This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

[0:37] Laura Camien: Welcome to the Sparks File, your one-stop weekend retreat for creative inspiration.

[0:42] Susan Blackwell: I'm Susan Blackwell.

[0:43] Laura Camien: And I'm Laura Camien. If you're joining us for the first time, you are so welcome.

[0:48] Susan Blackwell: But you may be asking yourself, what exactly is a spark file?

[0:52] Laura Camien: Where do I get one? What do I file in it? These are such good questions, and we have got answers.

[0:57] Susan Blackwell: A spark file is a place where you consistently collect all of your inspirations and fascinations.

[1:04] Laura Camien: Here's the deal. We are makers and we make all kinds of things.

[1:07] Susan Blackwell: If you're anything like us and you're making stuff all the time, or you want to be making stuff all the time, you know that the wellspring of inspiration can run a little dry.

[1:17] Laura Camien: So we're on the lookout for fresh ideas, images, and inspiration that spark our creativity and pique our curiosity, things that inspire us to get up off our asses and make things like this very podcast.

[1:29] Susan Blackwell: Or a riveting portrayal of race relations in America based solely on interviews performed verbatim.

[1:38] Laura Camien: Oh yes.

[1:40] Susan Blackwell: Oh yeah. Or encounter to that, a slog through the mud that reveals history and treasure.

[1:48] Laura Camien: Oh, I want that.

[1:50] Susan Blackwell: Every episode, we're gonna reach into the spark file and exchange some sparks, and from time to time we're gonna talk to some folks who spark us too.

[1:57] Laura Camien: And if you're not careful, you might just get your hands dirty in the best possible way.

[2:02] Susan Blackwell: So without further ado, let's open up the spark pile.

[2:07] Laura Camien: Welcome.

[2:09] Susan Blackwell: Hi Susan.

[2:11] Laura Camien: Cam's have I baby Blackwell.

[2:13] Susan Blackwell: What?

[2:14] Laura Camien: Oh, tell me, tell me.

[2:15] Susan Blackwell: Well, this is crazy but true. Last night, a friend of mine, Ashley Van Buren, who I want to shout out.

[2:18] Laura Camien: Hi, Ashley.

[2:18] Susan Blackwell: I want to shout Ashley out because I failed to mention when we did the uh recording of the podcast live at the Metropolitan Opera.

[2:30] Laura Camien: Yes.

[2:31] Susan Blackwell: Ashley Van Buren was the person who originally provided me with the Brundabar spark.

[2:37] Laura Camien: Ashley.

[2:38] Susan Blackwell: Thank you.

[2:39] Laura Camien: Ashley.

[2:40] Susan Blackwell: That's Ashley. For that. Didn't you want to say who sparked you with Count Ludwig?

[2:45] Laura Camien: Yes, my friend Brynn Boudier, who I adore, and she's totally opera.

[2:50] Susan Blackwell: She sat with me and just told me stories about her opera adventures.

[2:55] Laura Camien: She's all opera all the time.

[2:56] Susan Blackwell: She's all opera all the time. Thank you, friends.

[2:58] Laura Camien: We were so we were so excited and so nervous and so jacked up and so forgetting.

[3:03] Susan Blackwell: We needed help.

[3:04] Laura Camien: We needed support.

[3:05] Susan Blackwell: We did re shout you out.

[3:07] Laura Camien: So we um we want to thank you. But Ashley texted, she's great, and she's got a real eye for sparks.

[3:12] Susan Blackwell: And she texted me last night as I was falling asleep, and she wanted to share this fun thing she recently learned about on her travels.

[3:21] Laura Camien: And imagine how excited I was to text her back and tell her that the thing she texted me was my spark for a while.

[3:28] Susan Blackwell: No way.

[3:29] Laura Camien: No way.

[3:31] Susan Blackwell: Oh, isn't that crazy?

[3:32] Laura Camien: Oh my god.

[3:33] Susan Blackwell: We both just simultaneously shit ourselves.

[3:36] Laura Camien: So I can't wait to hear your spark and Ashley's.

[3:38] Susan Blackwell: There you go. They're all combo.

[3:40] Laura Camien: It's an Ashley Spark world, and I just live in it. Um, what else is going on?

[3:44] Susan Blackwell: We're super excited about our upcoming Sparkfile New Year 2020 Creativity Workshop and Live Podcast.

[3:50] Laura Camien: Crap.

[3:51] Susan Blackwell: What I love most about it is that it's not just the workshop, which it in and of itself is amazing.

[3:58] Laura Camien: Not just a workshop, baby.

[4:00] Susan Blackwell: But once we get to the completion of the workshop, we're gonna sit there together and we're gonna record a live episode of the Sparks File.

[4:09] Laura Camien: I know that means that before January 5th, I've got to come up with a really good spark.

[4:14] Susan Blackwell: You need a really good one.

[4:16] Laura Camien: Because you know those people are gonna be like, all right, tough stuff. What you got?

[4:20] Susan Blackwell: Well, it's just you know a reminder of a live theater. You get your instant feedback on whether that was crappy or not.

[4:26] Laura Camien: So here we can fool ourselves as long as we're entertaining ourselves, we're we're in good shape.

[4:31] Susan Blackwell: I know we're gonna take it back to our live theater roots.

[4:35] Laura Camien: I'm super excited.

[4:36] Susan Blackwell: I love the like-minded people that show up for the workshop.

[4:42] Laura Camien: Oh my god. Live podcast are really high quality people.

[4:46] Susan Blackwell: So if there's any part of you that's it, you're ner I if you're anything like me and nervous to go into a room full of strangers to try something new, it is the kindest, warmest, most fun, funny group of people.

[5:01] Laura Camien: That's right.

[5:02] Susan Blackwell: It's such a good group.

[5:03] Laura Camien: It's so fun to see also the relationships that are formed and the accountability partnerships that come out of it.

[5:09] Susan Blackwell: Because we always see then after the fact people talking to each other on social and supporting each other and cheering each other on.

[5:17] Laura Camien: And yes.

[5:18] Susan Blackwell: Man, that feels good.

[5:19] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[5:19] Susan Blackwell: So I'm super excited about that. We're gearing up for that.

[5:22] Laura Camien: And that is happening. And of course, the holidays.

[5:26] Susan Blackwell: And this creativity challenge that we're currently rocking.

[5:29] Laura Camien: We're in the midst of.

[5:30] Susan Blackwell: In the midst of the spark file.

[5:33] Laura Camien: Hashtag TSF Creativity Challenge is such an interesting opportunity.

[5:37] Susan Blackwell: I, in addition to other kinds of creativity, use it to make this year.

[5:44] Laura Camien: If you're getting a Christmas present from if you're looking at you're looking at me, you're looking at a homemade Christmas present.

[5:51] Susan Blackwell: Right.

[5:52] Laura Camien: That's awesome.

[5:53] Susan Blackwell: Is it?

[5:53] Laura Camien: Yes.

[5:54] Susan Blackwell: It depends on how inspired and sparked I am.

[5:57] Laura Camien: No, it's totally awesome.

[5:59] Susan Blackwell: I will treasure.

[6:00] Laura Camien: I have said this to my family.

[6:02] Susan Blackwell: Family, if you're listening, I don't know if you are, but I've said it a million times over.

[6:06] Laura Camien: Like I'm in for the sentimental, meaningful.

[6:09] Susan Blackwell: I made this by hand.

[6:11] Laura Camien: I thought about you as I was doing it.

[6:13] Susan Blackwell: Getting you a clay ashtray with my handprint in it.

[6:19] Laura Camien: Um I can't wait.

[6:21] Susan Blackwell: I don't know.

[6:22] Laura Camien: I love it.

[6:22] Susan Blackwell: I feel like I don't have a clear idea.

[6:25] Laura Camien: I don't even, I don't know what I'm doing for Nathan.

[6:27] Susan Blackwell: I don't know what I'm doing for you.

[6:29] Laura Camien: It's gonna come to you.

[6:31] Susan Blackwell: It's gonna come to you.

[6:32] Laura Camien: I don't I I'm gonna release the stress for now.

[6:35] Susan Blackwell: Um, but that has also been fun.

[6:38] Laura Camien: The like trying to figure out what you're gonna get made for Christmas.

[6:43] Susan Blackwell: Um Bluebly Blah.

[6:45] Laura Camien: Should be up.

[6:46] Susan Blackwell: Yes, I gotta hear this spark.

[6:48] Laura Camien: Oh, I'm so excited.

[6:50] Susan Blackwell: My spark phrase, I'm summing it all up in these words.

[6:54] Laura Camien: Yes, getting your eye in.

[6:58] Susan Blackwell: I'm curious.

[6:59] Laura Camien: Getting your eye in.

[7:01] Susan Blackwell: A phrase I had never heard before.

[7:02] Laura Camien: This spark, getting your eye in.

[7:04] Susan Blackwell: My attention.

[7:05] Laura Camien: Um, sources for my spark are bountiful.

[7:08] Susan Blackwell: Get ready.

[7:10] Laura Camien: Uh, articles from the website Atlas Obscura, a TV show called Mud Men, a two-minute documentary on YouTube made in 1962, a YouTuber called Nicola White Mudlark, and her website, TidelineArt.com, a short film by Kit Harwood, a great Facebook group called London Mudlark, Davidneat.wordpress.com, Amazon.com, Victorian London.org, a great piece on abc news.com, good old Wikipedia, and the following podcasts.

[7:40] Susan Blackwell: Boat Radio, Your London Legacy, Living History with Matt McLaughlin, and the Ethical Podcast, which featured a talk given by an author named Laura Makelum.

[7:49] Laura Camien: I'm not even kidding you.

[7:50] Susan Blackwell: Girl, you can do some research.

[7:52] Laura Camien: I this here's what here's the here's the gag.

[7:56] Susan Blackwell: I feel like I've scratched the surface.

[7:59] Laura Camien: Oh my God.

[8:00] Susan Blackwell: Yes.

[8:01] Laura Camien: Well, so cannot wait.

[8:03] Susan Blackwell: So it's getting my eye in, getting my eye out.

[8:06] Laura Camien: What is it?

[8:07] Susan Blackwell: Getting your eye in.

[8:08] Laura Camien: But just put that in the back of my mind.

[8:11] Susan Blackwell: Sorry, I'm putting that aside.

[8:12] Laura Camien: Time travel with me, Cams.

[8:13] Susan Blackwell: Okay, I'm going with you.

[8:14] Laura Camien: Closing my eyes.

[8:16] Laura Camien: I have this very clear memory from my childhood.

[8:19] Laura Camien: It's at my grandparents' house.

[8:21] Laura Camien: They lived in a house with a storefront flora shop.

[8:25] Susan Blackwell: But correct that image that you're cooking up in your mind.

[8:28] Laura Camien: It wasn't clean and quaint and lovely.

[8:30] Susan Blackwell: It was totally hoarded out.

[8:32] Laura Camien: It was totally haunted looking.

[8:34] Susan Blackwell: In fact, a lot of my recurring childhood dreams were sat in that house, but it's another juicy spark for another juicy day.

[8:40] Laura Camien: The image that I have is of my grandfather.

[8:43] Susan Blackwell: Wherever he went, he was frequently bent over at the waist, nose towards the ground, scanning, sort of like, you know, the position that an ostrich with its head in the sand looks like, sort of like an ostrich.

[8:55] Laura Camien: And he was always scanning the ground for anything might catch his eye.

[8:59] Susan Blackwell: His clothes and hands were always dirty from his work and his life, and his eyes were always scanning the surface, and his hand was extended to pick up and pocket what might catch his eye.

[9:10] Laura Camien: So flash forward through time.

[9:13] Laura Camien: The following is from a recent talk given by an author named Laura Maiklam.

[9:17] Susan Blackwell: These are her words.

[9:19] Laura Camien: I want to take you back to Victorian London.

[9:22] Laura Camien: Imagine you're standing beside the river.

[9:24] Laura Camien: The air is thick with smog, the river's busy, and there's steamships, colliers, barges, men shouting, and the Thames is basically a moving cesspit.

[9:34] Susan Blackwell: Now, baby Cams, now gentle listeners, the year is 1881.

[9:39] Laura Camien: And these are words from the Victorian social commentator Richard Rowe from his writing, Life in the London Streets.

[9:47] Susan Blackwell: This is what you see.

[9:48] Laura Camien: An old woman with a nutcracker nose and chin, which almost dipped into the filthy slush into which she peered, and dirty flesh, as well as a scrap or two of dirty linen showing through the slashes of her burst gown, over which, for warmth sake, she wore a tippet of ragged sackcloth.

[10:04] Susan Blackwell: She slinks off to her lair, followed by an imp bearing a rusty, crumpled colander piled with its find.

[10:11] Laura Camien: Its sex is indistinguishable.

[10:13] Susan Blackwell: It has long mud hued hair hanging down and a mat over its shoulders.

[10:18] Laura Camien: Through the hair, one gets a glimpse of a never washed little face whose only sign of intelligence is an occasional glance of wicked knowingness.

[10:27] Susan Blackwell: What were these people?

[10:29] Laura Camien: Richard Rowe was describing back in 1881, Cammian.

[10:34] Susan Blackwell: These people were known as mudlarks.

[10:37] Laura Camien: That whole passage that I just shared with you is uh the beginning of this talk that this woman named Laura Makelum gave.

[10:46] Susan Blackwell: And my spark today is all about mudlarking.

[10:51] Laura Camien: What?

[10:53] Susan Blackwell: What?

[10:53] Laura Camien: Have you ever heard this term before?

[10:55] Susan Blackwell: Never.

[10:55] Laura Camien: Came.

[10:57] Susan Blackwell: Hold on to your butts because this spark literally actually I'm holding on to my butt right now.

[11:02] Laura Camien: Do you see me?

[11:02] Susan Blackwell: This is so crazy.

[11:04] Laura Camien: I just started holding my butt.

[11:06] Susan Blackwell: Um, this is such a cameo-shaped spark.

[11:08] Laura Camien: And I I picked it out and cultivated it, especially for you.

[11:12] Susan Blackwell: Thank you, Blackwell.

[11:13] Laura Camien: So I first caught this spark on the podcast, weirdly, the Slate Political Gab Fest, which is a totally like liberal political chat show.

[11:22] Susan Blackwell: One of its co-hosts, David Plotz, who is also the CEO of Atlas Obscura, which do you know Atlas Obscura?

[11:29] Laura Camien: I love.

[11:30] Susan Blackwell: I love it.

[11:30] Laura Camien: It's an online magazine devoted to discovery and exploration.

[11:34] Susan Blackwell: And he briefly mentioned mudlarking, and I was like, huh?

[11:38] Laura Camien: And it just like caught my ear.

[11:40] Susan Blackwell: And I'm now going to attempt to do my very best to unpack mudlarking.

[11:47] Laura Camien: I cannot wait.

[11:49] Susan Blackwell: You cannot wait.

[11:51] Laura Camien: Literally cannot wait.

[11:52] Susan Blackwell: Yeah, this is so right up your alley.

[11:55] Laura Camien: So, according to Wikipedia, a mudlark is someone who scavenges in river mud for items of value.

[12:02] Susan Blackwell: Specifically river mud.

[12:03] Laura Camien: Specifically river mud.

[12:05] Susan Blackwell: Okay.

[12:05] Laura Camien: Though there is there are the other things like um streamlarking and there are things like that, but specifically river mud.

[12:13] Susan Blackwell: In the 1700s and 1800s, mudlarks would search the muddy shore of the River Thames at low tide for anything that could be sold.

[12:20] Laura Camien: That would be scraps of coal, that might be rope, it might be old tools, it might be things that were discarded or lost.

[12:26] Susan Blackwell: By the end of the 1700s, people dwelling near the river could scrape a subsistence level living this way.

[12:34] Laura Camien: Mudlarks were either usually youngsters or the elderly.

[12:38] Susan Blackwell: And though most mudlarks were male, there were girls and women who were also mudlarkers.

[12:45] Laura Camien: Historically, becoming a mudlark was a choice that was dictated by poverty and lack of skills.

[12:51] Susan Blackwell: The work conditions were filthy and uncomfortable because hold on to your nose, excrement and waste would wash onto the shores from raw sewage that was dumped in the river, flushed into the river, and sometimes also things like the corpses of humans and dogs and cats.

[13:08] Laura Camien: And because there were like broken glass and things like that, it was easy to get um injured doing this work.

[13:14] Susan Blackwell: And the income generated was meager, but on the flip side, mudlarks had a degree of independence since subject to the tides, the hours they worked were entirely at their own discretion.

[13:26] Laura Camien: And they also kept everything that they made a result as a result of their labor.

[13:30] Susan Blackwell: Right.

[13:30] Laura Camien: They're their own boss.

[13:31] Susan Blackwell: You're your own mudlarking boss.

[13:34] Laura Camien: It's I'm thinking I just have this image of you know the people who collect aluminum cans.

[13:39] Susan Blackwell: That's right, etc.

[13:40] Laura Camien: Okay.

[13:41] Susan Blackwell: Yeah, yeah.

[13:41] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[13:42] Susan Blackwell: Um, by the early 1900s, being a professional mudlark was no longer viewed as an acceptable or lawful pursuit, right?

[13:51] Laura Camien: But yeah.

[13:52] Susan Blackwell: So this they also sometimes they would be the mudlarkers were also the lowest of the low on the totem pole of almost like so.

[14:01] Laura Camien: If pirates were at the very top, people that would like jump on, like steal things off ships and like throw them down.

[14:06] Susan Blackwell: The mudlarkers were like at the very bottom of the barrel.

[14:10] Laura Camien: But I'd have to imagine that the city would at least be glad that the mudlarkers are cleaning up in a way.

[14:18] Susan Blackwell: Well, I don't know that that's true, Camien. And I don't know that that's true.

[14:24] Susan Blackwell: All right. So, um, today all of that has changed, and mudlarks and mudlarking still exist, but modern-day mudlarks don't do it to survive. Mudlarking is their passion, and these folks are amateur archaeologists and historians.

[14:42] Laura Camien: Oh my God, I love these people.

[14:44] Susan Blackwell: You feeling me, Camien?

[14:45] Laura Camien: So just a hobby like Saturday, let's go mudlarking.

[14:49] Susan Blackwell: That's right. Let's see what we can find. I just gotta chill in my mind.

[14:52] Laura Camien: Oh my God.

[14:53] Susan Blackwell: So a British politician named John Elliott Burns once said the River Thames is liquid history. So much has happened on its waters.

[15:01] Laura Camien: Wow. Don't you love that saying?

[15:02] Susan Blackwell: Wow, I do.

[15:04] Laura Camien: Liquid history is the name of my new nail polish color.

[15:09] Susan Blackwell: Could be a nail polish color. Liquid history could be a band name.

[15:13] Laura Camien: I'm thinking shampoo, but liquid history could totally be a band name.

[15:17] Susan Blackwell: What does liquid history shampoo smell like?

[15:19] Laura Camien: Books?

[15:20] Susan Blackwell: Library books that you forgot to return.

[15:22] Laura Camien: Yes, sure. All of those.

[15:24] Susan Blackwell: Um, but that's true of the East River.

[15:26] Laura Camien: Oh my God, it's true. The Hudson.

[15:27] Susan Blackwell: It's a great name for a record. Liquid history.

[15:30] Laura Camien: I mean, yes. I feel like we should cut that out and keep that spark for ourselves.

[15:34] Susan Blackwell: That's right. You heard nothing.

[15:36] Laura Camien: None of you heard anything.

[15:38] Susan Blackwell: What you see, you were saying, this is true of all rivers that they're liquid history.

[15:42] Laura Camien: Well, the Hudson, the East River, like you gotta believe that those port towns and towns that essentially built our country have more history, yeah.

[15:54] Susan Blackwell: Yes. Is that true?

[15:55] Laura Camien: Well, but here's an interesting distinction between these bodies of water and the Thames, and we'll get to it in a second.

[16:02] Susan Blackwell: Oh, I can't wait. So what was I saying? Oh yes, my latest LP, Liquid History. The River Thames is liquid history, and so much has happened on its waters, and few are more keenly attuned to this than mudlarks.

[16:16] Susan Blackwell: So according to the aforementioned author and speaker Laura Makelum, who I just quoted, that was from her appearance on the Ethical Podcast. And she said the Thames was like a highway. It has been heavily trafficked and peopled for centuries, and a lot of life has fallen, dropped, and been lost and thrown and flushed into that river for hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years.

[16:38] Laura Camien: And what makes a major river like the Thames different than say the Seine and other parts of the Hudson is that significant portions of it are tidal, meaning that the tide washes in and the tide rolls out twice every 24 hours, and so things are revealed with each low tide.

[17:01] Susan Blackwell: Okay, got it, interesting.

[17:02] Laura Camien: So there are, um, um, there's a, you know, the canal ways in Amsterdam.

[17:07] Susan Blackwell: Yep, those are not tidal, but recently they drained one and excavated it, and they found in a tiny piece of the channel, they found something like pulling this number out of my butt, but like 750,000 objects.

[17:24] Laura Camien: So in a river like the Seine or a river like parts of the Hudson, which there are some parts of it that I think are tidal and brackish, but all of these objects are there, it's just that they're not tidal, so we don't, the tide doesn't go out, and you can't access them.

[17:39] Susan Blackwell: Bring those items in.

[17:40] Laura Camien: There you go. So twice each lunar month, due to the equinox and something that are called spring tides, not the season spring, but spring tides, tides are at their lowest of all. And that's when you can really like the tide is really out. And if you are a mudlarker, you live by these tides. They are your Bible because when tides are low, all sorts of what Laura Makelum calls ownerless objects are sitting right there on the surface of the foreshore of the Thames.

[18:11] Susan Blackwell: What kinds of things, you might ask, might you find when you mudlark? Baby cams? Musket balls, rings, old coins and pottery, including Roman pottery and coins from AD 300.

[18:25] Laura Camien: Yes.

[18:26] Susan Blackwell: Neolithic flint blades, boar's tusks, which boars went extinct in the 1200s, were reintroduced in the 1700s and went extinct again, which helps identify how old the artifact is.

[18:39] Laura Camien: Oh my God.

[18:40] Susan Blackwell: Roman hairpins, medieval buckles, Tudor buttons, pewter pilgrim badges commemorating their pilgrimages, Victorian toys, messages in bottles, live hand grenades, human skeletal remains, 18th-century wig curlers for those big wigs that were fashionable during the 1700s.

[18:58] Laura Camien: Are you, I'm freaking out. Is your ass getting rocked?

[19:02] Susan Blackwell: I want to do it.

[19:04] Laura Camien: Really, like people find this stuff all the time, or is it like here's a rare find all the time?

[19:10] Susan Blackwell: Oh my God. Now, not every time you go out as a mudlarker.

[19:15] Laura Camien: I want a Tudor button.

[19:16] Susan Blackwell: You want a Tudor? Are you getting your eyes?

[19:18] Laura Camien: Really, really, really want a Tudor button.

[19:19] Susan Blackwell: You're getting your eye in for a Tudor button.

[19:21] Laura Camien: Okay. So Laura Makelum, I just love this. She says she gets a kick from that first moment when you pick up an object when mudlarking, it's like reaching back in time and touching an object for the first time since it was last touched hundreds of years prior. She's fascinated by its history. Who made it? Who bought it? What did they use it for? Did they lose it? She's fascinated by the direct link that these objects have with the past. A direct link not to kings and queens and conquerors, but to ordinary people and their day-to-day lives.

[19:55] Susan Blackwell: Absolutely. That's what I think of too. Of like the coins that they lost could have meant everything to them. A ring, you know, like just so many things that could have had life-altering consequences for them.

[20:10] Laura Camien: If you go mudlarking, one of the very first things you will probably find is all or a part of a clay pipe.

[20:18] Susan Blackwell: I think I'd like you to go back and rephrase that and say when you go, when we go.

[20:24] Laura Camien: Oh, there you go. Wait for it. When you go mudlarking, if slash when we go mudlarking, that would be when one of the very first things you will probably find is all or part of a clay pipe.

[20:36] Susan Blackwell: These clay pipes are small, cream-colored, perhaps a little bit of orange or brown or like black. Sometimes they're simple, sometimes they're innate. The more decorated pipes are called fancies, and they have all sorts of decorations. There's ships and anchors, there's rose and thistle, there's basket weave, there's snake scales, there's Masonic designs, there's military designs. I even saw one that's the bowl of a pipe. The bowl of the pipe is a woman sitting on a commode.

[21:03] Laura Camien: Oh my God.

[21:04] Susan Blackwell: You may also find the stems, or as I said, the bowls, and sometimes, if you're lucky, you might find the whole pipe.

[21:13] Laura Camien: But why are there so many clay pipes on the Thames for sure?

[21:18] Susan Blackwell: Yeah. These clay pipes have been around since the 1500s when tobacco was first introduced in the UK. It was brought over from Virginia. And at first, the cost of tobacco was very high, and smoking was only enjoyed by the rich, but then it became this very widespread craze. And by the mid-1600s, clay pipe makers were springing up all over the UK. Men, women, and children were all smoking. And at one point, it was actively encouraged to ward off the plague.

[21:46] Laura Camien: So sidebar, if you're sparked to make a historical drama set in this era or do a painting or something set in this era or a movie, whatever, be sure to include the fun detail of a smoking child.

[21:58] Susan Blackwell: Oh my God. So by the beginning of the 18th century, there were thousands of pipe makers to keep up with the demand. And the size of the pipe bowl increased over time. It was speculated because tobacco was becoming more affordable, so you could smoke up more in your pipe bowl. But it's a way that you can discern how old the pipe that you have found is.

[22:42] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[22:43] Susan Blackwell: They smoked as well. So these little clay pipes were cheap. Oh, another fun side spark. They called it drinking tobacco. It was smoking, but like sipping it in. The verb that they used was not smoking. It was called drinking tobacco.

[22:57] Laura Camien: More liquid history.

[22:58] Susan Blackwell: There you go. So these little clay pipes were cheap to produce. And back in the 17th century, you could go to a pub, you could order a drink, you could also order a pipe, and sometimes it was pre-loaded with tobacco. And if they got clogged up or you were a chain smoker and it grew too hot for you to continue to smoke it, people would discard them and start a new one. According to the Society for Clay Pipe Research.

[23:22] Laura Camien: That's a real thing.

[23:23] Susan Blackwell: Clay pipes had a short life expectancy. They weren't single use, but they did have a short life expectancy. And once they were broken or clogged, they were of no further use and they were discarded. And innkeepers were said to sweep them up, and probably they were chucked into the Thames.

[23:39] Laura Camien: Modern-day mudlarker Nicola White, who has a, uh, she has the YouTube handle, Nicola White Mudlark, compares it to future mudlarkers avidly collecting cigarette butts.

[23:52] Susan Blackwell: What?

[23:53] Laura Camien: Yes. And there's a lot of them.

[23:56] Susan Blackwell: So we, if slash when you slash we go mudlarking, when we on the Thames, that is like the first thing that everybody says the first thing that you will find is a clay pipe.

[24:07] Laura Camien: Oh my God.

[24:08] Susan Blackwell: Or a piece of a clay pipe.

[24:09] Laura Camien: I want to.

[24:10] Susan Blackwell: I know you do, girl. How well do I know you?

[24:12] Laura Camien: I want a fancy.

[24:13] Susan Blackwell: You don't want to? I want a fairy pipe.

[24:16] Laura Camien: I want a super old teeny tiny that I can give to my Chihuahua POTUS so he can smoke it.

[24:23] Susan Blackwell: Sweet photos. Um, Laura Makelum talks about how the river sorts things of similar size, shape, weight, and material. So it's not uncommon to find, for instance, a lot of pins together. Um, when buttons were expensive, people used to be pinned and laced into their clothes. These pins were handmade, and they were a necessity for every house. Babies were swaddled and pinned, corpses were pinned into shrouds, and people were pinned into their clothing with hundreds and hundreds of pins.

[24:55] Laura Camien: Can you imagine how hard it would be to like make out with somebody during this time period?

[25:01] Susan Blackwell: And then you're gonna show, wait. Dad's coming down the hall. Pin me back up, pin me back up.

[25:07] Laura Camien: I was just talking about getting poked.

[25:09] Susan Blackwell: And you were talking about getting poked.

[25:11] Laura Camien: We were both talking about getting poked.

[25:12] Susan Blackwell: There you go. You know, those great big Elizabethan ruffs, those great big ruffly collars that people would wear.

[25:18] Laura Camien: Yeah, they were held together with many, many pins.

[25:21] Susan Blackwell: And apparently people would shed those pins as they walked, and they were all different weights and gauges of pins for different fabrics, so small pins for like silks and big, heavy, straight pins that you would use for wool for thick wool. And when you tried to shove a pin through fabric that was too dense or too heavy, the pins would bend and people would discard them. So if you're mudlarking, you might find a lot of these sweet little bent copper alloy pins.

[25:51] Laura Camien: Wow.

[25:51] Susan Blackwell: Yeah. This is making me think also like the next time you're performing in a period piece.

[25:56] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[25:56] Susan Blackwell: Like just think about how differently you would move if you were that you were getting poked with a held-on pin.

[26:02] Laura Camien: Or that I know my mom made a lot of our clothes when we were growing up, and she would not get all the pins out like in the seams, and you would just be sitting there minding your own business, and all of a sudden you would be poked with a pin.

[26:13] Susan Blackwell: Pretty common experience, my childhood, which is very much like this.

[26:17] Laura Camien: I think you probably had a fair amount of, I just imagine just like reaching across the table for the salt and pepper.

[26:26] Susan Blackwell: A flaggard.

[26:27] Laura Camien: Yeah, these are like if your clothing is really held on by pins, that's a potential poke anywhere.

[26:33] Susan Blackwell: There you go. Um, the stories of what people have found mudlarking are legendary. One of the most interesting things Laura Makelum has found. Well, she was talking about finding, oh my God.

[26:45] Laura Camien: A human skull, a human remains.

[26:48] Susan Blackwell: Yeah. And that's what I hope I don't find.

[26:51] Laura Camien: Well, this ended up being, she had a supposition. It's, um, she had a supposition that it might be from a prisoner who was being conveyed on sort of like a, I, there's a name for it, but like a prison barge.

[27:04] Susan Blackwell: It's called a hulk, a prison hulk.

[27:06] Laura Camien: Okay. And, um, that may be the case, some forensic testing has put it at like 200 years old and has been, I think, transported to a university in Australia where they're doing research on it right now. Um, but one of the most interesting things that she has found is a glass eye, which she said was staring up at her from the mud, like old Father Thames.

[27:28] Susan Blackwell: Way.

[27:29] Laura Camien: But she's then the, the thing, uh, the thing that I feel like speaks to you, Camien, is the history associated with these things. And what she said about it is that after one of the world wars, there would have been more glass eyes and prosthetics manufactured, of course, made for people who had been injured during the conflict. And she also said that pretty much anything that could be flushed down a toilet ends up in the river. So it's possible it could have been thrown in the river, but it's possible it could have been flushed in the toilet and ended up in the river.

[28:02] Susan Blackwell: Sure, it could have been in a body that decomposed in the river too.

[28:05] Laura Camien: Do you want to see it?

[28:06] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[28:06] Laura Camien: You want to see the eye?

[28:07] Susan Blackwell: Yes. This is what was staring up at her on the foreshore of the River Thames.

[28:11] Laura Camien: Oh my God, we'll post a picture.

[28:13] Susan Blackwell: Yeah. We will post a picture. Can you imagine? Can you imagine that looking up at you?

[28:18] Laura Camien: No.

[28:18] Susan Blackwell: Hi. Laura Makelum tells a story about how she found what she later learned to be a bomb, which she unwittingly carried home on the train.

[28:32] Laura Camien: No.

[28:32] Susan Blackwell: A B O M B bomb bomb bomb.

[28:34] Laura Camien: Holy shit.

[28:35] Laura Camien: Yes.

[28:35] Susan Blackwell: So during a grenade type thing?

[28:35] Susan Blackwell: There's another mudlarker who I've mentioned, Nicola White, who did find a grenade and reported it to the authorities, and then they sent out the military and a bomb squad came and detonated it and it was live.

[28:49] Laura Camien: Oh my gosh.

[28:51] Susan Blackwell: Yeah. Because here's the deal during the Blitz and other conflicts, the river and the foreshore provide this very soft landing for these explosive devices. And there are quite a few unexploded bombs and hand grenades. She said as soon as she figured out what she had done, she threw the bomb back in the river.

[29:12] Laura Camien: Which I was like, oh no.

[29:14] Susan Blackwell: But she admitted it publicly, so I'm not telling a tale on her. Um of the reasons I was so excited to share the spark with you is because I know you love history.

[29:25] Laura Camien: I love it.

[29:26] Susan Blackwell: And this spark really feels like the confluence, if that is the right word, of its mindfulness, it's nature loving, it's seeking its history, it's archaeology, sometimes it's genealogy. And here's one small example of how all those things can come together along with some other fun elements like a little touch of activism and the love of animals.

[29:49] Laura Camien: So from her website, TidelineArt.com, Mudlarker Extraordinaire, Nicola White tells the story about how in July of 2018, she found like what looked like this little token in the Thames mud.

[30:02] Susan Blackwell: And when she got it home and cleaned it up, it turned out to be a tag from a dog collar of a pet dog named Bonzo Tabner. And there was an address, 21 Pelton Road in Greenwich, SE 10.

[30:16] Laura Camien: So she researched Bonzo's story and discovered that there had been a Tabner family living in Pelton Road during the early 1930s.

[30:24] Susan Blackwell: She was then able to find and speak to the grandson of Bonzo's owner, this woman who was still alive, quite elderly, recalled how Bonzo had been their pet dog during World War II, and how she had been so thrilled to be reunited with the dog after she returned to Greenwich because they had been evacuated during the war.

[30:46] Laura Camien: During Nicola's research, she came across a book called Bonzo's War, written by Claire and Christy Campbell.

[30:52] Susan Blackwell: And it turns out that Bonzo was one of the most popular dogs' names of that time, due to a popular illustrated dog named Bonzo.

[31:00] Laura Camien: Oh.

[31:01] Susan Blackwell: There's a spark for you. That's a high quality dog name.

[31:04] Laura Camien: But back to the book.

[31:05] Susan Blackwell: So Bonzo's War details the fate of over 2.5 million pets during World War II who were euthanized. Since cats and dogs were not allowed, they weren't allowed to be bought and brought to bomb shelters. The government advised pet owners to preemptively euthanize these millions of beloved household pets.

[31:31] Laura Camien: So Nicola found this dog tag, did this research, created a video, and you can find it all on her website, TidelineArt.com, about finding Bonzo's tag and this whole tale of research and discovery.

[31:44] Susan Blackwell: That's awesome. And after several people watched it, they expressed their desire to donate money for a memorial dedicated to these pets.

[31:52] Laura Camien: Oh, so a crowdfunding page was set up, and almost 3,000 British pounds were contributed to create a memorial.

[31:59] Susan Blackwell: Because while there was a memorial to the animals who died in conflict, like there were war horses and um dogs that were of service, there was no physical memorial to commemorate all those millions of animals that were euthanized.

[32:13] Laura Camien: How cool.

[32:14] Susan Blackwell: Yeah. So one year later, a specially commissioned ceramic plaque created by the renowned Cornish Potter Adrian Brough in memory of those 2.5 million domestic pets was unveiled at the old Blue Cross Cemetery in London. And it's all because of these finds that these mudlarkers make, and then this passionate research that they do to uncover the history behind these objects that they find.

[32:40] Laura Camien: Oh my something.

[32:42] Susan Blackwell: When you were listing all the things that it included, it also includes like solving a mystery, researching, you know, like that's right.

[32:42] Laura Camien: That's right.

[32:52] Susan Blackwell: And again and again and again and again, I heard people talk about how for them it's this very mostly solitary and very meditative like respite for them.

[33:05] Laura Camien: Yes.

[33:06] Susan Blackwell: To get down to nature, to get out of the city and go descend a little set of river stairs, and then all of a sudden, beyond the foreshore and beyond the Thames, and sort of the city falls away, and it's just you and the tide and history.

[33:21] Laura Camien: We're booking a trip.

[33:23] Susan Blackwell: All right. But if you're getting excited about mudlarking and all the historical treasures that don't tell me I can't do it, do I have to have a license?

[33:29] Laura Camien: Just pump the bridge.

[33:30] Susan Blackwell: That's me. If you're going to disturb the foreshore, you have to apply for a permit. In London, a mudlarking license is required from the Port of London Authority, and it is illegal to search or remove artifacts of any kind from the foreshore without one.

[33:45] Laura Camien: The PLA, Port of London Authority states, all the foreshore in the UK has an owner. Metal detecting, searching, or digging is not a public right, and as such, it needs the permission of the landowner.

[33:57] Susan Blackwell: So if you're listening in the UK, the PLA site has useful information for permit holders, including maps, rules, and regulations about where digging is and is not permitted, safety, and the tide tables.

[34:08] Laura Camien: But I have also received conflicting info on this.

[34:10] Susan Blackwell: Mudlarks are licensed to dig to certain depths. There are 51 licensed mudlarks, and they're licensed to dig up to one meter on the Thames, which is pretty deep.

[34:21] Laura Camien: Foreshore license allows you to scrape up to three inches.

[34:26] Susan Blackwell: And I've been, I it's I've been my understanding that no permit is needed for surface fines. Like if you're just browsing and just like sort of like looking at the surface and picking from the surface, walking along the Thames.

[34:38] Laura Camien: But there are clear requirements about what you need to do if you find something, you know, like human valuable or yeah, potential evidence from a crime, something over 300 years old or treasure.

[34:50] Susan Blackwell: If you do find anything of historical significance or older than 300 years, you have to report it to the Museum of London as part of their portable antiquity scheme.

[35:00] Laura Camien: But that makes sense.

[35:01] Susan Blackwell: If we wanted to go to London and do this, CAMS, which I think we should do on our upcoming international tour.

[35:07] Laura Camien: Absolutely.

[35:08] Susan Blackwell: Let's put that out in the world. We could take a mudlarking tour, and though we wouldn't be able to take any of our finds home with us, we could see what all the fuss is about.

[35:16] Laura Camien: Or we could mudlark closer to home.

[35:20] Susan Blackwell: Oh.

[35:20] Laura Camien: Oh my God, tell me where.

[35:22] Susan Blackwell: What if I told you that there was a prime mudlarking site and it was just a short subway ride away?

[35:31] Laura Camien: Please tell me where.

[35:32] Susan Blackwell: Little baby Cameon. I'd like to welcome you to Dead Horse Bay.

[35:38] Laura Camien: Oh my God.

[35:40] Susan Blackwell: So it's like, you're like, this is great. You're like, this is haunted.

[35:42] Laura Camien: You're like, this is great.

[35:43] Susan Blackwell: Is this haunted? Dead horse. All we have to do is take the number two train to last stop.

[35:48] Laura Camien: We transfer to the Q35 bus.

[35:53] Susan Blackwell: Which stops right in front of the Bayless shoe store.

[35:58] Laura Camien: This is getting scary.

[36:00] Susan Blackwell: We have to tell the driver that we're getting off at the last stop before the bridge. There are no signs pointing the way.

[36:07] Laura Camien: It's not on a map, but there are directions.

[36:10] Susan Blackwell: You can walk straight or turn all the paths lead to Glass Bottle Beach, which is located in Dead Horse Bay. But take heed, adventurers.

[36:19] Laura Camien: The walk from the parking lot is through some rough, wet, thorny areas.

[36:26] Susan Blackwell: Decent shoes and insect repellent are highly encouraged.

[36:29] Laura Camien: Susan, this is good because you're scaring everyone else away.

[36:32] Susan Blackwell: I know. I know.

[36:33] Laura Camien: We'll be fine.

[36:35] Susan Blackwell: All of this is from Atlas Obscura, which is the most sparkishly wonderful website going.

[36:42] Laura Camien: It's amazing.

[36:42] Susan Blackwell: So Dead Horse Bay was given its name sometime in the 1850s when horse rendering plants still surrounded the beach.

[36:51] Laura Camien: This is from the New York Times.

[36:53] Susan Blackwell: Dead Horse Bay sits at the western edge of a marshland once dotted by more than two dozen horse rendering plants, fish oil factories, and garbage incinerators. From the 1850s until the 1930s, the carcasses of dead horses and other animals from the New York City streets were used to manufacture glue, fertilizer, and other products at the site.

[37:15] Laura Camien: Chopped up boiled bones were later dumped into the water.

[37:18] Susan Blackwell: The squalid bay, then accessible only by boat, was reviled for the putrid fumes that hung overhead.

[37:26] Laura Camien: This isn't enticing me anymore.

[37:28] Susan Blackwell: I know.

[37:31] Laura Camien: This is one of those places that sounded like when it was like going full tilt boogie, that it was just like the bowels of hell.

[37:39] Susan Blackwell: Like it smelled like it the people that worked there and did those jobs. I mean, how could you ever get that smell out?

[37:47] Laura Camien: Um but you know, as cars took over and you know, horse and carriage diminished and horse carcasses then became scarce by the 1920s, there was only one rendering plant left.

[38:01] Susan Blackwell: And it was during this era around the turn of the century that the marsh of Dead Horse Bay began to be used as landfill.

[38:09] Laura Camien: So it was filled with trash by the 1930s, and the trash heap was capped, I think with topsoil, only to have the cap burst.

[38:18] Susan Blackwell: And the 1950s and trash spewed forth onto the beach.

[38:23] Laura Camien: And since then, all of this ancient garbage essentially has been leaking continually onto the beach and into the ocean from Dead Horse Bay.

[38:33] Susan Blackwell: But we're not talking about plastic and we're talking about thousands upon thousands of bottles and broken and intact, many over 100 years old, littering the beach.

[38:46] Laura Camien: And then there are the other things, leather shoe soles, telephones.

[38:52] Susan Blackwell: Is there cast iron stuff?

[38:54] Laura Camien: Yes, but here's the thing. So with all of this stuff, um, when it's sunk down in the mud, it becomes, I think it's called anaerobic, where oxygen doesn't get to it, and so it's preserved.

[39:05] Susan Blackwell: Things like leather are preserved, but the minute it comes to the surface, it starts to break down.

[39:10] Laura Camien: Yeah, yeah.

[39:11] Susan Blackwell: Um there was a great piece on abcnews.com, and there's they followed this artist named Gerard Barbeau, and he said to describe Dead Horse Bay in a sentence would be difficult.

[39:27] Laura Camien: I've traveled to over 30 countries in the world, and I've never seen anything like it.

[39:31] Susan Blackwell: When I first got there, I wanted to sample everything. There were toy metal figurines, ceramic figurines, dolls, doll heads.

[39:39] Laura Camien: Everything that we ever used and made in modern civilization was there.

[39:43] Susan Blackwell: This is what we are, the result of what we are. What brought me back to Dead Horse Bay was the sound of glass hitting itself as the tide went in and out, just the tingling sound of chimes.

[39:55] Laura Camien: It's like the sirens calling you out to sea.

[39:58] Susan Blackwell: Cammy, when you see pictures of Glass Bottle Beach in Dead Horse Bay, it's just literally it's as billed on the tin, glass.

[40:07] Laura Camien: It's just like a beach made out of glass bottles.

[40:11] Susan Blackwell: Okay, I'm interested again.

[40:12] Laura Camien: I know I can see your face. You're like, I'm interested, I'm disinterested, I'm just disgusted.

[40:17] Susan Blackwell: I'm interested again.

[40:18] Laura Camien: I'm back in.

[40:19] Susan Blackwell: Gerard, uh Gerard, who I was just describing, and uh Gerard, whose words I was just quoting, uses the items that he's cut he's collected in his art and his sculpture.

[40:29] Laura Camien: He does what's called assemblage, which is combining found objects and making sculpture out of it.

[40:35] Susan Blackwell: He talked about the joy of discovery of coming across something and you see its potential and the possibilities that combine with another object and another object may create something new and different that we haven't seen before.

[40:48] Laura Camien: He also described himself like a bower bird.

[40:51] Susan Blackwell: Do you know what a Bower bird is?

[40:52] Laura Camien: No, what's a power bird?

[40:53] Susan Blackwell: It's a bird who collects objects.

[40:56] Laura Camien: It's a bird that collects objects that are similar colors, like it might collect all shotgun shells or all red plastic, or it's amazing.

[41:06] Susan Blackwell: But they lay them out. Bower birds lay out their finds.

[41:09] Laura Camien: It looks impossible.

[41:10] Susan Blackwell: They lay them out to attract females.

[41:13] Laura Camien: And he said he does the same thing, but not just to attract a female.

[41:25] Susan Blackwell: Oh, that's cool.

[41:26] Laura Camien: So Bowerbirds.

[41:28] Susan Blackwell: First, what has been made out of it? If you were like Laura Makelum, the author and the speaker who I quoted earlier, you can make a book about mudlarking.

[41:38] Laura Camien: And her book is called Mudlarking.

[41:41] Susan Blackwell: The Mudlark was a charming movie that was made in Britain by the film company 20th Century Fox.

[41:47] Laura Camien: It is a fictionalized account of how Queen Victoria was eventually brought out of her mourning for her dead husband, Prince Albert, by a tiny mudlark.

[41:55] Susan Blackwell: No boy.

[41:56] Laura Camien: It's based on the 1949 novel of the same name by American artillery sergeant and newspaperman Theodore Bonnet, who lived from 1908 to 1983.

[42:05] Susan Blackwell: How cool.

[42:06] Laura Camien: Yep.

[42:06] Susan Blackwell: So you can make a movie out of it. It was starring um Irene Dunn as Queen Victoria. A galerist from the Vice Gallery in London named Florence Evans.

[42:15] Laura Camien: She's on Instagram at flow underscore finds, and she's an avid mudlarker.

[42:20] Susan Blackwell: She curated an entire exhibition of portraits of modern day mudlarkers alongside some of their mudlarking finds.

[42:29] Laura Camien: In addition to her historical and archaeological research and all of the things that that yields, Nicola White makes all sorts of things from her finds.

[42:39] Susan Blackwell: She makes driftwood art and she makes something called Thames Glass Fish.

[42:44] Laura Camien: And it's made out of there, these fish are made out of all the pieces of bottles that she finds.

[42:51] Susan Blackwell: Oh, those are cool.

[42:52] Laura Camien: Aren't they cool? Um, so it could be like from a perfume bottle, from a poison bottle, from a, you know, all of these ancient pieces of glass she makes into fish.

[43:02] Susan Blackwell: And they're not only these beautiful objects and pieces of art, but she also wants people to think about what they discard and what the implications of that are.

[43:11] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[43:12] Susan Blackwell: This is this is from her, this is uh taken from Nicola's website, TidelineArt.com. Walking along the remote shorelines of the Thames and Medway estuaries, I often come across a lot more plastic than I would like to.

[43:25] Laura Camien: I collect as much of it up as I can to take away, but before doing so, I will make a picture by the side of the river, then photograph it.

[43:32] Susan Blackwell: This fish is made of over 150 disposable lighters collected along the Thames estuary in less than two hours.

[43:42] Laura Camien: Oh.

[43:43] Susan Blackwell: So she collects this plastic that she finds, and then she makes something out of it, photographs it, shares it on her website, and then she disposes of it properly.

[43:53] Laura Camien: Uh-huh.

[43:54] Susan Blackwell: That's lovely. But it's such a bummer that she found that many in two hours.

[43:58] Laura Camien: Yes, exactly.

[43:59] Susan Blackwell: Um, it's a lot that's a lot of lighters. As I mentioned, Nicola also makes videos to document her mudlarking.

[44:07] Laura Camien: She has a very uh well-established YouTube channel, and she shares what she finds on it.

[44:13] Susan Blackwell: Sometimes she creates movements like her memorial for all the pets euthanized during World War II. Her YouTube channel is Nicola White Mudlark.

[44:20] Laura Camien: And then there are TV shows like Mud Men, which is a reality show following you guessed it, Mudlarkers who work on the foreshore of the River Thames, and they are characters.

[44:29] Susan Blackwell: Where can I watch that show?

[44:31] Laura Camien: Your friend the internet.

[44:33] Susan Blackwell: Really?

[44:33] Laura Camien: Yeah, Mud Men.

[44:34] Susan Blackwell: That's not on the internet.

[44:35] Laura Camien: I watched it right up straight up on the internet.

[44:37] Susan Blackwell: Stream it.

[44:38] Laura Camien: Okay. And then the question, as always, what do we make of it?

[44:39] Susan Blackwell: What do we make of it, Cam?

[44:44] Laura Camien: Mudlarking is a great spark for creating adventures that include seeking and attention to nature and its rhythms.

[44:51] Susan Blackwell: And it's a sort of outdoor meditation that comes from closely examining something for a long period of time.

[44:57] Laura Camien: In addition to mudlarking, as I think I said earlier, you can streamlark.

[45:01] Susan Blackwell: If you're drawn to it, it's a really gentle way to get up and out of doors.

[45:08] Laura Camien: Um, depending on where you mudlark and if you're allowed to remove objects, you can make collage art out of the found objects.

[45:14] Susan Blackwell: Um you could find an object and then track it back through its historical and sometimes genealogical background.

[45:21] Laura Camien: If you visit Dead Horse Bay, you will notice the sounds of the water moving across over and around millions and millions of pieces of glass.

[45:33] Susan Blackwell: The sound, I've heard a recording of it. It's so unique, it's so mesmerizing.

[45:38] Laura Camien: It's almost like a glass chime.

[45:40] Susan Blackwell: And I'm sparked by the idea of incorporating it into a piece of music or creating a sound bed that could stand alone, or perhaps it's part of a film score or music that accompanies a piece of choreography.

[45:53] Laura Camien: One more spark.

[45:54] Susan Blackwell: So mudlarks use a phrase called getting your eye in.

[45:58] Laura Camien: To explain this, I'm going to use the words of a man named David Neach from his website, David Neat.wordpress.com.

[46:05] Susan Blackwell: Hey, this is interesting.

[46:06] Laura Camien: David Neat describes himself as a maker and a teacher of making.

[46:10] Susan Blackwell: His making encompasses sculpture, model making, painting, graphic work, and design.

[46:15] Laura Camien: And he says, another one of the mudlarkers' favorite phrases is getting your eye in, or as I think of it, being tuned to the telltale signs of otherness, much simplified.

[46:25] Susan Blackwell: If you're after the usual things, I'd recommend you tune your eye to pick up circles and parallel lines for a start.

[46:32] Laura Camien: Proper circles or parts of them, and especially rings, are not native to this environment.

[46:37] Susan Blackwell: So they can denote pipe bulbs facing upwards and of bottles, bases or rims of pots and coins.

[46:43] Laura Camien: Neither are regular parallel lines natural here.

[46:46] Susan Blackwell: They're one of the chief indications of the man-made.

[46:50] Laura Camien: And here they may denote most forms of decoration or simply something straight.

[46:54] Susan Blackwell: So he's talking about when you're mudlarking, getting your eye attuned to those shapes that would not occur in nature.

[47:02] Laura Camien: That's right.

[47:02] Susan Blackwell: Get your eye in.

[47:03] Laura Camien: Getting your eye in.

[47:04] Susan Blackwell: So Laura Makelum, who literally wrote wrote the book on mudlarking, says that you can go mudlarking forever without say spotting a Roman coin.

[47:12] Laura Camien: But once you spot a Roman coin, then your eye gets in and you start seeing them everywhere.

[47:18] Susan Blackwell: And this reminded me of looking for sparks.

[47:22] Laura Camien: Yes.

[47:23] Susan Blackwell: Yes. I think to me, one of the most important things we can make of this mudlarking spark is embracing the concept of getting your eye in and looking for sparks.

[47:32] Laura Camien: Because as we know and as we have lived firsthand, Cammy, once you start seeing sparks, then you start seeing sparks everywhere.

[47:41] Susan Blackwell: I think that my grandfather had his eye in everywhere he went, he was bent over at the waist in the lifelong habit of scanning the ground, looking for ownerless objects.

[47:53] Laura Camien: And I bet if he was born in a different part of the world, nearer to the water, he would have been a mudlark or two.

[48:00] Susan Blackwell: Oh yes.

[48:02] Laura Camien: Cambo mudlarking.

[48:05] Susan Blackwell: Getting your eye in.

[48:07] Laura Camien: I love it.

[48:08] Susan Blackwell: Should we take a break?

[48:09] Laura Camien: I love it.

[48:10] Susan Blackwell: Let's take a break.

[48:11] Laura Camien: Okay. I was like, do I have my eye in anywhere in life? Do I have my eye attuned? Like Jeff Bowen has his eye in for birds.

[48:20] Susan Blackwell: Oh gosh, yeah.

[48:21] Laura Camien: And he can not only spot them, but then can spot the fine distinctions and understand you know what he's seeing.

[48:27] Susan Blackwell: I think I will only speak for myself. I have my eye in at thrift stores.

[48:32] Laura Camien: I can walk by the sh a cluttered, crowded shelf at a thrift store, and I can be reach through and back and be like this thing.

[48:41] Susan Blackwell: If there's like a line or a shape or a color that is mid-century, you're like you can scan and be like that. There's something back there.

[48:48] Laura Camien: I've got my eye in for that.

[48:50] Susan Blackwell: I do too. I can say that for sure.

[48:53] Laura Camien: Yeah. And it reminded me also of puzzle piece because that's exactly what it is. Like you tune your eye for what you're looking for.

[49:02] Susan Blackwell: That's right.

[49:03] Laura Camien: It is puzzle piece. And you're like, okay, right. You're right. I am only looking for something that's got a little blue on the body. And you get better the more you do it.

[49:11] Susan Blackwell: That's right.

[49:12] Laura Camien: I found something at the thrift store the other day that I I didn't realize it. I was going the day after they had had a half price sale.

[49:21] Susan Blackwell: Oh.

[49:22] Laura Camien: And so it was like emptied out. It wasn't emptied out, but it was the dregs. But I didn't know that when I was shopping. And I was like, why am I not finding anything in here?

[49:32] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[49:32] Laura Camien: And shoved in the back of a dirty cluttered shelf. I found this thing, and I was like, I barely know what you are, but I know that you are good.

[49:43] Susan Blackwell: And it was wrapped in saran wrap, so you couldn't really open it and see. But I was like, I'm gonna take a two dollar risk.

[49:50] Laura Camien: And I got it home and I cleaned it in the sink. It was very mudlarking. And it is awesome.

[49:57] Susan Blackwell: Really?

[49:58] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[49:59] Susan Blackwell: What is it?

[49:59] Laura Camien: It's sort of like a candle holder slash lantern. And you know I love a good candle holder/slash lantern.

[50:05] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[50:06] Laura Camien: It looks uh like it's from the 60s. It's I don't know how to describe it, but it was filthy.

[50:14] Susan Blackwell: It was super dirty, and it needed a good cleaning.

[50:17] Laura Camien: And it's super cool. And I'm sure everybody was like, ugh that passed by it, but I saw you have my eye in you had your eye in.

[50:26] Susan Blackwell: I really love that phrase.

[50:28] Laura Camien: I really love it.

[50:30] Susan Blackwell: Apparently, it also comes from sports, uh British sport. Have your eye on. I'd never heard it before, but it's super mudlarky.

[50:38] Laura Camien: So there you go.

[50:39] Susan Blackwell: Interesting.

[50:39] Laura Camien: Sammy Ann, do you have a spark for me?

[50:41] Susan Blackwell: Well, I have a spark for you.

[50:43] Laura Camien: I'm excited.

[50:44] Susan Blackwell: I have a couple of sources I'm gonna mention up top and a few that'll come out as we go.

[50:48] Laura Camien: But um, two sources I'd like to mention an April 2015 Humanities magazine and PBS News Hour.

[50:58] Susan Blackwell: Oh, two kiddies, two goodies, just elegant too, and then me up too.

[51:05] Laura Camien: See, I go for the intellectual sources, high quality.

[51:08] Susan Blackwell: No YouTube to be found here.

[51:10] Laura Camien: No, no Amazon.com.

[51:13] Susan Blackwell: I will pull shit off Amazon.

[51:14] Laura Camien: I will pull off, I'll pull shit off a user review on Amazon.com.

[51:18] Susan Blackwell: Hey, it's great, and it's in like investigative reporting. Somebody took the time to do that labor, so I don't have to.

[51:24] Laura Camien: That's right. That's right. And also I'm not bashing YouTube.

[51:27] Susan Blackwell: Fact check it.

[51:30] Laura Camien: No, no. Because we are we are not what?

[51:32] Susan Blackwell: No journalists.

[51:34] Laura Camien: No need to fact check.

[51:35] Susan Blackwell: It's on Amazon.com.

[51:37] Laura Camien: What you got from me?

[51:38] Susan Blackwell: There's something that I think you know about me. Like I was a little bit of a late comer to theater.

[51:43] Laura Camien: And by late, I mean I didn't really audition for a school play or musical until like my junior year of high school.

[51:51] Susan Blackwell: Oh, high school, okay.

[51:53] Laura Camien: Because I was cheerleading and I was on all the sports teams, and my dad was a good idea.

[51:59] Susan Blackwell: Oh, I mean, all like nerdy all of it. Like I did forensics, I was performing and doing public speaking and performing duos and poetry and all of that.

[52:09] Laura Camien: Sure.

[52:09] Susan Blackwell: So it's not like I didn't have any of it in my life, but my dad was a coach of track and cross-country.

[52:16] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[52:16] Susan Blackwell: And so I went along obviously with everything that my family did.

[52:21] Laura Camien: And they played sports.

[52:23] Susan Blackwell: So fun fact. But then my parents got divorced when I was in my sophomore year.

[52:29] Laura Camien: So by my junior year, I was living with my mom, and I think she encouraged me to like pursue the things that like really interested me, which was really wonderful of her to do.

[52:40] Susan Blackwell: But I also think there might have been a slight agenda there because if I didn't run on the track team, then I wouldn't see my dad as much, and she wouldn't have to see my dad as much, you know.

[52:50] Laura Camien: Oh boy, that's complicated.

[52:52] Susan Blackwell: Yeah, yeah. I want to believe that her intentions were altruistic and just wanted my, you know, and maybe, maybe they were.

[52:58] Laura Camien: Okay.

[52:59] Susan Blackwell: Regardless of her motives, she did push me to do different things.

[53:05] Laura Camien: And so the second half of my junior year, I really jumped in.

[53:09] Susan Blackwell: But when I went to college, like I only had that one year under my belt.

[53:15] Laura Camien: So I didn't think of like majoring in theater.

[53:18] Susan Blackwell: I mean, all the other kids that I knew had been doing it since they were like 10 years old. You know what I mean?

[53:22] Laura Camien: Sure.

[53:24] Susan Blackwell: So I was like, well, I love it. But and I had such reverence for it. Like going into a theater was like going into a church.

[53:31] Laura Camien: Uh-huh.

[53:31] Susan Blackwell: It was just like, oh my God. Yeah, you could do this. This is amazing.

[53:36] Laura Camien: But I got to college and I took an acting class and I got so much encouragement and support from my professors.

[53:41] Susan Blackwell: I started auditioning, and then I would literally do anything and everything because I felt like I was like catching up, you know what I mean?

[53:48] Laura Camien: Yes.

[53:48] Susan Blackwell: So I was and you were hungry, I bet, too.

[53:51] Laura Camien: Oh my god. Totally.

[53:52] Susan Blackwell: I was like, still like, you're gonna let me do this.

[53:54] Laura Camien: Yeah, this is amazing.

[53:55] Susan Blackwell: Yeah. So for the experience, you know, I did the main stage productions, the lunch bag theater, which was like one act over lunchtime, you know.

[54:03] Laura Camien: Oh man.

[54:04] Susan Blackwell: Yeah, I did senior thesis projects. There was um a growing theater company, which was this theater company that traveled to schools and performed for kids.

[54:14] Laura Camien: Uh-huh.

[54:19] Laura Camien: Manhattan, Kansas.

[54:20] Susan Blackwell: Manhattan, Kansas, the Little Apple.

[54:22] Laura Camien: There you go.

[54:24] Susan Blackwell: Um, and so I was doing all of that, and one year I discovered the Ebony Theater, which was this small theater on campus that was run by people of color.

[54:36] Laura Camien: Uh-huh.

[54:37] Susan Blackwell: And I did Manhattan Civic Theater whenever they needed uh someone that was, you know, younger.

[54:37] Susan Blackwell: I was like, what is this? I didn't know. I didn't know this existed.

[54:41] Laura Camien: Right.

[54:41] Susan Blackwell: And they were holding auditions for Anna Deavere Smith's Fires in the Mirror.

[54:47] Laura Camien: Wow.

[54:48] Susan Blackwell: And I got cast in it.

[54:49] Laura Camien: Whoa.

[54:50] Susan Blackwell: And this experience probably changed my life and certainly my artistic and creative life in a big, big way.

[54:59] Laura Camien: Was it a blend of was the cast a blend of people of color?

[55:02] Susan Blackwell: It was.

[55:03] Laura Camien: I'll talk about that again in a minute.

[55:05] Susan Blackwell: It was people of color and me.

[55:07] Laura Camien: Laura Cameron.

[55:08] Susan Blackwell: But if you know the show, I'll tell you, I'm gonna put a pin in that and I'll tell you more.

[55:12] Laura Camien: But yes, it was it wasn't, they didn't do it as a one-woman show, they did it as a four-person show.

[55:17] Susan Blackwell: Got it.

[55:17] Laura Camien: Okay. So being cast in a show with the Ebony Theater introduced me to such a wide and wonderful spectrum of new human beings that I don't think I would have encountered in my college experience because I was so insular.

[55:31] Susan Blackwell: Yeah up to that point.

[55:33] Laura Camien: I had been so absorbed in my own little bubble of theater nerds.

[55:37] Susan Blackwell: And this experience gave me the opportunity to grow as a person and like expand my horizons in totally new ways.

[55:47] Laura Camien: And I fucking loved it.

[55:49] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[55:49] Laura Camien: I loved it. And I also loved our director, Sherlin Henry Brown.

[55:56] Susan Blackwell: She was loud, proud, confident, feminist, and not apologetic about it.

[56:03] Laura Camien: And at that time, that was rare.

[56:05] Susan Blackwell: And she was a maybe in that location.

[56:07] Laura Camien: And in that location.

[56:09] Susan Blackwell: And so I was mesmerized by her, honestly. Like she was so different from me. And I was just like, wow, I want to be like, how can I be more like that?

[56:17] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[56:18] Susan Blackwell: And she was about as honest and direct as anyone I've ever known. Like she did not suffer fools.

[56:23] Laura Camien: And if she thought you were one, she would let you know real quick.

[56:27] Susan Blackwell: So she had zero tolerance for like faux politeness and bullshit. Just zero. And in Kansas, if any Kansas friends are listening, I'm sorry, but there's a lot of it there. There's an emphasis on being nice. Yeah. And being nice over being truthful. Yeah. Being nice over being direct. Do you know what I mean? Sure. Sherlyn was like, no, I'm calling you out on that. So she broke me of a few habits that honestly I don't know if I ever would have let go of otherwise. Like she really blew my mind. Like I might have mentioned, although not too specifically here, but I'm a child of a narcissist. And as a result, I was always a people pleaser. Yeah. So I was always trying to do and say the right thing.

And I wasn't conscious of being like false per se. It was just my coping mechanism. And this is how like I moved throughout the world. Sherlyn had zero interest in that. She was interested in getting to the real shit. And thank God I look back now and I'm like so thankful that she saw the capacity in me, like the capability. Because I didn't know. Like, I had no idea that I was full of bullshit at that time. Like, I was nice. I was appropriate, right? Yeah. I was polite. I was the kid with the right answer. So, as far as I knew, I was doing what I was supposed to do. But I wasn't really in touch with my own truth, you know. But I did have the desire, I think, to shed myself of that. I just needed someone to show me the way.

And Sherlyn was the perfect guide. For example, Sherlyn broke me, or at least started the breaking of me of my habit of saying, I'm sorry. Because, you know, part of being a people pleaser is apologizing for everything. Yeah, taking the blame for everything, because if something is wrong, it must be your fault. I mean, I always just that was just a reflex. I'm sorry. So one day, um, I'll never forget this. One day someone came into rehearsal and said, Oh, it's raining. And my response, I'm sorry. Oh, and I will I have a such a vivid memory in my mind. Sherlene heard that exchange from across the room, and she swiveled around so fast. And she said, What the hell did you say? Whoa. And I said, I'm sorry.

And she said, That's what I thought. What are you sorry for? Did you make it rain? And I said, No. And she said, You think you're so important, so all powerful that you can make it rain or make it not rain. You think that you could be responsible for the weather, even if you wanted to be. Then stop apologizing for it. It's not your fault, it's raining. And you apologizing for it raining, it's just bullshit. Wow. And I I was just like floored by it. But she was completely right on. And I really think of this as like a turning point in my life because I was terrified of her. I'm not gonna lie, but I appreciated her honesty so much. You know, obviously honesty can hurt, but sometimes it could be so much better than being surrounded by people who, you know, blow sunshine or are also apologizing for everything, things they don't have any responsibility for.

So the people, all of this is to say that the people working on this show had a lifelong personal effect on me, and I'm forever grateful for that. But the work of Anna Deavere Smith had a powerful effect on my creative life as well.

[1:00:00] Laura Camien: Oh yeah.

[1:00:31] Susan Blackwell: So first of all, if you're not familiar, the content of the show, Fires in the Mirror, is about the true life events that transpired when racial tensions rose to the surface in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, in 1991. Crown Heights was heavily populated by a Hasidic Jew community and a large black community at that time, living together in seemingly peaceful times, but there were simmering tensions. It was hit by another car, causing it to get knocked off the street onto the sidewalk, and it hit and killed an eight-year-old black boy. Yes. Now, ambulances came to the scene, city ambulances, and also private ambulances paid for by the Jewish community. There were accusations that the Jewish ambulances didn't help the young black boy.

Riots started right then and there. The Jewish driver of the car was allegedly beaten up by bystanders. And the next day, a young Orthodox Jewish scholar, just walking down the street, was stabbed and killed. Oh, yes. And many said he was killed as retribution for Gavin Cato, the eight-year-old boy. So the entire thing was a tinder box of tensions ready to erupt. Stories got told, optics became facts, local politics played a part, and it is so tough because you feel the emotions of everyone in the story and every side and every perspective. You can see how they came to the conclusions that they came to. So Anna DeVere Smith told this story as a one-woman show. And she created it by interviewing over a hundred different people in that community about what they saw, what they felt, what was at the heart of the matter.

She recorded every interview, and then she edited and crafted these monologues into a show, and she played every part. Yes. She used their words verbatim. And she studied the physicality of every person. She leaves in every pause, every lip-licking, every sniffle, every stutter, every inflection, every unfinished sentence. And this is where she got me. She studied their breathing. When and how they catch a breath, little mouth sounds, how they laugh, how like how they release tension in their breath, how their breath informs what they're feeling, even if the words belie their emotions. I was the more I learned about this, the more I was fucking mesmerized by it. So when Ebony Theater at K-State put on the show, they didn't do it as a one-woman show.

They did it as a four-person show. They cast one black man and one black woman to play those roles, and they cast one white man and one woman to play the Jewish roles. Okay. So I played all of the Jewish female characters. There were five of them. And I think it was a really actually it was an interesting take on it to split it up that way. I don't really know if it was the director's vision or if it was, you know, it's educational theater. So it could have been that they were told you need to involve more students, you know, or we'll sell more tickets if there's more students there. I don't know what the impetus was, but I do know like the opportunity for a mixed race cast to work on a show that is about race relations and race tensions.

Like it's an unforgettable opportunity because then our director being such an honest person, like the conversations we got to have in a in a safe space, in a brave space, in a space where we know we felt, you know, like we were learning and growing. Um so whatever the reason was, I'm so grateful for that opportunity. I'm grateful they did it that way.

[1:04:41] Laura Camien: I'm guessing that if it's a cast, the cast is all students, right?

[1:04:48] Susan Blackwell: Yeah. It would be really a challenge to find a single student who could play all the parts that Anna Deavere Smith originally crafted for herself. I mean, she is a master uh impersonator. Like she is a master mimic. Yes, although I want to talk about that because she doesn't call it that. It's more uh it's heightened, it's heightened mimicry. Yeah. So we'll get to that a little bit. Um, but what I learned about her process has captivated my attention for years. And though, you know, I haven't pursued it a career in acting. Yeah. But when I have acted, I've definitely used her techniques. Yeah. And as a writer, I'm absolutely obsessed with the idea of creating a show using a similar process. Like a journalist in my life, interview process. I really think I'm gonna do it. I really do.

[1:05:44] Laura Camien: I believe you.

[1:05:45] Susan Blackwell: So some people refer to this process as documentary theater. Yes. Some call it verbatim theater. But regardless of what you call it, Anna Deavere Smith is very often considered the creator of this type of theater, this genre. There's a lot of other people doing it now or doing similar things, like doing their take on it, but Anna Deavere Smith is really the founding mother of verbatim theater. So what I want to talk about today is her, a little bit about her and about her inspiration and this process she's really created. So tiny tiny bit about her. She was born in Baltimore. She was the first of five kids to an elementary school teacher and a coffee merchant. And in middle school, she developed an interest in social justice.

She formed a black student group, among other things. And you're in middle school. In middle school. Get it, Anna Devere. I mean, that's, you know, well wonderful. Yeah. Way ahead of the curve. So after school, she headed to California with her friends, and she wrote in her memoir, Talk to Me, that their goal was quote, to see America and to make sense, each in her own way, of what to do with all the breakage and promise that had been released through the anti-war movement, the assassinations of Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy, the beginning of the environmental movement, and the bra burning, brief as it was, of the women's movement. So she auditioned and she was accepted into the American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco.

And very early on, she had a transformative moment. It was a Shakespeare assignment. She found him to be intimidating, and frankly, she was not shy about the fact that she thought he was irrelevant. Uh-huh. And she felt quite ambivalent about his work. But nonetheless, her assignment was to take 14 lines of Shakespeare and say it over and over and over again to see what happened. Wow. So she picked a speech from Richard II. It's the one where Queen Margaret is cursing the devastation that Richard has brought on. And her lines were that foul defacer of God's handiwork, that excellent grand tyrant of the earth. Those were the words that she said over and over and over again. She later claimed that this exercise gave her some kind of transcendental experience.

The kind of experience that even three more years of her education there, she never had that again. She was so moved by it. This simple repetitive focus on saying the words. She came to view language itself as the way into the character. She quotes her grandfather who told her as a little girl, if you say a word often enough, it becomes you. Interesting. So after college, she worked some odd jobs, one of which was at KLM, the airline, and she manned the telephone line, like the complaint line, essentially. So she heard some stories, and she heard, you know, story after story from people all over the country, all over the world, dissatisfied customers. And if you think about it, they're most likely infused with a lot of energy, a lot of emotion.

These are dialects, a lot of dialects. Absolutely. And these stories got her thinking. She began to wonder if I were to go around and listen, listen, listen to Americans. Would I end up with some kind of a composite that would tell me more about America than is evidently there? Wow. It's a spark. There are sparks everywhere, including your service job at KLM. That's right. That's absolutely right. So thus began the development of her signature process. She would interview people, then have them depicted on stage. She was looking to portray a greater diversity of personal experience. And eventually, but not at first, but eventually she herself would depict the characters. At first, she had students and friends.

Oh, she had other people do it. She yeah, okay. And she would find people who sort of looked similar, and she'd say to them, Will you tell us a story? And we'll have it. Oh, interesting. Then you could watch yourself play out on stage. And then eventually she's like, I got that. Yeah. Interesting. I'll take all this. So she told the National Endowment for Human Humanities that she learned to approach the language of her interviewees the way she would a Shakespearean monologue. Assuming that the story, as told, these sentences in this order with these words, complete with false starts, coughs, laughter, and so on, was the truest and best way to present a character.

[1:10:40] Susan Blackwell: If they said um, I don't take that um out.

[1:10:45] Laura Camien: So she created various shows this way, including On the Road, a Search for American Character, On the Road, Voices of the Bay Area, Women in Theater, and others.

[1:10:56] Susan Blackwell: And then Gavin Cato was killed in Crown Heights.

[1:11:00] Laura Camien: Wow.

[1:11:00] Susan Blackwell: And Yankel Rosenbaum was killed as an act of revenge.

[1:11:04] Laura Camien: Anna was invited by the new voices of color festival organized by George C. Wolf at the public theater to develop a show based on these incidents.

[1:11:13] Susan Blackwell: Wow.

[1:11:14] Laura Camien: After eight days of interviews, Anna narrowed down to 25 characters.

[1:11:20] Susan Blackwell: She edited the interviews, and that content became Fires in the Mirror.

[1:11:26] Laura Camien: Frank Rich, theater critic of the New York Times, called it the most compelling and sophisticated view of urban racial and class conflict that one could hope to encounter in a swift 90 minutes.

[1:11:39] Susan Blackwell: Fun fact.

[1:11:44] Laura Camien: No way.

[1:11:45] Susan Blackwell: You've been sitting on that.

[1:11:47] Laura Camien: I didn't want to interrupt you.

[1:11:49] Susan Blackwell: You saw, so you saw her.

[1:11:50] Laura Camien: Yeah, I did.

[1:11:51] Susan Blackwell: And it's, uh, there's another piece that we've Hunter and I wrote called, uh, My First Time.

[1:11:56] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[1:11:56] Susan Blackwell: Where I say, I say that my first Broadway show was Angels in America. It's that's autobiofictionography. My first show was Fires in the Mirror.

[1:12:05] Laura Camien: And the ticket stubs and the receipts prove it.

[1:12:07] Susan Blackwell: Wow.

[1:12:08] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[1:12:08] Susan Blackwell: But I, I will, I remember it pretty clearly. Pretty, pretty clearly.

[1:12:13] Laura Camien: It made quite an impression.

[1:12:15] Susan Blackwell: As somebody who also was super interested in playing a lot of really different characters that were far from my lived experience.

[1:12:24] Laura Camien: That's right.

[1:12:25] Susan Blackwell: I was shitting myself watching that show.

[1:12:28] Laura Camien: I can only imagine.

[1:12:29] Susan Blackwell: I think you'd be so good at this.

[1:12:31] Laura Camien: I don't, I feel like I don't know that I agree with that, Cammy.

[1:12:35] Susan Blackwell: And there's something, there are certain performers and artists like, um, Danny Hawk, like Anna Deavere Smith, that are, uh, Sarah Jones that are so gifted when it comes to this specific, there's a specific talent that, I mean, let's not kid ourselves, like these people are masters.

[1:12:57] Laura Camien: Extraordinary.

[1:13:00] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[1:13:01] Laura Camien: Extraordinary.

[1:13:02] Susan Blackwell: So soon after Fires in the Mirror, her next project was Twilight, Los Angeles, which was also commissioned.

[1:13:09] Laura Camien: And this one was all about the LA riots that followed when the police officers who beat Rodney King were acquitted.

[1:13:16] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[1:13:17] Laura Camien: Again, she interviewed this time like 300 people from every perspective and created the show.

[1:13:24] Susan Blackwell: And again, the words of the show are verbatim.

[1:13:27] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[1:13:28] Susan Blackwell: So the way she describes her process is this.

[1:13:32] Laura Camien: I have been trying to become America word for word.

[1:13:37] Susan Blackwell: In the way that you would think about putting yourself in other people's shoes, I'm putting myself in other people's words.

[1:13:44] Laura Camien: Yes.

[1:13:45] Susan Blackwell: I interview people and I learn what they say, and I try to put together a lot of disparate parts of interviews into one whole in order to make a current problem come alive.

[1:13:56] Laura Camien: There's certain points in any interview that I do that people start to speak in a way where the rhythm, you know, leads me to believe that there's emotions stored in there.

[1:14:08] Susan Blackwell: And so as an actor, emotions are my fuel, and those are the types of moments that I want to reenact on stage.

[1:14:15] Laura Camien: This role, baby.

[1:14:17] Susan Blackwell: This is what I like fucking love. Like when the words that people use are not right on the nose, like they're not seemingly related to what the question was or what the topic is, and yet they're saying everything.

[1:14:30] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[1:14:31] Susan Blackwell: And all the monologues in Fires in the Mirror like that. One character that I'll never forget is one of the Jewish women. She was an anonymous Jewish woman, but she's talking about how they need to keep their hair short, like no longer than two inches long.

[1:14:46] Laura Camien: So she wears wigs.

[1:14:48] Susan Blackwell: Yeah. And she has four or five. And also they can't show their, nobody but their husband sees their real hair.

[1:14:54] Laura Camien: That's right.

[1:14:55] Susan Blackwell: And she's talking about this, and she's talking about how she has four or five wigs, but that it really bothers her that it feels like a lie. Like when she wears a different wig and someone says, Oh, I love your hair. I have to say it's not mine.

[1:15:15] Laura Camien: And in the context of the show, it's such a subtle nod to the idea of perception and reality, innocent lies, total deception.

[1:15:26] Susan Blackwell: It's just incredible. She's talking about what is happening in that community, but she's not talking about it at all. And I think Anna Deavere Smith has such an incredible way of identifying those moments.

[1:15:42] Laura Camien: The whole show is full of them.

[1:15:45] Susan Blackwell: So this talent that she has to like listen between the lines. I think it also is to her ability. This is something that I am needly sparked by to interview people and to interview them in a way so that they, this is, I mean, something as interviewers of people, we are always aspiring to finding those ways of letting people just like relax and let their true heart like show through.

[1:16:15] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[1:16:15] Susan Blackwell: Let their, the most authentic version of them sort of like step to the fore.

[1:16:23] Laura Camien: Yes.

[1:16:23] Susan Blackwell: She's a great interviewer.

[1:16:25] Laura Camien: And she talks about this moment.

[1:16:28] Susan Blackwell: This is the space that I'm fascinated with. She has said that she is trying to hear the realness that people conceal beneath the comfort of familiar words.

[1:16:40] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[1:16:40] Susan Blackwell: So it's not just a study of the words, but when the words disappear.

[1:16:45] Laura Camien: So when you're interviewing someone and the words drop out, and they are looking for new words, maybe words they're less comfortable with.

[1:16:55] Susan Blackwell: Um, she's looking at what's happening the moment that the language fails that person. They have to be more creative quickly. They have to dig deeper below the surface to find the words in order to communicate.

[1:17:09] Laura Camien: It kind of, this sparks me. Uh, there's, I remember reading the biography of Diane Arbus, the famous photographer. And she talked about how she would take a photograph of somebody who was determined to not let, like, like say she was taking a photograph of a socialite, and they were determined like not to let that mask slip. She would basically like, it was like an endurance contest and basically stay with them until the moment the mask slipped when they weren't putting it on, and that would be the photo.

[1:17:35] Susan Blackwell: Boom.

[1:17:35] Laura Camien: That would be the one. And I almost, not that I don't, uh, when I read Diane Arbus's biography, it almost seemed like a, at times like a viper strike where they, they were just waiting for that moment to like get in there.

[1:18:03] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[1:18:04] Laura Camien: And with, I don't think it doesn't feel that way within Deavere Smith. It's almost like just like giving, she's almost like a camera that's rolling, giving people the time and the space. And there's that all if you wait long enough, they'll say it.

[1:18:22] Susan Blackwell: They will say their terms.

[1:18:23] Laura Camien: They'll reveal themselves.

[1:18:24] Susan Blackwell: That's right.

[1:18:25] Laura Camien: And people always do.

[1:18:26] Susan Blackwell: But she's never looking for a gotcha moment.

[1:18:30] Laura Camien: No, she's not.

[1:18:30] Susan Blackwell: That's it.

[1:18:31] Laura Camien: That's the distinction.

[1:18:32] Susan Blackwell: Yeah, she's not trying to make fun of them, even when she puts them on stage.

[1:18:35] Laura Camien: No.

[1:18:36] Susan Blackwell: And this is honestly, this is the exploration that I'm fascinated with. Like, even just now, I wasn't planning on saying this, but it just occurs to me like let's say we took Gavin's interview. If you haven't heard it, go back and listen to it. It's amazing. Let's say you took that, made a monologue out of it, and had someone perform that.

[1:18:55] Laura Camien: Yes.

[1:18:56] Susan Blackwell: Gavin is giving us deep and intimate information about something that matters a lot to him, his grandmother. He starts to cry. He realizes, wow, this is a lot of emotion. He starts to make fart noises.

[1:19:12] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[1:19:12] Susan Blackwell: Yeah. From his armpit, laugh, cry, and move to the next thing.

[1:19:17] Laura Camien: If you saw someone perform, quote unquote perform that, it you would lose your mind, I think, because it's so real.

[1:19:27] Susan Blackwell: Do you mean perform it well?

[1:19:28] Laura Camien: Yes, of course.

[1:19:30] Susan Blackwell: You'd have to perform it well. It'd be, but it as you're talking, I'm like, well, that'd be a hell of a challenge.

[1:19:31] Laura Camien: A hell of a challenge.

[1:19:36] Susan Blackwell: But that's what I think she does. She's looking for those moments. The key, not to sound like your woo-woo acting teachers, but the key is the breath.

[1:19:40] Laura Camien: The key is the breath.

[1:19:46] Susan Blackwell: So I'm gonna talk about that too because she studies exactly that. Like every intake, uh, she leaves it all in.

[1:19:55] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[1:19:55] Susan Blackwell: So I find myself in real life, like noticing these things in daily life and wanting to reenact them. Again, not in a way to like make fun of someone, but because I'm literally fascinated with the idea of like, wow, they talk like that. What does that feel like? They talk so much louder than I do, or they laugh so much more free. What does that feel like?

[1:20:18] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[1:20:19] Susan Blackwell: Um, or the way someone over pronounces something like, should we be working? I'm just thinking.

[1:20:27] Laura Camien: You know, and then I feel like, oh, I just want to try it. I just want to know what does that vocal pattern feel like coming out of me?

[1:20:36] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[1:20:37] Laura Camien: And I just think, uh, she inspires me so, so, so much. And I think that her taking on those words and their physicality and more importantly, their breath. I feel like it elevates it from mimicry to the embodiment of that person. Like she said, like the language is the way in to the person.

[1:21:04] Susan Blackwell: And I think it's really fascinating because you know, sometimes when you're building a character, you don't have someone to model it after that specifically. But because she does, you know, she uses every bit of information she can get from them.

[1:21:20] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[1:21:21] Susan Blackwell: So anyway, I'm fucking floored by her. We've talked a few times about like what drives us to create. And our friend Meta Wagner wrote a book about it, What Creative Type Are You? And one of the types that she describes is the activist. You know, are you driven to create so that you can affect change on the world? And hands down, Anna Deavere Smith would fall into this category 100%.

[1:21:47] Laura Camien: She has said, I come at this more like a lawyer who would say that everyone has a right to a fair trial, or a journalist or a priest who would hear the confession. I'm interested in complicating the narrative and revealing to the people in my audience that there are many narratives. The more roots you have going off in different directions and grabbing the ground, you're probably gonna be a stronger tree. And that would be my objective. All of my work of art is a form of activism. I don't have the answers. I don't indict people. I can let the judges do that. I can let the media do that. I am a dramatist. I believe that the theater and other art forms are an opportunity to convene people around these issues and ask them while they're sitting together to do something.

[1:22:37] Susan Blackwell: Wow.

[1:22:38] Laura Camien: So it's just so clear she's found a way to combine her interests and social justice that started, you know, in middle school with her performance abilities. So look up, I won't go through them all, but she has many, many, many plays that she's done in this style. She's won many, many awards. And frankly, I'm just obsessed with the idea of writing in this way as a writer and a performer, like working in this way. I think there's so many things you can do with it.

[1:23:07] Susan Blackwell: You could explore a local issue this way.

[1:23:07] Laura Camien: Yes.

[1:23:10] Susan Blackwell: An issue at your school or in your workplace. If you have the kind of workplace that would let you be creative, um, I'm obsessed with this one. You could create from interviews with family members.

[1:23:23] Laura Camien: Oh, if your family is full of interesting characters, as I know mine is, you could explore an incident or a family secret from a variety of perspectives.

[1:23:33] Susan Blackwell: Right?

[1:23:34] Laura Camien: Wow.

[1:23:35] Susan Blackwell: I mean, it's really limitless. And I think that the key to really a good spark, right? I think the key to success though is the objectivity. Because writing to prove one side or prove one point is correct, is really less compelling. I think you, I think she's on to something that she, you have to show all of it without an opinion.

[1:23:59] Laura Camien: Yes, then let's, there is something when I say she's a camera, it's there is something where she just serves it up to you. And I know you just said it's heightened, but it's, it she, it is not over the top. And it is not, there's never like that sort of edge of judgment about it. It feels like you're just being served it up straight.

[1:24:21] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[1:24:22] Laura Camien: And it, I also think it's an in so many sparks. I, I love your idea of like even sort of like a take it like a really fun but innocuous story about the time that the dog stole the Thanksgiving turkey off the table, and then tell it from grandma's point of view and tell it from your brother's point of view who has spent the last 72 hours making the turkey.

[1:24:43] Susan Blackwell: Tell it from your little brother's point of view who doesn't give a shit about it and is just interested in their Micronauts. Like telling it from those different perspectives based on interviews with them is a really funny idea. But there's also something about building your own empathy and walking in other people's shoes.

[1:25:05] Laura Camien: Yep.

[1:25:07] Susan Blackwell: That is super powerful. Here's one less funny, but I dare you. If you have an incident in your family that sounds a little bit like, oh, I don't know, they haven't spoken to each other in 20 years. Like Uncle So-and-so and Aunt So-and-so stopped speaking.

[1:25:19] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[1:25:25] Susan Blackwell: Why? And what is that about? And could you talk to each of them? Could you talk to the people that were around when that will was read and someone got mad that they weren't left the thing? Oh, I mean, it's just poking a hornet's nest.

[1:25:42] Laura Camien: I’m telling our listeners.

[1:25:43] Susan Blackwell: What if you're for their undergrad theater final to poke a hornet's nest? Poke it. We were talking in your spark, poke it. This entire episode is about poking it.

[1:25:52] Laura Camien: Oh my gosh.

[1:25:53] Susan Blackwell: But no, I really think there could be a family out there that could be, you know, changed by something like that. Here's something that this is just a hanging, spinning question mark that I don't know the answer to, but I feel like the world has changed since I was in school and since I was like very much moved to make work like this.

[1:26:14] Laura Camien: Right.

[1:26:19] Susan Blackwell: And now with the world being what it is, as I'm pointing to myself, is a white lady like me allowed to make work where I'm portraying people who have different lived experiences than I do?

[1:26:36] Laura Camien: I think it's a good question. I think she struggled with that question too when she did Twilight. She, you know, she interviewed Korean Americans. And absolutely, this was not, you know, not her history.

[1:26:51] Susan Blackwell: I think that it's different when you're telling all the stories. If you're doing all 25.

[1:26:56] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[1:26:57] Susan Blackwell: And I also think you can do it and say, here's our cast of four, and we're gonna have, you know, Caucasian people play the Caucasians and people of color play the people of color. Like I think there are ways to address that if the overall story is important enough.

[1:27:14] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[1:27:17] Susan Blackwell: Interestingly, I had the opportunity to go see Fires in the Mirror at the Signature Theater in New York City, and a man has been cast as the one person show.

[1:27:31] Laura Camien: It's a man.

[1:27:32] Susan Blackwell: Shoes are big shoes. The shoes are big shoes to fill, but I think it also is interesting in relation to your question because she was a woman and she played all the parts. Every race, every religion, every gender.

[1:27:48] Laura Camien: Right.

[1:27:48] Susan Blackwell: And now she was like, when you cast this show, please look at men too, because there's no reason why the man can't play the women and all of the religions and all the races.

[1:27:57] Laura Camien: Best person for the job.

[1:27:59] Susan Blackwell: Best person for the job. Absolutely. But I think it was really interesting. She, I'm off book here for a second. I remember reading that she had said after Fires in the Mirror, there was a black man who was giving her feedback, all of it very positive.

[1:28:19] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[1:28:19] Susan Blackwell: And then he said, my only criticism is couldn't you show a strong black man up there? And she was like, well, Gavin Cato's dad, strong black man, Al Sharpton, uh-huh, Mike Tyson, those are all figures in the show.

[1:28:35] Laura Camien: Right.

[1:28:35] Susan Blackwell: So she was like, oh, there were black strong black men up there, but he couldn't see it in my body. He was not able to take them in as strong black men because I was the person portraying them.

[1:28:48] Laura Camien: Got it.

[1:28:49] Susan Blackwell: And so the reverse could be true now with the show with Michael Benjamin Washington in it. You know, will you have women think, oh, well, I didn't really see the female voices up there?

[1:29:02] Laura Camien: I doubt it because he's really, really, really amazing.

[1:29:05] Susan Blackwell: But you can't ever get past that. People are gonna have those blocks of like you don't look like the person that you're portraying.

[1:29:12] Laura Camien: Yeah, but I also just think that's really, really, really interesting.

[1:29:17] Susan Blackwell: So I do just want to shout out Michael Benjamin Washington, he was phenomenal. The director, Sahim Ali made some fantastic choices.

[1:29:27] Laura Camien: It's very minimal.

[1:29:28] Susan Blackwell: I have a vest. I am like vibrating right now as you say this. I was in the audience yesterday, just like, oh, feeling exactly that. Like, oh my God.

[1:29:39] Laura Camien: It flows so quickly and smoothly from character to character.

[1:29:43] Susan Blackwell: And the mirror plays a very prominent part in this in ways that the aforementioned mirror.

[1:29:43] Laura Camien: The aforementioned mirror.

[1:29:50] Susan Blackwell: So it really brought back so many memories. The show really holds up. In fact, the saddest thing about it is how relevant it still is.

[1:29:59] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[1:29:59] Susan Blackwell: I wish we didn't need a play that's 25 years old to mirror back our social issues to us. You know, I wish we could watch it and say, wow, those were crazy times. I can't believe the past got so crazy.

[1:30:14] Laura Camien: Yeah, yeah.

[1:30:15] Susan Blackwell: That it is in the past.

[1:30:17] Laura Camien: Um, but it's still here.

[1:30:19] Susan Blackwell: So I'm thankful that this work is being done and that this incident won't be forgotten, and the fact that we still have work to do won't be overlooked.

[1:30:28] Laura Camien: Wow, what a great spark.

[1:30:32] Susan Blackwell: Thanks, Black. Well, wow. I'm, this is like awakening an old passion of mine that I sort of have, you know, put up on the shelf.

[1:30:43] Laura Camien: Susan, we were just talking before we started recording today. We were just talking about wanting to get into the meaning of certain sounds that people make or they make.

[1:30:57] Susan Blackwell: Yes, we want to get to the bottom of it.

[1:30:59] Laura Camien: That's at the heart of our work.

[1:31:01] Susan Blackwell: It is. What is the emotion behind that? It's a small sound, but something's there.

[1:31:06] Laura Camien: Yeah, yeah.

[1:31:08] Susan Blackwell: But there's so much in this, and as a younger person, I think I would have immediately been like, how can I make work that is similar to that work? And now older, slightly more sedentary, Susan is like there's something about the empathy piece and getting inside, walking in other people's shoes, breathing their breath, and seeing the world from their perspective, whether that's the people of Crown Heights, or whether that's your aunt and uncle who haven't spoken to each other, or that's right.

[1:31:44] Laura Camien: It's an interesting, I don't know. I'm very interested in the empathy piece.

[1:31:50] Susan Blackwell: I think the acting piece of it fascinates me too because when you are creating a character from scratch, there can sometimes be either a doubt in your mind or a doubt in a director's mind of like, ooh, that's a little over the top when you try something.

[1:32:08] Laura Camien: Right.

[1:32:08] Susan Blackwell: Like it's almost, it's not believable, it's too much. And then you see a show like this where she is, it is verbatim.

[1:32:16] Laura Camien: Yeah, perfect, the physicality, the...

[1:32:16] Susan Blackwell: I wonder how that's conveyed in the script. I don't know.

[1:32:22] Laura Camien: Or do you get us past, do you get a set of the recordings so that you can study the breath?

[1:32:28] Susan Blackwell: We saw some, yeah. When we were doing it, we saw some.

[1:32:30] Laura Camien: I can't vouch for it.

[1:32:32] Susan Blackwell: Interesting.

[1:32:32] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[1:32:33] Susan Blackwell: And I just think like you watch her work and you're like, well, you can't say, like, oh, no one laughs like that. Oh, no one is as ridiculous as that.

[1:32:44] Laura Camien: That's right.

[1:32:45] Susan Blackwell: They are. Well, I remember when I, all the work of hers that I've ever seen, I was struck by how it felt incredibly authentic.

[1:32:53] Laura Camien: Yes.

[1:32:54] Susan Blackwell: It was sort of like, oh, I may not have met that person, but man, that feels real. The other thing that it's bringing to mind is I had an opportunity last summer to do the on-course production of a civilian show called Gone Missing.

[1:33:08] Laura Camien: Oh, interesting.

[1:33:08] Susan Blackwell: And a lot of that is based on interviews with people who have lost things.

[1:33:13] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[1:33:13] Susan Blackwell: And that could be an object, that could be a person, that could be a lover, things that have gone missing. And there was this piece that was assigned to me, and it was this slim little monologue, but it was a woman who like maybe she was in a nursing home and she basically was complaining about how, you know, things go missing and blaming the staff for things that have gone missing.

[1:33:38] Laura Camien: Right.

[1:33:38] Susan Blackwell: And you're not, you don't get the benefit of having been in the room when the interview was conducted or listening to any sort of like archival recording. You just have to figure, like take a choice and take a leap and figure it out.

[1:33:52] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[1:33:52] Susan Blackwell: And I remember this spark that you were sparking on me so hard today was awakened last summer when it was very vulnerable. I was like, I'll try, I'm gonna take a big, big scary swing.

[1:34:04] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[1:34:05] Susan Blackwell: And I remember saying I'm adult enough that I could say to the creative team, I'm going to try something, and this is really vulnerable. And doing it, and basically it awakened that old thing in me that I used to do more frequently, which was channeling a voice that was so far from my lived experience, but and just that sort of transformation.

[1:34:28] Laura Camien: It's a, if you have a little touch of that gift, it's fun to take that ride.

[1:34:35] Susan Blackwell: Well, I think a lot of people are drawn to acting for, I know I was, that I had permission to do and be and speak in ways that I was not allowed to or did not let myself in real life.

[1:34:49] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[1:34:49] Susan Blackwell: So like playing a real bitch on stage.

[1:34:52] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[1:34:52] Susan Blackwell: It was the most liberating.

[1:34:52] Laura Camien: Very free with their anger.

[1:34:56] Susan Blackwell: That's right. So liberating because it's like I had that character last night that in Gone Missing was so angry, so angry.

[1:35:05] Laura Camien: And I'm just like the nicest little buttercup.

[1:35:07] Susan Blackwell: But it's funny.

[1:35:09] Laura Camien: But you are human.

[1:35:10] Susan Blackwell: But it's fun to get let off the leash.

[1:35:12] Laura Camien: It is.

[1:35:12] Susan Blackwell: And because you're real scary. Every part of like you are able to identify that part of yourself.

[1:35:20] Laura Camien: So I'll just say one more thing about this. I love doing this spark because when I went to see the show again and started writing the spark, I just realized like I never told Sherilyn Henry Brown what a difference she made in my life.

[1:35:36] Susan Blackwell: I'm gonna find her.

[1:35:37] Laura Camien: I want to tell her that show and that group of people, Zach Bays, Billy Bill, all you guys like truly changed my life.

[1:35:47] Susan Blackwell: I think truly changed the course of who I became as a human being.

[1:35:52] Laura Camien: Yeah, as an artist and as a person.

[1:35:54] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[1:35:55] Laura Camien: Oh good.

[1:35:56] Susan Blackwell: I know we couldn't leave without some tears, but I just like, well when you were talking about her, I was like, oh, tell her now.

[1:35:56] Laura Camien: Tell her now.

[1:36:02] Susan Blackwell: I want to tell her, I gotta find it.

[1:36:06] Laura Camien: You mean to say God of Dyre. Did we learn anything from the art of dying?

[1:36:08] Susan Blackwell: Well, say what you mean to say.

[1:36:11] Laura Camien: John Mayer.

[1:36:12] Susan Blackwell: Say what you need to say.

[1:36:13] Laura Camien: Or John Mayer.

[1:36:16] Susan Blackwell: Sorry, that was not the reference that you meant.

[1:36:19] Laura Camien: Cam.

[1:36:19] Susan Blackwell: I thought you were doing it.

[1:36:20] Laura Camien: I was gonna say, is that it?

[1:36:22] Susan Blackwell: That's it.

[1:36:23] Laura Camien: That's a good one.

[1:36:24] Susan Blackwell: Oof. The man.

[1:36:28] Laura Camien: Okay.

[1:36:28] Susan Blackwell: We hope that this all put another bunch of sparks in your file.

[1:36:33] Laura Camien: Hey, I've got an idea.

[1:36:35] Susan Blackwell: Oh.

[1:36:35] Laura Camien: If there's a spark you'd like us to explore, or if you've taken a spark and you fanned it.

[1:36:40] Susan Blackwell: Oh boy, we have gotten some good emails.

[1:36:43] Laura Camien: We gotta, we have to do a mailbag.

[1:36:45] Susan Blackwell: We need to do a mailbag.

[1:36:46] Laura Camien: We're gonna do a mailbag when we get our shit together.

[1:36:48] Susan Blackwell: If you've taken a spark and fanned it into a creative flame, as many of you have, and you'd like to share that, please email us at thesparkfile at gmail.com, or even better, submit it through our website, thesparkfile.com.

[1:37:02] Laura Camien: Do it, do it, do it.

[1:37:04] Susan Blackwell: Don't just think about doing it. Do it. Really do it.

[1:37:06] Laura Camien: And we will take your feedback. We're happy to, but you know the price of admission.

[1:37:11] Susan Blackwell: First, you need to share a creative risk that you have taken recently.

[1:37:15] Laura Camien: So sweet.

[1:37:16] Susan Blackwell: And be sure to subscribe to this podcast wherever you get your podcasts.

[1:37:20] Laura Camien: Subscribe.

[1:37:21] Susan Blackwell: Rate. If you don't mind, five-star review it. If you like this podcast, you know what would be amazing? And we mean this from the bottom of our hearts.

[1:37:28] Laura Camien: Share it with people you love.

[1:37:31] Susan Blackwell: Share it with people who you think would also like it.

[1:37:35] Laura Camien: And if you didn't like it, you should see somebody about that.

[1:37:43] Susan Blackwell: If something tickles your fancy and gets your creative juices flowing, we are writing you a forever permission slip to make that thing that has been knocking at your door.

[1:37:53] Laura Camien: It's your turn to take a spark and fan it into a flame.

[1:37:57] Susan Blackwell: You gotta drive it. You gotta park it. You gotta walk down to the riverbank and quietly mudlark it.

[1:38:06] Laura Camien: That's awesome.

[1:38:07] Susan Blackwell: You gotta take it and make it when I bump into something that inspires me.

[1:38:19] Laura Camien: I dump it in my spark file.

[1:38:24] Susan Blackwell: Could be something that I wanna make or how I wanna be.

[1:38:29] Laura Camien: I pump it in my spark files.

[1:38:34] Susan Blackwell: I jump into my spark files.

[1:38:38] Laura Camien: Let's open up the spark file.