Episode 89: Time for some Spotlights

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So I’m not going to pretend that I feel anything but useless right now. But there is something small I can do. I can talk about content by Black creators on this podcast, which admittedly has a super small audience, but--like--open season for taking excerpts from this episode for press kits or promotional material as need be. Being knee deep in the podcast promotional swamp as I am and not doing it very well, at least I know that every little bit helps. Hopefully.

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Hi. It’s M. Welcome to Episode 89.

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And well, also, it gives me a chance to talk about one of my favorite audio fiction shows or a specific story within that podcast. And okay yeah, I’ll need to explain that. 

Witchever Path--from showrunners Jas and Steven LaFond--is one of my favorite podcasts, but there’s aspects of it that can make it hard to discuss on a podcast like this one. Basically, to give you an elevator pitch, in Witchever Path, at the end of each episode, the audience gets to vote on the direction the story goes. And there are different stories the show has told in the course of its run. And that’s where the difficulty lies, even though it makes it easier for a new listener to jump in. For an established fan, there’s a lot that can be said.

In short, I love every episode and every story, but I love them all in different ways, so it can be a little hard for me to parse out specifically what I love about each one and then pack them all into a convenient episode of this podcast. To kind of compensate for that, I’ve been working on a Podchaser review challenge in which I review every episode of my favorite podcasts, partially to help me sort out thoughts to discuss on this show, and yeah, that drilled in the point that there’s a lot to say about everything. So it also didn’t help.

But for this podcast medley, I’m going to focus on my favorite, favorite story Witchever Path has told, a story that, probably obviously,  also introduced my favorite character who--and this made me irrationally happy--makes an appearance in the newest story.  But for now, the story in question is their second one: Colick.

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Colick is the story of Makayla, a new mom who has to find herself at this new stage in her life. And that’s not an easy thing for any new mom to do. Or so I’ve heard, can’t say I’ve had that experience myself. 

But even in the best case scenario, when everything is genuinely and clearly going well, there’s a lot to reckon with for any new mom. One’s entire life has objectively changed. And subjectively, like as a culture, I think there’s a lot about motherhood and babies or the way we handled them, that’s just inaccurate. Like, it’s more about making certain people feel superior to everyone else than it is actually being there for a new mom and baby to give them support and to help them flourish. 

And that’s a lot to unpack some other time. Likely when I’m drunk enough to think an angry rant is socially appropriate. But beyond that, for Makayla, this isn’t an idyllic, everything is coming up roses situation. Whether that’s even possible or not. 

The title, well, it gives you a sense of what’s going on when you make the connection. A connection that took me a long time to make, so I’m going to be a bit more clear about it here. In case you’re like me. No shame in that. Just saying. The title is Colick, but the phrase you’re more likely to hear, in my experience, is “colicky baby.” Now, that may or may not be grammatically correct. But when a baby is colicky or has colic, they cry longer and more intensely than other babies.

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So before you say, well, babies cry, let me point out that a colicky baby cries is one that cries more intensely, without a clear reason. You can feed, change, and rock a colicky baby all you want or are physically able to, but because those aren’t the root causes of this baby’s distress, those actions are not going to help much.

Now, Makayla’s daughter, Lilly, shows all the signs of having colic, but given the nature of the story and the events that unfold, even though the prevailing theory is that colic can be attributed to a stomach distress caused by an allergic reaction in some regards--be it to milk proteins or something the breastfeeding parent ate that made it into the milk--there’s room to think that that’s not why Lilly is crying. I mean, even if it was, that’s a hard thing to address in a baby for an ordinary person.

But Makayla isn’t ordinary by any stretch of the imagination. She’s a witch, and because of that, Makayla is connected to something much greater than her or anyone else. It’s just not something she’s really explored or embraced as of late because life happened. Literally when you consider the baby. And her husband… well, maybe he was great once, but that ship has sailed. 

You could say, rightfully and in a way that avoids spoilers, that Makayla is alone and facing a challenge that she may not be able to handle on her own. But she’s not actually on her own. She just has to find her way back to her figurative home and to the not so figurative power that awaits there.

And for the listener, that’s inspiring if not empowerment incarnate. In this story, Makayla comes into her own not by changing or adapting to her surroundings but by looking to her roots and to who she is for her very real power. That’s where her development lies, and the fact that this is a story of a hero rising to a challenge gives that detail a special significance. Or at least it does in my mind.

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Because there is a plethora of content surrounding, a trajectory of development that I have issues with. And this might be me having read too many “coming of age” stories for various academics works over the years. But basically, more often than not “coming of age” or “coming into yourself” is about leaving behind the culture and mindset that you wore in your youth. Not so much the entities that raised you and not so much because there were genuinely things wrong with those mindsets or beliefs. Obviously, at some point you have to stop being a kid, and obviously, if anything is really destructive or inherently evil, yeet that thing into outer space, as the kids say though pardon the expression. 

But not all things fall into those two categories. And that distinction hard to explain or demonstrate because media doesn’t greenlight stories that show this nuance for a variety of reasons. But then there’s Witchever Path bringing out this profound truth that there are elements of your world, culture, or identity that cannot and should not be outgrown. 

So don’t give up the magic that you knew simply because it’s convenient to other people if you do. It’s always going to be convenient to other people for you to be small and insignificant. So embrace what makes you, you and grow into it or with it. Like Makayla does. Seriously, Makayla is like the hero I’ve always needed and wanted.

Because, yeah, people I’ve known across the years that hinder my development in any number of ways. Either trying to stop me from writing or from investigating the folklore and legends of my Filipino heritage. These things all get treated like childish trinkets to be dropped along the route of development. But that’s… a lie or at least pretty dumb. Or convenient for the wrong people.

So I’m just going to follow Makayla’s lead on this one.

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I’m going to need you to bear with me because I imagine that this is a very specific to me complaint. 

But I swear that every person I know in my non-internet, non-podcast life is writing a historical fiction novel set in Tudor England, like Henry VIII, specifically, and has asked me to proofread it when the drafts are inevitably done. Now a side note as someone who also writes books. Maybe put “writes” in quotes. Or “books” in quotes. Those manuscripts may never be done, so yeah this is a pretty petty complaint of mine. And sure, everyone’s been very graceful and understanding when I inevitably say no, but I still have to sit with this knowledge, which is not so great in and of itself.

And yeah, there are… others done by people I don’t know in person. Also, Google ads and related services keep hitting me with recommendations along those lines, like along the lines of Henry VIII and his court because hey, user--me--likes historical fiction, so let’s throw this stuff at her, like now.

And I get it, the musical Six is super popular and fun. And by shifting or remixing the standard stories we get told about the six wives of Henry VIII, it is doing important work, and all that is true, but that’s also where my IRL peeps got all their inspiration. Because it’s trendy. There’s a (quote) market for it. And I’ve watched Showtime’s The Tudors in all its historically inaccurate glory. But I’m so done with that era history. 

You hear me Google. I’m done with it. I know you’re listening in. I’m done!

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(Sigh) But you know, there’s… There’s more historical figures out there. Plenty of stories that could be told about other people who are just as intriguing and interesting. If not more so. Probably more so.

So now enter Harlem Queen, an audio drama that tells the fictionalized story of a figure I had never heard prior to this. Yhane Smith brings us the story of Madame Stephanie St. Clair who ran a successful numbers game while resisting Mafia control. And the control of pretty much everybody. She was her own woman. Like the model of her own woman.

Also, continuing the theme of things that took me a hot second or several to figure out. A Numbers Game is technically a gamble of sorts. It’s like a lottery run by an individual or collection of individuals where players have to pick a string of numbers that will be randomly drawn the next day. But in this context, you can also expanding that understanding a bit more if it helps you conceptualize the power and money Madame St. Clair had at her disposal. 

And then contextualize it further for the time period to understand how much of an achievement this was. Because, yes, while a lot of problems she faced are still relevant to today, people didn’t even pretend the contrary was true back then, something that the sound design and world layout makes very apparent from the beginning by bringing the early 1900s and its glitz and glamour and everything that isn’t that back to life. And in a very not sterilized way.

She says as somewhat content warning, considering these review episodes are loose recommendations. Basically, in this show there’s no holding back. Partially because you need all of that to fully appreciate Madame St. Clair in all her glory.

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And now, I’m sure you’re starting to see the point. It’s about time we highlight and tell stories about new and different historical figures because hashing out the same stories over and over again is deeply frustrating on an existential level, but that is only part of my point. As in the least important part.

Think back to my previous example because I know it’s one you’re familiar with: Henry VIII and his six wives. It’s not just that the story has been handled so much that it’s practically threadbare as in just a collection of half-hearted sentences: old king is bad and tends to get handsy with women, then he makes his own church and his wives are… Just there. Well, Katherine of Aragon was old and once his sister in law. Anne Boylen is bad because she’s the other woman. Jane Seymour is good because son. And in some situations, everything then fades out, right? But you could also go, Anne of Cleves is ugly, Katherine Howard is a cheater, and Catherine Parr survives him.

If that was all painfully simple, that’s kind of my point. You see, when you have a bunch of people speaking at the same time, even if it’s the same sentence, some words are going to come through better than others. Probably the words that are a bit more standardized or structured. In them, everyone hits the syllables the same way, and that uniformity surrounding that word cuts through more clearly even if it is the least important word in the lot. 

For this example, the basic historical facts are the things that cut through, even if the nuance of context or the significance latent to those circumstances--things that are really important in understanding or learning from these events get lost along the way. 

Like Katherine of Aragon wasn’t that much older than Henry, and some historians think Henry’s inability to have a son with his had more to do with his faulty genes than anything about her. Or that Anne Boyeln was an educated woman, vying for power and agency the only way she could. If society only values you for your purity, then your sexuality is really all you’ve got at your disposal. Or that Jane Seymour’s angelic nature was probably more of a survival strategy than anything else, considering what had happened to her two predecessors. Or that Anne of Cleves wasn’t actually ugly just wounded Henry’s ego, but that isn’t going to be how a king tells that story. Or that Katherine Howard was pretty much a child who was taken advantage of, both then and alse when she was an even younger child. Or that Catherine Parr was an intellectual in her own right. Repetition renders these details irrelevant.

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With the story of Stephanie St. Clair I got to go into it with a clean slate: a clean slate that isn’t exactly great to have because of the implications. I know of only one American History class that made it to the year 1900 and also Stephanie St. Clair was a woman of color, so… Things that have to get cut for time are usually cut deliberately. But regardless, the narrative in Harlem Queen gets to shine as the only voice saying a figurative sentence. Because of that, the figurative speaker gets to take whatever liberties they want. So Yhane Smith ends up with a relatively short season of audio fiction that captures both the intense strength and power of this figure and also moments of vulnerability that look to be more common in Season 2 if the first episode is anything to go by. 

Seriously, the characterization of Madame St. Clair is top tier writing. Add to that, there’s a lot of moving pieces to juggle narrative-wise, and yet they all seem to fall into place perfectly. It’s amazing, really. This is the sort of narrative everyone wants to tell.

But more than all of that, however, this version of Madame St. Clair ends up being a lens for understanding a perspective or viewpoint or place in society that you may have never had to live. As a character in a podcast, she’s a human being that ends up being a connection point to another place in another time that isn’t discussed despite the ramifications of that sort of historical trajectory for life in current year.

Here you have a beautiful historical fiction podcast that does what historical fiction is supposed to do. Without giving me a frustration ulcer, assuming that thing exists. 

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Yhane Smith and the whole cast of Harlem Queen have made a masterpiece of audio fiction. That I think you--as a person who listens to podcasts--should definitely listen to, but more than that, anyone who wants to create historical fiction, you need to pick up on the important lesson here. Also same thing for anyone who supports or publishes media. For the love of all that is good, can we please stop telling the same ten stories over and over again just because it’s been popular in the past?

I see Harlem Queen as a break from monotony. A much needed break of a wheel that is slowly grading away every remaining nerve I have. We shouldn’t just tell stories because there’s a demonstrable market for it. That’s an incredibly narrow-sighted justification that only doubles or triples down on other issues.  I didn’t know I wanted this audio fiction show until I found out it was an option. And it's only in podcasting that I find it because no one can take this option away for me.

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This has been a production of Miscellany Media Studios with music licensed from the Sounds like an Earful music supply. Thanks for listening! Find more information about our shows at miscellanymedia.online or follow us on Twitter @miscellanymedia for updates on current and future projects.

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