Making “Friends” for an Hour at a Time

The Western World will soon be engulfed in an age win which “friend” is a verb, meaning “to briefly come into contact with a person – and/or profiles, pictures, videos of said person – through the internet.”

But I think that I have found a new perversion of one of the most valuable words in the English language and the most important concept of human experience.

I have spent the past two or three years caught up in somewhat of a podcast revolution. Essentially digitized and neatly parceled radio shows, podcasts really hit their stride, in my opinion, when comedians took to the microphone and began recording themselves and their friends in a variety of formats: game podcasts, sketch podcasts, science podcasts, podcasts about movies and, reviving the old standard, the interview podcast.

It wasn’t until this summer when I realized what kind of relationship I had cultivated with both my favorite podcasts and their hosts. It was during an episode this summer when Tig Notaro, at the helm of the Professor Blastoff podcast (co-hosted by the excellent David Huntsberger and Kyle Dunnigan), described the gauntlet through which she had just run: a months long battle with C-Diff, the abrupt passing of her mother, culminating in a diagnosis of breast cancer. (Quick Interjection: Tig recently performed what was soon to become a legendary stand-up performance about her troubles. Fortunately, it was recorded and is available for purchase at https://buy.louisck.net/purchase/tig-notaro-live)

My feelings immediately after hearing this news from Tig, with whom I had spent almost two hours a week with for the past eighteen months, caught me off guard. I live in the world; I read stories about pain, tragedy and loss, all of which evoke in me (what I believe to be) appropriate responses of grief or sadness. But, although Tig was really no less a stranger to me than the couple of the news who were killed in a car crash, hearing her hardship, and knowing that she was about to get another serving of it, really cut me deep.

Then I thought about why I felt the way I felt.

From one perspective, these podcasts are some analogy to celebrity tabloids. The hosts and guests play voyeur, revealing themselves through personal stories, embarrassments and jokes to a passive and greedy audience, who laps it up. Certainly any ability that any “layman” such as myself could have to participate in the lives of show-biz types is exhilarating in its own right (hence paparazzi being able to profit off even the most mundane photos of celebrities). But podcasting brings it to a new extreme. There is as little filter as possible between the famous and the ordinary without the ordinary being served with some sort of warrant. And so the one-sided relationships are forged even deeper, but only on one side.

But I try to convince myself that it is different. I invest a not at all insignificant amount of time in listening to, laughing along with and learning from these podcasters. They, perhaps selfishly, have allowed me into their entourage and I have more than happily accepted the invitation. The aforementioned lack of filter allows me to project some level of sincerity onto the podcast participants. I don’t feel that I am oogling monkeys in a zoo with each new episode, rather I am meeting with a separate group of friends, catching up with them and, in the process of the conversation, actually saying nothing. So I feel able to assert that I am nothing like some bored housewife trying to forget my unhappy marriage by looking at grainy photos of Jennifer Aniston’s engagement ring printed in Us Weekly. Or am I?

I admit to the superficiality of these “friendships,” yet I cannot shake the feeling that they actually are friendships. I would recognize Tig if I saw her on the street. I would know about her life, her family and her childhood (because of what she talks about on her podcast, not because I am stalking her, or anything…). But Tig, were I to approach her as a “friend,” would find herself experiencing anything ranging from confusion to downright terror. There would be a small chance that she would smile and shake my hand and a very large chance that she would spray me with mace and beat me over the head with the nearest purse.

But, despite this awareness, I still fall into the trap. Today, I was listening to a backlog of Nerdist podcasts, one of which feature the totally awesome actress Anna Kendrick. Over the course of the hour and half conversation that I had the opportunity to eavesdrop upon, I found myself realizing, or convincing myself of, how genuinely sweet and spectacular this Anna girl seemed. My jaw dropped when she mentioned singing along to Laura Marling, whom I love and will feature on this website many times in the future. For brief flashes I imagined some scenario in which I befriend Ms. Kendrick and we spend time listening to contemporary British folk and enjoying classic cinema. Then I wake up, and realize that my insidious imagination once again caused me to walk unaware into a busy intersection.

But really, Anna, I’m sure we would become great friends.

Okay. Now it's weird.

I'm about to listen to a podcast with Joseph Gordon-Levitt as a guest. I'm probably just going to have start going outside to meet people in real life, right?

Once again, I would like to suggest checking out Tig’s awesome show mentioned above. It is being sold on Louis CK’s website here: https://buy.louisck.net/purchase/tig-notaro-live. It is awesome; it is raw; it is powerful, and only $5.