High Wire: The Moth Radio Hour

want to tell a story but don't know where to start. A tip I give them, get specific. What's a moment

“that meant something to you? Your first home run, that road trip with your dad, the time you”

bombed at the talent show. Start there, then build on that foundation. You can find tips to help you identify those moments along with prompts to inspire them and the moths new guided journal my life in stories. Whether you want to find your own story, reflect on your life or even give it a gift. You can order your copy at the moth.org/mylifeinstories. That's the moth.org/mylifeinstories." Then try the snack time sushi box at 252 or 999 or 1009 or 1009 or 1009 or 909. That's good for

all the prices. Now in your filial. All the, good for all. On your host, Suzan Rust. You don't have to join the circus to perform acts of Bravora.

“Life itself is a high wire act. We are constantly putting ourselves on the line,”

taking risks and searching for balance. This episode features stories about finding your equilibrium when life knocks you sideways. Sometimes you just have to step out on that wire and

be brave enough to go across. But sometimes, like our first teller, you just have to join the circus.

This story was told by Tiffany McKinney at a Detroit slam. Here's Tiffany live at the moth. I woke up one morning, opened my eyes and waited. I knew this morning would be the same as every other morning had been for the past two months. My husband and best friend of 22 years had passed away and I waited for grief to greet me. I waited for my brain to start the same argument

“to just stay in the bed and not get up. But I did. I got up and it was Monday. I checked my cell phone”

and I smiled. My group of girl friends, they were texting me, giving me messages of encouragement, telling me they were proud of me and sending me memes of hoops of fire, someone taming a lion and a lady in a sparkly litart flying through the air. The week prior, I had decided I had to do something to make myself feel better. Something to help me find joy. And I was working with the personal trainer. I had signed a poor swim class. When I saw a local new segment interviewing the

owner of the Detroit Flyhouse Circus. But what I was really impressed about is they had aerial silks. I don't know if you know what that is. But it's the fabric in the air. You see the fancy ladies up there and they're sparkly costumes swinging through the air and I could just see myself

in the sparkly litart. So I joined the circus. That Monday was to be my first day of circus training.

So I put on my T-shirt and my leggings, the uniform of circus people I guess, and went down to the Detroit Flyhouse Circus. So when I got there, I mean it was just a warehouse. I wasn't impressed. But I don't know what I expected to see. But I was still excited. And there was about a group of eight of us. And as you can imagine, we were very eclectic group down there ready to take circus classes. And so they divided the class up into two groups. And my group started first on the aerial silks.

And you could see the silk in the air. It was so beautiful. It's purple. And the instructor walks over and pulls the cord. And I mean it just dramatically like flow from the ceiling. It was so beautiful. And I was so excited. So we stood in the line. And the instructor told us he taught us how to hold and mount the fabric and pull ourselves up. So I'm standing last in the line of four people.

And one by one, first person goes up, wraps their arm up, wraps their foot up, and pulls

themselves up the air. So eventually it's my turn. Now these people, some of them apparently had had circus training prior to that day. Because they went up their spinning and doing all kind of flips. And I'm mesmerized. Not thinking, eventually he's going to be my turn. But what's I grabbed onto the rope? And I felt, you know, felt the weight of myself. Like,

reality crashed. It's like, slap me in the face. And I'm thinking, first of all, I'm heavy.

“Second of all, I mean, I'm probably the oldest one in the room. I was older than everybody,”

including that little instructor. And I'm out of shape. But I'm there now. So I'm holding on. And I'm trying to pull myself up. And as I'm trying, I managed to get like two feet off the ground with my foot. It's tangled up in the fabric and it's squeezing it so tightly. And it hurts. So I kind of fumble my way now. And I'm embarrassed. And I'm sweating. Okay? And I'm out of breath. But everybody is kind of gracious. And we just go with it. And the instructor continues to tell us how

to do these other tricks on the silks and every time. I'm lasting the line of four. And these people just get up there and spin around and make it look so easy. And it's in my turn. And I'm out of shape. And I'm so embarrassed. So about an hour in, we take a break. And at this point, I am just overwhelmed.

I'm so humiliated and I'm still sweating. And I just decided, first of all, I couldn't look

anybody in the face. So I just say, keep your head down, get your purse, get in the cargo home. So I grabbed my purse. I walked out the door. I got into the parking lot. And I promised you as soon as my foot hit the parking lot, I felt the Lord speak to me and remind me that this was my story. Nobody in there knew that every single day I was a fighting for the wheel to live. Nobody knew how hard it was and nobody else had that story. And I wasn't going to let them take this

little bit of joy from me. So I wiped my face. I turned around and went back to the circus. So the second half of the class, we still have to finish the class. The second half of the class,

“we learned tricks on a hoop. Now when I signed up for this, in my mind, I thought, what?”

Who the hoop? Because I see ladies at the circus using a hoop, new, no. This is a thin metal hoop, hanging about five feet off the ground from this thick rope, right? And oh, god, here we go. I'm thinking I'm going to have my rocking moment. This is going to be it, but that's not what happened. So the instructor starts again and he's telling us how to, you know, get up on this hoop or whatever. And again, I'm last in the line of four people. And it's just as hard. I'm struggling.

I'm sweating. They even had to lower that hoop down one foot just for me. But let me tell you something. By the time I pulled all 230 pounds up on that little metal hoop, the entire class was cheering for me. Including the instructor. I almost cried. I was so excited. So I just, I had my moment. I took it. I closed my eyes and I leaned back and I pictured myself in this sparkly, leotard. And when I opened my eyes, a little instructor standing there, you want me to take your picture? No, sir. I know this is not like anything

“like what it does in my head. Just leave me be. So needless to say, life is still not what”

I expected it to be. It's still messy. It's still hard. I still have to be reminded that this is my story. And I get to walk it out however I choose. But I know how to find joy even in the heart things. And while I finished that six week class, I did not return to the circus instead of hoping for a sparkly leotard. I just went to Target and bought one. That was Tiffany McKinney. She is an entrepreneur and speaker. Tiffany has given up the hoops and

silks, but she has other goals. Every day she looks for people she can encourage. She feels privileged to share the knowledge that hard things terrible things can happen. But she believes that

you can still find joy on the other side of it. On that note, Tiffany says that she is on a never-ending

quest for a pina colata and a palm tree. To see a photo of Tiffany head to the moth.org in the radio extras. There are moments in life. When just being who you are is an extreme act of bravery and act of defiance. Our next story was told by Dave Lara, who shared it at a moth main stage a new London Connecticut that we partner with guard art center. Here's Dave.

In the olden days, he was mostly men that went to war. And in fact, the term band of brothers comes from that old time period. They were men that had a similar life experiences. Wives children, regular jobs, they were drinking buddies. And you can depend on these band of brothers

My mother died and an absent father made a life-changing event for me. I was 17 and the

“Juno courts of Los Angeles declared me an adult. They called me emancipated.”

So I took my emancipated ass and I joined the Navy. But I didn't have a band of brothers. I was a criminal. Being gay had laws against my existence. There were penalties that included jail. Whether I was in or outside of the military, there were witch hunts looking for me in my kind, but I had no choice. I made it through a boot camp and was assigned a hospital course school

to become sort of a nurse, not quite a doctor, but most definitely a bed pan washer. I joke, of course. A hospital corpsman does what a doctor does to save a man's life in the field. After I finished, I got orders to the USS proposed a hospital ship off the coast of Vietnam. Most of my time would be on that ship. I was lucky.

“I remember it was raining when I landed in Vietnam, and with the bread mud and green uniforms”

of the Marines, everything became CP atoned. Like in the movie Wizard of Oz, with its friends of Dorothy's. My ship wasn't on station so I had to spend like 12 days up at an aid station near the DMZ called Dung Ha. Two corpsmen, Matt and Joe, were assigned to me and got me up to speed on my temporary duties. Matt was a short, stocky, blonde, cute little fucker, and he was battleharden and strong. That was in love.

“Joe, a big burly Polish guy. Well, he had a drool of sense of humor. He was so much fun to be around.”

They happened to be gay. Yeah, even then we had gay dark. It usually started with the question. So do you have a girlfriend? In war, you made friends fast. And so as I reported to my ship, we agreed that we were going to get together somehow. And that opportunity became quick. The repose my hospital ship was scheduled to spend iron art in Hong Kong for New Year's Eve. Joe and Matt got the time off. Join me and two other gays that I'd found on the ship

at the Hong Kong Hilton. We rented a double suite and we spent the whole night talking about what

it was like being gay. It was the first time we had ever been around our own kind.

When the others went back to bed finally, Matt and I stayed up talking seriously, if two men could make a life together. Society said that we were either insane or criminals. We didn't even know if our love was valid. Matt eventually went to bed saying he just wish he could find someone to love. It was there that we called ourselves the group. And that's where their capital T based on a novel by Mary McCarty. It's a story, a very campy story of women who meet at

faster. And then we follow them to their life. And the principal theme is being job discrimination, sexism, and men.

It was rough because I always lose my train of thought at some point.

Things that we knew about. And like our straight compatriots, our band of brothers got us

“through the worst of war. The pain that's suffering in the dying.”

It was a tradition at the time for sailors to buy zip-o-liders and have their ship name, their job title, their base etched on those our lighters. We had us etched with the group. And our bond was sealed. I mentioned band of brothers because we were seeing the worst of war. Matt and Joe, every day at Dalha, we're under constant rocket attacks. I on the ship was seeing suffering and pain. We came routine for men to die in my hands.

My 13 months were up. And I once again joined Matt and Joe at Dalha to spend my last week in

Vietnam before going back to the world. Second day, I was there. Matt and I found our self alone

“as we came off a shift. And he said, David, why don't we have her made love?”

I laughed and I go, dude, we haven't had a chance. But he asked, do you want to, don't you? Then I leaned in and kissed him. A few days later, a dust off, a metavac, was needed at a base, very close to the GMZ. He was called Kantian. And the unit up there were known as the walking

dead. Matt went on one chopper. I went on another. Joe was already up there. We landed and we began

to load the wounded. A rocket hit the chopper that Matt had come in on. And he was standing at the door and was blown several feet and ran to him and knew he was dying. And as I looked at him, he had glistening tears in his eyes. And I told him, I wish we could have been lovers. I love you, Matt. I love you. Showing some rings together around. Nobody cared that two men could love each other, not there.

And then Matt died. He just died. I spent my head on his chest crying. I could hear the show say, "Come on, David, you gotta go." He pointed to the chopper and come in on. He said, "It's a rotor blades are spinning like crazy. If you don't get going, it's going to get blown up too." I just stared at him. He grabbed my chin and he made me look at him and he goes, "You've been here long enough. You know how this works." And then he whispered,

"The friendship's over." Now go. I searched Matt's pockets. Looking for that Zipbo, the one inscribed with the group and its capital T. It was 1967 and when I went home,

“I was alone and in pain and I don't remember anything of my trip going back to the world.”

In 1970, the witch had caught up with me. I was stationed at Kwanik over Virginia. And I was just charged for the crime of being a homosexual. It was less than honorable.

And as I left the base for the last time, I threw it into a dumpster.

“I had been so proud of my metals, but my less than honorable discharge he raised them”

from my service record. I went to Arlington where Matt is buried and I promised to, I would do something to change the world so that men like he and I could serve honorably.

In the 1970s, I became a soldier in the gay rights movement and I helped establish the first

gay men's service center in Los Angeles. In the 80s, I joined an AIDS activist group called Act Up. And we were petitioning in the government to find treatments for the disease. And in the 2000s,

“I became members of veterans groups of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans to show by my presence”

that you could survive what war does to you. I still have Matt's zipper. It's a safe shape. As his tombstone, like all the headstones there at Arlington, but you know what, I'm not bitter. The Navy gave me more than it took. He gave me wisdom. He gave me Matt. And I have kept Matt's slider as a reminder of the best time of my life. And of the man, I still love.

Thank you. That was Dave Lara. Dave came to us through the mosque community program via a workshop that we held with veterans in media and entertainment. Dave, who writes novels and performs, describes himself as a retired 79-year-old Mexican Jewish high school dropout who is trying to stay relevant. While Dave says he can't do all that he used to, he still considers himself an activist.

He still shows up in veteran circles sharing the story of the group, making sure people know

that men like them were always there and died for this country just like everyone else.

“I've been asked what would I say to Matt if I could sit down with him right now?”

This is such a painful question. Do I speak to him as the young man I was or the old man I've become because he is for every young to me? I'll answer as the old man. And I would need into my friend Matt and say don't worry my sweet boy. We would have had our chance at love. We did change society, not completely, but enough that what you and I thought was impossible and I youth became real. The journey was brutal. Our small band of brothers, the group,

those men didn't achieve acceptance for themselves in life. They never found the strength

to fight society. They could not break out of the mold that they had built for themselves. But I did. And I know you would have been right beside me as I fought every single day for the rights and respect you and I deserved. I love you Matt. I always will. That was Dave Lara to see some photos of Dave from the time of his story go to our website TheMoth.org. In a moment, pushing the limits and pushing your luck when the Moth radio hour

Massachusetts. The Moth radio hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole.

The Moth radio hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole. The Moth radio hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole. The Moth radio hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole. The Moth radio hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole. The Moth radio hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole. The Moth radio hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole. The Moth radio hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole. The Moth radio hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole.

“This is the Moth radio hour and I'm your host Susanne Rust. How far would you go to get your colleagues to like you?”

The Moth radio hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole. The Moth radio hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole.

Everybody likes me. I am so nice, I'm actually scary, and I've always been proud of that.

In 2004 I took a community development job in a little Scottish village called Twecca. I was advised not to take the job. I was told they don't like outsiders, they will not like you.

“And I thought well that's not going to happen. So I start the job and it becomes evident that I'm randomly despised.”

I tried everything to please them. They wanted to learn first aid. I set up a 12-week course. None of them attended.

A guy had a heart attack in the foyer of the centre and I got the blame. I set up a break dancing class for the young people and the trainer left because the kids defecated on the bonnet of his car. I asked the women in the mother and toddler's group if they would not smoke round the babies. And they sent round a petition demand and a stop tend to fear and it was very, very stressful. One morning, one of the committee came in and said, "We're holding a gala in a few weeks. We do it every year to raise funds. Can you bake?" And I can't say that I can't bake, because there's

so be another reason that I've got to hate me. And before I even knew what I had said, I said, "Oh, I'm not doing a bake sale. I'm doing a parachute jump." I've got a lot of sponsors. She said I'll tell the rest of the committee, they all came in and they said, "We do like to choose the gala queen, the ultimate respect. I hope one of them over." One small issue. I suffer from severe vertigo. I am terrified of heights. I can't even look up

“a balcony. That's how badly it affects me. I can't back out. And I tell my sister, and she says, "Are you crazy?”

This is so dangerous. Why would you do that?" She says, "Come on, would you rather be the slate or dead?" And I said, "Well, dead, obviously." She says, "Okay, I'll go and get a headstone tomorrow. Here lies Martha, she was liked." I said, "That would be great." So there's people on the fillet all start being nice to me. They bring me lunch. We have banter. They give me a net name, jumper. So I cannot back out. The time comes to do the jump. I do two days of safety training.

should open. If that does not open, you will punch the of death in 11 seconds."

“That seemed like a really long time. I saw the plane. It was about the size of a coffee table.”

And it had no door. So I vomited for two hours. But I went in and I was crying sobbing with fear, but at 3000 feet I jumped from the plane. And my parachute opened and it was so blissful. It was wonderful. And I came over all the Armstrong. And I said, "Oh, Scotland's really pretty."

And I can fly. And just that that a quite powerful gust of wind blew me.

And I couldn't steer past that and I thought, "Yeah, this is where I die."

“I landed about 24 miles away in the grounds of a lesser-known Scottish castle.”

I was chased for some time by a rather troubled bill, but it was still one of the best experiences of my life. And I raised a thousand pounds. But within 40 hours they're revered back to hate me again. So I resigned. And the got me a leaving cart with new signatures on it. And a few years later, I met one of them in town and just said, "Oh, it's so lovely to see you.

What a shape you left. We are always late, too."

Thank you. But that was Martha McBrire, a Scott living in London whose passions are belly dancing, watching true crime and critiquing the neighbors recycling. After losing her hearing, she struggled with confidence until she discovered the power of true storytelling. Martha said that the moth gave her her voice back.

When Martha reflects on that event, she said that the first thing that comes to mind is an intense feeling

of peace while she was in the air and how that moved to the tears. But then she cringes when she remembers that she did something that dramatic to get people to like her. Her last brave act was a hill walk with a friend, a Ben Loman Mountain in Scotland, with inadequate equipment, no sense of direction and a false sense of optimism. Even when she slipped and fell and dangled from a snowy rock, sobbing with beer,

Martha said that she didn't have the heart to tell her friend that she really wasn't enjoying the experience. In a moment, a story of lipstick and memories when the moth radio hour continues. The moth radio hour is produced by Atlantic public media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. This is the moth radio hour. I'm Suzanne Rust. As we end this hour, we have a final exploration of the ways in which life continually challenges us

to find our balance and recalibrate. Our last story was told by Arscia Capadia, who shared it at a main stage of New Brunswick, a repartured with the state theater

“of New Jersey. Here's Arscia, live it the moth. Good evening. How are you doing today?”

So, my name is Arscia and I'm made in Bombay, India, where I spent most of my life. I'm an only child and my mom was a single parent, a teacher. Ami had a deep love for life and all the final things in life. A sari collection was absolutely beautiful. She collected sari from all over India. Her jewelry collection was fabulous,

Some of them had never returned it. So, maybe I should follow up on that.

I remember the house was never empty. She left cooking. She left feeding people. Sometimes, you know, people were almost sitting on top of each other fighting for that last scoop

“of biryani. But I think not a lot of people are aware of this that Ami had a secret addiction.”

She was a lover of lipsticks. Her eyes lit up like diamonds when she saw a tube of lipstick. Shining, creamy, beautiful, listening, just waiting to be applied. Her favorite colors with the darker reds, the maroons, the rust. Shining the better I think was her motto. But I think what she really wanted and lasted was those elusive foreign brands that we didn't get in India back then. They came in case in the shimmery golden tubes and

you were dependent on your foreign relatives to, you know, hustle them into the country for you. So, she had made a pact with one of her cousins who lived in London. His name was Khalik Khalik Uncle. We Indians call everybody uncle and aunties who just roll with that. So, Khalik Uncle came over the Christmas holidays every year and without fail, he would bring one of her favorite brands which was Max Factor. Right before he arrived, a letter would arrive in the mail in which he would

write. My dear Naseema, I'm coming as usual over the Christmas holidays and I'm bringing the latest shade of Max Factor with me. Amee would be counting down the days and along with her, so would I. Amee passed away when I was 13. She had stage three breast cancer and she didn't survive that very long within a year. She was guarded was imminent. Since she passed away at around 10 pm in the night and it's customary to bury the dead after one of the five obligatory

prayers in the Islamic tradition, it was decided that we would be we would bury her in the morning

after the first prayer of the day. So, we brought Amee's body home and it was kept on these huge

“chunks of dry ice in the room that I shared with her. I remember standing in that room seeing her body”

and wondering, what should I do now? Was there some playbook that people forgot to give me? What should a 13-year-old do? Should I be like lamenting, crying my heart out? I should I be all strong in silent and pretend to be this really strong start girl. I didn't know. My mother, she has four brothers and it was decided that they would raise me after her death. So, I remember my eldest uncle, who I call Mamujan, he came into the room at this point. He came over and he helped me and he said,

"Arshi, take all the time you want tonight. No one will disturb you." I remember standing in that room wondering what to do. People kept drifting in and out of the room to pay their last respects to her, but also to check in on me, but they left me alone mostly to my own thoughts. They say the darkest star of the night is right before dawn. I was dreading dawn.

I was hoping the sun would never rise. The night was stretching endlessly ahead of me and at some

“point, I think I posed off. And then, I heard the birds chirping. The first glimmer of sunshine”

through the curtains. I got up from the floor and I walked over to Ami's dressing table. I looked at her precious lipstick and I wondered, "What will become of you now?" Then I heard my eldest uncle Mamujan quietly tapped onto the room. He came over to me and he said, "It's time." In that moment, all I wanted to do was run back to Ami's dressing table, grab one of her favorite lipsticks and paint her red lips. One more time just before she left the house. So I asked my uncle,

"May I?" And he said, "Sorry, waiter, but that's not allowed. Just say a quiet prayer and let her go." So I said, surely we belong to the Almighty and to him we shall return and they took her away. The next night, after Ami's passing away, was the longest night of my life. Grief was everywhere I looked, even the pillows were crying. I remember my nanny,

sensed the angel of death to take someone's life, he first sensed the archangel grape Gabriel. You know why he does that? Because he doesn't want to scare the servant with the face of death, he just wants to give folks a gentle heads up. Maybe I'll love my grandmother, but this story doesn't make any sense. How can God be the most merciful one when he was showing so much cruelty to me, a mere 13-year-old? I didn't know what to do, but maybe maybe just

maybe, let's consider this, maybe that was the grand plan that Ami would go first and then this beautiful angel Gabriel would show up and take me to her to the other side. That would just work out perfectly because I didn't want to live without her, not for a single minute. I sat down waiting for Gabriel, no sign of him. And then I remembered my plan B.

“Oh, yeah, I had a plan B. I'm an only child, remember. We always have a plan B.”

Unknown to anyone else, I had secretly acquired a tube of rat poison. It was called rat all paste and was easily available back in those days in Indian homes. It was hiding under the bed and now I was clutching it in my hand. And in that moment, all I wanted to do was ingest the whole goddamn fucking deal. Just do it. She says the voice in my head. Your mother is dead.

She's never going to come back. She's never going to find out. And even if she does,

it's going to be too late. It's now, or never. And then I heard a soft voice in my head. It's hers. She says, promise me her she. If anything were to happen to me,

“you'll never do anything silly. You won't take your own life. You have to promise me.”

My mother, of course, she knew me so well. That was her dying wish. Oh, but come on, she's dead, right, says the voice. You can do this. My head is going to bust

into a million pieces. And then my eldest uncle, Mama Jan walks into the room again.

He holds me close to him. He patched me. And he says, I know you're going through so much right now. Words are not easy. There are no words to console you. You need help. As God for help, ask for His forgiveness. Ask for His mercy. Start praying. Sure, I don't need help, but forgiveness. Why should I be the one asking God for forgiveness? He should be the one asking me for my forgiveness. In fact, He should be begging me for my forgiveness and not the other way around.

Or she. You'll have so much time to have your one-on-one with God. Now is not the time for arguments. Just be the obedient little Indian girl. You are and start praying. Maybe Gabriel will show up. Maybe God will have mercy on you. Okay, so I start praying.

“The night is just ending and I can feel the darkness closing in on me. I think I pass out on”

the floor at some point. And then I heard the first birds chirping, the glimmer of sunshine, the curtains start moving. Now sign of Gabriel. He didn't show up. Maybe he forgot about me. Maybe he doesn't care enough, or he became busy with chores, because he's like working for so many different guards, I don't know. But the message is clear. I have to live. No one is going to come save me.

Slowly I find my legs. I get up. I slide the rat poison back under the bed, and I make my way to our knees dressing table. One by one I pick up a lipsticks, and I put them away in one of a favorite jewelry boxes. I close the lid and I say,

"Kothaf is a me, farewell. I never open that box again. I look at it from time to time, but I just let it be."

I now live in New Jersey, no prizes for guessing that I have a pretty formidable lipstick

shade of Chanel lipstick, creamy, glistening, just waiting to be applied. It cost me more than $30.

Didn't even bat an eye, I didn't convert it into Indian rupees, just paid up.

“Oh, I thought you must be so proud of me. But I haven't really gravitated towards the shiny reds,”

pink slab, you know, those the brighter colors that she loved. I'm more of a new girl myself, so I think that a me would have been really disappointed in my choice of lipstick shades. Hey, I'm me, I survived, I left to tell the tale. How thick hair, it's okay, Archiveta.

Why can't you tell the tale, wearing shiny red lipstick? Indian parents, there's no winning.

But I tried on me, I really tried. That was Archia Capadia. Archia is a global communications leader, storyteller, and mother of twins who has lived across three continents, but is now based in the New York Trieste area. Archia holds a master in film and television, and back in India, she was a journalist and nonfiction TV producer, creating some of the country's most iconic shows, including MTV Style Check,

and life's like that. She believes the best stories are the ones we live first and rewrite later.

Obviously, I had to know what her favorite lipstick was these days. She said it's a matte crayon lipstick from Indian brand called Sugar in the shade Lily Aldrin, a deep pink move color. I was on the subway the other day, and watched a mother lovingly apply some lip gloss to a young teen daughter's lips. She then took out a mirror from her bag so that the girl could

admire herself, and they both smiled at the reflection. It was a beautiful intimate moment

“that really made me miss my mother, who died when I was just 21. I think that learning to”

live through loss and grief is one of the scariest high-wire acts of all. Losing my mother in a young age really shaped me, and I wonder how it shaped Archia. She said that it made her realize early on that nothing is guaranteed, not people, not time, not even memories, in Archia's words. When you're afraid of forgetting the sound of someone's voice, you start looking for something tangible to hold on to.

When the person you rely on most disappears so suddenly, a part of you learns to keep some distance. It's not cynicism, it's self-protection. But it's also maybe intentional about the relationships I do have. If I let someone in, it means something. So losing her didn't just shape my grief,

“it shaped my approach to life. Hold on to what matters, accept that some things will fade,”

and build trust carefully, but hold heartedly when you find people who feel steady. Those are the words of Archia, Capadia. That's it for this episode of the Moth Radio Hour. Thanks to all of our story tellers for being brave enough to step out on the high-wire and share their stories, and to all of you for spending some time with us today. We appreciate you and hope you'll join us next time.

[Music] This episode of the Moth Radio Hour was produced by me, J. Allison, and Suzanne Rust, who also hosted this show. Coproducer is picky-meric, associate-producer Emily Kouch. The stories were directed by Jody Powell and Larry Rosen. The Moth's leadership team includes Christine Enormon, Marina Kluche, Sarah Austin, Genes, Jennifer Hicks and Jordan Cardinale, Caledonia, Karen's Kate Tellers,

Sarah Jane Johnson and Patricia Eurania. Dave Laura came to us through the Moth's community

Moth stories are true as remembered in a firm by the story tellers. Our theme music is by the

“drift, other music in this hour is from Epidemic Sound, podcast music, production support,”

from Davy Sumner. The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic public media in Woods Hole,

Massachusetts. Special thanks to our friends at Odyssey, including Executive Producer Leah Ries Dennis.

“For more about our podcast for information on pitching us your own story and to learn all about”

the Moth, go to our website, theMoth.org.

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