[MUSIC PLAYING]
GREG KING: I am very excited
to introduce Marisa Bardach
Ramel, here to talk about
her book today, "The Goodbye
Diaries--
A Mother-Daughter Memoir."
And I'll give you
a-- oh, by the way,
we have it over
there today for $15.
So please check it out.
Google discount.
And just give you a little
bit of background on the book
itself.
It's a mother-daughter
memoir where
Marisa and her late mother take
turns alternating chapters.
The book starts after her
mother's cancer diagnosis.
And essentially, this
diagnosis puts them
at odds to a certain degree.
It's a crucible kind of event
where there's funny moments.
There's sad moments.
There's awkward moments.
And just all of life kind
of happens during this time.
And it sort of
starts off this idea
that she's going to
talk about today where
in some ways exposing
that chasm that
exists between two people, how
embracing those differences
can actually bring
us closer together,
especially in today's times
where things sort of feel
more polarizing than ever.
And in many ways,
it's our similarities
that'll bring us together,
but it's our differences
that really keep us there.
And so this talk's about
sort of her and her mother's
journey through that.
And with that, I'll hand it off.
MARISA RAMEL: Thank you, Greg.
GREG KING: Thanks, Marisa.
MARISA RAMEL: I
want to thank Greg
King for inviting me to come
speak with you all today.
And I want to give
a special thanks
to my husband and my
literary agent who
are here supporting me.
And I want to thank
all of you for coming.
I was very intimidated
when I saw the poster
and saw that I was competing
against a performance
by the Broadway cast
of "Mean Girls."
And the fact that you've
chosen to spend your time here
really warms my heart.
And I can tell already
that you're my people.
So thanks for being here.
So have you ever wished you
could read someone's mind?
Maybe not the person sitting
near you at this very moment.
But maybe your boss
or your employees,
your spouse or partner, your
parents, your kids, a sibling,
a relative, a friend.
And let's not
pretend that this is
some purely altruistic
motive that we
want to read someone's mind.
Usually, the reason we
want to read someone's mind
is because we have a conflict.
You have one point of view.
The other person has another.
You really want them to
see your side of the story.
And they really want to convince
you of their side of the story.
And no one is willing to budge.
Now, we've always had
conflict in our lives.
Life is conflict, right?
But I would wager that
some of that conflict
has intensified since,
say, the year 2016.
We're more polarized than
we've ever been before.
40% of voters say
that the 2016 election
caused the distance between them
and a close friend or relative.
We're going to have another
Thanksgiving this year
where no one's going to talk
politics at the dinner table,
unless you're all
on the same side.
And yet, there's talk of the
exhausted majority, those of us
that are neither fully on the
left or fully on the right
but somewhere in that big
middle that isn't so incredibly
extreme.
And that term
really speaks to me
because I've been
feeling so exhausted
by everyone in the
world hating each other
and by the trickle down
effect that has to all of us
in this room who are
experiencing rifts
in the close relationships
in our lives.
I'm here today because I had
an experience in my own life.
It was a relationship
that experienced
a very painful divide.
And I want to share with
you both that divide
and also how we overcame
that divide because I believe
there are lessons in
that for all of us
on how we can repair the
divides in our own lives.
The relationship I'm
going to tell you
about today is one that's
filled with opposition.
It's been fraught
for generations past
and will continue to be fraught
for generations to come.
It's the story of a teenage
daughter and her mother,
perhaps one of the most fraught
relationships in history
and one I'm sure many of you
can think back to and relate
to today.
And in this story, I'm
the teenage daughter,
which means I need to
rewind about 20 years ago.
The date is January
13, the year 2000.
And I'm 17.
I'm a senior in high school.
And on this particular day,
I'm really stressed out.
Over breakfast that
morning, my mom
told me that she had a doctor's
appointment for her pancreas.
And even at the
young age of 17, I
knew that this
didn't sound good.
No one just casually
talks about a pancreas.
And I spent that
whole day waiting.
I went to high school that day.
I struggled to
concentrate in my classes.
I kept thinking about
this appointment.
And eventually, I
confided in my best friend
that my mom had this really
scary sounding doctor's
appointment.
And I didn't know what to do.
I spent the whole
evening waiting.
I went out to dinner for pizza
with my boyfriend at the time.
And very shyly, I
tried to tell him
about this scary
appointment that my mom had.
And I really wanted him to
comfort me, but we were young.
And he didn't really know how.
And then I spent that
whole night waiting.
My boyfriend dropped
me off at home.
And I went upstairs
to my bedroom.
I didn't even turn
on the lights.
I just went and looked
out my bedroom window,
willing my parents'
car to arrive.
I knew things were bad because
it was already past 8 o'clock.
And her appointment
had been at 4:00.
I stared out the window, waiting
for their headlights to appear,
waiting for the familiar
hum of their motor.
And then eventually, their
car pulled into the driveway.
And then I thought,
do I really want
to hear this news that my
mom is going to tell me?
I'd been waiting
all day to hear it,
but maybe I didn't really
want to hear it after all.
But I had no choice.
My parents came in the house.
They gathered me and my older
brother who was 20 at the time
into the living room.
And we all sat there
really awkwardly
because we weren't the kind
of family to just sit together
in the living room
having a serious talk.
We were close, but
we were always busy
and off doing our own things.
And when we got to
the living room,
we kind of stared at the couch
and didn't even really know
where to sit.
Where were our assigned seats?
Where did we belong here?
But eventually, we sat down.
And we looked at
my mom expectantly,
waiting for her to tell
us what was going on.
And after what
felt like forever,
she finally started talking.
I heard her say
pancreatic cancer.
And my thoughts were about prom.
What would my prom
dress look like?
And would she even be there
with me to help me pick it out?
My thoughts were
about high school.
I was supposed to
graduate in six months.
Would she even be there to
watch me walk across the stage
and collect my diploma?
And my thoughts
were about college.
I was supposed to go away
to college in the fall.
And would I still be able to
go forward with that plan?
Or had this news already
ruined everything for me?
I heard her say
two months to live.
And my thoughts were
about my future.
I used to think of my future
as this red carpet rolled out
before me filled with
adventure and fun
and discovering who I
was going to become.
And it felt like that pathway
was now crumbling before me.
She called me Missy.
And I heard her say, oh, Missy,
I've put a hole in your heart.
And she was rubbing my back.
And my thoughts were about
running away from her,
running away as far as possible.
We had always shared
an unusual closeness.
The montage of us up
until this point mostly
takes place at the Gap.
It mostly involves us
trying on matching outfits
in the dressing room,
giggling, the saleswoman joking
that we look like sisters,
swatting each other
on the way to the checkout
line, teasing each other.
We shared this unusual closeness
throughout my childhood
and even into my adolescence.
But after this night that
she came home and told
us this news, I stopped
speaking to her.
I stopped going
upstairs to her room.
I stopped asking
how she was doing.
I pretended like
she was already dead
as if that would spare
me the pain of losing her
over the next two months.
Well, as you can imagine,
this glorious teenage reaction
did not go over
well with my mother.
And she really tried to let me
come back to her in my own time
when I was ready because
maybe she was a saint.
But eventually, after
weeks of this behavior,
she and my father had enough.
And it escalated
into a blowout fight
that's still the worst fight
I've ever been in in my life.
And at the end of that fight,
my mom just looked at me.
And she looked so tired.
And she asked me, Missy,
I just need to know.
Are you going to be
there for me or not?
And I paused before answering
her because for once, I
wanted to be honest.
For once, I really
wanted to share
what this experience
felt like for me
and what I was really feeling.
And I took a breath.
And I said, I don't
know if I can be.
And I saw her face fall.
And I kind of fell inside too.
I thought being honest
would feel good.
But I felt terrible
because I knew
it wasn't the right answer.
My mom outlived her
two-month prognosis.
She did buy that
prom dress with me.
It was gray and very sparkly.
And she saw me walk
across the stage
and get my high school diploma.
And she even drove me
up to college five hours
from our home at
Syracuse University.
And we were slowly starting
to regain this friendship
on very cautious ground.
And when I was in
college, she used
to do this thing where she
would call me at midnight.
And my friends would heckle me
because all of our roommates
were getting booty calls.
And I was getting
calls from my mother.
But we used to talk for hours.
And one of these calls--
we didn't know it at the time--
would change our lives.
She called me.
And she said, Missy,
everyone keeps telling me
I should write a book.
I don't think I can
write one on my own,
but what if you and
I wrote one together?
And I immediately said yes.
I was in college, a freshman
at Syracuse University
studying journalism.
And I instantly loved this idea.
And so the next time
I was home on break,
we sat together on
my childhood bed.
And we mapped out the chapters
we wanted to write about.
We knew we wanted a
chapter about the night
she was diagnosed.
We knew we wanted a chapter
about this big, blowout fight
and how our relationship had
changed since her diagnosis.
She wanted to write
about chemotherapy.
I wanted to write
about therapy therapy
because that's
where I was going.
She wanted to write about
how her marriage had changed.
I wanted to write about how
my friendships had changed.
And we said, what if
we alternate chapters
to each share what
we're going through,
to each share our
side of the story?
We knew we were going
through the same thing,
but in two totally
different ways.
And we thought, what if there
was another mother and daughter
out there who might read
this and see not only
their own story reflected, but
the story of the other person,
and better understand not just
what they were going through,
but what the other
person was going through?
And so we each set off to
write our first chapters
about the night that
she was diagnosed.
And the next time I
was home from college,
we sat together again
on my childhood bed.
We had printed out our
chapters in advance.
And now, we exchanged
them in real time
because this was before
a little thing called
Google Docs, which would
have been very helpful to us.
And we were really nervous.
We were like giggling nervously.
It was like you were out to
read the other person's diary,
their most innermost thoughts.
And what would you find out?
Did you really want to know
what was written on that page?
Would it be funny?
Would it be hurtful?
And very timidly, we
exchanged chapters.
And we started reading.
And my mom's chapter
totally rocked me.
I had spent so much
time replaying the night
she was diagnosed in my mind.
It had been several
months since then.
And I had thought so
much about that day,
about waiting all day in high
school, waiting over dinner,
waiting for their car to
appear in the driveway,
and waiting for my mom
to deliver this news.
I had never once considered
her side of the story.
I had never once put
myself in her shoes
and imagined what that
day was like for her.
I read her chapter.
And I discovered
that she had spent
that whole day waiting too.
She waited while she
taught special education
elementary school
students in Queens.
She waited that afternoon
as she and my father
went to not one but two
different doctor appointments
that were both very scary.
She waited while
getting a CAT scan.
She waited in waiting rooms.
She waited in exam rooms.
At one point, she
waited nearly two hours
for a doctor to come see her.
He avoided her, saved her for
his last patient of the day
because he had no
idea how to tell her
this news that she was dying.
And then she and my father
waited on the car ride
home, my father pulling over
and sobbing while they discussed
what to tell me and my
brother and then deciding
to tell us everything because
that's what seemed fair.
I read her chapter.
And I felt shame, guilt, and
I felt really out of sorts.
I felt like, do I
really even know my mom?
Here's this person who
was one of the closest
people in my life.
But did I ever really know her
before reading this chapter,
before seeing the
world through her eyes,
before having true empathy for
what she was going through.
Exchanging that first
chapter with one
another was the
closest I've ever
come to being able to
read someone's mind
and allowing her to read mine.
Not all of us are
so fortunate, right?
A terminal cancer
diagnosis in the middle
of an already
turbulent adolescence
for a very moody teenager.
We don't all have experiences
that shake us into awakeness
and challenge us to try
something a little crazy.
Because really, what
did my mom and I
have to lose at this point?
And over the months and months
of writing this book together,
and then over the many years
I spent piecing it together
without her, I've come to
think of what we did together
not just as a book, but
as this commitment we
made to radical sharing.
We put our innermost thoughts,
our ugliest thoughts,
the thoughts you would
want no one to ever know,
into the pages of this book.
And we shared them
with one another.
And then by publishing it,
we shared it with all of you.
And if that's not radical
sharing, I don't know what is.
And if, in the back of
your mind right now,
you're envisioning a
person in your life
who you have a rift with,
whether big or small,
but you're feeling skeptical
about this radical sharing
thing, let me reassure
you that no one was
more skeptical of
radical sharing than me
as a teenage girl.
And you know who a teenage
girl wants to radically share
with the least?
Her mother.
And yet, she and I wrote this
first chapter and shared it.
And even though it was painful,
uncomfortable, vulnerable,
emotional, scary, we also saw
it as this opening, this way
that we could try to come back
together and rebuild not only
the friendship that we lost,
but build a friendship anew
that was built on real
sharing, real honesty,
and a real connection
to one another.
And I think so far,
it's been working.
The book came out
a few months ago.
And readers have told me that
they read Marisa's chapters.
And they read Sally's chapter.
And they flip-flop
back and forth
the whole time on
whose team they're on.
They read Marisa's chapter.
And they remember so vividly
being that angsty teenager.
And they want so badly
to see this teenage girl
overcome her immaturity and
reconnect with her mother.
And many of these readers
are now parents themselves.
And they read my mom
Sally's chapters.
And then they're
firmly on team Sally.
And they relate so
strongly to this mother who
just wants this friendship
with her daughter
before it's too late.
On one page, they're
on team Marisa.
On one page, they're
on team Sally.
How capable we are of
feeling for two people.
How capable we are of
seeing two sides of a story.
And yet, we're living today
in this very divided world.
We're constantly choosing
team Sally or team Marisa.
How can two people
overcome their opposition
and truly come back together?
And yet, we're elated when
we see two creatures overcome
their differences and unite.
Just Google unlikely
animal friends.
We see a giraffe cuddle up
to a koala bear, a puppy
and a kitten playfully
wrestling with one another.
We're not just in
it for the cuteness.
We're a little bit in
it for the cuteness.
But we're
embarrassingly inspired.
And we're inspired when we see
this play out among humans too.
Just Google Nino and RBG,
our incredible Supreme Court
justices the late Antonin
Scalia and Ruth Bader Ginsburg,
who despite having
totally opposite beliefs
shared the unlikeliest
of friendships.
And when Ruth Bader
Ginsburg was asked
about this unlikely bond they
shared, I love what she said.
She said, my opinion
is ever so much better
because of his stinging dissent.
My opinion is ever
so much better
because of his stinging dissent.
I love the word she chooses.
Better.
It's better because
of their differences,
not better in spite of.
She so clearly saw the
value that their discord
brought to their lives
both individually
and collaboratively.
We all have Ninos and
RBGs in our lives.
You might be seeing some of
them at Thanksgiving this year.
And I certainly
had one in my life.
And I went back recently
to these principles
of sharing that I have
learned from my mother.
I had applied those
principles of sharing
to so many relationships
in my life--
to my marriage,
to my friendships.
Why wasn't I willing to apply
it to the political divide
I had with my friend?
We always had opposite beliefs.
We always had riveting
debates that educated us,
challenged us,
inspired us, helped
us understand one another.
And yet after the
2016 election, there
was an undercurrent
of silence even
after all these
years of friendship
and all these years of debate.
And I was feeling stubborn.
I wouldn't apply these rules
of sharing to this divide.
And I started thinking, why not?
Why couldn't I?
Why was I so stuck?
Why was this situation
any different than all
the other conflicts in my life?
And so recently, I called her.
But I knew it had to
be more than sharing.
I had to share the way my
mom taught me to share.
I had to share with kindness,
compassion, empathy.
And then I had to listen to
her share with true openness.
And so I called her.
And note I didn't text her.
I didn't DM her.
That's not radical sharing.
I called her.
And what I said to
her was, I don't
like that we have this closed
door in our friendship.
We talk about everything, but we
no longer talk about politics.
What if we went there?
What if we decided to
talk about it again?
What would that be like?
And I was really nervous making
that call because I didn't
know how she would respond.
Would she shut me down?
Would she be upset that
I even brought it up?
Maybe I should just
live with the silence,
but I knew the silence was
sort of a false peacefulness.
And I felt that for
a true friendship,
we should be able to
talk about anything.
I was really relieved
and surprised and happy
on this phone call
because what I
found was my openness
was met with openness.
My kindness was
met with kindness.
And my empathy was
met with empathy.
We may not agree on
everything, but we
accept the duality between us.
And we appreciate the
way it challenges us.
My opinion is ever
so much better
because of her stinging dissent.
So my challenge to you today
is to embrace radical sharing.
It's going to start with you.
You're going to
have to go first.
You're going to have to
make that scary phone call,
or start that scary
conversation in person.
And then you're going
to have to receive
the other person
radically sharing with you
and be truly open to
what they're saying.
It may not even be
a political divide
that you're having in your life.
We have countless
personal divides as well.
I have found that even since
preparing for this talk,
I've been challenging myself
to share more radically
with the people in my life.
Because still to
this day, I find
when I'm stingy with
sharing, I suffer.
And when I'm brave at
sharing, I benefit.
And the relationships
in my life benefit too.
The world doesn't
change overnight.
My mom and I didn't
come back together
after the first chapter.
We didn't come back together
after the second chapter.
We initially planned our
book as eight chapters.
Our book turned out
to be 28 chapters.
And we wrote our way back
together chapter by chapter
by chapter for 2 and 1/2
years until she died in 2002.
For the conflicts in
our lives, none of us
know how many chapters
it will take to heal.
None of us even know
how long we have here.
So if you're trying and
struggling and trying
and struggling, but you
see a glimmer of hope,
just do what my mother and I
did and write another chapter.
Thank you.
[APPLAUSE]
GREG KING: Thank
you so much, Marisa.
MARISA RAMEL: Thank you.
GREG KING: Do you mind
if we ask a few questions
if there's any--
MARISA RAMEL: Sure.
GREG KING: Can I
ask the first one?
Or actually, I'll-- oh, OK.
Yeah.
I'll monopolize the mic later.
AUDIENCE: Thank you for
sharing your story with us.
So I think for the radical
sharing to be working,
you need two people because
the other person also
has to be very acceptive
of your opinion.
They are open to listen.
So my question
is, what would you
have done if your friend
actually shut you down,
if she's not listening
to what you are saying,
and then she just like
closed herself off?
MARISA RAMEL: That's
a good question.
And I think when you're thinking
of taking on radical sharing,
I encourage you to
really think about who
you want to take it on with.
Who do you see where
there is a divide,
but there is also
that glimmer of hope?
Who do you think might really
connect with this idea?
I think if my friend
had shot me down,
I would have felt really
upset and really disappointed.
I hope that I still would
have been proud of myself
for trying, and for sharing,
and for asking her if she
would be willing to share too.
I can imagine that if I asked
her, and she did shoot it down,
we would sort of go
on in the friendship
as it had existed
prior to that where
we still cared about each other
and are in each other's lives.
But there is a topic
that we don't talk about.
And maybe even if she didn't
come around right away,
maybe a week later, she
would change her mind.
Maybe with the next election,
she would change her mind.
Maybe she would at least
know the door was open if she
wanted to share in that way.
GREG KING: Other questions?
AUDIENCE: Hi.
I have a couple questions
if that's all right.
So one, I'm curious
because I've had
the pleasure of seeing you as
a 20-something and as a mother.
Wonderful in both
cases in both versions.
The way in which you
relate to your mom's story,
how has that changed
sort of since your youth
like reading those
stories till now,
like reading it back now
that you're a mother?
MARISA RAMEL: It's
changed tremendously.
When I was a teenager and in my
early 20s working on the book,
I thought my mom's chapters
were really boring.
I used to very lovingly
reread my chapter.
And then I'd skim through hers.
And then I'd read mine again.
And I thought for sure that
a publisher would tell me,
we love the book, but
scrap the mom chapters.
And until becoming a mother
myself, I have two young kids.
And I didn't understand the
value of her chapters at all.
She shares so much wisdom in
her chapters about parenting,
about how to be a mom to a
teenager who's not speaking
to you, how to be
patient through that,
which now as a mother
myself, I can't imagine.
And she speaks so much to
what she's going through
of trying to say goodbye to
her family that she's created.
As an adult and as a mom, I--
it's still hard to
imagine what that
must have been like for
her and how scary that
must have been and how sad.
But I also appreciate
that she was
able to share all this
wisdom in her chapters.
And other women who
have lost their moms
have told me that they
read her chapters.
And they feel mothered again.
AUDIENCE: I can second that one.
Early on in your talk,
you mentioned how your mom
asked if you would be there.
And you were honest with her.
And it crushed you.
Then later on, you found a way
of being honest that kind of
lifted you up.
For us, what's sort
of the difference
in how we provide that honesty
that sort of yields those two
different results, right?
How do we provide honesty in
a way that doesn't crush us,
but rather it leads
to lifting us up?
MARISA RAMEL: I
think that moment
of being honest
with my mom where
I said I don't know if
I can be there for you,
it felt terrible to say it.
But in hindsight,
it was the beginning
of us trying to be really
open with one another
and actually was very
helpful that I said that.
Because my mom, it
rang a bell for her,
like my daughter's
not doing well.
She's not coping well.
And that's when she
asked me, do you
want to start
seeing a therapist?
Maybe it would be helpful to
talk to someone else, not me.
And it was really the start
of us coming back together.
And even when we shared
that first chapter,
some parts of that chapter
felt good for each of us.
And some of it felt bad.
I think honesty doesn't
always feel good.
I think that's why
it's scary, right?
If it always felt good, we
would just do it all the time.
I think it requires
a lot of bravery,
but I think the value, the
end result of it, is worth it.
GREG KING: Any other questions?
By the way, I just want
to let you know again,
over on that table is the book.
It's the "Goodbye Diaries."
And honestly, you should
read some of these accolades.
It's on 17 Books
Every Girl Should
Read Before She Turns 17.
You have Joy Ann Reid
putting out quotes there.
So just a number of
wonderful, wonderful things
written about this book.
It's a fantastic book.
Please do check it out.
Marisa, thank you so much
for being here today.
MARISA RAMEL: Thank
you for having me.
Thank you all for being here.
[APPLAUSE]
