“This Time Tomorrow” with Emma Straub
When author Emma Straub’s dad got sick, he told her in the hospital one night “You should write a book about a daughter visiting her father in the hospital.” So that’s what she did, and that book became This Time Tomorrow. Emma and Nora talk about Emma’s latest novel and the realities of grief after losing a parent.
Read Emma’s GQ essay, My Father’s Rolex.
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Transcripts may not appear in their final version and are subject to change.
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Nora: If there are two tales as old as time, one of them is the midlife crisis.
There’s just something about turning 40…or 35…or 50…or whatever feels like the midpoint of your potential lifespan to make you look back at the choices you made to get to wherever you are right now.
What would have happened if you’d gone on that second date…or skipped it?
What would have changed if you’d taken another job, if you’d missed that train, if you’d returned that phone call or sent it to voicemail?
If you had the chance to wake up one day in the life you used to have…with all the knowledge you have today…what would you do?
If there’s another tale as old as time…it’s grief. It’s the process of losing a person you love and living with that loss.
This Time Tomorrow is a novel about longing, grief and love and acceptance…told through time travel.
And I…had no idea of any of that when I picked it up.
Nora: [00:08:19] I never know what a book is about before I pick it up. Oh, my God, reader. [00:08:22][3.7]
Emma: [00:08:23] Oh, my God. [00:08:23][0.3]
Nora: [00:08:24] I won't read the back. I won't read anything about a book if you tell me. Oh, I think you would like this book. I'm just going to blindly trust you. I'm going on vibes I'm going on. I can. I've loved everything I was written. Why wouldn't I love this? [00:08:38][14.5]
[18.5]
Emma: [00:09:00] First of all, thank you. That's so nice. Of so nice of you. And that's a crazy way to go through life. Like, that's a crazy way as a bookseller. I mean, as a bookseller, I guess I kind of wish that, like, that was how it worked all the time. Like, I wish that everyone was like you, where you could just be like, No, no, it's this one. This one. What's it about? Who cares? Not telling you secret. [00:09:25][24.9]
That’s the author, Emma Straub, who is also the co-owner of the Books Are Magic bookstoreS in Brooklyn. And it’s a small miracle that we were even able to talk for several reasons: First, we booked the interview for a Monday. And boy did Monday delivery! Outside of my closet, there’s SOMEONE taking a dead tree down. It’s 101 degrees and the air conditioning won’t work. And across the country in Brooklyn, Emma’s locksmith is trying to fix her front door.
Emma: [00:16:53] Hold on. I'm sorry. This is Albert, my locksmith. Oh, my God. Nora, I. [00:16:56][2.8]
Emma: [00:16:56] Swear to God. [00:16:56][0.5]
Emma: [00:16:57] It's okay. Hold, please. I'll be right back. I'm so sorry. [00:17:00][2.4]
Emma: [00:17:04] Hello. I'll be right there [00:18:12][67.6]
While Emma is answering the door, my computer starts to overheat
Nora: [00:18:36] My God, Marcel, my computer is so fucking loud. Yes. It's so bad. Yeah. [00:18:57][21.4]
But it all works out, and we get into it. And because most people don’t select books using my blind selection process, you might want to actually know what the book is about in some more specific terms.
On her 40th birthday, Alice is…not thriving. Her life isn’t bad, it’s just…not great.. She has a small apartment in Brooklyn. She has just broken up with her boyfriend. She’s working in admissions at the private high school she graduated from. Her father, who raised her, is dying…and her friends are married with kids and living in the suburbs
She drunkenly wanders back to her childhood home, falls asleep in a tool shed and wakes up to find herself in her 16-year-old body and her 16-year-old universe. Her brain is 40, but her body and her world are in 1996.
Her dad is in 1996.
And he’s not yet sick.
She spends the book trying to figure out how to get back to the present day, back to her 40-year-old body and universe. But she also gets to see herself and her father through her 40-year-old eyes. The dad she left in the present day was a shell of the father she’d grown up with. But the father she lived with as a teenager was in his 50s…ancient when you’re a teenager, but YOUNG when you’re 40.
Emma’s own dad died in September 2022, about four months after this time
Nora: [00:08:51] Tell me about what your life is like as you put this book together, as you even come up with the idea for this book.
Emma: [00:09:40] so my dad was in the hospital in in 2020. In August. I mean, my dad had been in and out of the hospital. I would say, for the last 15 years. It was not it was not unusual for him to be in some sort of a health. Crisis. And but in 2020, he spent a few months in the hospital and it was so different than it ever had been before because it was, I don't know, like even though my dad was not literally by any means like a Superman kind of guy. Like, this was a man who, like, did not believe in exercise, but did believe in vodka and cigarets, you know. So it's not that I was like, he's so healthy. He's going to live forever. It was more just that. Like he had always been fine. Like he is, just like, you know, his family is from Wisconsin and like, they're all like, enormous, sturdy people. Sorry. My mother is texting me from her friend's phone because she doesn't have service on their walk. Okay. [00:11:06][85.8]
Nora: [00:11:07] You know, Judy, it's not the time. [00:11:08][1.2]
Emma: [00:11:10] Literally everyone is named Judy or Susan or Barbara. Okay. Sorry. [00:11:15][4.7]
Nora: [00:11:15] You're looking for a baby name and you're like, I want it to be so unique. [00:11:18][2.7]
Emma: [00:11:18] Yeah. Yeah. [00:11:20][1.6]
Nora: [00:11:21] Pick a boomer name or I think the most subversive name you can choose is probably Jennifer. Yeah. [00:11:25][4.1]
Emma: [00:11:26] Yeah. [00:11:26][0.0]
Nora: [00:11:27] Choose the most common name for the women, you know, And then name your baby that there will not be another Jennifer in the class of 2030? [00:11:33][6.7]
Emma: [00:11:34] Yeah, like there's no Stephanie. There's no Jennifer. [00:11:37][3.0]
Nora: [00:11:38] Not a single one. There's no stakes being born anymore. [00:11:41][3.8]
Emma: [00:11:43] Okay. Oh. [00:11:44][1.7]
Emma: [00:11:46] Okay, So, so, so. So my dad was in the hospital and it was August of 2020. And so I'd been I'd been writing a book, I've been writing a novel. And all of a sudden, you know, I was not writing anything because it was the spring of 2020, and I was. Suddenly doing like Zoom first grade and Zoom preschool. And so I stopped working on what I was working on. And when my dad was in the hospital, we we talked a lot about books and we talked about writing and and we. And one day he was just like, You should. [00:12:31][45.1]
Emma: [00:12:31] Write a book about a woman visiting her father in the hospital. I was like, okay, what a prompt. [00:12:39][7.1]
Emma: [00:12:39] And it like. I mean, it sounds so, so weird and implausible, but like, I mean, if you just remember, I'm sure you do as we all do, like how implausible, like everything felt in the spring of 2020 and. I just. I saw it all so clearly. Like, I saw the idea, which was. Yes, about a woman visiting her father in a hospital. But yes, it was time travel. And yes, it was like the nineties and yes, it was the Upper West Side and all of these things. And I also. Like. I also understood. What it would feel like, I think in the way where like you bump into something and you know that it's going to leave a huge like purple bruise. And I was ready for that bruise. Like, I wanted that. [00:13:48][68.5]
[321.8]
Emma: [00:14:24] But yeah, it just came from being like, like this is happening. This is really happening this time. Like. Whether whether he dies right now, in the next month or whatever, or if he lives for. Another ten years. Like it's it's really happening. Like I was I was looking straight at it at his death, my dad's death for the first time. And when I started writing it, like. I mean, it's the kind of thing that, like your publisher, my publisher says, like, do not say this to people. [00:15:06][42.8]
Emma: [00:15:07] Do not. [00:15:07][0.2]
Emma: [00:15:09] Don't go on Nora's podcast and say this. I wrote it so fast. I wrote it so fast because I was ready to write it. You know, like the only book that I've written this fast. Ever was the vacationers, which was because I had spent like two years writing it badly. And then I was like, Oh, I should. [00:15:37][27.4]
Emma: [00:15:37] Send them on vacation. [00:15:38][1.0]
Emma: [00:15:39] And then I was like, Okay. And it was so easy because I already knew all the characters, because I had already written the book like 12 Times the Wrong Way. Yeah, So I wrote it so fast. And like I. Can't imagine that I will ever feel more grateful to myself for doing something when I did it. [00:16:09][29.8]
Nora: [00:19:53] so your dad gives you your dad gives you this idea, gives you this nugget of an idea, which is you should write a book about a woman visiting her dad in the hospital. This book pours out of you, and this is me analyzing you. A reason that it pours out of you is because there is so much of you in this book. And I think there's a lot of us and a lot of every author in there Fiction, right? Even if it's not pulled from your life, you're pulling characters scenes. Turns of phrase. Our work becomes an expression of our worldview, even if we're trying to express somebody else's worldview. But the main character did grow up on the Upper West Side. You do set it in the year where you turned 16 and. This book is not just about time travel. It is not just about a woman facing her father's mortality. It is also about this time of life where, regardless of how alive, where on the alive spectrum your parents lie. Yes. You also have to think about your own life and the fact that you are if you are lucky. At the halfway point. [00:21:04][71.0]
Emma: [00:21:05] Yeah. [00:21:05][0.0]
Nora: [00:21:06] And thinking about all of your choices, thinking about what led you to this point and what could have led to you. Just like. One step in either direction. [00:21:18][12.6]
Emma: [00:21:22] And I mean, like I, you know, my what I, what I have come to believe and what is true in the book is that lives are pretty sticky. You know is that like we can't that it would be hard it would be hard to change your life. Enormously given like, you know, just like a few little variables like that, that that we are who we are. But of course, it's also true like. The decisions that you make will lead to other decisions. Like The only reason that I have a bookstore right now is. [00:22:13]
Emma: [00:22:13] Because. [00:22:13][0.0]
Emma: [00:22:16] When I was extremely pregnant, when I was eight months pregnant with my second child. My husband wanted to move like our place was just, like, too small. And I was like, Well, okay, if we're going to move, we have. [00:22:33]Emma: [00:22:33] To move. [00:22:33][0.1]
Emma: [00:22:34] Close to my favorite bookstore, which is where I used to work this bookstore called Book Court, that was in Cobble Hill for 30 years. And so we did. And then. [00:22:47][13.7]
Emma: [00:22:49] The. [00:22:49][0.0]
Emma: [00:22:49] Court closed because that because the owners retired. Like it wasn't like a. [00:22:55][5.4]
Emma: [00:22:55] Sad like, oh, whoa, the fate of independent. [00:22:58][2.9]
Emma: [00:22:58] Bookstores like it was. It was great for them. They sold the buildings, like whatever. But I was like. [00:23:05][7.5]
Emma: [00:23:06] Whoa, so what am I supposed to do? [00:23:08][2.2]
Emma: [00:23:09] I just moved here so I could be close to the bookstore. And like, my, like, postpartum hormones. Told me quite clearly that we could either move again. Or we could just open a bookstore. We could just open our own bookstore. And so that's what we did, despite, like, not knowing anything and not knowing anything. And here we are six years later, you know, and like, it wouldn't. My my life is. Largely the same like. The main things are the same, but there's also this huge addition. Yeah, that has really changed my life. So yeah, I mean, I do think that there's something about turning 40 and. You know, that really makes you look at your choices and look at your decisions and ask if they were the right ones or the wrong ones and like. You know, I. I mean, I know I have a handful of friends. Who, like myself included, I guess, who have started totally different careers after turning 40. Men. Women like all different kinds of people. Because I think it is when you ask yourself, like. Like, is this it? Is this it? [00:24:51][101.3]
Nora: [00:24:54] Yeah. Is this. And what have I done? Yeah. What have I done? In good ways and bad ways. And. You never know what choice is, the choice that led you to the other choice. And with perspective, Right. You can you can look back and sometimes, you know, when you're doing it, sometimes you do not when you're doing it. But the worst part about being a person is that. We grow from those mistakes and then we would never have made them. This version of ourselves would have never made them. [00:25:34][39.5]
Emma: [00:25:36] I love. [00:25:36][0.2]
Emma: [00:25:36] I feel like you should have a whole other podcast that's just called the worst part of being a person. [00:25:40][4.0]
Emma: [00:25:41] The worst being a. [00:25:42][0.9]
Nora: [00:25:42] Person. It's just and there's so many. [00:25:44][1.8]
Emma: [00:25:45] But it's like. [00:25:45][0.5]
Nora: [00:25:46] You could not you couldn't pay me to be 16 again. [00:25:49][3.0]
Emma: [00:25:50] Yeah, but. [00:25:50][0.6]
Nora: [00:25:52] I don't think that there is a person listening to this who, if they did wake up. After a rager on their 40th birthday. If they did wake up in their 16 year old body, who wouldn't see themselves and see the world and see all of those choices differently? And I wonder how fun that must've been to write and to kind of like re-experience that self. I know that it's horrifying to have your words quoted back at you, but I underline this part where you're describing the character's 16 year old body and the realization that she's awoken in that 16 year old body and her appreciation for her beauty. That, of course, when she was 16, she thought, oh, God, you know, every time she looked in the mirror. [00:26:46][53.9]
Emma: [00:26:46] Yeah. Yeah. [00:26:47][0.6]
Emma: [00:26:48] Yes. I mean, because, you know, we all I think I think many of us have that experience where, you know, if you look at photographs of yourself from five years ago, ten years ago, 20 years ago, you think I was. [00:27:01][14.0]
Emma: [00:27:02] So beautiful. [00:27:03][1.3]
Emma: [00:27:04] I was so young. I had. [00:27:06][2.0]
Emma: [00:27:06] No idea that. [00:27:08][1.5]
Emma: [00:27:08] That's what I looked like. I thought I was like a hunchbacked. [00:27:12][3.4]
Emma: [00:27:13] Shriveled, lumpy monster. [00:27:17][3.7]
Emma: [00:27:19] You. [00:27:19][0.0]
Emma: [00:27:19] Know, like. [00:27:20][1.4]
Emma: [00:27:22] I think most teenage girls. That's what they see when they when they look in the mirror is is someone who is. Malformed and broken. [00:27:36][14.2]
Emma: [00:27:38] You know, like that. It was. It was. It was so it was so much fun. [00:27:45][7.2]
Emma: [00:27:45] And like, what what I loved about it was that, like. I mean it. Let me be it. Let me be in those places again. It let me time travel like it absolutely worked. The book works, and I think it would work. I think it works for other people, too. You know, we're like, you know, maybe. You know, maybe other people didn't like chain smoke. Like, as as like a 16 year old the way I did or didn't drink, I don't know. Too much malt liquor or whatever, like all the things that I was doing. But I think that. Oh, my hope, my like most fervent desire is that this book works as well for the reader as it did for me. And I think like part of it, part of it is that like as a as a writer, as a fiction writer, I do I do think about my audience, like, probably more than I should, probably more than is healthy, especially after opening the bookstore. Like, I do feel really aware of the audience and their expectations and my readership. But with this book, because of when I wrote it. And because of what? You know what what was happening sort of locally and globally. I didn't think about anyone else at all. And I think that like. I hope that it really is a case of the, you know, the hyper specific actually making space for everyone. You know, where like, if I if I'd written a book that was like, you know, she was 16, living in a nameless town with, you know, whatever. Like, if I had if I, if I had tried to make it as universal as possible, I don't think it would work as well. Like, I think that I you know, I like I've always been scared of writing books that take place in New York City. Because I'm like, it's New York. Like people have feelings about New York City. Like, if you love it, if you hate it, if you're a native, if you're if you've never been if you went once on a school trip and got lost at the Statue of Liberty, I don't know. Like people have their own associations and it's been so well captured in art and literature and film. And this time I just like I put aside all of those fears and I was just like, Here's mine, here's mine, here's what mine really, really looked like. My world in 1996. [00:30:42][177.2]
Emma: [00:30:46] Yeah. [00:30:46][0.0]
Emma: [00:30:47] It was the. I liked being there. [00:30:48][1.1]
[533.5]
Nora: [00:37:51] You're writing this and Your dad is still alive as you're writing this. How would much of. This process, this story, do share with him while he's still here? [00:38:02][10.7]
Emma: [00:38:02] Yeah. So I so I wrote the whole thing and I told him, I mean, you know, we had talked about it in the hospital, but then he was in the hospital for. Months after that and had this horrible, like, intense lifesaving life prolonging heart surgery. And then he came home and I mean, you know, he was in rough shape for a long time. And so I didn't talk to him about it for, I would say, a few a few months. And then I did. Like, I sort of reminded him, like, by the way, like, I really I really am. I really am writing this book. We talked. We talked about this. We talked. You were totally on board. And he was he was still. Totally fine with it, which is the only reason that I, I mean, the only reason that I wrote this book is because I knew he would be 100% okay with it. Which is not. Which is no small ask. You know, like it's a crazy. It's a it's a it's a wild thing to do to somebody. But then I finished and I gave it to him. And I know he was still like he. He was not. He wasn't like, totally. Healthy again. But so it took him a little while. And then. He he read it and he said, Emma, you. Know, it's. It's a lot of personal stuff in there. And I said, I know there is like whatever is. Is there anything that you want me to change? Like, is there anything that feels too revealing or, you know, that you want me to take out? And you said, What? What do you think? I want you to change? And I said, nothing. And he said, That's right. [00:40:05][123.1]
Emma: [00:40:06] And it's fucking gone. So. So then thank God. [00:40:10][3.3]
Nora: [00:40:10] Because honestly, I wasn't. Yeah. Well, what parts were you afraid would be too personal for him? [00:40:16]
Emma: [00:40:23] So my dad, Peter Straub, was a horror novelist. He wrote scary ass books. They were. They started out more like, supernaturally, but pretty quickly. Like certainly even in my childhood, they ended up being much more like dark psychological horror novels. Like, much more about like. Like the real horrible things that humans do to each other rather than like vampires. So he wrote that kind of book. And in the novel, the the Father character is a science fiction writer who has written like one, like super sort of campy time travel book that has been turned into a long running television show. And like, that was part of how I, like, gave myself permission to do it, is that I made sure that the character, the two characters in the book, the father and the daughter. Were were were fundamentally different from me and my dad. Like the the daughter character is turning 40 and she is she's an only child. She is single. She is child free, which are three things that I am not. And the father is single. And has written just this one. One book, you know, And like my parents were married for 56 years, and I just I wanted to take out everybody, you know? Yeah. I wanted to take out everybody else because I didn't want it to turn into a thing where, like, I didn't want anyone. Else in my family to feel, I don't know, like misrepresented or hurt or anything. Like I was just like, no, zip, zip, snip, snip, snip. It's not about you. It's not about you. But. My dad like he read the book. Twice. Three times. Four times. Five or six times. Like I think probably five or six times total. And that was still like, you know, months before it came out. So we had we had a lot of time with with it and with each other, which was incredible because we could talk about it. And like my dad and I were always like. Hilarious together, like hilarious, like a truly great team. [00:43:18][174.9]
Emma: [00:43:19] And. [00:43:19][0.0]
Emma: [00:43:21] Much more likely to be sarcastic and like, teasing rather than be like, I love you so much. Like we were. That was not like gross. GROSS That's GROSS. And what this book did was it let us have those conversations much more plainly than we ever had in my 40 years of life previous, like it made it. It. Just like he understood. He understood what I was doing. But I mean, he was also hilarious when I gave it to him, like a few months after I gave it to him. We were talking about the episode of. There was an episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm where Albert Brooks stages his own memorial service so that he can listen to what his friends say about him. And we were talking about that, and my dad was like, you. [00:44:24][62.9]
Emma: [00:44:24] Know, but I think I would like to do that. And I was like, Dad, I. [00:44:27][3.6]
Emma: [00:44:28] Literally just wrote you a whole novel. I wrote you a. [00:44:30][2.1]
Emma: [00:44:30] Whole novel. [00:44:31][0.4]
Emma: [00:44:32] About how much I love you. And he said, Yes, but what will the poet say? [00:44:37][4.8]
Emma: [00:44:45] Yeah. And he meant it. You know what I mean? Like, he was. [00:44:48][2.9]
Emma: [00:44:48] He was 100% joking and teasing me. And also. [00:44:51][2.9]
Emma: [00:44:52] He 100%. [00:44:52][0.3]
Emma: [00:44:54] Meant it. And like, I mean, I just, like, I will never be. I can't imagine feeling more grateful. I mean, I said this earlier, sort of about like. About being able to write a book. In the time that I wrote it, where like he was able he was able to read it and appreciate it and more importantly, like it made us. It meant that, like when he died. [00:45:26][32.3]
Emma: [00:45:29] I. [00:45:29][0.0]
Emma: [00:45:31] I mean, I felt obviously profoundly sad. I still feel profoundly sad every day. But I also felt 100% square, you know, like I didn't feel like. Like there was nothing that I was like, Oh, I never got to tell. [00:45:51][20.2]
Emma: [00:45:51] Him. [00:45:51][0.0]
Emma: [00:45:52] Whatever. And there was no like, she never got to tell me whatever. Like, I just felt 100% like, rock solid, which, like, I. I can't imagine. Like it. I mean, it seems. That seems impossible. Like it seems impossible. But it's true that like and that was that was what writing this book did. Like, that was what writing this book did. And so, like, to me, you know, like it looks it looks like a. [00:46:26][33.7]
Emma: [00:46:26] Book, you know, it looks like a book. It just looks like any other book. [00:46:29][3.0]
Emma: [00:46:30] Which is hilarious to me that like when you walk into my bookstore, any bookstore. You're like, Oh yeah, that's a novel about the novel. [00:46:36][6.7]
Emma: [00:46:37] That's a novel. [00:46:37][0.2]
Emma: [00:46:38] Like, as. Like they're all the same when like, this one. Absolutely. Changed my relationship with my dad. Well, no, it didn't. It didn't. It's not that it changed the relationship, but it helped us. Clarify the relationship like. Audibly and vocally and. And publicly, you know, like it's it's a pretty amazing thing. It's a it's an it's an amazing gift. It's an amazing gift to him and to me. [00:47:20][42.3]
[393.3]
Nora: [00:58:58] I was also thinking about how, like, I mean, objects are a form of time travel memories are a form of time travel and. I'm wondering, what are things that sort of bring your dad back to you or experiences that bring your dad back to you? [00:59:14][16.4]
Emma: [00:59:15] Yeah. [00:59:15][0.0]
Emma: [00:59:15] I mean, you know. [00:59:16][0.6]
Emma: [00:59:16] I have. [00:59:16][0.4]
Emma: [00:59:18] I mean, I have all of I have so many of his things, right? So I have lots of objects. [00:59:23][4.3]
Emma: [00:59:25] And I have. [00:59:25][0.4]
Emma: [00:59:27] I have still now all of his like. Not all of his, but like a lot of his friends. Like I. I feel really lucky that. Because I have the same job. As he did. I know so many people who worked with him in various ways. Like the other week, I went in to record like a little. Author's note that I wrote for the paperback about my dad dying just to be like peace. Things have. [01:00:12][44.5]
Emma: [01:00:12] Changed. And the guy. [01:00:16][4.2]
Emma: [01:00:18] Who was the engineer at Penguin Random House was like, I recorded your dad. [01:00:22][4.5]
Emma: [01:00:23] I you know. [01:00:24][0.6]
Emma: [01:00:25] And I mean, like, that kind of stuff happens to me all the time. All the time. So I feel like at least right now, like I'm living in a world and I, I exist in a world that is full of memories of him and interactions with him. But then, like the real the real answer. That like I haven't. Touched yet are his books that like. He wrote 20 plus books and he is in. [01:01:05][40.3]
Emma: [01:01:06] All of them. [01:01:06][0.6]
Emma: [01:01:07] He is in all of them. I mean. [01:01:08][1.4]
Emma: [01:01:09] Like what? [01:01:09][0.2]
Emma: [01:01:10] You know, you said this at the beginning that like, you know, this book. I am clearly in. But fiction writers are always putting themselves in their books in in ways big and small. And so, you know, my dad was from Milwaukee. And so, like, there's a lot of Milwaukee in all of his books, even the ones that take place like on a Caribbean island, like, guess what? They're still. [01:01:35][25.4]
Emma: [01:01:35] Milwaukee. They're so Milwaukee. [01:01:37][1.7]
Emma: [01:01:38] And like his, he loved jazz And so there there's. There are jazz musicians and jazz music playing in the background of all of his books. His favorite. Foods and drinks. You know, like, I just like places that he loved, things that he loved. Are like his books are full of those things and like, I can't I can't even look at them right now. Like, I can't because it's it's too it's too much. It's too much. Just like I can't like I have all these voicemails and emails and videos and things and I can't I can't look at them too much, you know, like there's one voice that I could listen to just because it only makes me laugh. Because he said it's like just a joke. Like it's just him. Like being like, this is. [01:02:44][65.8]
Emma: [01:02:45] Worse than an. [01:02:45][0.6]
Emma: [01:02:46] Apartment to F and you're making too much noise. Like, it's literally nonsense. But yeah, like, I feel like I'm not ready. I'm not ready yet to dive back into his books. Just because they're so rich with him. [01:03:05][19.6]
Emma: [01:03:06] Yeah. [01:03:06][0.0]
Emma: [01:03:07] But, like, that's that's the very best part of having. A parent who. Is an artist, you know, who leaves like a like an enormous body of work behind. And like, that's what that is. What makes me so excited about this book of mine is that like that, my kids. We'll have. This record. Of me. And my dad together. [01:03:47][39.6]
Emma: [01:03:48] You know. Forever. [01:03:54][5.8]
Nora: There are rules to time travel stories, one of them being this: you can’t stay there. You can’t stay in the past or the future, not without ruining something or everything. The place we belong always needs us.
And that’s true in life, too. We can only live this version of our lives, even when it’s one we didn’t choose and do not prefer.
Our time travel is limited to our memories, to the objects left behind, to wandering through our minds exploring the what ifs. What would we do or say if we could go back and see our people again…
Voicemail_12144500164_20230508: [00:00:12] I would. Just hold him and I would let him eat a whole pint of blueberries because I used to ration them over a week. And then I would just let me the whole thing this time and I would take a nap with him, even though he was not a fan of contact naps. I would just make that happen and I, I would just have a normal day. I would just have like a really normal day, probably at our house because we loved staying home and. Yeah, that's what I would do. Not believe in anything special. Just the magic of a boring day. [00:01:05][53.1]
Voicemail_17155515624_2023050: [00:00:01] Hi, Nora. My name is Pam. [00:00:04][3.6]
Voicemail_17155515624_2023050: [00:00:21] You know, my husband died when he was 32. And one of the things that I still think about, I thought about a lot in that first year following his death was all of the times that, you know, would be a really beautiful day outside. And we would both say, I wish we didn't have to work today and we could just go on an adventure always with our dog and go hiking or backpacking or do something. And, you know, instead we were always responsible, usually responsible adults and and did not take that PTO or call in sick. And so, yes, if I could go back in time, I would take those days off. Absolutely, because we were saving them up for some future vacation That never happened. And it would have been great to go on those spontaneous adventures every time we wanted. [00:01:26][64.5]
Voicemail_16128601553_20230504: [00:00:24] It's interesting because if I were to go back in time, would I be the same age as I am now to see my dead parents? Or would I be the useless, dirty diaper crawling, snot nosed who wouldn't understand anything? So that's a conundrum so far. To go back as a grown up, to see my mom at 29 would be kind of weird and creepy because she's about my daughter's age. But I would like to. Yeah. Would I want to talk to her. Let her know how I turned out, because that was the hardest thing for her dying was knowing that she wasn't going to get to see my sister and I grow or would I just listen, let her put forth whatever she wanted to pour out of her mind or all those extra special things. But that's the problem with losing somebody young it's all existential.[00:01:15][51.5]
Voicemail_19126653999: [00:00:02] If I could go back to when my husband was alive. He died when I was 28, and I'm almost 35 now. I would spend most of whatever time we had just lying in bed. Spooning. Making love and talking. And just being. And I would have gotten into therapy while he was sick. I wouldn't have cared about people's opinions and judgments when I was making decisions about our prenuptial agreement and my future and how I was or wasn't. Financially protected or legally protected. And. I would have not given up my career to be a caregiver. Even though it was such an honor to give for him. Had I known that I would be able to get my career back after six years, I would not have done that. And I would have delegated more and asked people to bring us food and advocated for myself whether that was making my own food, meal, train or whatever. And I would have taken more breaks from caregiving for things like a massage or meditation or anything, because I'm also still really challenged physically from the way that I abused my body and neglected my physical, mental, emotional, spiritual needs for so long. I love him. I miss him. And I would do a lot of things differently if I knew then what I know now. [00:00:02][0.0]
Voicemail_17192467359: [00:00:04] If I could go back to when my person, which today is my Grandma was alive, I would just ask her, why is everything so hard? What do you do about it? Which what sense did you make of it in 94 and a half years? And were you really happier living completely alone because you sure seemed like it [00:00:32][28.1]
Listener: If I could go back in time and spend some more time with my husband, who I lost in October of 22 when he was 31 years old because he had a heart attack. I would go back to the very first day that we met and do our eight years all over again. Everything. Every single day I would do exactly the same. I wouldn't change a single thing. I wouldn't change a single fight. I wouldn't change a single fact. I wouldn't change a single day even knowing that I would lose him on October 31st. 2022. I would go back and meet him and do everything all over again. Thanks, Norah. I'm glad I got to say this out loud. [00:00:01][0.0]
Listener: ] Hi, Nora, This is Patrick in Virginia. You know who I am? Anyhoo, So if I could go back to when Laura was still alive. Well, first thing, I would make a lot of bets on, like, sporting events and stuff where I already know the outcome for them. Time traveling from the future. And then with the money I accumulate from that, we never really got to travel a lot. And it's something I've done a lot since she died, and there's been things I've done that I think she would have really enjoyed. So. I will just take some time and travel for and just appreciate our time together a lot more. It's just amazing how fleeting everything can be. And. And you just never know. That you're going to miss it until it's gone. And I just would have the time back with her. [00:00:55][55.0]
Listener: If I could go back in time to before my great Aunt Rebecca passed away in 2019, I would go back and just simply take a photo with her. Take a photo because we have no photos together. And after she died, it has been the worst because there's nothing physical to remember our connection and our relationship by. And we always, you know, we were just forgetful. We always joked, okay, next time, next time you visit, we'll take a picture next time. And then there was no next time and there was no picture. And that has me alive ever since. So I would go back and I would just take a picture. I would take so many pictures. I would not just take one picture. I would take all the pictures because I wish I had captured more of those moments that we spent together because I only saw her every ten months or so when I when I could get out to Saint Louis and visit. So. I wish I had taken, I would have taken that picture. And I try to tell people all the time, it's like, take the damn photo, because you just never know. [00:01:18][66.1]