This Is Love

A photograph of a page from the Voynich manuscript. Letters or symbols are scribbled across the page and towards the top of the page is an illustration of a group of small, nude women in what appears to be a pool of green water. Strange tubes connect to the pool.

Episode 102: The Manuscript

Episode #102

2024-11-20 05:00:39

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“After more than a hundred years of hard work from some of the greatest cryptological and linguistic minds on the planet, we still don’t quite know what this object is. There’s really nothing like it in the world.”
Detail of the painting Ascent of the Blessed by the painter Hieronymus Bosch. The painting is painted in a dark color, almost completely black, but a tunnel appears in the painting, with light streaming through it. There are people on their way to and through the tunnel.

Episode 101: What Happens Next

Episode #101

2024-11-06 05:00:16

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Recently, Phoebe told a personal story about her mother, who died this year. In this episode, she talks to journalist Sebastian Junger, who was rushed to the hospital one day after feeling sick – and then, he saw something strange.
Photograph of Valentine Judge in her late 30s with a beach in the background. She's wearing a cardigan, has her hair in a braid, and is looking directly at the camera with a slight smile.

Episode 100: Valentine

Episode #100

2024-10-16 05:00:07

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For our 100th episode, a story from Phoebe about her mother, Valentine, who died this spring.
A photograph of a Prairie Warbler bird on a tree branch. It is yellow on its front with brown on its back and tail.

Episode 99: Prairie Warbler

Episode #99

2024-10-02 05:00:50

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“Every spring it's one of the first birds that I look for. When I hear my first prairie warbler, it resets things for me. It gives me these memories of the past, but it also just reminds me of why I love birds so much.”
Writer Andrew Leland and his son smiling on top of a dome in Italy.

Episode 98: At the End of Sight

Episode #98

2024-09-18 05:00:10

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Writer Andrew Leland was diagnosed with the degenerative eye disease Retinitis pigmentosa when he was in high school. "It was like, 'I'm going out in the woods with my friends at night. And oddly enough, I'm bad at it.'"
Black and white photo of Miguel Esteban as a teenager at his desk leaning over a typewriter with a piece of paper with the logo of his magazine, Transmission.

Episode 97: Octavia and Miguel

Episode #97

2024-09-04 05:00:38

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When Miguel Esteban was 14 years old, he picked up the phone and called Octavia Butler.
A sepia-toned photograph of a young Hawaiian man, Patrick Makuakāne, mid-dance. He is wearing a cloth skirt, a yellow lei around his head, and a lei of green leaves draped around his neck. His knees are bent in a slight squat, and he looks over his right shoulder, away from the camera. There are other men in identical dress dancing and sitting in the background.

Episode 96: Hula with Teeth

Episode #96

2024-08-21 05:00:24

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One Saturday night in the 90s, Patrick Makuakāne and about 15 other hula dancers showed up to a club in San Francisco they called Old Dreamland.
A photograph of BokHee An - an older Asian woman smiling and wearing glasses. She is standing in what looks like an operating room, wearing light blue scrubs, surgical gloves, a surgical hair cap and a surgical mask partially tied around her neck. There is a tray of surgical instruments laid out on a table behind her.

Episode 95: Nurse BokHee

Episode #95

2024-08-07 05:00:24

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Nurse BokHee is in the background of every season of "Grey’s Anatomy." She’s become one of the show’s most beloved characters – but she's only had a few lines.
A photo of the very large front gate of the Green-Wood Cemetery, taken from below so the sky is above the spires.

Episode 94: A Day at the Crematory

Episode #94

2024-07-24 05:00:01

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Gabrielle Gatto works in the crematorium at one of the most famous cemeteries in the country. Thanks to our friends at Finally! A Show for sharing her story with us.
Photo of Wendy Carlos surrounded by electronic keyboards and synthesizers, with a cat sitting behind her and another cat in her lap.

Episode 93: Switched-On

Episode #93

2024-07-10 05:00:48

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The synthesizer was invented in the 1890s. But for people to really start using it, it took half a century, and a musician named Wendy Carlos.
A dark blue sky covered in stars, above a dark landscape with a hint of orange setting sun at the horizon. Photo credit: Edd Stone

Episode 92: To Know the Dark

Episode #92

2024-06-19 05:00:42

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The night sky is getting brighter almost everywhere in the world. We visit a place that is trying to stay dark.
Color photograph of Peggy Seeger, a white woman with short light gray hair, sitting in a camp chair outdoors, playing an autoharp. She is wearing sunglasses and grinning at the camera. There are colorful water coolers and other people, including one playing a flute, behind her.

Episode 91: You Can’t Promise to Love Forever

Episode #91

2024-06-05 05:00:43

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There’s a famous love song – called “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face” – about folk singer Peggy Seeger. Peggy told us: “If you’ve never been in love before – uncontrollably in love – I advise you, for an easy life, stay away from it.”
The front facade of McGillin's Olde Ale House in downtown Philadelphia. It's an old brick building with a large neon sign.

Episode 90: The Most Romantic Place in Philadelphia

Episode #90

2024-05-15 05:00:18

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McGillin’s Olde Ale House is the oldest bar in Philadelphia, and it also claims to be the most romantic place in the city. The Philadelphia Inquirer says: “McGillin’s has matchmaking magic.”
Ray Billingsley, a middle-aged Black man, sits at his drawing desk, working on a comic strip of his comic, Curtis.

Episode 89: At the Drawing Board

Episode #89

2024-05-01 05:00:50

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Curtis was one of the first nationally-syndicated comic strips with a mostly-Black cast of characters. Ray Billingsley has been drawing it for newspapers every day for the past 35 years.
Maria Bamford screaming at a microphone.

Episode 88: I’m Alright

Episode #88

2024-04-17 05:00:45

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When comic Maria Bamford made her OkCupid profile with the username Hogbook, she says Scott Marvel Cassidy was one of the only people who contacted her. His username was Lazer Eyes. 
Kyo Maclear as a young girl sitting at the top of a set of brown stairs in front of a screen door looking over her backyard. Her mother, a Japanese woman wearing a bandana over short hair, is sitting in a deck chair next to Kyo. Both are wearing summer dresses. The photo is taken just behind a bush with pink flowers that are on the left edge of the photo.

Episode 87: A Family Secret

Episode #87

2024-04-03 05:00:56

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When Kyo Maclear took a DNA test, the kit came with a piece of paper with terms and conditions that read, “You may discover unanticipated facts about yourself or your family when using our services that you may not have the ability to change.”
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