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Support for this American life comes from ADP,

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when it comes to taking on the

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next anything. ADP, always

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designing for people. A

0:38

quick warning, there are curse words that are unbeeped

0:40

in today's episode of the show. If

0:43

you prefer a beeped version, you can

0:45

find that at our website, thisamericanlife.org. The

0:49

People's Almanac came out in the mid-1970s. It's

0:52

hard to imagine a more eccentric bestseller. Over

0:55

1,400 pages long. It read

0:57

like an encyclopedia written by an excited and

1:00

precocious 15-year-old who loved all the obscure details

1:02

of all the knowledge in all the world.

1:04

There are sections on the greatest man-made disasters ever,

1:06

and also on the greatest prize fighters, a

1:09

guide to buried treasure in the United States, biographies

1:12

of famous and infamous scientists, a

1:15

history of advertising going back to ancient Greece, and

1:17

also a chapter about a minister who took over

1:19

a newspaper for a week in the year 1900

1:21

and made all editorial decisions.

1:24

What was on the front page, what they covered, based on

1:26

what he believed Jesus would have done if

1:28

Jesus had gone to the newspaper game. And

1:32

at the end of the book was an address,

1:34

and a note from the authors asking for

1:36

suggestions for future editions and asking readers to

1:38

tell them what parts of the book they

1:41

liked and disliked. So, we

1:43

eventually received thousands of letters, each

1:45

of which I read. David

1:47

Walachinsky was one of the authors of the People's

1:49

Almanac. And because of that, I

1:52

was able to determine that the

1:54

most popular chapter in the People's

1:56

Almanac was, was List. Above

2:01

analogy in the world people most

2:03

loved twenty five pages out of

2:05

the fourteen hundred page book that

2:07

had some lists. Similar the

2:10

so boring stuff like the world's fifteen

2:12

big cities and ten tallest buildings and

2:14

ten longest rivers. But there

2:16

are weird or lists twenty historical

2:18

figures who were born is illegitimate

2:20

children, fifteen people who has an

2:22

absurd number of spouses and this

2:25

one has made a little more

2:27

edgy. And nineteen Seventy Five in

2:29

this is published twenty celebrities have

2:31

been psychoanalyzed from letters I got

2:33

about as he says that they

2:35

learned that one was that readers

2:37

who really loves was famous people

2:40

who never existed but but lives

2:42

today like Sherlock Holmes, Superman, Wonder

2:44

Woman, Scrooge with Doc. Surgeons.technically

2:46

a person but you get idea

2:48

and the most popular list was

2:50

nine Breeds of Shocked By so

2:52

based on that we decided to

2:54

do or of the first book

2:56

of with. First book

2:58

of this was an even bigger, even

3:01

more ridiculous a huge best seller. Pop

3:03

Culture Phenomenon is owed over three million

3:05

copies at for Seagulls, a short live

3:07

Tv spin off, and a board game.

3:11

I was a teenager in the Nineteen seventies.

3:13

I had no interest in this kind of

3:15

thing whatsoever. But every being one of those

3:17

ubiquitous books that you could not help but

3:19

know about. and looking back right now, reading

3:21

a book lists today. I

3:24

think Accidentally figured out how to give the

3:26

pleasure of scrolling the internet. Way

3:28

before the internet existed. Basically.

3:30

Was a way to least through impossibly random

3:33

stuff to something catchy. Grabbed your I. We're.

3:35

different kinds of lists and people

3:37

responded all of them we have

3:39

the celebrity with saw you know

3:41

where we would ask ronald reagan

3:43

what are the events and history

3:45

you wish you could have witnessed

3:47

then there was a straight with

3:49

that was statistical you know what

3:52

was the worst airlines in the

3:54

world based on deaths per miles

3:56

flown and then my favorite kind

3:58

what what we called the hannity

4:00

where you'd actually have to do

4:02

some research and then

4:04

put a paragraph describing the entry.

4:06

No, it was a popular list

4:08

they ever did. It was like that. And before

4:11

I tell you what this list was, I want you to

4:13

please listen for a second to some of the lists that

4:15

it had to beat out to be the most popular list. Okay,

4:17

here we go. Fifteen

4:20

famous events that happened in the bathtub. Sixteen

4:23

names of things that you never knew had names. Eighteen

4:26

famous brains and what they weighed. Fourteen

4:29

men who became units of measurement and the units named

4:31

after them. Benjamin Franklin's Eight

4:33

Reasons to Marry an Older Woman. A lot

4:37

of competition there. So

4:40

what was in that most popular list? Sex,

4:43

sexual positions in

4:45

order of popularity and then the

4:47

advantages and disadvantages of each one.

4:51

Decades later, people still tell

4:53

me, thank you so much for that list. I learned

4:55

so much. And

4:57

maybe this is obvious on its face, but just to lay out

4:59

why that would be such a big deal in the 70s. I

5:04

think it was a big deal because nobody talked

5:06

about it. It wasn't in print. And

5:09

I think a lot of people only

5:12

thought there was one sexual position. No.

5:15

Yeah, oh yeah. I mean, there were people

5:17

like that. And a lot of

5:19

the people who would tell me about how

5:21

it affected them, they

5:23

read it at a time when they were teenagers. I

5:27

mean, essentially, I just opened it up to

5:29

that page in the book, and

5:31

these are so basic. It literally looks like

5:33

which person is on top and

5:36

whether they're lying, sitting, or standing.

5:38

And each position gets five

5:40

sentences maybe, like a sentence of

5:42

advantage, a sentence of disadvantage. It's

5:44

very purse. It's

5:46

two pages total. Yeah,

5:50

yeah. It's not the kind of sultra. The

5:59

Book of Linths. And the success of the Book of

6:01

Lists demonstrates so clearly that putting

6:03

something on a list can have such power. It

6:06

can reach people. But

6:08

of course, most of the lists in our lives are the

6:10

ones we write for ourselves. And

6:13

it's interesting. People put all kinds of

6:15

things on them. Oh my God. I

6:18

feel nervous. Why do you feel nervous? Because

6:22

I was just looking

6:24

through my lists, and I just feel

6:26

like a freak. This is

6:29

Aviva Dukorinfeld, a producer at our show here. And

6:32

I learned about the very personal and idiosyncratic

6:34

list that she keeps in a staff

6:36

meeting, where I talked about Walechinski and different kinds of

6:38

lists. And at that meeting, Aviva

6:40

started talking about her lists. And

6:42

so I was offering this, kind

6:45

of assuming I would start saying

6:47

my lists so that everyone else would be like, yeah, yeah, me

6:49

too. And then they would share their lists, and it would be

6:51

kind of like this bonding moment. That's what you thought was going

6:53

to happen. Yeah. And that's not

6:56

what happened at all. What

6:58

happened is that I named a couple

7:00

of my more recent lists, and

7:03

then everyone started laughing and was like,

7:05

what the hell? In fact, Laura,

7:08

our coworker, messaged in the chat

7:10

Aviva's brain with seven exclamation points.

7:13

And it felt like a little, I mean, it

7:15

was all in good spirits, but it felt a

7:17

little embarrassing. Aviva does

7:19

keep some lists that lots of people keep, practical

7:22

stuff, like books she wants to read, gift

7:24

ideas for people she loves. But

7:27

then, on the notes app of her phone, there's

7:29

a whole bunch of lists that have no practical purpose at

7:31

all, but are really just her sort of

7:34

organizing the stuff that is rattling around in her

7:36

head. So a list

7:39

that is just like organizing my brain is,

7:44

let me look,

7:47

things that are off brand for me, or

7:52

common things I've never done, or

7:56

times strangers have involved me in their

7:58

business for unclear reasons. seasons, like

8:01

on the street or on the subway. That happens to

8:03

me all the time. Okay, so

8:05

then let's dive into those lists. Things

8:08

that are off-brand for me. Read

8:10

me that list. Okay. I'm

8:13

bad at jumping. I'm

8:15

inconsistent with my birth control. You

8:17

mean you're not taking a pill every day that you

8:19

should? No. Why

8:22

is that off-brand? Because I'm organized. The

8:26

other thing that's embarrassing about reading these lists is

8:28

that they're so private, but whatever, I don't

8:30

care. I

8:33

can't rollerblade. I hate

8:35

PETA, even though I was vegan for a year

8:37

and vegetarian for a bunch of years. I just really

8:39

don't like them. I

8:42

don't love bowling. That's a

8:44

new addition. The last

8:46

one I really don't want to share but

8:48

will, but it probably

8:50

shouldn't be on the radio because it makes me

8:52

seem really psychotic, which is that I've never kissed

8:54

anyone famous, and I just assumed

8:57

I would have by now. Because

9:00

you're how old? And so

9:02

you've kissed a bunch of people. Yeah, a ton.

9:05

And the most famous person I've

9:07

ever kissed is the captain of

9:09

the Belgian field hockey team, which

9:11

is not famous. No, that is

9:13

not famous. No. Yeah,

9:15

his name is Jay. This

9:26

list, with a list of common

9:28

things I've never done, which by the way, only

9:30

has two items on it, karaoke and going to

9:32

Costco, with a list where I

9:35

feel the emotions that I feel on my body, with

9:38

a list times people will refer to me as

9:40

neurodivergent, even though I don't think I am. All

9:43

these lists are different ways that have either

9:45

sort of naming parts of herself for

9:48

herself. Yeah. Yeah, I'm

9:50

just trying to make sense of who

9:53

I am and what is going on in

9:55

my brain. The English form. Yeah,

9:58

because it's so organized. clear

10:00

and clean. And

10:02

the business of making sense of

10:05

yourself is, I found to

10:07

be extremely messy. With

10:11

that in mind, Viva still keeps old

10:13

defunct lists because they're like a record of

10:15

who she was. Listen,

10:18

when she was a teenager, like harmless things

10:20

my dad hates, or things I should have

10:22

known, or her very first list, seen

10:25

some of my grandmother's nursing home, made

10:27

on weekly visits when she was 14, trying

10:29

to make sense of that world. Normally

10:32

she doesn't show these lists to anybody. She'll

10:34

just notice something about herself, and then

10:36

she'll notice a second example of the same thing. She

10:39

starts to collect them, so she can stare at

10:41

the list, try to understand it. And

10:44

the fact that it's collected on a list, what feeling

10:46

does that give you once it's on a list? Oh

10:49

my god, it's like relief. It's so

10:51

nice. Because it's just bouncing around in

10:53

my brain. And so once it's on

10:55

a list, I don't feel

10:57

like I have to remember it. But

10:59

it isn't just like you don't have to think about it. It's like you

11:02

don't have to worry about it. Like before you put it on the list,

11:04

it seems like there's a kind of fretting of like, what does

11:06

this mean about me that this is a thing? And then once

11:08

you put it on the list, you're like, I know what it

11:10

means. It means it's on this list. Yeah, totally. That's

11:13

true. Like I exist,

11:15

and this is a thing about me. Today

11:23

on our program, lists, and I tamed the chaos of

11:26

the world. I have to say,

11:29

I feel very aware in putting together everything

11:31

that I've said to you so far today. The

11:34

way I did it is the

11:36

way I write every radio story I've ever

11:38

done since, I don't know, forever. The

11:40

first thing I do is I make a list of all the possible quotes that I

11:42

might use. So in

11:44

this case, it was three single-spaced type pages of

11:46

quotes from Aviva and from David Wawachinsky, but asterisk

11:49

by the quotes I like the most. And

11:51

then what I do is I stare at the list until

11:53

it just pops out for me. This

11:56

quote took a first, and this one second, and this one can end the

11:58

thing. video

12:00

story without a list to take control of

12:02

all the confusion and all the possible choices that I could

12:04

make and make it make sense. So

12:07

today lists how they run

12:09

the world and everything in it. For

12:12

WUBE Chicago, it's American Life, I'm Ira

12:14

Glass and I'm Hold On. Have

12:16

a list right here. Number one, stay

12:19

with us. Number two,

12:21

stay with us. Number three,

12:24

stay with us. That's

12:35

one list for life. So

12:38

let's start our show today with a list designed as

12:40

a kind of magical tool for living your life and

12:42

maximizing your potential and being your very best self. Anyway,

12:46

that's what this list was supposed to

12:48

do. This story comes to us from John Fisil. Ready

12:51

to talk about the list? Sure. You want

12:54

to see it? It's right. This

12:57

is it right here. What do you want to ask

12:59

me about it? I'm on a Zoom

13:02

call with my brother Pat talking about

13:04

a list that was written by our other brother

13:06

Mike and I want to ask him

13:08

what he thinks I should do with it. It's

13:10

one of the last pieces of Mike's writing

13:12

that we have. What do you think should be done

13:15

with this list? I

13:17

don't care. If you

13:19

burned it I wouldn't feel sad. I

13:22

wouldn't be angry. I'd say why'd you

13:24

burn it without me? My

13:26

brother Mike died in 2015. That's

13:30

almost 10 years ago now. Jeez. And

13:33

you know trigger warning and

13:35

all that. He died because

13:37

of a suicidal act. It's

13:40

unclear why he did what he

13:42

did. There were stories his

13:44

roommates told about paranoia, hallucinations,

13:46

Mike becoming obsessed with aliens.

13:49

It was also sudden and shocking that my

13:51

family and I started grasping around for anything

13:54

trying to make it all make sense. Which

13:57

brings me to the list. Mike

14:00

wrote the list the summer he was about to be

14:02

a sophomore in high school. Sixteen

14:04

principals to live his life by, titled

14:07

Goals for Success, double

14:10

underlined on a rectangular piece of poster

14:12

board. They were corny

14:14

bro-isms, if I'm being honest. Make

14:16

a commitment, be unselfish,

14:19

create unity, come together as never before.

14:23

As you can see, Mike was a

14:25

real overachiever, type A type. Improve

14:28

every day as a player, person, and student.

14:31

Be tough, be self-disciplined, do

14:33

it right, don't accept less. He

14:36

was captain of the high school football team,

14:38

straight A student. Give

14:41

great effort, be enthusiastic, eliminate

14:44

mistakes, don't beat yourself. He

14:47

hung the list on his closet door, facing his

14:49

bed, so that when he woke up in

14:51

the morning, the first thing he saw was expect

14:54

to win, be consistent.

14:57

Develop leadership, be

14:59

responsible. I

15:08

first noticed the list when I went into Mike's

15:10

bedroom to steal a pair of his boxers. I

15:13

was always forgetting to do my laundry, Mike

15:15

always did his. And my

15:17

feelings about the list were immediately complicated.

15:20

I felt like it was somehow judging me. I

15:23

was the oldest of my siblings, but

15:25

to me, Mike always felt older. He

15:28

was Mr. Rotary Club, Mr. Scheduled

15:31

out his daily routine. I

15:34

was Mr. Been arrested twice, Mr. Smoking

15:36

weed out of an aluminum can and

15:38

probably doing irreparable damage to my lungs

15:40

in the woods. And

15:43

Mike knew he was better than me. He

15:45

even wrote a poem in English class about how

15:47

disappointed he was in me. I'm

15:49

not kidding. He was titled Second

15:51

Chances. Back

15:54

then, I resented the list. I

15:56

probably made fun of him about it because that was the

15:58

nature of our relationship, even though we were. close. But

16:01

after he died, I actually saw

16:03

these principles as something I should live up

16:05

to. Because at

16:07

that point I was spiraling. Mike

16:10

was 24 when he died. I was 26.

16:12

I couldn't get myself

16:14

together. Drinking, depression,

16:16

a simmering, futile anger

16:19

at the universe. The

16:21

original had been framed, and I asked my parents if

16:23

I could have it and hung it up in my

16:25

apartment by the front door. I thought

16:28

maybe its commandments might rub off on me.

16:31

And there it stayed for a bit. I'd

16:33

glance at it every once in a while and feel again

16:36

like I was falling short. So

16:38

after a couple of years, I took it down. I

16:41

shoved it in the back of my closet. It just

16:43

bothered me, the toxic positivity, therapist,

16:45

waiting room, posterness of it all.

16:49

But I also couldn't bear to get rid of it. Which

16:51

is why I called up Pat to finally

16:53

figure out what to do with

16:56

it. If anything, I would think

16:59

the list would be

17:01

cursed. So you can keep it. It

17:03

makes you feel

17:06

better. I don't want anything to do with the list. Pat

17:09

was the closest person to Mike in the world.

17:12

He's two years younger than Mike, who

17:14

is a year and a half younger than me. Pat

17:17

and I can't even agree on the most basic

17:19

things about the list. And he

17:21

had neat handwriting. Like that was one thing

17:23

that struck me looking at the list is

17:25

how neat his handwriting is. It doesn't look

17:28

neat, not to me. Yeah, way. Are there

17:30

straight lines? Are we looking at the same

17:32

photo? Yeah, yeah. No, that's not neat. That's

17:34

neat. Look at the K. He doesn't even

17:36

dot the I's. But he's

17:38

consistently not dotting his I's. That

17:40

says something. That he

17:42

never learned how to write the letter I. Pat

17:46

saw something in the list that

17:48

I also felt, but I couldn't

17:50

necessarily name. What role do

17:52

you think the list played in his in

17:55

his death? I

17:57

mean, the list didn't play a role, but it's

17:59

a reflection of his

18:01

psychology, which played

18:03

every role in his death and

18:08

shows you the type of responsibility

18:10

he felt. It

18:15

shows you the type of pressure he put on

18:17

himself. There's nothing about

18:20

self-care in it. And

18:22

there's nothing about being true to yourself either.

18:26

It shows you a lot of what was going

18:28

on with him and this mindset

18:30

that he got trapped

18:33

in. And that made him very sick. When

18:37

Mike was a sophomore at Penn

18:39

State, he started experiencing delusions and

18:42

he was barely sleeping. But

18:44

if he felt like he was struggling, he didn't

18:46

tell anyone. He kept going to class.

18:49

His roommates noticed and they were talking about how

18:51

to get him help. And

18:54

I think, this is just my opinion, I

18:56

guess, that Mike didn't want

18:58

to be found out. I

19:00

mean, in the past, I've connected

19:03

the list to Mike's mindset as in

19:05

like he was not somebody who's gonna

19:07

be vulnerable if he was suffering.

19:11

No, he was not. Are

19:13

there any bullet points that stand out to you

19:15

in particular? There's a

19:17

bunch, eliminate

19:20

mistakes. That's one

19:22

of the ones that's just supposed to eliminate

19:24

mistakes, we mean. You can't. How? That's why

19:26

they're mistakes. Yeah. Create

19:29

a unit, come together as never

19:31

before. I

19:33

mean, he's not just trying

19:35

to get people to come together as

19:37

never before. I

19:40

like that one. That reminds

19:42

me of, he was a good

19:44

unifier. He had friends

19:46

across all the arbitrary social

19:49

cliques. After

19:51

he passed, did you think about

19:53

the list at all? Or did you? I

19:55

didn't give it a lot of thought until

19:58

I went. to

20:00

the football banquet and

20:04

heard Mr. Ricky speak and then I

20:06

got pretty angry. And then I was

20:09

pretty annoyed at the list. One

20:14

of the captains of our 2018 and a 2009 Garner Valley graduate, Mike DeSeal,

20:19

embodied the qualities of the coachable player.

20:22

That's Mike's high school football coach, in case you

20:24

can't just tell from his voice, renaming

20:26

an award after my brother at a banquet in

20:28

2016. Mike created

20:31

and shared a list of goals for success,

20:33

16 standards that he

20:35

vowed to uphold and to use as a compass

20:37

to guide his path. They

20:39

were make a commitment, be

20:42

unselfish. This is really the

20:44

moment the list passed into lore. When it

20:46

became the way my brother was remembered, the

20:49

coach paid to have goals for success,

20:52

professionally matted and framed. That's

20:54

the copy that I have. He

20:56

also hung a replica of the list in our high

20:58

school's weight room, next to a

21:00

photo of Mike in football gear with his tough

21:02

game face on, to inspire

21:04

future generations, which

21:06

I appreciated. He was putting

21:09

so much into memorializing Mike. But

21:12

later, I started worrying about the kids

21:14

who saw it and whether they might

21:16

judge themselves by it, the same way that I

21:18

had. We want our players to do what

21:20

you're supposed to do and believe if it is to be,

21:22

it's up to me. We want

21:24

them to be model citizens, model athletes and

21:27

model sons. In essence, we want

21:29

them to be like Mike Fisciel. The

21:31

coach goes on to describe what happened to Mike.

21:35

He says that he fell from the fourth floor

21:37

balcony of his dorm and that it

21:39

was an accident, which he got from

21:41

my parents. That was how they framed it. But

21:44

Mike didn't fall. He

21:46

jumped. The list

21:49

still makes me feel sad, but

21:52

that was when the list started making me feel angry. To

21:56

me, it's like this

21:58

obsession. with

22:00

image that is

22:03

such a toxic quality

22:05

of the community that

22:07

we're from and the family

22:10

that we're from. We

22:12

may have looked good from the outside, but

22:14

alcoholism and mental illness run in our family

22:16

and were a big part of my childhood.

22:20

You don't need to know the specifics, just know that

22:22

it was chaos. And

22:24

not even Mr. Golden Child was spared from it.

22:28

Where I struggled, and flailed,

22:30

and totally embodied all that

22:32

chaos, Mike tried to contain

22:34

it, to impose order on it, to

22:37

fix it by being perfect. And

22:39

that's what the list is, a manifestation

22:42

of his drive to be perfect. That's

22:45

how Pat sees it, anyway. It's

22:47

painful for me, the list, because it's

22:50

about what trauma did to

22:53

Mike. And

22:55

now these adults are waving it

22:58

around like it was some sort

23:00

of thing to be proud of with

23:02

him. There's

23:04

a lot of things that I'm very

23:06

proud of that he did. I'd

23:09

rather those things be remembered than

23:11

this insane

23:15

pressure that he put

23:17

on himself. What do

23:19

you wish he was remembered for? What are the things you

23:21

want him remembered for? I think

23:24

just who he was, really. There's

23:28

really nothing to be ashamed of. But

23:31

he wasn't this model person

23:34

in school. We sold weed

23:36

together. We

23:39

provided pretty much the entire football team with

23:41

weed. We had a little business thing going

23:43

on. It was funny.

23:46

It wasn't bad. It was funny. It's

23:49

also just the truth. Whether it's funny

23:51

or not funny, I just want the truth

23:54

remembered. I

23:57

don't want to have to deal with these fake

23:59

stories about me. Mike when I

24:01

was at the banquet and

24:04

they gave his

24:06

they gave a check to the kid that won his

24:08

award and dad and

24:11

I'm with dad and kid

24:14

comes up and dad dad says to him, make

24:19

sure you spend this on other people. That's

24:21

what Mike would have done. And

24:25

I look at the kid. That's not what I've done. That's

24:28

what I said and I looked at dad and I

24:30

go, who are you talking about?

24:33

Talking about Mike. And

24:35

then I look at the kid and I'm just like, dude,

24:38

my brother would have spent this on the dumbest shit. All

24:41

right. You do it. You do it. You

24:43

do whatever you want with that money, kid. Go have

24:45

fun. Like, really? You said that?

24:48

Yeah. I

24:50

mean, he would have. He would have

24:52

blown that money. He was, he was

24:54

greedy and bad with money. Yeah. And

24:57

he would he would buy like a four

25:00

hundred pairs dollar pair of sunglasses and

25:02

then like accidentally leave them

25:04

on top of the car and lose them. Then

25:07

he put a subwoofer in his in his car.

25:10

OK. The subwoofer

25:13

was awesome. OK. The

25:15

subwoofer was such a deal and

25:19

perfectly for the hatchback. The

25:25

list doesn't just leave out Mike's flaws.

25:28

It also misses really the best stuff about

25:30

him. He was warm, generous,

25:34

extremely goofy. He

25:36

was curious. And

25:38

that that was a really good quality that he

25:40

had. He found people really interesting. So we like

25:42

to listen. Be curious would be

25:44

a good one to be on here. Yeah.

25:47

Kids from my grade, they come up to me and

25:50

they tell me stories about Mike when they started on

25:52

the football team and they felt they didn't belong there

25:54

because the older kids were dicks. And

25:57

they said my brother would come around and he would

25:59

he would come. with them and he would

26:01

encourage them. And then

26:03

I remember hearing from Alio Pramola

26:05

and she said, when they were dating,

26:07

Mike had a great relationship

26:10

with her grandmother and he would watch

26:12

TV with her grandmother. I think it

26:14

was like a game shows or something. Maybe it was a Wheel

26:16

of Fortune and he would just

26:18

watch TV with her and they would

26:20

shoot the shit. And yeah,

26:24

those are the stories that like I'm proud of

26:26

because they, they're a reflection of who he was.

26:28

He was a good guy that people enjoyed. And

26:32

that's the kind of stuff I want to remember. Last

26:36

year, Pat wrote to the football coach at our

26:38

high school and asked him to

26:41

use the list to spread awareness about suicide.

26:44

He got him to add a line to the bottom of it.

26:47

It says, there is great strength

26:49

and vulnerability as it takes courage

26:51

to push through the fear and

26:53

share one's true self with others. Recently,

26:58

after my wife and I moved into our new apartment,

27:01

I made a decision to hang up

27:03

the list again. It's in my home

27:05

office. Now I'm

27:07

the one looking at it every day

27:09

and I don't resent it anymore. Maybe

27:12

it still makes me feel a little weird. Okay. But

27:15

I just, I see it for what it is. I

27:17

don't feel judged by it. And

27:19

some of the lists I'm genuinely down with,

27:22

like create unity is a beautiful

27:24

idea. It reminds me of

27:26

the best of Mike, but

27:29

mostly. I

27:31

just like looking at my brother's handwriting. John

27:41

Fisiel, he's a senior producer at the show

27:43

Snap Judgment. His story was produced by Sean

27:45

Cole. Coming

27:52

up, over a hundred dogs

27:54

and one giant bear and its

27:56

list of enemies. That's in a

27:58

minute. I'm Chicago Public Radio. when

28:00

our program continues. Support

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for This American Life comes from Choiceology,

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an original podcast from Charles Schwab. Hosted

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true stories from Nobel laureates, historians,

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of a website or domain. Hi,

29:11

I'm Wendy Doar. I'm an editor with New

29:13

York Times Audio. For me, the

29:15

magical thing about audio is how it can

29:18

take you closer to somebody else's life. You

29:21

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app at nytimes.com/audio app. You'll

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need a news subscription to listen. This

29:43

is American Life from Hourglass. Today's program

29:46

lists how they tame the chaos

29:48

of the world. This list

29:50

is all the dogs in my dog's

29:52

life are kind of

29:54

segmented by different criteria.

29:57

This is Bobby Shorewood. here,

30:00

Chris Bender of. He's showing Chris a list that he

30:02

keeps on his phone of neighborhood

30:04

dogs. We've got Lunchbox, who

30:06

is a cream Scotty with a

30:08

turquoise vest. We've got

30:10

Virgil, who is kind of some kind

30:13

of doodle dog, but I said little

30:15

fried chicken dog. And the owner looks

30:17

like my friend Otto. What

30:19

is little fried chicken dog? Like

30:22

some doodles have tight curly brown

30:24

hair fur, and it looks exactly

30:27

like fried chicken. This dog

30:29

literally looks like a walking piece of fried chicken.

30:32

Bobby keeps this list because there are so many dogs

30:34

where he lives. There are 130 dogs on

30:37

this list. His memory isn't always the greatest, and

30:39

he's convinced that people can tell if you don't

30:41

know their dog's name and you're faking it by

30:44

saying things like, how's he or

30:46

she doing today? Or how's your

30:48

puppy? You got to find

30:50

it. He is not into the potential awkwardness of

30:52

that. And okay, just for context, he does have

30:54

a list of people like this too, to

30:57

remember the spouses of friends and coworkers that

30:59

he's not just ones, people's kids. But

31:02

the dog list, he also finds it helpful to rank

31:04

all the dogs. So his dog Chewy's

31:06

favorites are at the top, his least favorites

31:08

are at the bottom. Like there are

31:10

some dogs that bully Chewy, so we throw them at

31:12

the bottom of the list, and then we

31:14

know, hey, this one

31:16

is who beats up Chewy.

31:18

You might want to believe that name. As

31:21

you see how this works in practice, Chris followed Bobby to

31:23

the dog park, and it doesn't take

31:26

long before they get into a list needing situation. I

31:28

definitely think I recognize that dog. The

31:31

tall doodle over there. So,

31:36

see a big boy I'm sure Chewy's run into at

31:38

this dog park before. Let me

31:40

see. He scrolls down

31:42

the list on his phone till he

31:44

gets to the dog park section, searching

31:47

for a dog with the description. Shaggy

31:49

brown doodle, yeah. I

31:51

don't know. He finds nothing.

31:54

He'll have to add that one to the list. Bobby

31:56

has no idea how other dog owners do it. Keep

31:58

track of all the dogs. Though I

32:01

think it's entirely possible that other people are no better with the

32:03

names than he is. They just don't

32:05

care. When

32:07

he and Chris get back to the house, they run into

32:09

a neighbor's dog who somehow wasn't on the list yet. I'm

32:11

going to add it to the list though. I've

32:14

actually bumped into that dog

32:17

many times. He always says

32:19

he's friendly and it's like, I know, we've

32:21

met like 10 times. You

32:24

think he doesn't remember you? I don't

32:26

know. I don't know. That

32:28

guy needs a list though, you know? I

32:40

have two. Part-gate list. There's

32:43

some lists you definitely do not want to be on.

32:46

This past Thanksgiving, Masha had

32:48

people come stay with him at a house they

32:50

affectionately called the Dacha because it's out of the city and

32:53

not Russian. That's just the word

32:55

Russians use. We totally call it the Dacha. Masha

32:58

is Masha Gessen. They write about Russia for the New

33:00

Yorker and in books. The

33:02

day after Thanksgiving, two of their guests left for

33:04

some of their celebration. A bunch

33:06

of the remaining guests, four or five people, went on

33:09

a hike. Pretty vertical one actually,

33:11

up a nearby mountain. So

33:13

they get to a spot way up high. Yeah,

33:16

it's an overlooked point. It's pretty tiny. We're

33:19

all standing pretty close together, looking

33:21

out at the Catskills

33:23

and the little

33:26

town where we live. And

33:28

then two of us pulled out our phones. As one

33:30

does. How much in nature can you take? And

33:33

both of us saw a news

33:36

item that one of

33:38

the friends who had left that morning had been

33:40

declared a foreign agent. Foreign

33:43

agent? In other words, the Russian government

33:45

just put them on an official list of people that it

33:47

is not very fond of. Foreign agent

33:49

is not a good thing. And this is

33:51

something that the Russian government does almost every

33:54

Friday. They put out a list of foreign

33:56

agents. Right. It's

33:58

like this weird, weird spectacle. to see who

34:00

is now a foreign agent. It's

34:04

weird. It's like a sinister version of

34:07

like when Oscar nominations

34:09

come out or something, you know? Actually,

34:12

that's not a bad simile because,

34:15

you know, when Oscar nominations come out, then

34:17

you have to wonder what's going to be

34:20

the outcome for any one of these. Yeah.

34:23

And with foreign agents, it's a little bit like that. Part

34:26

of being on the list of foreign agents is

34:28

that you're put on notice, right? You're

34:30

on our radar. We may launch

34:32

a criminal case against you, which has much

34:35

harsher consequences. Oh, you can graduate

34:37

from this list to worst lists. Yes.

34:40

They end up on other lists like the wanted

34:42

list. Or somebody just stays

34:44

a foreign agent indefinitely, but

34:46

it's extremely unpleasant. It sort of reconfigures

34:50

your world. So

34:55

the battle on this mountain, Masha and one of the

34:57

other Russians read this on their founds, that

34:59

their friend who they just had Thanksgiving dinner with the night

35:01

before is now a foreign agent. So

35:04

we both say his

35:07

last name, Vinyafkin. And

35:10

this is something that's actually happened

35:13

before between the two of us,

35:16

where we just take out our phones on

35:18

a Friday, see a name, and

35:21

say the name, because you don't have

35:23

to say Vinyafkin has been named a foreign agent,

35:26

because we know it's Friday. Masha

35:31

says Russia is now in an age of lists. It

35:34

started when Vladimir Putin created the list of foreign agents when

35:36

it took the presidency for a second time in 2012, and

35:39

he started clamping down on dissent. At

35:42

first, it was just organizations on the foreign

35:44

agents list, human rights groups, media outfits. And

35:47

then three and a half years ago, they

35:49

started adding the names of people to the list. Russia

35:52

actually modeled as a foreign agent law on an

35:54

American foreign agent law that dates in the 1930s,

35:56

one key difference between the two

35:58

laws Among many. In

36:01

America to be a foreign agent. Decade.

36:03

To be working for are acting on

36:05

behalf of foreign government organization. And

36:08

you put yourself on the list. You. Register

36:10

as phone agent. The.

36:12

Russian. Government has put you on

36:14

a list cause your foreign agent and will that.

36:17

You are one. Much.

36:19

As as this list. And way to

36:21

put government's been using it. A

36:24

typical and ways operating these days. It's.

36:26

Like very bureaucratic. And

36:29

so all these lists of weird. Not.

36:32

Enclosures rate as some

36:34

foreign agents list or

36:36

undesirable organizations or unfriendly

36:39

countries. So the

36:41

United States, for example, is an unfriendly

36:43

country to assert my. What

36:45

they mean is like Mortal Enemy. It's

36:48

so weird that they feel. Compelled.

36:50

To divide off the world into the friendly countries

36:52

and insanely countries have they actually have to write

36:55

it down on a list. of

36:58

the great point and then it's a very

37:00

you know a combination of a of a

37:02

country that the has the ideology of a

37:04

fortress under siege. And

37:07

a country that has like. A

37:09

deeply, deeply bureaucratic self

37:11

understanding. Sir. Everything has

37:13

to be somehow classified and put

37:15

down on paper or in a.

37:18

In. A nutshell: table. This.

37:21

Resurgent to tells her in as

37:23

a month and Russia is really

37:26

focused on the bureaucracy like the

37:28

bureaucracy is. Is. It's

37:30

his, his, his, his heart. of this is

37:32

it's it's it's core. And. That's

37:35

why lists are so important. Much.

37:37

Are you on this? list? I'm not. I'm

37:40

on a. Different

37:42

lists. A worthless. Mother

37:45

says that. Ah,

37:47

I'm I'm on the wanted list.

37:50

Because there's a criminal case against. Much

37:53

has been put on one of these less. Does.

37:55

Your out of the normal world and

37:57

it it is weird undefined limbo. Purgatory

38:00

putting in more worrisome.

38:04

Because it's unclear what can happen next. What is

38:06

clear is that it's a permanent status. A

38:10

problem today is about less. As part of that,

38:12

we wanted to hear from people who are on

38:14

a target west about what it's like to live

38:16

that disquieting life. And I

38:18

agree to reach out to some to talk about

38:20

it, especially that what it's like to be on

38:22

the foreign Agent list. For

38:24

an ageless is interesting cause being on

38:26

that was really coming. Such a wide

38:28

range of things like maybe it'll be

38:30

nothing. Maybe. Things will get a

38:33

lot worse. Who's.

38:35

Much. I've. Been watching

38:37

the for an Asian plus grow for Sears. It's.

38:39

Not but four hundred people, most of them

38:41

living outside of Russia. And

38:43

I probably know half of them. That's

38:46

one reason I've been sort of obsessed with the list. It's

38:49

a day the changes your life. Just.

38:51

I was cutting the turkey and

38:53

I believe that it was. I

38:55

was in them midst of cutting

38:57

way for struck in a row.

38:59

This. Is a yeah. My friend who was

39:01

put on the list the Friday after Thanksgiving. For.

39:04

Thirty that weekend. Or first Turkey

39:06

that day. Probably.

39:09

That we got And.

39:13

Then. I saw my

39:16

wife come into me

39:18

and my realized that

39:20

she was deal with

39:22

Just I realize that

39:24

something happened. And

39:27

so she told me that I was declared a

39:29

foreign agents. Ears

39:32

Galina Annapolis version of the experience of

39:34

finding out she was on the list

39:36

to the media lawyer who is representing

39:38

journalists have been put on the list.

39:40

Then she was branded for an agent

39:43

herself. She was the first lawyer in

39:45

the list. She found out when a

39:47

report called to ask for about the

39:49

implications the list or not license. For

39:51

the first few seconds I didn't realize

39:53

that he's actually saying to me that

39:56

my name is pure and on the

39:58

least. I thought that she was asking. to

40:00

provide a comment like what would happen?

40:03

What if you appear on the list?

40:05

How that would affect your

40:07

life? And then I just realized that it's

40:09

actually not a hypothetical. That he's actually informing

40:11

me that my name is on the list.

40:15

Being put on the foreign agent list has

40:17

consequences regardless of where the person lives. And

40:20

once the Russian government names you a foreign agent, you

40:23

face a bunch of choices because

40:25

there are all sorts of special rules that apply

40:27

to foreign agents. And you

40:29

have to decide whether you're going to comply. One

40:32

rule, every time you

40:35

communicate anything publicly or semi-publicly

40:37

in the media or

40:39

in social media or in a

40:41

dating app even, you have to

40:43

warn people that they're dealing with a foreign agent. There's

40:46

a special disclaimer you have to use, an

40:49

extra large type. It's

40:51

huge. It has to be like in font

40:54

and letters twice bigger than

40:57

the main text. Do

40:59

you remember the exact words? You

41:01

can say them in Russian if you want. Yes. The

41:08

disclaimer says this message or

41:10

information was created and or

41:13

disseminated by a foreign agent

41:15

non-governmental organization. Which is

41:17

quite like a big paragraph, considering

41:20

the size. Like

41:22

in social media, it would be like in

41:24

a cup flock. All

41:26

caps, yeah. And it gets

41:28

more Byzantine. A person who's

41:31

been put on the list must create a

41:33

corporation. And the corporation in

41:35

the eyes of the state is you. And

41:37

you're the corporation. This

41:40

corporation has to file quarterly financial reports

41:42

detailing the income you make and the

41:44

money you spend, submit

41:46

to an annual audit, and

41:48

also post regular reports of your

41:51

activities, whatever that means, on

41:53

the internet or submit them to the media

41:55

for publication. The paperwork

41:57

has to be perfect every time. But

42:00

the rules are vague. So you

42:02

can make mistakes easily. And

42:04

then, if you made a

42:06

mistake, here government comes

42:09

with a fine. First

42:11

fine, second fine, and then criminal case.

42:13

So it's all made as

42:15

a big trap. You know,

42:17

all these games around it,

42:20

it's like a commentary

42:22

game. They are just running after

42:24

us and we're trying to run

42:27

away, trying to still do

42:29

the job. Galina

42:37

follows the rules. Most of her

42:39

clients do, even if they're living outside

42:41

of Russia. Because everyone

42:44

has someone or something left behind. Family

42:47

members that the authorities can decide to

42:49

harass, property the authorities can seize. My

42:52

friend Karen decided not to follow the rules.

42:55

He'd left Russia right after the full scale invasion of

42:57

Ukraine and a couple months later his name popped up

42:59

on the list. Like everyone, he

43:01

still had a million things tying him to Russia.

43:04

So I knew that I'm

43:06

not gonna play by

43:09

those rules and I decided

43:11

to just get

43:15

rid of everything I had back there,

43:18

including my apartment. So

43:21

you were thinking that now that you were

43:24

on this list of foreign agents, your property

43:26

in Russia was in danger and you should

43:29

basically take money out of the country. Yes.

43:34

What did that feel like? It

43:38

felt like nothing. I

43:43

told myself, we don't go there. I

43:47

mean, in that infinite

43:52

depth of feelings

43:54

about your country,

43:58

everybody, who you

44:00

left there and stuff, it can

44:03

drive you crazy. So I just didn't

44:05

feel anything. A

44:08

little over a year later, Karen found out that he

44:10

was on another list, the list

44:13

of extremists and terrorists. This

44:15

was, you could say, an upgrade. It

44:18

meant that the Russian state froze whatever assets he still

44:20

had in Russia, so he'd been

44:22

smart to sell his apartment. But

44:25

being on this list also meant they'd

44:27

opened a criminal case against him. Just

44:30

to make this clear, Edmond informed that

44:32

there was a case against him. Karen

44:34

had to hire a lawyer to figure out

44:36

what he was charged with and which prosecutor

44:38

was charging him. Karen

44:40

and I have talked about this weird process of having

44:42

to find your own case, because

44:45

there's also a criminal case against me in Russia. I

44:48

found out about it from articles in Russian

44:50

government media, and then my name

44:52

appeared on the wanted list. In

44:55

the hierarchy of lists, the wanted list

44:57

is probably the worst that we

44:59

know about anyway. I've

45:02

now been arrested in absentia, and in the

45:04

next few months, a Moscow court is going

45:06

to sentence me to seven or eight or

45:08

nine years in prison. It

45:11

took my lawyer two months to find

45:14

a case against me for, quote, "'spreading

45:16

false information about the Russian military.'" Karen

45:19

said I was lucky. It took his lawyer

45:21

six months to find his case. Karen's

45:23

crime? Years ago,

45:26

Karen donated money to Alexei

45:28

Navalny's Anti-Corruption Foundation. Navalny

45:31

is the Russian politician who died in an

45:33

Arctic prison earlier this year. And

45:35

when did you give money to the

45:38

Navalny Organization, do you remember? Well,

45:41

for years. And

45:43

that was, of course, it

45:46

was long before they

45:48

labeled Navalny Foundation

45:50

as illegal or extremist or

45:52

anything else. I

45:57

was one of the most famous people in the

45:59

country. One of thousands of people, I

46:02

believe, who supported Navalny

46:04

and his foundation. Do you have

46:06

any idea how much money you

46:08

gave them? Not

46:12

that much. I believe

46:14

a few hundred dollars

46:17

total. By

46:19

the way, Alexei Navalny was also

46:21

on the list of extremists and terrorists.

46:24

He still is on that list. Does

46:27

the authority say they haven't received

46:29

proper documentation of his death? You

46:39

know, any

46:41

contact with Russian

46:44

state recently resembles

46:47

more and more contact

46:49

with Huligan's back

46:55

in elementary or middle school.

46:59

Bullies. Yeah, like with

47:01

bullies. This is

47:05

a feeling that they

47:07

are very strong, very

47:10

hostile and very...

47:14

Small-minded? Yeah.

47:19

Strong, hostile

47:21

and small-minded. Sort

47:23

of feeling that they are

47:25

like big angry

47:29

animal who is trying

47:31

to attack you when they're scared of you.

47:34

And who can kill you because

47:37

they are scared of you. Let's

47:39

just call this animal what it is. You're

47:41

describing a bear. Russian bear. That's

47:45

such a cliche. With

47:52

the Russian bear on your heels, you have to watch

47:54

your step. If you're going

47:56

to travel, you have to ask, is

47:58

it safe? Can I go there? Ilya

48:02

Krasincik, a different Ilya, now

48:05

divides all the countries in the world into

48:07

three categories. Can go, maybe

48:10

can go, can go with consequences.

48:14

Can go with consequences really means

48:16

don't go. You don't want the

48:18

consequences. Ilya

48:20

started a media outlet called Helpdesk,

48:23

which reports on the war in Ukraine and helps

48:25

Ukrainians lead the fighting. In

48:28

the eyes of the Russian state, he has been

48:30

a criminal for more than two years, proposing about

48:33

war crimes and bucha. I

48:35

haven't been a criminal for as long as Ilya has, but

48:38

I've also learned. There's a whole convoluted

48:40

science to it. Some

48:43

countries will extradite people to Russia. Some

48:45

countries might. And

48:47

then there's Interpol, the international police, which

48:50

Russia tries to use to have people detained and sometimes

48:52

extradited. The

48:54

planning that goes into traveling to other countries can get very granular.

48:58

Sometimes it's not about where

49:01

you go, but about

49:03

which company you fly. And

49:06

this is really difficult because, for

49:08

example, Turkish airlines have, if something

49:11

will happen, they can

49:13

land in Russia because they

49:15

have this airport as the

49:17

Plan B airport. But

49:20

you need to call every airline and ask

49:22

them for every route. And I think somebody

49:25

should do this. You

49:27

could easily spend all your time,

49:29

your entire life, perfecting the act.

49:32

Being Jerry, who keeps evading Tom. So

49:35

it's absurd, and absurd should be fun. I

49:38

don't know, like Kafka, yeah. Kafka is

49:41

funny some way, but

49:43

it's also awesome. It

49:52

used to be when a friend was named a foreign

49:54

agent, I would send them a note saying, I'm proud

49:56

to know you. Like It was some sort of

49:58

recognition. At.

50:01

Some point that stop feeling right? I.

50:03

Don't feel proud. Novel: My Friends

50:06

were put on the list. And not when

50:08

I landed on Russell's Wanted list. When.

50:11

That happened. my friend and yeah, the

50:13

one who was carving the Turkish at

50:15

Thanksgiving tested me. I'm not

50:17

super. The protocol is. To

50:19

congratulation or express condolences.

50:22

I feel sad. Help

50:24

me understand the saddens. Because.

50:28

You know when I found out that I'm. There

50:31

is a criminal case against me and then later

50:33

when I found out that I was arrested and

50:35

absentia. I'm. In

50:39

a sense, in an

50:41

intellectually, it's almost exciting

50:43

and. As

50:45

people often say, it's it's It's a

50:47

sort of recognition. And.

50:52

And. I so profoundly sad eyed

50:54

Celts in I'd like I

50:56

was carrying around another burden

50:58

that hadn't been there before.

51:02

What Is it? It's

51:08

a it's a good once me. If

51:13

I'm telling you some, some routes.

51:16

If. I'm told me I hate you.

51:20

It's okay to be said about

51:22

that because it's sad that someone

51:24

seats me and when I'm same

51:27

that well I'm owners My that

51:29

or they're stupid. Law.

51:32

Feel that this reactions are sealed in

51:34

you from the sadness and tragedy of

51:36

that. The. Elephant in

51:38

the room of my sadness. Is. The

51:40

being considered a criminal by the Russian state. Means

51:43

I'll never be able to go home again. Not

51:46

even if there's a change of regime. I

51:50

doubt that the first, second, or even third thing

51:52

they're going to do after poussin the stretch, all

51:54

the lists. so

51:57

like the vast majority of russians who are

51:59

on these lists even is

52:01

out for life. For

52:11

many of us who live outside of Russia, this

52:14

business of being on lists is really akin to

52:16

having a troublesome chronic illness. You

52:18

keep tabs on it, you modify your behavior

52:20

as necessary, you hope it doesn't kill you,

52:23

but other than that, you live a

52:25

relatively normal American or German or Dutch

52:28

life. For

52:30

those who are still in Russia though, the condition can

52:32

be much more serious. Zoya

52:35

is one such person. Zoya

52:37

is not her real name. She's

52:39

an LGBT activist, and in November of

52:41

last year, the Russian Supreme Court declared

52:43

the, quote, international LGBT

52:46

movement was an extremist

52:48

organization. Zoya had

52:50

been put on lists even before that though. Internal

52:53

lists, circulated within government

52:55

agencies. These lists aren't

52:57

meant to be public, but there's an

53:00

illicit service that will search different internal lists

53:02

and databases and send you what they

53:04

find. Like a Freedom of Information

53:06

Act request, but fast,

53:08

unredacted, and for sale. You

53:11

can't just pay a very

53:13

small amount, like $30, and

53:16

download everything what they have on you. Including

53:21

these informal lists

53:24

that police create

53:28

for their work. You

53:30

will be able to see how these

53:32

regimes see you, what do they have on

53:34

you, do they follow your flights,

53:37

do they, like, here's

53:39

enough information. And

53:42

what you get is an Excel

53:44

document or PDF? PDF. PDF. PDF

53:46

document. On the

53:48

PDF, the lists you're on are marked in red.

53:52

So her PDF said, extremism and

53:54

terrorism, in red. But

53:57

again, this wasn't the public list of extremists

53:59

and terrorists. Yeah, it's two

54:01

different lists. If

54:04

it's possible, I will say it in Russian.

54:08

I need to be able to speak in

54:10

Russian. But

54:12

the word

54:26

doesn't exist. So it's like if they added another suffix to the

54:29

word suspect. So

54:39

it's closest

54:41

to if

54:44

they called you suspectable

54:46

in extremism and

54:48

suspectable in terrorism. Yes.

54:52

It's like this internal list is the draft of

54:55

a list. Like eventually Zoe will

54:57

probably be brought up on charges. She'll

54:59

be the suspect in a made up crime. But

55:02

for now, in draft form, she

55:05

is merely suspectable. Can

55:07

you tell me why you were

55:09

trying to buy this information?

55:14

I think it's for me to understand

55:16

reality around me, because when you are

55:18

inside country, you very often don't feel

55:21

that it's risky to stay there. And

55:24

where you get this

55:26

information, you understand it now. You

55:29

cannot be safe. You

55:31

have to be prepared every day

55:33

that you could be arrested. They

55:36

could come to your flag. And

55:41

it's not a question. Will they come

55:43

or not? They will. Just

55:45

the question is when. And will they

55:47

have time to leave

55:50

country? Will you have time

55:52

to say goodbye for your parents or not?

56:00

potentially, probably, be placed

56:02

on the list of extremists and terrorists. She

56:07

started making some plans for leaving the country Sunday.

56:11

And she made one very practical plan for

56:13

staying. We bought a very good door. And

56:17

when I came to the shop, I

56:19

asked a guy to recommend me a

56:21

door. The

56:23

best, the best

56:26

when police will come and they want

56:28

to break this

56:30

door, I need like 50 minutes,

56:32

20 minutes. And

56:34

they choose this door for me. This

56:37

was the main criteria. When

56:39

you were buying the door, what did they

56:41

think you needed it for? They

56:43

thought that I'm a drug

56:46

dealer. And the

56:49

guy told me that, okay, you will have a time

56:51

like to throw away to

56:54

the toilet, everything that you have. I

56:57

didn't explain to them why I

56:59

need this door. I think that probably it's

57:02

a more understandable reason for them. Police

57:11

usually come in the morning every

57:15

evening. Before I'm going to sleep,

57:17

I check the door. Everything, all

57:19

this, everything should be closed. Because

57:22

if not, then I will not have this 20 minutes. How

57:25

many logs does the door have? Three. And

57:29

why do you need 20 minutes? I

57:31

need to clean my computer and contacts.

57:35

Because if I will not

57:37

do this, then all my

57:39

friends will be in the risk. And

57:41

also, I have to fix my

57:44

dog. My dog will

57:46

protect me and they could

57:48

shoot dog. So you have to

57:50

put your dog in the other room? Yeah, in the

57:52

bathroom. I ask them and kindly ask

57:54

them to not touch him. Zoya

58:00

has many reasons to stay in Russia. Since

58:03

her sister died of cancer several years ago, Zoya

58:06

and Zoya's mother have together been raising

58:08

Zoya's niece. Zoya's

58:10

parents don't want to leave. Zoya's

58:13

partner doesn't want to leave. Most

58:15

important, Zoya doesn't want to leave. So

58:19

she has decided that she will stay as long as

58:21

she possibly can. She

58:23

believes the authorities will give her one

58:25

final warning, something like, leave

58:28

the country now or go to jail. And

58:30

then she'll leave. I'm

58:33

not sure why she thinks there will be a warning. When

58:36

it comes to her niece though, Zoya's

58:38

sure that the girl should leave the country as soon

58:40

as she's old enough. I

58:42

don't believe that she will

58:44

have a future. I

58:47

don't believe that life

58:51

will be better in Russia. I

58:53

see now how many people support Putin

58:56

in these elections and

58:58

how people celebrate it. And

59:02

I wish all the best for

59:04

my niece. I want her to live

59:07

in a free country with

59:09

the possibility to choose partners,

59:13

work, opinion,

59:17

everything. What

59:19

if I said all the same things to you? It's

59:26

good if someone wish me all the best. Whether

59:30

my niece will, this is what I wish

59:32

for her. But of

59:34

course she will decide. Just

59:38

before we sat down for our interview, Zoya

59:41

told me something that was still pretty new to her

59:43

too. She was pregnant. I

59:46

am in a huge crisis now because today,

59:49

all morning, I just cry. And

59:51

I feel it how I start to

59:54

care not about myself, but about a

59:56

child. It's

59:58

like this child when they're born. will already

1:00:00

be on one of those lists. Hannah

1:00:04

Arendt called bureaucracy the rule by

1:00:06

nobody. Maybe that's why

1:00:08

it feels so hopeless. They

1:00:11

label you an extremist or a foreign agent.

1:00:14

And next thing you know, you're using those terms

1:00:16

yourself to describe your life,

1:00:19

because it is your life. Thinking

1:00:21

about where you can go, what

1:00:23

you can say in public, how you're

1:00:25

being singled out by the Russian state can affect people

1:00:27

you love and how

1:00:30

it can always, always get worse. And

1:00:33

you're never not going to think about it. Masa

1:00:44

Gassan, this is staff writer at The New Yorker

1:00:46

and the author of several books. Most recently, The

1:00:48

Future is History. I

1:00:59

work at Cirque du load. And

1:01:07

we would love a very total maximum of 32. The

1:01:10

imp Steve

1:01:32

that powers

1:02:00

our website thisamericanlife.org. If you need

1:02:02

something to listen to you can

1:02:05

stream our archive of over 800

1:02:07

episodes for absolutely free thisamericanlife.org. This

1:02:09

American Life is delivered to public

1:02:11

radio stations by PRX, the Public

1:02:14

Radio Exchange. Exes always to our

1:02:16

co-founder Mr. Tori Malatia as

1:02:18

he describes his own management style and

1:02:20

a list with three main

1:02:22

points. Strong, hostile

1:02:25

and small-minded. I'll have

1:02:28

a glass back next week with more stories of

1:02:30

this American Life. A

1:02:33

rosary. The last week,

1:02:35

next. One bird. He

1:02:39

has a bone in my bones. One

1:02:42

bird. Goodbye.

1:02:58

Next week on the podcast of This American Life,

1:03:00

how far would you go to win 52 free

1:03:02

burrito bowls? Probably not

1:03:05

very far. What if

1:03:07

you were competing against your biggest rival, four

1:03:09

said burrito bowls? How

1:03:11

far would you go then? Well,

1:03:14

one man found out on a cold

1:03:16

Wednesday night in January. So I ran 38 miles.

1:03:20

Had you run that bar before in a single

1:03:22

row? Things you do to

1:03:24

beat your nemesis. Next

1:03:26

week on the podcast of Renewable Global Radio

1:03:28

Station. What's

1:03:44

up sandwich heads? Today on Steve-O Sandwich Reviews we've

1:03:46

got the tips and tricks to the best sandwich

1:03:48

order. And it all starts with this little guy

1:03:50

right here. Pepsi Zero Sugar.

1:03:52

Partial to pastrami, craving a cubano.

1:03:54

Yeah, sounds delicious, but boom! Add

1:03:56

the crisp, refreshing taste of Pepsi

1:03:59

Zero Sugar. and cue the

1:04:01

fireworks. Lunch, dinner, or late night, it'll be a

1:04:03

sandwich worth celebrating. Trust me, your boy's eaten a

1:04:05

lot of sandwiches in his day, and the one

1:04:07

thing I can say with absolute fact, ahh,

1:04:10

every bite is better with Pepsi.