Post to the Host

Comments from the Week of 04.30.23

Dear Garrison,

As a humorist who also has a violist for a wife, do you or she tire of the endless viola jokes? Or have you made up any of your own? How about some violinist jokes for self-defense?

Jon Obestar

I haven’t heard any violist jokes in years. I think they’ve become forbidden territory as being cruel to the weaker and more vulnerable. I love the viola as a harmony instrument and even the mellow tone of a solo viola is very appealing to me. It’s pleasant hearing her practice in the next room. But humor is a changing terrain — dare I even mention that there used to be “moron” jokes? Glad they’re gone and now I’m waiting to hear a good AI joke. GK

Hello, Mr. Keillor.
I’m 32 years old and I grew up listening to your show. I have particularly vivid memories on road trips with my family between my home in Minneapolis and my aunt and uncle’s house in western Wisconsin. I have recently been listening through recordings of The News from Lake Wobegon that went up on Spotify not too long ago and I’m saddened that this seems to be a fading art in so many ways, at least the way you did it.
I don’t have anything to ask of you, but thank you for carrying the storytelling torch for so long. I now live in Brooklyn, New York, with my wife. I’d be honored to buy you a beer.
All the best,
David

I’m sure we’d have plenty to talk about, two Minnesotans stranded in the big city. I like New York a lot and hope Brooklyn agrees with you. I like the readiness of New Yorkers to speak up and say their piece. Minnesotans suffer from low self-esteem and I can’t tell you how many times I’ve gone to a performance in Minneapolis that was wretched and pretentious and badly done and it got a standing ovation and a four-star review in the Strib. We could reminisce about road trips too — mine were west to Spokane — and I guess we could reminisce about Lake Wobegon. And maybe you’d give me an idea for a new monologue. GK

Hello,

I’ve been given the task of choosing and reading a love poem for my sister’s wedding. Do you have a favorite or two that you might recommend? She’s not very religious so Biblical references are out.

Amanda Morris

Since feeling is first by E.E. Cummings or When in disgrace with fortune by W. Shakespeare or Burns’s My love is like a red, red rose that’s newly sprung in June or my sonnet You made crusty bread rolls filled with chunks of Brie or — oh, there are hundreds to choose from. GK

I have been to many PHC shows in the Twin Cities and I’m a big fan. MY VERY FAVORITE show was a couple of years ago at the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville. You performed for a couple plus hours and then you gave your band a break and you started singing hymns. The audience started joining in and even started singing in harmony. The acoustics were phenomenal. It gave me chills. It was awesome. I think it went on for about 30 minutes. I have always loved your voice, as I have always said you can harmonize with any of your guests. Thanks for the years of entertainment.

Debra Killian

I remember the acoustic of that room too. The Ryman, as you probably know, was built as a gospel tabernacle and that high ceiling and the wood pews make something magical down there, and of course the audience included a large proportion of Baptists and Methodists, maybe fallen ones but they still could harmonize, and what you heard that night is something that won’t exist in fifty years. Churches have turned from worship to performance and the old hymns are not heard so often. Sunday morning at my church in New York we sang Shall We Gather at the River and What a Friend We Have in Jesus and even though we’re New York Episcopalians, we put our shoulders to them and made the statuary weep. All I did at the Ryman was give them a key, start them off, and then switch to bass, and I didn’t wave my hands at them as a choir director would. It was moving to me too. GK

I just had to let you know that for some of us PHC was perfectly designed for THC. I’m a 76-year-old woman and I always had an edible before listening to PHC, including for many years before it was legal.
It helped me follow the twists and turns of the monologue. I was convinced that GK had to have been under the influence to write such meandering plot lines and always coming back and tying up the loose ends before the story was over.

Signed,

D.

I was done with drugs around ’76 because they did nothing for me. I never used alcohol on Saturday before the show. The guy you heard was stone-cold sober, a little jittery, sometimes terror-stricken, but I just kept talking, no script in sight, and tried to come back full circle. And your memory, I must say, is very merciful. GK

What advice do you have for someone older than you who feels he still has not reached his potential?

Leroy Cook

I feel exactly the same way, Mr. Cook, and the advice is the same as would be offered to a twenty-year-old and that is, Follow Your Heart. It isn’t easily followed. Ambition can lead us in delusional directions and we need to focus on what our true calling is. Good luck. And don’t waste time on regret. GK

Dear GK,
Your posting from 4/26 left me bewildered, confused. How so? For decades your profound wisdom has permeated Lake Wobegon narratives, and now your autobiography, That Time of Year. But this morning’s post felt as if you had adopted “manufactured identities” of a different sort — not as metaphor, nor as satire. But as deception. Were your next three live appearances really canceled? Did your finances suddenly disappear, leading you to make $20 solicitation-appeals from your readers? Did your wife really abandon you?? Where — in your post today — have you introduced Kellyanne Conway’s “alternative facts”?
Margaret Wheatley (in Who Do We Choose to Be? (2017, p. 19–20) writes, “social media enables a culture of manufactured identities, where people create any self that ensures their popularity in the Digital Age. Identity has changed from a culturally transmitted sense of self within a group to an individual one, where you can be anything you want. Ideas of objective truth and integrity disappear. Ethics and taking a stand don’t matter; popularity does.”
Perhaps your intention was to illustrate the fluidity (and ventriloquism) of your own identity. Fair enough. Sometimes an object lesson delivered right — between-the-eyes will make the point most succinctly. Nonetheless, I still felt a sense of betrayal — and wished that you had included a gentle warning: “Caution: Satire is in full swing in today’s words!”
I remain a loyal fan. Like you, I’m a grateful beneficiary of world-class medical care at Mayo Clinic. May your subtle, ever-more-cheerful voice continue to bless us all. Today — and in the sweet by-and-by.
Gratefully,
Rev. Dave

Overland Park, Kansas

The column was a joke and I’m sorry it missed the mark. There were elements of parody in it and I didn’t make my purpose clear enough, for which I ask to be forgiven. GK

Dear Garrison,
Thank you for writing about gratitude, and about telling people they are important to you.
When I was a preschool teacher, I would have the children thank the janitor, the milk deliverer, the gardeners, and anyone who came into our school to help.
When I eat breakfast, I think about all the people it took to bring me my glass of orange juice, from the growers to the truck drivers.
When I’m in an airport restroom, I thank the janitor for keeping the restroom clean.
Many people who help us daily are “invisible,” but they shouldn’t be.
I’m glad you realize this, and have been thanking them.
Thank you for many years of inspiration, and laughs.

Sandy Gilman (on an island off the coast of Maine)

I’m trying to make up for years of ingratitude when I, a very fortunate man, managed to find things to complain about, but now I’m at an age when I know people who are deep in suffering and this gives a person perspective. I hobble off to medical clinics, get painfully in and out of cabs, walk gingerly up stairs, and when I come across health workers who are kind and even (God bless them) have a sense of humor, it lights up my day and I’m grateful. GK

Hi, Garrison.

Reading your take on workplace toxicity and bosses from hell brought this blessedly retired woman back to the Bad Ol’ Days. I had two consecutive bosses at my workplace — the first was clearly undiagnosed bipolar (with a not-so-hidden animosity toward anyone with a more advanced academic degree than she had), the second specialized in micromanagement that extended right down to the placement of my office furniture. One coworker who retired shortly before me almost fell down laughing when she opened the congratulatory card I had given her and it played “Take this job and shove it — I ain’t working here no more.”

But there were other toxic workplaces that topped ours — one hospital I frequently had occasion to call for test results was so dysfunctional that no matter which department you were calling, the person you spoke with was surly. It was a good reminder that there’s always someone having a worse day than you are.

Pat McC.

Those workplaces had managers, part of whose job was to create a culture of caring and good manners and mutual respect. I’m sorry for people who get stuck in toxic places. Live light, maintain mobility, until you find your rightful place. But of course conditions can change suddenly. I’m lucky to be a writer. I work solo. My workplace is the kitchen table and my wife runs this place and I love her dearly. Nothing better than that. GK

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