Michael Aronson and Jody London

00:03 I'm Jody London. I'm 45 years old. Today is March 22nd 2009. We are in San Francisco and I am here with Mike Aronson my husband.

00:14 I am Mike Aronson. I'm 48 years old. Today is March 22nd 2009. I'm in San Francisco and I'm here with my wife Jody London come to the storycorps booth was because every time I tell people that we met through a personal ad it gets a really big reaction. So I thought it would be really nice just to kind of have catalog for us and for our family the story of how we met. So maybe we should start with you talking about.

00:51 Where you found the personal ad and why you responded to my ad?

00:56 Okay, I happen to bring it with me cuz I am a pack rat. So the ad was in the Jewish bulletin. This is just before I guess all personalized were done in Internet and you had Jaden things like that. So this is the old paper version and this was I just started looking at personal ads ran on there.

01:23 Pray, this is us September 15th. 1995.

01:34 So I had been doing some serious singles and some Jewish singles height. What was it called? The Jewish singles hiking Club, I believe some of those activities and I'm getting my confidence up to do do more random dating like this.

01:55 What got me the courage was actually I was semi set up with a very shy person named Susan Tanner and we weren't sure it was anything romantic was just because we both were single and looking for something to do and we had some very pleasant but platonic outings in San Francisco and she told me she had actually answered then personal ads and I said well if this person who is extremely shy and little bit neurotic and very with Juno introverted could do personal ads then I imagine I could I could do them too. So this was my first

02:32 Attempt at it and I have your unmarked a few ads.

02:36 I'm the first one we come to is titled adventurous Cal petite pretty independent Jewish female 32 with brains and social conscious sinks carrying confident intelligent call funny guy with nice eyes for all that comes with a LTR. What's LTR as we go down the list and I skipped a bunch and I hit one called says smart sexy JF 31 slightly cynical way fun seeks intelligent witty tall athletic Prince Charming for lifetime of happiness signed it up calling at 1.

03:19 And then there was another one. I tagged your called from mountains to Mozart.

03:27 34 sjf you at the time where?

03:32 I was 35, okay.

03:36 35 and trying to get out of a sort of a on again off again.

03:42 Relationship. I think I was just getting out of it and it's about a month or two before that.

03:49 So it looks like the first one I called.

03:56 It was a different one was a thirty-three-year-old. Somebody said she was a teacher.

04:04 And I ended up meeting that one first actually, so when you called you what you were getting a voicemail box, right?

04:10 I believe so. Yes. So yours was the second one I called.

04:20 Was it no actually I called yours first.

04:24 Yeah, this is okay. I clip the sign looks like I called you on on August 21st.

04:31 And I left.

04:36 I'm well, I guess I would have left a message in the voicemail box and you would have called back. I left you another message Sunday, August 27th, and you must have called back cuz we met the next day. Yes, that would be correct.

04:55 So so yours was yours was the first one I called. So it was a must I like the sense of humor in the ad.

05:07 So I didn't know I knew I was tall. I didn't know if I qualified as athletic.

05:13 I figured I could qualify for intelligent.

05:16 And I didn't know if I qualified for Prince Charming or not, but I thought I'd give it a try.

05:24 So I called your ad first. I called another ad the next day and I think I ended up meeting that person before I.

05:34 Contacted you know, where where were you when I left the message? I was 31 at the time, but I think I had one of my first person died when I was.

05:52 21 or 22 and I had just graduated from college just because it was kind of fun thing to do if I was bored and all the said you had all these blind date.

06:02 Coming out of the woodwork and I still have somewhere at home envelopes with all the letters cuz the first time I read an ad in 1980.

06:12 6 it would have been I I got so many letters and then by the time I ran the said this was the third at I had to run it with it was all on voicemail. So I have two pages of notes and I had I think over 50 people responded to that ad so you can actually tell a lot about people from their voices and so I listened to all the the messages and some of them you could save in the voice mailbox. Some of them you would hit delete immediately. This was the first time I had run an ad in the in the Jewish bulletin and maybe I should talk about how I came to be running an ad in the Jewish bulletins. I was usually where we start the story when were telling it to friends is you going to talk about where you were

06:59 So I have a really good friend named Jody with an i. I'm Jody with a Y and Jody with an i I had met when I was living in Washington DC that in 1989. We're both working for the Congressional budget office. And there was a big thing in Washington DC at that time where there was a Jewish Republican senator from Minnesota who would sponsor these Jewish singles parties and his name is Rudy boschwitz. So they were called the boschwitz parties. So Jodi and I went to several wash with parties that summer when I was living in Washington and we we would introduce ourselves to people always say hi. I'm Jody high on Jody and then the people with look at us kind of puzzles. Like how can that be able to say where the Joe died and that was always our joke and we always got a couple days out of this party and several years later fast forward Jody and I are both living in San Francisco. And she said come on we have to go to those Jewish singles parties because the Jewish Community is very interested in seeing Jews marry other.

07:59 She was in so they would sponsor these parties. I think they still do what on Monday nights periodically, they would call them blue Mondays and I always called them kosher meat market. I really didn't enjoy the the Jewish singles parties, but Jody loves them. So in 1994, we had gone to one of these Jewish singles parties and Jody had met the cutest guy in the room and they had started dating and in May of 1995. They got engaged it. So it was the ultimate success story in a Jewish singles party. She met a nice Jewish accountant, but he was very quirky and fun and all those other things. So we have a 3rd friend Jessica and Jessica said to me Jody we need to we need to go to this Jewish singles party that the Jewish bulletin is sponsoring, you know, because look how Jody met Mitch and I had just started a new job. I was working for a political appointee at the Public Utilities Commission, and I didn't have a lot of time for anything extraneous and I'll

08:59 Who was at the end of a streak of dating people who I refer to generic, please? Mr. Inappropriate. There was a long string of people who are just wrong, but I was busy working and I was thinking about this new job and I was really focused on I'm meeting anyone and I said fine. Let's go to the party. But the only way I'm going to do it is you get $5 off the admission price if you take out a free personal ad so so you and your cousin and I we all have to put ads in so we went and I just kind of pulled that add together based on my prior ads that I had run and we went to the party in the party itself was it. I don't think I met anybody there but then suddenly I had all these messages to deal with so I started responding to the messages and and actually Jessica and I met some of the same peep. There's at least one guy who we both I said I'm going on a blind date and when we compared notes, it was the same guy and he wasn't right for either of us.

09:59 But I had just come back from meeting that guy when I got your message on the 21st of August. It must be and I really liked the message. You left me back. You said something about living in East Oakland you weren't sure if that was you know, you weren't sure if you were athletic but you like to Ski & Bike you played in a garage band and you just had a nice voice and you can tell a lot about people by their voices and you are funny. There was some ways that you worded your response that were very amusing and so I'm pretty sure that when I find the note I started your name and I really really wanted to talk to you. So I called you and left you a message back and then it took you a week to get back to me. Oh, that's it. I left you a message. You never called back and took you a week to get back to me in the night that you finally called me back at home as a post on the voicemail box. I just come back from the duddy date with the same guy that

10:59 Find the coffee date and and I was so excited that you had called back cuz I kept in your what about that guy Mike he sounded so nice, but he hasn't called back. Maybe he wasn't really interested. So I called you back right away. And we spent an hour talking on the phone. And remember that we had a really great conversation and and we were trying to figure out when we could get together and then we decided that the only way it was going to work cuz I was going out of town. I was right before Labor Day and then I was traveling for work was it we had to meet the very next night. And I remember that when you told me I said while I live in the Mission District and you said oh good. I've always wanted to explore the Mission District and that was a real breath of fresh air because a lot of the guys I would meet at the Jewish singles parties would say, oh the mission is it safe there?

11:47 And I felt very offended by that because that was where I chose to live. I felt safe there. So the fact that you were willing to come to the mission was very very inspiring to me. So and N. So one thing about the phone call at the time I had these silly messages on my machine my God, how could I forget that was the things when I called you back to leave you the message. So you call Mother voice mailbox in the Jewish Bolton and I like your voice mailbox response and then I left you a message on your home phone. And it said, this is the headquarters for the Tim Wakefield for president campaign, and I did not know who Tim Wakefield was but

12:32 I thought that was a very very funny. So I think I said in my response. I don't really know who Tim Wakefield is, but maybe I should so maybe you can call me back and let me know right.

12:44 Did the Red Sox were at we're having a streak in Tim Wakefield was the quirky knuckleball pitcher and he was my hero at the time. He was like he'd like 110 straight or something like that. So but it didn't occur to me when I was calling these voicemail boxes for the dates that people would be calling back on my home phone, but that's the way it worked at the time. So I had this quirky message and I was horrified that you got that that silly messages. And what would you think of me? And it turned out to be a good thing? So they give Tim Wakefield partial credit.

13:20 Why was it important to you at the time to be looking at the Jewish because you hadn't been you hadn't done in personal ad in a Jewish publication before why didn't why did it important to you? I had always wanted to marry someone Jewish mainly because

13:40 Every time I would think about Christmas and having a Christmas tree, it was really hard for me to think about how I would have a Christmas tree. That's not the only thing but I just felt like I know that there's certain areas where I can be inflexible and I could see that there were certain issues around religion that we're going to be much easier for me in a relationship if I married someone Jewish and what I've always liked about Judaism, is it the values at least the way I interpreted use them are very practical and pragmatic and they give you some good rules to live by and I felt like they were values and wanted to share with my partner and pass on two children that we might have. So it just seemed like it was easy to do and I have to say that when I put the ad in the Jewish bulletin as opposed to other newspapers. I suddenly got what I like to call higher caliber of Bachelor. They were they were meeting more of my

14:40 Threshold requirements in terms of interest in education and just sort of basic compatibility. I felt like I had much more in common with the people who were responding to the bulletin at the night. I had with the people who responded to ads in the Bay Guardian. So how come you were were in the Jewish bulletin again? I didn't think it was like mandatory that I was going to be dating Jewish women when I was growing up my my father who was born Jewish is very anti-religious. So everything I had a pretty normal Jewish upbringing but everything was my mom fighting for it in my father would have to just kind of throw up his hands. They okay, they can go have a bar mitzvah or whatever is it? But he was you know, he's very anti-religious. And so I think I had kind of that in in mind that that that my mom had to fight

15:33 This to do these Traditions that you thought were important that that was at that price. I wasn't that wasn't fun, you know to have to have to fight for a side. So I figured why don't have to marry someone Jewish but at least I want to get in a situation where I don't have to fight to keep the Traditions that that my family thought were important and then my brother who is even more into the Judaism than I was married someone Catholic again originally before they had kids they would just eat celebrate each others Traditions the ones they had kids in Africa that they have a kid when they had their first son at the point we met right then all the sudden it was becoming clear that they were going to kind of go one way or the other. My brother is kind of given up a lot of the Jewish things that gave him Joy. He would look like leading services and he was the song leader camps and things in and he gave a lot of that up I think and I thought well, that's I mean he's happy with his marriage and he's happy with his family, but it seems like his part of him that he's he's giving up since then why don't want to have to go

16:33 About that stuff as part of the compromise and I don't want to fight about it. And the person who I was on again off again. She didn't have any particular religion, but an end she was open to going to satyrs and things like that, but there are certain things where I could see it was it was a fight one of them to be perfectly candid was anyang before I said, you know on Yom Kippur you supposed to practice abstinence and she was really offended by that said, why do I was going to tell me things like that? So that's part of the tradition. It's it it's part of it. It's a day where you give things up to remember what it's like to give things up for a day. It's important to me. It's not that I'm so religious, but I just like that idea that once a year. You just say, I'm going to give up

17:16 Things, you know for add a meeting about food and water and and and other forms of enjoyment. Just remember what that's like and that's an important part of the trust me I said, you know, at least this person I see it could be a fight on a lot of things. I mean I was the only reason I did that relationship didn't work out but I was one of the things in mind so I grew up not knowing any Jewish women who I was interested in really and there was one but she

17:45 Did you know that we we all like to Junior High School, but you moved away like and end so after after while

17:52 I kind of thought well, can I even get this? Can I even find somebody interesting who's Jewish but I thought I should give it a try so it doing the the singles hiking Club at least been met some women or at least interesting to me. Is that okay? This is this is worth a shot. So I thought if I if I'm going to do this I should do it to the Jewish bolt. I thought I should at least give Jewish women, you know a chance and

18:17 So

18:19 You know, I didn't get to talk to you about the first one. I met you she wasn't the right relationship, but she was very attractive and she was interesting and everything. So I said, okay, it's worth a shot. And then once I'd like I talk talk to you and certainly after we met I said that this is great. This can really work. Did you want to talk about when we first met? Yeah, there's a part of it another part of the reason. I was interested in meeting someone Jewish is because when I was a child my family lived in Phoenix in the sixties and seventies and there were very few Jews there and I was constantly being single that is being the Jewish kid kid Jodi. Can you can you bring that candle thing at Hanukkah time the the Mormons, you know would give my parents The Book of Mormon and try to get them to convert to being Mormon and an inn in my parents are really fight to be Jewish. And so I think it became much more important for me to be with you as people and I had had very positive formative experiences in Jewish youth-group Strickland the b'nai b'rith use organ is

19:19 And I think the. Really inclined me to want to to to marry someone Jewish just because it helped me understand all the values that we should talk about our first date as I mentioned. We weren't we met the day after we spoke on the phone. It was a Monday and we met at esperpento on 16th near Valencia and you're wearing not the same clothes exactly but pretty much the same way. I remember meeting you and I remember when we had spoken on the phone I said well, how will I know you still want all and it looks kind of like an absent-minded professor and and you did it was kind of needed wearing a blue dress shirt and khakis and you kind of needed a haircut at the time kind of like today we met at esperpento originally just just going to have a drink and that was a good place to me cuz it's it's it's not a topless is some people he was a top. It's a tapas place. You can get a little, you know plate of food and it and a cocktail or whatever I think.

20:19 Sangria, right and we started talking and in an hour went by and usually, you know by the end of an hour. I was ready to dismiss the date and get back to whatever I was doing and and we were having a really good time. So we just kept talking and we ordered more food and I think another drink and then we went around the corner on Valencia Street to Muddy Waters, which is also still there and there were some people who came in and we're trying to Panhandle I think during a mariachi mariachi band near serenaded by the Mariachis. Okay, and then we talked about all sorts of stuff and one of the things that we talked about with the fact that you were about to take a in a few months you were going to be in about six months in the winter of 2006. You were going to go on a big driving tour around the United States and you were going to go through Tennessee and I was telling you how I really wanted to go to Graceland.

21:18 And both of our eyes lit up at the idea of going to Graceland. It was really a there many Epiphany moments during that evening cuz we had originally met just thinking I would just give you the the ropes on how to how to handle the personals but then we really hit it off. Did you want to say anything about that. I just was so pleasantly surprised. I didn't know what what to expect I said, I'd only have the one date, you know, like a week earlier or something like that and that person again came in she was intelligent and attractive and everything which was kind of Spacey. I didn't know and you came in and you know, I was definitely attracted to you and you were

22:01 Just had all this great energy to you and you wear your find your funny. You know that I restore you told was was was was funny funny as he talked about your pastor the time. I don't know if you were doing that. I probably was but I remember and you and you walked me home. I lived on 17th Street between Valencia and Guerrero it and you walked me home.

22:26 And and we and we said, you know, good night and we shook hands and you and you shook my hand. You know, you took my hand with two hands and I thought oh, I really like this guy is really nice. How can I let him know? I really want to see him again in the only thing I could think of was to give you my business card. It was so dorky, but I did and I remember right? I went out of town a couple days later with some friends. We drive up to mount Lassen and all I did was talk about this date with you and they made so much fun of me for giving you my business card. And and and and you know, my other friend Jody told me I had broken all the rules cuz it's booked it came out that you're about the rules. I called you too soon and this and that but we just really hit it off and and I think because I'm worried that we'll run out of time that we should talk about the song because the song is really critical to this whole story kind of the elements. So

23:19 So I was playing but I don't think I'd written a new song in a little while when it came up at but but anyways, so we

23:29 We got to get that this was in August and early September of 2005 right in the spring of 2006. I did my trip and you join me for two weeks of it. I drove to Florida you flew to Florida. We met my dad there and we travel through the South we did among other places. We did go to Graceland. I was kind of using the trip is like the final by then. I knew I knew you weren't yet. I mean, but but but I don't know how much you thought that I might propose at Graceland is very nervous when we went to Graceland. I remember to buy these tickets and I I accidentally in and have to get on a shuttle bus to go to the house and ask how I do the ticket away and I was a wreck was hard. I was I had been thinking about it just tell you the truth. It was just because of the work circumstances because my my company wasn't paying me. I was basically out of money and didn't think I could afford an a

24:29 Put engagement ring on top of the trip with with a lot of it. So but I also thought okay, let's use the trip. Just you know, we're going to be together solid for 2 weeks. Let's make sure we really get along another than one argument about what the quality of the bathroom we should stop and let let the record reflect that I just needed a bathroom and you thought I needed to clean bathroom. I didn't really care. I just needed a place to get a great time on the trip. And and so after the trip, in fact right after I drop you off in Chicago, I'm Revisited some college friends and said, I think I found the one they said good go for it, you know.

25:04 So then it was just a matter of kind of working out the logistics and make me sure I could afford a ring and things I would like to I would like you to engage in June and we're getting married in January of 1997 1997. So I decided I should do something special for that and I knew I wouldn't be playing at the reception or anything cuz my band is too rough for that. I said it shouldn't be paying attention to the band when we're getting married suicide to do with the night before as I work at the song and I told I introduce if I saying Jody wrote most of the words this song is really I used a lot of it.

25:47 The words from the from the person that's the one thing in the personal ad was smart sexy JF 31 slightly cynical way fun seeks intelligent witty Paul athletic Prince Charming for lifetime of happiness. As one of our first dates was going salsa dancing wedding as we took dance lessons at metronome metronome ballroom, and we made the huge mistake of starting with the Lindy Hop, which is a very complicated dance and really what we needed was a basic Jitterbug and if he did eventually get that but we we tried all sorts of ballroom dancing and you were very

26:32 You are very good-natured about all the dancing cuz I love to dance and I love ballroom dancing in the romance of it and and it wasn't something you had done a lot of so I always really appreciated that so, you know, the funny thing is I can't remember exactly why we title this song fidgety girl and you were just had a lot of energy and we're always like wanting to go do the next thing or something. You're not somebody just said something I would compliment you when I catch you sitting and relaxing for an hour cuz it's rare So I mostly songwriter and not the former, but that will

27:16 Open paper look past the bars in the sky and acronym that catches my eye. Well.

27:41 Captain sexy

27:50 Come and dance with me.

28:12 Call me back, but I wasn't home. So I had to wait for my phone. We met on Monday left then you like swing. I feel like we can talk up everything trying to rain game coming, but I'm not well, Graceland will give it away.

29:04 Wow.

29:05 It's funny. I was I was looking for the words to that switch on the yellow paper. I first chatted it down and I was worried I would forget the words but I remembered and I just realized that I never actually wrote all the words to the end of the song down that I just hadn't had him in my head anyway, so I was sitting here frantically to get the words out. So I would remember them then I realized I didn't even see the night before our wedding and I didn't know about it and I was very delighted and one of the most interesting things about the song is how you now we have kids and we're very involved in our community and in our school in NM anytime your band has a gig and I'm there. They usually Play the song someone's Halloween party at the school carnival and and usually I'm the only person out on the dance floor and then one of my friends will say, oh, is this your song I'll come dance with you but I always really liked the song. It's always really realize that you wrote.

30:05 Half the words to it. This is the part where your witty like because you worked at that way. So so that was my main goal for the storycorps interview. But since we're here what what else should we talk about? Why I mean, I mean that the music also tied into to our engagement to

30:28 Oh, yes. Tell the story of our engagement. That's a very good story first date. We kind of wanted on the Mission District of art of our facilitator here. We have to say that our first date started in North Beach. We went to Coit Tower and we had a drink at the Savoy Tivoli on Green Street vodka Negroni. Yes, but then we go to South Park on that go to South Park where there's a swing set cuz I love to go on the swings.

30:58 So when we were so finally when I when I when I thought I could afford at least an adequate ring if it's probably not as I like when I like it in our peer group.

31:15 I decided on June 21st for long time San Francisco had something called The Making Waves Festival where they had bands up and down Market Street all cut the music not just rock and roll bands actually International at about

31:29 Tanner 15 different spots on Market Street and threw an invite my band professional help with getting the play there. We had a friend who was one of these helped to organize making ways and he got his hand on his stage in addition early in our dating Jody. It introduced me to his friends at the Public Utilities Commission. You had a band that they called All Animal Emergency led by a Filipino. I guess you was an administrator is that Public Utilities Commission has a great singing voice very well in Latin jazz. Now that she's she's dropping trying to the Filipino Pat Benatar. She's actually very good at that has a very good Latin jazz band the place around the Bay Area in at the casino's Northern California. Okay. So both bands were scheduled to play Making Waves. So I just had this crazy day where I decide that's the day. I'm going to propose to Jody.

32:23 I'm so I had the ring in my pocket. I skipped out of work lug my bass equipment on the Market Street played with professional help. Nobody was there and then a couple hours later played in front of the Nordstrom shopping center with all animal emergency doing are Filipino rock set with the guys from the Public Utilities Commission it and Raquel. So after that wrapped up, I really wanted to get around to the proposal but we had other things in mind because I had left I left the Public Utilities Commission several months before and then I was working somewhere else and then a good friend of mine was leaving there. And so she was having her going-away party heard you asked me if it was okay. If we went to the going away party for us. We went over to the marina and had pizza. Yes, and I have the ring burning in my pocket along with all the music open my car's I was just waiting to get to the end and then you offered a friend or two of yours a ride home.

33:23 Sunset I think I'll go out by 9th and Judah or something by then. It was getting pretty late and you still wanted to get supplies for a picnic the next flight dragging on and on and on and I think I'm with you tonight. I decided that I really wanted to go back to where we had our first full date and go to the swings at South Beach and that's where I would propose South Park. So I said so after we did all the other things supplies and said, can we go to the swingset? That's right. And so I was supposed to navigate at this point. I was I was in the passenger seat and we were coming from the supermarket in Noe Valley and I said, okay. Well, let's just go to Dolores Park. It's on the way back to my apartment and you and you said no. No, we have to go to South Park and at that point because you rarely get soda definitive. I just shut up and told you how to get there and I didn't say much. I just went with the go-with-the-flow we got on the

34:23 And the moment wasn't quite right cuz you were a couple guys doing a drug deal over in this next to the swing set. It didn't feel like the right romantic moment. You were getting cold miniskirt cuz it was summer and you were ready to leave if I said no get back on the swing.

34:42 We're going to do and I got down on my knee. It was very sweet. Cuz she got the ring out and said Jody would you marry me and you didn't say anything. You know, it's rare for me to be without words, but I really didn't know what to say. And then finally you said aren't you going to answer and I said, of course, yes, I will and and and that's what we had to go to the Redwood Room and have a drink because that was just supposed to go then have a drink. So it was a very San Francisco engagement.

35:16 So

35:18 Was there anything else you want to do the close up about the story? What what do people like about this story? They like how inventive it is. It's inventive isn't the right word, but it's very it's an adventurous story.

35:36 And it's it's a happy story. It has a good ending. We're still in love. We're still married. We have two children. We have nice careers you all those things and

35:48 And if you know if you're a rabbi you like the story cuz it's about 2 Jewish people who used you as channels to meet. I don't know. What do you think people like about the story? You know, it's funny because because like you said people sometimes surprised about the personal ad thinking that we know a lot of other people who met through some kind of personal ad situation. It seemed so common to meet people online but people still feel like there's a stigma attached to that and I feel like that's actually a natural outgrowth of the way our society has evolved because it used to be that you grew up into town and you knew everybody and and you would get set up with someone and everybody knew everybody know these people move all over the place and we don't have those social networks that we had. Even when when our parents were we're growing up, you know, there was a real a real safety net and a community that would support you is you is you grew up and came into adults.

36:48 And I think that personal ads are just another way whether they're online or in the newspaper for people to find community and to figure out how they're going to fit into a somewhat complicated world.

37:00 So I don't and I'm not at all embarrassed. I think it's a great story. It's very romantic. I think that's at the end of song is very romantic and that's something people really like this the romance that you would write me a song and that it wasn't a sappy love song It's a sedan song. You still don't like sappy love songs that much. I know I don't deserve to live like our third or fourth date when when salsa dancing. We were trying to learn Merengue on the fly. So is there anything else we should say since this is for posterity. I still love you. I love you get on when we when we met and I said this is this is great. I got to make this work. You never going to meet the perfect person. You never going to meet someone. Who's who's perfect. I don't think there's such a thing as a perfect person. What you're going to meet is the person who is perfect for you and every

38:00 He's going to have flaws and what you have to figure out is which flaws can you live with and which was can you not live with I know I have flaws. And so you appreciate me and you love me for my flaws and I love you for your flaws, but we found a way to make that all work and that to me is the essence of of making a relationship strong. So that's one of the things I would want to live with this story.

38:29 Well, actually just on that note kind of curious. What are some of the flaws that the other person just maybe the smaller little things in life that kind of Turkey.

38:43 Well, we fit because she I'm I'm proud of my guy. I'm I'm kind of a outfit in kind of person and Jody's a very directed person when she gets she gets head strong and and and very fixated on going a certain direction and sometimes she needs to back off and and compromise of it she gets annoyed with me because I'll be very wishy-washy about what to do next. Yes. I'm off and saying do you have an opinion on this Now's the Time to tell me that you have an opinion about something and one of the other things the life lessons that I've learned through the years is that

39:21 Whatever is an issue in the beginning of a relationship is going to be an issue throughout the relationship and you have to find ways to manage that and one of the things that is worked in. Our relationship is that the the things that are issues, you know, the things that are issues for me about about you you manage and you handle in ways that that I feel respected by them and I think that hopefully the same is true for me cuz I know that you know, I'm not always the easiest person in the world to live with you like like being time. I I'm I'm habitually late on things but I learned you know being on time for certain things is very important for Jody. So I make sure even if it's something very there's still things that I can maybe it's not as important or I'll be a little late but there's other things if it's important. I'm I'm on time or keeping the house clean. Like we finally just said we're going to hire a house cleaner because the floors are clean.

40:23 Any last thoughts before we vanish? I just want to thank MPR and the people who are behind the story Corps program because I think it's great and it's a really it's a great opportunity for people to think about all sorts of different things and share them. I think we have a lot of respect for the story telling her of her family has a long history story. Tell your dad always does these slideshows with family history and things which may be now will evolve into videos and I've always been a packer. I mean this is this is part of a huge file. I have clippings and Souvenirs of my life arranged by a year. So the idea of kind of catalog

41:04 And keeping things for posterity unusual stories is and the fact that we both in College radio, I think needs to radio connection.