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[0:00] Leah Walsh: Hi, and welcome to The Compass, the podcast documenting the struggles of life as an artist.

[0:05] Leah Walsh: I'm Leah Walsh. Hi everyone. I'm on the first day today of a two-week family leave from my day job, which I'm so excited about. I was able to take it before Sessie turns one next month. So I'm really excited to just spend all the time with her, all the snuggles. It's really just hurting me to be away from her so much. Frankie is doing some writing up at Space at Writer Farm this week, so Sessie and I are going to the Midwest to visit a bunch of my closest girlfriends and their babies. So very exciting. Wish me luck. That's gonna be our first solo plane ride, so we'll see how it goes. My guest today is Meg Fee.

[0:45] Leah Walsh: Meg is a beautiful writer who I went to Juilliard with. She was in the year ahead of me in the drama division. And we've been on separate paths since we graduated. She left the city a few years ago to go to grad school for public policy in North Carolina. But we've kept up through social media, and I've just been really interested by how her personal writing on her blog, Post Juilliard, really found a following, and she ended up publishing an ebook of her posts, and then last year she published her first physical book called Places I Stopped on the Way Home. She's working in New York City right now at the New York Times, and I was really excited to get back together in person and have a deeper conversation. I hope you enjoy the 141st episode of The Compass.

[1:50] Leah Walsh: And within that, I guess is also an implied hard question. Um, what is the dark side for you most often when I say that? I figure I just start with the hardest question.

[2:02] Meg Fee: Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is our good interview technique.

[2:05] Meg Fee: Yeah. Um, I think in the current climate, I would say that there are two things that I would consider the dark side and they probably work in tandem. Um, I think the first thing is that because we're seeing the democratization of information in new and very important ways with the internet, we're just also seeing this world in which everyone feels like they have the right to comment on everything.

[2:43] Meg Fee: And so I think as someone who has written quite openly about their life and who started doing that in 2008 when the world of blogging was like really the sort of this wild west of the internet. No one knew what to expect and it was like actually a quite sweet place at that time. And as that became commercialized and people saw an opportunity um to make money off of it that changed that world and at the same time that was happening it just there was this influx of comments not just on blogs but you know like websites popped up like there's one called Go Me G-O-M-I and it stands for get off my internets. And so there were just these message boards of people basically commenting on anyone's life. Anyone who is living their life in any way in on the internet. Um, people had opinions and just the word, the worst possible opinions really, really mean stuff.

[3:53] Meg Fee: Um, so I think it's really easy to internalize some of that feedback and to predict to change how you're going to write in response to that before it ever happens. Right. So I worry the dark side for me is to self-censor in a way that the words don't ever get to the page. That you're predicting criticism and in doing that, moving your own needle further away from sort of your true north. Um, and I think the way to get away from that is to just make a daily practice of writing.

[4:35] Meg Fee: Um, I'm saying that out loud. It's like, oh, that's something I should be doing. Uh-huh. Um, I'm certainly not currently. And then I think the other dark side is in our current political climate to fall down the rabbit hole of does this matter? Do the arts matter? Does theater matter? Does writing matter? Does any of this matter when there are children in cages at our border as we speak? Does this matter when we see systemic racism or white supremacy at the highest level of our government?

[5:13] Meg Fee: And I think it would be easy to say, you know what, no, the arts don't matter. But one, I think that's short-sighted, and I think it lacks courage. And I think actually the arts matter more than ever because that's part of how we make sense of the world in which we live. How we process it.

[5:34] Meg Fee: Yeah, exactly. Um, but it, you know, I think the dark side is probably just any thought living in a world that stops you from doing the art. Whether that's fear or an assumed lack of importance or a future projection of you know here's the thing like we have to do it because doing it matters. Even if very few people show up to see a play, like doing that play matters.

[6:20] Meg Fee: The journey of rehearsing that play, the journey of writing it, the journey, like that all matters, even if the end result isn't the accolades we might hope for. Right.

[6:32] Leah Walsh: Um, so you mentioned trying to do have a daily practice of writing.

[6:39] Leah Walsh: Trying to be operative word. Was there a time um like when that criticism first started that you felt for a while that you did go in that direction of um like changing what you're writing, or before you learned how to tune that out and draw yourself back?

[6:58] Meg Fee: Yeah, I don't know that I have. I think actually—

[7:00] Meg Fee: Or were you able to recognize it as a force you had to resist?

[7:06] Meg Fee: I what I'm embarrassed to say in this moment is I don't think I have tuned it out. I think in some ways now it feels worse than ever. Um, and I'm not quite sure if I don't think I can tell you why that is. Um, but for like I've I've fallen out of the practice of just showing up daily for my own um, you know ritual of sitting down and exercising that muscle and making sense of the world in that way.

[7:39] Leah Walsh: Right.

[7:40] Meg Fee: Um, no, I'm I'm embarrassed to admit like it's it's like meditation. It's easy to sort of say, like, I know that's really important. I know doing that thing is gonna make me a better person, but like, oh those ten minutes, like I'll get to it tomorrow. Because there are so many other things to do, and it's it's it's hard because it is so meaningful.

[8:04] Leah Walsh: There's so many things I want to talk about just to catch the listeners up on where you are now. Um, Meg and I went to school together at Juilliard for acting.

[8:16] Leah Walsh: She's been a writer for a long time post-Juilliard. And then now you just just graduated with your master's in public policy from Duke.

[8:27] Meg Fee: Which is so amazing.

[8:28] Leah Walsh: And had a book published.

[8:28] Meg Fee: Yeah, a year ago.

[8:32] Leah Walsh: A year ago. So in the midst of when you're in grad school, right?

[8:34] Meg Fee: Yeah.

[8:34] Leah Walsh: Yeah. Assuming it was a two-year program.

[8:36] Meg Fee: It was a two-year program, yeah.

[8:38] Meg Fee: It was purchased probably the March before I started school and was published about a year later in May.

[8:45] Leah Walsh: So right after I finished my first year of school.

[8:47] Meg Fee: Right.

[8:48] Leah Walsh: And the paperback just came out uh I think in July, so a month ago.

[8:54] Leah Walsh: And it remind me of the title?

[8:55] Meg Fee: Places I Stopped on the Way Home.

[8:57] Leah Walsh: That's right. So yeah, go check that out.

[8:59] Meg Fee: Yeah.

[8:59] Leah Walsh: Um, so can we talk a little bit about you have all of these interesting transitions in your life since school, which we all do in so many different ways. But I'm curious when you started writing as a way, as you said, to like figure things out in your life.

[9:18] Meg Fee: Yeah, you know, I started writing pretty much immediately after Juilliard.

[9:23] Meg Fee: Um, it wasn't something you did when you were growing up as much. You know, I'm journaling. Actually, sort of the irony is like I think I applied to 13 colleges um as I was graduating high school and most of them were literal arts schools.

[9:40] Meg Fee: Um, one of them was Evansville.

[9:42] Leah Walsh: Oh really?

[9:43] Meg Fee: Yeah, yeah. We've when I appl when I like did the, you know, you do like in the I applied in Chicago and it was like at the Palmer House Hilton, and it was I think I applied for North Carolina School of the Arts, Juilliard, and Carnegie Mellon.

[9:57] Leah Walsh: And that's where I auditioned for Juilliard for grad school.

[10:00] Meg Fee: Yeah.

[10:01] Meg Fee: But for somehow I got linked up with Evansville and applied there at the last minute. But those four schools aside, um, it was like the University of Virginia, the University of Texas, Northwest.

[10:13] Meg Fee: Actually, I don't think I applied to Northwestern. But like you were trying to figure out what you wanted to study.

[10:18] Leah Walsh: Yeah, and I had gone to a really academically rigorous high school. And you know, in some ways I actually really look back and I regret that I didn't have a traditional undergrad experience because I I really liked my time at Juilliard, but the focus was so singular.

[10:40] Meg Fee: Yeah.

[10:40] Meg Fee: Like it shrunk the world in a way that at 18 I wasn't ready for.

[10:44] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[10:45] Meg Fee: I'm always incredibly impressed with my classmates who went for undergrad because I like I studied acting in college, but I needed that liberal arts and that time to like grow up and study abroad and do all of that stuff.

[10:58] Leah Walsh: Gosh, yes. I highly if anyone's listening to this and doesn't know, I highly recommend yeah, going to going to a conservatory program as a master student.

[11:11] Meg Fee: Yeah, so I I oh so yeah, when I got into Juilliard, I was very willful with my parents and basically said, This is where I'm going, like no questions asked.

[11:22] Meg Fee: And I was in a really privileged situation where my parents could like that was okay. But they said the one uh can like that our one request is that you have to journal while you're there.

[11:36] Leah Walsh: Um and dad.

[11:37] Meg Fee: I know because I was I had been a good writer in school, and they said we want you to keep developing this skill set.

[11:45] Leah Walsh: Oh my gosh.

[11:46] Meg Fee: And so they were like, We're not gonna read what you write, but we want to know that you are in fact, you know, exercising this muscle, keeping this habit.

[11:56] Leah Walsh: Um, which is kind of wild to look back on and go, wait, did like did we know? And no, we absolutely there was no—

[12:02] Meg Fee: Do they keep journals themselves?

[12:05] Meg Fee: They're so cute.

[12:06] Meg Fee: I don't think so, no.

[12:08] Meg Fee: You know, I think like as a kid, I would sometimes wander up to the one desktop shared computer and see like an open Word document that my father had like written poetry on, or but he, you know, he's a tax attorney.

[12:23] Meg Fee: Um so yeah, I don't know how they had the foresight, but I'm really glad that they did um and I kept it up like not consistently while I was at school and actually if I were to go back and look at any of those journals they are humiliating because it's like oh my gosh so and so was mean to school to like mean at school to me today or so and so like winked at me and didn't that feel great.

[12:52] Meg Fee: So it was like when I started blogging in 2008 there was something transformative about the idea that someone else might see that.

[13:02] Meg Fee: Right. That was very different I didn't like journaling but I found that oh there's there might be another set of eyes on this that changes the way I write in a really important way um and I started writing at a time when I was like really in the throes of depression and so writing was a way for me to reach for a like a happier future to sort of put on these rose colored goggles and go, okay I'm like in the saddest moments of my life but where can I see joy and where can I commit that joy to paper so there actually are a I think quite a few studies on the cognitive benefits of writing particularly for things like depression because it is like meditation or it is like prayer where it's a way for the brain to just sort through what's going on.

[14:03] Meg Fee: Um, and one of my favorite things about writing is sometimes I'll see something that I've written that's like, you know, made its way onto some other corner of the internet, and I'll read it, and honestly, if my name was not attached to it, I would not know that those were my words. Because in many ways it's like acting or it's like an ego-less activity when it's going well, like you're just not fully conscious because you're in the present moment, and so it's a bit like alchemy. It's not like I'm not laboring over every word that comes in the editing stage. It's just like a part stream of conscience, part like committing music to paper in the form of words. And so when you started with the blog, like you said, it was kind of before those things had become really monetized the way they are.

[15:00] Leah Walsh: Oh, for sure. Um, was there a point where you did aim for that or tried like made any sort of switch, or is it kind of always been organic and like focused on getting your writing out there?

[15:15] Meg Fee: Yeah, I would have loved to have made money off of it. Because I was living like, you know, working in restaurants in New York. So I could have figured out how to make money. I just didn't have that commercial savviness. But I think also at the end of the day, is that did not align with who I was in some really fundamental way. And I do think like I've always been sort of conscious of like there's so much media that we can consume at any given moment that I wanted to make sure that I wasn't just like pumping noise, that I wasn't pumping pollution into the world. And I think sometimes when writing is like listen, I'm not like make money how you want to make money. But I do think blogs, and this is where I'm like, oh god, what will someone say if they listen to this and judge me for it?

But blogging because it moved from this very organic place to this very commercial place, there was a period of time where the line between like what was being said because it was true, because the writer thought it was true, and then what was being said because the writer thought they would make money saying it, or they had been paid to say a specific thing, that line became really blurry in a way that was I think dangerous to the people before there were like established.

[16:43] Leah Walsh: Yeah, now there now there are like better norms about it.

[16:46] Meg Fee: And I still think like, you know, like cool, is it is why why are you peddling this lipstick to me? Like, is that really important in light of like the, you know, I it's like the whole Taylor Swift thing from the 2018 midterm elections. Like, it's amazing that she came out a week before the election and said, like, hey, I am gonna vote in the Tennessee election, this is who I'm voting for, and this is why, and here's the link to register to vote. Like, that's incredible. I would love to see more bloggers using their platform to take a stand without fear of like, oh, I might lose right followers, I might lose sponsors. Like, who cares? We're living in a like really tenuous moment in history and the rules are not normal, and people should not like it's not just about you right now.

[17:37] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[17:39] Meg Fee: I don't follow a ton of bloggers, but the few like big ones that I do when they do post things about current events and things like that. I'm like, okay, good for you. Yeah, and I should say, like, there are bloggers out there who are doing it, and it is incredible to watch them do it, and incredible to build a community around some of these really important conversations, and I just like truly am in awe of them and wish that everyone would do that, which maybe it's like the bar is too high, but it's it is odd when you see people staying in their lane so committedly like this is my lane. I only talk about my kids and this other interest, and that's it. You're just like wow, you have to try so hard to not acknowledge.

[18:26] Leah Walsh: Yeah, there's like a lack of authenticity to that, and I think people are beginning to sniff that out.

[18:32] Meg Fee: Like, I think you know, if you look at the data on millennials and how millennials are spending their money and investing their money and wanting to tie it to causes like that data is really promising and exciting. We are the generation that wants um that wants change on a lot of different fronts. I think millennials get a lot of black and sometimes rightly so, but we inherited quite a few issues, yes. Um, but yeah, I think I think the data on young people is actually quite promising. Um can just talking about this particular subject, can we kind of skip forward about why you decided to go back to grad school?

[19:17] Leah Walsh: Yeah, sure. It's all seems related, yeah.

[19:20] Meg Fee: So I this is gonna be I'm like committing this to print, I guess, so to speak. I you know, it was okay, so I at some point in time, I think I turned 27 and I was like, uh I can't just keep working in restaurants anymore. Like I were you auditioning at that point, or you already spent like how long I stopped acting like almost immediately.

[19:47] Leah Walsh: So I graduated Juilliard, I was super depressed and I had this really severe eating disorder. Um, which like that was deeply intertwined with the depression. Um so I didn't I couldn't figure out how to reconcile like my health and what I looked like with the industry, and so I just stepped away from it, thinking that I would find my way back, and I just didn't. Um and there are times that I regret that that I like wish I had given it more of a college try or wish I had stuck with it longer, but you know, I in I moved in and I like did the best that I could on a daily basis and I just never found my way back.

[20:34] Meg Fee: Um yeah, so when I was about 27, I was just tired of working in restaurants and took like an admin job at a finance company, and that led to another executive assistant position at another finance company, and then I ended up at a third one, and the third one was like the, you know, the place to be, and the pay was okay, but the perks were great, and then it had good name recognition, and I just remember sitting at that desk and feeling like the Edward Munch painting, the scream. Like that was my internal feeling every day. I was like, I hate this. I hate this so much that I can't breathe.

[21:17] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[21:18] Meg Fee: Um, and also not for nothing, I was not good at it. Like, I'm smart enough to fake my way through it, but I was not a good executive admin. Jobs are so hard. It was s well, one, it demands multitasking on an incredibly high level. And multitasking is um what's the term? It's like we as human beings actually can't do it. It's fundamentally not good for you, but yeah, it's a maladaptive trait. Like we shouldn't be able to do it. It's not healthy. Well, and it also depends on who you're working for, because I've in this day job stent I'm in now, I consciously avoided doing even though they can pay better, like the executive assistant jobs because it's very stressful and anxiety producing for me to like be in charge of someone's schedule, yeah, or their email, or like be so directly tied to what they're doing.

[22:09] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[22:09] Meg Fee: You know, and I think it's it's a bit like a relationship. If the chemistry is there, it's like there were there was a finance company that I absolutely hated the company, but quite liked the guys I was working for. And so the really like one of them actually wrote um a letter of recommendation for me for grad school. So there were like bright spots within it, but I think just at this final job, like the amount of the work would workload was so intense and there was just bad chemistry between me and one of the guys I was working for. And you know then when like you make a few mistakes, and so you try even harder to not make mistakes, which just means you make more mistakes.

[22:50] Meg Fee: So I think I was there for about eight months, and it was my birthday in early October, and I was sitting in a bar with a friend. I said, I'm just not happy. I'm so unhappy, and something has to change. And I don't even like looking back now, I think, whoa, what was that? Like really rapid fire series of events that enabled this to happen. Um, but I just decided, like, I'm gonna quit my job. I had an agent at that time, and there was interest in a book.

[23:23] Leah Walsh: A literary agent.

[23:24] Meg Fee: Yeah, a literary agent. There was interest in a book, and I had decided I was gonna finish writing the book so that we could sell it the whole thing, as opposed to like on commission, which is where you basically give a proposal and they give you your advance and you write the rest of it. Um, but I couldn't l I just couldn't go home at the end of this day from the r this job and sit down and write. Like I just didn't have the mental energy. Um, so yeah, I was like, I'm gonna quit this job, I'm gonna finish writing the book, I'm gonna apply to grad school, and I'm gonna move on. Like something has to change. Um, so I quit my job like a week before the 2016 election.

[24:07] Meg Fee: Um, yeah. Um, and I look back now and I thank God for my manager at that job at the time. Um, she doesn't work at that company anymore, so I feel like I can say that she was like, you know, you signed a contract saying you'd give us a full month's notice, and you're only giving us two weeks. Um, she was like, So I have to tell you that like you signed that contract, but wink wink, you can leave. And I was like, okay, if I leave, like what what does that mean? She basically said, Well, you can't come back and work here again. And I was like, okay, I'm okay with that. Like, I don't want to be an executive admin, and I don't think I'm going into finance.

[24:46] Leah Walsh: Right.

[24:46] Meg Fee: Um, so I yeah, and I you know, those two weeks I think were critical. Um, because it just I don't know, it was like I actually look back on that time between quitting that job, which was like what, November 2nd, and all the grad school applications were due, like January 5th, and luckily I had taken the GRE a few years earlier, and it lasted for five years. I had taken it thinking I was gonna try to get an MFA in writing. Um so it was just like this really holy incredible, scary two-month period in which I finished writing the book in a month, and then that next month I applied to grad schools, and I applied to Masters of Public Health programs because with my background in the eating disorder, that was I was like, this is so important, this affects everything.

It's so deeply like interwoven with you know inequality and like so I applied to Duke because at the time the dean of the program was this guy named Kelly Brownell, who is like the leading food policy person in the country.

[25:54] Meg Fee: Um, so I apply, I get in, in that April I go to the accepted students' day, and I sit down and I'm listening to everyone talk about their interests, and I'm like, this is not a public health program. This is a public policy program, which I didn't even know existed. Like I had been out of academia for so long. I didn't even know it existed. I was like, what is this thing? And I was like, you know, I think this is okay. Like, this is a happy accident. This feels good. Um, so yeah, I showed up to Duke that August and quickly realized there was no food policy in the classroom at all.

[26:36] Meg Fee: And that Dean Brunel was going to be stepping down after a year.

[26:40] Leah Walsh: Oh no.

[26:41] Meg Fee: Um, but there was this World Food Policy Center there, and I was like, this is okay. Like, I'm still aiming my arrow at this, so to speak. And then I realized that within that realm, in order to be taken seriously, it was my impression that people wanted you to have a master's of public health. Well, no, people wanted you to be an MD or a PhD. And I was like, oh, I'm really not some sort of science or medical exactly, like that the highest level of that. Um, but through like a really happy strange series of accidents. Um, the person who was leading the food policy center at that time, like we sat down and had coffee, and she was like, Oh, you know, blah, blah, blah, this guy who is just working for us, he went to work at IDO, and IDO is this company that does design thinking, and maybe you should look into that, blah, blah, blah.

Um, and so that was in the first semester. In the second semester, Duke offered a class in the policy school called human-centered design. It was like improving the citizen experience through human-centered design. It was the first time they offered the class as a full semester class. It was only open to second years, so I didn't qualify. Um, but I like it was on my radar, I saw it, and not enough second years signed up. So they opened it up to first years. And this guy, Tom Allen, taught the class, and he was the first chief experience officer in the federal government. So he worked for the VA under Obama. And he taught this class. And I think within the first few weeks, I was like, oh my gosh, I love this.

And I think you'll appreciate that, you know, it's funny, like now looking for jobs in that field, they'll often say, like, we're looking for people who either studied this explicitly or we're looking for journalists or anthropologists. And the thing that I've gleaned, like the reason they specifically um name those professions is because those are professions in which people are asking questions all the time. And I perhaps you know where I'm going with this, but like first year of Juilliard was ask the question, ask the question, ask the question. So for me, I'm like, oh my gosh, like my acting background is specifically about ask the question, just keep asking the question. People and storytelling and exactly.

And human-centered design is all about creating solutions with empathy for people at the center of it. Um, so it for me was this happy marriage of policy school, of writing, and of acting. And so that is where I am now, and in some ways I feel incredibly lucky because I look at classmates who graduated from Duke, and they're really interested in housing policy or food policy, or you know, any number of different subjects, and I came away from policy school with a real love of a specific methodology, a specific lens to look at problems that you could apply to any number yeah exactly so just to give us like a general idea would most people coming out of that apply for jobs in a very literal sense like government jobs yes nonprofit yes yes things that can like lobby for policy and the government things like that.

[30:19] Leah Walsh: Yeah to work in politics um to work for people on the hill to work for Planned Parenthood um a lot of people go to work for Deloitte or Booze Allen um um consulting firms who have sp you know specific government contracts um I'm trying to think what else like the Department of Justice or like the the OMB the office of oh it's like the office and of management and budget.

[30:49] Meg Fee: I think I should know that there are a lot of acronyms in in that world but yes that sounds I that's amazing that everything aligned to engage that particular place.

[31:01] Leah Walsh: But it sounds fascinating.

[31:02] Meg Fee: It is and and it's funny because I'm at this job now where I'm doing user research um and I can trace back this to like a happy series of events that began in 2012 where like I met a random person and years later when I said oh eight you know I'm doing human centered design she was like I do human centered design and she put me in touch with and so like it's just it does I you know I it does feel very much like the stars have aligned in a really deeply meaningful, fulfilling way.

[31:37] Leah Walsh: That is so inspiring to hear you say.

[31:42] Meg Fee: It's taken long enough.

[31:44] Leah Walsh: Yeah, and so now, like we were talking right before we started recording, you're kind of trying to figure out where you want to land next to finish in North Carolina. Maybe stay in New York, maybe go somewhere else.

[31:56] Meg Fee: Yeah, I don't know. It depends on who hires me full time.

[31:59] Leah Walsh: Yeah, I the one thing I'm pretty sure day one of policy school, the career office was like, what are your, you know, what are the things you really care about? And I was like, I will not move back to New York.

[32:11] Meg Fee: And you know right after graduating.

[32:13] Leah Walsh: Yeah, like two weeks later.

[32:15] Meg Fee: I'm like, okay, here I am, and eight weeks has become four months.

[32:19] Leah Walsh: And I'm like, is four months gonna like is there a future here?

[32:23] Meg Fee: Well, I I know that's up in the air for you right now, but how how did the change in scenery when you went to North Carolina affect you as a person and as a writer, like your mental health, yeah, um location.

[32:37] Leah Walsh: Location is so influential.

[32:41] Meg Fee: I had an amazing apartment, which was awesome.

[32:45] Leah Walsh: Right.

[32:45] Meg Fee: That's the difference. Yeah, I had a one-bedroom apartment that like the bedroom was huge, the living room was big, and it had like a mini dining room, which I used as a yoga room. Um and and Durham is just so green, and that's so fun. And I ended up again, it was like a happy accident. A friend said they were gonna be living on near one campus versus the one we were going to school on, and I was like, yeah, cool. And she had done some legwork on potential places to live, and I just went through down it and like chose the second place and put a deposit down on an apartment. Um and it ended up being really lucky because I didn't have a car. So I it was close to one campus I could take the shuttle to the other that took like 20 minutes but it was close enough that I could walk downtown so it was just really um when I got there I was like this is amazing I'm never ever leaving and I think after about a year I thought okay I miss a city I'm not saying I miss New York City but I miss like I I couldn't find a good dry cleaner and I couldn't find someone to like fix my you know when you're those soles of your shoes wear out I was like who here can do this so I missed I missed like a bit of hustle and bustle but yeah and in terms of writing like that change of scenery was really critical and I also think spending two years thinking about the world and problems like in a totally new way like I I don't feel like I've actually gotten back to the kind of writing I've done before school because I spent so much time strict strictly doing like policy writing but that policy writing I think is gonna be super helpful when I do go back to writing for pleasure so to speak um because it tightened up my writing it was like okay it needs to be as efficient and like pointed and effective as possible um and how bizarre and I think in the end probably really valuable that these two years were these two years in history in our country like right after Trump got elected.

[35:09] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[35:10] Meg Fee: I tell people now that when like I have just enough information to be dangerous in a conversation, which is really fun.

[35:18] Leah Walsh: Like I've just and and that sometimes I can use that power for bad because like I've got certain buzzwords that I can say and I know that the person across from me may not be able to challenge me on it.

[35:30] Meg Fee: I'm like, yeah.

[35:31] Leah Walsh: Um and so I try but I do try to like I think going to policy school made me much more rigorous about like you know if we're gonna call Trump a racist and I I'm pretty sure we can at this point like let's what empirical data can we look at to back that up.

[35:49] Meg Fee: Right.

[35:50] Leah Walsh: Um so it made me more what things are we calling him out on.

[35:53] Meg Fee: Yeah.

[35:54] Leah Walsh: And let's not have it be his tie.

[35:56] Meg Fee: Yeah.

[35:56] Leah Walsh: You know yeah exactly.

[35:59] Meg Fee: Exactly. But I do think like when I think about policy school I'm like if I took away only two things it's that one our country was built upon like really racist policies.

[36:15] Meg Fee: That racism is so deeply baked in. Um like I you know to if you look just at the housing policy in this country and like there is a real case to be made for reparations just in terms of like how homeownership like the the cost of homes has accrued uh or the price of homes that you sell them for has accrued over the last 80, 60 to 80 years and who was able to access those homes 60 to 80 years ago and who wasn't.

[36:46] Leah Walsh: Right.

[36:46] Meg Fee: Um and how the inequality that we're seeing now really is so like it's just so deeply embedded into what's been what's been happening since our country was founded. Um and I think the second thing is that like early childhood development is is a place where we need to be investing serious money as a country um because from you know like 25th week of in in the woman's body to or I should say like in the individual's body that's carrying the baby um to two years that's just massive and all there's just so much much research coming out that backs that up and if we do seriously want to get at systemic inequality and opportunity for like actual you know giving everyone equal opportunity that is a place where we could be investing money to actually give people um to level the playing field in some way because currently it's not it's just not level.

[37:53] Leah Walsh: It just and it also just seems like something that there's no interest in investing in.

[37:59] Meg Fee: As someone who's just gone through having a baby yeah and looking at the way most other countries support a family or a woman who's trying to have a baby and how there's just zero resources across the board here for maternity leave for healthcare is just absolutely insane.

[38:21] Leah Walsh: So do you know what I don't know if I can say this but I'm going to because you know like you know we should call do you know what Duke's maternity leave policy is?

[38:32] Meg Fee: No.

[38:33] Leah Walsh: Take a guess.

[38:35] Meg Fee: Um, let's see. Is it just that you get the time off and they don't have to pay you?

[38:41] Leah Walsh: That you get your job back?

[38:43] Meg Fee: They it's after you get unfair three weeks, three weeks paid leave.

[38:46] Leah Walsh: Okay.

[38:47] Meg Fee: After you take three weeks of your own.

[38:49] Leah Walsh: Oh my god.

[38:50] Meg Fee: Yeah. Can you imagine being in a at a university where the best, like some of the best and brightest minds in the world are saying, hey, we we know that we have to invest in this. We know that breastfeeding is important.

[39:01] Leah Walsh: That is.

[39:04] Meg Fee: We know that spending like we know that it's good for the mother's health. We know it's good for the father's health, we know it's good for the baby.

[39:09] Leah Walsh: We know it, yeah.

[39:10] Meg Fee: It's just it's really mind-boggling.

[39:14] Leah Walsh: Well, and I considering that like my whole long-term plan with getting these day jobs was for the maternity leave.

[39:22] Meg Fee: And then the language around when I did get it, the language of it.

[39:29] Leah Walsh: Was it the discipleness or like the you're you're so lucky, I'm so lucky, like having to like bow yourself down to feel grateful for that time.

[39:41] Meg Fee: There's just something so disgusting to me about that.

[39:46] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[39:47] Meg Fee: And I think one of the other things I learned from policy school is that a lot of times this money exists.

[39:54] Meg Fee: Like we have the money to support these policies. We're just not putting it towards these policies. Um, like Elizabeth Warren has proposed a two cent wealth tax. And the plan is, from my understanding, is that for every dollar over $50 million dollars of income. So you have to have like past the $50 million dollar income mark. Oh my god. For every dollar over that two cents will be taken out. And those two cents will pay for universal pre-K and universal health care. And there would still be a billion dollars left over. Oh my god. And when you like someone said to me recently, we're not quite sure if those numbers add up. And so you know, I'd have to do more research myself. Right. Um, but when I think about like if that is true, the fact that it doesn't already exist is mind numbing.

And the fact that so many people would fight, you know, hand over a claw. Yeah. Whatever that phrase is. Yeah. Hand over fist. There's um to keep it from happening. Yeah, there's this guy. Uh have you ever read anything by Anand Giraharadas? I haven't. He is amazing. Um, one of the questions we've been asking people in our user research on the project that I'm working on now is like, who do you trust on the internet? Like, are there two or three people you follow that you really love, that you look to see what their opinions are? And for me, he is one of those people. Um, and he wrote a book this past year called Winner Takes All. And it's about the idea that philanthropy exists for wealthy people.

Like, people will give their money away only insofar as it allows them to consolidate their own power. So, like, it's all well and good that Zuckerberg is giving X amount of dollars away, but in doing that, it lets him off the hook from a lot of taxes and allows him one like more power and more control about where that money goes. Um, so I think you know, earlier this summer at a specific university. Um, do you remember the story? There was a commencement speaker who basically said, Everyone who's graduating today, I'm paying off your student loan debt. And it was, you know, it made the rounds on the internet. It was so incredible. And I was like, what is what does Anand have to say about this?

And he was like, Yeah, this is great. This is a big step forward, except this guy voted against this tax, like closing this tax loophole, which would allow many, many more students beyond these in this audience to reap the benefits of that same kind of um. So I think yeah, it's really interesting how people with money have more power, and that you know, it's important to call them out on that. This is not a revolutionary thought that I'm saying, it's just something that like is only beginning to crystallize in my mind.

[42:51] Leah Walsh: Right. Yeah.

[42:59] Meg Fee: Yeah, and that whole world of philanthropy has so many well intentions, yeah, ideas. Well, you know, that last that last um finance firm I worked for, some of those guys, and like let's be honest, it was all guys. Right, would stand around and talk about giving to one specific organization, and it felt very much like who will give more. It wasn't about like giving to this organization they because they believed in it, it was like giving to the organization and giving more than the person next to them because then they'd have more power and like more social capital.

[43:36] Leah Walsh: Yeah, and so it was very much like, hey, you guys, like you have all of this information, and we're in New York City where there is real need for you to go into different different communities and like give your time. I think at this point, like, look, it's great for people to donate money, but I'd like to see that coupled with like taking some time out of your job or out of your day to just like to teach a skill to give kindness, to give empathy, to in some real tangible way.

[44:09] Meg Fee: Yeah. Especially now that so much of life is online and exactly. Exactly. Anonymous.

[44:16] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[44:19] Meg Fee: Um, can we talk a little bit about the nuts and bolts of um when you self-published your book?

[44:25] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[44:26] Meg Fee: And when you got it published.

[44:27] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[44:28] Meg Fee: Just in case anyone else out there has a similar project or yeah.

[44:32] Leah Walsh: So I like resources you found helpful or whatever.

[44:37] Meg Fee: I how did that all happen? I had been writing the blog for so long. Um that I was like, you know what? I just want to put a few of these blog posts together and sell it for somebody. And it was like a digital.

[44:52] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[44:52] Meg Fee: Yeah. I mean, it was a p it was a PDF. It was a downloaded PDF. And actually, it's funny, I don't even remember. I can't tell you, like, did I save it as a PDF on my desktop and just upload it? Like maybe. That's that must have been what I did. And then did people pay you for it, or you just made it available for people?

[45:15] Leah Walsh: People paid me for it.

[45:16] Meg Fee: What I did was I put it like a link to buy on my website, which was a Squarespace website. And I think I used Stripe, um, which takes like a small commission from every purchase. But I yeah, it must have been like a a digital download. The thing is, I can't tell you how I did it. Looking back on it now, I'm like, oh, if I could do it all again, I do like, you know, I like I like the PDFs where it's like you see the page turn, like it's got an like this was as low-tech as it possibly could be. But honestly, I was so proud of it, and it was such a cool experience to actually see because I saw every purchase that came through, and oh, it was just like the day that I put it up for the first time, like seeing people. Oh, it was just I was like, Oh my god, I'm making money, and this is so cool.

[46:11] Um yeah, and so I published it in on my own in October, and that December, right before Christmas, someone reached out to me via Twitter that I knew sort of peripherally and said, Hey, like I work for um a publisher in the UK, and I've shown this to some of my colleagues, and I'm just wondering uh if if the world rights are still available. And because that happened, I reached out to my best friend who is a writer who at that point had had published one book and now is like on her, you know, she just signed a four-book deal. She's incredible.

[46:46] Leah Walsh: Um but she had a literary agent, and so she was like, you know what, let me put you in touch with Ella.

[46:52] Meg Fee: So she introduced us over email, and Ella said, like, I you know, I I love this, I'd like to sign you as an author. And we together made the decision that I would the the ebook was only like 12,000 words, and what I was aiming for with the book was something closer to 50,000. Um, so we made the decision together that I would finish writing it and that she would then shop that full version.

[47:17] Leah Walsh: Um, so yeah, the uh that so I like didn't write anything for about eight months. Uh so let's see if that happened like October, November, December, that was like nearly a year later in that November was when I quit my job and finished writing it um and then I think she started shopping it in January or maybe February and it sold sometime that March so it was like a really easy wonderful process that felt really really lucky.

[47:52] Meg Fee: I think the the part of the process that felt less good was like actually the book coming out into the world.

[48:00] Leah Walsh: Yeah and many many people talk about this that like there's a weird hangover after a book comes out and that you know like is it exactly the book I wanted to publish well that's what I was wondering like did was there an odd experience with like the editing process when you have other people editor was amazing.

[48:21] Meg Fee: So she was incredible I cannot say enough good things about her or does it just feel so concrete that you start second guessing I think it feels so concrete that yeah you start second guessing exact book yeah and it's not like it's never going to be right um but it feels so finished it feels so finished in a way that like writing online never did it felt so finished and so it's also that experience of when you write you know I'm sure with acting you've had this experience like you do the performance and like doing that performance belongs to you but the person receiving it like it's their interpretation of your performance belongs to them.

[49:05] Leah Walsh: And actually, what their interpretation is is none of your business.

[49:09] Meg Fee: And so you do have to cede total control. And I think that's a weird, like because I wrote about really personal moments in my life. I'm like, oh god, these don't belong to me anymore. Like I've given them an a I've given them away. I've given away this my interpretation of this series of events. And now everyone else has their own interpretation of my interpretation, and that doesn't b those interpretations don't belong to me.

[49:40] Leah Walsh: Um yeah, there was a like a weird bittersweetness about the whole experience that a part of me is like, well, now I just have to write a second book to like clearly, yeah.

[49:51] Meg Fee: Like, okay, erase that. Like, let's let's uh you know, put a new memory on top of this other way.

[49:57] Leah Walsh: Yeah.

[49:58] Meg Fee: Are there any lessons that you've learned in the last couple years that you're really proud of that you want to tell me about? It could be small or large.

[50:06] Leah Walsh: Ugh.

[50:08] Meg Fee: Sometimes I think the reason I am like on the earth in this lifetime in this body is just like because my soul or whatever you want to call it needs to learn how to sit with uncertainty.

[50:22] Leah Walsh: So hard.

[50:23] Meg Fee: It's so hard. It's so hard. I certainly have not learned that lesson, but I'm like knee deep in it always, and probably will be for the rest of my life. And I'm sort of proud of my willingness to commit to that learning.

[50:41] Leah Walsh: Um yeah, is there anything else I've learned in the last few years?

[50:47] Meg Fee: I mean, that's a great one.

[50:49] Leah Walsh: Yeah, I don't know.

[50:50] Meg Fee: Life is hard.

[50:51] Leah Walsh: Life but life is hard no matter what you do.

[50:53] Meg Fee: It's always gonna be hard, and that doesn't make it not incredible.

[51:02] Leah Walsh: How has your family taken in your writing and your career path changes?

[51:07] Meg Fee: Oh gosh. So I think the whole reason I'm in this world and this life, da da da is to teach my parents to sit with uncertainty. I didn't even mention that your dad was a tax lawyer. What's your mom's background?

[51:19] Leah Walsh: I mean, she creatives in the family or she worked in marketing for many years.

[51:24] Meg Fee: It's like a really great math, you know, she's great with math, but but very you know, I've the older I've gotten and the more twists and turns I've had in my career, you know, quotation marks. I've come to understand that everything is creative.

[51:40] Leah Walsh: Cause creativity is really about, you know pattern seeking and then identifying where the pattern falls apart.

[51:48] Meg Fee: Like that's what we're all doing at any moment, right? Um so yeah, I think both of my parents were deeply creative in their own ways.

[51:56] Leah Walsh: Uh how have they responded?

[51:58] Meg Fee: You know, I think I think they're really proud of me. I think they're really proud of the book. I think I definitely like put them through the ringer for a long time. Um, and I think it is weird for them to know that like this book does exist in the world and does chronicle some very intimate things.

[52:18] Leah Walsh: Um, and they'd probably prefer that some of their friends don't know all those things, but I think they've done a really good job of taking it in stride.

[52:27] Meg Fee: We don't have to talk about this if you don't want to, but I'm curious if there was anything when you were recovering from your eating disorder resources or things that you found ended up really helping with your recovery.

[52:42] Leah Walsh: Yeah, therapy.

[52:44] Meg Fee: Yes. Um, like I think everyone should go to therapy no matter how well you are, in the same way that everyone should exercise because it's good for the body, like therapy's good for the brain.

[52:54] Leah Walsh: Um, yeah, I got really, really lucky, and my mom actually found a therapist who is the head of the eating and weight disorders program at Mount Sinai.

[53:04] Meg Fee: So I walked in, like I was 23 years old, walked in, and within the first 10 minutes, I was like, Oh yeah, this is my guy.

[53:12] Meg Fee: Because he was able to say, like, here's what's happening in your brain right now, and this is not your fault. You are not a failure. Yeah, you are not broken in some fundamental way. It's more like your brain is doing this very specific thing because you're hungry. Um yeah, resources. I mean, I because I was dealing with binge eating disorder, I found that the sort of common, like the way people talk about dieting is just so so so screwy. And actually, like thinking about empirical research, there is no all the research says like diets do not work, they just don't work, and yet that is the thing that's pushed again and again. And actually, there's been some really encouraging research in the past few years that says a person's weight is not actually an indicator of their health, like in terms of oh, they're gonna die sooner or they're more likely to have a heart attack.

Actually, the best indicator is are you exercising, are you eating fruits and vegetables? And if you're doing those things, actually your weight doesn't matter that much. Um, I think we live in a society that has this really dangerous idea that one certain body type is valuable and all the other body types aren't valuable. So all of sort of the common wisdom around dieting, around weight loss, just it made me worse. Like the more I tried to do those things, the more I binged. So I like had to do as much research as I could to figure out what was happening in my body, why was it happening, what was the science of it, and what could I do to recover? And by recover, I don't mean like even when I was at Juilliard, a lot of people said to me, 'Oh, well, this is just something you're gonna have to live with forever.'

And I was that made me so angry. And so I felt very strongly like if that is the only truth that has ever before existed, I refuse to accept it. Like, I will go in search of a new truth because I will not deal with this for the rest of my life. Yeah, that and I was also really fortunate. That's true. And I was really fortunate too in that I didn't love my eating disorder. It made me feel like shit all of the time. Like, and I talk about this in the book. There are like three years of my life I do not remember because I was so sad and so unwell. Like, and I remember people in my life at that time saying to me, like, well, at least you have your health. And I was like, that is the one thing I do not have.

Um, but yeah, a ton of research, or research on like, you know, why in the 1970s did the American government say fat in food is really bad for us? Right. Oh, actually, there was a really interesting struggle between two scientists, and one person said fat was bad, and the other person said sugar was bad. And hey, you know, the American government put their eggs in the basket of fat is bad. Well, what happens when you take fat out of a product? You put sugar there because that's the only way, like it tastes good and it remains on the shelves. Um and so sort of learn like unpacking the science as much as it exists because understanding what's happening in the gut and microbiome is like very hard to study.

And how it's tied to your brain. Yeah, yeah. Very, very complicated. And I'm actually like the research is still very much in transition. Like there, you know, we don't know everything yet. We're still figuring it out. So for me, eating became about hooking into a belief system around food that was bigger than myself and bigger than my weight. And then it also became about a belief system in which what I looked like didn't matter at all. Like it didn't matter, who cares? Um, which is you know, hard coming from an acting background and living in the world in which we live, in which we've assumed that thin is beauty and we've assumed that beauty equals value. Um but yeah, I just I went in search of science.

[57:35] Leah Walsh: I love this theme through your life of just seeking more knowledge and research. It seems to be so important to you, and I love it.

[57:43] Meg Fee: Yeah, and I think that look, like I went to Juilliard and then Duke. That is really, really fortunate and really lucky, but I do think there are so many ways to get knowledge, which is different than an education. Yes. And I think it's dangerous that we live in this world. I'm saying this a lot, but I do think it's dangerous that we live in this world where we think a person has to have a degree in order to do something. Um, because they're like with the democratization of information, there are tons of ways to get knowledge and information now. And people should be encouraged to seek out an education on their own terms and according to their own means. And they should never be penalized for what that looks like.

[58:28] Meg Fee: Yeah. I was home educated up until college, and I remember I had some t-shirt from some like home education conference or something that said, I don't remember who said the quote, but the quote was um schooling should not be construed with education. I always loved that. My I'm staying in a friend's apartment right now in Sunnyside, and she was schooled at home until college, and she's the smartest person I know. She's the person who I'm like, I'll say, you know, where does the term cliffhanger come from? Like I think it was Charles Dickens in the Pickwick papers, and she'll be like, No, it was so and so. Like the amount of knowledge in her brain is just staggering to me. I definitely have some blind spots in my education, but it definitely it taught me how to be curious and how to learn, which is gathering. Like I know how to find the information or how to learn.

[59:32] Meg Fee: Yeah, you know, and it was really interesting going to Duke because being in that public policy program, having an acting background was really undervalued. Having any kind of arts background, I would say was really um they underestimated me. And that was a real shame because I was like, man, acting really is about being curious. And totally that like I can learn how to write a research paper, no problem. But like learning to be curious, learning to kind of deep, yeah, deep sort of a cellular level, yeah. I mean, that's that's a priceless skill.

[1:00:16] Leah Walsh: So there's two questions I usually ask at the end. Okay, unless there's something that you would really like to talk about that I've not touched on.

[1:00:22] Meg Fee: I don't think so, no.

[1:00:23] Leah Walsh: Okay. We've gotten covered a lot of things. If you do find yourself going to that dark side, that uninspired or depressed place, are there any tangible things that you go back to again and again, like books that you reread or places you go or music or something like that.

[1:00:44] Meg Fee: Yes. I love Tiny Beautiful Things by Cheryl Strayed. And I love a book called Leaping.

[1:00:53] Leah Walsh: Okay.

[1:00:54] Meg Fee: L-E-A-P-I-N-G by Brian Doyle. Okay. It's got like leaping colon, blah blah blah blah blah, other mysteries and da-da-da. And it's a series of essays. Um that is just so beautiful. Um, and he has he starts the book with an essay on writing and why he writes, and it is oh just so so remarkable. It's gutting. I love it. Request that book at the library.

[1:01:22] Leah Walsh: Yeah, absolutely.

[1:01:24] Meg Fee: So I would say those books, and then you know, I'm saying this out loud because I'm like, oh, I should start thinking about this again now that I've graduated, now that I have like a job and income. It's just like a a that making the whatever art you do a part of your daily ritual, so that it is like a habit, so that you know, you like the bones of that habit exist even when this dark voice comes comes to the party, so to speak.

[1:02:03] Leah Walsh: Um, and then the last thing I wanted to ask was if you've seen anything recently of any art form that you want to recommend.

[1:02:10] Meg Fee: I don't know if you've had time, you've been so busy.

[1:02:12] Meg Fee: Oh my gosh. Fleabag. We just finished season two.

[1:02:15] Leah Walsh: Yeah, the first season got like gutted me.

[1:02:21] Meg Fee: I thought the first season was unbelievable. And so my friends in the UK, obviously, they got the second season before we did, and all the reviews were like, This is unbelievable, everyone else should go home. Like, this is TV. And so when I watched it the first time, I was like, Yeah, it was good, but like I loved the first season so much that I was like, it was fine. And then I would then there was just this feeling of like it was stuck under my skin. Um, and so I've probably watched the second season now three times, and we'd just finished it in the last couple days, and I've been I really have been thinking about it a lot.

[1:02:58] Meg Fee: Yeah, she sh Phoebe Wallerbridge is is a force of nature. Um then she is the creator of Killing Eve, too, right?

[1:03:09] Leah Walsh: Yeah, yeah, she definitely wrote um the whole first season of Killing Eve, and I think it's good.

[1:03:09] Meg Fee: Oh yeah, she's yeah I'm like, how does someone's mind work like that? How does she exist in the world? Um I'm glad I'm really glad that she does. I'm jealous of her talents for sure.

[1:03:29] Meg Fee: Um my gosh, no. I'm working on paying off student debt. Not to say like that theater should absolutely be paid for and so like invest in that. Um you know, I've been out of that world for so long that do you have any recommendations?

[1:03:50] Leah Walsh: Oh my goodness. There's a lot of things that I want to see right now. I'm trying to think what's playing that I have already seen that I can recommend. We want to see. We have a couple friends who've been on the podcast who are in this um retelling of Three Sisters called Moscow Moscow Moscow. That's uh cool MCC right now that I really want to see. As soon as we turn off the podcast, I'll remember things to do.

[1:04:14] Meg Fee: Okay, okay, cool. Anyway, okay, flea bag.

[1:04:18] Leah Walsh: Yeah, flea bag.

[1:04:20] Meg Fee: Yeah. This is not recent, but the there is a show on Netflix called River, which is like a six episode series. It's like the whole thing, right? What do they call that?

[1:04:33] Leah Walsh: Limited, limited series.

[1:04:31] Meg Fee: Which is you know, typical BBC, it's like about a detective inspector, um, and his partner, and it's just one of the most beautiful, it's just storytelling perfection. Yeah, it's about a a team, you know, two partners and following a mystery, and there's just I think it like does a really incredible job of depicting how much joy there can be even in moments of like real despair.

[1:05:12] Leah Walsh: Thank you so much for doing that.

[1:05:14] Meg Fee: Yeah, thanks for having me. I appreciate it.

[1:05:15] Leah Walsh: Of course.

[1:05:16] Leah Walsh: I'm excited.

[1:05:28] Leah Walsh: Thank you for listening to the Compass Podcast. If you find these conversations valuable to your life as an artist and would like to support the ongoing production of The Compass, please consider becoming a patron at Patreon.com slash The Compass Podcast. Pledges start at as little as one dollar a month. You'll get access to bonus content and anything you can give would be greatly appreciated. Also, if you have a moment, please rate or review in iTunes. Every little bit helps other listeners to find the podcast.

[1:06:03] Leah Walsh: Music by Brandon Speth, audio assistance from Nick Choxie, and a special thanks to Frankie J. Alvarez. See you next time.