Search Results

< Back Megan's Story Megan (20) tells a story about the most important person in her life, her grandfather “Poppy”. She talks about a road trip to his log cabin in Vermont, the many stops on the way, and their special relationship. 00:00 / 04:41 The most important person in my life was my grandfather, Poppy. We were really close because he lived down the road from me growing up. I was over there all the time whenever my parents were working or needed to do something. My grammy, she would always have cinnamon raisin toast with butter ready for me anytime I was there with a glass of chocolate milk. And Poppy was so adventurous. I didn't even realize how old he was. He would ride bikes with us and play basketball. It was always a really great time there. One time, I remember going over there. My parents didn't just drop me off. They stayed. What happened was my and Poppy, they were going to move further north. Then they ended up moving to their dream log cabin in Vermont. And this was a really special place. It had a river, and it had a train too that would shake the house, but it was now 3 hours away. Even then, he would drive to, like, to see me play and, like, my band performances and softball games and everything. In March of 2022, my grammy had passed away in a car accident. And so, because my puppy was always putting everybody before himself, he didn't know that he had cancer. And so, after that accident and my grammy's passing, he received his lung cancer diagnosis. And so, he ended up having to leave that Vermont log cabin, and he had to move in with my parents. Now he was starting chemotherapy and would require a lot more assistance. I was away at school. And so, during this whole time when Poppy was receiving these treatments, I really wasn't there. It wasn't until the summer break when I was able to come home that I saw him again and we were able to spend so much time together. It was really like how it was when I was younger when he lived so close. It was really awesome. We went fishing. We would just like old times, we would it was really great. But then he decided that he no longer wanted to continue with the chemotherapy because, like I said, it was taking a great toll on him and his body, and the risk wasn't worth it at that point. He made the decision to stop, and it was really sad. But I just wanted to, like, enjoy every second with him because he is so special to me. During this summer, every weekend, he would ask me to take a ride up to Vermont to go visit his house, his log cabin, because he hadn't been up there since, you know, months prior, in August of 2022. We went on a big road trip to Vermont. It was really a road trip to remember. He sat in the passenger seat playing DJ. He brought along all of his CDs and was, like, switching them every so often, but we made many stops on the way. We stopped at each and every one of his old houses. We stopped to at old friends' houses, old churches. We stopped at his old realtor's office and old restaurants that he would have great memories. So, this whole trip took us a really long time. But whenever he would say, hey, Megan. Like, can we just stop at this one more place? I would say, yes. Of course. So, I would just make sure that I would say yes to everything because I knew that this was really special for him. When we got to Vermont, we ate frozen meals that my mom prepared for us, and we slept in sleeping bags. And we just enjoyed the time in the moment. After that trip, in August, I had to go back to school in September, so it was really hard to leave. In November of 2022, I got a call from my parents saying that, Poppy had had a stroke and that I should probably come home. So, I did not take this lightly. I had this gut feeling, and so I just drove home that night just to be safe. And, when I got home, he wasn't awake at that point. He wasn't talking or anything. But I got to see him one last time. And everybody that came over, all my family members, we all slept over at my house just to make sure that everybody was there. And then the next morning, he took his final breath. It was Veteran’s Day. So, when the funeral home came, they put a flag over him because he was a veteran of the army, and so that was really special to everyone there. And then we saw him drive off, and we just stood there and watched him turn the last corner. Previous Next

Emily W's Story Emily W talks to Emily L about how the feminist movement has shaped her growing up and how the culture of women's liberation influenced her ideologies and life. Scroll to Listen Emily W's Story 00:00 / 04:39 The feminist movement which was then mostly called Women's liberation movement was a major civil rights movement when I was growing up in the sixties and seventies. In high school I started paying attention to national leaders like Gloria Steinem in particular, who had started Miss Magazine which was kind of the first thing that was called a women's magazine that wasn't about housekeeping and cooking and among many other things she said that women needed to recognize and fight for the right for recognition and equality, the idea that women were equal. It seems like such common sense, but it wasn't people didn't always act as if that was common sense. In a lot of ways I felt that my whole life, but especially when I went to college I went to a women's college, Wilson college in Pennsylvania and I learned academically some of the things that I was picking up from the culture from women's liberation, things about, you know women have always been pioneers, but our history has been often hidden either accidentally or on purpose. Certain women have always defied the norms and excelled but they have not always been celebrated. Just that there were a lot of hidden stories of women, both individual and national. So feminism made me question a lot of the norms that I've grown up with. I certainly was never told as a kid that I wasn't equal to a man. I was always told well you can do whatever you want to do. But the culture saw until I grew up with these sort of Unthinking things around the T. V. Ads magazines. And that in my hometown was the college that my mom went to which was this women's college. It turned out to be one of the best things I've ever done in my life. When I got there I realized-- I mean it's sort of like my intellectual life took off. There were certainly efforts made by most of the professors to bring women's history or whatever into the curriculum. So in some way I definitely got more academic knowledge than I might have been at another school. But mainly it was just being around all women and when women have all the opportunities women take all the roles. So it was nobody saying you can do this. It was just if you wanted to do it you did it. And so it wasn't political at all. It was just like learning by doing oh you can do anything, you really can do anything. The baseline assumptions have changed considerably and it's much more than the norm for women to have a choice of how they lived their lives. That's kind of the bedrock change. So I think the biggest change probably is that the assumption of inferiority since it and it wasn't all that women couldn't do as good a job at things but there was always the assumption that you probably didn't even want to give women a chance in the workplace or anything serious because they would get married and or have kids and then leave, and so therefore you really needed to give men the opportunities that we're serious. And I don't think that happens as much. There's still some of it, but I don't think nearly as much overall about feminism, it's certainly not a big hot topic today and the way that it was when I was growing up, but I think although there's so much more to be done, it's okay that it's not a hot topic because it doesn't need to be in quite the same way that second wave feminism, which is the era that I grew up, made some progress and therefore feminism for a lot of people could be put on the back burner because men and women and people of other genders just sort of take it far more likely to take it for granted that, of course everybody has self determination. So I don't personally take any credit for that, but I think my generation as a whole, and the generation just before me, um, can take some some credit for kicking up a lot of fuss and making things happen.

Julia's Story Julia reflects on what her life might look like in sixty years. She explains her values and emphasis on how she strives to be someone her family and others can lean on. Scroll to Listen Julia's Story 00:00 / 03:43 Jonathan: “When somebody says to you ‘in 50 or 60 years you will be in your late 70s’ and let’s assume that you're moderately healthy, what comes to your head?” Julia: “So trying to look into the future like that, I say what first comes to mind is thinking about my family. Um, I have an older sister who right now is 24 so 60 years from now, she’ll be 84. And then I have two younger brothers, one who is about to be 18 so he’ll be 78 from now. Then I have a youngest brother who just turned 14 so he’ll be 74 but I hope that 60 years from now we’re all still close together–I hope we’re all still around. But um, I see family being a big part of my life. I always love looking forward to going home. I’m from Eastern, Mass. so if I want to spend a weekend back home I have that ability to just drive back. Um, I hope that that’s the kind of relationship that I have 60 years from now. I hope that I’m able to still hold onto that connection with my siblings.” Jonathan: “Do you think that this family relationship is equally as important to your brothers and sister? Do you think they would say the same?” Julia: “I hope they would say the same! Um, I’m not positive I mean my older sister–she is very–she heavily prioritizes relationships with people so outside of family she is very much so always putting herself out and trying to stay connected with her friends from highschool and from college. On the contrary, I’d say I’m the opposite of her. I like having friends and I love knowing people but also I’ve always been a busy person and I’m okay with doing my own thing and if I know people and have people to hang out with that’s great but if not, I’m still okay with continuing to be individual. I think I will continue to keep a strong relationship with my siblings and if I have a spouse, them–being able to keep a strong relationship with them and their family ‘cause I love having big get-togethers and catching up with people. And I value the relationship with a few people as long as it's a strong one and genuine.” Jonathan: “Assuming that–maybe it’s the wrong assumption–but assuming for the moment that your partner/you’re married or whatever in 50 or 60 years, how important is it that that person be close to your siblings?” Julia: “Um, I think it’s pretty important. I mean, right now I’m in a relationship and I don’t know what 60 years will look like but I’ve been in a relationship for almost 3 years and I value being very close with his family and they are people that I’m very close with and I wanna have a really close relationship and be someone that they can turn to if they need anything!”

Liya Liang speaks with Nina Kleinberg about her experiences attending a preparatory boarding school and leaving all she knew behind. The two discuss the effects that it had on her life reflecting on the aspects of race, class, and socioeconomic status had on her experience during her four years. Liya's Story Liya Liang speaks with Nina Kleinberg about her experiences attending a preparatory boarding school and leaving all she knew behind. The two discuss the effects that it had on her life reflecting on the aspects of race, class, and socioeconomic status had on her experience during her four years. Scroll to listen Liya's Story 00:00 / 03:29 My high school self-looking back on it, I was just, I think a big fish in a small pond. I like never stepped out of my comfort zone. I never really pushed boundaries. I wasn’t a person to take risks. I think that my college experience is different than my high school experience in the sense that I’m learning to learn and learning for myself and about myself discovery. So, a big part of my identity I’m from Lowell Mass, and that’s the second most populated Cambodian refugee community. Being Cambodian was always an important part of my identity, but since I was immersed in a lot of Cambodian culture, I didn’t see why it was special or why it was different. My parents until I was in middle school never really talked about what they have went through, what they have gone through, same thing with my grandmother until I asked. So, that kickstarted me looking into my identity more, but back then I didn’t really think about my Cambodian identity that much. I knew it was a strong part of me because I was living in it, but I didn’t really get to deconstruct my place in the greater scheme of the world because I was in the middle of the ethnic community of it. I knew it was different, I’ve never really been around that many rich people, and I’ve never experienced that before, it was just a culture shock in the sense that I felt like I didn’t connect with people that much, since we were so different, but I ended up making friends. Initially, I was “oh these people are so different, they dress different, they look different, they talk different” and I was in a different environment, I felt really insecure, and I didn’t have that much confidence in myself, it was really the first time I pushed myself. Within weeks I just got more comfortable talking in how I spoke whether it was different and whether it was ineloquent, and I think that really helped a lot. I just thought that the student body would be more diverse. There were Asian people, but they didn’t really deem me Asian since I am Asian American. That was really hard for me because I am not a white person, I’m not a black person, I’m Asian, but I am Asian American. And I often found myself counting the amount of people of color in the room just to make myself feel a little more comfortable, I was also sometimes really hyperaware that I was the only person of color in the room. That was like the first time that I experienced that. It really made me insecure I think the first couple years. But then I realized that not that it was all in my head, that I needed to grow comfortable in my place, and that my place in the grand scope of things wouldn’t change. If I just couldn’t figure out a way to navigate these spaces, that I would struggle. And if I really really struggled that would be at the expense of why I was here, my academic and just to do well. I just knew that I had to do great, because of my identity and because I was purely there I guess, because of my identity. I was really really stressed, I wanted to be perfect. My junior year and my senior year, I was really focused on I have to do well because I am here because I need to excel, I need to represent my community as home, represent my own Cambodian community. I think my identity of Asian American grew stronger because of it, and I was in a different environment, but I think I was very sheltered being home.

< Back Tony's Story Tony reflects on his working relationship with the reknowned American storyteller Studs Terkel. Studs was best known for his oral history books, in which he interviewed ordinary people about their lives and experiences. Tony worked closely with Studs and provides great insight on how important their work was. Everybody has a story to tell- Tony and Studs were instrumental in documenting these stories for decades. Scroll to listen 00:00 / 18:07 Thinking about and talking about stories, just makes me remember so well the great storyteller Studs Turkle who was born in 1912. Who spoke with hundreds of people, all over the country, about their lives, these conversations he was always uncomfortable with the notion of an interview, he liked to think of it as a conversation. Studs had a radio program on WFMT in Chicago for 40 years, but before that there was a program heard on public radio stations around the country, when public radio was just finding his legs. I heard him in Boston, and I thought I’d like to know this man; I worked in the radio business, and I was able to persuade somebody in Chicago to talk to me about working at WFMT so that is how I got to meet Studs. I was in a large part moved and interested in Chicago because of hearing him and his remarkable way of talking with people of all kinds. He was very very clever; Studs were very clever. He had people to realize that this was a friendly event, and they needn't be shy or intimidated by it, he was genuinely interested in what they had to say and that’s why in the end he had such successful conversations because people knew he was honestly interested in who they were and how they lived their lives. And he had funny little techniques pretending that he couldn’t get the tape recorder to work and getting them involved in helping get the tape started which meant that they were more equals than someone getting interviewed by an interviewer they were participants. I was lucky because I helped Studs and worked with him over a couple of decades and would often be invited to go along as he would see people around the country. Like a lot of men in his generation who grew up in cities, he never learned to drive a car, so if I had no other importance at least I could drive. I was lucky to be able to participate in this and so it’s a pleasure for me to be able to talk about Studs. Those experiences also made for stories because I then had stories to tell about the experience of being at the side of a master recorder of American and as you say Worldwide voices. The books that result from Studs interviews, his conversations are extraordinary and probably not being read as much as they once were, and that’s a shame. Previous Next

Follow Francesca as she shares her spiritual journey as a follower of Saint Francis of Assisi, inspiring her devotion to uplifting others around her while spreading love. Francesca's Story Follow Francesca as she shares her spiritual journey as a follower of Saint Francis of Assisi, inspiring her devotion to uplifting others around her while spreading love. Francesca's Story 00:00 / 03:47 Julia: “What person or entity in your life has been the most influential for you?” Francesca: “For me, I grew up in a difficult family, but a friend invited me to go to church with her and they taught us how to become followers of Saint Francis of Assisi, and he became the most important and most influential person to me. It was fortunate that I had that happen to me, just by chance it seemed like.” Julia: “Do you want to talk a little bit more about the process of finding him as that influential person or kind of what he meant to you?” Francesca: “Well I had already had my first communion. I had gone through all the training and the catechism and everything, but none of it meant anything in my heart. And after my first communion I was attending a church that was a national monument, that was gorgeous. You walk in and there’s paintings all over the ceiling, and everybody went because it was such a beautiful church and everybody went to show off their clothes. And I didn’t know what I was doing there, you know? And then my girlfriend said, you know, come to my church you’re gonna like my church, it’s fun, we have the beat music, guitars and everything. So I decided start going over to her church. And when I went, at first I said why are there no paintings, there was nothing, you know, there was nothing. And they said ‘It’s a Franciscan church and Saint Francis wanted the churches to be simple.’ And then they said ‘You can come on Friday afternoon, we teach all about Saint Francis.’ So I went on Friday afternoon, and they would teach us all about Saint Francis, and then they would teach us about the problems we were facing today - how would he tackle that? And we would have to go home and do homework and bring it back the next Friday. And then after we worked all together as a group, after we worked, then we would have time in the courtyard and it was a beautiful, beautiful courtyard. And we would have time to play. And they were teaching me, then I understood finally. So Saint Francis became my ladder to God, because before I hadn’t gotten any of it, you know? It was all up here, but it wasn’t in my heart. I couldn’t find a consistent church near me, so I go to a Congregational church. It's important to me to be able to serve and to be able to belong. So I started going, and I started serving, and it's important to me, and it's also important that Saint Francis always had to uplift the least of the least, you know, always make sure that you can help them. Like if they’re homeless, whatever. Help them. Help them. Help them, you know? Don’t leave people stranded behind, you know? So that was really important to him, and it was important that we stop reading the Bible, stop reading all the books, and do it. Get out there and do it. So that was really big for him. So I try to be as active as I can. Whether its part of my church or not, I try to. If I see someone who is homeless, I stop and talk about whatever they want to talk about. Saint Francis became really meaningful to me, he made sense to me, for love to exist. For love to be the most important part of living your life." Previous Next

< Back Brenda's Story Brenda talks about her experience being a daughter to Brazilian immigrants and first generation college student. Brenda describes the transformation in her perspective from once desperately wanting to fit in to typical American standards, to now embracing her Brazilian roots and culture. 00:00 / 04:01 Both of my parents emigrated from this state in Brazil called Minas Gerais. My Mom came from the capital which is Belo Horizonte and my Dad is from this small, more rustic rural town called Governador Valadares. I didn’t think too much about it in my early, early ages but as I started getting into like third grade, fourth grade, with people, you know, dressing up for St. Patrick's day. And just being like, there is no Brazilian recognition, like really, there would be hispanic heritage month that we kind of talked about and black history month but Brazil is really weird because we are a little bit of everything. Usually, you know, when I am in the sun, I get like very, very tan. And my hair, especially when I was younger, was very long and big and curly and I had bushy eyebrows and I hated that. I really hated that. My best friend growing up was blonde with straight hair and blue eyes. And I would pray to God, like literally this third grader, I would cry to my Mom, and be like why don’t I have blonde hair and blue eyes, why don’t I look the way I want to look and fit this mold that I so desperately wanted to fit in. So at the time, I didn’t realize how badly I wanted to identify myself with something but that's what the issue was is that I often felt like these kind of headline identities, none of them really fit for me. But a lot of that in hindsight came from me trying to push down a lot of these aspects of myself that I feel like made me inauthentic. And it didn’t really, I guess come full circle until I got to UMass, and that's when my bubble really burst. And so my whole floor was filled with hispanic people, black people, caribbean, a very diverse mix of college kids. And when their families would come they would bring their traditional little Brazilian pastries and stuff, like pao de queijo, which is like cheese bread. And I remember this so well that one of the guys Mom came and brought it around for like to everyone on the floor, and that is such a Brazilian thing to do, like if you bring one thing you’re bringing it for everyone, I don’t know, and it just felt like, it was weird, it felt like a piece of home that I got to have at this really scary huge place. And I don't know, I feel like UMass being so big gave me the space to stop the comparison. That was when I was like, oh my god, I can stop being a poser kind of, and try to just relax a little bit, wear my hair natural. I also feel like going through different experiences and really realizing how much my parents sacrificed for me and care about me and show me so much unconditional love that not everyone in college gets to experience made me really appreciate them on a level that I never had. They really raised me with so much warmth, that it is crazy that I ever wanted them to stop being like that and be more American because it was the most nurturing environment. And now it's like, I’m like Mom please cook and yeah, just embracing that aspect also just like, now it’s time to kind of embrace differences. So yeah, I guess just like not thinking so hard about who I am and just being who I am, is what I am doing right now. Previous Next

Hannah talks about the risk that she took in studying abroad in Amsterdam and her experience amercing herself in the culture by herself and how it impacted her future career path. Hannah's Story Hannah talks about the risk that she took in studying abroad in Amsterdam and her experience amercing herself in the culture by herself and how it impacted her future career path. Scroll to listen Hannah's Story 00:00 / 02:07 Would you tell me about a time that you took a risk? A time I took a risk was going abroad last semester, my fall semester, senior year to Amsterdam. And I know it's like cliche like, oh yeah, you like go abroad, whatever. But I really wanted my abroad experience to be as natural as possible. I didn't want to go to an American school in a foreign country. I didn't want to go to a school where I knew I was going to be surrounded by other American college students. I really wanted to just like go abroad and experience like culture shock like head on. So I decided to go to fret university type in Amsterdam, like by myself. I didn't know, I didn't know it was. So when I got there, I literally like booked my flight a week before and just got on a plane and shipped myself off to Amsterdam knowing no one. And yeah, that was the time I really did take a risk. And what did you learn about yourself? Did learn that taking a risk is not only can I do it and I'm very capable um but like it just gave me that confidence that I can take risks in the future. And that taking risks actually is a good thing. And I have so many positive outcomes from doing it and I really have made some of my best friends um throughout the world just doing that experience. And so post grad, I'm a senior. So I'm graduating next at the end of the semester in like a month, which is terrifying. But I, I decided to take a job in South Korea, um, teaching English, which I never, I never would have done, had I not taken that risk to go to Amsterdam because it's like a similar situation where I don't know a soul there. I don't know a soul in Seoul. Um, but I, I don't know anyone there. I'm just going by myself to a country that's thousands of miles away, um, with a 13 hour time zone, like, and I'm ok with it and I'm excited for it and I'm, I'm not crying because of stress this time, but I'm really excited.

Jesse's Story Jesse shares a story with Kelly about his trip to Bhutan and the lessons helearned from his Buddhist practice. Scroll to Listen Jesse's Story 00:00 / 03:09 I've been a Buddhist my whole life. And I had been working with a teacher who had a very big impact on my life. I studied with him for about 13 years and he died in 1987. And I was kind of grieving and wondering, you know, where do I go from here? I felt kind of lost. I just had this idea of going on a retreat, maybe not a retreat, but a pilgrimage, to Bhutan, which is nearIndia. And because that was a place where he had spent some time and it had a very powerful impact on him; it changed his life. So I figured I'd go there and just experience that place as he did. I didn't want to do it alone. It's just that I don't like traveling alone. So I looked for some of these tours, that were going to Bhutan, which there aren’t many of because it is kind of out of the way. And it's kind of expensive to get there. So I was looking for some tours, and I found one in a Buddhist magazine. These people went exactly where I wanted to go. They're going to India and Bhutan and Nepal. And the guide was a Buddhist painter. It sounded interesting to me. And I contacted them and signed up. There were about 10 of us on the trip. And they were all Sufis for some reason. They were American Sufis and their main goal was going to India, where they had a temple that they were going to. My main goal was to visit a particular monastery where he spent time in Bhutan called Taktsang monastery. And it's just on a cliff. It's just like a flat cliff.And it's this, these buildings on the side of it are quite amazing. It's a very disorienting place because you're up on the side of a cliff, you know, and you just like space all around you. So it's quite remarkable. I almost didn't make it. I got sick in India. And I was in bed for a couple of days. And I was really worried that I wasn't going to make it to this monastery because that was the whole goal of this trip. You know, I was really getting kind of bummed out. But the fever broke. And the next day I was able to get up and go and we hiked up, it's about a three hour hike up to the monastery. And I was really hurting. And you know, I've been sick in bed for a couple of days. I was dehydrated. It was a tough climb. But luckily there were some horses that were going up and down to the monastery. And a fellow was with one of the horses and he just took a look at me. He goes, “Want to ride the horse?” And I agreed to do it. It took me up most of the way if not all the way, but most of the way, and I was able to get there in spite of being really sick. I beat most of them up there because of the horse. I don't know exactly how tall it is. But it's pretty steep. The monastery in the distance and it's up on this cliff. The closer you get the more you see these paths right along the edge of the cliff. It's pretty wild. It wasn't that scary. No, it was always a fairly wide path. You have these VISTAs you could see forever but it wasn't actually treacherous. It looked hard to get to but it wasn't that hard to walk there.

< Back Barbara L's Story Barbara discusses the important friendships that she has maintained in her life, and how over a lifetime of working in film and theatre, she has maintained these relationships while also achieving her dreams of working on set. 00:00 / 04:23 “Friendship has always been really important to me, so I’ve done what I needed to do to keep those friendships. I have 3 girlfriends from high school that I still am in touch with a lot and go away with every year for a girl’s weekend, and a girls week when we turn 40 and when we turn 50 to some place really great. So that has been a real highlight of my life, that I have these wonderful friends from high school. As I said I have a friend that I am in touch with quite a lot, she was here this year visiting, that I know since I worked in San Francisco, a very good friend that I know that was a girlfriend of one of the grips. And we are still friends even though she lives in Oakland now, and friends in New York that worked on The Outsiders, that are still very good friends, that are a couple. He worked in casting, and she was the set nurse, who eventually became a costumer. So there are those folks, but then when I would be away on location, which I was a lot, if I was working in New York it was a lot easier obviously to keep contact with my friends, when I was living in New York. I was on location a lot and there was no cell phones, no internet, no email. So, the only thing you could do is call or write letters, and I did both. I was sort of able to keep in touch with postcards, but then I would get back to town, after having been gone for maybe six months, and you know, you start calling people and you don’t know how long you’re going to be there, maybe a month, maybe six weeks till I start again, maybe it’s only going to be three weeks and I’m going to be gone again. So, by the time you set up, you call them, maybe you find out what is going on with them, you plan to get together for dinner, and poof you’re gone again. Or if they are people that are working in film, they are gone again. My friend who was in casting, he stayed in casting a long time, and if he was in the middle of casting something, the only way I would see him was if I was willing to go to a play with him or see a new comic that he was thinking about casting in something. And that would be the only way I could see him because he was basically busy from morning to night. Everyone and everything was a little bit that way, with everyone that I knew, so it was lonely at times. I would sometimes be in a different time zone, and wonder “who can I call? I’m feeling lonely.” And I had an important relationship in college, but it really wasn’t until I was forty that I had another one that was more than a sometimes thing. When you’re in town, or you’re both in town, and during a film. In some ways, it made me be my own agent, you know have a lot of my own agency because I was my most consistent companion. It was just me; I was the only one who was always around that I could rely on. And I felt independent in the world and strong. We were talking about packing earlier, but I would have a plane ticket in my purse a lot of the time, and I would be able to pack in a pretty small bag and be gone for a month because I was just so used to living out of a suitcase. And I just felt good in the world, and I felt, having made it my own way with no one else helping me, besides my white privilege that is, I was able to have gotten myself to that position and I was happy. I kind of took it for granted in a certain way that I had done it, I did not always think about how I had done that for myself, but I was happy just having to gotten to where I got. To where I could choose the films I wanted to work on, where I could expand my role and do more producing and do script supervising sometime which was really fun. Being on the set and dealing with more of the actors, the director, and the camera people, it really was like my dreams come true.” Previous Next

Ray's Story In this clip, Ray discusses his journey to a love of theater and acting. Acting has taught him a great deal about life, and is a critical part of his identity. Scroll to Listen Ray's Story 00:00 / 03:52 Ray: So, um, my English teacher in my freshman year English class also happened to be the guy who ran the drama activities at Springfield College. This is 1961 we're talking. He was always trying to get the jocks to try out for the - because he never had enough bodies for the plays that he was doing. Then I tried out for a play in the spring quarter of my freshman year and I got a small part in a play called - by Tennessee Williams - called Cat on a Hot Tin Roof! So I got to see all the plays that they did, which was an eye-opener to me, because I had never seen a play before, really. Never seen the live theater. I fell in love with the idea of making theater. It was imaginative, it was like you all created to- as a, as a group of people, you created something, and, that was imaginary, and you lived in it! And you got to express a part of yourself that might not be able to be expressed in the rest of your life! It seemed very magical to me. So anyway I had decided, “Well I’m going to transfer and become an English major.” But I also said, “Maybe there's some theater going on over at the junior college, maybe they do something in the summer.” So I went over, offering to work backstage, but they said, “Aren't you going to try out for the plays? We do two plays in the summer. You should - ought to do that.” So I tried out for the first play and got a supporting role in it! I'm sure I was terrible. (Laughter) But, I did it, and found it interesting. And then the guy who ran their theater program at the junior college, he directed the second play they did in the summer. And he cast me in the lead for that without me even having to audition! And as it turned out, also I got a headline in the paper, in the Flint Journal, a review, and it said “Burke Scores in Local Play.” In all the time I did athletics, there was no recognition at all, and suddenly I had a degree of public success that just blew me away! I had - amazed me! It made me really turn my head around. Not just to switch and become an English major; I wanted to study theater. That fall, I suddenly was in Evanston at Northwestern University, and found myself as a full-time theater student. My focus was to be acting, but I loved all aspects of working in the theater. After I finished graduate school I did teach, uh, at Southern Methodist University, for, uh, three years. And then that led into working in more professional situations, and eventually I left the educational theater behind. And said, I want to try and see if I can't make it as a professional actor. There’s the same kind of progression that you do there. That led to, you know, working in regional theater for 14 years, which led to I wanted to work in a larger kind of framework, so I said I wanted to do television and film. So we all moved to Los Angeles and I was there for 20 years, doing TV and film and some theater. And after twenty years, um, we shifted and moved to the Twin Cities where I still continued to, ‘cause they have wonderful regional theater there, a really great - the Guthrie Theater. And I worked there for 16 years and only occasionally in television and film, when something would come to town that I’d get a part in. So I’ve been, now, a professional actor now for fifty years, and a student of acting for almost 60 years. My wife has always said that acting for me is a practice. It's not a career as such. So it’s more than just the way I turn my living, it's a way that has shaped me and fulfilled me as a human being. I think I said to you once that I'm a better actor because of having a full personal life. I'm also a better person for having been an actor, I think.

< Back Jonathan's Story, 2021 Jonathan talks with Julia about the importance of his family network during the pandemic. Likewise, he is thankful for social media and zoom technology because it enabled him to stay in touch with his family. 00:00 / 03:46 Again the family network was very, very important. Your children, where are they currently living? Where are they living? Two of them are in Northampton Massachusetts, which is where I am now. Which explains one hundred percent why once we were both retired why we moved here. My daughter said cheerfully, I am quite happy to look after you when you are a Gaga but I am not driving up and down 91. And that seemed pretty reasonable. She's been, she's been wonderful. During the pandemic, you know before we all got vaccinated and all that, she would go shopping for us. We didn’t feel this way but we pretty much lived an isolated life in our house. And she wouldn’t let us go anywhere and it was wonderful. And she was very cheerful about it, never complained. That's a great relationship to have too, and very selfless of her. Yeah, oh yeah, I mean she's, all three of them are very very caring about these old folks that report to be their parents. Would you say, I know you mentioned that now looking back on it, during COVID you were isolated, but would you say that that isolation translated to feeling lonely or would you say on the contrary, being able to use zoom and connect with your brothers all over the country and also with your son in California and having your daughter around, would you say you actually still felt very connected? Yeah, I know that people who lived on their, who lived on their own, have had to cope with learning, there is no question about it. Which means both our sons, so child number one, child number three, are on their own, and different times it’s been very hard. We have a nephew too who lives in Ottawa and he’s on his own, he's talked about that. I think that for people who are partners and who get on with their spouses, some of course are partners but wish they weren’t, but we are not in that category. It's been, it's been much easier. I felt, right at the beginning of the pandemic when it was totally unexpected and we had no idea what was happening, I suppose I felt a little bit, alone. But, having a spouse, having children and grandchildren who didn't come into the house for months but we would walk up and down the street. You know, and chat with them. And having zoom and being a voracious reader, I don’t think that was an issue for me. Previous Next