Johanna Bleckman and David Bleckley

[00:03] JOANNA BLECKMAN: My name is Joanna. I am 39 years old. Today is May 20, 2020. I am in Ann Arbor, Michigan, recording with my good friend and colleague, David.

[00:17] DAVID BLECKLEY: Hello, my name is David. I'm 40 years old. Today is May 20, 2020. I'm in Ann Arbor, Michigan, recording with my friend, colleague and fake sister, Joanna. Hi. Joanna.

[00:36] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Right. I should have mentioned the. I totally blew our cover of icpsr. Hi, David. How are you today?

[00:46] DAVID BLECKLEY: I'm good. I'm good. I've been looking forward to this.

[00:50] JOANNA BLECKMAN: I know. Yes, me too. Me too.

[00:54] DAVID BLECKLEY: So I was thinking about our conversation a little bit. And I was thinking about talking. How did. About how we met. So can you remember how we met?

[01:13] JOANNA BLECKMAN: So I don't. I don't think that I met you before interviewing you for the position at Research Connections, but. Am I forgetting. Oops. Am I forgetting meeting you? No, I mean, aside from the fact that like we were, you know, we're brother and sister and we were born into the same family, whatever. But like. So I interviewed you for a position for this. For the data processing supervisor position. Position. Right. And I. My first memory of you is that. Well, not quite of you, but is it your cover letter and your resume? I was like, this guy sounds perfect, but his cover letter is really long. It's way too long.

[02:00] DAVID BLECKLEY: And that's how every good friendship should start, really, with an excessively long cover letter and a resume.

[02:07] JOANNA BLECKMAN: You know, just like I want to be your friend so badly, I'm going to take not like three paragraphs and a signature. I'm going to take like one enormous paragraph and then a second one that goes onto the second page. Yeah. And then I must have interviewed you. I honestly don't remember your interview though. Damn, I'm bad at this.

[02:28] DAVID BLECKLEY: Yeah, that was. Yeah. I'm glad that we're having a conversation about memory, considering that friendship were blacked out for. So that's great.

[02:41] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Yes, that's right. That's right. And so before I get fired from my job, what David means is that I have a memory thing related to seizures. And there's a whole. I don't want to jump to the really good stories yet, but there's a whole conference we attended together in D.C. like a four day conference that I don't remember at all.

[03:07] DAVID BLECKLEY: Why don't we just jump right to that? I mean, you know, because I was. I was thinking.

[03:14] JOANNA BLECKMAN: I can't jump right to it because I don't remember it. You jump. Right.

[03:18] DAVID BLECKLEY: One of our questions was what's your. What's your Favorite memory. And I was thinking. I was thinking about this trip. So it was. It was April of 2016, maybe March, I think.

[03:39] JOANNA BLECKMAN: No, well, Aera is typically April.

[03:42] DAVID BLECKLEY: Yeah, it was.

[03:43] JOANNA BLECKMAN: And it was Aera. Right.

[03:44] DAVID BLECKLEY: It was April 2016. And I remember that because my son was just about to be born, just like a few weeks later, because I went to the Smithsonian.

[03:56] JOANNA BLECKMAN: You have a son?

[04:03] DAVID BLECKLEY: I went to the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum and bought him a constellation poster because one of the names we were thinking about was Orion. And so I wanted to get this poster of the heavens and found one. And then after that, I ran back to the conference hotel and met you and your friend in the lobby. And then we went for a walk and we went to the Round Robin. Yes. So we're in Washington, D.C., Smithsonian, round robin, etc.

[04:42] JOANNA BLECKMAN: And we also. The only part I do remember is that we also walked past the White House and we were both wearing trenchy coats, sort of. It was rainy and whatever in D.C.

[04:53] DAVID BLECKLEY: So we walked there and we got.

[04:54] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Told that we were too close to the White House. It's the only thing I remember.

[04:57] DAVID BLECKLEY: Only on the way there or on the way. On the way there, everything was just fine. We walked past, it was, you know, sunny. And then we went to the Round Robin, which is close to the White House, and we had mint juleps and appetizers and we talked and talked and talked. And I. That was the moment that I felt like we really became friends and not just co workers. And actually you were my manager, so you were like my boss. We were at this conference and we really shared a lot of, what, our teenage years and our twenties and really in depth stories about growing up. And I was just like, we're friends now. And then, yeah, we're friends.

[05:49] JOANNA BLECKMAN: We're going to remember this for you years.

[05:51] DAVID BLECKLEY: And then on the way back, yeah, we did some sort of Secret Service or, you know, security personnel told us that we were walking too close to the White House. And so we walked back. And then, I think, I don't know, months or years later, I dropped that story. You know, like we were discussing something and I was like, oh, yeah, like you told me about that in D.C. and you said, well, I've never been to D.C. with you.

[06:24] JOANNA BLECKMAN: I've never been to D. C. With you.

[06:30] DAVID BLECKLEY: And that was. That was, you know, at the same time hilarious because everything is funny in our lives.

[06:39] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Yes.

[06:40] DAVID BLECKLEY: But also quite tragic because, you know, this was this really special moment. And, you know, I picture it as, like, this real, like, inflection point. In our relationship as like colleagues to friends. And then you're just like, no, no clue.

[06:56] JOANNA BLECKMAN: No, that never happened. Yeah. It's really weird to live with memory loss with.

[07:12] DAVID BLECKLEY: You're frozen. If. If you can hear us, you're frozen. We'll give it. We'll give it a minute and wait and see if she might need to re. Enter the room or reconnect. It's a bummer, I thought. I think she was about to say something. Like, really? She was about to say something? Yeah. Let's give it a minute. If you have her contact, you can let her know that she can just re. Enter the room using the same link if she needs to.

[08:21] JOANNA BLECKMAN: So it is really weird to live with memory loss and pockets of my life that other people remember that I don't remember. And I love telling this story about us, especially the part where you're like, we're such good friends now. And I'm like, oh, I'm so glad that was meaningful to you, but I don't remember it.

[08:44] DAVID BLECKLEY: Yeah, I think. Yeah. I mean, and that's. That's one of the. Yeah, that's one of, like the. One of the parts of being your friend, too, is like experiencing, you know, secondhand, of course, what you experience and knowing that there are things that you're going through and that I don't always understand and that. And. And having to witness that and wishing that I didn't.

[09:26] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Having to witness that. It's such a train wreck.

[09:32] DAVID BLECKLEY: It's like watching a building slowly smolder.

[09:40] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Yeah.

[09:40] DAVID BLECKLEY: You never know if it's just going to catch a complete dumpster fire.

[09:44] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Right, right. And if it's going to just collapse, you know?

[09:48] DAVID BLECKLEY: Yeah. I mean, there's that too, like, all.

[09:50] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Over the data, you know, just.

[09:54] DAVID BLECKLEY: Just everywhere. Yeah. But the round robin also has as another. As another facet to it because there was a sequel.

[10:09] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Yes. And I remember the sequel. Yes.

[10:11] DAVID BLECKLEY: Yeah. And I think. I mean, that was part of. Part of it is like reclaiming. Reclaiming the round robin with our sister. Yeah.

[10:21] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Our sister Leah from. From my side of the family. I don't know how to.

[10:28] DAVID BLECKLEY: Well, I mean, she's our.

[10:29] JOANNA BLECKMAN: I don't know how to spin that. She grew up with me. She grew up with you, but not you. But. Yeah.

[10:33] DAVID BLECKLEY: Yeah, but we are.

[10:34] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Yeah. Yeah.

[10:37] DAVID BLECKLEY: But that was fun to be reunited with her for the first time in my life and.

[10:41] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Yeah.

[10:42] DAVID BLECKLEY: Also, you know, to show you the round robin because it's really. It's a cool. It is a cool bar, you know.

[10:50] JOANNA BLECKMAN: And I had I had oysters for the first time that. Second time that we were at the Round Robin, because I'm sure. I'm guessing I didn't have them the first time, but I wouldn't know.

[11:01] DAVID BLECKLEY: I don't think so. No, I don't think so. And it's a. It's a. It's a whiskey bourbon bar, which. That's your drink.

[11:07] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Yep.

[11:08] DAVID BLECKLEY: So, you know, morning, noon, and night. Yes. Including right now.

[11:13] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Oh, yes.

[11:14] DAVID BLECKLEY: Perfect. Yep. Yeah. So. Yeah.

[11:19] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Yeah. So you and Leah and I got to have like a magical, like, 35 minutes or something like that of work, because I had been saying to her for years, you've got to meet our brother David, because he is just like us. And so we got to sit around at the Round Robin. I was with. I was walking with a cane at that point, I remember. And so we got. We sat around, had a lot of drinks, had a lot of oysters, and it was like, I got to look at David and look at Leah, and it was like the family. It was. It was obvious to her and to me. And I'm going to say to you, too, that we are kindred spirits.

[12:01] DAVID BLECKLEY: Yeah, that's true. And all the bad things you say about Leah, I. I can't really, like. I can't picture it because, you know, we are so connected. And you say on a daily basis really awful things about her.

[12:20] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Do. Yeah. I mean, she's a terrible person, so I don't know what to.

[12:25] DAVID BLECKLEY: And I just.

[12:26] JOANNA BLECKMAN: I don't want to sugarcoat it.

[12:27] DAVID BLECKLEY: I just didn't see it. You know, I mean, she. She was really kind to the wait.

[12:34] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Staff to cover, but.

[12:35] DAVID BLECKLEY: Yeah, So, I mean, that's a really good judge of, you know, you can really judge somebody by how they. They treat folks in the service industry. And I think that she passed that.

[12:51] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Yeah, She's. She's really a disappointment to all of us, I think. Yeah.

[12:57] DAVID BLECKLEY: Yeah. Several years of, you know, theatrical performance will also give one a certain skill set.

[13:05] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Right. She can fool anybody she wants to fool. Actually, my sister is one of the most wonderful people I know. So I just have to put that in there because this is, you know, sorry to ruin it with the truth.

[13:22] DAVID BLECKLEY: That's okay. So I'm glad that you brought up your cane, and I'm glad that you talked about that in the past tense. Do you want to talk about that together a little bit?

[13:37] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Sure. I have multiple sclerosis, and I've had it for eight years now. Oh, eight years this month. Yeah. And the worst flare up that I had was in 20. Oh, my God. 2018, maybe. Is that right? Yeah, it must have been 2018. I walked around the world for three months or something like that with a cane because I was like, my left side of my body was not doing what my brain wanted it to do, and that was sad. What else do you want me to say about the cane? Well, Jim McNally, one of the archive directors, the project directors at ICPSR, he lent to me a kit of metal. There's a word for it, little metal tools with, like, 26 of them. Actually, there's probably more because there's punctuation. So there's, you know, all the letters of the Alphabet and then punctuation. And you can. You can take a little hammering, pound letters and punctuation and stuff into metal or, you know, other materials. And so I. I borrowed that kit and I pounded Ms. Into. I came and it was really nice to meet.

[15:09] DAVID BLECKLEY: I didn't know he did that. I knew. I knew that you had shared a bond in that time.

[15:15] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Yeah.

[15:16] DAVID BLECKLEY: Yeah. So I have to say that as I was thinking of other. Other positive memories, you know, like fondest memories together. One was. One was the round robin, and the other was when you came back in spring of 2019 with no cane.

[15:39] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Although I had stopped using the cane before my treatment.

[15:45] DAVID BLECKLEY: But that's a lot.

[15:46] JOANNA BLECKMAN: That's a lot. That is a lie. That's a lie.

[15:48] DAVID BLECKLEY: You have. You have.

[15:49] JOANNA BLECKMAN: I have terrible memory problems, so you're probably right. Yeah, yeah. Yes. But I know. And you have said to me over the last year and a half, you've said to me at least twice, maybe more times, how wonderful it is for you to see me without a cane. And, like, being seen and noticed is a big thing for all humans. Right. But, like, it's a thing that I have been lacking in my life historically. And so. So for my brother to out of the blue, just say, you know, Joanna, it's so good to see you without the king. You're just walking around, walking around like that never happened. That is very meaningful to me when you say that. So thank you.

[16:42] DAVID BLECKLEY: You're welcome. I didn't know that.

[16:44] JOANNA BLECKMAN: You didn't know that. Okay, now you do.

[16:48] DAVID BLECKLEY: It is true, though, because, you know, first of all, that disease is just a. Just a bastard. And I'm mad. I'm mad at it, but also, oh.

[17:07] JOANNA BLECKMAN: I think, oh, no.

[17:10] DAVID BLECKLEY: Are you still there? Maybe we just left the video.

[17:13] JOANNA BLECKMAN: So you can hear me, but I'm not moving in the video is that what's going on. Okay.

[17:17] DAVID BLECKLEY: Yeah. So yeah, I, it's, it means a lot because you know, that disease is just a bastard and I hate it. But it also means a lot because, you know, I, I think that there were, there were interventions that could have happened along the way that could have prevented it that you didn't, your body didn't need to get to that point. And I'm so glad that you have found a team of doctors and folks that have kind of set the path in a much better way.

[18:05] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Shout out to Jackie Broughton, who is a former ICPSR staff member. She, I see her neurologist, she went through this treatment before I did and she was keeping tabs on me after leaving icpsr and she was like, you're not getting the treatment that you need. And now I did get the treatment that I need. So shout out to her who is. She has the same initials as I do. She calls herself a data nerd. She thinks I'm a data nerd too. Really know data very well. I know other things that are related to data, but whatever. So data nerd. So she calls herself the black version of me and I call myself the white version of her. So there's something else. Oh, ms, Right. We both have Ms. So I said that I want her to listen to this.

[19:01] DAVID BLECKLEY: You should just give a lot of shout outs to like Joan Baez.

[19:04] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Joan Baez? Yes. Oh God. Joe Bias in my parents living room. Because you're a part of our family. Thank you. Who else should I shout out to? David?

[19:18] DAVID BLECKLEY: Now I'm drawing a blank because you put me on the side.

[19:20] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Rufus Wainwright. No, but I want to ask you some questions. Okay. Because I feel like you've been, you've been asking me lots of wonderful questions. Although I guess we never finished the like. Do you remember when we met? But that was, it was just your interview because we hadn't met before. Your interview with. Because you worked at icpsr, but you worked in a different like department and so we never interacted.

[19:47] DAVID BLECKLEY: Right. And you're just better than me. So there's that.

[19:51] JOANNA BLECKMAN: I mean. Yeah, totally true.

[19:54] DAVID BLECKLEY: No, I. There's actually that, that story is. There's, there's not a lot of anything that I thought would come out of that story other than just like a nice way to start, you know.

[20:06] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Okay.

[20:07] DAVID BLECKLEY: It's like stories have a beginning.

[20:10] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Although I did recently give you. When I was. So we. ICPSR recently had the walls painted and the carpets pulled up and you know, new carpeting put in and so we do a lot of like cleaning out, which is funny for an archive because we like, we tend to keep everything and. But then it was like we can't keep everything because fire hazard and we need space. So I had to go through. And I was shredding things that are personnel related that I didn't need anymore. Right. Like resumes from years ago I might have interviewed or whatever. And I found the notes that I had put together for my director at the time about people we interviewed for your position. And I found the little blurb about you and I had to cut that out because I had to shred, you know, securely shred everything, everything else. But I wanted to give you that little blurb because basically I was like, this person is perfect, we should hire him. And he's the, he's the best thing ever. And then it totally panned out and you, you are the best thing ever. And I'm sad to say I wasn't the one who hired you into icpsr, but I am clearly the one that made you want to stay because that's who I am.

[21:29] DAVID BLECKLEY: Thank you. That's completely humbling. And also your statement about yourself is not far from the truth. I do think that the people at ICPSR make it a really wonderful place. And you know, I think that to folks who are outside of, I don't want to call it the industry that sounds too high pollutant. Folks who are outside of the work that we do, our work might sound like completely boring, possibly useless and not very applicable to, to what their day to day lives are about, but they know. Yeah, I mean first of all our work is important, but also we've just got wonderful people doing the work and I think that makes it just, it makes people stick around. And I, I had an interview a few jobs ago and the, you know, you ask at the end of the interview they get, they make time for you to ask questions and questions that always come up are like, well, what do you like best about working here? And the person who became my manager said the people. And that was at that point in my career had not been a thing really. Like I've, I've always enjoyed my co workers but I've always been a more of like a mission focused person, you know, like I get fulfillment in my job through the mission of the organization and the work that we do and things like that. And so for somebody to just like say, I come to work every day because I'm surrounded by great people, it made an impact and I've thought about that moment so many times and I think that at icpsr, it's really true. I think that we've got a lot of people who are just kind, good people who care a lot about each other and who care about the work and are excellent at the work. But it makes hard days so much easier when you know that you've got people who have your back, when you know that you have friends that you can turn to when work is hard or when life outside of work gets hard. I think moments like this, you know, this pandemic that we're in globally, we've gone pretty darn seamlessly as an organization into that. And part of that is the nature of our work. You know, that we can work remotely. You know, we're not producing car parts and we're not, you know, selling sandwiches. We are doing something that's a little bit more ephemeral as far as data and technology based work. And. But I think that the fact that we've got such good people who care about each other, who check in on each other and make sure that, that we're taking care of ourselves outside of the 9 to 5, I think that also has gone a long way as far as making this working through the pandemic situation doable.

[25:12] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Yeah. Yeah, I completely agree with you.

[25:15] DAVID BLECKLEY: So, yes, you are wonderful. But you are, you are one in a. In about 125 wonderful people.

[25:27] JOANNA BLECKMAN: That is the truth. That is the truth. This is. ICPSR is a wonderful organization with lots of wonderful people. And it's hard to just. It's so hard to describe us and who we are do. Which is often frustrating to me because I feel like it, it means that there's all this amazing talent and wonderful, you know, humanity hidden underneath this kind of like opaque what, what we do.

[25:55] DAVID BLECKLEY: So.

[25:55] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Yeah, but I agree with everything you said. Of course I'm looking at questions that I want to ask you.

[26:05] DAVID BLECKLEY: Okay, I'll give you some silence then. Thank you.

[26:12] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Oh, man. Because all you do is talk.

[26:14] DAVID BLECKLEY: I know, I'm very long winded.

[26:16] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Yeah. Okay. Tell me somebody who aside from me, because we all know you've had an incredibly positive impact on me. But tell me about someone you feel you've had a positive impact on at ICPSR or outside of it. But let's stay focused.

[26:39] DAVID BLECKLEY: I don't know. That's really hard. I don't.

[26:44] JOANNA BLECKMAN: I could answer that question really easily for you, but I'm not going to.

[26:49] DAVID BLECKLEY: Okay. Well, I think I, I would say trying to sound as Humble as possible. I've had a positive impact on two of my closest co workers, Amber and Bianca. We refer to each other as non blood work family. And we've like, we are the epitome of what I was just talking about with like having each other's backs, you know, we, we are there for each other. If, you know, if somebody's going on vacation and you need something done while you're gone, or if you're just having a bad day and you need to vent or you need to offload some stuff, we are, we're there for each other. You know, we know what's going on in each other's lives. Not in an intrusive way, but just in a, you know, caring about each other kind of a way. You know, we're all pretty different from each other, but we're, we all like share enough that we just really click. And you know, I think the positive difference that I make in their lives is just that of, you know, being, being a friend, being somebody that cares about them, that cares whether they're having a bad day or whether they're too stressed, you know, providing resources where I can because I've been at ICPSR a little bit longer and you know, so if there's something that I know the answer to, they know that they can come to me as a resource. But I mean, yeah, I think it's, it's like completely reciprocal though. It's not like I am, I am making a difference in their lives. They like, they make a difference in my life just as much and if not more so. So I, yeah, I would have a hard time being like, wow, there's somebody that I just really made a difference and you know, it's been a one way interaction or something like that. I think every relationship.

[29:09] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Well, that wasn't the question. So you answered it. No, I was not trying to do that.

[29:16] DAVID BLECKLEY: That was not what I meant.

[29:19] JOANNA BLECKMAN: No, the question wasn't who, like unilateral impact. Yeah, I didn't do anything, but he, he made my career better.

[29:29] DAVID BLECKLEY: Right. Yeah, no, I, yeah, I think, you know, Amber and Bianca also, we encourage each other a lot. We encourage each other to, to push hard, you know, to, to do better in, at work, in life, in, you know, in terms of like social justice and making a difference in our communities and thinking about things in new ways. I think, you know, that's another thing we do really well is to push each other and hold each other accountable. I think we may have lost Johanna again. So I'm going to pause the recording. So, Joe, we were talking a little bit earlier about your flashes of memory loss and the chunks of chunks of life that you don't remember. And you know, we work at a data archive and one of the things that we're constantly thinking about is making sure that people's research and life work doesn't just leave when they leave the earth. You know, that we want to make these data and these resources available for people around the world. And you know, we store them in all these redundant ways, you know, in caves and in the cloud and on tape backup. And, you know, I just wondered, considering your relationship with memory, how do you think about our work and I don't know, how do you kind of grapple with that tension between moments of your life that you can't remember and then spending your career ensuring that data are preserved and for perpetuities?

[31:45] JOANNA BLECKMAN: So I have never thought about that, but I love the question and what comes to mind is that I. So my memory loss doesn't bother me. So there's a, there's apparently a four day stretch that I don't remember because I went to a conference with you and I don't remember it, but that it doesn't, it doesn't bother me because what I have right now is enough. Like I haven't, maybe, maybe it's about volume of what I've lost, I don't know. But I see my life as like collecting experiences and that's an experience that I've collected that there is a period of time that I don't remember and there's, there's a handful of other times that I don't remember. And so I don't know if that, if that says that I like am a terrible archivist or if that says that I care more about other people's, you know, quote data than I care about my own data. I don't know. But I find it interesting that I am, while I used to curate data, I don't do that anymore. I hardly ever touch data. What I do is I protect privacy, right? I try to protect the privacy of research subjects, of non human entities that might be in the data that need to be protected, vulnerable institutions or whatever. And I try to make sure that folks are using the information that we provide to them, both ethically and within the bounds of legal constraints and all of that. And so that's obviously not in opposition to archiving and making sure that we preserve all of all information, but it is, it does create a natural tension between keeping information and Exposing information and keeping it and not exposing it. Right. Or being very intentional about how you expose it. And I'm not sure how that's related to my memory issues, but there's something core about me that is very interested in privacy and also very interested in, like, this. The. Like the state of my life in my mind right now. Right. And not. It doesn't matter if I've lost something, because that's another very interesting part of the puzzle. Right. Like, that's a data point. I guess I could say that's a. That's a really. I find that to be a really fascinating thing about myself. Like, if I'm writing my story down, it's like, hey, I forgot some things because of some weird brain things. And isn't that neat?

[34:44] DAVID BLECKLEY: Yeah. I mean, so the memory. The memory is not the four days. Like every little event that happened in those four days. The memory is that you've lost that memory. You know, like, that is. That is the truth for you. That is your data point.

[35:04] JOANNA BLECKMAN: That's exactly right. That's the truth for me. Yeah.

[35:07] DAVID BLECKLEY: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that's that tension between data utility and data privacy or, you know, respondent confidentiality. That's something that we're always talking about and that we're always thinking about. And. Yeah, I think, you know, that's. I don't know, I wish that there were a really pithy way to, you know, connect that back to the tension that you're talking about in. In your experiences, you know, but there. There is that dynamic between sort of accessing memory and creating memory, you know, and that, like, it. It's less important to live in the past of each one of these events than it is to be able to create your present and to experience where you are now.

[36:20] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Go ahead.

[36:21] DAVID BLECKLEY: I was going to say, I've always experienced you to be a very present person, someone who does care about the past, does hold on to memories. You know, your. Your first road trip across the U.S. you know, to go out west. That's something that you talk about. And. But you also are constantly thinking about your next trip out west. You know that, and creating the new memory and having that new experience. So you're not someone who just dwells in their glory days. You know, I think that you're a person that is looking to make today a better day.

[37:11] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Yeah. That's a nice compliment. Thank you.

[37:17] DAVID BLECKLEY: And I do want to. I want to say, too, that in this moment of the coronavirus pandemic, when those of us who have immediate families in the same household are probably increasingly sick of one another or at least looking to have some variety. Your tradition of spending time alone in the desert is probably something that sounds really excellent to a lot of folks right now. I've definitely, you know, I've definitely had some daydreams of, you know, following in your footsteps and just, you know, going and losing myself in the desert for four or five days and loving my family and coming back to them always, but, you know, just having that time because, you know, I. And I also. I think a lot about folks who don't live with anybody right now and who have nothing but their own thoughts and, you know, are in that type of isolation. But, you know, folks who are craving more human contact and others of us who are craving a few moments of isolation. Yeah.

[38:42] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Yeah. I highly recommend going to the desert alone as much as possible. Although I'm missing. I'm missing my solitude a lot less during this pandemic than I would have expected.

[38:56] DAVID BLECKLEY: So interesting.

[38:57] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Look at me growing, being less. Less obnoxious about being around other people. Star gold star.

[39:07] DAVID BLECKLEY: Gold star. And good survival technique right now. Because you're in this for the long haul, my friend.

[39:14] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Because nobody wants me to go to prison. I mean, maybe my family does, but. Yeah, not really.

[39:21] DAVID BLECKLEY: Yeah.

[39:21] JOANNA BLECKMAN: You know.

[39:23] DAVID BLECKLEY: Yeah. And the prison industrial complex, they could.

[39:25] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Use you, but they could use me as a. As a. Some kind of worker beef. Yeah. Yeah.

[39:34] DAVID BLECKLEY: Do you.

[39:35] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Speaking of prison.

[39:37] DAVID BLECKLEY: Yes. All good conversations start that way.

[39:42] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Start with. With prison. Well, I was gonna ask about data, so I don't work with data anymore. Really. I work about data. That doesn't make any sense, but you know what I mean. I mean, yeah, but even. Yeah. I don't know, but is there some project or some data collection? And I actually. Oh, I think I might know the answer, but I'm not going to spoil it. That you are really, really committed to or really particularly interested in @ICPSR.

[40:19] DAVID BLECKLEY: Boy, I've been really lucky to have been able to work on some. Some projects that I really care about. And, you know, part of that is me sticking my neck out and telling people, you know, in leadership positions that, you know, hey, I'm really interested in this project, and if there's ever a spot for me, please consider putting me into that role. So I'm thinking about the data LUMOS project that, you know, in 2017, when there was a perceived risk that government data might be pulled down off Internet sites, you know, we created that archive to give folks to the ability to crowdsource data rescue and to archive it with us. I was really pleased to be part of that. And that introduced me to a whole lot of really interesting people around the country who are doing data rescue and that kind of work to ensure that public data remain public forever. So I was really proud to be part of that. But also, actually, the job that you hired me to be a part of has been super fulfilling. And that is kind of taking the Civic LEADS project, which is our civic learning, engagement and action data sharing archive, taking that project sort of from an idea that you and Susan had, you know, started to formulate and started to implement, and moving from that sort of more amorphous idea into a concrete archive that is now, you know, five years old and has got, like, three dozen studies archived in it. That's been really fulfilling to work with all of the data producers and researchers who, from all different kinds of fields, who are studying youth, civic engagement and activism and education, and all of these different disparate ideas that are all really intrinsically related to one another and getting to share those data sets with the world. So not one specific study, but that body of work has been super exciting to be a part of. And to go from kind of a no name. I mean, ICPSR definitely has got a name. The University of Michigan definitely has a name, but the Civic LEADS archive was an idea. And now we have, you know, people around the world who are excited to give us data because they know that we've been successful at archiving some of these other studies. And that's. That's super exciting to know that we've gained the trust of researchers over the course of these five years.

[43:37] JOANNA BLECKMAN: I have to say that as your supervisor at that time, watching you come in and immediately take that over and do, I mean, project management, but so much more than that, to take that idea and apply project management skills, but also, like, strategic skills that I like, can only hope to acquire one day. Watching you do that and what it felt like was, oh, I couldn't do what he's doing. And that means I made a really, really good hire because that's. He's, you know, that that work is under my purview, and I couldn't. Couldn't be doing that anywhere near as expertly and strategically as David. So that was really cool. And I'm lazy, so I was like, yes, David's gonna do it. No, but that was really. Yeah, yeah, I remember that. I remember the start of that. I mean, certainly that project is ongoing, but I remember the start of it quite fondly.

[44:37] DAVID BLECKLEY: Yeah, and our lazies complement each other. So, you know, it's. It's the areas where I'm super lazy. You know, you can just apply your rigor.

[44:48] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Yeah, I'm gonna take your word for that.

[44:50] DAVID BLECKLEY: Yeah.

[44:51] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Thank you.

[44:52] DAVID BLECKLEY: So, you know. Yeah. You mentioned that you don't really work in data that much anymore, but was there. Is there a study or a moment in your work that, like, really resonated or. You know what? No, I'm going to scrap that. I'm not even going to ask that question. I want to ask you this question instead. So you introduced me to the Helsinki bus station metaphor, right. And I think that you really exemplify someone who has stayed on the bus. And I want you to just describe to me what is it like to be a person that stuck with something that questions whether or not you're on the right path and has really made a way for yourself to get to a point in your career where you've really carved out a niche.

[45:59] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Damn. We have not a lot of time left for that question. I'm so flattered that you asked me that question, though. So I don't have time to describe the Helsinki bus station theory, but so I started off in data because I went to the ICPSR summer program actually, and I took some regression analysis courses and I loved it. So I was like, let me go ahead and work there after I graduate. And that wasn't right. And I was. I liked it, but not that much. And I stuck with it because I don't like the idea of getting a different job. And I really liked the people at icpsr. Right. And I felt like, you know, I don't want to leave. I like these people and I don't want to get a new job and all that. And all that, like, stuff about being human part was part of that Helsinki bus station, Right. Because I was being a little indecisive and not wanting to make changes and maybe following some kind of gut instinct that there was something else for me to do there or whatever. And that's how I ended up after 13 years as the privacy officer, because I eventually, through luck and skill and some good strategic choices, I ended up in a. In a. In a. On a set of projects that really required sort of next level restricted data access management and next level legal agreements and next level privacy thinking and confidentiality stuff. And I have always wanted to be a lawyer. Was never going to actually be a lawyer, but this allowed me to sort of to get at the ethics part of the legal field. But still within social science research data. Right. And I then sort of advocated for this position over a couple years. And I mean, I think that that's. Right. That it is a good illustration of that theory, that if you start out. I think it's really aimed towards artists. Like, if you start out painting and you're like, there's nothing. There's nothing under the sun that hasn't been painted. Right. And so why am I doing. Why am I painting. Why am I painting sunsets? Why am I painting birds? Why am I painting abstract art? But the theory is that you stay on long enough and enough people start sort of branching off doing their own things, and you find yourself branching off, doing your own thing after pursuing whatever it is over time. And that I do feel like that's. That's what has sort of happened with me. That I. I wasn't sure what I was doing, but I knew that there was something here that I really loved and something that I. That I was passionate about and that I could do well, and it just. It took about 10 years to find it. Yeah. But, yeah, thank you for asking me that question. I fear that we are. We are out of time.

[48:54] DAVID BLECKLEY: If you. If you have one last question. We've got a little bit of time.

[48:58] JOANNA BLECKMAN: Okay.

[49:00] DAVID BLECKLEY: I was just gonna. I was gonna say, you know, I think that you're the best fake lawyer and the best fake sister that I could ask to work with.

[49:12] JOANNA BLECKMAN: So you are the best real human and fake brother that I could ask to work with. So. And I've never been. Never wanted to be anything more than a fake lawyer. So thank you. That is. That's huge. And I'm going to, like, that's going to be tattooed on my heart. Thank you.

[49:29] DAVID BLECKLEY: You're welcome. Well, Joanna Bleckman, thank you for sitting down and chatting with me. I miss. I miss seeing you in the office, but I'm glad that we're all safe. Take care of my niece and nephew.

[49:42] JOANNA BLECKMAN: I will. And David Bleckley. Take care of my little baby, Kai. And thank you for sitting down with me. Thanks.