TUS01503-Podcast 01 2025 January Part 2

Marc Moss: [00:00:00] Welcome to the Tele Something podcast. I’m your host, Marc Moss, founder and executive director of Tell Us something. The next Tele Something event is October 7th, 2025. The theme is Walk on the Wild Side. You can learn about how to pitch your story and get tickets@tellussomething.org. This week on the podcast,

Mark Schoenfeld: I’ve been told I look like Matt Damon and you’d have to imagine me. Skinnier with more hair on my head and less on my face. Little bit.

Kelley Provost: My hand finds its way to my purse. I do not let go of these hot five fingers that are my child’s hand, and I grab my phone and it does not ring a second time. My sister and my husband lock eyes with me. We know that this is the news that we’ve been waiting to hear since we left Missoula.

Marc Moss: Four storytellers share their true personal story on the theme. Hold my beer.

Tess Sneeringer: So I turn back to Officer [00:01:00] Becky who has a second question, which is, have you been drinking? And I say, no, ’cause I have not been drinking. And she walks closer than me and she smells me. And she goes, you’ve been drinking.

Jeff Ducklow: I looked to my left. And a tower of ice, probably the size of two Wilma buildings stacked on top of each other was slowly starting to lean away. And I just went, oh my God. My heart was beating so fast. I couldn’t feel it. It was, I was just frozen in disbelief.

Marc Moss: Their stories were recorded. Live in person in front of a sold out crowd on January 13th, 2025 at the George and Jane Denison Theater in Missoula, Montana.

I do have to apologize for the quality of the recording. The gain was set too high on the recording device and there was a lot of his and background noise. I did what I could to remove it, and a lot of that is gone in the process of removing most of the his, all of the applause and ambient noise went away.

The hiss is still noticeable in places. These stories are great [00:02:00] though, and it has been too long. That they’ve been sitting dusty on my hard drive. So let’s get to it. Tell us something acknowledges that we are gathered on the traditional ancestral and unseated territory of the Ponderer Salish and Kni peoples when tell us something engages in land acknowledgements, we try to make them specific to the time of the year that the live event took place.

Keeping that in mind, we know that traditionally storytelling is reserved for the winter months for many tribes. This was a practical choice given the fact that during the other seasons people were busy growing, gathering and hunting food. When the stories on this episode were recorded, it was winter with long, dark evenings, the snow and wind blowing outside, and that is wind telling stories is used to entertain and to teach the children.

Another reason for winter storytelling is that many traditional stories contain animal characters. [00:03:00] To be respectful. People wait until the winter when animals hibernate or become less active so they cannot hear themselves being talked about. We take this moment to honor the land and its native people and the stories that they share with us.

First up is Mark Schoenfeld, who dives into a captivating story of a college sophomore’s unexpected adventure abroad from a covert mission to buy bootleg DVDs to an even more clandestine identity as an undercover evangelical Christian missionary. What happens when a spontaneous prank involving a Matt Damon lookalike turns serious, forcing a confrontation with an organization that calls itself the company and challenges the very meaning of faith?

Mark calls his story. What would Jed do? Thanks for listening. I should start by saying that I can’t tell you where this story takes place. The main [00:04:00] reason is that I would like the option to go back.

Mark Schoenfeld: If I, you know, wanted to, I was a sophomore, just finished my sophomore year of college. I had never been abroad, but here I was halfway across the world and that night, one night we went out on town, a couple guys from the program and myself, we were on a mission to buy. Bootleg DVDs.

So we were in this open air market and uh, the two guys and I had invited, this guy had met in the country to help us because we had no idea what we were doing, and he was going to show us. This opener market and teach us how to find bootleg DVDs. [00:05:00] And it was a lot like, I would imagine trying to find like a woodpecker or something in Greeno Park because there’s a, call it, it’s kind of staccato, it’s D dd.

Listen, and you kind of move around past like some fake Gucci purses and DV.

Past the row of CDs and other trinkets there in an alley was a man with two suitcases and I imagine probably sunglasses, I can’t really remember, but he was looking, trying to look nondescript, and we went and uh, we had invited this friend Jimmy along and he was talking to the man and he was like. Okay, any motion for us to come back.

And he opened up these two suitcases and it looked like he had knocked off a Blockbuster video. [00:06:00] They were overflowing with DVDs and we were just like digging through them. ’cause you know, this is a long time ago. DVDs were a really big deal. I don’t even think Netflix was mailing them yet.

And if I was a college student, so I wouldn’t have been able to afford it. And these were a dollar each. Anyway, I was glad Jimmy was there because he was able to point out some issues that we might have with these DVDs. Like, say exam for example. It was 2002. The, the, uh, third Lord of the Rings movie hadn’t come out yet, but there it was in this suitcase, return of the King, except instead of Mortenson, it was Tom Cruise.

And I had to buy it, and it was legend and it was still a good purchase. And the same was true. Well, he, he also, Jimmy also noted [00:07:00] that there would be some movies that were in theaters and they were probably filmed surreptitiously. So I bought The Born Identity, Matt Damon. Terrible quality, pretty good movie.

You know, he is all like confused about who he is and he is a. So we bought some DVDs, went and had some food, and someone got the idea over beers to pretend like I was famous. See, my two friends in the group both had family from this country, so they could really blend in, they could speak the language.

And Jimmy obviously was from the country. Um, I was not, and I stood out.

And can’t tell you what country it was, but you can just guess that I stood out. And so they said, let’s pretend like you’re famous. It’s not a big tourist town. And I said, okay. And they said, who? Who do you look [00:08:00] like? Who could we say you are? And I said, well, I’ve been told I look like Matt Damon,

and you’d have to imagine me skinnier. With more hair on my head and less on my face. But I, a little bit, I also, I also get Louis Anderson,

which keeps me humble. So anyway, Jimmy and I go to this fountain area where people are taking pictures and hanging out and talking. And a couple minutes later, my friends from the program come and approach us. Talking excitedly come up to me, wanna, to wanna approach me, but Jimmy’s kinda holding him back.

But then I’m like, no, come on. And they come and I sign autographs and take turns taking pictures. And as we had hoped, there were like two more people, maybe four. And then I, you know, kind of repeated it and, and [00:09:00] Jimmy’s like talking to the people in the outskirts. And I can’t understand a word he’s saying except for Hollywood and Matt Damon.

But I’m just signing and signing, taking pictures with people, and I’m just caught up in it. And then I look around. If you were to zoom out, it would be this one white speck in just a sea of non-white people, basically the inverse of Missoula.

Not that I can relate, but. I start to get nervous. Um, and I look at my friends on the outside of the circle now, the ones from the program and they’re whiter than I am, and ask them, they’re these like two kind of official looking people watching us and not happy. And I turn to Jimmy and I say, Jimmy, we gotta go right now.

And he’s got this like shit eating grin [00:10:00] and I’m so glad he didn’t ask me why. Because I would’ve had to lie to him again. I had told him that I was a foreign exchange student, which is what my visa said. But the truth is, I was an undercover evangelical Christian missionary, and I was breaking every rule in the rule book

I had. I had come to the country a few weeks before. And spent all this time in this basement. So you can imagine with this guy who looked like a youth pastor telling us how to do things, and I’ll never forget his goateed face, the way it distorted when he told us how Christians were still persecuted in this country.

And so they gave us code words like God, the father was Fred, Jesus was Jed, and the Holy Ghost was Casper. [00:11:00] Uh. Christians were family and the organization, which you’ve maybe heard of, I won’t say real crusaders though. Um,

they were called the company, which is what they call the CIA and spy movies. Uh,

let’s see. There was competition for adding people to our family, you know, so we called the Mormon and Jehovah’s Witness missionaries, momos and Jojos, and this was fed to us. And they, and, and then there would be competition for our time. So say someone wanted to come and like practice their English on us and not wanna receive the gift of eternal salvation, we, they called them leeches.

Which I found only slightly less offensive than their term for the whole [00:12:00] mission, which was the Orients Express. I think they’ve changed it

at this point. I was, um, pretty disgusted with this organization. I decided to, you know, still do it. Uh, but I was gonna like, do it how I thought Jed would do it. Like ww JD what would Jed do? I had read the Bible, which we were the, the, the textbook. I mean, and I wanted that kind of authentic faith. So I called up, you know, after that night, kind of racked with guilt and just really wanting to be there for my friend that I’d made Jimmy.

I called him up and we went to the coffee shop, tea shop where we had first met, and like that night we started with tea and switched to beers. And as things got looser. I told him the truth that, uh, that I was a family member and that I [00:13:00] wanted to tell him about this guy named Jed. And he, he, he told me that he, he did feel like something was wrong in his life and that he did need something.

He said he often felt like he was, uh, a ship lost at sea. He was like, I’ve got a textbook story for that one. And I was really surprised he was so open and we met. Again and again. Every day after that, until it was time to leave, I was so disappointed. I wanted to go home. I wanted to sit on the toilet,

but I didn’t wanna leave Jimmy. The company told me it was my hubris, uh, that they, that I wanted to convert it. But what the truth is, the night before I left, Jimmy looked at me and he said, am 60% sure Jet is real. But I’m a hundred percent sure I’m a sinner, and the company told me that I had done the hardest part.

I [00:14:00] wanted to go back, but it turns out they don’t let you go be a missionary if you’re not a Christian anymore. So I’ll never get to, I’ll probably never get to see Jimmy. A almost willing to believe in the life.

Marc Moss: Thanks, Mark. Mark Schoenfeld has been a lot of things, a window washer, a screen printer, a public radio host, a middle school teacher, and an adjunct professor to name a few.

One thing he’s always been is a writer of stories, songs, and poems, which led him to earn his MFA in creative writing from the University of Montana. A disgruntled Texan Mark and his family now call Western Montana home. His work has appeared in print, online, and on air, which you can find@markshow.com.

That’s M-A-R-K-S-C-H o.com. In our next story, join Tess Sneeringer, a high school junior on Halloween night in 2009, as she navigates an exclusive party, a ninja clad twin brother. And a [00:15:00] sudden police raid that turns into a chaotic scramble for escape. What happens when a misplaced car and a nosy officer Becky, make this unpopular attendee, the unlikely culprit for the entire bust?

Tess calls her story a chance to be popular. Thanks for listening.

Tess Sneeringer: So there I was sitting on the hood of my mom’s pink Toyota Avalon with my twin brother David, and our friend Paul. Waiting for the cop in front of us to call back up. It was 2009. We were juniors in high school and it was Halloween and we got ourselves into this situation because I decided to go to a party, a party I was barely invited to.

This was really David’s friend’s party and he was always Mr. Popular. And I had my friends and we knew our place and we were not popular. And that is kind of how David and I existed in elementary school, middle school, high school, the whole way through. So much so [00:16:00] that when we got to this new high school on my first or second day, I’m still meeting people and they’re like, oh, you’re David’s sister.

And I was like, oh, that was fast. I guess I gave a my parents a little relief by making friends in the first place. ’cause I saw an email left up one time on the family desktop that said Tess had friends over last night. Thank God. But it was junior year at this point, and the social standings had been set.

But tonight, David knew he needed a ride home from this party and he wasn’t cruel. So he invited me to the party. And yes, I had my friends, we had our place, but you know, if you’re not popular, like okay, maybe, maybe tonight I could be popular. And so I go to the party, but I go late. And I leave DC where we grew up and go out into the suburbs to this house I’ve never been to in a neighborhood called Chevy Chase.

That is the name of the neighborhood. And this is the land of manicured lawns, big houses, cul-de-sacs, [00:17:00] like safe, quiet streets. And again, I don’t know this girl well enough to ever have been to her house, so I’m like trying to decipher the house addresses. This is before smartphone, GPS, and I finally. Find it and I pull over into the first parking spot find, and I, I do have a flip phone, so I text my brother, I’m here, and he comes out and he is dressed as a ninja so I can barely see him, and he is like beckoning me from the bushes.

Okay? So I follow him through this gate, down the stairs, into this basement where there’s full high school rager, ensuing. There’s Natty Light, there’s beer pong, there’s scantily clad Halloween costumes. And I am dressed as this like doth girl and I have a black wig and black lipstick and fake piercings and like a studded belt and combat boots.

And I love that Halloween costume. But that night it might’ve worked a little too well ’cause I went into the party and barely anybody [00:18:00] recognized me. And I really hope that’s ’cause it was the costume and not just ’cause they really didn’t know who I was. But I, I tried my best. I socialize, I held my own.

For about an hour until we hear pounding upstairs on the front door, and sure enough out the like basement windows, we see red and blue lights and the party is officially busted. And despite the host, having told everybody that you go out the back door only leads to the front, everybody goes out the back door and people are hopping fences, army crawling through bushes.

It is a complete. Cluster, everybody’s scattering. And I just glue myself to my brother ’cause I have no experience running from the cops. I, this is well outside my comfort zone. And our friend Paul attaches his fate to ours and joins our team of escape. And so we’re make our way around to the front of the house where we’re kind of in the bushes, but we can see the street [00:19:00] and we see the cop car kind of rolling down the hill, um, away from us chasing our friends.

And so we make a break for it. ’cause our car, I park the car a little bit up the hill, and the second I get my driver, my hand on the driver’s side door, I see the reverse lights from that cop car speed way back up the hill at like 20 miles an hour and stop right in front of us. Officer comes out, introduces herself as Officer Becky, and she asks me, do you know where you’ve parked?

Where I parked? What, and I look around and I see that I am blocking the neighbor’s driveway. They have a car in that driveway. And in the following moments of silence, I realized that I am the only reason the cops have busted this party I was very invited to. So I turn back to Officer Becky who has a second question, which is, have you been drinking?[00:20:00]

And I say, no, ’cause I have not been drinking. And she walks closer than me and she smells me. And she goes, you’ve been drinking. And I’m like, I don’t like, what do you want me to say? But in my head, my father, the ever present lawyer in my life has told me that if I ever end up at a busted party while sober, I should tell the cops to say, I offered to take a breathalyzer test and make them put in in writing.

And so Officer Becky says, you’ve been drinking. And I say, breathalyze me. Officer Becky doesn’t even have a breathalyzer test. She’s a, she came to gimme a ticket, maybe tow my car and ended up ally busting an underage party. So I’m sitting on this hood with me, my brother and Paul, who are probably cursing my name offering to give breathalyzer tests and we’re just waiting there ’cause she has to call backup and these two.[00:21:00]

Fools decide to make polite conversation with Officer Becky and, oh, I’m so sorry. I have to work on Halloween. That’s such a bummer. And this cop is like, actually it’s my favorite night of the week to work. Oh, okay. Super fun loving person here. And then she decides she wants to search us. And again, these two really emboldened tonight, uh, decide to put their.

Recently learned, uh, civil liberties course material to an application and say, do you have probable cause? And she asked them, well, do you have any weapons? My brother is dressed as a ninja. He goes, I have some nunchucks. These are my nunchucks. I took karate. He used them for his costume, hands them over, she searches us.

She doesn’t find anything. And she asked me for our, my id. And I look [00:22:00] nothing like my id. I have a black wig on. I have all this stuff. So I hand it to her and I’m like ripping everything outta my face. Wig piercings out, like trying to smear my makeup, just trying to like it’s me, I swear. And that’s as about about as much as she has to do with us until finally this cop second cop car comes out and this guy comes out, he’s probably like 20 years old, and he just walks up to me and gives me the breathalyzer test.

And I’m like, I don’t know what to do with this. Like, how do you use this thing? And so he takes it back, he unwraps it, he like undoes the straw, hands it back, and Officer Becky goes, you can take this, but you’re not gonna pass. And in my head I’m like, hold my LaCroix. Watch me and I blow into this lyer test, hand it back.

And I see this young cop just like flip the screen a little bit to Officer Becky and then I can see it. There’s three beautiful zeroes. Plus passes flying colors [00:23:00] and Officer Becky goes, have a safe note and that’s it. So the three of us get in the car, you know, we’re all mad at each other for how the other handled the situation.

Um, but we get back to our house in one piece and Monday rules around, and the school day is pretty uneventful for me. But then I get to softball practice and I, one of my friends comes up to me and she’s just like, Hey, are you and Monica okay? Monica’s my softball co-captain, and I’m like, why would Monica and I not be okay?

She goes, oh, well she was at that party and she got her third citation and now she has to go to court. And in my head, two things. One, the first two citations were not my fault. The third one, definitely, I’ll take that one. But the first two were. The second thing that I realized is my name has probably gotten drug through every A OL in instant message group chat.

Like every side conversation, people probably hate my guts, but [00:24:00] I’m not even worth being angry to my face. I’m that unimportant. And in that era that was kind of worked out in my favor ’cause I didn’t have to deal with their hate to my face. Um, and I can’t say I dabbled that much into the popular crowd anymore in high school.

Um. But we made it. My friends and I graduated. College got better years after college got better, and so I just wanna say if any of you are in high school or have a high schooler for which any of this sounds familiar, this too will pass. And if you peaked in high school, I am so sorry. Thank you.

Marc Moss: Thanks Tess.

Tess Sneeringer has lived in Missoula for six years and landed here after spending the first half of her twenties as an outdoor educator across the American West, far away from her childhood home in Washington DC [00:25:00] telling a story for tele something became a Missoula bucket list item after she saw her first show in 2019.

So she told a story in 2021, but then she stayed in Missoula longer than she thought she would. So. She figured she’d do it again. Her first appearance featured a survival story set in the Utah Desert, and she’s back on this episode of the podcast with another survival tale. This time of high school social life.

Coming up after the break,

Kelley Provost: my hand finds its way to my purse. I do not let go of these hot five fingers that are my child’s hand, and I grab my phone and it does not ring a second time. My sister and my husband lock eyes with me. We know that this is the news that we’ve been waiting to hear since we left Missoula.

Jeff Ducklow: I looked to my left and a tower of ice, probably the size of two Wilma buildings stacked on top of each other, was slowly starting to lean away, and I just went, oh my God. My heart [00:26:00] was beating so fast. I couldn’t feel it. It was, I was just frozen in disbelief.

Marc Moss: Stay with us. Remember that. The next tell us something event is October 7th.

The theme is Walk on the Wild Side. You can pitch your story by calling 4 0 6 2 0 3 4 6 8 3. You can learn about how to pitch your story and get tickets@tellussomething.org. Thank you to our story sponsor who helped us pay our storytellers The Good Food Store For more than 50 years, the Good Food Store has been Missoula’s Homegrown independent source for natural, organic, and locally sourced food.

Learn more@goodfoodstore.com. Thanks to our media sponsors, Missoula events.net. Blue Dog Media and Missoula Broadcasting Company. Learn more about them and listen online@missoulabroadcastingcompany.com. Thanks to our in kind sponsors Float Missoula. Learn more@floatmsla.com and Joyce of tile. Learn about Joyce and the work that she [00:27:00] does@joyceoftile.com.

Alright, let’s get back to the stories. You are listening to the Tell Us Something podcast. I’m Marc Moss. In our next story, Kelly Provost shares her raw and honest journey of self-acceptance and defiance. Beginning with a lifelong struggle against body image that culminates in a breast reduction, but just as newfound confidence blossoms on a dream European vacation.

A phone call in London’s West End moments before the Lion King performance delivers a life altering diagnosis that changes everything. Kelly calls her story Careful what you wish for. Thanks for listening.

Kelley Provost: We were about ready to walk in to a production of The Lion King in London’s West End when I was diagnosed with breast cancer, now, I always knew my breasts were going to kill me when I was 12.

I thought it was going to be from embarrassment because I realized for the first time that they’re [00:28:00] supposed to be there. 13 and 14 more of the same. I am buying bras for just very little content, but it’s making me feel a little better about myself to, uh, you know, be a part of middle school. 14 and 15.

Come and boy, howdy. So did the knackers violently, seemingly overnight they appear. Think two globes on a stick, not what I ordered. Thank you very much. So the tone of the embarrassment shifts from non-existent to, oh my god, I gotta hide these ladies. Um, a very intricate, very large lever and pulley system exists to keep them found in where they’re supposed to [00:29:00] be and hidden.

Saying goodbye to button up shirts and sassy straps, and God forbid strapless on any occasion at all. And it just becomes this whole thing. So from about 16, I would say till 38, it was hide and seek. It was, you know, under pillows. Hiding my bra hooking up and just lamenting and loathing the breasts that I had so desperately in seventh grade.

I must, I must, I must increase my bust. You know, be careful what you wish for.

So I had looked into getting a breast reduction before and when I was about 21, I had some good insurance. And, uh, I made the appointment and I went in and they had said that, um, that was all fine and dandy, except for [00:30:00] that I wouldn’t be able to nurse future baby. I have no idea why at 22 that mattered. I mean, the way I was living my life was not conducive to a child in any form, but I thought, oh no, I better not do that.

And, uh, so I didn’t. So life goes on and I’m, I’m having the boobs. It’s all a big mess. And, uh, I meet the love of my life and we start having beautiful babies. And finally these large ridiculous mammies do their job and they nourish two beautiful, healthy babies. So by the time I’m 38, I’m, I’m back on the breast reduction train thinking I might do that.

It took a while to convince the, uh. Insurance company that running as I am a runner with size. I mean, we’re talking like double K shit you’ve never heard of, they don’t sell ’em in Dillard’s, y’all. Um, you know, I, I’m, I’m sending pictures after a 20 mile run, like do it, [00:31:00] you know, blood, ugh. They finally agreed to this breast reduction.

So at 43 years of age in 2015, I get. And you’re going, what took me so long? Well, I’ll tell you this. I finally had the figure. I had wanted. I was proportioned. I was happy. They were beautiful. And so from 43 to 44 to 45, I bought all the clothes I wanted to. I do love fashion. I was having so much fun with it, and I decided I was having so much fun that I was gonna take these beautiful ladies.

My husband, our two young sons, and my sister to Europe. So we all went, my family and my chest and myself and my cute suitcase filled with a lot of clothes that I was excited to wear on many different occasions. We were starting off in London and we’re gonna do a week in Paris, and then two [00:32:00] weeks in Spain.

So I cultivated my outfits carefully. So here we are. In London. It is July 5th, 2017. We had landed in Europe on July 2nd, so we’re just day three in. We’d had a day of sightseeing and we’re gonna have a little lie about in our flat in London. Before the nights events, we were really excited about this one, the kids, because they like the Lion King.

Of course, it’s on London’s famed West End. We know the production is. Brilliant costumes, acting all of the events. I am mostly looking forward to looking good with London’s elite in the West end, having a fabulous meal. Soaking it all in nodding yes, I see you. You look so good. Me too. Right. And uh, you know, just, just really [00:33:00] enjoying a night out with London’s culture.

As one wilt with expectations, they begin being dashed almost immediately. What turned into a three hour break, turned into a two hour break, turned into a one hour break, and I don’t look fabulous. I’m hot. I hate being hot. We’re late. I hate being late. And instead of my fabulous sit down dinner with really insensible shoes that we took an Uber to, it’s looking like we might not eat at all and we might not make it to the theater on time.

Damnit, dammit, dammit, dammit, dammit. So we hop on the London, uh, metro system and we pop off that Piccadilly Circus, think Times Square, think. Super crowded. Think any other time in my life I’d be soaking it all in, loving every minute of it, but instead I’m feeling [00:34:00] real gross. ’cause we’d eaten McDonald’s.

We were very overdressed. Um, I’m hot, I’m sweaty. But we, we, we land in Piccadilly Circus. Very crowded, very busy. Lots of bodies that I didn’t create or I’m not married to or related to touching me. And we’re late and it’s starting to be a real problem for me, and I’m losing the battle to not ruin the evening for everybody.

And I death grip my 6-year-old son’s hand, and it’s hot and it’s sweaty, but I ain’t losing this boy. And I’m kind of watching my husband’s blackhead Bob as he navigates us to what we know is the West End and the theater. And we’re looking for that marquee that says The Lion King. And my phone rings. Now you might think that from what I just described, that I would fumble for my phone and it falls off and breaks, and that’s the story.

But it’s not because I’m [00:35:00] waiting for this call. Tom Petty had it right the way is the hardest part, so my hand finds its way to my purse. I do not let go of these hot five fingers that are my child’s hand, and I grab my phone and it does not ring a second time. My sister and my husband lock eyes with me.

We know that this is the news that we’ve been waiting to hear since we left Missoula on July 2nd. Is this Kelly? Provost? It is. This is Dr. Ty. It is breast cancer. Hey. Thanks Dr. Tai. That’s what I thought. Um, okay. Got a run. Now when there is a crack in the universe such as that, you sort of remember everything that happened before then, and very little of what happened immediately after.

But I can tell you it was something [00:36:00] like Dr. Strange or The Matrix, but without the capes or the portal or the drugs and. Uh, I took a second. My sister, my husband, I don’t know if I uttered it, but we all simultaneously knew that I had just been diagnosed with cancer, breast cancer. I didn’t know what kind, I didn’t know how fast moving.

I wasn’t sure if I could continue on for the rest of my vacation. And time didn’t stand still, as it turns out. So we’re still rushing. We’re still going, and we make our way into that Dang theater. Stunned. Not completely surprised. But you know what a feeling, never have I been so grateful for the lights to dim so that I could come into my body.

My death flashed before me. And unlike other times, I’d fantasized about my death because I had, let’s face it, um, this, this time [00:37:00] I wasn’t thinking, oh, they’ll be so sad. I was like, man, I married a good man. He’ll remarry and she will love those kids. My sister has the best relationship with them that she possibly could.

They will miss me, but they could read my diary because I have conducted myself in such a way that I leave behind a leg. Legacy of love and beauty. So. Intermission hits, lights come up. I tell my husband to go get the kids some souvenirs, and I get the information that I was really looking for, which was, can I stay on vacation, or is this shit super serious that I need to fly out early?

We’d already discussed such a proposition. I make my way outdoors and I, I get on the horn and I, I reach St. Ronnie, a community medical Senator Center. She is a nurse navigator and she starts telling me information that I’m digging. She starts saying things like, it’s [00:38:00] stage one, it’s slow moving. It’s the good kind of cancer.

There’s, there’s no such thing. FYII love ani, but no. And, um, I’m relieved. I’m relieved that I can stay on my vacation. I decide I’m gonna be done trying to watch my figure so that by the time I get to Spain, I look great in my bathing suit. Because here’s the thing, please don’t wait for a cancer diagnosis to eat all the tear soup, extra butter on your bread to live your life out loud, to rip your top off in every beach in Spain, which I did.

I encourage you to start living now and you can keep your top on if you want.

Marc Moss: Thanks Kelly. Kelly Provost is a survivor, a thriver, a lover, and a lover. She loves Duran Duran fashion. Laughing and dancing. Watching people be proud of themselves is her favorite thing [00:39:00] ever. Her goal is to create a community of people who love themselves so much.

That they inspire others to do the same. A life coach. A life lover, a life liver. Closing out this episode of the Tell Us Something podcast, Jeff DLow embarks on an adventure Wish, a seminary graduate Turns sea kayak guide Jeff recounts the incredible dangerous decision to paddle towards and touch. A Tidewater glacier in Alaska.

What began as a bold pursuit of a memorable death could quickly become a fight for survival against one of nature’s most unpredictable forces. Jeff calls his story a terrible idea. Thanks for listening.

Jeff Ducklow: So before I tell you what happened on August 7th, 2015, I need to clear up a couple things. The first thing is it wasn’t when I looked back.

That I knew what I did was stupid. I knew before I did it that it was stupid. [00:40:00] The second thing is, even if you graduate from Princeton Theological Seminary with a master’s in Divinity, yes, a master of Divinity,

it doesn’t necessarily make you any wiser. And for those of you. Who might judge me as a man with a death wish. I say, no, it was not a death wish. It was an adventure wish. So skipping over the part where a seminary grad who is headed for ministry becomes an adventure guide heading towards a glacier. I’m gonna save that for the next, tell us something with a theme.

Hold my Bible.

But since this is hold my bear. It was a warm Alaskan summer day and I was paddling in a remote fjord all by myself because it [00:41:00] was my day off from sea Kayak guiding. It’s at this time I got one of the worst ideas I’ve ever had. It was the most unrecommended, the most dangerous thing I could do that day.

I decided I would approach one of the most powerful, unpredictable forces in nature. I would approach my sea kayak a Tidewater glacier, and touch it with my bare hand. Now again, I did not have a death wish, but I have to be honest, I always admired family trees that had really interesting deaths.

And I thought, you know, being crushed by a glacier, that’s, that’s pretty good.

I had seen others like trampled by elephants in [00:42:00] Borneo or died after catastrophic igloo collapse. I never wanted a mundane death like died while choking on a hot dog at the state fair. That wouldn’t do. But crushed by a glacier, not too shabby. So I decided today was the day as I started paddling. I’m thinking this is a terrible idea.

Now, the glacier I’m talking about is huge. At the face of it, where it comes into the water, it’s a mile long. It’s about 500 feet high. It stretches back. It’s basically a river of ice going 13 miles up to some very high of elevation where it’s a 700 square mile ice field. So I dunno if you’ve been around glaciers, but it’s basically this river of ice always moving downhill.[00:43:00]

And the tide water glacier in particular is very unstable because as it comes into the ocean that water is starting to erode the foot of the glacier. I’m making it even more unstable as the rest of it continues to move downhill. And sometimes they pop, they crack, and at other times it might sound like an incredible boom of thunder when a big chunk of ice will break off the face of the glacier and land in the water.

In fact, it’s so compelling. Cruise ships would come and they would watch the Glacier Cat Now. As a guide. I knew this, and yet I continued forward.

The other thing about the glacier is when it calves off, it leaves icebergs in the water, and in this case, it really matters because you’ve heard of the phrase tip of the iceberg. [00:44:00] These tips were huge. These were very large tips.

After the last story, I want you to hear ’em saying tips.

Some of these tips were the size of submarines or a house and what that meant as a sea kayaker. If you’re cruising by one and it decides to roll like they do. It will scoop you up to an early grave. So you try to stay away from the berg. Remember the Titanic? So now I’m paddling, and if you’ve ever been in Alaska, you also know it’s so huge that it’s almost impossible to judge distance.

I’d never gone anywhere this far with with my clients. So. [00:45:00] An hour, hour and a half had gone by and it seemed I wasn’t much closer. And then I get to the spot where I’d seen cruise ships, where they watched the glacier calving and calving, by the way, doesn’t involve cattle. I was confused for about a month up there looking for cows in the water.

Someone help ’em. Um, it’s just big chunks of ice that break off and become icebergs. So I get to the, this place and it’s, it’s a half mile back because that’s the law that a cruise ship needs to stay a half mile back from the glacier because when a big chunk of ice breaks off, it can create a wave as high as 30 feet.

It can also create an underwater tsunami just as large, which could capsize, uh, a large, and just for reference, I’m in a sea kayak.[00:46:00]

Which is basically a 14 foot tube of plastic, and I’m going past that mark, and I’m thinking, this is a terrible idea, but somehow I feel like I’m being sucked in against my will. I thought I heard the ice saying, come to the eyes, and like, yes, my frozen Lord. And now I’m getting pretty close and I see where there’s a group of harbor seals.

They’re hauled up on the ice like they do. And normally they’re super cute. They have these big eyes and they’ll pop up next to your kayak and look at you. But this time they look more concerned.

I thought I saw one. Say what? In the name of humanity. And I don’t know if seals are religious, but I’m pretty sure I saw one of them with his flipper make the sign of the cross

and bean [00:47:00] seals. They followed me for a while. That’s what they do. But then they suddenly disappeared as if to say, we have pups to feed, we have fishing to do, and even though we’re waterproof, this is as far as we go. And now I get to. I really close to the glacier. I can’t see the top of it, just the wall in that.

And suddenly the temperature plummets and the atic winds, as they call ’em, are blowing off the glacier and I’m freezing. There’s gear for these kinds of expeditions, but I wasn’t wearing it.

And I’m getting up closer to the glacier. It’s amazing. It’s blue, it’s white, and it looks like. Giant rock crystals rising up from the sea into the sky. It’s like I landed on another planet. I’d never been this close before. And then I remember why I went and [00:48:00] kept on going and now it’s like 50 yards, 25 yards.

What am I doing? But I’m in too deep, my friends. And now it’s 10 yards. 10 feet, and I stop paddling. I drift in.

I’m looking straight up, 500 feet of ice over my head. And I don’t know if I touched it too hard.

I looked to my left and a tower of ice, probably the size of two Wilma buildings stacked on top of each other. It was slowly starting to lean away, and I just went, oh my God. My heart was beating so fast. I couldn’t feel it. It was, I was just frozen in disbelief. And then I thought, here comes the Darwin Award.

I, and [00:49:00] I had certainly earned it. It was nature’s way of saying, excuse me, we, we don’t think you should reproduce. And it was a cold hand on the shoulder saying, we’re gonna have to take you outta the gene pool. And then I thought, I heard the ice again saying, come towards delight Jeff. Come towards delight.

And for a moment I thought, okay, I thought I didn’t really have a choice anyway. Then I thought I heard the voices of loved ones saying, don’t go towards the luck. And then I thought, I heard the voice of my very practical mother saying, oh, great, now who’s gonna mow my lawn? And just then the will to live was ignited and with an incredible,

that’s what it felt like. I paddled as hard as I could, and I was just [00:50:00] waiting for this multi-story wave to crash down on me with huge icebergs. And I saw a huge iceberg in front of me. So I started going towards it and I was able to get to the far side of it. And as I did, I heard an amazing sucking sound and I thought, this is it.

And I looked over to my shoulder and this iceberg is about the size of a small house, went straight up out of the water, like an atomic cloud. And I go, this is it. But I also remember thinking, so that’s what the bottom of a glacier looks like.

And so I was still paddling for my life when suddenly I realized I was spared all the energy for that falling tower of ice was absorbed by this iceberg, and in suddenly I looked around. It was sunny, it was warm, and I was alive, and I, I started paddling in reverence. [00:51:00] No more whistling, no more singing. I passed by the seals again.

One of them was shaking his head saying, you lucky son of a bitch.

I got back to the lodge. I didn’t tell anybody what I’d done.

I went into my cabin and I pondered and I came up with this. I paddled away agnostic on whether or not nature was my friend or my buddy, but I also came out a believer. That nature wasn’t against me. This experience didn’t get me back on the religious road, but I do believe that day I made my peace with God. Thank you.

Marc Moss: Thanks, Jeff. Jeff Ducklow has always loved nature. As a youngster, he spent most of his free time playing in the woods and felt more at home there than he did anywhere indoors. He considered nature his friend, even into adulthood when [00:52:00] he decided to turn his passion for nature into a career as an adventure guide.

Yes, Jeff felt he and nature were buddies, A belief he wholeheartedly embraced until the events in his story that you just heard shook his faith and gave him more insight into the nature of nature. Thanks for listening to the Tell Us Something podcast. Coming up on the next episode of the Tell Something podcast,

Nita Maddox: he walks up and he’s got this completely unredeemable action adventure movie, and I pull up his account and it’s just bad movie choices and $50 in late fees, and he tries to introduce himself again, and I was like.

Listen buddy. You have terrible taste in movies. You owe $50, you’re gonna need to pay us $20 of those late fees. Take your crappy movie and kick rocks.

Joyce Gibbs: And so I run around to the back where the, where the nesting area is while she’s eating her food. And I open up the cage or open up the back of the hutch.

[00:53:00] And there they are. Four furlough eyeballs closed. Squirmy little baby rabbits. And they’re squirmy so much so that one of them falls out of the back of the hutch and lands in the snow and it starts screaming

Amanda Peterson: and I was in it. So by in it, I mean that by age 16 I had signed a purity contract with God.

Really it, it was just a piece of paper that some guy in a church printed, but to me it was from God and I was signing it for him. Thus, I took it very seriously and I wore a purity ring.

Marc Moss: Listen to the stories from our return to Butte America in April of 2025. On the next episode of the Tell Us Something podcast.

Subscribe to the podcast so you’ll be sure to catch these [00:54:00] stories. On the next Tell us something podcast. Remember that. The next tell us something event is October 7th. The theme is Walk on the Wild Side. You can pitch your story by calling 4 0 6 2 0 3 4 6 8 3. Learn more and get your tickets at Tell us something org.

00;00;00;00 – 00;00;25;10
Marc Moss
Welcome to the Tell Us Something podcast. I’m Marc Moss, founder and executive director of Tell Us Something. We are currently looking for storytellers for the next Tell Us something storytelling event. The theme is hold My beer. If you’d like to pitch your story for conSyderation, please call (406) 203-4683. You have three minutes to leave your pitch. The pitch deadline is December 7th.

00;00;25;12 – 00;00;29;26
Marc Moss
I look forward to hearing from you this week on the podcast.

00;00;29;29 – 00;00;47;13
Jesse Ballard
I distinctly thought about the doll house in the corner, the horse mural on the wall. And so when I started to wake up from that nighttime nap, I was really surprised to look around and see thorn branches instead of that childhood bedroom wall.

00;00;47;15 – 00;01;08;26
Betsy Funk
The flowers are there and they’re up to our knees in color and riotous glory. It’s a misty day, so we aren’t hot. It’s cool. And the mist has made the flowers scream at us. It’s glorious. And I’m hiking with my daughter, who?

00;01;08;29 – 00;01;31;02
Syd Lang
Goodness. For the open mouth piece. Right? Yeah. So I’m throwing up everywhere, and all of a sudden, the crowd of kids just falls completely silent. And. And a kid goes, hey, that’s my grandma’s costume that you’re throwing up in.

00;01;31;05 – 00;01;58;18
Marc Moss
Three storytellers share their true personal story on the theme Never Again. Their stories were recorded live in person in front of a packed house on September 18th, 2024 at the George and Jane Denison Theater in Missoula, Montana. Tell Us Something acknowledges that we gather on the ancestral lands of the Salish, Kootenai, and peoples. These lands have been inhabited for millennia, shaped by the wisdom and stewardship of the First Nation peoples.

00;01;58;20 – 00;02;24;27
Marc Moss
We acknowledge the historical and ongoing trauma inflicted upon indigenous communities, including the forcible removal from their lands, the destruction of their cultures, and the systemic injustices that continue to persist. As we honor the indigenous people who have called this place home. Let us commit to learning from their traditions and values a tangible way to do that. If you live in Missoula, Montana, is to visit the Missoula Public Library on Friday, November 1st.

00;02;24;27 – 00;02;51;27
Marc Moss
Missoula Public Library hosts a First Friday event highlighting native art and culture, showcasing the library’s permanent collection. That event kicks off four weeks of programing celebrating Native American Heritage Month. A tooltip will be installed on the Harrison Children’s Library. They will unveil an exhibit of the Salish Kootenay Seasonal round that gives children a new interactive learning tool. They will also debut a new collection of indigenous books and materials.

00;02;52;00 – 00;03;17;04
Marc Moss
Stop by the library or visit Missoula Public Library Board to learn more. Tell us something. Stories sometimes have adult themes. Storytellers sometimes use adult language. Jessie Ballard and her family are stranded in the Kenyan desert, where they faced danger, dehydration, and exhaustion. Come along with Jessie on a wild, adventure filled with unforgettable memories in a story she calls the best walker.

00;03;17;11 – 00;03;25;21
Marc Moss
Thanks for listening.

00;03;25;23 – 00;03;57;10
Jesse Ballard
I want you to think back to the last time your car broke down, or you were riding in a car that broke down. Think through the steps involved to being rescued. I imagine it was a stressful situation, but pretty simple to get rescued. A phone call to triple A, wave down a passer by. Call a buddy and maybe within a few hours you were safely back at home or in a safe place at least.

00;03;57;13 – 00;04;22;27
Jesse Ballard
Now, I want to take you back in time to late 1980s in a remote area of northern Kenya. Myself, I’m around eight years old. My younger brothers, around six, were with my parents and we had just finished visiting family in a remote area of northern Kenya. We were living in Nairobi, the capital city, at the time we’d finished our visit.

00;04;22;29 – 00;04;47;27
Jesse Ballard
We packed up our double cab white Nissan and we were well on our way back to Nairobi. We happened to hours after our travel. We ended up in this area part of our travel called the chawl B desert. Chawl B is the gabbro word gabbro. Being one of the groups of people that lives in the area for dry and salty.

00;04;48;00 – 00;05;12;02
Jesse Ballard
So I just want you to imagine dry and salty for miles and miles around you. Well, I’ve set up how remote it is, but here we are driving along and another car happens to come by us, and they stop. And it’s Mr. and Mrs. Anderson. Family, friends. Wow. What are the odds of that? So my parents strike up a conversation.

00;05;12;02 – 00;05;35;14
Jesse Ballard
I think my brother and I are just playing in the back seat, and then they wave and off the Andersons go. My dad goes to restart the car. Nothing happens. We all jump out of the car and start waving at the Andersons, who by this point are miles down the road in a dust cloud of dry and salty.

00;05;35;17 – 00;05;58;02
Jesse Ballard
Well, that didn’t work. My dad tried valiantly to get the car started, but it wasn’t going to happen. So he makes the decision. He’s going to be the hero. Dad, and is going to embark out on his own and find help. My mother, sitting in a pickup truck with an eight year old and a six year old, said, not.

00;05;58;05 – 00;05;58;20
Betsy Funk
We are.

00;05;58;20 – 00;06;25;04
Jesse Ballard
All coming with you. So we gathered the supplies, the few supplies we had, which included a jerry can. For those of you not familiar with that phrase. It’s kind of a big plastic or metal container that’s often in the back of a car on Safari with extra gas, or in our case, with extra water. So my mom grabs the jerry can and we start our walk through the child B desert.

00;06;25;07 – 00;06;44;22
Jesse Ballard
At first, my brother and I think this is great. We’re skipping. We’re throwing rocks. We’re having a grand old time. What an adventure we’re on. Eventually, the charm starts to wear off. It’s made extra irritating by my mother banging on the now empty Jerry can.

00;06;44;24 – 00;06;47;08
Betsy Funk
Boom boom boom boom.

00;06;47;10 – 00;07;11;09
Jesse Ballard
Over and over and over and over. Mom! Stop that! That’s annoying. I pause here to have you think of walking a Montana trail, where you might encounter something like a bear. What is it that you do when you’re on a trail where you might encounter a bear? You make noise, right? You’ve got your bear bells. You’re ready with your bear spray.

00;07;11;12 – 00;07;34;18
Jesse Ballard
My mother knew that we might encounter lions or some other wildlife, and the boom boom boom was out of protection for us. But of course, I was childlike, blissfully ignorant to that, and just annoyed at the incessant bang bang bang. So we’re walking and walking and walking and eventually the sun starts to go down and we are exhausted.

00;07;34;18 – 00;08;00;27
Jesse Ballard
So tired. My dad managed to grab some thorn branches and build an enclosure for us to rest in. I don’t my dad and my mom were doing much resting, but I was so tired and I felt so safe in that enclosure that I conked out. I fell fast asleep even though I was only eight. I have this distinct memory of feeling like I was back in my childhood bedroom.

00;08;00;27 – 00;08;30;00
Jesse Ballard
Even though I was in the middle of the desert in a thorn bush enclosure. I distinctly thought about the doll house in the corner, the horse mural on the wall. And so when I started to wake up from that nighttime nap, I was really surprised to look around and see thorn branches instead of that childhood bedroom wall. So as I was waking up, I start to hear the sound of cowbells in the distance.

00;08;30;00 – 00;08;54;14
Jesse Ballard
Digging, deep digging. So we are all listening, and we know that if there’s cowbells, there’s humans, there’s civilization. So we get up and we follow the sound of the cowbells. And that leads us to this. Now abandoned old tented camp. But it wasn’t totally abandoned. There was a caretaker there watching over the property, and he welcomed us in.

00;08;54;15 – 00;09;24;04
Jesse Ballard
He pulled out some cots for us to lay on, and again, we just fell fast asleep. Sleep through the night and as the as we’re there, he’s also giving us cup after cup of tea or chai so that we could get hydrated. And as we’re waking up, I remember this what’s probably an old wives tale to test if you’re dehydrated or not, where if you lift the skin on the back of your hand, if it sticks together, supposedly you’re dehydrated.

00;09;24;07 – 00;09;48;15
Jesse Ballard
And I thought, oh, I’ve been walking in a desert. I mean, I’m dehydrated. And sure enough, when I lifted that skin, it stuck together. So keep that tea coming, get rehydrated. But as I’m waking up that next day, I hear another strange sound. It’s little kids yelling and I can hear that thunk, thunk thunk of rocks being thrown up into this tree near my bed.

00;09;48;18 – 00;10;13;19
Jesse Ballard
And I look up and there’s a giant snake up in the tree. I was pretty scared, but these kids just kept at it and kept checking the rocks, and eventually that snake slithered away. So big sigh of relief there. So now we had to figure out how in the world we were going to get home. Well, this old camp happened to have an old ham radio.

00;10;13;21 – 00;10;40;00
Jesse Ballard
The problem was it had a dead battery. So these two Samburu Lascaris guards, who were part of the the staff at the camp, decided they were going to book it back to our car and get the battery out of the car that we could hook up to the radio and call for help. They did that trip so quick for my brother, and I felt like hundreds and hundreds of miles, but they were back real fast.

00;10;40;03 – 00;11;14;11
Jesse Ballard
So we hooked up the radio and my dad gets on there and we hear this crackling over the radio and another familiar voice. It’s our neighbor from back in Nairobi, placing the order for her tented camp. A dozen eggs and a bag of flour. What are the odds that it would be Mrs. Cotter on the radio? But eventually my dad got through to friends who were wonderful and volunteered to drive up and help get the car and get my dad and the family back home.

00;11;14;13 – 00;11;46;10
Jesse Ballard
Well, my parents decided that another long drive was not the best thing for it and seen little me and my brother. So they managed to make a connection with a local pilot who had a little Cessna plane, likely something like an hour story earlier, and he flew into this remote area. No landing strip, just a bumpy road, but bumpy fields that he landed in, and myself and my brother and my mom loaded into this tiny little plane, which for me was so exciting.

00;11;46;10 – 00;12;11;11
Jesse Ballard
We were going to fly in this cool little plane and get home. My brother was prone to car sickness, which also translates to air sickness. So he’s in that plane just trying to hold it together, and my mom’s doing her best to distract him from wanting to vomit by pointing out things that were flying by. So we’re flying along, and my mom sees this waterfall in the distance.

00;12;11;12 – 00;12;37;04
Jesse Ballard
Look, man, look at that cool waterfall. Our daredevil pilot decides you want to see the waterfall? Let’s go. Hangs a really sharp right. Pulls the plane right up against the waterfall, which did not help the air sickness at all. Eventually we make it back home. My dad makes it back home and we are safely under the roof in our own house.

00;12;37;07 – 00;13;07;23
Jesse Ballard
And I’m back in my bed with my dollhouse in the corner. The horse mural on the wall. I’m sure my parents were in their room going. Never again. But for me, I had a trophy proudly up on my bookshelf, given to me by my parents. A little trophy that on the bottom, red nest Walker. You get.

00;13;07;26 – 00;13;31;04
Marc Moss
Thanks, Jesse. Jesse is a perinatal care coordinator who moonlights as an actor and a birth doula. She lives in Missoula with her husband, two kids, and two cats. In our next story, Betsy Funk hikes with her adult daughter Kelsey, in Glacier National Park on what would become a grueling hike for her daughter. Kelsey’s determination and love for the outdoors pushed them through tears and exhaustion.

00;13;31;07 – 00;13;42;19
Marc Moss
Betsy calls her story Glacier calls. Thanks for listening.

00;13;42;21 – 00;14;07;12
Betsy Funk
I’m from Glacier country. And for those of you who know Glacier Country, you know that the park calls to us and often that means we’re compelled to go visit her. This is happening this one week, and I was feeling it, needing to go back to Glacier. Back to hike. So I made the decision to go. One day I called a friend.

00;14;07;14 – 00;14;23;00
Betsy Funk
I said, let’s go hiking. She said, yeah, I’m up for it. Let’s go. I said, well, have to start early because we want to get back in time. She had a baby and we wanted to make sure the baby got back in time to get some rest. She says, yeah, no problem. I got this. And so I went and picked her up.

00;14;23;03 – 00;14;49;29
Betsy Funk
We loaded up the baby backpack, the snacks, all the Kutama of going to Glacier. Of course, we got our layers and our bear spray and headed up to Glacier to our favorite hike. Now, my friend is my daughter, and she, she has her son, and she’s excited about going on this hike because she’s been doing this with me since I was carrying her in the backpack up the hike.

00;14;50;02 – 00;15;11;01
Betsy Funk
She did it with me when she was a teenager and says, I will go no farther. And she also did it with me and kicked my ass up the switchbacks. So we know it’s her favorite. She has, she has a real passion for this part of the park, as do I. So we get to the trailhead. It’s about eight in the morning.

00;15;11;01 – 00;15;31;29
Betsy Funk
We decide we’re going to start early. This particular trail takes on a slow day, about six hours to do. It’s not extraordinary hard, but it is touted as one of the most beautiful hikes in the park. So as we’re unloading her son and I’m unloading her and we’re getting things ready to go, I look over at her and I say, Kelsey, how are you doing?

00;15;32;04 – 00;16;05;16
Betsy Funk
I’m good mom. I said, so you sure about this? Yes, mom, I got this. I said, great. Okay. You’re sure of it? Let’s go. So the trail drops off. the going to the sun Road, and it goes for about a mile into the subalpine forest. And as you step on that trail, the sounds of the road drop away and you’re surrounded by the moistness of bear grass and ferns.

00;16;05;19 – 00;16;31;17
Betsy Funk
A soft foot underneath. And it gradually hikes uphill into these beautiful mountains. That compelled us to go and call us. So as we’re hiking, I’m realizing this is taking Kelsey a little longer than I thought it would. Now she’s carrying her son, and, And that’s okay. So I turn around and say, you sure you’re up to this?

00;16;31;17 – 00;17;02;17
Betsy Funk
She says, oh, I got this, mom, so I’m fine about I don’t know, I want to make a guess, but a mile to a mile and a half in on the trail, it’s becoming pretty apparent to me that this is going to be a long day. She’s taking a while, and I guess this is where I tell you that my daughter is in six plus years of living with and gradually dying from, glioblastoma multiforme, which is brain cancer.

00;17;02;20 – 00;17;38;27
Betsy Funk
It’s terminal. She’s been through two brain surgeries, five and a half years of chemotherapy and a full term pregnancy. she’s a fighter, and she wants to do this hike. She loves this hike. But when you look at her, you realize that cancer, it doesn’t take you all at once. Cancer takes you. Bit by bit, one piece at a time.

00;17;39;00 – 00;18;04;17
Betsy Funk
And I’ve been watching for over six years. My daughter die in front of my eyes, one piece at a time. So we’re hiking along the trail and I’m starting to be concerned. It’s taking her a while. She’s gained a lot of weight with all the treatment. She’s slow, she’s tired. And I ask her, else we can stop at the why?

00;18;04;18 – 00;18;34;04
Betsy Funk
It’s okay. We’ve been here. It’s wonderful. She says, no, mom, I got this. So we get to the why where she knows the next thing she’s going to see are these glorious meadows filled with arnica, an Indian paintbrush, mountain aster. And she has a degree in horticulture. So she she says she’s jazzed. She wants to see this. So we get to the line and I say, okay, we’ve got a choice.

00;18;34;06 – 00;18;55;18
Betsy Funk
We could stop here, go back, have lunch. It’s great. We’ve seen wonderful things. We could go on up to get an idea, or we could head over, say, pass. And she says, mom, Syde pass. That’s the only option. I got this. So we head up. The meadows are there. They’re up to our knees in color and riotous glory.

00;18;55;21 – 00;19;29;00
Betsy Funk
It’s a misty day. So we are as hot. It’s cool. And the mist has made the flowers scream at us. It’s glorious. And I’m hiking with my daughter. So from there we open up and we go through some beautiful waterfalls and creeks and we get to the switchbacks. Now these switchbacks are no fake. Go. They’re real switchbacks. They go and they go, and then there’s little summit and then you go some more.

00;19;29;03 – 00;19;53;05
Betsy Funk
at this point, we’ve been on the trail twice as long as it would take anybody else to be on the trail. I said it was a misty day, so there were very few people on the trail, and those people had long since passed us where I thought we’d be done. At about two in the afternoon, it was becoming pretty apparent that we might be down after dark.

00;19;53;07 – 00;20;18;15
Betsy Funk
We go to start the switchbacks, and it’s even more apparent that Kelsey is weakening. She’s struggling about every ten meters. She has to stop. Let’s feed the baby mom. Let’s take a rest. Kelsey. We can go back any time I got this, mom. It’s okay. I got this on these switchbacks. She finally allowed me to take the baby.

00;20;18;17 – 00;20;44;07
Betsy Funk
I carried them on my back. Now you’re wondering, what’s he doing? Well, he was just hanging out. He was cool. He was wrapped up all snuggly warm, and I just kept handing food back there. He was good. So we’re hiking up the switchbacks, waiting for calcium, checking in. How are you doing? I’m okay. I got it, mom. Take the next switchback.

00;20;44;07 – 00;21;11;21
Betsy Funk
How are you to him? Mom, I’ve got this. Okay. We eventually make it to the top. Along our way, we pick up a couple of heart stones. And as is tradition in my family, we put the heart stones on this enormous cairn that stands at the top of the pass. And we put them there to honor those who come before us and to guide those who come after us.

00;21;11;23 – 00;21;34;24
Betsy Funk
And we hold each other and we celebrate and we embrace and we feed the baby more food. and then I ask for calcium. If we go back, it’s shorter. We know where we’ve been and we’re okay. It’s an extra mile, a mile and a half to go down the other Syde. Mom, I didn’t come here to quit.

00;21;34;26 – 00;22;03;17
Betsy Funk
I’ve got this. So I take a deep breath. I say, I’ll take the baby. She’s my baby, I said. Okay, she was a stubborn one. so she carried the baby as we drop down this trail. If you’ve never been there, you walk through hanging gardens of monkey flowers and orchids all scream and riotous color in the high alpine saying, come have sex with me, please.

00;22;03;20 – 00;22;31;25
Betsy Funk
The beautiful. And she is relishing in it. She’s in rapture. She’s loving this at the same time. Her legs are shaking. She’s worn through one pair of leggings because she’s large and her legs have chafed. She’s bleeding. I give her another pair of leggings. She’s begun to walk through them. She falls. She breaks up, holds. I ask if I can take a photo.

00;22;31;27 – 00;23;00;27
Betsy Funk
She says, nope, I got this mom. So we continue down, shaky knowing it’s getting late. There’s nobody on the trail at this point. The clouds are settling, it’s getting scary and it’s bare. 30 if anybody knows what bare 30 is. Well, basically the rule is stay 100 yards away from a bear right? Oh, I have someone with me who’s having trouble walking on the trail.

00;23;01;00 – 00;23;25;03
Betsy Funk
And when we see the full size, the grizzly bear ten feet off the trail and I ask her, can you bushwhack? She says, mom, I don’t think I can. I don’t think I can hold myself up. We can’t walk on the trail. I take a breath and I say, okay, so there is this full sized grizzly ten feet off the trail.

00;23;25;03 – 00;23;53;11
Betsy Funk
The trail goes on a switchback above the bear and below the bear. So we’re going to cut across a little field to try to avoid doing it twice. Right. So I tell Kelso, right here it is. Kelso, I’ve got the bear spray and I’m standing with the bear spray, and I go, you walk behind me and she goes, mom, I said, just walk behind me because I’m looking at that bear.

00;23;53;11 – 00;24;26;20
Betsy Funk
And I say right to his face, she’s not going to die today. Not today. And she makes it. She gets the other Syde. I start to back up, still holding the bear spray. The bear shakes his head and huff 70, walks over to a pine chain just below the bear. We made it. We continue down the trail and it’s clear Kelsey is truly struggling.

00;24;26;22 – 00;24;49;08
Betsy Funk
a ranger has been sent in to help us, although what could he do but help her up? Because at this point, I’m giving the baby her modality of getting down this trail, bleeding and shaky and very unstable is to sit on every step, slide on her ass, and have us help her up. And then she walks away to the next one.

00;24;49;08 – 00;25;17;02
Betsy Funk
Sets and slides. It’s getting later and later, and I’m thinking, we need to call somebody in. And I ask him, should we call for help? She says, mom, I gotta do this. I got this. We make it to the bottom. It’s glorious. I’m relieved. I’m crying. The baby’s asleep. and there’s a at the bottom of this trail.

00;25;17;02 – 00;25;42;06
Betsy Funk
There’s this beautiful path that goes down on the river. And I go and put my feet in. Because I’m an old woman and my feet hurt. And she goes and puts her feet and she’s. Oh, this doesn’t this won’t do, mom. And she goes because she’s bleeding and she sits right in the creek and she goes, you know, mom.

00;25;42;08 – 00;26;02;12
Betsy Funk
I don’t think I’ll ever be able to do that again. And I looked right at her and I said, you know what else you got? This. Thank you.

00;26;02;14 – 00;26;24;04
Marc Moss
Thanks, Betsy. Betsy Font lives in the Flathead Valley, where, surrounded by mountains, she raised her family. She believes stories are the result of the mischief wonder and magic of life and of a willingness to be witness to all of it. To see photos of Kelsey and Betsy on their hike visit. Tell us something, doc. Work coming up after the break.

00;26;24;06 – 00;26;40;28
Syd Lang
Thank goodness for the open mouth piece, right? Yeah, so I’m throwing up everywhere, and all of a sudden the crowd of kids just falls completely silent.

00;26;41;01 – 00;26;42;13
Syd Lang
And a kid goes.

00;26;42;16 – 00;26;43;18
Betsy Funk
Hey.

00;26;43;21 – 00;26;47;23
Syd Lang
That’s my grandma’s costume that you’re throwing up in.

00;26;47;26 – 00;27;08;22
Marc Moss
Remember that the next tell us the main event is January 13th. You can learn about how to pitch your story and get tickets at Tell Us something.org. Thank you to our story sponsors who help us to pay our storytellers the Good Food Store. For more than 50 years, The Good Food Store has been Missoula’s homegrown independent source for natural, organic and locally sourced food.

00;27;08;24 – 00;27;43;14
Marc Moss
Learn more at Good Food store.com. And thanks to story sponsor ParkSyde Credit Union, whose mission it is to be the best place for people of western Montana to get a loan. Learn more at ParkSyde fcu.org. Thanks to our accessibility sponsor SBS solar, allowing us to provide American Sign Language interpretation at the live event. SBF solar stands at the forefront of the solar energy revolution, with over 30 years of industry experience specializing in custom solar design and installation for both reSydential and commercial applications.

00;27;43;20 – 00;28;10;17
Marc Moss
SBA solar is committed to promoting energy independence and environmental sustainability. Learn more at SBS linc.com. And thanks to our workshop sponsor, White Tide Designs, helping us to feed our storytellers at the group workshop. White Tie Designs is a woman led art and design studio that produces colorful spaces and stunning artwork that fosters positivity and empowers individuals to be their best selves.

00;28;10;19 – 00;28;34;26
Marc Moss
Learn more at Wide Tide designs.com. Thanks to our media sponsors, Mizzou Events Dot net, where you find all the good things that are happening. All of our Missoula and Missoula Broadcasting Company. Learn more about them and listen online at Missoula Broadcasting company.com. Thanks to our in-kind sponsors. Float Missoula. Learn more at float msl.com and choice of Tyler. Learn about Joyce at Joyce of tile.com.

00;28;34;29 – 00;28;58;14
Marc Moss
All right, let’s get back to the stories. You are listening to the Tell Us Something podcast. I’m Marc Moss closing out this episode of the Tell Us Something podcast. Syd Lange is a summer camp counselor at a small, long running camp in Colorado. Listen as she meets a special individual one summer and watch their friendship blossom amidst laughter, shared stories, and a whole lot of fun.

00;28;58;16 – 00;29;08;17
Marc Moss
Syd calls her story lovesick. Thanks for listening.

00;29;08;19 – 00;29;39;15
Syd Lang
I’m standing in the middle of a large dining room, and I’m in a bit of a pickle. The problem is, there is a cute girl sitting in the corner and I am in fluorescent, Colorado. well, actually, not in fluorescent. Fluorescent, as of the last census, had 149 people who lived there. It’s technically an unincorporated community, and I’m in Florissant, but not really forest.

00;29;39;15 – 00;30;02;20
Syd Lang
And I’m actually 30 minutes up a dirt road in the middle of nowhere. And I’m in this dining hall, and I see this girl and she’s sitting in the corner, and I want to go sit by her. She’s got this wild mullet that I later learned. She’s cut herself with a river knife on the Grand Canyon, and she’s got these vibrant eyes, and I want to sit next to her.

00;30;02;20 – 00;30;32;15
Syd Lang
But I’m a little bit nervous, and I’m nervous because on the drive out from Montana to Colorado, I’ve lost my voice somewhere. Wyoming’s long takes a long time to drive through there. I’m sure somewhere my voice has taken a stop and not come with me. I get to Colorado and I, I have laryngitis. And so here I am, standing in this room trying to meet a staff of seven people, small staff, and I can’t speak.

00;30;32;15 – 00;30;36;07
Syd Lang
And so I’m introducing myself, scratching through words. And I’m saying I am sad.

00;30;36;07 – 00;30;37;12
Betsy Funk
And I, I don’t.

00;30;37;12 – 00;30;57;00
Syd Lang
Normally sound like this, and I don’t know what to tell you. And I’m so happy to be here. And, it’s my fourth time coming to work at this outdoor education center. And we do summer camp, and we also do, teaching students. And so I spend the next week during staff training trying to get to know this girl.

00;30;57;01 – 00;31;14;19
Syd Lang
It’s not going well. I’m not really getting to know anyone because no one can hear me. And so at the end of training, we decide that we’re going to go all together as a staff. We’re going to go into town. The big town. And so we get in two separate cars, and I manage to weasel my way into the car with her.

00;31;14;19 – 00;31;32;03
Syd Lang
And I’m thinking, oh, good, here we go. Now it’s my time to rock. And so we get in the cars, you know, five, seven person staff team, right? Five people and one car, two people and the other. Here we go. So we get in the old 2001 Subaru Outback, and she rolls down all the windows because it’s August in Colorado.

00;31;32;03 – 00;31;52;12
Syd Lang
It’s still pretty hot. She turns on the radio and she’s singing the whole drive, and my little scratchy laryngitis voice is no competition for the windows or the music. And so I’m silent. The whole two hour car ride. We get to town and she has this great idea. We should go to karaoke.

00;31;52;14 – 00;31;54;16
Betsy Funk
Like, oh, awesome.

00;31;54;18 – 00;32;23;15
Syd Lang
This is perfect. So I get to karaoke and Big Green Tractor, my typical karaoke songs. Not sounding as good as it usually does, and I’m up there and I’m scratching through the lyrics and I finally, as the night goes on, I get a chance to sit outSyde with her and we’re talking about how we both have worked at this camp, but we’ve worked there opposing seasons, and so we have never we’ve never met before.

00;32;23;18 – 00;32;26;03
Syd Lang
And she goes, oh, I’ve heard of you, though.

00;32;26;06 – 00;32;26;11
Betsy Funk
Like.

00;32;26;13 – 00;32;48;25
Syd Lang
Oh God, this can’t be good. And she goes, yeah, you’re Patient zero, aren’t you? Yep. So, so let’s go back to 2019. It was my second summer at camp, and I’m coming as the climbing director this summer. And my goal is to get students excited to sign up for my climbing program, because the more they sign up, the more I get to climb.

00;32;48;25 – 00;33;17;02
Syd Lang
And that’s the dream job to a 19 year old. And so here I am. I’m dressed in front of all of the kids. It’s 150. Kids are sitting in an outdoor auditorium, and I’m putting on an opening night performance, and it’s this zany, wild experience and I’m dressed head to toe in a giraffe costume. And luckily, there is a break in the giraffe costume from the top of my head to the bottom of my chin.

00;33;17;02 – 00;33;33;27
Syd Lang
It’s got this like big giraffe muzzle, you might call it these big ears. And I’m in a belay system, which is a climbing term. If you don’t know, I’m wearing a harness and another person is also wearing a harness, and we’re kind of mocking what climbing might be like. And I have no control over if I’m moving forwards or backwards.

00;33;33;27 – 00;33;53;20
Syd Lang
I’m tied into a rope and my player is deciding how much slack I get. And so here I am, and I’m like dancing in front of everyone. I’m so excited. I’m the giraffe and I’m going to climb with you all summer. Come sign up, and all of the sudden I turned to the left and I just start spewing vomit just out of nowhere.

00;33;53;20 – 00;34;10;18
Syd Lang
Thank goodness for the open mouthpiece, right? Yeah. So I’m throwing up everywhere, and all of a sudden the crowd of kids just falls completely silent.

00;34;10;20 – 00;34;12;03
Syd Lang
And a kid goes.

00;34;12;05 – 00;34;13;06
Betsy Funk
Hey.

00;34;13;09 – 00;34;36;14
Syd Lang
That’s my grandma’s costume that you’re throwing up in. And so I’m standing in front of everybody spewing vomit and also spewing the norovirus, which took over the entire camp all summer. looking back, it was pretty awesome. You know, kids in the dining hall, they’re standing up and three kids are vomiting at once. And all these interactions, it was a real stand by me moment.

00;34;36;15 – 00;34;56;21
Syd Lang
We had a barf tally on the Syde. Yeah. Totally awesome. So I coined the name patient zero, and I’m sitting here and I’m like, really going into this story, like telling her maybe more than I should. And I look over after talking about this and I’m expecting her face to be like, oh. And she looks at me with just this, like excited astonishment.

00;34;56;22 – 00;35;14;03
Syd Lang
She goes, well, hey, that’s cool. Have you heard of my character early? Like, oh, okay, we’re going to do this. Here we go. And so she starts telling me about this character named Earl, which is a bird, and the bird dance to every event. And Earl kind of sounded like this. So she’s going into Earl.

00;35;14;03 – 00;35;39;11
Syd Lang
And then I start talking about granny. And granny was my other claim to fame at this establishment. Granny is an old character. She’s an old woman character. And I’m working outdoor ed season at this time. And so fifth and sixth grade students from the surrounding area in Colorado, they come up and they spend a week with myself and the other field instructors, and we we replace part of their curriculum from the class.

00;35;39;11 – 00;36;01;16
Syd Lang
So we’re teaching it. And also acting it out. It’s really an odd place. And so I am working I’m teaching the, the homesteading curriculum, and I’m granny dressed head to toe in a bonnet. And granny, I just fell in love with granny. So I spent two months being granny and granny sounded like this. Hey, kids. Well, come.

00;36;01;16 – 00;36;01;23
Betsy Funk
On.

00;36;01;23 – 00;36;07;08
Syd Lang
Down. Here we go. We’re going to churn some butter.

00;36;07;10 – 00;36;29;20
Syd Lang
And granny had a really rough season because granny had giardia. And if you don’t know what giardia is, it is a parasite you get from drinking unclean water. And she already really stays until you take care of it. So the idea, Judy, a granny, is running around teaching these kids in her bonnet and her and her homesteading dress.

00;36;29;27 – 00;36;45;19
Syd Lang
She keeps going, Granny’s got dysentery. Where is the chamber pot? So at this point, everybody has heard about patient Zero and also granny with giardia.

00;36;45;21 – 00;37;08;21
Syd Lang
And I’m swapping stories with this girl. Her name is Sophia, and we’re going back and forth, back and forth and just doubling over in laughter outSyde of this karaoke bar. And we decide that what we need to do is bring Earl and granny together. And there’s a perfect opportunity for that. We have, in this outdoor ed season, what’s called the hoedown.

00;37;08;24 – 00;37;29;29
Syd Lang
And I can guarantee you, you have never been to anything like the High Trails Hoedown. It is magical and wild. All the students are packed into a small auditorium. The teachers are. They are wide eyed, confused, or like, this is what you do. What? And all the staff comes in, were dancing around in different costumes and we put on a performance.

00;37;29;29 – 00;37;51;14
Syd Lang
And every night the performance looks different because we don’t play in it and it goes on for like two hours. These kids dancing at the hoedown and granny and Earl come out and they just steal the show. And for the next two months, granny and Earl steal the show every single week, granny and Earl.

00;37;52;24 – 00;38;26;08
Syd Lang
Spend a lot of time together. Granny and Earl also sit in Sofia, fall in love. throughout the entirety of that season, Sophia’s mullet slowly grows out. My voice slowly comes back. Thank goodness. Good old Larry’s kicked it, kicked the curb, and, we moved back to his unit together. And granny and Earl still live in Missoula. We’ve been here for two and a half years, and we have a pretty darn good time.

00;38;26;11 – 00;38;38;07
Syd Lang
and I would say we still know how to throw a pretty dang good hoedown.

00;38;38;09 – 00;39;12;06
Marc Moss
Thanks, Syd. Sydney Lang grew up in Olympia, Washington, and has been living in Grand Old Missoula, Montana on and off for the past seven years. She attended the University of Montana, where she studied communication and climate change. She spends much of her time climbing big rocks and zooming through the trees on her bike. She has been working in the outdoor education world for many years both in Montana and Colorado, said love seat bubble gum, ice cream, practice slack line by the river, play on local trails and cook dinner with friends.

00;39;12;08 – 00;39;35;12
Marc Moss
Thanks for listening to the Tell Us Something podcast. Remember that the next Tell Us Something event is January 13th. The theme is hold my beer. Learn how to pitch your story and get tickets at Tell Us something.org.