  Follow us at @GroundControlParenting and on www.groundcontrolparenting.com  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hello, and welcome to Ground Control Parenting, where today we're
gonna try something new. I'm sharing this episode with another
Seneca woman, podcast network podcaster, spoken word poet and performer,
Amina Brown. She's the host of a great podcast called
Her with Amina Brown. Amina and I have created this
crossover episode to share with our audiences, and we had

(00:25):
a lot of fun doing it. You'll get to meet
Amina and hear about her work, and you'll get to
know a little bit more about me as well, since
we take turns interviewing each other, and of course there
will be talking about parenting. Amina starts us off, She'll
welcome me, and then we'll get rolling. So welcome to
the Ground Control Parenting Her by Amina Brown, collab enjoy. Hey, everybody,

(00:48):
welcome to a new episode of Her with Amina Brown.
And let me tell you, hey, this is actually a
crossover episode. So I'm going to introduce to you a
fellow podcaster who is here with me. So those of
you that are listening on her feed, you are listening
to an episode of Ground Control Parenting as well. So

(01:10):
we're we're gonna be here having a wonderful experience. I
want to welcome fellow Seneca Women podcast network podcaster host
of Ground Control Parenting, a podcast about the joy and
the job of raising black children, Carol Sutton Louis, I
thank you so much. As you know, I've been waiting

(01:31):
to do this for a while. I'm really excited to
be here, and I'm excited about this crossover. This is
very cool. So I'm really I'm really excited about us
doing this. So let me ask you. This was not
in my list of questions, but I'm going to ask
you so that our listeners can have the setting. I'm
always telling my listeners that we are we're in a
living room. When you imagine your listeners, your community around

(01:54):
Ground Control Parenting, what's the space in the home where
you imagine you are with them. That is such a
good question. I would say it's probably the space where
I am now, which is we call it our family
room or our sitting room. It's where my family gathers
and when friends come, they gather. It's not quite the

(02:15):
living room. It's the formality of a living room. It's
like where we all sprawl and play games and watch TV.
So I am so dedicated to the concept of having conversations.
For me, it's a lot of parenting conversations, but conversations
in areas where you can feel relaxed and and be yourself.
And so this is a room that I think that
happens in. I like that question. I'm gonna have to

(02:37):
think about that when I'm talking to people, right right.
I love that. I love I love that that informal
living room. Many of us, especially those of us who
are black and grew up in our black families, we
remember the family members that had the formal living room
where you were not allowed to cross that threshold. We're
not We're talking about a living room you could take
your shoes off and hang out. So I love that.

(03:00):
Welcome to all of the Ground Control parenting listeners and
community who are here, and welcome to my her with
Amina Brown listeners as well. I'm excited for us to
talk a little bit today. Carol, same here, and I
just have to say to follow up in the living room,
I'm true confession. We had that formal living room where
literally there was plastic on the couch until the company came.

(03:20):
I mean I had a friend that used to joke
that they had like a like a velvet rope. Yes,
that's it, because you could not just go into that
living room. You were only special occasions and and and
God forbid anybody see it with a plastic on. You know,
when company comes, you ripped that plastic off. And then
my dad and my stepmother had a living room like that,

(03:41):
and we were only allowed to go in it for
family pictures. That was the place where we took family pictures.
That was our one time we got to sit down
actually on the couch itself. Otherwise I was only in
there to clean it up. And I was like, why
am I in here cleaning up a room? I can't
even sit in here. Okay, when this comes out, I'm
gonna put up on Instagram a picture of my family

(04:04):
sitting in the living room with a family picture, because
that's exactly exactly what we did. For sure, I gotta
find mine too, Carol. I'm gonna work on mine too well.
Part of part of how Carol and I met is
that we are both podcasters under the Seneca Women Podcast Network,
and it was just wonderful to get a chance to
talk with you and hear a bit more about your

(04:24):
podcast journey leading up to being on the network, because
we both had podcast journeys prior to coming onto the
network and now um experiencing how we sort of change
a little of maybe the format and things of what
we're doing, but not who we're talking to and not
why we started our podcast in the first place. But
before I get to that, you have told us that

(04:45):
you would imagine you are in your family room with
your listeners. I want to know what is the snack
if the people were there in your home? Is there
a snack that you would offer? Is there a favorite
dish that when people come to just hang out, that's
a dish they know they're going to have at your house.

(05:07):
So I will answer that I love to have people over.
I love to be a hostess. I don't get to
do it as much as I like. I love the presentation.
Not the biggest cook in the world, but I love
the presentation. So snack presentation is high on my list.
You know, put it out on the plates. And there's
usually a hybrid because I tend to eat um fairly specifically,

(05:29):
like helpfully if you will. I mean, I'm not a
big potato chip fan. I'm not a big Derrito's fan, however,
because a good hostess has to have stuff for everybody,
So I will have my almonds and my guac, because
guac is really healthy. Guacamole and chips. I'll have some
cheese and crackers, even if I'm not doing dairy those days.

(05:50):
Some days I do, some days I don't. And if
I'm not whatever, I will have the cheese and crackers.
They'll have a guacamole, and then I'll have some kind
of chip, some kind of interesting chip, you know, sort
of um, some flavorful chip, and let people sort of
have that whatever they want, you know. I like giving
an array of snacks. I like I like making people

(06:10):
feel like there's a bounty. You know, there's there's like
a lot of this good opportunity to to snack if
you want it. So there are a lot of them,
whatever they are. I like a bounty of snacks. I'm
really glad you brought that word here for us, because
I'm gonna have a bounty of something. It is snacks
that I want to have a bounty of. I appreciate

(06:30):
what you said about an interesting like a like a
unique cracker or a unique chip. I you know, because
when when you come across a little rosemary olive oil cracker,
you're like, and this is not just a saltine. You know,
I'm supposed to layer my coldby cheese on top of this.
Like I just I appreciate the choices there, Carol. This

(06:51):
is this is good work today. Okay, talk to me
about your podcast. I love an origin story, Carol, because
I think it's helpful when people are listening. Sometimes we
don't know that ideas are germinating with us, you know,
we don't realize it. And so I think it's always
good for people to know the origin story because they

(07:13):
might realize, oh, I have an idea in me. So
what what was the original moment that made you go,
I need to take this to a microphone. Okay, So
I'll give you just a teeny bit. I tend to
tell a long story. I will try to tell a
short story. I'll give you a teen about the origin
of ground control parenting, the concept, and then I will

(07:33):
fast forward to ground Control Parenting the podcast. So I
am a lawyer by training. I have um three children
who are now grown, and much to my surprise, when
I started having children, I was actually more interested in
spending more time with them than I thought. That sounds weird,
but I really enjoyed. I mean, I knew I would

(07:54):
like having them around, but I really enjoyed um spending
time with them and watching how they developed and doing
all I could to support that. And uh, just a
quick aside. I had a girl first, and then two boys.
I grew up with two older brothers, one of whom
I literally grew up with, and the other one was
my half brother whoop was much older. But to make

(08:17):
a very long story short, I loved my my brother,
who was closest in age and me dearly, but I
could see from an early age that he was definitely
dancing to a somewhat different drummer than certainly my parents wanted.
And so I watched the dynamic of a very loving family.
My parents were great, and they loved us both dearly,
but they had some trouble understanding my brother. He wanted

(08:39):
to be an artist, I mean, and we were a
family of educators and my father was a lawyer. I mean,
there was a different headset and for black people like
families and that era sort of it was because he's
older than I. It was tough for my family, my
father in particular, to sort of to make that make
sense for himself. So watching my parents with my brother

(09:00):
and watching there be a little struggle along the way.
Fast forward to when I had children and I had
a boy, I thought, oh, I don't really have a
great role model for boys. I mean, and I'm having
this black boy and now in America, I need to
just really and and I need to really focus on
how to do this a little differently. And you know,
as I said, um a lawyer, I went to school

(09:21):
for a long time. What do I do when I
don't know? I do research? So I dove into sort
of boys and and how boys work and and um.
So I started when my first son was born, really
amassing um information and going to parent groups, not with
an anxiety about it, but more like let me know
what I don't know, and let me think about how
how I should think about this. And over the course

(09:42):
of the years with my kids, I tended to keep
researching and thinking about parenting in ways like, you know,
I don't know the answers, but I know how to
find some answers. And I was in parent groups that
I found really helpful. Over time, as my children grew older,
I had all this information that I had amassed and
wanted to help out other parents because I had you know.

(10:02):
By good fortune. UM, I had the time and the
energy to do this, and so many of my friends
who were killing themselves at work and we're sort of
unable to focus. I just want to give them like
shortcuts here, you know, read this book or take this,
put your kid in this class. Whatever. That hence ground
Control Parenting. The blog was born because I really wanted to. Um.

(10:24):
It was a combination of at that point, really wanting
to take a more serious take a step away from
active parenting and do something I mean work. I struggled
when my kids were growing with the fervent desire to
spend time with them, but at the same time the
knowledge that I was not using all of my skill sets.
I mean I was. I was supposed to be doing
something more and I don't mean to a little parenting,

(10:46):
but I was supposed to be doing something in addition
to parenting. So I said, let me create this blog
and let me put out these resources. I did that
for a while for several years, and I said, Okay,
now it's time to write a book. Because I have
written a lot. I've interviewed people for the dog, and
I want to write a book. And so I put
together a book proposal, UM with an agent and we
set it out and um, the word came back, Okay,

(11:10):
this sounds good, but who is this woman and why
would anybody want to listen to her about parenting? So
I decided I had to take a different approach because
my blog certainly had an audience, but it wasn't a
vast audience, and I had not been as public as
I could be. So I started teaching. I taught parenting
classes at a local college in their continuing education and

(11:32):
that was great. Two things happened. One Um, my mom
was a teacher, and I understood the value of lesson plans.
So I was doing extensive lesson planning and it was
fun and I enjoyed it much more than I thought
he would. But it took a lot of time and
effort to do a lesson plan, and I'd have, like,
I don't know, twenty five people in the classroom. And
so at the end of one cycle, I thought, I'm

(11:52):
working really hard to reach a relatively small group of people.
And then the pandemic hit. So it's kind of a
one too. I wouldn't teach anymore, And um, I thought, well, okay,
I'm sitting around I was in New York City in
my apartment, my husband, just the two of us for
the entirety of the pandemic, and it's like, let me
just try to and and and as importantly, a bunch

(12:13):
of my friends were sitting around their places with a
with a laptop. I said, let me try to put
this out to more people at one time. So a
very long winded short story, but the bottom line was
I wanted to take the information that I had been
able to disperse sort of locally and just see if
it would resonate with a larger audience. I love it.

(12:34):
I love it. I love that, And I'm hoping that
our listeners will be thinking about the things that they
have inside of themselves, these ideas, these like desires we have.
I mean, that's definitely a part of how my podcast
was born. It was actually, in part born out of anger,
which can be very inspiring, you know. It was born

(12:55):
out of anger of feeling like women of color are
not getting the platforms they need, They're not getting the
opportunity to come into spaces and share their stories. And
I was frustrated watching other people not do it. And
that's what's sent me there like, Okay, well, let me
set this microphone figure out. You know, I would love

(13:18):
to hear your thoughts. Why you believe it's important for
black women and for other women of color to podcast,
to exist in the podcast space. That is a really
good question as well. Um, I will start with my
own personal experience with podcasting. It is it the The

(13:39):
experience has been so much richer and deeper than I
thought it would be. I came to this mic with no, frankly,
not a whole lot of podcasts appreciation. I mean, I
sort of listened to some, but I had not. I
was not deep in the world of podcasts, and I
came with a mission to reach people with information I
thought would be helpful. But what the ability, What the

(14:01):
ability to sit in front of a mic and in
exchange ideas and broadcast to the world. The empowerment that
that can create. The It is empowering. It reminds you
you have a voice. Um, And even if five people
listen to you and they're all family members, they'll and
they say to you, I heard what you said, and

(14:21):
I really resonated with me. There's such affirmation in the
ability to speak your truth, speak your thoughts, and and
have people connect to it and so and that that
goes sort of beyond um any particular episode. You know,
we joked about the number of episodes that we do
for this podcast world that we're in, and we're grateful

(14:42):
to be able to do it. But it's a lot
of talking and and but just when I feel that
I will hear from someone that they listen to one
and one that frankly was a while ago and that
I sort of wasn't top of my mind, and they'll
remember something about it, or more importantly, they'll feel some
way or have some experience with it that wasn't what

(15:03):
I intended. And that's actually really glorious. And I want
to I want to turn this to you though, because
you mentioned sort of your podcast being born out of anger.
But your work when you're not podcasting is work that
I truly admire. You're doing it and the vocation generally
the work of spoken word and the work of poetry.
So you would have the opportunity before you came to

(15:24):
this mike to sort of stand before people and speak
your feelings. What prompted you to add on taking it
to the airwaves? Man? I you know, and I guess
I also want to give like a shout out and
arrest in peace to Barbara Walters because as a child

(15:45):
I studied Barbara Walters and Oprah Winfrey as interviewers. I
always loved the idea of interviewing people. I just thought
that was the most fantastic thing you could do. So
really that's sort of how the podcast was born. I
didn't I was coming into it as a stage person,

(16:05):
but I was really not thinking as much about that
as I was, Oh, this will be me getting to
like sit down and interview other women of color, where
women of color get to be the experts we are.
We get to be the ones who are sharing the
knowledge that we have. We get to be in a
role where we are not minimized in any way. That

(16:26):
was sort of the space I wanted to make. And
then the rest of the time I was talking and
all the things. So it's been interesting, Carol now in
this iteration of her with Amina Brown, I do some
solo episodes, and probably my listeners who listens to those
solos episodes, they are experiencing a bit more of what
I'm like on a stage, because on a stage, it
is like if spoken word and a one woman show

(16:50):
and stand up comedy came together in a storm in
a tornado. That's what's happening when I'm on stage. So
people out in this iteration of the podcast are getting
to hear a little bit of the ignorant things I
say on stage. So how different is it for you
to prep to walk on the stage it is to

(17:12):
prepare to sit down in a mic? I mean, let's
on in the instances where you're not interviewing someone. Obviously,
if you're talking to someone, you've you know what you're
gonna ask. But when you're doing solo, is it a
different prep? This? Is it a different experience? You's no clapping, Okay,
That's that's the thing I was gonna say. I actually
think the prep is the same, Carol, But the feed

(17:34):
not having the feedback is very strange. Like talking to
the camera, I mean listen to me, well yeah, sometimes
talking to the camera, but talking to the mic, like
and not having the gasp that you might hear in
the audience, or hearing someone like they laughed louder than
they meant to. They didn't realize it was going to

(17:54):
hit them. That funny, All those things that happened to
you on stage that let you know, like, oh that's working.
People identify with that. It is very strange podcasting and
not having that and a podcast episode going out and
sometimes you hear nothing. People listen to it, they don't
really say anything. Sometimes I get like a random DM hey, um,

(18:16):
this week's podcast reminded me of something I experienced growing up,
and I'm like, yeay, somebody's out there. Yeah, yeah, that's funny.
I I appreciate that because from what I understand I am,
I am not a stage performer. I mean I will

(18:37):
stand up and talk to people, but but I imagine
that the feedback, the energy of the crowd. I mean,
you instantly know if something is landing correctly or particularly comedy,
if it if it ends, if it doesn't it. Yeah,
it's a different but but it's probably good exercise for
you to be able to do them both. Yeah, I
think so. I'm curious to see how it will be now,

(19:00):
Like returning to stage. I mean, I've had a few
events since things have kind of opened up in the pandemic,
but I haven't had that full show feeling where I
just went and did a show for an hour, So
I'm kind of curious to see now having spent most
of the pandemic talking to a microphone, and no one
was there except my husband, who's also my producer, so

(19:23):
he might be there. That's it though, you know, like
to now see how how is that going to affect
what I'm doing when I get on stage? I hope
it means some things are sharper that way as a storyteller.
So I have to follow it up with a question
I'm dying to ask. So a little bit of background.
I went to Music and Art High School which is

(19:43):
now uh Performing Arts the Fame School. It wasn't when
I was there, but you know, filled with people who
were very talented. I was a musician, but not very talented,
so I never I mean, I would perform when I
had to. But clear to me in high school was
that there were people that were really good, eager to
get on stage, and then then there were the rest
of us. So what I always want to know in

(20:04):
terms of someone who performs, are you because I always
think of sort of stage right, and you know what
if you get stuff, particularly when you're playing an instrument,
what what happens? Walk me through your walking out? Are
you energized? Are you do you go into some zone
where you know what you're going to say next and
what happens. God forbid if you like, forget a line.

(20:26):
I forget all the time. All the time. I do
get in a bit of like a focused zone, I
would say before I go on stage. And I'm always
nervous every time. It doesn't matter how small or how
large the crowd. I am nervous every time. I have
a rule where I typically don't eat, like two hours
or less before an event. I have not thrown up

(20:49):
on stage in over twenty years of performing professionally, and
I intend to keep my stat so I do not eat.
So that way we don't there's nothing there if we
feel nervous, we don't have to worry about those mistakes.
And you know, when I was starting, there wasn't YouTube,
There wasn't Instagram where people would be like, poet throws

(21:10):
up on stage and now your viral for that. You know,
that wasn't a thing. People might be like, somebody threw
up at this show I was at in random town.
A hundred people were you know, only those hundred people
know you threw up, instead of a thousand people or
a million people knowing that about you, and then they
don't have to see it over and over like boomerang,
like on repeat, like that memes come out. Yeah, no,

(21:33):
I get that's it. I don't want that for myself,
so I I typically do get really nervous. I get
really quiet. I don't like for there to be like
a lot of like noise and and just things that
would make me feel anxiety. I always think a lot
about my great grandmother and my grandmother. I think a

(21:54):
lot about the women in my bloodline and how I
am able to do what I'm doing because of them
in a lot of ways, in a lot of layers
of ways, I'm able to do what I do because
of them. I think about the circumstances under which they
continue to keep their voice, and that I owe it
to them to be who I am boldly and confidently

(22:18):
when I get on stage, and there's something about that
kind of thought, like if I if you're watching me
on the side of stage and I close my eyes,
I'm typically thinking about that and then they say your name,
and it's like, once I get up there and get
to the mic, I I feel I use living room
all the time because I feel like I'm in a
living room with those people. That's how it feels to me.

(22:39):
It's like I immediately feel like, what have y'all been doing?
Why are persons like this? I visit Abra, it's like
all like the random thoughts. It's just us having a conversation.
It just instead of being two people, it's however, many
people are there and I feel totally comfortable as soon
as I get there. Oh man, that that's great. I

(23:01):
can relate a little bit. Um Long ago, I was
a litigator, and the only good thing I didn't stay
a litigator for long, but the only thing that stayed
with me that I still use is that before I
walked into the courtroom, if I had to make any
appearance before a judge the morning, right before, I would
get a gurgling in my stomach, I would really feel.

(23:22):
I would feel it. I would be I would feel
the physical nerves. And although that was not particularly comfortable,
it reminded me that I need to be like something's
going to happen, and I need to all my senses
need to be sharp. And now when I'm interviewing, when
I'm about to sit down for the for the podcast,
if I don't feel a little bit of that. I'm thinking, Okay,

(23:42):
I better, something's not right. I need to be sharper
because you want a little bit of physiological reminder that
you know you're about to do something, you need to
be ready for it. So I get it that that
a little bit of nerves. I regularly have a psychiatrist
who visits the podcast, a child expert in child stress,
and he talks about how stress is good. It it

(24:06):
motivates you, it it um helps you stay clear focused.
What the bad part about stress is when you get
an overload, so you really want to You're not trying
to remain stress free, just trying to manage your stress.
So I think we're both talking about the instance where
stress management is helpful for sure, for sure. So I
want to actually circle back with a quick parenting kind

(24:28):
of question, because I mentioned that my brother was an artist,
um and and it was tough for my parents, who
were educators and lawyers, you know, just who had had
a different track in life, to sort of grasp I mean,
they were supportive he went to art school, but they
were kind of waiting for him to do something else.
So you grew up and and at some point you

(24:50):
tell me when. But at some point you knew you
wanted to be an artist, So when did that happen
and how did your family react? That's interesting, that's interesting
to think about. I it's almost like, if I really
think about it, Carol, I don't know if I knew
artist at first. I knew that I wanted to be
a writer, and I do believe writers are artists. I

(25:11):
just don't know if as a child I had made
that connection, you know, like I would have I would
have thought artists are people who do visual arts or
people who perform. They play music, they sing, they dance,
those things. Um And honestly, I grew up in my
mother's house. It was just a house full of books,

(25:31):
all like just she had and still does to this day.
She just had a wonderful library. I just remember as
a child like peering at her books, you know, once
I could read and trying to figure out who is this,
Who is Tony Morrison, you know, who is James Baldwin.
And so I think in a way, because my mom
was such an avid reader then she had such a

(25:52):
wonderful library. She really encouraged in me this sense of
reading and enjoying a story well told, And then I
read all these books as a child and just thought,
what is the job you do where you put your
words in this? Because I would like to be that.
I would like to find a way to do that.
So I knew very early on it was writer for me.

(26:14):
But I truthfully think that I wanted to be a
novelist when I thought about writer. That's what I thought.
Then I got into Nikki Giovanni. And you know, my
mom was one of those people who wants to go
to a bookstore. Whatever city you're visiting or whatever area
of town, must go in the bookstore. You know, this
is an old school thing to say now, but must

(26:35):
go on a card shop when it was popular for
there to be these like greeting card shops, and of course,
inevitably the greeting card shop also had little gift books
and different things, you know, related to words. I mean,
my mom just eat this up, takes her two daughters
in all of these places, which all of that, I
think just gave me this sense of the importance of

(26:56):
words and wanting to write. So by the time I
started reading poetry, that was the first thing I probably
started writing on my own, Like in my little notebooks
and things. And my mom also was a big proponent
of journaling. She encouraged us as her daughters to journal
because she would say, that's your one place in this
world where you're unedited. It's not for anyone. No one's

(27:20):
grading it, it's not for class. It's a place for
you to put your thoughts, put your feelings. So I
journaled a lot. But then by the time I got
a notebook where I was like, here's my poetry notebook. Now,
I know that this is not a thing that parents
do today. When I'm about to say my mom did.
But my mom told us that there was no such
thing as privacy in her house. And I know that's
not how the people parent today, but that's what she

(27:43):
said to us back then. It's no privacy in my house.
If I find a notebook, I'm reading it. If I
find a little note you wrote in class, I'm reading
it because I need to know what you're doing, what
you're up to. So she was shrew to her words.
She read one of my notebooks and she said, this
is actually really beautiful poetry. She was like, why don't

(28:05):
you share this other places? You know? I mean, you know,
as your mother would say, She's obviously like this is
a brilliant person. I have birth. You know, why why
would you not take this to the New York Times
at twelve years old or whatever? And because she was
my mom, I just I was like, you're not a

(28:26):
respectable critic of my work, Like you're not the voice
for me to know is this actually going well? So
I I just didn't believe in it, and she is.
She is truly the reason that I am even performing
to this day, because I just I don't think without
her pushing me that I would have made the connection
that that's a thing I could do. Wow, that is

(28:49):
such a great story. Lots of great parenting stuff in there,
and that I just have to step back and point out,
first of all, the library. I mean, parents everywhere need
to understand that more books you have around, the more
positively you can influence your children's tread I mean, we
definitely I grew up with a lot of books, and
and god knows, my husband is the world's most avid reader.

(29:09):
So this our shelves, I mean, see behind me our
shelves or line with books. So it's lovely to hear
your vantage point of being a Reynolds's books and them
and having that experience how it encourages you to read UM.
And then secondly, this is such a great story because
you know, more often than not you the story. It's
like mine and my brothers where the parents didn't understand
and they were like, that's interesting, but now what are

(29:31):
you going to do? I mean, your mom was like, hey,
this is something that you should be doing. That that
is amazing. And and just finally about the no privacy,
it's so funny, UM, I remember that vividly that you know,
and and I tried to institute that with my children
early days when um Facebook was a thing. When my

(29:51):
kids were growing up, that was the thing. The first
thing was Facebook. And my rule was you can only
have a Facebook um page if I am your friend.
If you friend me, you have to friend me. So,
because I just like your mom, I just didn't want
there to be like this whole other world that that
And I guess for me the difference was maybe they

(30:12):
could have their own little worlds in their books that
they kept in their room, but on Facebook they were
creating this over the world that a bunch of other
people were looking at. But so I can I can
appreciate that feeling. I'm impressed that she found stuff and
read it. God, I mean, I definitely had that desire.
And yes, I know it's not what you're supposed to
do with your children. However, there was a time parents did,

(30:35):
and sometimes it worked out. There are a lot of
times it didn't. This is one case with my mom
that are reading those things totally worked out. Either that
or you became a really good hider of things, right,
I mean, and she and she knows me. It's like
I've never I've never. I just like I I have
a lot of brain capacity for other things. Hiding is

(30:58):
not one of them. I have been telling on myself
since I was like five or six years old. I
just don't like inadvertently just tell on myself. So she
she knew the vibes, she knew what I was going
on there. That's so funny. You know. It's just one
other thing occurs to me. Your mom encouraged you to journal,

(31:19):
which I think is really great. Um, I had the
opposite experience, but it didn't dim my interest. I was
an English major and I loved didn't didn't Oh yeah,
I didn't have I didn't have writing aspirations per se.
But I you know, it was a pipe dream to
to write a book. I mean, as I said, I
tried once already. And my mother was she too, was

(31:44):
an English major, she was a reading teacher. She was
just all about the books. But she was a very
very private person, very introverted. Had an extroverted daughter, but
she was a very introverted person. And she used to
say to me, don't ever write anything down that you
wouldn't want to read on the front page of the
New York Times. Yeah, and I knew I that, I

(32:07):
remember that like it was yesterday. I mean, she was
a very private person, and you know that was evidence
of it. She didn't want me to sort of write
something down and have somebody read it that I didn't
want to read it. So, you know, I guess you
could take that to one way would be just to obey.
But for me, it it gave me some insight that

(32:27):
there would be an issue if I wrote something down
that was problematic. But it didn't stop me from wanting
to write or write things down. And and as I
grew older, and I kind of understood. You know, it's
funny when you get to a point and you realize
your parents are actually people and that there their guidance
comes from a place, comes from their very specific place,

(32:47):
and you can respect it, but you just realize it's
just it's not sort of all knowing all being it
sort of knowing some but from a very different, very
specific perspective. As I got older and I started to,
I know, journal, but I definitely have lots of notebooks
where I started to write my thoughts, I have to say,
as as freeing as that is, in the back of

(33:08):
my mind, I can still I mean, I'm either my
mom is is long gone now, unfortunately, but I'm either
writing thinking my you wouldn't like this, right, or but
I'm also thinking, okay, I need to put this away
somewhere safely so the New York Times doesn't get it
right that part. I mean, I'm not gonna lie about it.
My younger sister, we are almost eleven years apart, and

(33:28):
I have definitely given her some very specific instructions because
I imagine that she may be here after I'm gone.
So I've told her when I go, you get in
the house for those people, and I'm gonna put my
journals in a place and you get you get that
stuff out of my house. I don't want anybody posthumously
putting out some stuff that I didn't mean to be

(33:50):
put out. So that's that's our little directive we have
as sisters. It's a certain box. Whenever I moved to
a different house, I always take her in the closet
and say this by right here. When I'm gone, you
come in here first and get it. I don't want
those people in here. No, no, okay. But what she's
supposed to do with it, she has to keep it.
She has to hand it down. I mean, she's gotta
it's gotta live. You can't wait. Does it get buried

(34:13):
with you? I mean, what happens to the box? You know?
There have been different instructions for different times. There was
a time that I was like, you're gonna burn everything.
Now I'm like, I don't know. Maybe you know, you know,
if I had children, maybe i'd want them to have it.
But then, you know, I always think about um. One
of my favorite films, Bridges of Madison County with Meryl

(34:33):
Street and the kids. After she passed, the kids were
going through all her stuff and realized she had an
affair with this National Geographic photographer, and I'm like, you know,
and now they're freaked out because they're like, oh my gosh,
my mom had a sex life. And I'm like, what
if this lady didn't want you in that, she didn't
want you to be in it. She did that for herself,

(34:54):
you know, something like I feel like there's still Carol,
there's maybe there's two boxes, you know. I feel like
there's some boxes and things and I'm like, here, and
if I had a child, or a niece or a
nephew or a mentee, here's a box that I would
want you to have access to. But there are some things, Carol,
that are not for the people. They're not and I

(35:14):
think the burn instructions will still be true for that box.
So I think that all of our listeners, everyone across
our two podcasts, need to think seriously about having two boxes,
because there is definitely a world where the things that
you muse about, the things that you think are important,
the things that you think could be helpful need to

(35:36):
be kept. I mean, my both my parents are gone,
and when my my mom passed away, I had all
my her stuff and my father's stuff which she had kept,
and I was randomly like throwing things out until I
realized this was my father's writing. This was you know,
and it was really important to me suddenly to keep
it because I wanted to see his words on a
page I wanted. And there's something about just understanding what

(35:56):
people were thinking. So that's really important. There's stuff that
needs to be preserved, and then there's a stuff where
it felt really good to write it down. It was
really important for you to have it to go back to.
But yeah, it needs to be and I mean they
should definitely be two boxes, because you should definitely have
that second box. It should exist. It just needs to

(36:16):
self destruct. Yeah, that's what I want, Carol, a self
destruct certain certain people I don't want reading that. I
don't want anybody to be like, wow, this is salacious.
Let's put a book out. No, no, I don't know
how it works in the afterlife. But don't make me
come back and tell you don't do that. Don't make
me do That's what I'm saying. No, yeah, yeah, and one,

(36:38):
I mean I'm sounding old when I say this, but
you know, all this cancel culture now, you know, sort
of like OK, god forbid, I'm like, know what I know?
And you know, you. You go out in this sort
of blaze of story. Oh she was so great, she
did this and that, and then they find some stuff
you wrote when you were twelve. Well, I wrote when
I was twelve, and they're like X one journal and

(37:01):
that's it. Now you're descenders. Can't get no royalties off anything. No, no,
absolutely not. Okay, there's a business here, the self destructing journal.
People say, that's what we need. I really I think
you for bringing that up. Carol listeners. We know you're
out there. Please let us know that you have this,

(37:21):
because it's like we need like a safe that you know,
you could tell it or somebody could press a button.
You give somebody to code. They take that thing out
there somewhere and everything just incenterates inside. That's what we need,
exactly exactly. Okay, good, well, you know what imagine in
this short space of time together, we have created a
business models this opportunity at us. We are solving the

(37:41):
worst problems. We are We absolutely are great minds thinking together.
It's a beautiful thing. We'll be right back after these messages.
Welcome back to the show. Okay, I have one more
series of questions for you, because you know my head
is always in the in the parenting mode. But but
I want to talk about I mean, you mentioned not

(38:02):
having kids. I have not yet There's a world out
there in in parenting that I having it addressed on
my podcast. This is a great opportunity to start. And
that is my fervent belief in the world that people
who helped raise up kids but didn't give birth to
them play in the role of kids like i've you know,

(38:24):
certainly grandmothers of course, but aunties, especially play aunties. I mean,
you know, you're you're chosen family that helped you, and
god mothers and friends and people that are just around you,
they there can be such a special relationship. And so
I want to ask you first, when you were growing up,
did you have any kind of relationship with say, your

(38:45):
mom's friends or with play aunties, And then if do
you provide that for anybody. One of the things I
really love about now now as a grown woman, looking
back at how my mom raised me, it's my mom
had such rich relationships with other women, most of them
being other black women. So there was this moment where

(39:07):
her friends would come over and I was one of
those little kids that love to eat all the little veggies,
all the little broccoli florets and the little baby carrots
and all, you know, the little califlower thing. And so
they would sit there and eat little veggies with me.
But at a certain time at night, I knew I
had to go to bed so that they could stay
up and talk. And as a little girl, I just
remember fervently feeling in my bed, I am one day

(39:31):
going to be grown so that I can stay up
with my girlfriends and do whatever they're doing. I don't
know what they're doing, but I want to do that.
I want to be a part of it. But I'm
too young, you know. So there's just so much like
reverence I have for that, because in general, she was
modeling for me how to be in community with other
women and how important it would be in so many

(39:53):
phases of life to have these women that you could
stay up late talking to them, or you know, come
by the house at whatever time and chat with them.
So I think that's a big, a big model there
that I look back on now and feel really grateful.
And I I mean, I remember one of my mom's
friends as the one who taught me how to do
my makeup for the first time. Because I was very

(40:15):
you know when you get to that twelve thirteen. For me,
that was like a girl is very fascinated, a girl
wants to know about lipstick, a girl wants to know
what should she do, what should she not do? And
her friend Lisa, she sold beauty control, which I guess
maybe beauty control still exists, but it was kind of
like an Avon Mary Kay kind of model. And so

(40:38):
she did the whole thing, taught me how to wash
my face, how to moisturize the toner, you know, like
she came over into like what you would go to
the makeup counter in the department store. She like came
to our house and did that for me and got
to show me sort of how to do, you know,
an an appropriate look for my age at that point.
And that was so helpful to me because, you know,

(40:59):
the men in my family, we we were coming from
like a church background, like a Pentecostal holiness background, where
women weren't supposed to wear makeup. So my mom was
actually rebellious to that by wearing the bright lipstick that
she wore, you know, but I didn't grow up seeing
my grandma use mascara and things like that. You know.
So that was wonderful to have another woman, you know

(41:21):
around that could say, oh, I see this is a
thing that you're interested in. Let me show you how
to do this the right way before you get some
red lipstick and just do just do things your face.
Let's try to figure out what we're doing. You know.
So that's one like strong memory I can think of.
But my mom had a lot of wonderful women friends

(41:43):
in her life. We had wonderful church community to My
mom was a single mom raising my sister and I,
so we had a lot of people around us that
we're father figures at points were mentors, at points were
showing us how to do various things. My youth pastor
taught me how to drive, you know. They were just
all these like you know, my mom tried, she was

(42:05):
there was just a lot of like made up, a
lot of like yelling like that, and she was like,
somebody else, I gotta do this. This is somebody else's job.
It's not me. I can't be the person. So that
was really wonderful to think up too, to see this
wonderful church community that I grew up in to surround
my mom as a single mom. That she never felt

(42:25):
um like alone in parenting us that she knew she
had some other people. I mean I remember dating boys
and people in the church being like, why are you
dating so and so? And I'm like, well, you can
be talking to my mama. Why are you asking me
like I'm in love obviously obviously we're fifteen, we're gonna
get married. You're not gonna marry him? No, no, thank you. Yeah.

(42:45):
See those friends, those play on ties. They can say
stuff that you can't hear from your mother. No. No,
Like I distinctly remember my youth pastor this is this
is telling my age y'all. Because we didn't have cell
phones obviously, but it's very popular when I was in
high school for some parents to get their teenagers their
own phone line where you had your own number and

(43:06):
then there was like the house number, because otherwise if
it was just the house number. My mom was definitely
one of those moms that would pick up the phone
and be like, hello, I need to use the phone.
This is the mom that would read the things. Yeah
that's no, and I'd be like wait. I'd be like Mom, okay,
and then we will wait and she'd like say goodbye.
She didn't even give you the opportunity, Like she wouldn't
even hang up and let you say goodbye. She was like,

(43:26):
y'all say goodbye so I can use my phone. So
I felt very excited when she gave me my own
phone line, Carol. It was it was the nineties, so
I had every part of the phone was a different color,
the receiver, the base, the cord, they were all bright.
It was very great. And was I talking on that
phone past bedtime when my mom told me that I

(43:48):
should be off the phone. Of course I was, Carol.
Of course I did. And my mom went in there
and grabbed that phone. I just remember her arm winding,
winding the cord around that phone and putting it somewhere
that I just didn't know where. And I remember going
to my youth pastor and complaining to him. I remember
going to him and saying, this lady, and he he

(44:11):
wasn't married at the time that I can remember. Maybe
he had just maybe he was just about to get
married at this time. He was engaged. He's like, really,
she took your phone, I said, she took my phone away,
rubbed the cord around it, and took it out of
my room and he was like wow. He was like, man,
so um, who who paid for the phone? Like who

(44:33):
bought the phone? And I was like, I mean she
bought it, but it was a gift, and like you
can't buy a gift for someone and then just take
it back. You can't do that. He was like, oh, man,
so um, who paid the bill? Like when the phone
bill came? Who paid it? And I was like, I
mean she did, but like she's a mom, she should

(44:54):
she should pay it. So I don't have a job,
I'm a child. How could I do that? He was like, oh, man,
and who pays for like you know, the roof like
over your head and everything? Like who pays for the
house where you live? And I was like, well she does,
because that's so. It's like the more he was asking me,
the more I'm like, oh god. And he was like,

(45:17):
you know, I think you might owe your mom an
apology for how you reacted and how you weren't following
the rules because it's really her phone. If you think
about it, you know, it's her phone in her house,
in her bedroom. You're sleeping on a bed she bought.
And I was like, why did he use the logic
against me? Like this, you know, like, I really I

(45:40):
went to him, Carol, expecting him to be like, how
dare she take your that's your one way of communication
to the outside world. How dare she what a terrible parent?
Let us tell the elders of the church. We have
a terrible mother in the church. And I'm walking away
going apologize to this lady for taking my fault. That

(46:03):
conversation was not supposed to go this way. But that's
an example of having someone who's not your parents that
can ask you some questions get you to thinking about
your choices. You know, Yeah, that's that's just a great example.
Let me ask you this, what kind of a play

(46:26):
ONTI do you think you would be? Would you be
the kind that would say, like you wanted your youth
pastor to say, girl, she did that, Okay, wait, I'll
talk to her because that is not right. Or would
you be the kind that would say, okay, and can
we just revisit sort of? I mean, would you be
team kid or would you be team mom? You know

(46:48):
this is fascinating because my sister and I both have
actually talked about this, like as we've gotten older, and
you know, we're sort of at that point where we're like, wait,
we are the age that our aunts and uncles were
when we were children. So that still feels weird because
when we're with our aunt and uncles, we still feel
like the kids and like they're the adults. But when
we actually get by ourselves, we're like, we're actually the

(47:09):
age they were when we remember them as children. And
so we have talked about like who who is the
cussing auntie? You know, we've talked about that because you
need to have at least one of those. You need
to have at least one auntie that's the person that
cusses and is the person who's going to have a
good drink, you know, at the family gathering. And I've

(47:33):
always wanted to be the auntie that if if children
have questions regarding relationships and sex, that they know they
can come and speak to me, and that I'm I'm
going to speak the truth to them and give them
some rounded wisdom that I wish had been spoken to
me when I was their age, to give them some

(47:54):
things to think about. But especially for those of us
who grew up in church settings, when it comes to
dating and sex, you you really aren't getting the information
because people in the community feel like the less they
tell you, the less amount of trouble that you may
get in when the opposite is honestly, really true. So

(48:15):
I feel that that probably to some people, has been
my role a little bit that if you have a question,
I'm the person that you can come and speak to
and I'm going to tell you the truth about that.
That is a really valuable role to play because you know,
we all when it comes to talking to our kids
about relationships and and and death, especially about sex, we

(48:38):
all kind of first dive back into how we were
brought up and if if we appreciated it, if it
was a good way, we do that. But if if
it wasn't, we try to go in another direction. And
I will tell you that, um, even even with their partner,
I mean my husband, I had different approaches. I was
all about the Okay, we're going to talk about this

(48:59):
because this need to be talked about. But you know,
with three kids, they each react to me differently in
terms of how much they want to share. And I
you know, my mom laid down for me and I
fully agree that I'm not trying to be my kids friends.
I'm not trying to create a relationship where we tell
each other every single thing, because you know, you talked

(49:21):
about the trauma of people finding out you know, and
the after their mom is gone, and the books that
you know she had an affair with with some guy photographer.
I don't. I think kids, no matter how old they are,
there's this image you have of your parents that you
kind of don't want completely shattered. I mean, as you
get older, you acknowledge your person. You know, your your mom,

(49:42):
your dad, their people, they have perspectives. You don't agree
with them necessarily, they are the way they are. They're
not you, but you don't want um. So so it's
so it's hard. Um So I say, I'll have to
say that I respect that my kids they're all grown now,
but they're not like call me up every five minutes
to tell me some new I then, but with a
but it's really important that they have somebody else that

(50:05):
they can go and ask questions too, because I want
them to talk to a third I want them to
talk to somebody, but I don't want I. You know,
our parents are whoever they are, and I think it's
really important to have another person that's not them, so
you just get a different perspective and and a valuable one. Now,
you know, if you're that real play auntie that you

(50:26):
know likes a good drink and you know is the
wild one cussing all the time and all that, you know,
you want to make sure that you know you've got
some balance there. You don't want to send your child
off with some somebody who's telling her about ways that
you don't necessarily agree with. But but I I really
it's it's such a it's such an interesting and kind
of a dicey relationship. I mean, I am friendly with

(50:48):
some of my children's really good friends, but I know
the line that I can't cross in terms of asking
about my child, right, you know, I can't write. It's
like I'm not going to put them in that spot.
I can't. I mean, I'd love to know, and I'm
really close to this person, but I'm not. I can't
do that. It's so weird. I mean, you you you
spend so much time, you know, with these children, and

(51:12):
then suddenly there's there there have to be boundaries and
distance and and you have to respect them. So those
play aunties come in handy because girl, you know, I
have called up my girlfriend and like Listen, she's not
gonna talk to me about this, but if there's some
way that you could talk to her, I would be
very grateful. Okay, put it out there. And the last

(51:35):
thing I'll say to Carol is, you know, and I
especially experienced this and my friendships with women. I think
there are all these different phases of life right that
we experience as women. And some of that is related
to maybe where our career goals are, where that ends up,
and some of us thought we were going to work
for somebody else and then we end up becoming entrepreneurs.

(51:56):
And some of that's related to our relationships if we
decided to marry someone or be in a long term partnership,
if we thought it was long term and that relationship
ends or we end up experiencing divorce. However, our journey
is towards parenting, whether we actually become parents or not.
And then those of us who do the phases of

(52:18):
that and the developmental stages and all. And one of
the things that I would say has been a real
joy and I feel an important thing in my life
is I think it is important for us to have
friends who are in our phase of life because we
need that sense of feeling understood, you know, in the
particular phase we're in. But I think it's also helpful

(52:41):
when we have friends who may not be in the
same phase of life that we are. Like I've been
an entrepreneur now over ten years of my life. It's
wonderful for me having friends who aren't and talking to
them about their jobs and how they navigate their work
spaces and them hearing from me about this. You know,
I don't have children, and I've walked through the various

(53:02):
journeys of my friends, some whose journey towards parenthood was
easy and when they actually got to parenthood was really hard,
and some whose journey towards parenting was very difficult. And
so for some of my friends, I may be one
of a small number of friends they have that don't
have children. And I'm like, you know what, You're gonna
get a lot of mom talk, so I don't need

(53:22):
to provide that to you. I'm here to remind you
that you were a woman also outside of the fact
that you are a mother to these children that I
know you love very much. And also you'd like to
leave and go to Tuesday Morning or go grab a
cup of coffee by yourself, or use the bathroom without
having anyone's little fingers coming under the door. It's my

(53:43):
job to remind you that you're gorgeous and beautiful, you're
a sexual being, you are not just that. And I
think when we have friendships that give us that sort
of cross section, it gives us some ability to see
each other in our different phases of life and not
assume things about what may be going super easy or

(54:04):
what may be going really hard. We get a chance
to walk through that with each other, and I've really
enjoyed that about the women that are in community with me.
I just have to quickly add that one of my
dearest friends, who we've been friends for over thirty years now,
jeez Um, and she is Um. A wonderful woman, a

(54:25):
very successful film and television producer, has had an amazing
life and a great career and continues to have one.
And when we met, she was that was abandoning a
legal career to sort of try her hand at Hollywood.
She was just like pivoting completely, as was I because
I was leaving a job I really loved, I was
getting married and my husband's work required him to move

(54:48):
to Chicago. I didn't know any in Chicago, so we
were both pivoting in directions that we were excited by
but kind of wary of. Long story short, we've joked
about this photo past thirty years that if you could
push our lives together, you know, I I did the
kid thing in the you know, the sort of I'm
still married thirties somebody. I mean, we're definitely I have

(55:09):
the domestic thing, and I agonized for decades on not
having that career that I thought I was going to have.
And she has the hell fire career and you know,
is divorced and didn't have kids. And so we serve
that what you just talked about that role for each other,
it is. It is both um the one that the

(55:30):
friend that is not going to burden you with all
the whatever it is that they're talking about. You want
to hear because it's not your life whatever work, stress
or whatever. It's like, you want to eat that up.
But we're also the ones to tell each other that,
you know, as good as this looks from the outside,
you know it. You know it's great on one level,

(55:51):
here's how it's not great. And you know, sort of
here's the reality of the situation versus the sort of
you know, how how it looks, you know, the the
life both of us are alives. I mean, it's it's
really been amazing to sort of have this journey with
her where you know, she's at the OSCAR, she's at that,
I mean, she's doing it. I'm like, all right, and
and and I'm thrilled for her, and I'm excited to

(56:13):
hear what's going on and and then you know, but
I know the three sixty of it, you know. So
that's that's really really valuable. So I I so applaud
your interest in your work and making community of women
because I don't know where we would be without them. Okay,
that's it for real, Carol, That is it? Yeah, yeah,

(56:34):
so can I. I we're wrapping up here. First. First
of all, I want to thank you so much. I've
had so much fun, really great. Yeah, it's been really
really great. I've loved talking with you as I knew
I would, but it's really been amazing. And can I
just slide in for the very end them what I
do on my podcast, which is the GCP for Ground

(56:55):
Control Parenting Lightning Round. I will give you an abbreviated
version of the life. You can just ask you two questions.
First one should be easy, and that is what is
your favorite poem or saying, I'll give you the both
and then you can answer. The second one is give
me your favorite two children's books. Books do you remember
from growing up or books you've given to friends you know.

(57:18):
So poem, favorite poem, favorite children's books. My favorite poem
is theme for English b by Langston Hughes, and it
has a line that says, go home and write a
page tonight and let that page come out of you,
then it will be true. That's my favorite one of um,

(57:38):
my two favorite children's books. My top one is Goodnight Moon. Ah,
still my favorite. And my second one is Mufarro's Beautiful Daughters.
My mom read that to both my sister and I
and it's a it's a wonderful story, but it's also
gorgeous the illustration and it is just beutiful. So still

(58:01):
I actually still have a copy in my library, Like,
that's one that I needed to have a copy of
for sure. Yeah, those are great, great answers. You probably
got a copy of Goodnight Moon. That is a very
meditative Oh, yes, it's it's a meditative book. I'm a
collector of books around here. I'm I am now like,
it doesn't matter if I read them. I need to
see them in my home. That's where we're at. Carol. Yes,

(58:25):
I agree, definitely on the it doesn't matter if I
read them. But anyway, thank you so much as this
was so great. Thank you for joining me. I am
happy to be invited into the family room with you,
and I was glad to bring you here into the

(58:45):
living room where we could eat gorgeous snacks. We could
have rosemary crackers. I'm just yes, I'm here for all
of it. I will make sure we're sharing all the information.
But from my listeners, please make sure that you go
and take a listen to Ground Control parenting podcast hosted
by Carol Sutton Lewis. Yes, and for all of my listeners,

(59:07):
please right after you listen to this, go listen to
her with Amina Brown and you'll be glad you did.
Thanks Carol, I'll see you soon, see you soon. I
hope everyone listening enjoyed this conversation and that you'll come
back for more. Please rate, review, and subscribe wherever you
listen to podcasts, and tell your friends for more parenting info.

(59:27):
And advice. Please check out the Ground Control Parenting blog
at ground control parenting dot com. You can also find
us on Instagram and Facebook at ground Control Parenting and
on LinkedIn under Carol Sutton Lewis. The ground Control Parenting
with Carol Sutton Lewis podcast is a part of the
Seneca Women Podcast Network in partnership with I Heart Media.

(59:48):
Until the next time, take care and thanks for listening.