Show Notes
You’re listening to Burnt Toast! I’m Virginia Sole-Smith. Today, my conversation is with Lisa Sibbett, PhD. Lisa writes The Auntie Bulletin, a weekly newsletter about kinship, chosen family and community care. As a long time Auntie herself, Lisa often focuses on the experiences of people without children who are nevertheless, in her words, "cultivating childful lives." We’ve been talking a whole bunch about community on Burnt Toast lately, and Lisa reached out to have a conversation about the systems that get in the way of our community building efforts—specifically our culture's systemic isolation of the nuclear family. This is one of those conversations that isn't "classic Burnt Toast." But we're here to do fat liberation work—and so how we think about community matters here, because community is fundamental to any kind of advocacy work. Plus it brings us joy! And joy matters too. I super appreciate this conversation with Lisa, and I know you will too. Join our community! Today’s episode is free! But don't forget, if you were a Substack subscriber, you have until October 28 to claim your free access to our paid content. Check your email for your special gift link! Episode 216 Transcript Lisa So my newsletter is about building kinship and community care. I live in cohousing, and I’ve been an auntie for many years to lots of different kids. I’ve always been really involved in the lives of other people’s children. And people who have lives like mine, we often don’t really have even language for describing what our experience is like. It’s sort of illegible to other people. Like, what’s your role? Why are you here? And all of this has really blossomed into work that’s definitely about loving and supporting families and other people’s children, but I also write about elder care and building relationships with elders and building community and cohousing. And I have a chronic illness, so I sometimes write about balancing self-care and community care. Virginia I have been an instant convert to your work, because a lot of what you write really challenges me in really useful ways. You have really made me reckon with how much I have been siloed in the structure of my life. It’s funny because I actually grew up with a kind of accidental–it wasn’t quite cohousing. We had two separate houses. But I was the child of a very amicable divorce, and my four parents co-parented pretty fluidly. So I grew up with adults who were not my biological parents playing really important roles in my life. And I have gotten to the point where I’m realizing I want a version of that for my kids. And that maybe that is just a better model. So it's fascinating to consider what that can look like when not everybody has those very specific circumstances. Lisa It’s a dreamy setup, actually, to have amicably divorced parents and extra parents. Virginia I’m super proud of all of my parents for making it work. My sister —who is my half sister from my dad’s second marriage—has a baby now. And my mom made the first birthday cake for them. There are a lot of beautiful things about blended families. When they work, they’re really amazing. And it always felt like we were doing something kind of weird, and other people didn’t quite understand our family. So I also relate to that piece of it. Because when you say "cohousing community," I think a lot of folks don’t really know what that term means. What does it look like, and how does it manifest in practice? What is daily life like in a cohousing community? Lisa There are different synonyms or near neighbor terms for cohousing. Another one is "intentional community." Back in the day, we might think about it as kind of a commune, although in the commune structure, people tended to actually pool their finances. I would say that cohousing is a much more kind of hybrid model between having your own space and being up in each other’s spaces and sharing all of the resources. Join the Burnt Toast community! So I really
More from The Burnt Toast Podcast
You’re listening to Burnt Toast! Today my conversation is with Jamilah Lemieux. Jamilah is an award-winning writer, cultural critic, and leading voice in digital feminism, known for shaping online conversations around race, gender, and relationship. She writes the Care and Feeding Parenting Advice column for Slate, and her work has appeared in outlets like the Los Angeles Times, Vanity Fair, and the Washington Post. Jamilah is also the author of the brand new book, Black. Single. Mother. Real Life Tales of Longing and Belonging. I've been a fan of Jamilah from Slate's Care and Feeding Parenting Podcast, where she was a longtime co-host. Today we get into who gets to call themselves a single mom, the kind of social life co-parenting lets you have, the importance of friends, and we ask: Is dating (especially for single moms) a diet? Become a paid subscriber to comment, get episode transcripts, and hear Indulgence Gospel — our new bonus segment, running after every episode! Corinne hops on to debrief with me about my conversation with Jamilah. Indulgence Gospel segments are audio-only so don't miss out! You can listen right here (tap "play" above) or add us to Apple, Spotify, or wherever you listen. Another great way to support Burnt Toast is to MAKE SURE you are following us for free in your podcast player! And if you have two more seconds, please leave us a rating and/or review! Just scroll down wherever you're listening and tap the stars, five of them please, and leave a little note about why you love Burnt Toast. Both of these things really help new listeners find conversations like these! BUTTER Jamilah: Old Wisconsin Yumbo honey brown sugar turkey sausage stick. Virginia: Kin by Tayari Jones
You're listening to Burnt Toast! We are Virginia Sole-Smith and Corinne Fay, and today we're talking about PEPTIDES.
You’re listening to Burnt Toast! I’m Virginia Sole-Smith. Today my conversation is with Emma Copley Eisenberg. Emma is the author of the nationally bestselling novel Housemates and the story collection Fat Swim. Her essays, literary criticism and reporting have appeared in The New Republic, Granta, and Esquire among others, and she writes the Substack newsletter Frump Feelings. She lives in Philadelphia. Emma joined me to chat about her new short story collection Fat Swim, fat characters in fiction, what thin authors get wrong, why we’re over Jonathan Franzen and so much more. And become a paid subscriber to get Indulgence Gospel — our new bonus segment, running after every episode! Corinne is going to hop on to debrief this interview with me. We're talking about fat kids in fiction, our Default Outfits and MORE! Paid subscribers all get commenting privileges and a full episode transcript. JOIN US HERE.
In the original episode, we asked, "Is Mel Robbins a Diet?" Plot Twist (or is it?): Mel is now selling nutritional supplements. Protein shots, to be exact—so we decided to give them a try. Paid subscribers can listen or WATCH Corinne try Mel Robbins' Pure Genius protein shot and give us her honest review. 👀 Free list: You won't want to miss this! Subscribe here.
We are Virginia Sole-Smith and Corinne Fay and it’s time for your April Just Toast episode! This is a special episode because we recorded in person! I traveled to New Mexico to see Corinne, have new Burnt Toast headshots taken and visit Meow Wolf with my kiddo and my boyfriend. It was a glorious trip and I'm excited to share some of the behind the scenes with you today. In this episode we're talking about: ⭐️ Why it's so hard to have your photo taken. ⭐️ Thin friends not putting their fat friends on the grid. ⭐️ The art of a good selfie. One audio note: our Airbnb in Santa Fe was an acoustical odyssey, so please bear with us on the sound quality. You need to be a paid Just Toast subscriber to listen to this full conversation. Membership starts at just $5 per month! Learn more at https://www.patreon.com/virginiasolesmith/join. Sign up for just $5! Join Just Toast! 🧈🧈🧈🧈🧈🧈🧈🧈🧈🧈🧈🧈🧈🧈 Episode 241 Transcript Virginia We're recording in person from an Airbnb in Santa Fe, New Mexico. If the audio is not perfect today, it's not Tommy's fault. It's that we're doing it in an adobe room and that creates some echoes. Corinne We have covered the floors with soft things, but it's still very echo-y. Virginia So bear with us. This is only our second ever in person episode, so it's going to be a really fun one. This is a Just Toast episode. As we explained on our previous Extra Butter episode, we're no longer calling it the Indulgence Gospel, although we always will in my heart. We're trying to make it clear what kind of episode you're listening to. So if you are listening to this whole episode right now, you are a Just Toast subscriber, which means you are a regular paid subscriber tier. There's also our premium tier, Extra Butter, for a little more money where you can get behind every single paywall. Whichever tier you are, we're very happy you're here. Corinne We're going to talk about something we did yesterday. Virginia Corinne and I did something together for the first time. Corinne If you're a longtime listener subscriber, you may have noticed that we have no photos together. Virginia Except one we took in a hot tub two years in Hot Springs. Corinne Yesterday, while Virginia is here in New Mexico, we got some photos taken by a photographer named Molly Haley. Virginia Who is an old friend of yours. Corinne We went to middle school and high school together. Virginia Since we were doing a photo shoot, we thought, well, we've got to talk about photos on the podcast because it's a whole thing. Corinne Photos can be hard! Virginia I would amend that sentence and say photos are hard. Corinne Although your child would disagree. Virginia My 8-year-old keeps telling us that that's a silly thing to think and photos are great and they love having their photo taken. Corinne They're not wrong. Virginia No, it's a lot of stuff. A lot of diet culture noise. It's a lot of being seen, I think. Being perceived. Corinne Would you say that you've struggled with photos?