Episode 337: What To Do When Your Mom Gets Dumped with Hallie Bateman
Doree and Elise share the products that the young people in their life have influenced them to try. Then, they invite illustrator and writer Hallie Bateman on to discuss illustrating a book with her mother about getting through her divorce (What to Do When You Get Dumped), the joy of witnessing that immense emotional growth in her mom, what life is like as a working artist, being a mom of twins, and using wit and humor to get through darker times.
Photo credit: Daniel Iroh
Mentioned in this Episode
What to Do When You Get Dumped by Suzy Hopkins and illustrated by Hallie Bateman
Connect with Hallie Bateman
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Transcript
The transcript for this episode Ai generated.
Doree (00:10):
Hello and welcome to Forever 35, a podcast about the things we do to take care of ourselves. I'm Doree Shafrir.
Elise (00:17):
And I'm Elise Hu. And we are two friends who like to talk a lot about serums.
Doree (00:23):
Welcome to the show,
Elise (00:25):
And I hope you all are taking care of yourselves because it feels like everything's on fire.
Doree (00:30):
I mean, in Los Angeles, literally everything is on fire,
Elise (00:34):
But also metaphorically and figuratively.
Doree (00:37):
Yeah, that too. That too. It's a rough time out there.
Elise (00:43):
I should put the question that we always give the guests to you, Dora. What are you doing that you consider self-care lately?
Doree (00:50):
Oh, I mean tennis.
Elise (00:52):
Tennis, yeah. You have have a few trips to the desert coming up. We should report to our listeners.
Doree (01:01):
Yeah,
Elise (01:01):
Dory's tennis teams are quite successful.
Doree (01:04):
I have two trips to the desert one this weekend and one next weekend for my two teams. We are going to So Cal sectional baby.
Elise (01:14):
Yeah, girl.
Doree (01:20):
No, I'm excited and I think it'll just be a fun experience. Supposedly this sectionals is a very fun vibe because there's no nationals for this season, so it just sort of ends here and it's supposed to be more chill, so
Elise (01:39):
Guess you have to play right? I mean, you have
Doree (01:42):
Matches set up. Yeah, but I think it's like when there's the possibility of going to nationals, the teams are much more cutthroat and competitive, whereas at this, people are just kind of there to play some tennis in the desert and have a good time.
Elise (02:03):
Yeah, that sounds great.
Doree (02:04):
What about you? What are you doing for self-care?
Elise (02:07):
I'm trying to get back into bar trivia. So for the last couple of weeks, for the last couple of weeks, I have gone to bar trivia on Wednesday nights, but I think I'm too thirsty when I get there, as in thirsty for drinks, I get lit and then by Thursday morning I'm like, wow, my eyes are all swollen. Oh no. And I have a headache. What happened? So I need to take it a little. I need a throttle on my,
Doree (02:42):
Oh my God,
Elise (02:43):
My bar trivia reentry. I think I'm hitting it a little hard, but it is so fun. Some of the teams are giant. They have like 12 people, and last night it was four of us, and so we were teasing the teams near us that we're all because we were so outnumbered. And then they have these fun music rounds or picture rounds, and yesterday there was a crossword round and every answer in the crossword had the word tip in it. So it'd be like tiptoe and centipede and antipathy were the answers. You would've really enjoyed this particular,
Doree (03:25):
I was going to say bar trivia. Don't invite me to cocktail parties, invite me to bar trivia.
Elise (03:34):
There was one round where I felt really helpful in, and it was photos. It was images and you had to name the decade. So they had an image of Saddam Hussein after he was captured. Remember when they found him in the hole and he was all bearded, and somebody on my team wanted to say it was the nineties because the Operation Desert Storm was in the nineties, but I was like, no, that was after, this is clear. Look at his beard. He was living in a hole.
Doree (04:04):
Right.
Elise (04:05):
Funny. So it was clearly 2004 and they had a photo of FDR at Yalta and Nelson Mandela after he was released. And so there's some rounds where I'm totally useless like comic books?
Doree (04:19):
Yeah, no,
Elise (04:21):
And classic rock real problem. Real gaps in classic rock.
Doree (04:26):
The guy who we have hired many times to do private trivia nights, trivia
Elise (04:34):
Nights,
Doree (04:35):
He always used to do a TV theme song round, and I was really bad at that.
Elise (04:43):
I watched a lot of USA and TNT and TBS as a kid, so I'm guessing I might,
Doree (04:49):
You'd probably be good at it.
Elise (04:51):
That might be something. I was really into Matlock as a kid, which they rebooted. By the way. There's a new Matlock on cbs. Of
Doree (05:00):
Course there is. Of course there is because there's no original ideas anymore
Elise (05:08):
In the category of products and serums. I have been just studying Ava, my tweens stash to see what she has. Ooh, yeah. Yeah. She's really into lip oils. The tweens are using a lot of those Fenty beauty lip oils, and then the elf lip oil. I love the elf lip oil. I think it's like $9, but lovely. And I like the little applicator and it's now a go-to product for me that I just discovered. Love that. From following Ava, I'm going to have to get her list. That's so fun. I'm going to get her shoppers.
Doree (05:50):
Yeah, get her list.
Elise (05:52):
This was sort of like when we were talking about the Altadena girls who were doing the wildfire relief for their friends, they had a list and that's probably helpful because we can kind of peek in on that list and be like, oh, these are some things we need to try.
Doree (06:04):
That's why I was excited to go shopping for them, and then they were like, we're good. Which is fine, obviously, but yeah, because I was like, oh, I want to know what's the deal here.
Elise (06:18):
Well, last year Ava got me that blush from say, SAIE for my birthday, and I love it. It's that cream blush, you just put a dot on each cheek, and I've been using that since last February, so I have learned about some cool stuff. Otherwise I would be some of our millennial callers and texters who are like, I haven't updated my makeup in a while. It's good times. Thank you for contribution. I got to pay Ava some sort of consulting fee and just put her on my payroll. I think that it's good for tax purposes or something too. I can make her my TikTok consultant. That whole TikTok, that 12 hours or 14 hours without TikTok really rocked a lot of young people's worlds. Did it really? That was like, yeah, and I checked my notes and it really was like 14 hours though. I am seeing a lot of people are saying that now that TikTok is so openly playing political games and kind of sucking up and kissing up to the Trump administration that people are less into it. It's kind of gone the way some users seem to be not engaging in the same way they were before.
Doree (07:34):
Oh,
Elise (07:34):
Interesting. Yeah, it'll be really interesting to see what happens with our social platforms. It is a time of unknown.
Doree (07:40):
What's funny to me is how quickly we forget the social platforms of old, the way people were talking about TikTok was almost like, it's too big to fail. And I'm like, no, the world is littered with the corpses of dead social platforms. Absolutely. Everyone thought Vine was too big to fail, and then Twitter killed it. MySpace was too big to fail and then it just sort of went away. There's nothing that says that TikTok must stick around could.
Elise (08:16):
I think this is already the beginning of the end for it too, this whole pause and becoming a political football. But who knows? There's so many creators that are really reliant on these platforms. That's the only thing. There's an entire economy. Yeah. What's different about Vine days versus TikTok days is the creator economy and all the people who leverage the attention economy and the brands that participated in order to launch entire careers. You ask teens these days and tweens these days what they want to be when they grow up. And a lot of 'em say they want to be YouTubers, they want to be influencers. That's a legit career path now.
Doree (08:59):
Crazy.
Elise (09:00):
What a time to be alive.
Doree (09:01):
What a time to be alive.
Elise (09:05):
And because it is a rough time to be alive or a strange one. I feel our guests have been all extra refreshing and extra delightful as Counterprogramming. And then this week we had an awesome conversation with the cartoonist and illustrator, Halle Bateman.
Doree (09:26):
She was great. She was, she's someone that I've followed for over 10 years and it was so great to get to talk to her. And also just to be reminded, she was so young when she sort of first came on the scene on the All and the Hairpin and sort of late aughts, early aught, teens, internet. So yeah, she's super cool and the new book is wonderful and such a delight and yeah, she's just so great. Should we introduce her officially? Officially?
Elise (10:06):
Yes. Yes. I will do the honors. Halle Bateman is a writer and illustrator whose work has appeared in the New Yorker, the New York Times Magazine, the Owl, and many others. Her books include Directions, what to Do when I'm Gone and Brave New Work. Other books she has illustrated include Urus. She lives in Cincinnati, Ohio, and her latest book is What To Do When You Get Dumped, which was written by her mom. So this project is extra special, it's extra poignant, and the book, despite its title, is often full of levity.
Doree (10:48):
Yeah,
Elise (10:49):
Yeah.
Doree (10:49):
It's really charming and funny and I think gets at something very real and heartbreaking. I just thought it was such a great book. Before we get to Halle, just want to remind everyone, everything we mention on the show is on our website forever 35 podcast.com. We're also on Instagram at Forever 35 podcast. Our Patreon is at patreon.com/forever 35. You can shop our favorite products at shop my US slash forever 35, and our newsletter is at Forever 35 podcast.com/newsletter. Also, please call or text us at (781) 591-0390, or you can email us at Forever 35 podcast@gmail.com. We do, I would say we love getting all of your communication. I especially love getting voicemails because I love hearing our listeners voices, so if you are moved to send us a voicemail, please do.
Elise (11:47):
Those voicemails are really great, though. Any type of communication is always
Doree (11:54):
Exactly, exactly. Alright, we are going to take a short break and we will be right
Elise (12:00):
Back. We'll be right back.
Doree (12:09):
Halle, welcome to Forever 35. We're so happy to have you on the show.
Hallie Bateman (12:14):
I'm so excited to be here and I'm exactly 35.
Doree (12:19):
Oh, yay.
Hallie Bateman (12:20):
Gosh, we so rarely have
Doree (12:21):
Someone who is right at the 35 age. Yeah. That's wonderful. Well, I think, you know, because you did say you listened to the show that we start our interviews by asking our guests about a self-care practice that they have. So we are wondering if there is something that you do that you would consider.
Hallie Bateman (12:44):
Yeah, I was actually, I was thinking about that before the show, and I have two things from the last 24 hours that I can show.
Elise (12:52):
Okay, perfect. So they're recent. Alright.
Hallie Bateman (12:54):
Yeah. Okay. So one of them is reading comics, as I'm sure, I think you're both based in la. The fires have been happening. It's horrible. And even just as I don't live there anymore, but as someone from afar who has so many loved ones affected, I've been really just so kind of grief-stricken and out of it and glued to my phone and I try to sit down and read a novel and my vision just blurs and I can't function. So the last couple nights I've just been picking up graphic novels and I can read it because it's gentler and an easier ask. You can dip in even if you're not able to read anything else. So that's my one self-care tip. And then the other one, which I use today was just saying, no, when they want to weigh you at the doctor's office,
Elise (13:54):
Yes.
Hallie Bateman (13:55):
You don't
Elise (13:56):
Have to say yes. Yeah,
Hallie Bateman (13:57):
Can we skip that? And they're like, oh yeah, and it's just incredible. So those are my two things.
Doree (14:05):
I love that. I started doing that a couple years ago and I feel like at first they were surprised and now I think enough people are doing it that they're just like, oh yeah, no problem.
Hallie Bateman (14:17):
Yeah, they kind of seem like, okay. And then I'm like, why are we even doing this? Why is
Elise (14:22):
Anybody doing it at all?
Hallie Bateman (14:24):
Then
Doree (14:27):
Can I ask what graphic novels you're reading?
Hallie Bateman (14:32):
The one I was reading last night is from my all time favorite cartoonist, Linda Berry. That's Linda with a y, and it's one called Come Over, come Over. I think it was from a syndicated comic that she did in the eighties. That's about these two sisters, Linda Berry, I don't know if you guys are familiar, but she's kind of a legend. She won a MacArthur Grant a few years ago, and I think she used to be on David Letterman a lot or something. Oh wow. She's just a total character, but her comics are what got me into comics. She's my icon who I just kind of worship from afar.
Elise (15:16):
Well, both of us have gotten to practice your self-care tip by reading comics because you have what to do when you get dumped, which is a graphic novel out now. And even though the topic seems like a downer, the way that you drew it made it actually full of heart I thought. And pathos. And whimsy in places too. And so thank you for that because we have been here in LA in the midst of the fires, and it was really nice just to be able to get through an entire book and have it capture our attention for a concentrated period of time.
Hallie Bateman (15:57):
I think that one reason why a book, this book is for someone who's going through heartbreak, and I think that asking someone in a state like that to pick up and read a book, it might be nice to have the imagery. And my mom and I thought about that a lot when making the gentleness and the invitingness of the images, even though parts of it are hard, but it's also a funny book and that there's a lot of warmth in the art, and so yeah, I'm glad it landed that way.
Doree (16:41):
So this book is about getting dumped, but it's very personal. I mean, the author is your mother and it's about your father. And I know you've collaborated with your mom before on a previous book, but what was it like collaborating with her on this particular project that brings up so much for her, for you, for your relationship? It feels like a lot.
Hallie Bateman (17:08):
Yeah, it was a funny place to be in, and oddly because my parents are both writers, my parents are journalists and met at working at the local paper. So it was strange working on this book with my mom and I'm close with my dad still. We maintain a relationship. He's a really wonderful person who's bad at being married as hell. My brothers and I explain it, but being journalists, my mom, I think really, maybe I'm this way because of her or them, I don't know, but the way that she processes the world is through writing. And my dad is also a writer who wrote about our family for many years. There was never a point where he was like, oh no, a book about the divorce. He was like, okay, yeah, that's her story, of course. So I don't know, my dad's just kind of supportive and my, yeah, so this book was really different than the first one because my mom had this real life thing happen to her and completely blew up her life.
(18:24):
Just as a backstory for listeners, my dad left my mom very suddenly for an ex-girlfriend after 30 years of marriage, I think it was right before or around their 30 year anniversary, and was really an out of left field thing, just temperamentally for my dad, for my mom did not see this coming. So the grief of it was overnight, your whole world being just kind of exploded. And so yeah, it was being supportive and with her for the first few years as she climbed out of this really dark place. And then around the three year point, she just didn't feel like she was actually doing that well, and it had already been three years, and she was like, what can I do? And she had looked for books that would speak to this type of grief and she couldn't find anything. The closest things she found were books on bereavement, but it didn't really address what she was going through. And I was kind of watching her, my mom's just was cut, literally chopping wood with a wood splitter on her property for such a long time and doing manual labor. And I was like, you are a writer. I think you should be working on something. I didn't need it to be a book about the divorce, but
(19:59):
I'm definitely the child who, my mom calls me a pusher. I'm just harassing you to be working on something. So she ended up, I gave her a tarot reading, and the tarot reading kind of ended up, she was already thinking about this book. And then the tarot reader was like, yeah, you should write a memoir as a pathway to your own healing. And she just kind of took that as an affirmation of, she had the concept, a book that was about heartbreak, and she wound up working on it. And once she had an initial manuscript, we came together. But it was just really different because it was really coming from my mom's story and very personal. So yeah,
Elise (20:54):
I'm interested in how authors and illustrators work together in that. There were a lot of the illustrations in the book that actually carried a lot of information, something, there's something very arresting about where your mom is on one page and your father's on the other page, and it's like their inner demons or how they were as a child.
Hallie Bateman (21:15):
Yeah, that's one of my favorite spreads actually.
Elise (21:17):
And that required that you actually do some of the writing or do some of the probing in order to get to the image. So when you say she wrote the manuscript first, what does that
Hallie Bateman (21:28):
Mean? So I would say my mom built the framework. My mom knew that she wanted the book to be a countdown to your heart being unbroken. She knew what she wanted the sections to be, and she had so many of the pages. And when we came together, it becomes like we took her draft and opened all of it up and started. I start to apply my image brain, and it's hard to define this is why the book, it doesn't Say Written by Susie Hopkins and illustrated by Halle Bateman because it is so collaborative. I am writing with my mom, but I'm not going to know what she, I'm like, what if it's something like this? Or what about this angle? And then she's contributing and I'm writing, or we're both pitching jokes to each other, but it's all coming out of a lot of conversation and a lot of squabbling in a lot of mother daughter like, oh, I know it
Elise (22:38):
Don't, I know it. That's like every
Hallie Bateman (22:39):
Day in my life. We are no exception. We're no exception. So the spread that you were talking about, I'm glad you brought that up because I think that's the perfect example of our working together, because when my mom finished the draft, she was not through the hardest part. She was in the hardest part of post-divorce. She was in what she calls the muddle in the book, that middle slog, and she was able to write about it, but there was a lot of stuff that we had to come to together and some of it, including that spread, came about because I am still in relationship with my dad and I'm not going to be like, dump him. He sucks.
Elise (23:26):
And Halle, if you could just describe the spread for folks too, because I feel like I spoke about it rather abstractly.
Hallie Bateman (23:33):
So the spread is called blame, if you must. It's about who the person is when you're divorcing them and who they started as. So it shows my mom and my dad kind of frowning at each other across the spread of the pages, and it details their realities next to her. It says, my reality, you lied and cheated. You didn't talk to me. You were never home. You never wanted to make love. You didn't care about me. His reality, you were always angry. You constantly criticized me. You didn't want to spend time with me, you never wanted to have sex, you didn't care about me. And then you turn the page and you see them in the same positions. But as children, it shows my mom's childhood reality. I saw so much violence. I was scared. I never told anyone I lived with shame. I was lonely. What I needed didn't matter. I needed unconditional love. And next to him it says, I heard I was always wrong. I lived with shame. Crying was seen as a weakness, anger and conflict were hidden. I was lonely. What I needed didn't matter. I needed unconditional love. So yeah, the two spreads. The title says Blame if you must, but no, that it's not always that simple.
Elise (25:00):
I
Hallie Bateman (25:00):
Just thought it was
Elise (25:01):
So beautiful and so relatable.
Hallie Bateman (25:04):
Thanks. Yeah. So this fully came out of, I think I saw the image and was like, mom, what if we build it this way? Then my mom understands that she helps fill it out. We each go back and forth in conversation to find the truth at the heart of it. So each page is like that. There are things where my mom saw what the image was, and then I tried to depict it and was like, is this what you're thinking? And then I add something. So I've illustrated books where I've never spoken to the author, but this is a completely different homemade book. So
Elise (25:50):
We should point out that even though it is about this very traumatizing life event, the book is also humorous. You infuse it, you and your mom infuse it with a lot of wit and whimsy, and I'd love to talk about that and how the jokes came about. Or is that just kind of part of your general personality and your affect and it just comes through on the page?
Hallie Bateman (26:17):
Yeah. I think that it is part of my mom's and my fabric of being, especially when it comes to dark subject matter to joke. Our whole family, I think has kind of a dark sense of humor and are drawn to maybe darker topics, but a way of being able to hold those conversations is being able to laugh about them. Yeah,
Elise (26:53):
It's a coping mechanism. I always say that because always making kind of like, oh, wait, was that across the line? But then I'm like, it's a coping mechanism. It's kind of like a journalist thing, I guess.
Hallie Bateman (27:02):
Oh, totally. Yeah. So yeah, I think that never, we weren't like, oh, and the book should be funny. It was just,
(27:13):
Of course, it's funny because my mom is so funny and it is funny. Oh my God, swiping on her dating apps you would not believe. We would not believe the things that we have seen, and we put what we could of that in the book, but you can't not laugh. And then there's just, yeah, my mom going through the divorce, there's a section in the book. One of the things that she advises is to sleep sideways on the bed because you're not sharing that bed with anyone anymore, so you don't have to sleep long ways. You can sleep across the middle. And my mom really did that and still does. And I remember visiting her and going in her room and being like, what are you doing? But that's a real thing, and I think to be, see it as just a sad, serious topic.
Doree (28:21):
There were so many parts of the book where I was like, oh my God, this is so dark, but it's so funny. And you just capture that tone. Well, so thank you. Also, we got a couple of galleys here sent to me, and my husband was like, huh,
Hallie Bateman (28:43):
Did you order this? Or Who dumped you? I was like, no, I didn't really heard that. Couple people that their partners like, wait, should I be worried? Also,
Doree (28:53):
Why are you getting multiple copies of this book? We're interviewing her. I swear. We
Elise (29:01):
Take a and we be right.
Doree (29:11):
Did you, how has your mom changed over the course of working on this book?
Hallie Bateman (29:17):
Oh my God. There's something happening with her that is still happening, that's happening as our book comes out where I feel like I'm seeing her blossom step into a new, I am sort of just watching. I'm like, what's happening? It's still in progress, but I saw her in the darkest place I've ever seen her be post-divorce, then be in a middle period of patching it together. It's all in the book, the walking in circles and hopping wood and all that stuff. And I think through the process of writing it and synthesizing everything and getting distance between her and the divorce, I've seen her become so much more herself and become very boundaried in a give no fucks way that I think it usually takes people getting into their nineties to be like, no, I don't want to see her. Nope. They just stop having a filter. My mom is very nice to be around. She's not like that, but she doesn't do anything she doesn't want to do.
(30:44):
And she was already kind of like that, but I just feel like she's really a lot more herself, and it made me realize how much when she was married, she was burying or what, who knows? That's a really complicated thing to disentangle. But she has really, I think, stepped into herself in such a full way, and I think it comes through in this book too, of I would've never thought my mom would write a book like this. She's a very private person. She's not someone I'm a Leo. I'm like, what? I do look, but no, she's
Doree (31:28):
Not. She not. Also, it's generational. I think that that generation is more sort of closed off and they're not used to sharing in the same way. So yeah, it's really interesting to see
Hallie Bateman (31:43):
That. And she's a journalist. She spent her whole career writing about other people, and so I think our first book is kind of written to me. This book is her. It's her story. It's her voice. It's really cool. I'm really proud of her.
Elise (32:06):
That actually leads to a question that I wanted to ask you, which is that one of the tips in the book is about just taking notes and jotting things down during a personal crisis. We are in this time of crises all over the world for various reasons, but why was that such an important piece of advice that you wanted to get out there?
Hallie Bateman (32:28):
So that's actually something that my mom did. There was the tarot reading where she really was like, oh, I'm going to write this book. But even before that, she was taking copious notes the whole time. She actually had a box that it was like a shoebox that she cut a hole in the top and just put a little drop a note in each time,
Elise (32:51):
Like a suggestion box,
Hallie Bateman (32:53):
Comments and suggestions for the
Elise (32:55):
Hotel.
Hallie Bateman (32:59):
So I think there's a couple things. One, when you're in a crisis like this, which I think with the fires this applies to, or with covid, it is going to be so hard to remember what this was like. And because we're in the middle of something that's traumatizing, our brain is doing a lot to, I don't know, steer us or shield us from what we might be experiencing. And specifically in the book, my mom talks about writing down what happened and what did he say, and take these notes so you can look back later and maybe have the experience of, oh, I don't feel like this anymore. Or you're sitting there missing him, and then you look back at the notes and then you're like, oh God, I forgot that he said that. Fuck that. No.
(33:59):
And then from just a writing perspective, my mom was taking notes for a few years before she really started on the book. I think at that point, she probably would not have been ready to sit down and say, okay, I'm going to start typing out a Google Doc, and if you jot down a note as the thought is passing through you and pop it in a folder or in a box or whatever, that's a way to capture it and tuck it away and revisit it when you're ready. I think it's a really smart way to approach writing things down, especially when you're going through something hard.
Elise (34:43):
Yeah, looking back now, I wish I would've done that during various dark periods of my own life. Oh, it'd be cool to have had notes of that and just what you were going through at that time and what was in your inner life.
Doree (34:57):
I've found some of those things in Old Gchats, and
Elise (35:02):
That's,
Doree (35:04):
There's all these inadvertent records of how we were feeling, because when I was working on my memoir, it was like, oh, when was that thing? How was I feeling about it? And a lot of stuff I was able to unearth through Gmail and Gchat. Hallie, you've been posting on Instagram about your babies. Yeah. Can you talk a little bit about what that has been like and what kind of drawing and writing about motherhood has been like for you?
Hallie Bateman (35:47):
Yeah. Speaking of taking notes when big things are happening, the first thing I thought of was a few days after they were born or whenever the smoke cleared, not feeling like it happened until I had written everything down and I was actually in the hospital. They gave me the epidural, and I had my sketchbook and was like, live blogging in my sketchbook of, wow,
(36:11):
Now two hours in the epidural feels this way and I hate it, or whatever. So yeah, I have twins, max and Nora, and they're 10 months old, and I think I've filled eight sketchbooks so far with for some reason, starting with their pregnancy and ongoing. I have been very more religious about writing everything down. I don't know. Yeah, it's been really magical to have my babies and have my art making follow me into this, and I think myself included, so many creative people are kind of terrified about how life is going to change when you have kids. And I certainly was like, I don't know. What does it look like to draw or write or what happens with your muses and your commitments when you have babies?
Elise (37:24):
One insight that I have, and I'm not that much more experienced than you as a mother, my oldest is 12, is that I felt like motherhood or parenthood in general demanded because children require so much attention. I felt like it demanded my attention in a way that I wasn't really accustomed to giving the kind of attention that babies or children demand was a kind of tension that I don't think that I had honed or practiced, but I'm so glad that I learned it or they taught it to me because it is making me a better creative and a better listener. As a journalist. It has actually helped me become more empathetic in which then serves the art. It serves whatever you're making too, because I think creativity is a lot about attention as well. So I think that it's expansive or it can be how you metabolize it.
Hallie Bateman (38:16):
I a hundred percent agree. I think that there's a way where maybe before I had kids, I was just like, oh, but hours in the day, how does that work? So right. It's about, maybe I have less actual time, but
Doree (38:35):
That's true.
Hallie Bateman (38:36):
So much of art is made when you're not sitting at the table. For me, when I'm not actually sitting drawing. It's about the sparks of the ideas or the inspiration or just the things that you notice and you, yeah, when I'm with my babies, you can't be doing anything else, especially with two, it's like I am, I can't
Elise (39:01):
Not imagine having two at the same time
Hallie Bateman (39:02):
Just ping ponging. But yeah, I've found it to be incredibly inspiring and yeah, I feel more powerful. I feel maybe just creating life and being, there's not, I feel like spending now over a decade as a working artist who's plagued with self-doubt. It's like I'm getting so bored of that, and it's really coming out. This was a while ago, but I opened up a project I was working on, and I felt a wave of doubt, and I started sometimes to unfreeze myself, I'll journal about how nervous I am or whatever, and I wrote a sentence and I was like, oh, I'm not nervous. Nevermind. I think there's some muscle memory of being, I don't know, of being more scared or more hung up, and I'm not saying I'm free of those things. You could talk to me tomorrow and I would be plagued, but
(40:08):
I do feel like something has unlocked where, for example, with the journals that I'm keeping, I'm like, yeah, I'll probably, I might try to make a graphic memoir at some point. I'm not like, oh, I wonder if I'll get it together to make a memoir. I'm just like, yeah, this is my life. Of course I'm taking, this is probably for something. I'm a little more realistic with not thinking that maybe some of the imposter syndrome has stripped away or something because it's like, did I ever think I was going to have twins? No. This is crazy. Crazy.
Doree (40:46):
Do you guys feel that way at all? Well, it sounds like you just have a more sort of clear-eyed view of yourself and what you're capable of. Yeah, I mean, I definitely changed after I had my kid. I love that. I love what you're saying about that kind of shift from, Ooh, I don't know. Maybe I'll do this to, yeah, I'm going to write a memoir at some point. It sounds so simple, but it really is such a crucial reframe. I really like that.
Hallie Bateman (41:25):
Wow. It's fun to talk about. Yeah, I was going to say Hall, it's been two fellow moms.
Elise (41:29):
Yeah, exactly. Well, and then fellow writers too. So it's just such a delight to chat with you and hear about your process and talk a little bit more about the book. Where can folks find you?
Hallie Bateman (41:41):
You can find me on Instagram at hath Bates, which is a handle I made up in 2007. So, sorry, that's not actually my name.
Elise (41:50):
It's vintage. Can't
Hallie Bateman (41:50):
Change It. So you can find me there and find our book anywhere books are sold. And thank you so much for having me, you guys. This was really fun.
Doree (42:05):
I was looking at Hallie's Instagram, or one of her Instagram posts came up for me, and I think she's cut off all her hair.
Elise (42:14):
Oh, she has? Yeah. Even since she talked to us last week.
Doree (42:17):
Yes, because when we talked to her, she had really long hair and bangs, and she just posted a picture from a couple days ago where she said last night at our event, and she has a pixie cut.
Elise (42:31):
Oh, cute. Okay.
Doree (42:33):
Cute. I know. She looks super out, folks. Cute. I love it. Check that out on her
Elise (42:37):
Instagram.
Doree (42:37):
Yeah. I love the book Launch haircut.
Elise (42:42):
Oh, we have to ask Rachel Goodwin next time she's on with us too, about Emma Stone and shaving her head, and whether that affects how she's thought about doing her makeup and stuff. Okay. Let's go into the intention zone and check in. Check in on last week.
Doree (42:58):
Let's do it. Let's do it. What was yours last week? I was going to just try to get through the day. And you know what? I have successfully done that. I mentioned this on the casual chat, but I'm doing this a hundred day sticker challenge through my accountability workshop, and I basically just have to write a sentence every day, and I get a sticker and it goes on a chart, and it's oddly satisfying. If you want to check out the accountability workshops, they're at accountability workshops com, and they're run by Annie Hartnett and Tessa Fontane, who are two amazing novelists. It's just great. But anyway, the sticker challenge is, that's my main intention because I'm just committed to it because I've set, there's something about setting the bar so low, just a sentence that is very satisfying. But my actual intention this week is to just have fun at sectionals. I just want to go and have fun and enjoy the whole experience and get to play some tennis and be in the desert, and I'm just excited. So I want to be grateful for the whole situation and live in the moment and appreciate it this weekend. So that is my intention.
Elise (44:17):
Yeah, have fun. That's going to be great. Yeah, I'm excited. I love being out in the desert too. Palm Springs is one of my favorite getaways because you are just, there's a feeling there's a mood of being out there that allows you to kind of downshift, I think, which
Doree (44:31):
Is really nice.
Elise (44:33):
Even when it's super hot. We'll go there sometimes in the summer because Issa with the July birthday likes to spend it in Palm Springs. But then, but even then, there is something really relaxing about being in the desert. For me, my intention was to improve my sleep hygiene. That was most nights. How'd that go? Most nights. Most nights. Okay. My recency bias was last night when I stayed out too late and went a little crazy, and so it doesn't feel great today, but I think in the aggregate over the week, I did. All right. And it's very hard to put out a writing related intention because they feel insurmountable to me. But I am getting close to my screenplay deadline, so I'm going to put as my intention this week to at least have Act two finished. And Act two is the hardest part. It's the longest. So I'm going to put Act two down as my intention this week. Wish Me Luck Act, send me those vibes. Yeah,
Doree (45:42):
Sending the vibes. Vibes are being sent.
Elise (45:46):
Thank you. Thank you.
Doree (45:46):
Alright, well everyone, thanks so much for listening. Forever 35 is hosted and produced by me, Doree Shafrir and Elise Hu, and produced and edited by Samee Junio. Sami Reed is our project manager, and our network partner is Acast. Thanks everybody.
Elise (46:00):
See you next time.
Doree (46:01):
Bye.