What's the best thing about St. Louis?
What should I do?
Nothing, shit, nothing.
Watch your damn back before somebody
Run your ass over, put a bullet in your head.
I'm serious.
I am too.
Zion, Zoe, Zena, Zen and Zavier.
Five Zs?
Yeah, zzzzuh!
You know what I'm saying?
And then we used to have this thing they called it the candy truck.
Yeah.
You know what I'm saying?
You could go by there, you could take, take a dime.
A dime.
A quarter would get you half the fucking truck.
Okay?
Unfortunately, if teaching was something that others would care about in meaning of financial reasons, a lot of the teachers that are great in what they do wouldn't leave the profession.
This is majority white over here.
That's why you're going to see the birds.
Because if it wasn't, the birds wouldn't be over here.
If it wasn't, they'd pack their shit and they be gone.
If you're not from St. Louis, you have no business on the north side.
Hey everybody.
I just got back from St. Louis, Missouri.
Have you been down to St. Louis?
It was my first time there.
I met this wonderfully rich collection of people who I'm so excited to introduce you to in this special on the ground from the street from the backseat chapter of 3 Books.
Now on the way from the airport to the hotel, the first guy I met who I don't have a recording with, but he was just like filling me with all the St. Louis trivia.
He was like, did you know the Gateway Arch is 630 feet by 630 feet?
Did you know we hosted the Olympics and the World Fair in the same year?
I was like, well, I knew about the World Fair.
He's like most people do, but not everybody realizes we hosted the Olympics too.
1904 was a banner year in St. Louis.
We were the fourth largest city in the US at the time.
There's this deep well of pride coming from this guy.
The next day, I had a bit of time to explore, so I went out to look for the Eurasian tree sparrow.
Yes, the Eurasian tree sparrow, which looks like a house sparrow, but has this like little black cheek on it.
It's this local bird species that doesn't exist pretty much anywhere else in the whole Western world.
Nowhere else other than St. Louis because German immigrants brought six species of birds to St. Louis in 1870.
Five of them died that first winter, but the Eurasian tree sparrow, hardy, hardy tree sparrow, actually took hold and from, I think they brought six birds over, it's actually established a foothold in St. Louis, has not disrupted the local ecology, and I really wanted to see it.
So, you know, I hailed an Uber and I met Jacqueline who drove a bus in town for 27 years.
When I asked her for the best thing about St. Louis, she first said, nothing, watch your back, somebody going to put a bullet in your head.
I mean, that's a direct quote.
That's really what she said.
I was like, what?
But it was a raw conversation and we ended up talking about the erosion of community, deprioritizing connection, and how we might find or look for new kinds of support in a disconnected world.
Jacqueline said, my family is whoever loves on me.
Blood makes you kin, but it doesn't make you family.
After, with Jacqueline's help, I found the Eurasian tree sparrow.
I then hailed another Uber and I met Deneane, a 28-year-old single mother of five, who does drop-off, pickup, and evening solo every day while driving Uber 30 hours a week, working at a cupcake shop, and running a small business online.
We went to the Gateway Arch together and Left Bank Books, which is established in 1969, one of the best independent bookstores I've ever been to, and we talked about enduring.
That's going to be the theme of her formative book, as you'll hear, how after her mom found bruises all over her body, she left her abusive relationship and found the strength to start over, found the strength to endure.
The next morning, I gave the talk that actually sent me down there, and then I got a final ride to the airport from Albano from Albania, who left his job as a public school teacher in Florida to make more than double now as a driver.
Unfortunately, Albano said, if teaching was something others would care about, then teachers wouldn't be leaving the profession.
I hope you feel a special kinetic pulse in this chapter.
Listen to the stories from people whose stories aren't often told.
Get ready to laugh, to cry, to connect hearts as we tether ourselves to the human connection that exists around us every single day.
So are you ready?
Let's head down to the backseat of a number of cars in St. Louis and hang out with Jacqueline, Deneane, and Albano as they share the love and connection that we are always searching for here on 3 Books.
Let's flip the page into chapter 136 now.
I was born here.
In St Louis? What was St. Louis like the year you were born?
It was more of a community.
Uh-huh.
You know what I'm saying?
People knew each other.
Yeah, you knew each other.
You kind of looked out for each other.
You know what I'm saying?
What neighborhood?
I was born on the west side.
Yeah.
Was that mostly black neighborhood, white neighborhood?
Yeah
Like 90% black?
100% black.
Yeah, yeah.
100% black.
And your parents, how'd they end up in St. Louis?
And you know what?
I've never asked that question.
I lost my mom when I was young.
I'm sorry.
So, yeah.
And I lost my dad when I was young, too.
So my grandmother kind of raised me.
And I really don't know how they ended
Like, I asked my auntie and them that question, but it's like, I don't know.
We just end up here, so.
Yeah.
Turn left on Dale Avenue.
I wish they had ended up some damn where else, because I don't like St. Louis.
Why not?
Because it's, I mean, it's too much here.
It's just too much going on.
I mean, and it's stuff going on everywhere you go.
But I guess, like, I drove for mass transit for 20-some years.
So I know the city very well.
You drove a bus?
I drove mass transit.
Oh, like the streetcar?
Yeah.
Is it called streetcar?
No.
It's called mass transit.
Mass transit.
It's just called mass transit.
But what kind of vehicle is it?
This is a Kia.
No, mass transit vehicle.
A big bus.
Oh, it was a bus.
It was a bus.
A huge bus.
You drove a bus for 27 years?
Wow.
That's wild.
I passed your stop.
I don't care.
I like talking to you.
Where are you going now?
I'm going to a house.
For real?
Because we like...
Well, why don't you stay here?
I'll call you.
I'll just need two minutes here.
I'm supposed to find a bird at a bird feeder.
You what?
I'm finding a bird at a bird feeder.
There's a, there's a bird feeder here.
I'm looking for the Eurasian tree sparrow, which it only exists, it's a bird that only exists in St. Louis.
For real?
Yeah, because they released it here in 1870.
But it got eaten everywhere else by the house sparrow, but only persists in this one city pretty much.
And in Europe.
It's called the...
So you think, you think a bird feeder going to have a bird there?
Well, yeah, they say that they're in the bird feeder.
Shit, you done made me curious now.
I know.
That's why I said we should talk.
We talking.
I love hanging out with you.
So it's safe here?
Yeah, you good.
Cuz you told me half the neighborhoods I gotta be careful in.
So there's a lot of shootings on the streets is what you're saying?
Like every day?
Yeah.
Really?
There's shootings on the street every day?
Every day.
It's a killing.
You can watch the news and somebody has either died on the north side or the south side.
One of these sides, they done killed somebody on.
I'm telling you.
I wouldn't lie to you, Neil.
And how many of them are just people walking by, like innocent people?
That ain't too often.
But we had, you know, we have had people to come in town like this volleyball some, this was some years ago.
In fact, I was still driving a bus.
And she came in in time for a volleyball tournament and the guy robbed her and shot her, killed her on broad daylight.
Don't complete the trip.
Just drive me around the block a couple times so we can keep talking.
Neil, I ain't got time to talk to you.
Why?
I got somewhere to go.
Where's this bird feeder at?
I can't.
It's supposed to be at the address I said.
You can't find the address?
We were here.
This is it.
That's it right there.
Jacqueline, the bus driver for 27 years in St. Louis.
Born in St. Louis.
Born and raised.
And raised.
I just born.
I was raised.
And your daddy's from Arkansas.
My daddy from Arkansas.
I'm not sure where my mom's from.
Because she died when you were young.
My dad and my mom died when I was young.
But I don't know how I know where my dad and not my mom.
That is so odd.
That's puzzling to me.
I'm going to have to find out where my mom is born and raised.
But your daddy's not alive.
So who are you going to ask?
I can ask my sister.
I can ask my aunt.
OK.
We got to figure this out.
It's right here.
Neil where you going
It's supposed to be some bird feeders here.
I'm looking for them.
There's no bird feeders.
You put in the wrong address.
Who told you this bird feeders was over here?
Well.
This is it right here.
OK.
Well, then I'll get out here.
It's a safe neighborhood, right?
Yeah, it's cool.
All right.
It's cool.
So we're sitting at the corner of I don't know where we're in.
What neighborhood are we in St. Louis?
You're on the west side.
We're on the west side of St. Louis where the street is empty.
There's nobody on the streets.
The houses are old and they're all detached like clapboard houses with white picket fences and like tattered American flags and like kind of yellowed brushy bushes.
You know, the properties are kind of like it was a majestic neighborhood like 50 years ago.
It still is.
Okay.
How much of the houses cost here?
You probably can.
These houses probably run you in the upper hundreds like right around 140, 50, 60 and they building it up because you got new houses.
$150,000 is actually would be can be considered like a steal in like Toronto.
Yeah, that's a lot.
Yeah, you can get you can get a lot.
And I heard that you can get a lot more house for your buck here in St. Louis and we have lots of investors calling trying to buy property and stuff.
Like I have I have my father my godfather's house.
It's worth like a hundred and eighty.
Well, I have people calling me like every day for this house.
Yeah, what like every day?
They you ready to sell you ready to sell?
No, I'm not.
Jacqueline is such a bright vibrant beautiful personality.
She's wearing a bright apple red silk tie and her long hair and a bright apple red turtleneck, too.
She tells me she's 59 years old and that she's lost her husband about five years ago after they'd been together for 29 years.
Leslie and I have been married for 10.
And so hearing stories of people losing spouses, you know, 20 30 40 years into relationships always, you know, gives me pause and makes me feel.
She says they have two boys a 35 year old named Justin who is a sergeant and a 33 year old named Jamal who's a truck driver as well as two grand boys.
I'm I'm real self-sufficient.
You know what I'm saying?
I'm that I'm that I can get it done kind of woman.
You know what I'm saying?
I don't wait on no man to do nothing for me.
I do it all for myself now.
I would love to have a man to come in my life, but that hasn't happened.
You told me that St. Louis used to feel like a community and now it doesn't so what changed
I think family's changed and what I mean by that
Like I said, you know, you've heard the saying it takes a community.
It takes a village to raise a child.
I think that structure kind of fell apart at some point, you know what I'm saying?
And and you get a lot of that don't say nothing to my kids.
I mean even in school just the teacher, you know, call you up there.
Oh, she said this to my instead of you know, everybody being in line with you know, what I'm saying?
For this child, you know making education for this child, you know, the mother gets all defensive because you know, it's just it's crazy.
I know you mean the education systems change.
It used to be like we created the schools to take care of each other and to educate each other and then it became this discipline oriented thing.
Yeah, that's why it became well, well it became it like because it always been a disciplinary because when we were in school, we got whooped.
I don't know if you that old.
No, no principal was able to whoop us.
The teacher was able to whoop us.
They took that out of school.
Like I said, and then if the if the teacher even called a parent up there, it's like she got a hand on her here rolling her head.
I know you ain't touch my son.
You know what I'm saying?
Instead of finding out the the core the root of the problem because somewhere your kid is a little badass.
Okay, but we don't want to do that anymore and that's becoming a huge.
So you think the fragility that the the everyone's everyone's to politically correct and everyone's so defensive and people are soft people are soft people are fragile people are fragile.
So that's caused the lack of community.
Community being lost.
There's a lot of books being written about this, you know, The Anxious Generation by Jonathan Haidt our guest in chapter 103 and the book.
I just featured in my book club last month.
It talks about the decline of trust in society through the 80s with the advent of the 24-7 news cycle, which I don't know how many of us really appreciate what happened.
But you know, when we started putting news on TV at all hours of the day, we had these increased media reports of kids getting abducted or abused the reports including the sort of creation and use of the phrase stranger danger.
Why?
Well, of course in order to attract the attention of our fear-based amygdalas advertising revenue had to be maximized and how do you attract more advertisers?
You make people look at the screens more.
How do you make them look at the screens more you put things on the screens that they're naturally afraid of that.
They can't stop looking to because the parts of our brain that are evolved to look for survival at all costs can't stop staring at it.
But this is despite the fact that things have actually never been safer throughout our history books like Enlightenment Now by Harvard psychologist.
Steven Pinker show that the world is safer today than ever before or I mean, this is just me saying these things.
I think so.
I could just be off on this, you know, Oxford evolutionary psychologist Robin Dunbar.
Our guest in chapter 132 in January of this year.
He does have a model called Dunbar seven pillars of friendship.
So these different ways that humans use as signals for how we know if we can be friends things like language shared upbringing education hobbies humor musical taste in a shared worldview, right?
So these elements of a tribe might be do they look like me talk like me think like me.
So maybe mixing the benefits.
We all intellectually know come from diversity actually temporarily reduces trust because we have to examine whether or not we trust people that don't look like us think like us talk have the same worldview as us as Robin Dunbar would say or maybe it just takes time to learn new ways of connecting and that's okay.
That's good.
It's good.
Exactly.
That's okay.
But it's it's up to me.
Everybody has to open up open up and be willing to receive like I need to be able to receive your culture.
You be able to see my culture and the next person's culture and who knows what could even become of all any of that, right?
You know what I'm saying?
Yes.
I mean I can learn from you.
You can learn exactly I can learn from you.
You can learn from me.
That's the whole point of 3 Books.
Ultimately.
I mean we start talking about what life was like in st.
Louis and what it's like today.
Jacqueline told me she loved it, but now she doesn't why what's the disconnect today?
That's the huge disconnect.
I think we have now people just don't care.
You know what I'm saying back in the 70s.
You have people that cared about not just their people, but other people, you know what I'm saying?
When people watch their kids, they watching the neighbor up the street kids.
Like if they see them all baby don't do that.
You know, that's you know, all night.
You can't take her day.
That's surly's daughter.
You know what I'm saying?
Now people they'll tell you when they see stuff snitches get stitches.
Don't nobody won't say nothing.
You know what I'm saying?
People don't care if it doesn't.
If it doesn't resonate to them, if it's not their family, if it's not their loved one, they don't care.
They do not care.
And that's the biggest breakdown in our community.
Wow.
It is, that's the biggest breakdown because that's just like if I'm coming down the street and I know this is this is Mr. Smith house, but I see this strange guy coming out just out of his house with a TV in his hand.
First thing I'm gonna do is get on the phone.
Hey, they don't look like Mr. Smith.
Well, you might just want to come check this out. You know what I'm saying?
Yeah yeah
And a lot of people won't do that.
Yeah, don't want to you know get stitches.
That's what they say snitches get stitches.
Well, give me stitches.
You know what I'm saying?
Because if I see it, I'm gonna tell it.
The breakdown of society people aren't outside together anymore.
We aren't watching our neighbors kids anymore.
We don't know the people outside our own house.
I heard Esther Perel say recently a phrase which stuck with me.
It's that we all have a thousand friends these days, but nobody to feed our cats.
Do you agree with this lack of community?
Is it a st.
Louis thing?
Are you seeing it where you live to you know, Jacqueline's 59 years old, which means she's born in 1965.
I asked her what it was like growing up in the 60s and 70s.
Paint us the picture of what trust and community looked like back then.
What was it like in West St. Louis in 19 in the 1970s?
Paint us a picture.
I loved it.
Well, first of all, my mom had my grandmother had seven girls.
And two boys, she actually had three, but she lost a boy in 64.
So they brought this four-family flat on the west side of st.
Louis.
So imagine that my mom has six kids.
She had a sister that had nine kids.
She had another sister have four.
All of us is in this fourth.
Oh, wow.
All of us are right here.
So it was like it was never a dull moment.
You were never alone.
Never.
This is first time in my life that I've ever been by myself because I grew up with sisters and brothers.
Then I grew up with a huge family.
So it was family.
It was like a party every day.
Like so what was it?
Like you walk home at 3 30 p.m. You walk into your house.
First of all, I'm not by myself.
Remember nothing but kids.
Nothing like it's like a river.
You know, have you ever been on a river and as far as you can see, it's water.
That's how it was with these kids.
Like it's like 15 20 kids like kids everywhere and running and playing and you know what I'm saying?
And then we we used to have this thing to call they called it the candy truck.
Yeah, you know what I'm saying?
You can go by there.
You got to take a dime a dime a quarter will get you half the fucking truck.
Okay, you probably own that truck for a quarter.
I'm telling you, I'm telling you, I'm serious.
You can probably own that truck for a quarter.
But it was like you then you came home.
You know, a lot of times my mom, my mom and dad was still at work, but I had older sisters and brothers because I'm the baby.
So I had older sisters and brothers.
They made sure I did what I needed to do.
That was, you know, change my clothes.
You always had we always had at least two pair of shoes.
That was probably the most we would have you had play shoes.
You had church shoes.
So you had to come out of your you had to come out of your school shoes.
Anyway, like more like three pair, but you had to come out of your school shoes and take your play shoes outside shoes.
You have to put them on and back there.
We have a lot of homework.
You know, we did the most we did was like we had chores around the house, you know what I'm saying?
But once you got through with your choice, you went back outside with them thousands of kids work and you just you played and play.
I mean, I know every childhood game red light green light, hop scotch tag, hide go seek, jacks, just all kind of games.
You just we just play.
We were just outside enjoying the out.
You know what I'm saying?
It wasn't no video games and all that.
We were outside mingling with each other and you just knew the whole entire neighborhood.
You did you knew I mean a woman can come out and had their house and she knew who I was.
You you belongs in their house right there.
You know what I'm saying?
You five houses down.
You're your grandmother's Miss Borders.
You know what I'm saying?
You just knew we knew it.
Everyone knew everybody.
Everybody knew everybody.
They were outside because they're outside.
But the time outside is a big ingredient for community.
Yeah.
Yeah, because when we get like the amusing ourselves to death a book by Neil Postman in the 1980s pauses the theory I think that like TVs are going to make us listen to the title of the book.
Amusing ourselves to death.
So the time outside is a huge problem.
Was there ever any time to read?
Nope.
The only time you really read is mostly in a summer because they had you know back then the government has summer programs for the kids.
I don't know if you know anything about that, but it had different programs for the kids where if you had like a neighborhood park and they had people that they called them.
I can't even remember what they call.
They like leaders.
They like, you know, but they they were like over with us, you know, we did craft.
We did reading.
They took us on field trips.
This was the whole summer.
You know what I'm saying?
They took us to the library, you know, all kind of different stuff, you know, it was just we did.
You can almost say you did.
Well, I guess the only difference is in the summer and during the school year is we didn't do it up during the daytime, you know what I'm saying?
Because we were in school.
But once we once summer came you just did it all day long.
It was just so much to do.
There is kids everywhere.
You're outside a lot.
Being outside is a big ingredient to community.
You said you had community in St. Louis.
Now you hate it.
You don't like here anymore.
You told me when I got into the to the uber be careful certain neighborhoods.
Somebody might put a bullet in your head and you weren't joking.
No, I wasn't because every night there's shootings and you got to be careful.
People don't know each other anymore.
We've lost community. So one reason is because people aren't outside as
And two don't get me wrong because in the in the black community and that's what I was going to tell you
You gonna you say how do you know you in the wrong neighborhood?
You have about 10 folks standing on one porch just drinking talking loud, you know, you're in the wrong neighborhood, you know what I'm saying?
That's not where you supposed to be did the cuz see we I don't know.
I don't know about other states, but we kind of we kind of we kind of differentiate the different sides of St. Louis like we'll say the north side the south side the west side the east side.
So you have to make sure what side you are on to you know what I'm saying?
Like I know what you're saying, but of course doesn't I'm only here one day.
I have no idea to figure that out.
Well, if you get what you have to get in the uber.
And I can guarantee you the uber knows the driver knows.
Yeah, so don't go somewhere random don't go.
Which sides do I go to which sides do I not go to?
Okay, you you come in here on the west side.
You can go as far west if you want to go and until you get South and you don't want to be on the south side either because everything back west north where I'm from that moved them to the south because they building up on the West.
What do you mean they moved them?
You know, it's like, you know, low-income housing, so when people apply for low-income housing, that's where they send them.
Yeah
Send them South, you know what I'm saying?
Because this this area over here.
Like I said, this all where we sitting right now.
It's majority white.
It's considered a city, but this is majority white over here.
That's why you're going to see the birds because if it wasn't the birds wouldn't be over there they'd pack
they shit and they be gone.
That's only why the birds over here, but and you don't want to go you don't want to go at all on the north side.
If you're not from St. Louis, you have no business on the north side.
So if you go somewhere you ask that driver, what side of town am I on?
What happens if I go to the north side?
The north side is just it's I'm telling you it's horrible.
It's horrible.
What do you mean?
It's it's first of all you go.
You gonna see run down houses like I mean run down like seriously run down.
You know what I'm saying?
You gonna see like I said, you you probably see a few kids on the street.
I'm talking little kids, but you're going to see grown-ups were like I say, they either getting smoking weed.
They drinking cussing right among these little kids.
You know what I'm saying?
You're going to see that.
That's how you're going to know you're on the wrong side because you're going to see grown folks disrespecting babies.
Grown folks disrespecting babies.
People that should know better, you know what I'm saying?
But yeah, don't care.
Don't care grown folks disrespecting babies.
Jacqueline's painting us a portrait of trust and connection in society what it looks like when we have what it looks like when we don't.
I just finished reading a book called Dark Age Ahead by Jane Jacobs and she's famous for coining the phrase eyes on the street.
I asked Jacqueline what she thinks of that phrase.
She said we used to have eyes on the street eyes on the street.
And it made a difference and made a huge difference. It did because you knew if you came in certain community, we knew what what grass we can walk on.
You know what I'm saying?
Miss Miss Miss Miss Love.
She looking out the window.
You can't walk on her grass.
You know what I'm saying?
You knew, you know, some things you couldn't do in neighborhoods because you knew who would be watching who say who gonna tell it.
You just know it.
We've lost family.
We're living farther away from each other now.
Have we lost togetherness?
Are we farther apart from our tribes?
But then Jacqueline surprised me again.
But you know what I've learned within these last few years and I know the Holy Spirit gave me this revelation and it's like and don't get me wrong.
I don't frown on family, but my philosophy now is my family is whoever loves on me.
Blood does not make you family.
You know what I'm saying?
It doesn't know not blood doesn't blood makes you keen doesn't make you family.
You know what I'm saying?
Whoever loves on me makes me.
I love I love you.
And you that's family to me, you know what I'm saying?
As soon as I met you I love you.
I fell in love with you.
That's family.
Now I have blood cousins out there that I don't even like.
But you might have a neighbor that loves you and you love her.
Exactly.
And the neighbor feels like your family.
Exactly.
I was 18 when I lost my mom.
I was 14 when I lost my dad, but my mom my mom made a bigger impact on me than my dad, you know, because that's mom, you know what I'm saying?
So it was a lot of things in life that you know, I either had to come by it, you know what I'm saying?
What did your mom teach you?
Huh?
Exactly because well, I mean my mom taught me for the most part my mom was a very meek woman.
My mom didn't cuss.
She didn't smoke.
She didn't drink, you know what I'm saying?
She was very attentive to her kids.
She didn't she wasn't one to oh, I love you.
I love you, but she showed us love, you know what I'm saying?
I wasn't able to speak that love that word until I got with my husband and he showed me how to open up.
Brené Brown has a quote which my wife and I are lucky to sit down with her in chapter 75 and she said professing love is so easy and so cheap showing like bell hooks All About Love.
She's showing love is what's up.
So how did your mom show love?
She like I said, she was very attentive.
She was very attentive.
I mean my mom I was like a mama's baby.
Like I said, my mom was was I was 18 with my mom.
I slept in the same bed with my mom until she passed away.
Your whole life?
My whole life, that's how close I was to my mom, but it was a lot of things
Just you and her? Where's everybody else?
That was what I was it.
Oh only you slept with your mom cuz you're the baby
Yeah, cuz I'm the baby.
Yeah, we got a baby in my house.
Yeah, that's probably gonna always be a baby.
Yeah, my wife still sleeping with him.
Like he's still around at night.
Like he's got my spot in the bed sometimes.
I always be well, you know boys.
Where did your dad go?
Who knows?
We've covered a lot so far.
I mean, this is just one draft for one person in St. Louis, but Jacqueline is just so full of life and energy and thoughts.
But wait, did we ever see the bird the Eurasian tree Sparrow and what is Jacqueline's most formidable book two more questions.
We still need to answer.
Wait, I never saw the bird.
Oh, wait, I've seen I've seen I saw Morning Dove.
I saw Blue Jay.
I saw Robin no Eurasian tree sparrow Jacqueline.
Well, you're my Eurasian tree.
Oh, give me 30 seconds.
I'm gonna find it.
It's right here.
Come on.
Oh my God.
So the birds are talking to me now you say yeah, they're talking about you.
You're right.
They say look at this nut.
Yeah, I got it.
The Eurasian tree Sparrow.
Oh, yeah.
Who told you they was over here?
Well, it's got a black and white cheek, which is different than a house bear.
They were released in 1870 by the Germans.
They brought 60 pairs over.
They released them in Lafayette Park in St. Louis.
They started to breed.
They brought a bunch of birds over all the rest died.
But just after that happened a lady came out of the house right next to where we were and she's like, hi, we're like hi.
She's like, what are you?
What are you up to?
We're just like, oh, we're just I'm just looking at a bird and she's like the Eurasian tree Sparrow.
We were like, yeah, she's like, I know I figured and I was like, oh my gosh, I'm sorry.
I hope we're not bothering you.
She's like, no, no, no.
We when we when we bought this house, we had to sign our names on the contract saying that we knew our home or nearby was breeding grounds for the Eurasian tree Sparrow and that we wouldn't take down the nests.
So don't know the I can't verify this story, but I love the fact that a neighbor came out of the house and says like I guess you're looking for the Eurasian tree Sparrow, which was wonderful.
Now, let's keep going.
What about the book?
Can we tie Jaclyn's story into a book?
Can you give me one book to change your life Jacqueline?
I would say the Bible, I would
Turn left on Central Avenue.
What age were you when you read it?
When I start reading it?
Probably probably around my 20-ish.
Yeah, my late 20s.
Yeah.
Why'd you start reading it?
What made you start?
Because I felt hopeless and helpless.
Hmm.
Turn left on West Park Avenue.
Somebody told me hey, get God in your life.
How did that help?
Because it gave me hope.
This is before you're married before you work 27 years for the bus.
This yeah, this is this is like after I lost my mom, you know, you know what it's like to be an 18 year old kid with no mother to give you no guidance, no directions, you know what I'm saying?
My mom was taken from me at such a young age, you know what I'm saying?
And I didn't.
How did she die?
She died of cancer.
You know, that was that was before.
My mom lost her dad at age 18.
She still talks about it.
My mom's 73.
Yeah.
Yeah, she knows exactly.
It's a it's a it's a void in your life that could never be filled.
You know what I'm saying?
You never get over it.
You get you get you adapt to it, but you never get over it.
You know what I'm saying?
I mean, it's not too many days that goes by that.
I don't think of my mom, you know what I'm saying?
And some kind of compassion.
What's one message she gave you?
She my mom gave me family actually family, you know what I'm saying?
Because my mom really believed in togetherness for his family was concerned.
You helped each other, you know what I'm saying?
I mean just like when my sister, my oldest sister start having kids real early.
You we lost our dad.
So it was just my mom and the kids, you know what I'm saying?
Is it's like 11 years difference in me and my sister.
So she started having kids my sister when my sister wasn't at home.
We took care of her kids.
That's what my mom gave to us.
You help your sister out when you know what I'm saying?
So right now today with my niece.
It was three of them two boys and one girl.
I'm talking.
We're very close because I was a part of their raising even though I was young man, my niece is just like, ten years apart but I was a part of that raising so
And did God or Jesus or the Bible did it feel some of that void?
Oh, it feels a lot of it.
It feels it feels more now than than I mean, I I'm a better person because of it, you know what I'm saying?
Because you know, you you just feel sorry for yourself.
You know what I'm saying?
It's why me you have this pity party and the Bible lets you know that he never said that you wasn't going to have triumph.
He said he would never he would be there.
He would never leave you.
So he's here with me.
He didn't say I wasn't going to have troubles through this world.
You know what I'm saying?
He didn't say that we wasn't going to die.
It's just I lost mine so early but he didn't he never told us all of us going to die.
You know, we just don't know when so that helps me.
Yeah, that gives me you know what I'm saying that that really kind of caused me it brings me out a lot of times of feeling sorry for myself.
You know what I'm saying?
Because we all have a story.
We all have been through something.
We have different stories, but we all have stories.
We all have seen like the worst in this world.
So that kind of help.
Now so inspired by that chat with Jacqueline.
I wanted to go keep moving, you know, go to the bookstore go to the art.
So I open up the uber app again.
And this time I meet Deneane.
So your name is Deneane and you tell me you got depression for nine months.
Yeah, but also like I feel like it got worse.
It's like of course things take course.
So like after I lost the two plus like not close to people but really too close to me.
I never went through a bad breakup.
And so like that really like hit it because I'm like I have kids, you know, like we have kids together.
So it was just like me.
You got kids?
How many kids?
I have five.
You have five kids?
You're 28 years old?
Yeah.
How old were you when you had your first one?
I was 18.
Wow.
So 18 every two years.
Yep
But you guys weren't married, right?
And now you guys broke up.
Yeah.
What happened?
12 year relationship.
He was a cheater and then abusive.
And I finally decided to just get away.
Two strikes.
You're out.
Yeah, I finally decided.
Pretty big strikes though.
Yeah, real big ones.
Cheater and abusive.
And abusive.
What kind of you mean abusive?
Like hands.
Like physical abuse.
Yeah, physical, physical abuse.
I'm so sorry.
Yeah, so I finally, but in the midst of going through all of this, I found the strength to like start over.
It's you went solo with five kids.
Yeah.
And how old are your kids?
Oh, my oldest is 10.
And then I have an eight-year-old, seven-year-old, five-year-old, and a three-year-old.
And what are all their names?
Zion, Zoe, Zena, Zen, and Zavier.
Five Z's?
Yeah zzzuh!
I'm from, I'm from Canada.
So it's Z up there.
Yeah.
Yeah, five Z's.
I can see the arch.
Yep.
I see the arch 640 feet tall and 640 feet wide.
Built as the gateway to the West.
But they built it apparently 100 years after they meant to build it.
Did you hear that?
I never heard that.
That's what my driver said yesterday.
Actually, the idea for the Gateway Arch in St. Louis was first presented, quote, as a suitable and permanent public memorial to the men who made possible the Western Territorial Expansion of the United States, particularly President Jefferson, his aides Livingston and Monroe, and the great explorers Lewis and Clark, and a whole bunch of other people.
Now, this happened in 1933 and construction finished in 1965.
So it was 58 years ago.
And mathematically, it worked out to 22 years late, not a hundred years late, like I said.
So how do you take care of five kids by yourself?
That would give a lot of people depression to start with.
It's very challenging because like, of course, you have to be on time and like organized and it's like, it's a lot.
Like you have to attend to each personality.
But financially, I don't feel any different with being without them because I was still financially responsible for everything.
So you drive Uber
How many hours a week?
I do about 33 hours.
Is that full-time job?
Full-time and then I work a part-time.
What's your part-time?
Basically, a cashier at Jilly's a Cupcake Spot.
At what?
Jilly's?
Uh-huh.
Pig Spot?
Cupcake.
Cupcake Spot.
Yeah.
Cool.
So then how do you take care of your kids?
I mean, you're because you're working how many, 33 hours here, then how many hours there?
So there, I only work like, I'll say 5 to 11 hours.
It just depends.
You have to have someone helping you with your kids then, drop off, pick up or something.
No, I'm doing it.
So you drop off?
But the daycare helps me where I take them.
So like if I drop them off at 7.30 in the morning, they'll take them to school for me.
Oh, okay.
And then I pick them up at 5.30.
Wow. So you got them 5.30 straight till bedtime.
And the bedtime is probably late now with the 10-year-old.
Yeah.
You don't got any time for yourself.
Basically.
And then we suddenly see the arch.
We see the St. Louis Gateway Arch.
We jump out.
We take some pictures.
I'll paste them on the blog post at 3books.co. If you're watching this on YouTube, I'll put some pictures right here so you can see.
We see it.
Oh, we're at the arch.
But I want to get the picture with you.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
One, two, three, cheese.
And you're, and the arch is in the picture.
One, two, three.
Oh, yeah.
Look at me.
Cheese.
Oh, yeah.
Now one of us in the arch.
This is awesome.
Then we get back in the car.
What was the last book you read?
See, I've been listening to audiobooks, so.
Do you like, do you like reading?
Yeah, I used to read back in high school.
12, like 12 years ago.
What was your favorite book?
It had, who was it by?
It was an Arabian book.
It was called Something in the Sun.
It talked about the war that was going on.
I forgot the name of it, but we had to do a report on it.
And I really, really liked it.
I wish they would have made a movie about it.
Arabian book.
It was.
Arabian book, Sun in Title.
A Thousand Splendid Suns.
Yeah, there we go.
Yeah, is that it?
By, by, oh, yeah, of course, by Khalid Hosseini.
The guy who did The Kite Runner.
Oh, that, but that woman had a terrible life.
She's married to all these terrible guys.
That book, that was hard, man.
That made me depressed.
Yeah, so you had to read it too in school?
No, I didn't have to.
I just read it.
Ohh
I read it, yeah.
Okay.
Yeah, that was, that was, I don't know, but that was a good book.
Did it change you?
She ended up, I think she ended up having a good outcome.
At the very end.
Yeah, like she ended up.
300 punishing pages, then it was like 15 good pages.
Yeah, she ended up having a good, I mean.
So what'd you like about that book?
I think it was about the fact that she endured, like, you know, and then it's crazy because it seems like that's what I've been doing.
But, um.
I'm a hopeless romantic.
So it seemed like, like she got with the person that she really loved at the end.
Like they love conquering, you know?
So I think that's why I liked it.
So what do you mean you're enduring?
Because you're working the two jobs.
You got the five kids.
You're a solo mom.
Everything I have went through, like I went through a lot, you know, so it was just like, you know, with the abuse, with the cheating, with the just trying to figure it out, being a young mother and like my parents, like when I found out I was pregnant, my parents was like, they were mad.
Cause like I had everything set up to go to college.
So they said you're on your own, you know, so I literally been on my own since 18.
So it was just like just going through all the things that I went through.
I endured, you know, and like, I know, I know my time is coming to, you know, have my good, you know, my good time.
So yeah.
What's your good time look like?
Healthy.
And when I say that, like raising healthy children, like we're in counseling now for them seeing the fighting and stuff like that and just being happy, like having a routine, having peace, just having a schedule, having, you know, just conversations with my kids, watching them grow, watching them develop and just like pushing them through whatever they want to do.
Like my son wants to be an artist, you know, and my daughter wants to do ballet and stuff like that.
So it's like, I just want to see them go, you know, like just blossom, you know, and then I have a business.
So I want to see my business take off.
You got a business on top of all this?
What's your business?
So I sell designer perfume and cologne.
Plug it, plug it.
Yes.
It's called Fleur and I sell.
F-L-E-U-R?
Yes.
Designer perfume.
Yes.
Wow.
Tell me more.
How'd you start it?
What were you doing?
So my parents used to sell designer perfume and cologne in Jamestown Mall when I was younger.
And so I loved it.
Like I love smelling the scents and matching it up with people, the pheromones and stuff like that.
And then once I got older, I realized, actually during the pandemic, I had a niche for like putting baskets together and like the color scheme, how pretty they are, how pretty they were and everything like that.
And I was like, man, and I took off during COVID because nobody wanted to go to the store and go shopping for Mother's Day, Father's Day, Christmas.
So it took off and I just fell in love.
What do you mean took off?
Like I started, like every holiday, I started averaging almost like 50 baskets a holiday.
So it was, and I was a one person, you know, like doing this so I'll be in my room just like going, like just coming up.
How much could you sell a basket for?
The highest I've sold one for is about $240.
Wow.
The lowest is about $15.
Wow.
And what's the website?
How do I find it?
So I have an Instagram, it's Deneane.
You can never delete Instagram.
So give us your Instagram handle.
So it's Deneane Fluer, D-E-N-E-A-N-E, but on here I've spelled F-L-U-E-R.
Okay.
And.
@deneanefluer
Spell it again one more time.
D as in David, E-N-E-A-N-E-F-L-U-E-R.
Wow.
So people can go in there and they can buy your designer perfumes.
Yeah.
And how many do you want to do?
How many do you want to sell a year?
So 50 per holiday.
Now, what if you want to, how many do you want to sell?
I want to sell, for real, I want to go bigger, but I have to get people that I trust to like help me out because I really want to, you know how like with churches and businesses, like when they have the little baskets or like little gifts, like just thank you gifts and stuff like that.
I want to do those.
So I really want to go corporate with it.
Like, okay, here you're at like the conference you just left.
You remind me so much of Suzy Batiz.
Suzy Batiz is the founder of Poo-Pourri and she had this vision for being like a hustler.
She calls herself.
She drives a black Porsche now and she's worth about a billion dollars.
And she's, yeah, and I interviewed her.
So you got to listen to that.
Chapter 123 in my podcast.
And how do I find your podcast?
Do you use Spotify?
Oh, no.
Do you use Apple Podcasts?
I have Apple Music.
Do you have Apple Podcasts?
So type in podcast into your search of your iPhone and a purple button should come up that says just the word podcast.
So click that open.
This is what you spend your time on more than TikTok and Facebook.
Now go search and type in three, the number three, space books, B-O-O-K-S.
Press enter and see that one of me.
Yep, there we go.
Yes, it's me.
Yeah, that's me, Neil.
I'm Neil.
So just click the top, the top one.
Yeah, it's weird.
Now just, okay, click five stars.
No, just kidding.
I'm just kidding.
So then go, that's it.
So then like go down to 123.
Scroll down to 123.
Yep.
There we go.
Suzy Batiz.
Yeah.
Now follow that or subscribe and listen to that.
I interviewed her.
I'll tell you what, Deneane, you are like her and you're going to have that business.
And you know what?
You are enduring because you got rid of that guy who was cheating on you and was hitting you.
You got five kids.
You want them to blossom.
You got them in therapy.
You're a wonderful mom and I just have so much faith in you.
I can tell it right off your, you're like, so what do you write about?
Self-help?
Okay, what do you got for depression?
Like you're like, let's figure this out.
Like you are, you want, you know what Suzy always says?
She said, my whole life, you know, all I want was freedom.
Yep.
Your parents disowned you in 18.
They left you on your own.
That's, that's bad move.
That's when you, that's when you need your parents most of all.
Yeah, but I, I really don't know cause like they're still there, but like they made me strong.
Like, okay, you decided to have this child.
So like you have to be responsible for this child.
Oh, it was, it was actually a survival training.
It was like
So you're happy you did it?
Yeah. Yeah.
But then what'd you do?
Find an apartment by yourself?
Um, so I had moved in with his mom and he moved out and it was just crazy.
Like that's when I first found out he was cheating, but I was like, I don't know.
I was just so young.
How old was he?
You were 18.
He was 20.
Yeah.
So how'd you guys meet?
High school.
Yeah.
So it was just like, I started seeing who he was, but I also felt like I was just, this is my brother.
I also felt like I was by myself, you know, so it was just like, huh?
Okay.
So then I ended up getting my own apartment.
And was he with living with you or no?
No, when I first moved in, I was by myself and then he ended up coming there and saying he wanted his family and to make it work and stuff like that.
And yeah.
How long did that last?
That lasted while I was at the apartment for like two, almost three years and I ended up having two more kids.
But he left, he left.
So I got diagnosed with a kidney disease while I was pregnant and he left me hanging like once I couldn't work anymore.
Yeah.
So where were you working then?
So then I was working at T-Mobile.
So you're working all these places while you have the kids.
You only get six weeks off or something.
Yeah.
In Canada, you get a year off when you have a kid, a year.
Every time my wife had a kid, she gets a year off, a full year.
That's how everyone in the country gets it.
Wow.
The whole country.
Yeah, that's amazing.
Yeah, because here we only get six weeks, but like when I got sick, my brother who's calling me now, he lives in Vegas.
Jon Jon.
Yep.
He lives in Vegas.
And so he told me like he came in to see me and he was like, you know what?
We're packing up.
You're coming with me.
So I moved to Vegas with my brother and like he helped me.
I gave birth there.
It was beautiful
That was your fourth kid.
Yeah yep.
That was my fourth one and I gave birth there and it was just like it was a it was a healing experience healing.
Yeah, and I felt I wish I would have stayed but I didn't I ended up coming back because like I felt like I needed my mom my dad because like I did I got really really sick and they were saying that I only had two years to live.
Yeah, so you're 26 24.
No, I was 24.
Yeah.
Wow.
Yep, because I got diagnosed with FSGS.
But that's not true you have two years to live, right?
It's not true.
I'm still here.
Yeah, I'm still here and I ended up having another baby because they told me like never to have another kid again and stuff.
Even though I didn't plan on having another baby, but I did.
All with the same guy
Yep it was the same guy like I ended up getting back with him. He told me he had changed and I believed him.
The cheating part or about the hitting part? The hitting was happening the whole time you're with him from the beginning?
No so when when we were in high school, you never did that. So what prompted this all of a sudden it started like after I had my son.
So our first our first son like after I had that and it was it was I don't know if when it first happened it was like a shot because it wasn't even an argument like he had came over and I was happy that he was there and stuff like that.
And I was just like when I say I was like, okay, you know, like I think he's about to come spend time but his phone kept ringing and he was like, I gotta go and I was like, but you just got here, you know, like I thought we were about to watch a movie eat, you know, hang out all this type of stuff because here it is.
I'm young.
I'm stuck with a baby like and it's like he's still living life and I'm just like, okay.
So where's our us time, you know, and I remember he got super super mad because he was like, where did you put my shoes?
And I was like, no, I'm not giving you your shoes.
You got to stay here with me and I'm thinking it's innocent and like he just snapped like and I remember just being in shock, but I didn't want to tell my mom because I was just like I was in shock like but she said where did it come from?
Why is he hitting?
Like I would never hit my wife.
I think it came from because like he told me his father used to beat up his mom, but he resented his father.
He said you never want to be like him.
So I never thought he'll do it, but it came out and then it never went back.
It never stopped.
It just kept getting worse.
Really?
He couldn't control it.
I think he could control it because like he wouldn't do it in front of people.
Yeah, like you wouldn't do it in front of people.
Did you get do people know what's happening?
Yeah.
Who'd you tell?
Well, my mom ended up finding out because she seen the bruises and then it started getting to the point to where I couldn't hide it because like I had black eyes and like he had he had messed my job and yeah, like people started finding out about it.
I'm so sorry.
I'm okay
Now I'm good.
My mom found out because of the bruises.
Everybody's got a story.
Deneane's book is A Thousand Splendid Sons by Khalid Hosseini because it has the theme of endure, enduring, a theme she resonates with in her own life after leaving an abusive relationship, solo parenting five kids at age 28, doing all the drop-off and pickups while holding down two jobs for Uber and the Cupcake Place and running her own business @deneanefluer on Instagram.
It's D-E-N-E-A-N-E-F-L-U-E-R on Instagram, which we'll link to it in the show notes as well.
So from here we keep going.
I changed the address on the Uber to Left Bank Books, the 1969 founded oldest and most popular independent bookstore in all of St. Louis, but I also couldn't resist sneaking in a couple of our fast money questions too.
A Thousand Splendid Sons taught you to endure.
You got a favorite bookstore?
For some reason, I like Target.
Like that's where I go to get my kids books, but I like Target.
Target's good.
They have a nice collection, like, okay, so Audible.
There's a book that I've been looking at and it's called Sacred, The Sacred Woman or Sacred.
And I heard about it through The Breakfast Club because like I listen to them in the morning.
Yeah.
And they brought on the author and I looked her up and like they had the book at Target, but I found it on audiobooks.
I have the app already.
So like I've been trying to listen to that.
Sometimes I play it while I'm driving, but I haven't really got off into it.
What good books do you ever get from Target?
Kid books.
Like what?
Like, what is it?
The Hair Joy.
I like it.
Yeah.
Dr. Seuss books.
Yeah.
Now we're on the highway.
We're going by a billboard that says $485 million, $650 million.
Another billboard that says Standout Webster University.
Lots of ads for lawyers.
Lots of ads for lawyers everywhere.
Art and Bloom, St. Louis Art Museum.
There's a Ferris wheel out here.
There's a St. Louis Blues Arena.
There's a big sign that says Advertise here.
A big sign that says Own Tomorrow.
What the hell is that?
S-I-U-E.
It looks like a school.
Buy one, get one for a dollar from McDonald's.
That's what we should have for dinner.
Ew, no.
How do you organize the books on your bookshelf?
So right now I just have a basket and like I just put them in there and like it's filled in with coloring books and stuff like that.
Nice.
Coloring books.
What books you read with your kids?
Oh, the ones that I just named and then like they usually get my grandma had just got them this book from Rochester, Minnesota, but it has music in it.
I can't think of the name right now, but that's something they'll call it.
The ones I just named.
So we're going to go to Left Bank Books right now.
The most famous books are independent books are I think in St. Louis.
There's a bunch of the good ones here though, but I looked online.
This one's got like 900 reviews, you know, it's open till 6.
Everyone says you got to go to Left Bank Books.
I'm on my way to Left Bank Books.
And we got to go in.
Let's buy some books.
Deneane, so grateful to have met her across paths with her in St. Louis.
And by the way, the last book Deneane snuck in there on our list at the end was Sacred Woman, a Guide to Healing the Feminine Body, Mind and Spirit by Queen Afua, A-F-U-A.
Deneen took me to the Arch and Left Bank Books and then we went in and went book shopping together.
Okay, there was a big black puffy cat in there named Orleans that was hiding in a basket.
There's a sign on the front door saying careful.
You don't let the cat out.
You know, there was this big wall of book club books right at the front.
You can tell a lot of local book clubs.
They keep their most popular most recent pick at the front door, which doubles as a great way for other people to come and see what book clubs are reading and the store itself has their own book clubs.
You go to the basement.
There's a used section, but unlike most places, it's in the POS system.
So when you ask, do I have this book?
They say, yes, we've got one new and we've got one used in the basement.
Anyway, the place was just wonderful, real activist streak.
You know, there's lots of pins, lots of buttons, lots of posters, like it's a real strong.
I felt the vibe of the store very strong.
We go shopping together and while you know, we got a nice stack of books for Deneen and her kids on behalf of our three books community.
And then I also picked up a couple books for myself, a signed copy of Slow Birding, The Art and Science of Enjoying the Birds in Your Own Backyard by Joan Strassman, S-T-R-A-S-S-M-A-N, who's a St. Louis professor.
And I read that book and I put it in my book club.
If you don't get my book club, just go to neil.blog and you can sign up every month, last Saturday morning of the month.
I send out giant email with all the books I've read in my reviews of them all.
So I read that book, loved it, fun.
It goes through like Blue Jays and Cardinals and Starlings and you know, birds that we see more often, but we don't know a lot about necessarily.
And I also got The 27th City by Jonathan Franzen, which has just been republished with a new cover that features the St. Louis Gateway Arch on the cover.
So I was like, I gotta get that.
Plus, I've read Jonathan Franzen's four most recent novels and a bunch of his nonfiction, but I have not read this 1988 debut novel.
And why is this all important?
Because Jonathan Franzen is our next guest on 3 Books
Oh, yeah, baby, get ready for that.
That's coming up on the next full moon.
Now, is that it?
Are we done driving around St. Louis?
No, I gave my speech the next morning and I had one more drive to the airport left, one more drive left.
And this time there was a limo waiting for me outside the hotel to drive me to the airport.
And I'd like to introduce you to our very last St. Louis driver.
That would be Albano from Albania.
Let's get into the back of his car now.
So yeah, just pretty much where it all depends on where you live inner city.
Mostly it's hard-working civilians trying to keep up with high-end demand and low-paying jobs.
So they would they expect more from the person they vote in and some I would say for most of the people and I've lived in St. Louis City for over 20 years and it's heavy Democrat because they want better for themselves and better for the city areas around it have a lot of money.
So they want somebody that's going to help them.
Maybe not pay as much taxes make more money, which we all want to make more money.
Once you have more money that you get more right wing.
Correct. That's right.
The richer the richer the people the more right wing is what you're saying, but even though you can get more money and still be humble is still live by.
That's what people love Warren Buffett because Warren Buffett is like a crazy billion, but he's like super blue doing the big donations and you know, he said you don't see that from others.
You don't see that from us would be like the Patagonia guy
because the Patagonia guy taught us that you could be super
rich and then just give it all correct, you know, but the
thing is when billionaires are in charge of the donations
that's not good either because then you get like a billion
dollars for a tiny little art school a billion dollars for
a tiny little but then like meanwhile the hospital downtown
Chicago like falling apart.
Yeah priorities, right prior priorities.
We give money to the things that are not supposed to be needed.
So in Canada, you know, if you came to Canada 40 years ago guess what our airplanes are were in the in the run by the government, you know, but our trains are run by the government our boat, you know, everything's run by the we don't have private all this our hospitals run by the government schools are run by the government right now.
We're starting to get private schools.
Now, we're starting to get private hospitals.
Now, we're starting to get because everybody wants to live like the Americans.
Nobody lives better in the world than rich Americans.
That's they have the highest quality of life.
Look at these guys.
They're flying around in jets.
They're going to space.
They don't know normal.
They're all super fit.
That's crazy to me.
They're all super fit because they have time to put into it
Time to put into it right and they don't have to work like me every day get up at four.
Yes.
So how many hours a week are you working doing this job?
Well, it all depends.
There's days where it's really busy and there's days where it's like I'm an independent contractor.
How old are you?
I'm about to be 33 years from Albania.
Yes.
Born and raised?
Yeah, I moved here when I was 10.
So 22 years going on.
How does somebody go from Albania to st.
Louis?
Well, we went through the visa lottery that they do for countries like Albania and we had family in st.
Louis and we decided to move here because it was cheaper and not as cold as Cleveland, which was our second option.
So for somebody who's never been to st.
Louis before like me yesterday and who maybe is never going to come how would you describe the city to people?
What's the city?
Honestly st.
Louis is very multicultural.
It has a little bit of everybody's culture.
I think the immigrants that have come to st.
Louis have made the city better all the jobs that are thriving now is because those that didn't want to work for $5 an hour washing dishes.
It was the foreigners who came in and actually took those jobs with no English.
If there was one Albanian, let's say for example, he brought in another Albanian that didn't speak the language worked hard and a lot of them have started from nothing.
A lot of them have their own construction companies a lot of them do real estate different things and they even the Bosnian community Italians live in a specific area in st.
Louis because they moved there way in the early 90s.
So if you're interested like eating somewhere you have a little bit of everybody's culture if it's Indian food, if it's whatever you're craving Thai food, Albanian, you have a little bit of everybody just depends on where you're going.
I mean the whole city seems like it started with immigrants like you go back to the 1800s like German immigrants.
I mean the reason there's I went to go see this bird yesterday the Eurasian tree sparrow.
Okay, because German immigrants brought it over in 1870 with six other species from Europe to try to grow the birds here that they liked and only one of them survived and that one did not destroy the local ecology, but it never spread further than st.
Louis that are still here man.
You can go see them I can give you the address.
You spent 24 hours in st.
Louis and I didn't even know that I spent 23 years.
The first guy I met when I landed yesterday was guys did you are 630 feet cross 634 correct started 1904 World Fair was here.
And did you know these summer Olympics we are most people did not know the summer Olympics really he was like so interested in making me love st.
Louis.
I got it.
I know I do too.
I tell people a lot about st.
Louis is a great city.
I know it gets some wrong feel because of crime or whatever like but otherwise a lot of people say about about the crime and why is that not an issue?
It's it's it's an issue in certain pockets of st.
Louis.
It's not something that it's everywhere.
It's this happens in all of the world.
Not just in st.
Louis certain areas are more run down than others.
Maybe not as much money is put into those neighborhoods because maybe it's just the way others treat it.
Maybe not as much money from taxes going into those neighborhoods without I give them love not give them pain.
Absolutely.
Yeah, and everybody needs it like when you said your wife is it yeah teacher.
Yeah, I taught for eight years prior to doing this.
I taught math.
I was living in Orlando prior to coming back to st.
Louis during the pandemic and I taught here too for three more years and I taught inner-city students and they come from rough neighborhoods, but that doesn't mean they're not smart because people judge people by their color by their look by things like that.
Every kid is able to learn and to be able to succeed.
They can't help it.
They're born in a situation like that.
So I'm turning the engine off for a sec.
Yeah, my name is Albano originally from Albania have lived in st.
Louis for over 20 years.
I've went to school in Iowa got my degree in accounting moved to Orlando taught for five years there taught three more years here in st.
Louis.
I'm recently doing Luxury car service.
I know it's different than a professional job, but it's something I enjoy I get them.
Why'd you leave teaching to do limo driving?
Unfortunately, if teaching was something that others would care about and meaning the financial reasons a lot of the teachers that are great and what they do wouldn't leave the profession how much money when you make it as a teacher in Florida?
How much money you make now?
I started in 2014 making $42,000 in Florida after eight years of experience.
I was making $60,000 here in st.
Louis doing car service.
I make about double.
So just just shows you that not necessarily nowadays.
You have to get your degree.
It was more needed maybe 10 to 15 years ago.
If the high-end jobs require you to go to school to get your doctorate, I'm all for it.
I'm a teacher.
So I recommend everybody to go to school, but you can still make a very good living nowadays by doing something different something they enjoy doing.
We're prioritizing the wrong things in society.
We're saying drive around rich people's worth more double society with us to teach our young kids how to be good people.
That's why we end up, you know, messing ourselves up.
If we hollow education we lose everything.
Absolutely.
And I wish that every school in America gets not only the resources that they need especially those in inner-city schools that don't have the resources that they need, but I just wish that in general everybody puts effort towards teaching and teachers in specifically.
We always talk about the kids and their mental health and their state of being in the classroom, but we never prioritize the teachers.
Wow.
Thank you.
So this was a rougher a messier maybe a more human conversation than we usually do on the ground in the cars in a city.
I'd never been to before as it was happening live.
Obviously as you could tell I mean, I ask everybody for permission before sharing their story for recording their stories and then you know, try to stitch them together with my comments jump in because they feel kind of, you know, unglued a little bit without to help bring us all right there hearing and listening and seeing stories that we don't always see.
Thank you so much for exploring some of these stories with me.
I'm very happy to add some more books to our top 1000 from a source that wasn't I could never have predicted when I started the show and so we've got to add right now and we're getting close to number 600 people.
We're going to add well, first of all, we got out an asterisk, right?
So we're going to add an asterisk to number 674, which is the Holy Bible.
That's what Jacqueline gave us that was picked in chapter 110 by Kevin Kelly originally.
So we now have an asterisk on the Bible, not the way that that typically sounds but we've got one there.
We're going to add number 603, A Thousand Splendid Sons by Khalid Hosseini, which I'm thrilled to add.
I mean, we didn't have any Khalid Hosseini books on the list.
No Kite Runner yet in case anyone wants to pick that or call us at 1-833-READALOT and tell us if the Kite Runner or Khalid Hosseini book is maybe one of your most formative and then I'm just going to add because you know, we all had one there and the Bible was a duplicate.
So I'm going to throw Sacred Woman by Queen Afua.
We did not give it a sense of space on this show, but Deneane mentioned it and talks about it and I wanted to get a little bit more of her heart out there.
So number 602 is Sacred Woman by Queen Afua.
Thank you all of you so much for coming down to St. Louis with me and listening along.
Alright, are you still here?
Did you make it past the three-second pause?
If so, I want to welcome you back to the end of the podcast club.
Yes, this is one of three secret clubs, not three secret clubs, three clubs that we have for three bucks.
Three bucks is the name of the show.
So we got to have three clubs.
First club is the end of the podcast club.
I talk directly to you.
You talk directly to me.
Play your voice notes, your letters, your phone calls.
We got some letters from Vishwas Aggrawal coming which is going to be fun.
And of course, we've got the Cover to Cover Club.
Just drop me a line anytime.
Let me know if you're in the Cover to Cover Club.
That's anybody who tries to listen to every single one of the 333 chapters.
Remember, I was in my 30s when I started this show.
I'll be at 60.
I think I'll be 60.
Yeah, when I'm done.
So who wants to hang out for 22 years?
Who's up for the 2.2 decade long hang?
Those are Cover to Cover members.
And then finally, we have a secret club.
This is an entirely analog club.
It's completely crazy.
It cost me a bunch of money.
I love doing it.
It's super fun.
But how do you get in?
Well, you gotta call our phone number for a clue.
That's 1-833-READALOT.
That is a real phone number.
If that doesn't work, just drop the T at the end, readalot, because that's a superfluous T I put in there to make the sentence make sense.
Leave us a message is always great.
But also get the code word and you'll know what to do because I'll tell you what to do in the voicemail.
Then you can join our analog only secret club.
I can't say more about it now.
All right.
Now, let's kick off the end of the podcast club as we always do by going to the phones.
Hi Neil, this is Jennifer in Goldsboro, North Carolina.
I was calling with a dream guest suggestion, which is actor Paul Giamatti.
I heard him on another podcast and they referenced him being in front of a wall of books and he talked about how much he loved reading.
He has his own podcast, not about books, but he talked about how much he loved reading and it made me say, oh gosh, what are your favorite books?
What are your formative books?
But of course they didn't talk about that.
They just moved on to the next thing.
So help me, Neil.
You're my only hope.
How can we get to the bottom of this?
Good luck and thank you for all you do.
Bye.
Thank you so much to Jennifer from Goldsboro, North Carolina for the wonderful idea and request to get Paul Giamatti on the show.
I love Paul Giamatti.
What's your favorite Paul Giamatti movie?
I'm going to go with the surprising Win-Win.
Have you seen Win-Win?
I feel like that was like a relatively poorly known movie, but Leslie and I saw it in theaters and we loved it.
We also liked The Holdovers, which we saw more recently, of course, the Best Picture nominee, and then you can go way back.
There's just so many good roles.
He has always struck me as a really interesting guy, so consider it done.
The invitation is going out today.
I'm inviting Paul Giamatti on the show.
Fingers crossed.
Let's see if we can pull it off.
That would be wonderful.
So now it's time for the letter of the chapter, and I got good news.
Guess who's back?
It makes sense that while I was hanging out in the backseats of Jacqueline and Deneane's Ubers, guess who pops into my inbox?
Vishwas Aggrawal.
You might remember a couple chapters ago, we had a letter reaching out to him.
What's going on with Vish?
I didn't hear back and I kind of reported that, but now he's back.
We got some notes from Vish.
Hey, Neil, sorry for keeping the pace for a while.
It was so great knowing people still recall my work.
It's all your magical efforts, you know, Vish, which makes and keep very common things on the top of people's minds.
Thanks again.
Thanks very much.
You can, in fact, leave it at thanks.
Thanks can be a word enough for someone like you.
All I can say is God bless you ever, ever more, and all your divine efforts to touch people's lives.
Love you, Neil.
You will remain a best human.
As he does to us, too, as you can feel that love.
Now, he says, so I miss giving you an update.
As you're aware, I've not driven Uber anymore.
The last few rides I did were during the pandemic.
Since then, I've been trying my luck with self-employment in Canada with two different gigs simultaneously.
I went to school again and did a post-grad in immigration law, and I appeared for entry to practice immigration licensing from the College of Immigration and Citizenship and become a regulated Canadian immigration consultant.
But also, I gave multiple exams to get a real estate license and I worked in real estate initially and did a dozen odd deals.
But now, I'm focusing on immigration practice as real estate has downturned in Canada.
On the family front, my daughter, Hia, has started going to university.
She's currently in second year doing an honors and Bachelor of Computer Science at UTM, which is the University of Toronto, Mississauga, where Preeti, my wife, also went to school once again after having two degrees from India.
She took IT as a second career.
Currently, she works as a program manager in Home Depot at their head office.
Cheers, Vish!
Oh, it's so wonderful to connect the dots from Chapter 7 with Vishwas Aggrawal, which you haven't listened to, go back in time to Chapter 7 of the show, all the way up to Chapter 136 when we're in the backseat of Ubers again.
Yes, a wonderful connection through space and time.
Okay, and now it is time for the word of the chapter.
Let's head back into the show now.
But my philosophy now is my family is whoever loves on me.
Blood does not make you family.
You know what I'm saying?
It doesn't.
No, no, no.
Blood doesn't.
Blood makes you kin.
It doesn't make you family.
Oh, you know what I'm saying?
Yes, indeed.
It is kin.
K-I-N, a noun that Merriam-Webster defines as number one, a group of persons of common ancestry, semicolon like a clan, one's relatives, kindred, it says here, and that or be kinsmen, like he wasn't any kin to you.
As Jacqueline said, family makes you kin, but it doesn't make you family, right?
No, blood makes you kin.
She said one more time, blood makes you kin, but it doesn't make you family.
I don't know.
It's interesting.
You go back to the word, there's two really closely related words that are going to seem really obvious in retrospect.
Number one is kind, K-I-N-D, like you're from the same kind, which is an old English word from the 1200s, originally spelled C-Y-N-N, if you can believe it, but think kind.
What kind of person are you?
What kin are you?
I guess there's a bit of a mispronunciation with the I being long and short, but kin kind together, but also it is also a short of akin, A-K-I-N, right?
So that word means related by blood.
So when you think of the word kind, and you think of the word akin, you might not always think of kin, but we often think of kinship on the show.
So kin is common ancestry, but kinship, I want to say, is the love and the connection that we feel with other people.
That was the theme of the conversation.
I felt so much love and connection going down there with Jacqueline, Deneane, Albano, and hanging out with you in the backseat of a number of different cars in St. Louis as we truck around the country, as we soak through the world that we're living in these short 30,000 days and try to connect and reach out and touch and feel the love and feel the energy of so many people around us.
I love this chapter.
It was special.
It was different.
It was a lot of fun, but now we're going to go back next chapter 137 with Jonathan Franzen to go deep into the giant mind that is maybe one of the arguably the best novelists in the world today, but everyone's got an opinion about that, but he's certainly in one of the tops.
We're going to go there next time and that's going to be a lot of fun, but until then, until the next full moon in June, remember that you are what you eat and you are what you read.
Keep turning that page, everybody, and I'll talk to you soon.
Take care.