 Hi, welcome to the All Things LGBTQ Interview Show where we interview LGBTQ guests who are making important contributions to our communities. All Things LGBTQ is taped at Orca Media in Montpelier, Vermont, which we recognize as being unceded indigenous land. Thanks for joining us and enjoy the show. I'm here with Becca Ballant. Congratulations, Becca. I don't think you need much introduction here in Vermont, but we're very honored to have you here to talk about your book. Thank you again. I'm excited to be here. I've had a wonderful time reading it and reviewing it and rereading it. And I can't thank you enough for writing it. Thank you. Maybe viewers out of the Vermont viewing area might be interested to know that Becca is a congressional candidate here in Vermont for the at-large seat from the Democratic Party. She's president pro tempore of the Senate currently. She has had many incarnations, including as a middle school teacher and in other capacities that we'll talk about in the interview and is now maybe heading to Congress. We certainly hope so. Yes, thank you. So welcome again. Thanks. Let's start with some announcements, if I may. This is Becca's starting much of her book tour. She had a launch in Brattleboro when the book first came out, but now she's going to be reading at the Green Mountain Book Festival in Burlington on September 24th at 2.30. And this is very interesting. It's a new incarnation of the old Burlington Book Festival. It'll be at the library. And there are several other appearances that will occur before the show airs. So I'm not going to announce them. But then at Bartleby's in Wilmington on September 8th, I'm sorry, September 28th, Becca will be appearing again with the book. And if you want to purchase it, feel free to go to your independent bookstore. And there are digital venues that we won't mention because they're very corporate. Exactly. And Green Writers Press has published it. And if you want to get it from them, it's prominently displayed. You go to greenwriterspress.com and press buy book. Can you tell us a little about Green Writers Press? I'm so interested in independent presses. Yeah. So, you know, it was really important to me when we had the idea and by, I mean, we thinking about my wife, Elizabeth, and some of our closest friends who really encouraged me in this project. And, you know, actually we should say, I thought, oh, yeah, I've written by my count a quarter of a million words over the course of, you know, nearly 10 years writing as an op-ed columnist. And I thought, oh, this is going to be easy. And I'll just pull together my favorite columns, do a little editing, slam bam, and all we've done. Oh my gosh, a much bigger project and took a lot longer than I thought. But I'm very pleased with how it came out. But we wanted, if at all possible, to go with a small publishing house in Vermont, preferably. And it just so happens that Green Writers Press, based here in Brattleboro, DD Cummings is someone who actually for a while was a neighbor of mine. She has published some of Madeleine Cunan's books and some other great writers. And, you know, it was, it's a value of mine to take care of the people who have taken care of me, right? It's one of the reasons why we had our big celebration of my victory in the primary here in Brattleboro, even though we know that's not necessarily the center of power, political power in the state, but it was really important to me that it be a hometown crowd. And same with the book. So many people were longtime fans of mine in this column and would respond to me in real time at the grocery store, the post office, when I would publish a column. And so we reached out to DD Cummings. She was so enthusiastic, really, such a joy to work with. And I have to give a shout out to my spouse, Elizabeth, because she's really been the one as I've been out campaigning so hard. She's been the one picking up the pieces on the bookside, because as I was telling you earlier, we didn't really anticipate that the timing would work out so that it would be released right in the middle of the primary that it hadn't been the plan initially. But, you know, I'm delighted it's out. And so I hope people will go to GreenWritersPress.com, check out their other books, learn more about that publishing house, and, you know, throw them some work if you can. It's a really neat model for local writers. Well, I corresponded a little with DD Cummings about the book, and she seems like a lovely person. Yeah, an interesting interview, interested in seeing this interview. So yes. And she's, she's, you know, like a lot of folks here in Vermont, a really creative person and a doer, you know, has an idea and sees it through to fruition. So I couldn't be, I couldn't be happier with the way the book came out. It's really just, it's also just to, I have it right here. And I know you have it. It's just a very lovely book too. It feels good. It is exactly how I wanted it to look, because I think aesthetics are really important. It's not just the words on the page, it's how it all fits together. So, yeah, I'm, I'm so happy. So Elizabeth, if you would say is your literary manager? She is. And also, you know, I always like to say, you know, I had a lot of help with the editing on this book from Michael Fleming, who was my editor, but also from Chloe Leary, who is a dear friend in Ella Spotswood and other dear friends who did a lot of editing. But when the columns first came out in the paper, the person who was always my editor before I hit submit was Elizabeth. And she would be the one that said, do you really want to say it this way? This is how I'm reading it. I actually think if you organize it this way, it's going to be more accessible to the reader. And so she, she's been fantastic. And she will tell everyone that for essays, you know, I'm, I know how to bring a reader in. I know how to build a narrative. I know how to weave ideas in. My weakness is how to close. And she helped me so much over the years to get much better at that. And so I, I strongly recommend it. Everyone needs a good editor. And if it happens to be your wife, fantastic. You don't have to put them on payroll, right? That's right. Shout out to Elizabeth then. And she seems very organized too, which is a great gift in a partner in general. Let me ask you how long it took you when you decided to publish it as a book? How long did it take? We were trying to figure that out. And because it was so many fits and starts, I started it the, at least, at least two years ago, that the whole idea of it. And we did an initial call of the columns and made a list of the ones that I thought that I wanted to be in there. And we, we, what happened was I went back when I thought we had the ones that I wanted. I went back and read them again, you know, as often as what you read it, you read it with new eyes. And I was like, actually, I don't want that one in there. And I don't want it to be chronological. And so it took, it had a number of iterations. And it really felt like we landed on the right format when I realized all of them over the years really fit in these, these buckets, essentially. And they weren't, I didn't write them that way. They just, that's how they came, came out. And, and I think, you know, you, you are someone who follows, you know, literary practice. And so sometimes when you're a writer, you have to work so hard at getting out an idea. And other times it's like it comes out fully formed. And you don't know when that's going to happen. And when it happens, it's magical, right? There are times when you, you look at what you wrote and you thought that came from somewhere else, right? So I often think about sometimes we are just the medium through which ideas pass, right? From the ether, from, from the universe. And so for me to sit down and say, oh, gosh, without even thinking about it, it actually fits into these themes of how I try to live my life, not just as a writer, but as, as a leader, as a teacher, as a mom. And that once we figured that out, then it really started to fall into place. But it took us a while to get there. It really did. Well, it's a really thoughtful pattern organization, I think. And you mentioned that it's an eight-year arc and that your thinking has changed over the eight years. I would imagine you'd want to take, maybe some of the columns were so rooted in the time that you might want, might have edited them out or not. That's exactly right. There were, there were columns that I loved that I just felt so connected with. But in talking with my editor, Michael, and with, with others in my, my core group, and they would say, I know why you love this, but it's really time specific, or it's really incident specific. And we don't know whether it will be universally accessible. We want this to be something that anyone can pick up, even if they never followed your column, even if they're not a news junkie, right? Because I, as a, as a long-term social studies teacher, as someone in politics, I do read several newspapers a day, right? And, but that's not the norm. And so people would remind me that's not the norm, Becca. And so really think about the larger ideas that, that fit together in the book. Well, it's so well informed, though. And it's well researched, but the research doesn't bog you down. You know, there's research in each column and it shows that you know what you're talking about, or you're just based in research, but it doesn't, it doesn't weigh us down. It's very fast moving and accessible. And there's rereading. I've certainly reread it. And I've recommended it to every single friend I've talked to, including my Champlain Book Group that I have, I'm no longer part of, because for that reason, it's engaging and accessible and fast-paced and smart and research and inspiring. Thank you. Thank you. Well, it is, it's great to hear that. I really wanted something that people could pick up, you know, pick up, put down, if they only had a few minutes, read something before they started their day, or before you go to bed at night, and having them be fully formed ideas that were digestible, right, in small amounts of time, but get you thinking beyond that. And to hear you say that it is fast-paced, but it's also inspirational. That, that's exactly what I wanted. And so thank you for telling me that. That means a lot to me. And it is, I had a wonderful moment a couple of weeks ago when a dear friend of mine, his wife got it for him, and he was reading it out loud from other way around. She was reading it out loud to him. And in the middle of it, they said, they had no idea. They were like, Oh my God, that column is about our daughter. And it was. And before, so by the end, they were both crying. I was just like, you know, she knows, she knows who our daughter is in the world, and who she wants to be. And that is the greatest gift, right, that a writer can get back is to have somebody tell them, you touch them so deeply. So there's so many points in these narratives that have that certainly had that effect on me. So how long did it, you mentioned four specific influences in your introduction. And I was wondering if you could talk a little about them starting with your experience at the Farm and Wilderness Institute, the Farm and Wilderness Foundation. So it's a group of camps in Plymouth, Vermont. So centrally located. And I had worked there as a rock climbing instructor, a backpacking leader, went on to direct one of the camps, met my wife there, her parents met there. My daughter goes there now. It is a Quaker based organization. And so it's based in Quaker philosophy and practice, but most of the people go there are not actually Quaker, but they they understand the importance of being able to see the light of the spirit in each person and taking that time of quiet. And so it was a place where I went to work when I was in my 20s. And it was really the thing that got me both to fall in love with Vermont, absolutely almost from the very first night I started working there back in 1994. I thought, this is where I want to make my life, not just because of how beautiful the landscape is, but also just fell in love with that sensibility that so many Vermonters have, which is the natural world is a critical part of who they are as people. And it is, it is an incredible gift that I was given to learn about this, this organization and to meet my spouse there. And the people who have really guided me in my career have been to a large extent connected in some way with the Farmer Wilderness Foundation. It's a group of a very loving people doing really good work in the world. And I work with a lot of young people there that I'm still in touch with. And so that idea of being able to see the light in other people or the goodness in other people was a really big part of me figuring out how I wanted to be a public official. And it was a through line that I saw through my teaching and then into public service as a politician and a leader is that you're not always going to agree with people. In fact, sometimes you're going to have really, really hard conversations. And, but if underneath it all, you can continue to go back to at our core, we want to be seen, we want to be loved. And, and even when I get it wrong, even when I do lose my temper, even when I do say something I regret, that when I can regroup and come back to that, I'm able to reach back out to that person or at the end of a conversation say, you know what, I came on, you know, hot at the beginning of this conversation, I apologize. I know that you just, you need help on this issue. And you're reaching out to me, you know, through impatience because you're, you need help and you're fearful. And so that frame has helped me so much navigate really hard dynamics in politics. And also just made me, I think a better person. So farm and wilderness was a really big influence on my life and continues to be seeing the light and other people is so important in these polarized times. So that's a very powerful message. And your next influence is Brené Brown. Tell us a little about every, a lot of people know her. I think you've even listened to the podcast you mentioned about vulnerability, but refreshing it. So Brené Brown is a professor of social work at the University of Texas at Austin, I think, I think I'm getting that right. And she has done Houston. Could be Houston. It could be Houston. So we will, we'll make sure we get that right. But she is a prolific author. She's a podcaster. She's had a number of really influential TED talks. And really the core of her research is that it is only through getting in touch with our own shame and vulnerability that we can have true connection with other people. If we are so concerned about protecting ourselves from people really seeing who we are, then we're not able to have true connection. But of course, we fear that we won't be accepted, right? Or that we'll be rejected. And what's been so interesting for me as a leader, as a politician, and having gone through this really hot primary, that as I call my supporters, which is what I've been doing since the victory, is you call the people who were there who volunteered time for you, who gave money, who were with you when other people weren't, who endorsed you when other people didn't. And time and time again, what I've heard from people is it was your willingness to be vulnerable, your willingness to be authentic, to be genuine when you were talking not just one-on-one with someone, but in a group about who you are, what are your struggles, how do you want to show up in the world. That's what I think made it possible for us to win this, given that I was not from Burlington or Montpelier. I was a school teacher from southern Vermont. People said there was no way we're going to be able to do this. And what I heard time and time again was you were showing up in a different way through vulnerability, authenticity, genuine connection. And on the night of my primary win as part of my speech, and it's something I put in at the last minute, but a friend helped me realize the whole core of the work that I've done in the legislature has been about relationships and not about connections. Like not transactional connections about relationships. And so I really got that frame from Bernay Brown, and it's something that I go back to time and time again. There is a particular video that I watch of hers of a talk that she gave, and it's called, your critics are not the ones who count. And what she means is you've got to know who are those people in your core circle, friends, family, who will tell you the truth, right? Good, bad, ugly. They are the ones whose feedback matters, not the people making nasty comment on social media, on Twitter, all of those things or the person who doesn't know you on the street who's screaming at you about something. It's those people who keep you true to yourself. And Bernay Brown often says you have to write on a very small piece of paper, like a two by two piece of paper, those people who you absolutely trust to be there for you and to tell you the truth. And when they tell you you're veering off of your values, or when they tell you that you need to stand firmly in your values and that you're right, you need to see it through, listen to them. Don't listen to the critics who don't have skin in the game. And that's tough for any leader, you know, and all this world of noise, you know, it's really hard. There's so much noise, so much noise. And I get caught up in it sometimes. And my friends, my family, my coworkers will remind me when I'm getting caught up in the drama, and they'll say, you know, essentially, let's bring it back to your core values, bring it back to Bernay Brown. And so those folks who are watching who are not familiar with her work, I strongly recommend it. I feel like it is insight into how all of us can be better leaders, even if we don't see ourselves as leaders within the work that we do within our relationships. And one of the things that really stayed with me from her research was that trust is built in tiny little moments. It's not built in grand gestures, right? It's not built in the, oh, you know, a relative, you know, writing you a big fat check, you know, when you need financial help. Yes, that matters. But what really matters is day in and day out. Does that person help you through the rough patches? Does that person sit with you when you are full of self-doubt? And so I really think about that in terms of my work in politics, too. It has to be built in these tiny little moments. And that's why, for me, it's never been about transactional relationships, because you have to keep going back to establish that you have a true connection with somebody. And it's more private than public, if you're going to dichotomize it. Yes, it is. It's, oh my gosh, I'm so glad you mentioned that. It's in all these moments that most people will never see. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. Tell us about Laura Coyle. So Laura Coyle has been a long time mentor to me. So we got to know each other through a mutual friend, but we were both involved in an organization called the Coactive Coaching Institute. And she became my, you know, for lack of a better term, my personal coach, mentor, therapist, someone who kept me focused on my values and what I wanted in my life. And she's someone that I've worked with for over a decade now. And I know that without her and her guidance and her poking at the edges of saying, are you doing the thing that you're supposed to be doing? I know if I didn't have her in my life, I wouldn't have run for state senate. I wouldn't have run for Congress. I wouldn't have finished this book. It's that person who keeps you focused on, you know, are you living your values? And if you're not living your values, how can I help you live your values? And so she is, I talked to her twice a month. And she's actually, I met her in person, but she now lives on the West Coast. And we, you know, when you have someone that's been a mentor for over 10 years, they know where all the bodies are buried. They know all the skeletons in the closet. They know all the pitfalls. And so she can reflect back to me, you know, I feel like you're collapsing everything. You're worried about this thing and you're calling in all the other things that ever went wrong in your life. And let me just reflect back to you that actually, you know how to do this, right? You know how to do this. You can do this. And you know, I think lots of people, they forget that it's not cheating to have somebody in your life helping you stay focused on what's important to you. Because as you said, there's so much noise. We get pulled in so many different directions. There's a lot of half dues and shoulds that come from work, from family, from friends, well, you have to do this, you should do this. And one of the things, a gift that she has given to me over the years is there's no half due. There's only choice. There's only choice. So what choice are you going to make in this moment? And yeah, she's, she's a spitfire. And you can find her on coilcoach.com if you're curious about her. She's also an actress and a musician and just such a creative soul. But she is a big part of why I ever started writing these columns. She was one of them. I think you mentioned her in the context of starting to write the columns. Yes, I was terrified. I was like, what do you mean I'm going to write one every week? And she was like, you can do this. And I don't know if it made it in the acknowledgments, but when I first was writing the columns, it would take me so long to write each one. And she was like, oh my gosh, you're spending too much time on this. I, you know, your goal for the next column is you're going to cut the time in half that you're spending on writing it. I was like, are you joking me? Like cut the time in half. And then, you know, we would do that. And then she's like, okay, and now we're going to do it again. Like we're going to cut the time in half. You know how to do this. You know how to weave together these ideas. And I think she was the one who finally said to me, no one cares about your semi-colon, Becca. No one cares. You're the only one who cares about your semi-colon. And of course, writers, we get, you know, we get caught up in our own heads. Absolutely. But we need champions. Creatives need champions. People who put themselves out there need people in their lives to keep them focused on getting through the rough patches, because there's always going to be critiques and criticism. But almost always, we are our own worst critics. And we have instincts that we don't always listen to. That is true too. Morally and otherwise. And you work at the training institute, the Collector Training Institute also was influential, you said. Yes. Yes. So I went and got trained as a co-active coach. And in its simplest terms, it's essentially about how to ask the right expansive questions of people to bring them to who they most want to be. Okay. And it's something that I use in my work in a legislature too, that sometimes what gets in the way of passing good policy or coming to a decision about a bill is not actually the stuff that's in the bill. It's sometimes caught up in ego and self-doubt and issues that happened years ago between colleagues. And more than once, having that training through a co-active coaching institute helped me to realize even in those moments when it seems to be about a particular issue, if you ask a more expansive question, you'll get at what's really at the heart of it. And I'll just give you a quick example. We had a very difficult policy battle that we were having between the House and Senate a couple years ago. And partway through this, I realized, oh, it's not actually about the dollar figure, right? Like, we wanted this, they wanted that, we're trying to haggle over money. And at some point, I realized, oh, it's actually about a values proposition that they have a different set of values around this policy. And as soon as that dawned on me, I realized I could go into the next conversation in a really different way. And I'll never forget one of my colleagues in the Senate was just like, that's ridiculous. We just need to hammer out how much money they're willing to give. I said, if we focus on that, we will never get to an agreement. We will never, because it's not about that. Of course it's about that. I was like, no, it's not. And I was so pleased. And I did not gloat, but I could have. And when it all came out that, oh, you're absolutely right, Becca. It's actually not about the money. It's about this other thing. And I wouldn't have gotten there without having that view of how to question, how to sort of poke at the edges of an issue to get at what's really at the heart. And that was through the Coactive Training Institute. Another, I'd encourage people just to check it out. If you don't have to take the whole series of training, you can, you can do them in separate pods. And you can also go online and find a coach who's been trained in this way of inquiry. And it can help you get to where you want to be. That's great. I have a lot more questions, but you've also agreed to read, to do a couple of readings for us. You have something in particular you want to hear. And yes, please. What page so I can follow. I think one of the most powerful essays is the one about your grandfather. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. If you wouldn't mind reading from now, I would love to. I think that's page 58. Yeah. And this was one actually when I felt, and I have to go back, yeah, 2012. This was when I felt like I understood my writer's voice in a different way with this essay. So this is called On Being Neighborly. And I wrote it May 1, 2012. This weekend is my birthday. It is also the anniversary of a more gruesome milestone. May 5, 1945, was the day Mount Housing Concentration Camp was liberated near Linz, Austria, the birthplace of Adolf Hitler. I know this date and I keep track of it because my paternal grandfather, Leopold Ballant, Leo to his friends and family, was murdered while on a forced march from Mount Housing to the town of Gunzkirchen in the waning days of the Third Reich. On April 22, only two weeks before the camps liberation, Leo stopped to assist another ailing prisoner. He knew, as they all did, that stopping along the march meant certain death. But he did what so many others before him and after him have done. His humanity and empathy overpowered his fear. Leo wrapped this man's arm around his shoulder, put his own arm around the weary man's waist, and dragged him along for a short distance. His already low reserves were soon spent and they fell dangerously behind the group. As I witnessed his informed, my grieving grandmother afterwards, both Leo and his comrade were summarily shot and their bodies heaved into the chilly waters of the Danube. I know, Leopold, only from the family stories I have heard and from the memoir my father is working valiantly to finish. And yet the story still gives me an ache in my chest whenever I allow myself the quiet space to think about it. My grandfather's murder impacted so many lives and continues to do so. Elie Wiesel has written, time does not heal all wounds. There are those that remain painfully open. From my parents, I get my sense of humor, my insatiable curiosity, and a deep love of history. But because we have also passed this pain from generation to generation, I am a latecomer to the belief that neighbors can be a force for good in the world. My father was always and remains hesitant about connecting with neighbors. I used to chalk it up to his European manners. But in my adulthood, I've come to realize it is actually a manifestation of the complex trauma of the Holocaust. Of course, he doesn't want the neighbors to know too much about him and his family. Neighbors can betray you. Indeed, they did betray him and his family. So I think what I'll do, and instead of reading all of it, I want I want to just pause here for a moment and say the stories of my grandfather's experience and his death was something that really haunted me from the time of my teens until today is this question of what would I do in that same situation? Would I have the strength? Would I have the humanity? And in writing this essay was really when I was able to understand that, although I think that question will always be a part of me, I realized that the question, the deeper question was actually much more important. And I think that's all I'll skip to that part. When faced with stories of atrocity and bravery, we often ask ourselves, would I have had the courage to stand up and do the right thing? But I think this is perhaps the wrong question, because most of us will never be faced with such a situation. Instead, the real question is, do I have the courage day in and day out to show kindness to and concern for my neighbors? The small gestures do really matter. When I bake bread for a neighbor, even if our politics don't match, or check on another when she's sick, although sometimes she talks my ear off, I am asserting that there is still basic humanity in the world. I do it for me, for my parents, for my children, and for their great grandfather, Leopold Ballant, who retained his humanity in the midst of the Holocaust. That is one of the most powerful essays in the collection. Thank you. I'm really glad you asked me to read that one, because more than anything else on this campaign trail, what I heard was, in every community I went to, was, Becca, I want to be able to talk to my neighbors again. People feel completely traumatized from the Trump administration, from January 6th, from the big lie, from all of that. And they have said to me, I used to feel like I could talk to my neighbor, and now I feel like because we have different political signs, or because I know that they support this movement, and I support a different one, that we can't talk anymore. And that is so dangerous. It's so dangerous. But it gave me so much hope that I was hearing this time and time again, that there is a hunger for this, that people want to be more courageous. But we need models for doing it, right? And it isn't going to take, I think, community by community, it's not going to take one person nationally or as a figure here in Vermont. It's going to take each of us doing these things, inviting the neighbor over to the barbecue, even though you know they voted for Trump, inviting people to come and sit and have tea with you, even if you were on the opposite issue, size of an issue at the local level. I mean, that's the thing. People say they don't want to go to their select board meetings or their school board meetings anymore. This is where we are. And so for me, that essay, even though I wrote it back in 2012, it's even more impactful for me right now when I read that because that's what I'm hearing from everyone. I want to reconnect with my neighbors again. And then balancing that, you have another wonderful neighbor story about the lawnmowers. Yes. Yes. And it is so funny. I mean, that just this very light and humorous and, you know, packs a powerful punch also. Thank you. And it's, you know, I do think a lot. So when I first moved here, and I don't actually know. Briefly summarize it since I used the shorthand because I've read it several times. Yes. Yes. So yes. So is it a tail of four mowers? Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. So essentially, for those of you who haven't read it, the tail of four mowers is talking about essentially my neighborhood. And I use the the experience that I had trying to mow my lawn and realizing, right, one mower breaks, I borrow another mower, that breaks, that one runs out of gas, and to keep going around neighbor to neighbor, and realizing that that experience itself knowing that we had this network around the neighborhood that I felt comfortable connecting with. And I think we feel better as people, even if we're introverts, because I'm an extrovert, but my wife's an extrovert, we feel better as people when we know there's a broader network. And what's been interesting is when that first ran in the paper, I heard from people across Wyndham County, because it ran in the Broward Brewery former, who said, wow, like, I wish I lived in a neighborhood like that. And I thought, you can. You can. And you have to you have to cultivate that, right. And I don't. I mean, I love my neighbors. I don't think we are extraordinary exceptional people, right. We just realized that we all feel better when we pitch in, you know, and, and I could not have run for office, even as a state senator, without the neighbors helping, keep keep my lawn up, you know, make sure my mail comes in, you know, when when the house was broken into one time, you know, neighbors got me in touch with someone who could repair the window, like all of those things. And I do think we have this sense of, oh, that can happen somewhere else. But that can't happen in my neighborhood. And I get it. Many people in Vermont live in more rural areas, and a neighborhood could be an entire rural dirt, you know, dirt, you know, dead end road, or it might be a much broader sense of what your neighborhood looks like. It could be your whole town if you're in a tiny settlement. But I would encourage people to understand that those kinds of networks get built, one loaf of bread at a time, one mower at a time. You know what I mean? I do. I do. I mean, we live in the senior center. In the beginning, I had resistance over the city, but you know, it's turned into a very neighborly environment. And we all disagree politically, I think. Yeah. If you have pets or all kinds of needs, you know, neighbors. I'd like to switch gears, if I could, before we use up too much time, you know, the title of the show is all things LGBTQ and you call us queer TV, colloquially. That's right. And you mentioned in your introduction that one of the impediments to becoming a political figure was that you were at 17, you knew that you were gay. You were gay in words. Can you tell us when did you come out and what was that like? Right. So, you know, as you know, and these things often have several iterations, right? So when I think about when I first suspected that I was gay, it was really when I was around 11 or 12, you know, really understanding, you know, huh, I'm not feeling about, you know, the boys in my class, the way that, you know, some of my friends are. Of course, I had strong friends across the gender identity spectrum, but in terms of love interests, and I was thinking about how the thing that saved me at that age, because you get so many, I mean, that was, you know, I was, that was the 80s. That was the early 80s. And getting so many messages, so many homophobic messages, hateful messages. And it was really my town library that really saved me. It was knowing that I could go there. My mom would drop me off and I would just escape into the stacks. You know, that is always, it's funny. I didn't put that all together until just now that on the campaign trail, when we were in a new town, and I had a little bit of downtime, I would tell my staffer take me to the library. And I would go and just, you know, quiet my mind, sit in the stacks, sometimes read a book and sometimes just be there because it's a place where I feel the most safe, honestly. And so as a kid, reading, read a May Brown, you know, reading Kate Millet and others, just seeing yourself, right? It's that seeing yourself in a work of fiction or nonfiction. So I'll through middle school and high school really knew that that's, you know, who I was and didn't know how I was going to navigate that. And then, you know, we're looking back on some yearbook pictures at the beginning of this campaign. And I was elected, you know, for the superlatives in my yearbook, I was nominated to be most humorous. And also the one that cracks me up is all American, which I never quite knew exactly what that meant. But I didn't feel comfortable telling my closest high school friends until right after graduation. And it just, you know, they were wonderful friends, but I just didn't know whether I could be safe with them and wanted to have a life in politics and just didn't think it was possible. And it is when you feel this incredible drive and yearning like for me to be in public service, to make life better for people and to feel like, oh, that is my calling. And also I don't think I'll ever get there because the only hero I have is Harvey Milk, and he was assassinated, right? So that you say to yourself, it's not safe yet, right? It's not safe for me to do that. And so it's kind of remarkable that I am where I am right now, given how long it took me to really come back to this thing that I knew about myself, which is I want to be somebody who is working on a large scale to alleviate suffering. And the way that I can do that is through politics that I have some skill in that. And now the world has changed so much that Vermonters just nominated me. I won the primary, handily. I didn't think that was possible even a few years ago, Ann. I really didn't. I didn't think Vermont was ready to elect an openly gay person on the statewide level. And so because people say things, right? Like, people would say, yeah, I really support you. I just don't want you to be too gay. Like, don't- Oh, I've heard that. Yeah. Yeah. And so- And the studies colleague said, Ann, it's okay that she's a lesbian, but she's too lesbian. But yeah. Yes. Yes. And so I think many of us who are in the larger queer community, like, you know, you've got the, when you come out to yourself, you come out to your family, you come out to your friends, when you come out to your colleagues. I mean, I was a teacher for many, many years. I wasn't out to my students or my colleagues. Absolutely not. And so it is this now being a public figure and being completely and totally out. It's different. It's great. It's gratifying. You're doing a lot of people around the country, hope. I know. You have, you know, you have a national profile, which is fabulous. Yes. Yes. And I'm learning just how much that's true. I bet. I bet. There are a couple of other matters I'd like to focus on. Vulnerability is one that one of the strengths of the book, I think, is that you do organize it in an unconventional way according to eight values that you have. And one of them is vulnerability. And I love that section in the book. And you mentioned in the intro that you felt reservations about writing the column because of, because of the personal self-disclosure that was going to occur. So my question now is, do you feel that way about publishing the book? I did at first. When it first came out, I felt, well, a couple things. One, I thought, and I said, poor Elizabeth, she heard this over and over again. I said, who would want to read it? She was like, what do you mean you would want to read it? I said, well, I mean, yeah, I wrote these columns, but yes, I had a following. But who would want to read them in this form? And does anyone care? I must have said that so many times. Does anyone care about these ideas? And I got to just say, we all need those people in our lives that will say time and time again, I know that you are feeling vulnerable. I know you're feeling, what I would say, I have a vulnerability hangover. I was vulnerable. I don't feel very good right now. And it's so delightful when people say to me, reading this book or reading these essays has given people permission to do certain things, to be more vulnerable, to be more kind to someone they wouldn't necessarily be to, to be someone who will stop and talk to a stranger, even though they never would have done that before. That is the power of this book. That's what I'm realizing is that it is, I do know courage is contagious. I see it time and time again. But if the book has that impact on people, inspires them to go a little bit out of their comfort zone with someone they don't know, or building that kind of neighborhood connection that we want, or giving that person who they knew they absolutely know they disagree with on really a hot button, political issues, but giving still them the time of day to talk about something that's worth it all. That's worth all the blood, sweat, and tears in getting this through. And so I feel less and less that vulnerability hangover than I did when we first released it, because I honestly thought, okay, so now we've done this, and now nobody's gonna buy it, and I'll feel like the biggest loser. Never. Let's talk about the reception of individual columns, because last night I listened to a Zoom panel with some friends whose book came out six months ago, and they've been going around on their tour. And so they're able to gauge a little bit public reception, but your book tour has really almost just started. But we do have responses to individual columns that you can tell us about. What really was successful, do you think, or what resonated? Yeah, you know, and it's really different for, you know, lots of different people. The whole group, grouping on hope, I think people, they desperately need that right now. And I'm looking at the lists here, you know, A Walk in the Woods, The Natural World, The Spiritual Realm, Peak Moments, Pink Light on the Stone, all of these, I think give voice to what so many Vermonters feel, is they feel more hopeful when they get out in the natural world, when they're thinking of things larger than themselves. I mean, I'm just hearing it time and time again, and on the campaign trail that people don't want to watch the news anymore. They don't want to watch, they don't want to read. These are people who have always been some, you know, people who are up on current events, they say they're so exhausted from it. And that knowing that they have this tool outside of them, the natural world, you know, resetting outside to give them hope, I want, I desperately want people to feel more hopeful, because when we don't, we've lost, we've completely lost. And so those, those columns are definitely resonating with folks right now. I think a lot of people are really interested in seeing how the issues that I'm talking about on the campaign trail are issues that I was talking about 10 years ago. It's just a continuation, right? My fear about authoritarianism and the rise of the autocrats and, you know, how, when I look at how the Republican party was changing dramatically, even before Trump won the primary, right? A lot of people point to that moment. And I say, oh, that was just, you know, sort of a, a consolidation of power. But in terms of people moving away from mainstream Republican ideology, that was happening before. And so I think in some ways it's scary for people to see that in this book, but also in a way it's helping them to connect the dots of how we got here. Because I think so many people just didn't realize what had been in the works. Does that make sense? Absolutely. And one essay I loved that resonated with me personally, because Linda and I were just in New York and I saw Hades Town for the first time. Yes. And, you know, your analysis of that is so spot on because it transcends Trump. It's a whole power dynamic that is operative in this country and the Trump, you know? Exactly. And, and I think too that we all can fall prey to that if we are not vigilant about our own feelings about when groups are scapegoated or when we look for easy answers, right? That it's, that we all should be vigilant to, to monitor our own feelings and, you know, and our thoughts around these issues that, that, that rile us up, that it is, it's obviously I'm a Democrat, right? So I'm a Democrat, I run a Democratic ticket. I, you know, it is, it is a a policy, a set of policy goals and philosophy that I deeply believe in. I also know that it's important for me day in and day out to question my own thinking about things, to do that, that, that exercise. Because when I don't, when I sit in smugness, or I sit in, you know, I've got all the answers, then I, I stop bringing sort of an academic rigor to the work that I do, right? Let me see the footnotes. I want to see the footnotes. Oh, I love that in the book too. My favorite selection in the hope section was a sense of wonder to balance out the anger. Yeah. And you know, you mentioned people not watching the news. Yeah. A lot of the mainstream media is just so angry. Yes. Yes. Almost. I mean, I'm much more selective now because I become, you know, stressed out and despairing. Yes. You know, I am, you may have seen this. I think it was in the Washington Post, probably a month ago now, maybe, maybe over three weeks, a writer named Amanda Ripley, who has had, you know, several bestselling nonfiction books and she used to write for, I think the Atlantic and Politico. She wrote a column that was about how mainstream news right now is actually not fit for human consumption. And she, her own self, she's a journalist has been dramatically reducing the amount of time she's exposed to it because she sees how it's impacting her psyche. And I understand it. It also worries me. And so I think we do need to have those moments in our lives when we are looking for hope in awe and audacity and it can't just always be this anger and fear or else we become hopeless ourselves. That's such a good note to end on. Believe it or not, we're out of time. I had a million more questions. We'll have to come for a sequel. Maybe if you're free, I know you're going to be very busy now, but maybe after you're, you finish the book tour, we can come and talk again. I would love that. I would love that too. And thank you so much. This has been a real treat. I've been looking forward to it and I enjoyed preparation and the execution of it. It was really fun, Becca. Thank you for joining us and please come again. I will. Thank you so much. Thank you for joining us. And until next time, remember, resist.