Uncle John - God, Collapse + Differing Perspectives

This is a story I recorded on my iphone voice notes app 2 weeks ago. Honestly, right after I finish a show I have a day where I think I might just stop writing or stop performing or relax for a while. Then some idea or story bubbles up in my brain and I have to figure out a way to do it, write it, say it.

This story came about when I got an email from the RISK! podcast (which is an incredible long running live storytelling podcast) about submissions for stories. I thought, damn, I wish I had a story for them! I have just been writing and performing one of the craziest stories of my life about flying around the world teaching chess, it’s going to take some life experience before I just GET another story like that. Then I read the prompts ‘Gods - Differing Perspectives / Collapse’ and a story came to mind about my friendship with my Uncle John.

When I read Gods, Differing Perspectives and Collapse I was like…oh I have a story about that.

1. I believe in God and I have personal relationship with him. And at times it’s contentious. And I think a lot of my perceptions of God are shaped by some really bad ideas and experiences growing up.

2. And collapse - half of my family doesn’t talk to the other half of my family for over 30 years now and everyone involved are Christian’s that go to church and close their eyes and sing songs about Jesus. And it was confusing growing up. And as I have grown older it makes me more and more angry. Especially as members of my family started dying off.

3. When I get angry or annoyed or upset, that tends to mean there is some story or idea I want / need to work out in my brain.

Then I thought, well, this story probably isn’t right for the RISK podcast and I was well deserving of a little break because I just finished a long year or touring and shows. Then I remembered a coffee I had with Uncle John in Los Angeles and the movies we would go see and the conversations at a diner after and I remember holding his hand in a hospital bed when he had cancer and then jetting off to go film a comedy special. And I felt scared to write the story, scared to tell it and certainly scared to submit it.

I jotted down some notes and laid on my belly on my bed and rambled through what might be there and what you hear is what came out. I wasn’t planning on singing but at the time that is what came to my head so it did it. And then I realized it was Good Friday and maybe it’s a good day to share whatever it is with you.

If you connect with this story at all or have any questions about it…please text me, DM me or leave a comment. I would love to keep developing this story if it resonates beyond the personal into other peoples experiences. OR…if it is just a voice note about my amazing friend Uncle John who I loved very much that is fine too.

on the left: Uncle John and I at Intellgentsia Coffee in LA in 2017 a few weeks after he was diagnosed with cancer. On the right November 2022, the photo on the wall is of his parents, my grandparents Velma and Corky Pierce.