Tales from the Underworld
Subscribe to Lemonada Premium for Bonus Content
Description
This week, the girls are celebrating June’s birthday! Jessica recounts a harrowing ski trip and announces the official opening of the GC (girl cottage). June can’t seem to shake a mysterious cough from the Olden Days and they come to terms with the end of the holiday season. Remember Deep Divers, you’re not alone in the underworld and if you’re feeling depressed, try a spray tan!
Stay up to date with us on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram at @LemonadaMedia.
Joining Lemonada Premium is a great way to support our show and get bonus content. Subscribe today at bit.ly/lemonadapremium.
Transcript
SPEAKERS
June Diane Raphael, Jessica St. Clair
Jessica St. Clair 00:10
Hi, I’m Jessica St. Clair.
June Diane Raphael 00:12
And I’m June Diane Raphael.
Jessica St. Clair 00:14
And this is The Deep Dive, we’re about to do what women have done for centuries are crowding around the fire with our generous hunches, we got babies hanging off our tits, and we’re going to share with you our fears.
June Diane Raphael 00:27
That’s right.
Jessica St. Clair 00:28
Our joys, our tips on how to stay alive.
June Diane Raphael 00:32
Now Jess, we’re heating a call that no one has made.
Jessica St. Clair 00:37
Not a soul, but you’re invited to listen.
June Diane Raphael 00:39
Absolutely, because we make one promise and one promise only, we will not Google a thing because frankly, we’re too damn tired. Please get ready to go on The Deep Dive.
June Diane Raphael 00:57
Hi, Jessica.
Jessica St. Clair 00:59
My dear friend June. How are you? I’m so happy to see you. Are you where I think you are?
June Diane Raphael 01:13
Oh, yeah.
Jessica St. Clair 01:15
I am broadcasting from the cottage, the BC headquarters. It looked GC girl caught it nothing’s been done. But just it looks. I’m just seeing white walls and I’m seeing a neutral palette and it’s a white that you don’t learn this when I was painting my house like you think that you just painting white. But every white has about a gazillion different shades inside of it. And so I’m seeing a white wall that’s got that’s got like a gray tint to it, no, I’m just saying oh beautiful white hold this we are taking this cottage that I do not own that I am illegally subletting down to the studs.
June Diane Raphael 02:02
Wow.
Jessica St. Clair 02:03
And we are painting it, okay, the colors are coming fast and furious the decisions are being made in a in a split second. There is no hemming nor hawing. We don’t have a Pinterest page. We don’t need one because I am going from my gut. This is primal, this is […] okay? Part of it is?
June Diane Raphael 02:31
Love to have him on as a sponsor.
Jessica St. Clair 02:32
I walked into Target now you know me I’m blue and white and blue and white, blue white, and I thought I was going to do that here. But then I walked into Target and what did my eyes behold. But their colors are green, green and oatmeal and white and wood. And I just said yes. I said yes.
June Diane Raphael 02:56
You said yes to the dress.
Jessica St. Clair 02:59
I just have to say that you know I’m excited to get more things in the in the cottage and the GC girl cottage. Because of course I am listening to your audio it sounds a little bit echoey in there so and that’s probably because we need more. We need more so I’m just gonna recommend drapes and maybe like closing that door and just like we’re gonna be […] just there’s tinny there’s a, tinny quality they agree with that. Throw that out there I agree with […]
June Diane Raphael 03:29
I’m thrilled to see you in there just your mic stand looks sturdy. Your the framing of your zoom right now feels significant. This is the best thing I’ve ever done for myself. I haven’t been alone inside of a structure inside. In I don’t know since I moved in with Dan like I’ve been living my life on the streets. I’ve been a I’ve been five on the American dream I’ve been just trying to make get get by this place is well known. Can you just do a little bit of a table setting and a little tablescaping for our new listeners?
Jessica St. Clair 04:13
Yes.
June Diane Raphael 04:14
And just tell us which did what this 2024 yeah.
Jessica St. Clair 04:18
Okay, so as we said in last week’s episode, I am in a staycation in the underworld. I’m walking through the underworld. a loved one is ill and I am having a very, very difficult and very hard time I’m facing some very intense, existential truths and I don’t I definitely feel unmoored. And I’m reaching for anything that can possibly help me. I bought something at Target how to live a happier life. Oprah co wrote it I don’t I don’t know how to do this because I’ve never been in the underworld before really, I thought I had.
June Diane Raphael 04:57
You have the though Jess.
Jessica St. Clair 04:59
I thought so, but it turns out it’s like a new, you know, not every Hilton is the same, like, not every underworld. Sure, there may be Herod but every different, you know, every different establishments gonna do like its own. He knows, like, lots of times you go to a Starbucks, and it’s like, there’s what we know. But occasionally you’ll see, especially in the facade, the setting looks a little different. Items that fit you, and you know how to move through these spaces and there are some that you’re like, oh, my God, I’m in the […] This doesn’t make any sense.
June Diane Raphael 05:38
Yeah.
Jessica St. Clair 05:38
They’re serving, you know, different foods at breakfast and, so I’m in an underworld I’ve never seen before. And I want to just give, I want to give our listeners just a taste of the holidays, because I gave them to you over text.
June Diane Raphael 05:55
And this is upsetting because it […] for new listeners, like we are just if it is the holidays, you know, so it’s something we really look forward.
Jessica St. Clair 06:02
Not this year. So I bought a nine foot tree in the hopes that would buoy me and it immediately died. And I had to look at a dead tree for this darkness for this staycation in the underworld, which was fitting but I just couldn’t wait to get that thing out and I mean, it was midnight on Christmas Day and that thing was in the fuckin alley. I was like, get it out, get it down, get it gone. And then I went to New Hampshire, where my family is my parents and cousin Cale who for the list new listeners is my cousin brother that I was raised with and he is has many survival skills, he was an Eagle Scout and he is his wife, Julie, of course, is an Academy member. And so what’s interesting is I have eldest daughter energy because I am the eldest daughter, but I have a fake older brother. So who’s very much my brother. So I showed up and I was weakened at Bernie’s, I was a lifeless form. I was behaving as a human but I was not alive, right?
June Diane Raphael 07:10
Like if we unzipped you, like a zombie would walk out.
Jessica St. Clair 07:13
Like I was the undead. So I’m there and it’s cold and it’s dark, because they really share the same weather as London. So you know how that gets me, and Bibi was like you gotta stop complaining. And I just complained the moment I got off the plane, like this is too dark, it got dark at 3:30. So Cale said, listen, we’re going all gonna go skiing and I said, no, thank you, I’m going to be in the lodge, because that’s what like in a Hallmark movie, you go into the ski lodge and you have a cup of something hot and, and it’s cozy. I said, I’m going to do that because I don’t want to get on a ski slope. You know, actually, what I said was I have my books on Buddhism and death and acceptance I’m going to read those by the fire and he said, I don’t think that’s a good idea. And I said, well, I’m an adult woman, I can do what I want. So they go out skiing, Cale takes maybe 11 cousins out skiing by himself. And first actually we stop at the Elkins general store for breakfast sandwiches. Now they make a wonderful breakfast sandwich. They’re ready made, I made Cale go in. I had cash, I didn’t give it to him on purpose. I just felt like I needed to be taking her. He comes out he goes I didn’t know if you wanted one. So I didn’t get you one […] he literally puts the window down just a crack and throws it in like a like a wild animal. And I’ll go get another one. Like I was just like God dammit so anyway, I’m in the ski lodge and I stridently read a little bit about death and I’m like this is really, really not working, I’m so tired and I thought to myself, could I lay down under the table.
June Diane Raphael 08:50
Jessica.
Jessica St. Clair 08:51
Come on, do they have these foam floors because you’re clunking clunking on your ski boots and there’s snow everywhere. But I said if I laid down under this table, could I sleep and that’s when I thought this isn’t good. This is a low point.
June Diane Raphael 09:09
I’ll say.
Jessica St. Clair 09:10
And I thought people are going to think like a Meg Ryan when she had that drinking problem. It seemed like why is this mom separated from her family? She’s not in ski clothes, and she’s trying to lay down so I tried to sleep on the table with my head on it, it was so weird. And families were joining the table and eating bologna next to me because they were like, you know, there was nowhere else it was the lunch rush. So the next day, I said I made a mistake. I do need to ski.
June Diane Raphael 09:40
Yes.
Jessica St. Clair 09:42
I didn’t want to do that. So Cale said great, so he did make the mistake about the breakfast sandwiches and we got there and then I had to put on the ski boots which is very difficult if you haven’t I haven’t skied since I was like 20 years old.
June Diane Raphael 09:55
It’s so hard to put on ski boots. So and I was hot, you know because you’re hot inside your hand the white cold outside, I don’t know why people do it.
Jessica St. Clair 10:03
So I’m, I’m trying to get my feet in, and I was like is too hard and I’m starting to cry. And he’s trying to get the boots on me like a child. And and then the moment I arrived at my parents house, they’re obsessively sharpening their knives with this electric knife sharpener they got on Amazon and I sliced off the top of my finger, but I forgot to put a bandaid on it. And so at some point, blood started, and now I’m just going, I’m bleeding. Cale I’m bleeding, and he goes, my God, you gotta get it together. And I was like, I’ll just wrap this old receipt around this, I go, don’t get a bandaid, it’s fine and I wrapped an old target receipt around my bleeding finger and I just jammed it in his wife’s gloves that I was wearing.
June Diane Raphael 11:00
I go, this will stop up the blood, it’s fine, just put me on the skis and then you just like, send me out.
Jessica St. Clair 11:07
Because you really, I will say in order to go skiing, like skiing is one of those things you have to there’s the first sport and challenge of just getting to it. It’s like that is almost I will say like 80% of the battle. But then when you’re doing it, you’re also like, you got to look alive. […] You look like you could go off the mountain and then it’s like, okay, you’ve come down the mountain and now we have to shuffle over to the lift and like that’s a whole other well.
Jessica St. Clair 11:39
When the moment of the rest really is on that lift.
Jessica St. Clair 11:42
And you’re terrified, you’re gonna fall off of it. So BB goes, you gotta keep your ski tips up, she’s screaming at me. She’s only skied one day the day before that I was trying to lie on the floor and so she claims that I pushed her like when we were disembark, but we have, I have pushed my kids because you have to because if you don’t, you’ll get clobbered by the next, the next […] Sure, but what happened was I was still airborne. I was on as it made its turn. I had no choice but to jump. So I jump like Tom Cruise style. Mission Impossible ski jump and then people are screaming at each I’m like why would you push me like you made it so I had to jump to like yell push me. This was more fun when I was with my cousin Heidi yesterday, I’m like, I wish it was here. Like, I don’t want to do this. So that was the ski day really. And then we get back to the rental car and shout out to the dads up there in New Hampshire because they all have pickup trucks. That’s hot. They’re all bringing those kids ski and they got an igloo cooler and they got these fucking pickup trucks. So everyone’s loaded into the picture of why had this like weird rental Ford Bronco, that really would didn’t suit me. And we got back to the car and I go, I locked my keys in there. And it was such a bad rental car that it didn’t like what keep what car nowadays doesn’t keep it open when your keys. My keys are in their camp. And he goes, Oh, God, I go Just leave me here. How do you lock it from the outside? Like I’ve never even heard of such a thing these days. Like we’ve evolved as a species past that. But this is why I love Cale because he’s got such Paul, he was bringing such Paul energy he always does. He said, you go home, I’ll take care of this. That’s, what I needed the entire week. He just he took care of it, you know, he propped up my lifeless body and then he figured out a way to break into the car because that’s one of his survival skills.
June Diane Raphael 14:02
Of course it is.
Jessica St. Clair 14:05
He knew that the Ford Bronco has a special window for your hunting rifles or whatever you’re gonna put in there and he was able to shove Bibi through it. He took the smallest cousin and shoved it through.
June Diane Raphael 14:20
See this is the thing and I want to like really lift up Cale right now because I do think you know yes, the toxic masculinity of your does need to go but let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater. One thing I would like to maintain is male survivors skills, because I actually don’t want to learn them but I want them nearby and I want men and I want to raise men who do know how to survive out there because we do need that and it’s hot.
Jessica St. Clair 14:54
And here in the academy for the the January month, I’m going to move this up. So we’re going to do some organization, this is The Deep Dive Academy you can come pursue your degree and significance but we’re gonna do some organization we’re going to, instead of dry January, it’s a very wet January, we’re going to learn some more some more drinking skills. But also Cale is going to teach us how to build a fire. Now that is so hot, and I want to learn from myself but I also just easier than […] great, it looks very hard on Survivor but no and barely anyone can tell you needed some dryer lint turns out need Flint. And we need Flint, but so that you can keep in your purse, okay. But I really do just love when a man knows certain survival skills know certain things, changing a tire now we’ll be teaching a lot of these things in the academy. But I also do just want to say that’s not an invitation for men again, the two men who listen to this for them to think like well.
June Diane Raphael 15:53
Not our husband’s.
Jessica St. Clair 15:57
No.
June Diane Raphael 15:58
Wow, Jess, well, can I ask you okay, so you’re you’re now you’re skiing? Or you did go skiing? Are you on one greens? Are you on blues? What is your skill level of.
Jessica St. Clair 16:09
[…] We’re on the barnyard slope, which was what you could only do that if you were bunny slope to Barnyard. That’s it and that was enough, you know, and so we just did that over and over again, which felt very existential. And I had a lot of time just to like you know, after so […] went very slow. I was like, you know, I want to use , yeah why nice long yeah, turns. Yeah, a lot of just digging in the edge of the ski, but I don’t like it. I never want to do it again. You know, that’s fine and Bibi had. You know it’s funny because they do draft off your energy. She knew I was like off and that’s something I need to work on and that’s where the GC comes in, that’s where the girl cottage comes in. So anyway, I come back was a hell of a trip back. Not fun, not a fun trip back. Okay, long, that’s all I’ll say about the trip back. Okay, it’s time to take a break. We’ll be right back after this.
June Diane Raphael 17:33
Don’t be trapped on an aeroplane when you have dark thoughts. Let’s just put it that way. You want to get out? You can’t breathe. Yeah, it’s hard. Lack of oxygen to that’s why people get so weepy on airplanes. Yep. 100%. So I we get back and now I’ve been knocked alone for six full days. And I’m like, I’m losing my fucking mind so then that Tuesday when I dropped me off at school a comeback, I let myself into the girl cottage. And it’s like my whole body relaxed. Because I can be me here. My underworld self is welcomed. Nobody has to see it, I can cry punch a pillow take a shower at 10am. No one has to know what goes on behind these walls. I don’t want observation right now. Yeah, I don’t want you under observation. Deck is closed. It is I mean, you are under a bit of a conservatorship but I don’t want but I don’t I don’t want people seeing and love this dress. So because here’s what I was actually worried about. I thought based on like some things that were going on with you that you were going to bail on this. I tried to back out I was gonna back out but then I texted you in a moment of crisis. And you said it’s not an expenditure, it’s an investment. It is stop thinking about it that way. And once I decided on that, I thought yeah, let’s this is actually exactly the time I need it. You need it most. You know when you are going through a hard time that you need to sit and meditate you need to sit and think so. And it is too much it is too much and especially it’s a such a specific female problem for us to be in the realm of the domestic and have our homes post pandemic turn into our offices nope, our our our gymnasts are everything, it is too much. And when you’re making money for your family and when you’re pursuing your creative life that is sustaining people, okay, sustaining people in your life. You deserve to have a space.
Jessica St. Clair 19:48
That is so true.
June Diane Raphael 19:49
It’s like having a plug in that shouldn’t be in when you’re sitting in your kitchen and those dishes aren’t done and you’re trying to do a podcast. It’s like you can’t be productive your way. You can’t, and I’m just I feel so happy Jess, this is great news. And I will say this feels almost like a birthday gift to me. Because, you know, of course, today is my birthday.
Jessica St. Clair 20:16
I forgot
June Diane Raphael 20:17
But I swear, looking at this room, I’m like, this feels like a gift to me, you know.
Jessica St. Clair 20:23
I’ll never remember any of our birthdays. I’ll never remember anybody’s birthdays. I’m so sorry. I didn’t remember it. We’re celebrating it of course, I don’t care.
June Diane Raphael 20:31
I don’t care, and I’m not a birthday like.
Jessica St. Clair 20:38
Tracker, you know, I have such a ambivalent relationship. I’m excited to share it with you, but I’m not in some ways, I prefer telling people it’s my birthday. Is like a little tripod for 45 minutes, there’s nothing to talk about.
June Diane Raphael 20:42
I’m telling you that it feels like what I’m looking at what I’m seeing in the Zoom screen, nice whites, nice clean lines. A real palette. It’s just look so it looks gonna be fresh, really fresh, really clean, really peaceful in there is like a birthday gift.
Jessica St. Clair 21:13
You know and of course you share a birthday with my father, and most years, I would have to come I would wait till about three or four o’clock to see if my dad would call and he wouldn’t. You know, he’d forget Irish people don’t care, man birthdays.
June Diane Raphael 21:26
I will say this was a big lesson toward the end of his life.
Jessica St. Clair 21:29
Last […] probably five years. I will call him and say, hey, Dad, it’s my birthday and then he would say, ah, of course it is, you know, and we would have a laugh. And it was a very freeing kind of shift when I was like, that’s not, you’re not going to remember, but I want to hear your voice. So I can actually get what I need from you. And I think going is your father. Remember your birthday? And I knew happy to tell you. I know. And I’m not gonna legally at the beginning of the year. Yeah, vaguely. It’s well in because me Daniel Schneider and Matt McConkey of course, we do have the worst birthdays you could have. I’m just saying in terms of.
June Diane Raphael 22:22
You know, people have spent their money people are people and already, but I and I feel the same thing. I agree, I don’t also want to celebrate. You know, it’s very tough when I came home yesterday, from Christmas vacay and it’s like, people are back. You know, people are back in work, and emails are going on. It’s like I will oh, I also I’m like, well now I can’t take a day off, like, everybody’s like, we’re back. And you were just off. But oh, I had a wonderful vacation. You know, I had a really, I definitely think for me. The come down from Christmas, I know you were excited so excited to get it out of there.
Jessica St. Clair 23:04
Yeah.
June Diane Raphael 23:05
And I felt really like the 26th this year, I felt so sad that it was over. Oh, I feel so sad.
Jessica St. Clair 23:13
That’s wonderful though, because that means you had a great.
June Diane Raphael 23:16
I did but it was also just you know, again, of course it’s never really about the day for me. The Christmas Day can feel a little I always have like, you know, low grade anxiety during it it was it’s more the season you know, it’s a season it’s a season.
Jessica St. Clair 23:29
So I was sad to see the season go until we did go away and that felt great because it was I think that’s a great time to go away.
June Diane Raphael 23:38
Everyone’s like everybody’s traveling but it’s for a reason because it is a really nice time to be like that’s passed.
Jessica St. Clair 23:47
And this is a treat, this is a treat and then we go back into the new year.
June Diane Raphael 23:53
And I love it being warm. So cold Dakota Whistler.
Jessica St. Clair 24:00
I do love to ski but I especially after that harrowing tale. It’s kind of in that because it is it’s it’s a weekend affair. It’s not really something I think you should do over the holidays which work.
June Diane Raphael 24:17
Growth no.
Jessica St. Clair 24:21
Well, I’m just so happy you’re alive. I’m happy, it’s your birthday.
June Diane Raphael 24:24
Thanks Jess.
Jessica St. Clair 24:25
You are. God, you’re so special.
June Diane Raphael 24:29
Thank you. I buy. I feel loved. I feel like very grateful, and I woke up this morning I did have just an amazing my eyes popped open of course our youngest son was in bed because why not? He’s always there. And I just like turn to my left and Lord nose to nose and he says Happy Birthday Mama. Oh, and I just saw email him already. I just was the cute I said that was it for me, so I’m all set over here? It was really like very special. Yeah, and but I’ve, you know, just been thinking of you so much, just, um, I’ve just been, you know, my mind has just gone to you so much. And I was so sad also that your entree into the underworld happened over the holidays.
Jessica St. Clair 24:29
You know.
Jessica St. Clair 25:29
It seems like it did happen that for a lot of people that was wild, like, we kept hearing of, you know, loved ones who are like randomly in the hospital or in the hallway. I don’t know, oh, and also you and I got a terrible bronchial infection. We must start suffering.
June Diane Raphael 25:47
I’m not 100%.
Jessica St. Clair 25:49
It’s like.
June Diane Raphael 25:51
Okay, so when I wrote you, text, I thought I had tuberculosis.
Jessica St. Clair 25:56
I did, I was like, blood into it, I know.
June Diane Raphael 25:59
I texted you and I was like, I gotta tell you, I am not well, and I have symptoms that are I have a cough and chest tightness. And it’s not COVID that is unrelenting. And I was kind of scared to tell you. I don’t know why when I got that text back that said, same. We were both on our way to the pharmacy, and it was Sunday nights.
June Diane Raphael 26:22
That was when I was like I had NTPs. I mean, antibiotics and an inhaler stacked. That was real tough and I had to go and do a sitcom. You know, a live sitcom, you did drag again. That was the beginning of Weekend at Bernie’s like I again, you watch it, it’s a lot like men in the men black because inside I’m an alien and outside on the human form. And luckily, I was with one of our, our nearest and dearest Melissa Rauch on Night Court. But I was like, I’m gonna give you know, John Larroquette, this respiratory infection that will end you know, a legend, a sitcom legend. And I know no one will know about it. But I couldn’t I was like, diamond, I was dying. That’s how I started the Christmas season it was just, you know, it’s so interesting to like. So I also had the exact same thing that just that and by the way, what was it even it’s like, started as nobody ever really could tell me what it was and what it is I do to Jess, I’d like to go for a half marathon. But I’m like, I can’t run I can’t breathe. Is there an iron lung that I could put it Torian that’s all I know is this hasn’t been seen since the things so old timey about this infection. And I had to travel so first, I had a regular inhaler and then I said to my doctor, like it’s not cutting it like I’m not better. And he said get a spacer, now I had asthma as a child and I never even heard of a spacer. It’s something you put on top of an inhaler like this because the size of a shoebox, and then you pump pump, start to breathe. And then in the hopes that more of the medicines going to get to where it needs to go. So I had a special device that I was traveling with. And I’m like, and by the way, I know people are just like, oh, why did you go out? You should’ve rest it, I want i I just want to say I did actually rest for a while. Do we did I did it? No, it didn’t we will say okay, so it’s like we were on track, I tried, but at a certain point I was like I got a I was embedded the week before Christmas, and nothing got better. The week before Christmas is go time for moms and caregivers. It’s not a time to be felled by a Victorian illness was crazy. So everything about it just felt so ancient. And it was like we were in the Gilded Age. You know what I started turning to assumption for fat Cokes. What I was doing is I was on a regimen of full fat I would pop crack open a coke and Goddamnit don’t go back because they’re better than Diet Cokes for you. They’re so good though. And I that would buoy me for a couple hours. And then it will crash because you know, in the old days, Coke had cocaine and I think it probably does have a trace. But that was what was keeping me afloat. It was crazy, it was crazy. I remembered I was gonna say I want to tell you something about. Regards over here, not entirely better and it’s been a mo taking deep breaths. I can tell you that. I can’t get back on the treadmill. I’m supposed to run 10 miles this weekend in preparation. It’s like the peak of my training, and I’m like I haven’t I haven’t stepped foot I haven’t run. Well, one thing this takes me to is I’ve been searching for my antidote to the underworld, or at least two get a porthole of light and somehow and so part of it is the GC which we’re you know full steam ahead, but part of it is going to be a focus on my health and specifically cardio. Okay, do you want I think we’ve abandoned cardio I can’t run because I got the knees of a 75 year old woman but I’m gonna hike I’m hiking up mountains. Okay, whatever Hills I can find them. Talk to Casey because she announced that she’s getting an elliptical and I said, Casey you’re in the 80s like are they even being made anymore? You know and she said like she similar she can’t run she bought a treadmill they’ve I think then sold it to someone for probably about $5.04 days later she said the mirror she’s had all manner of technology and big pieces of equipment.
Jessica St. Clair 26:22
That’s right.
June Diane Raphael 26:30
That’s an ADHD.
June Diane Raphael 30:31
She said the peloton bike. And it’s all come and gone, and she said, I want the elliptical. And the elliptical is 2024 and I sit I […] I said that was when you used to go to crunch on Astra Cleese.
Jessica St. Clair 31:24
That’s what I’m saying by the way a woman.
June Diane Raphael 31:26
Yeah, really?
Jessica St. Clair 31:28
A woman died at that crunch Yeah, it was very very sad, I should architect but anyway well you know what else happened at the New York sports club the case used to see me at somebody was working out a woman this is such a gross story but she was working out in a on an elliptical and she felt something hot and wet hit her calf with the man head jerked off onto her calf and that was a mixture behind her.
June Diane Raphael 32:10
Why people go to gyms I never understand.
Jessica St. Clair 32:14
You used to be a vintage of a bit of a gym rat.
June Diane Raphael 32:17
I can never I had to drag myself there but it’s it’s such a strange environment. Oh, it’s what’s going on in those locker rooms, oh fucking.
Jessica St. Clair 32:27
I mean, yeah, Equinox is the only gym that I’ll even step foot into but even that like I just I can’t I can’t go to gym.
June Diane Raphael 32:37
Shadows is crazy.
Jessica St. Clair 32:38
What we do in the shadows and also like I so much as I said, it’s crazy that our homes have become our gyms all that is true.
June Diane Raphael 32:48
I just feel like I can’t do this in public anymore. This is a this is a they used to say an acting class like have a private moment for your character like what’s your private moment? To me working out it’s intimate. It’s intimate, I never want someone to see that. But going back to the to the cardio, the cardio and you know again Jessica I can’t breathe and I don’t know if I can do cardio.
Jessica St. Clair 33:17
That’s like on its this is a tough transition time for me okay, because I did get halfway up a mountain yesterday I was like I’m gonna have to be carried down by somebody but I think that cardio we let it go we let it go. It was like so it was so has said it’s like literally arts let’s do like ballet. We’re moving and yeah […] like trend […] training.
June Diane Raphael 33:43
Yeah.
Jessica St. Clair 33:44
But I think for stress reducing from one of the many, many books I purchased at the airport about mental health. I cleared it out. I cleared out one of those breakdowns. I was just like, get it all get it all put it in the bag. And but one, some correspondent, some health correspondent. She decided to do cardio for a month and she said it significantly reduced her stress and she had because her ex husband had just died and she was like really freaking out. So it was a big turning point for her and I know you’re doing cardio. So I thought let’s give it a shot. Uh, you know, I love it, it is a full antidepressant. For me, it brings down my cortisol levels throughout the day. I absolutely love running. I also do think a lot of people say that they’re not runners, they don’t have the knees for it. I want to push back on that a little bit.
June Diane Raphael 34:37
Okay.
Jessica St. Clair 34:38
Why do you say you don’t have the knee?
June Diane Raphael 34:40
Well, I do have because the I went to a sport. The guy who fixes the knees of the US Soccer team, you know, the World Cup TK? And he said and I quote you have the knees of a 75 year old woman like don’t you have no Carter’s cartilage left something’s desperate It’ll be wrong with you.
Jessica St. Clair 35:01
Okay, and just like go running. Here’s what I love though for non runners. I tried to get Casey to do what she said she wouldn’t I said instead of that, that elliptical, get a treadmill.
June Diane Raphael 35:15
Walk on an incline.
Jessica St. Clair 35:16
Up it that’s yes. Mm hmm. That’ll do you just fine. Something I did with cousin Cale was I said the one hour I was allowed to be out of the home without BB I said I need to forest bait. And he said all right, and so we went into the woods on a trail and we went to a stream and we I closed my eyes and we just stood there for like 10 minutes and our five minutes and I said this nature is what I need. That’s more even than cardio but if we can combine the two I need to be in nature. That’s why I think I’m drawn to the greens right now. I need to center myself because I’m dealing with gigantic human thoughts and truths and realities about life right now. And that’s I feel like I need to return to the primitive times. I don’t know. I don’t know I’m going to try I’m really on a I’m on a parasympathetic nervous system healing journey. If anybody has any tips or tricks send them my way.
June Diane Raphael 36:29
Again we should cold plunge but who can do it now?
Jessica St. Clair 36:36
Cale jumped in Pleasant lake in on January 1 I got him cold plunging and immediately stopped doing it jumped into a frozen lake frozen lake jumped in.
June Diane Raphael 36:43
That’s dangerous.
Jessica St. Clair 36:45
I know he could have died so glad you didn’t have anyone can do it at Cale but like wow sure. Time for another break more deep dive when we return.
June Diane Raphael 37:15
Listen I’m impressed that you’re you’re you’re looking to nature and you’re looking to health to feel better I, something that I would be doing and that I did during my my visits to the underworld and tricks through it were to turn to just things that immediately felt good. I see nothing hard nothing wasn’t like nothing just want to offer that just just things that pleasures guilty pleasures just things that felt good you know that a lot of and then other people poopoo on reality shows and Bravo and all of that but sometimes you just need to dissociate pleasantly.
Jessica St. Clair 37:58
Absolutely, and I shared that with my loved one I said June is a huge fan of buffering you might be the poster child of buffering like a lot of people are like don’t buffer don’t buffer.
June Diane Raphael 38:10
You’re like absolutely buffer.
Jessica St. Clair 38:12
Yeah, I’m not saying.
June Diane Raphael 38:13
But I just think like I know I love this idea of cardio and I’m but I just also think that sometimes we have we’ve talked about this before Jess, but we need minutes to tick by we time to tick by.
Jessica St. Clair 38:27
But that’s the thing that I’m struggling with is that I and I’m also bringing back the fuck yes life mentality which I was my battle cry. And I really did sort of let it go for a bit while she’s back. That’s why I got on the slope, because I’m like I’m going to say yes people off so whatever crazy thing you want me to do just say it I’m going to have to say yes, that’s how things you know, was like yes, of course. Yes, we’ll go do that. Go do that’s that it because that’s faking it till you make it if you force yourself to do the thing you might actually that’s the Mona Lisa smile.
June Diane Raphael 39:07
If he up turn the corners of her mouth it start feel a little bit happier.
Jessica St. Clair 39:12
That’s right.
June Diane Raphael 39:13
Do you know that I tried to get self tanner in New Hampshire because I was like I am zealots, no. Yet seemed solid at Colonial pharmacy. Tell you that much. I was like do I amazon it? He won’t get here in time. I wanted to just I that was the only you sent me fucking Tiktok about someone saying, what did they say? Before if I was a therapist, I would say go get a self tan and then come back. Tell me if you still need this.
Jessica St. Clair 39:42
Yes.
June Diane Raphael 39:43
I know you think you’re depressed or sad.
Jessica St. Clair 39:45
Just go get tan, you know I’m on a package go get tan.
June Diane Raphael 39:49
And then let’s talk like.
June Diane Raphael 39:51
Yeah.
Jessica St. Clair 39:51
Have you tried if you think you’ve tried to make everything, have you tried tanning?
June Diane Raphael 39:56
No, and that’s really you know, for a pill white ladies out there that should […] yes can you get.
Jessica St. Clair 40:06
Why haven’t I?
June Diane Raphael 40:07
Yes, outside in you know I love that and I believe in that I believe in it, horror of my being now unfortunately I woke up this morning with a broken nail and I told you I’ve adjusted some of my medication and one of the nice side effects of my new cocktail of meds that I’m on is that I didn’t like this little pinky broken on them my first my birthday in the beginning didn’t bother you.
Jessica St. Clair 40:39
No no, no.
June Diane Raphael 40:43
Wow, I was just like, oh, that’s okay.
Jessica St. Clair 40:46
That’s gonna be a good litmus test.
June Diane Raphael 40:48
Yeah, I was just like I know I’m going to tell you see, it’s it’s so interesting in moments of trauma and women’s apparel where people go like what they turn to and of course you saw with the pandemic. I, something happened to me over Christmas now I’m talking about 22nd 23rd 24th Prime Time, and obviously dying of our illness. Ocular infection or illness where there was a death rattle in my at rest for my answer like you feel it. […] when my life down here that little like a little bit of a crackle in a wheeze. It’s so upsetting. Anyway, so during this time, it’s go time. Okay, it’s go time in this house. There’s so much joy, there’s so much happiness. And I needed to do something to almost counteract it, yeah. And so what I did was I turned to the darkest and the most upsetting program.
Jessica St. Clair 41:02
I’ve ever seen in my life to see it and I don’t want to hear about it.
June Diane Raphael 42:03
It’s called Squid Game.
June Diane Raphael 42:04
Oh, no.
June Diane Raphael 42:06
When I tell you Jessica on Christmas Eve, I’m racking the last presents I’m and I got my earbuds and I couldn’t even show Paul what I was watching as I was toiling around the house because he was he would have been so disturbed. And I on Christmas Eve I finished it was like I needed to somehow and that’s a weird that’s something that I don’t know if anyone else can relate to and peak joy moments.
Jessica St. Clair 42:34
Capitalist.
June Diane Raphael 42:35
I some for some reason I need to balance the sweetness and the saccharin feelings with I guess that’s your mommy. But like, that’s emotional, umami, but like even the poster for that. And I find I think I had Lenin tell me what the plot is. Or Dan, somebody told us the plot and the plot itself. I can’t get out of my mind. And you know, I don’t ever see Squid Game I want. Can I say something about squid game and I know years too late everybody watched his during the pandemic trigger warning, trigger, anybody who doesn’t want to hear about what Squid Game is.
Jessica St. Clair 43:13
Fast forward, like 30 seconds. The rest of us who are here.
June Diane Raphael 43:18
It is one of the most immersive shows I’ve ever seen. Like, when I tell you Jessica, I was there in Squid Games. I was a contestant I was I was there with these people, it was so.
Jessica St. Clair 43:34
They’re fighting for their lives. Is that right?
June Diane Raphael 43:37
Yes, well, yes, but the backdrop is like, is very dark and it’s about cheat a lot of them are in debt different. They all arrived for various different reasons, but they are playing children’s games like tug of war, stuff like that. And then they fall and then they die. And they have they’re dead, they’re dead. Playing red light, green light. And if they don’t stop, they’re dead.
Jessica St. Clair 44:05
I don’t understand.
June Diane Raphael 44:06
They’re dead, okay. I’m already in the underworld, I don’t need to be plunged deeper into it.
Jessica St. Clair 44:15
See just that red light green light, when I close my eyes to meditate, I’m also turning to that’s what I’ll think about.
June Diane Raphael 44:23
I’m sorry.
Jessica St. Clair 44:24
You know this reminds me to, of just something that Carl Hornblower and I were just chatting about because we’re writing up a show about the sandwich generation, you know, taking care of our parents while we’re taking care of young people, and how you get through it and I have a couple of friends dealing with these very life or death scenarios. And what they’re doing is taking pictures of some of the most upsetting and I’m like, I don’t want to see that. You have to, I’ve seen it. So you have to see it now, you must carry this dark memory. You have to he know what, but that’s how we’re gonna get through this. Because then we feel like we’re not the only ones in the world. That’s the only antidote or each other. Now, hopefully what The Deep Dive we’re trying to do is to say, hey, well, you ain’t the only one down there.
June Diane Raphael 45:24
No, no, you’re not.
Jessica St. Clair 45:26
Spelunking to, and listen to. And when I tell you like Paul hasn’t watched. And because it’s too upsetting for him. Dantonio at the movie about those cave people that live down in the cave. And those spelunkers go down. And there’s a whole community of cave hillbillies that live down there and have translucent skin. You want to see that movie?
June Diane Raphael 45:57
I do, actually.
Jessica St. Clair 45:59
Because I guess I think that that for some reason. It was interesting, it happened at Christmas time. You know, season of joy a season of happiness that I decided like now’s the time because I always see it on Netflix I’m always passing it, you know, but I thought now is the time. Now is the moment where I become a contestant in swinging.
June Diane Raphael 46:18
So I’ll just tell you I’m so sorry Jess.
June Diane Raphael 46:21
No you’re not I wish you were like I wish there wasn’t.
June Diane Raphael 46:26
I am a little bit am or little, right like read my 123 you’re dead. And it’s so tough because the last thing I’ll say is the first scene of red light green light they don’t know that people are actually dying so that’s when they all they don’t know where they’ve come they don’t know what this situation is. So when they realize these contestants realize it’s red light green light 123 and they’re going to die if they don’t stop it’s yeah, it is just some of the most amazing storytelling I have ever seen. I was absolutely blown away you know again me love actually are giving me I don’t want that over the holidays and I don’t want it after the holidays. I don’t want it. So Paul today got me for my birthday. Squid game it’s a solo games, game you play on your own. That is like a true crime game where in the game a someone of course, like young white teenage girl has been abducted or fell out the window or something. And you have to figure out.
Jessica St. Clair 47:48
Oh God.
June Diane Raphael 47:51
It’s like a really fucked up clue you play by me you don’t play with anyone else, you said nope. You just sit you watch security footage, there’s like a site you have to go to and I’m like, ooh, a cannot wait, I cannot vote. One other game idea, this fucking podcast is all over the place it’s a real grab bag.
Jessica St. Clair 48:13
But one game we played a cousin Cale the fucking killed me is called poetry for Neanderthals. And it’s the good the game is basically password. You have a word that you need to communicate to the group.
June Diane Raphael 48:26
Okay.
Jessica St. Clair 48:27
The person sitting next to you has a blow up club, like Neanderthal.
June Diane Raphael 48:32
Okay.
June Diane Raphael 48:33
And the way you get to communicate is only with one syllable. So the word like toast, yeah, so like toast was killed and he’s great and it makes people you’re not supposed to talk like a Neanderthal but it makes people act like that. Hot Bread, real hot bread or I had like prison and I said bad man go to bad place for whole life, bad man bad.
June Diane Raphael 49:04
So every word you use to express this to be one syllable.
Jessica St. Clair 49:10
Man if you do double syllables, the person next to you hits you with an inflatable club on the head.
June Diane Raphael 49:18
It is the best last and best thing ever heard.
Jessica St. Clair 49:23
I’m gonna see if I can put it on my Amazon storefront I know yours as it was when other business .
June Diane Raphael 49:30
It was a I’m gonna say it was a casualty of the strike. It went under I no longer.
Jessica St. Clair 49:37
Mine is still thriving. So I’ll put that on my Amazon storefront, yeah, great.
June Diane Raphael 49:42
Okay, I didn’t even tell you what I did what one of my resolutions is and I just started it this morning as a gift to myself.
Jessica St. Clair 49:50
What?
June Diane Raphael 49:51
Oh, Jessica, I’m so excited for this. I have started a book journal. So I am after every book, writing for 2024. I already put two books in that I just finished, like over the last week because I was on vacation, but so they’re going to be my 2024 journal that I buy, right the title or the author. And then I write probably about a page maybe more, maybe less about how I felt.
Jessica St. Clair 50:24
Wow.
June Diane Raphael 50:27
And I’m.
Jessica St. Clair 50:27
What a wonderful record.
June Diane Raphael 50:30
I know, and so there are lots of times where I’m like, I love reading so much but of course, you know, I don’t know if it’s menopause. I don’t know if it’s what I read. I read a book and then I don’t remember. And when I tell you I don’t remember. I mean, not a character’s name, no theme. It’s gone. Yeah, it’s gone. So I read two books, over vacation and I was like, I gotta put down I gotta write the score. I got to write I gotta write it down, I gotta put it down and so am I of course on Tiktok. They’re all of these beautiful Tiktok of people creating these journals and making sketches and weeding out and putting ribbon on it and doing this beautiful things. And I liked that but I also it’s like, I know myself. No down and dirty stuff, but I love also that you’re leaning into that hobby of yours because you know what I’d like for 2020 For more games, not squid games more games with the family baby.
Jessica St. Clair 51:29
Yes, do I just recently played with Casey another wonderful game called Dutch Blitz? That I’d love to bring, it’s really fun.
June Diane Raphael 51:39
I’m not going to be good at either of those games, but I’m phenomenal at poetry for Neanderthals.
June Diane Raphael 51:39
Let’s play it.
Jessica St. Clair 51:39
Fast paced, Casey maintain she’s like you only bring out games that you are incredible at so you know? And not who are always and I just happened to be good at them. So my fault you know, I’m a Capricorn what can I say? Am I like a fast pace moving fast moving card game. But I’d also love to play hearts. I’d love to play hearts.
Jessica St. Clair 52:07
Okay, great, well, Deep Divers again, this is all going to be available in my store. And listen, can I just shout out the new year is such a wonderful time to start your studies at the Academy. The doors are open. admissions are rolling. Everybody gets in. Everybody gets a degree. It doesn’t matter if you ever do an assignment you come in significant you’re gonna leave more significant you will have your degree.
June Diane Raphael 52:40
I though I just thought of like a wonderful thing we could do with our students which is play on Instagram Live. We could play poetry in motion we could bring someone on an Instagram Live. I don’t know how to do the tech of it, but we’ll figure it out.
Jessica St. Clair 52:53
Well, I love a game week. I love a game assignment that we people have a game night maybe it’s time for game nights to come back.
June Diane Raphael 53:01
Oh, I love it and I love cards. I’ve only played hearts one time and it felt I felt like I’d come home, I was like.
Jessica St. Clair 53:08
Since I felt I could see you as.
June Diane Raphael 53:11
Spades but I know that I already love it, you know?
Jessica St. Clair 53:15
Yeah.
June Diane Raphael 53:15
I think I told you my mom was in both my parents were in a bridge club and my mom would say that she was in it for over a decade and she would say every time she sat down I just started I’m new to this but I have a deep appreciation for that card life hashtag that card life so wonderful.
Jessica St. Clair 53:39
Sitting down sport opposite of skiing.
June Diane Raphael 53:42
Opposite, don’t be on a mountain
Jessica St. Clair 53:45
Don’t be on a mountain do less to do more. You know that’s that’s our I’m stealing it from Kulap, I guess and you know what? That’s wonderful. I don’t even have to have my own slogan I can steal it from a friend. How about that for doing less. Deep divers, we hope you’re doing your hats off to an okay start.
June Diane Raphael 54:03
Yeah.
Jessica St. Clair 54:03
And we’ll see you next week.
June Diane Raphael 54:06
Love you guys.
CREDITS 54:44
The DEEP DIVE is produced by Lemonada media Jessica St. Clair and June Diane Raphael. Our producers Ana Cecilia, our associate producer is Dani Matias and ours supervising producer is Jamela Zarha Williams our engineer is Johnny Vince Evans. Additional Lemonada support from Steve Nelson, Stephanie Wittels Wachs and Jessica Cordova Kramer. Special thanks to Anne Geddes for a cover art and Lennon Parham. For her sweet sweet vocals. The best way to support us is to rate and review. Follow The Deep Dive wherever you get your podcasts or listen ad free on Amazon music with your Prime membership.
