[00:00:00] Hi everyone. So it's been a while since I've had a guest on here and I 
know that, I know you're gonna be super excited for this conversation. So, um, 
you know, Listen, mom in, grab a drink. Let's hang out. I have Shauna 
Pennington Bird on here, and we are gonna talk about who knows what, 
because there's a lot of stuff on her form that we can talk about, and she's local 
to me, which I always think is just super exciting to have somebody that's local 
to me.

Um, so Shauna, thank you for being here. And, um, so Shauna's from broken 
wide open.com. Um, we'll have all the information, of course, for you to go find 
out more information when you, when you do connect with her, but we're gonna 
have an interesting conversation here cuz we're going out from what the normal 
female entrepreneurs are doing into this new realm.
And I'm just excited for, for this conversation. So [00:01:00] thank you for 
being here. And Oh, thank you. You wouldn't mind telling my listeners, um, a 
little bit about yourself. That'd be great. I hate when I say that a little bit. Maa. 
You tell my listeners whatever you want them to know. awesome. Thank you. 
Thank you.

Um, hi. Yeah. Uh, thank you for having me on the program. Um, I hail from 
just outside Seattle, Washington in a, a suburb called Buren e. Old Buren. I've 
lived here about 25 years and, um, I am a performer turned audiobook, narrator 
termed voiceover actor. And I also own my own business, couple of businesses, 
but the big one is Seattle Voice Academy, and that's the female entrepreneurial 
stuff where about seven years ago we wanted better quality training for singing 
and for voiceover.

And we wanted it to be really focused on women. And so I started a company 
where we teach, we taught in person in Georgetown. For the longest time we 
had studios, had a piano there, we're able to teach people to come in [00:02:00] 
and then the pandemic hit and we did not close. We just, we called it snow days. 
And for the people who live in the Seattle ish area, , they know that when the 
word snow comes up, everyone freaks out cuz it's a four letter word.
Oh God. And, and, and. And for good reason because there's hills here. And so 
if it snows people like the cars slide off the hills without people being in them. 
That happened this year with ice. Yep. . So that's why no one goes anywhere. 
So I was like, okay guys, it's snow days until further notice. And I bought nine 
people on staff.

Guess what? We are still in snow days until further notice. Because we 
discovered that we were teaching just as well online and more people and 
people all over the world. And that was really cool. And so that is, we didn't 
stop. So we're still doing that. And we're not in person. We're gonna do some in-
person retreats.

Yeah. In the mountains of Washington this summer. I think we're gonna go out 
to the coast in the fall, and those are fun. But the bulk of what we do now is, is 
through Zoom. It's online. It's doing a really good job doing that. That's Seattle 
voice. It's wonderful how we've switched. [00:03:00] And then my other world 
is I'm a voice artist.

Um, my other company is Shawn Pennington Baird voice artist, i l c, and, and 
that is doing animation and corporate work and narrating commercials. And I 
have three agents and I spend about half my day down here just talking to 
myself in a padded room, , um, which I think everyone should have the 
opportunity to do.

Oh, it's kind of awesome. . So this morning, uh, let's see. Today is gonna be a 
little bit about Bitcoins. I don't really know much about Bitcoins, but they pay 
me in hard cash, so it's fine. . Um, I need to do a, uh, something corporate. 
There's a corporate, uh, a script that's come in, and then I've got, uh, pickups for 
an animated series I'm on.

So, Every day is a little bit different. And that's literally just me. And then I 
have a virtual assistant who helps. I have an accountant who helps and I have a 
business coach that keeps that all buttoned together. And then the third thing is 
a show I wrote. Because when I, when I did the, well, not too much sale Voice 
academy, but the other one, the voice artist.

[00:04:00] I love traveling to work on my craft. And oftentimes I'll find 
opportunities all over the world to do this. Yeah. We need, we need to get out of 
our padded boxes. Yeah. And so seeing ourselves in person, this is back in like 
2019. So before the pandemic, there was this cool conference in Scotland, it's 
Ireland, it was in Dublin.

And I was like, oh dude, I can't go to Dublin by myself. I gotta take my family, 
or my husband who is right of Scottish descent will kill me or divorce me. And 
so he and Maddi got to come with me and we went to Iceland and Scotland and 
Ireland. And we spent two weeks. I felt great and we had so much fun.
We hiked, we had all this stuff, we had colds, no big deal, right? And they flew 
home and I had three days by myself in the wilds of Ireland to have like the best 
time ever. And so I drove across this, they called it a mountain pass, yet . I 
know, right? like a speed bump. But anyway, I got to the town and I pulled into 
my Airbnb and nothing was okay.

I started sweating buckets. All the colors sucked out of the world. And I was 
like, oh, okay, this is not [00:05:00] normal. I'm gonna get my phone. So I got 
my phone. Thankfully I had, I had wifi, thank God. How do you dial emergency 
services? It's 9 99. So I dialed 9 99 and. About 22 hours later, they saved my 
life. It was a 14 hour open heart surgery.

Oh. Because I was known as a tripled AAA dissection. Oh. So my aortic 
aneurysm that I didn't know I had. It ruptured aortic aneurysm, and so most 
people don't make it. The doctor, the surgeon, beautiful woman, she was like six 
foot tall, blonde, amazing woman. 14 hour surgery. She said she didn't expect 
me to survive the ambulance ride to the hospital.
or the surgery. Yeah. And when I woke up though, in Ireland it's great cuz they 
don't tell you what's wrong with you, which is great . But here in the States 
they'd be like, oh my God, sign all these forms. You almost died . Right. But in 
Ireland they were like, oh, here grand. Do you want some tea? Oh, that sounds 
beautiful.

I didn't think there was anything wrong with me other than I knew I had a scar 
on my [00:06:00] chest. And they had, they had shaved my bikini area and all I 
could think of was, oh my God, that's gonna itch. Like those, that was my whole 
mentality for like 12 hours was can we get something for the itching? Yeah. 
And so I didn't get depressed or scared.

I just stayed very. Calm, which, uh, we could all learn from that in the states. 
Oh my gosh. Yeah. So I never knew until, and then four hours in the ICU or 
four days in the ICU staring at cows when they would turn me around. , um, 
watching hurling. If you're not, if you don't, what? Hurling is not curling. That's 
the ice in the rocks.

No, hurling. It's not throwing up. It's um, it's a really important sport in Ireland 
where they try to beat each other with sticks and there's a ball somewhere, . But 
it was really fun to watch in the ICU next to the other guy who didn't die either . 
Um, and so anyway, four days later my husband shows up. He had to fly back.
My daughter stayed at home. She was eight at the time. Oh. And I was in 
Ireland for four more weeks. Wow. Cause they don't let you fly. I missed 
[00:07:00] the voiceover conference. I didn't get to go. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, and the 
good news is I just kept getting better. And so it took them maybe, I think it was 
two weeks before they told me what happened.

Wow. And by the time we flew home, You know, I was cold sometimes. Um, I 
had, you know, it's hard to walk around a, I was getting some exercise, not a 
ton. Mm-hmm. , but I wasn't really freaked out until I got home. I had, um, two 
infections in my chest. It was hurting. Yeah. Yeah. So I ended up at Virginia 
Mason Hospital in Seattle.

Yeah. And then, then they're like, what the hell happened to you? . Right. . And 
then they, you know, then, and I, I finally got to it. I was like, Hey Ben, can you 
hear their story? And then tell me and translate later so I don't panic. Yeah. And 
that was the first time I was in a room all by myself too. Cuz in Ireland you're 
with four other people and the whole Ireland thing felt like a slumber party.
Right. Which is why I wrote a show called Broken Wide Open. And it's actually 
funny and it's, it's not a bad time. cuz I, I stopped the, I stopped the show by the 
time I get back to Virginia Mason when all the Americans are like, oh my god, . 
So too much, [00:08:00] too much reality. Yeah. That's not funny anymore. All 
that happened right before the pandemic.

So by the time we slid into the pandemic, I was like, everyone's freaking out. 
And I'm like, yeah, I've already been freaked out. Welcome to my mom, . 
Right? I already got this. I already died and came back. It's, it's okay. Yeah. So I 
actually was, was pretty calm during all of the pandemic. Right. Uh, they did 
finally get covid, what, from, from Switzerland last September.

And I was fine knocking wood, wood, all that stuff. And, and I had done all the 
waxing, all of that triple maxing, all, all the masking. But the good news is that 
so much had become better that my risk level was lower. Right. Nice. Anyway, 
that's where I am today. That's all these years later I'm, uh, you know, yeah.
Yeah. That's a lot. No. So the, so the, the really, um, Gosh, I've gotta find other 
words. It's, it's not ironic. It's of course the conversation we're supposed to have 
right now. But the, the thing is, we're celebrating at recording right now in three 
days is my dad's first rebirth party birthday Wow. Is what I call it.

Wow. Um, a [00:09:00] year ago we had exactly the same thing. Didn't know 
happened, and they're like, how are you even alive, ? Yes. Yes. And, and so we 
did it in the American way, and it was a week of me and hell because I couldn't 
go see my dad. And so I, yeah. I find it ironic that, of course, I like looked at 
that. I went, oh my gosh, I never even put the correlation.

Of course, we're having this conversation today, , right? Like, of course we're, 
because I did look at it as a, a rebirth with him. Mm. It's like, okay, I realize that 
everything changed when you decided to have the really, because he did get a 
choice. You know? You didn't get a choice. I, no, no. They were like, and 
unzipped the un, they unzipped me, unplugged my heart, you know.
Right. Zapped it with lightning and put it back in and zipped me. . Right. He 
made the choice to go through the pain. So I've always just like, thank you dad 
for doing that. You know? I know, you know, blah, blah, blah. But I, but I just 
find it really ironic and the conversation also that [00:10:00] I know lately in my 
head has been working through the chronic issues because now it's, uh, now it's 
a chronic issue.

Yes. Like you said, it's not a disability. Um, it can be, um, it can be a lot of folks 
with dissections end up with lots of issues. Yeah. Yeah. But don't we all have to 
deal. Issues and make choices on what are we gonna do? Yeah. Every day I 
think, do we want a wallow in it or do Yeah. When something that major 
happens though, something, at least for me.

Mm-hmm. for sure. For me, also, for my friend who was a comedian in Seattle 
who got hit by a car, he's fine , but yeah, he had the same thing where it's like, 
oh my God, I almost died. Those of us who've come close, we go, oh, you know 
what? Our priorities just rearranged that hangnail. It really doesn't matter. Oh, 
that thing we have to do on Sunday, I'll just tell 'em I can't go.

There's a huge reorientation of what is important and what is not important, and 
it's it. It's at the minute you wake up, it's like boom, these are the things that are 
important. Yeah, and [00:11:00] it does. It changes everything. I know it, it 
changes, you know, it happened to my dad, but of course it very connected to 
that, but I know it totally changed everything in the way I looked at my 
business.

Even like things that were on my list, all of a sudden I'm looking at it going, that 
does not matter to me anymore. Yes, exactly. Yeah. You know, this is the 
direction I want to go. and it's, it's not the like mean girl or anything. Like, don't, 
nobody's getting in my way. It's just that I'm, there's, there's like, no, that just 
doesn't matter.

Sometimes there's a priority shift. Yeah. So the little things that used to get us 
down, suddenly you go, you know what? I wanna do this now. It's sort of like, 
there's a great book called The Five Second Rule. Um, I can't think of who 
wrote it. But anyway, it's, it's, it's almost kind of like that because you think, 
you know what?

I'm alive today. I'm really glad to be alive today. And that's my thought when I 
wake up for the last three and a half years. Yeah. Hey, cool, I'm alive today. 
Right? So when that's your baseline, you go, oh, hot coffee's the best. And you 
just like, that could be your whole [00:12:00] day. And you're like, I'm okay 
because I have soft sheets.

Yep. Okay. You know, and so the things that used to bug me, oh my God, I've 
gotta lose 30 pounds. Well, that gets re-shifted into I'm gonna get on the bike 
today and work out. Yeah. Oh, wow. I can still cycle. What? Yeah. Oh, wow. I 
can, I, I feel good. , I don't have to feel skinny. Yep. So I had some big priorities 
shift.

And then, and I do, I'm on a lot of medicine mm-hmm. . And it's very 
interesting because I, I sometimes go into the places on the social medias and I 
participate and or read some of the mental stuff that happens with the folks who 
haven't been maybe scared as bad . Right. Where they're like, oh my God, I 
have so much pain here, so much pain there and I'm on the same drugs and for 
whatever reason I'm, you know, I get some things for sure that they get, but I 
tend to get less.

And it could be cuz I'm just not focused on it, mm-hmm. . And I'm like, oh 
yeah, I'm not gonna let that happen to myself. Mm-hmm. . And so I think the 
power of [00:13:00] suggestion, the power of mind, the power of, um, uh, of 
suggestion really matters. Because I remember after I got back, I was in the 
hospital for double vision, double vision's, not really a good time.

I was like, oh no, I'm dying. And it was just, it's just double vision. And so I got 
into the hospital and they gave me a, a cat scan of my head this time, not just 
my chest, which had been irradiated many times, . And um, and they're like, oh. 
So they, they, they come into the ER and they, they put, take me upstairs to the 
neurological ward and they start talking like this.

And I was like, why are you guys talking like that? And I talk, as you can see it 
maybe very fast and , um, I have a lot of energy naturally. And they were like, 
you've had two strokes on your right side. And I was like, How come I can snap 
with both hands. I can juggle, give, give me, gimme three balls I'm gonna juggle 
for you.

They're like, we don't know why you can move your left side. And I said, that's 
not helpful. You just freaked me [00:14:00] out right now. Now my left side 
won't work. Thanks. Thankfully. But the left side kept working. But I did. But 
the power of suggestion, right? So it was five. So they released me from the 
hospital is Thanksgiving of 20 20 19, still 2019 still.

And I remember I got home and suddenly the lights, I read some stuff on the 
internet, which I recommend no one, no one do. Mm-hmm. . And I'm like, oh 
God, the lights are too bright. Oh no, I shouldn't drive. Oh no, I should never be 
alone. Oh no. And for four days I convinced myself I was a very sick woman. 
And then on Friday I took a lift into the hospital cause I couldn't drive.
Right? And we get there. And again, they're doing that same very slow thing. , 
they're, I found out they are really quite gentle with stroke survivors, . Okay? 
And so they lead me back here, put your coat. Here. I'm like, okay. So I, I, she 
walks in the room, she's like, um, she had me do all the tests. She goes, these 
strokes are old.

We don't know when you had 'em. I'm like, wait, what? Wait, what? I suddenly 
feel, by the way, feel fine. And I'm like, what? So like, did they happen during 
the surgery? She's like, I don't know. They [00:15:00] could have happened like 
two years ago. What? Wow. Wait, what? Wait, what? What? And that to me is 
like the galvanizing moment I think for the rest of my life.

which is like, hmm. The power of suggestion is really a big deal. And if I tell 
myself I can't do it, I can't do it. And if I tell myself I can do it, I can do it. 
Yeah. And on the days when bad things do happen, I take it in stride and I go, 
okay. Cause I do still get double vision. I, by the way, lots of us do who've been 
on bypass machines.

Hmm. The doctors are like, oh no, it's not, it's not, it's not connected. Well, bes 
when social media is helpful. Oh yeah. Well, about a hundred of us have had it. 
So I'm thinking, thinking it is connected, right? . And it always goes away after 
about a minute and a half. It's all good. So strange. Yes. Oh yes. So I, so yeah.
Chronic stuff. Yeah. I got some chronic stuff going on. Thankfully it doesn't get 
in the way of Well, I love voiceover because the first thing that happened after 
the, the dissection is they had me meet with the genetic folks here in Seattle. 
Mm-hmm. And they're like, here are all the things you can no longer do for a 
[00:16:00] living.

Mm-hmm. , you cannot be a police officer. Well, I'm not once That's okay. 
Except for on tv I can still voice one. And they're like, you can't be a wrestler. 
Well, okay. That's cool. No crap. . Um, I know, right? All this thing, I 
apparently shouldn't scuba dive when I was a hardcore diver, so that's a little 
tough.

Okay. But I've done 1200 dives. I've been underwater. We're good. You retire it. 
Yeah. And they were like, they basically said, don't let your heart rate get above 
1 45 if you wanna go on disability. Most people do. And I was like, I'm a voice 
actor. I mean, yeah. When I do animation work, I, I've worn the heart rate mo, 
not the heart rate, the, I've worn my blood pressure monitor while doing 
animation.

Yeah. It gets up there. It does, yeah. But it, it doesn't stay too long and, , you 
know, I still cycle like crazy. I get a lot of exercise, mostly indoors, but I do 
cycle outside. I'm not supposed to crash. I'm on a lot of blood thinners. That's 
not really good for you. Um, and I'm on all the medicines your grandparents are 
on.

Right. Um, but I feel good and I'm [00:17:00] living a very normal life and I 
still do solo travel. That took some courage. Yeah. I had a pretty good 
meltdown one night in Switzerland, , and then I was fine. I had that moment of, 
oh my, oh my God. Oh my God, I'm by myself. Oh my, was that the first one? 
Um, yeah, that was probably, I mean, I have occasional panic attacks.

That go away pretty fast. That was the first meltdown alone. My daughter went 
back to Ireland with me two years later and having her there Oh, was so good. 
Yeah. That was actually the first one. She, we were in dingle in the town where 
it happened. Staying not there. Another place. Yeah. To meet with the other 
people who'd helped me and um, it was a morning, we were supposed to go, uh, 
see raptors and owls and everything that afternoon and we kind of, I kind of, she 
was still in bed.

I climbed back in with her and I shook for two hours. Mm-hmm. , but then was 
like, Hey, we need to go play with owls. And she's like, yeah. And so we were 
fine. Right. Got back in the car and drove on the left. I was up to say that stay 
left , but not too far left. I know. I couldn't imagine left. So we played with owls 
and I was Okay.

[00:18:00] And so when we went back to, um, you know, when I went back to 
Switzerland last fall, that was a solo, solo trip. And I had a couple days in 
Iceland by myself and a couple days in Switzerland by myself, and then a group 
again. . And then this coming week and a half, two weeks from now, I'll be in 
Mexico by myself for two days and then back at a conference again.

Mm-hmm. , I like being with the group always seems like a good idea. Yeah. 
But I have the confidence to know what to do and what to take and all that stuff, 
so. Right. Yeah. I mean, and, and of course, you know, I'm woo so you don't 
wanna tempt the universe, but it's just like, seriously, I'd survived that, so.

Mm-hmm. , I do feel like I have the confidence to get through more, is what I 
assume. Yeah. I just wanna keep, you know, I'm alive , so I would like to keep 
living. There are folks and I, there was one of the genetics folks, they're like, oh 
no, you really should just sit on the couch the rest of your life. Oh my gosh.

I was 45 when this happened. Yeah. I'm 49 now. Yeah. So while I said, okay, I 
won't scuba dive, that's, and I, they, I'm pretty sure I shouldn't tell 'em about the 
roller [00:19:00] coasters I was on last summer, but the way, the way I do a 
roller coaster, if I choose to make that risk, I'm so calm during that roller coaster 
and Cause I don't, don't let my blood pressure get high.

Yeah. And I looked over at my daughter and I was like, this is what beta 
blockers are for Honey . I'm on the good drugs. Let's do this roller coaster , let's 
do it. . So my sense of humor, I think, which I think I had before all this stuff 
happened, and of course I woke up, you know, with the senses of humor intact.

Yeah. That's my safety line. Yeah. And, and I, I do agree. I, my, my husband's a 
firefighter, so we Wow. We had inappropriate humor before that cuz we're high 
school sweethearts. Um, you know, my dad's a Marine. I grew up with 
inappropriate humor. Gotcha. . So, I mean, it was, it was immediately the, you 
know, harassing and the sarcasm, you know, right back into it.

And I know for us that's, that is our coping. Mechanism. Yes. And in a positive 
way. Mm-hmm. , because moments we're fall that way. Moments, I've 
sometimes had [00:20:00] moments where I'm like, wow, am I really 
suppressing this with too much humor because I, I, I know. And then I go, I 
don't care. I'm having a good time.

Right. , it makes it okay for me. And if I can make all the doctors and nurses 
laugh too. Yeah. So we, as long as, you know, not during surgery, but like, there 
was a surgery where I was mostly awake and she was like, just be quiet for a 
minute. Okay. , right. Cuz you're like, oh, Kate, I can't make everybody laugh.

That would be really bad for me. It's not, let's not jiggle right now. Really bad 
for me to make everybody laugh, but I've really gotta say this.

I totally get it. And I totally get the whole, the whole conversation in your head 
of like, oh, should I analyze this? , am I not? Mm-hmm. . Should, should I be 
sad? I don't know. Cause like, I don't wanna be sad, so, no, I don't wanna be sad. 
It's okay. and the therapy, I mean, it's, it's been now three and a half years since 
all that stuff happened.

And the first thing I did when I got home is right down the story. Well, 
[00:21:00] and what, and what happened to create Bright, what Broken White 
Open was, I was, I picked up my daughter, she goes to school on vash on island. 
I have a, a sixth grader that I put on a boat every day. Oh my gosh. How, how 
weird is this? I put her on a boat with a bunch of other kids.

Yeah. And they all go to school on an island. That's really weird. And then I 
pick her up when the boat comes back. And I remember I, we were gonna go to 
the mainland of the Olympic Peninsula just for like a tune over two, two night, 
overnight. It was the first time traveling since it had happened. And so I still had 
a pretty huge scar, still had external precautions, and we went into the vaon.

Well, I went to pick her up and I walked into the Vaon Bookstore and there was 
a book right there on the table. Had a heart on it with all this electricity all 
around it. And I don't think I have it down here to read it. It's by Brian Doyle. 
And it was a book all about hearts, and it was most beautiful poetry I'd ever 
read.

I was like, I need to read that. Yeah. That's sitting there for a reason. So I 
bought the book and over the next two days, sobbed through it, right? Because 
it's about his [00:22:00] son. He had twins and one of the boys was born with 
his heart upside down. Mm. and this passages in this book were so poetic and so 
beautiful and so therapeutic.

Mm-hmm. that I was like, I need to write my, I need to write this stuff down. 
Not, not his stuff. It was, it was like this. Yeah. It just lit soling on fire in me. 
I'm like, I gotta write, I gotta write down what happened. Yeah. Especially the 
jokes. Cause I had been workshopping all the funny stuff in every er uhhuh that 
I went to afterward.

People go, what happened to you? And I just start working this material and we 
would laugh and I was like, well that's a good joke. I need to keep that one right. 
, that's another good joke. I should keep that one. So I remember I came home 
and I had my laptop and I was like, write show . So I end up contacting, uh, his 
publisher and got permission to use two quotes, uh, from the book in the.

Which was beautiful. Oh my. And it's a hard, it's a hard monologue to memorize 
because it's so poetic. Yeah. And so beautiful and so profound. And then the 
music for the [00:23:00] show, I was listening on, it was on the plane on the 
way home from Ireland. I have a good friend who's a musician in Belfast, and 
I'd presented her when I used to run a performing arts center, her name is Kathy 
Ryan.

And I was like, oh my God. Kathy's music. And some of her music came on and 
one was called Carer Reed. And Carer Reed is a rope bridge that I had just 
crossed the day before my heart exploded. Oh my gosh. And I was like, and I'm 
listening to this song going, oh my God, this song, this song, this song, this 
song, I bet there's more.

There was another one called, um, the Long, it's the Farthest Wave that's all 
about trying to get home. It's all about hearts. Mm-hmm. . And I was like, oh 
my goodness. Oh my goodness. So I contact, well, first I called, I didn't know 
how to get Old of Kathy. So I reached out to other friends through fa, thank God 
for social media, through Facebook.

And I found the guy who used to produce her, who got me her phone, her email 
address, and I emailed her, said, Kathy, this is what happened to me. , can I use 
five of your songs? She's like, yes. . And that's how it all sort of started 
happening. Yeah. And so the whole thing was written by January when the 
pandemic happened.

So right. It was January, the show was written. I sent it [00:24:00] to a good 
friend, USF L Gundy, who's a playwright of great renowned. And I was like, 
I'm just gonna send him my show. Mm-hmm. . And he's a very, very good 
friend. And I was like, Yusuf, I know you get this a lot, but I, I need you to read 
this and tell me, tell me where it's at.

How many more rewrites? And he emailed back, workshop it, do it now live. 
Oh my gosh. And I was like, okay. So with that wind under my wings, right? 
Cause sometimes you need that moment of, of just someone saying it's okay. 
And he did it at just the right moment. And so I called the musicians who I 
knew would be brilliant on this.

Uh, one plays accordion, Robertson Wooder, he's amazing. Dave Pascal and 
Bass. I mean, these are, these are musicians I've known for 30 years. And I was 
like, Hey guys, um, let's do a show, . And it was supposed to be live, it was 
supposed to be in the Seattle area. Um, there was maybe, you know, all this 
dream of taking it to Edinburgh, French Fest in Ireland.

And I'm like, we just gotta get it up and running. And so I sent everything to 
them and the pandemic came down. Yeah. And I was [00:25:00] like, oh, let's 
do it. Let's do it through Audible. I'm an audiobook narrator, , right? No, we 
could just do this online for now and still do it live later. And they were like, 
yeah, we're in.

So it was so fun during the pandemic to have a project where we were all 
mostly rehearsing, working solo. Occasionally we'd come together at Dave's 
studio, record some songs with musicians and just me, but we weren't all never 
in the same place for the show. And I recorded the whole thing here in my 
studio I'm in right now.

David Koch directed it from his house. And then we, we, we premiered it 
almost exactly a year ago. It was like March 15th, 20 2002 or 2022. And then it 
came out officially on Blackstone Audio, picked it up in June. And then this 
year, in like December, I was like, okay, everybody, let's do it live Uhhuh , and 
let's go to ar.

Let's go to Ireland. Let's go to, let's take it back where it's supposed to be. Oh 
my gosh. It'll be for the, the four year anniversary. We'll be there on those dates. 
[00:26:00] Oh. So yeah, I'm gonna, I'm gonna, you know, probably shake for 
two hours one morning . But, um, you know, we're gonna, yeah. So it's those six 
people going and we're gonna end up going the Fringe first and the French Fest, 
the Edinburgh French Festival is thousands of shows all happening at the same 
time.

It's insane. You walk down the street and you're like, how can this much theater 
be in one place? Oh. So we're not expecting big turnouts, we're expecting kind 
of meaningful turnouts, and then mm-hmm. going to Ireland. That's a little 
different cuz we know lots of people who were involved. Yeah. So that's just 
fun because we can bring all the people who were there to see the show live and 
then get to do it live.

Yeah. I mean, the amazing thing is, is that, I mean, all along the way, and hey, 
everybody listening, we get signs. We're all getting the signs of exactly what 
we're supposed to be doing. It's just who's paying attention. But , all along the 
way, you were getting the signs that Yep, yep. Yeah, yeah. Yep. And you took 
it and you, you jumped like, you just jumped with it and it was so [00:27:00] 
healthy.

That was my therapy. Yeah. I didn't, I didn't spend hours with a therapist, which 
I still could, don't, I'm not, I'm not opposed to it. Right. But the therapy was 
getting that story out on paper. Mm-hmm. just dumping it all out. And then, you 
know, when I, cause my husband, I didn't let him read it because he did not 
have.

Neither did my dad. Yeah. Very different experience. Horrible times. You 
would know this. Yeah. Val, you'd understand. Yeah. Cause they're terrified for 
me. They get a phone call, they're in the Yeah, they're, they're in the aisle at 
Target buying new shoes for school, triggered Uhhuh . And they get a call 
saying, we don't think she's gonna live.

Yeah. Oh geez. So, yeah. You know, um, it was, wasn't until all the music was 
done and I had, had been listened to one song and he was like, whoa, let me 
hear another one. And my husband's a very good theater critic and I was like, 
he's, he, he, he works at Fifth Avenue Theater in downtown Seattle. He's mostly 
stage hand.

And he's a designer and he is directed a lot of shows. Uhhuh, he's directed me 
like 35 years ago, , um, long time ago. And he, he listened to like the fourth 
song. And I said, okay, the [00:28:00] director thinks you're gonna set design 
this. I have not asked you. You do not have to set design this. You wanna hear 
the whole show.

Yeah. And he looked at me, he goes, yep. And I left the house. I went, here you 
go. And I left. Right. Because I just couldn't even, I mean, it's done at that point. 
It's, it's, it's the, the, the egg shell was hard. . Yeah. And we're gonna, we're 
gonna do it. And when I came home, he had the set design finished. He had all 
the, all the little, he had, he had a model for me.

And I was like, okay, . And then I said, I'm gonna make a guess. You don't 
wanna run the show. He was like, Nope, , I have, he has no desire to hear it over 
and over again. And he said, oh yeah. Like about a month later, I was talking to 
him and he goes, you know, I listened to your whole show, dry Eyed. He's like, 
I listened to the whole thing.

And I thought, wow, this is, this is really good. And then he, he watched Come 
From Away, which he hadn't seen. We've all seen Come From Away. If you 
don't know the show, it's in Broadway show about the 38 planes that landed on 
Gander on nine 11. So it's a beautiful, happy, but sad show. Not the same. 
Same. Not the same.

He said he sobbed [00:29:00] right through. Come from away. It was like his 
sixth time seeing it. But that's when he felt all the stuff from the show that I had 
put together. Yeah. Ugh. And my daughter, we were back in Ireland, and I said 
to her, I said, Hey, David's asked me to write a passage in your words. You 
wanna help me?

She's like, well, can I be in the show? I was like, um, currently let's think about 
that a lot. But I don't, I don't know . I go, but if, if I were to do that, I need to, 
are you comfortable helping me? And do you wanna pick the song that would 
happen right after you talk about what happened? Or, or me or whoever's doing 
it?

And so we listened and we found this song and it's so beautiful. It's a lullaby. 
And she and I, it's by Kathy Ryan and she and I listened to it, you know, in 
Dingle Ireland. And the two of us were just sobbing. And Maddie goes, yeah, 
that one , right? And I went, yep. She goes, I never wanna hear that song again.

Mm-hmm. . But she said, that's the song. And it, it is. Cause I played it for 
them. And we do it with just, just guitar and vocals. Oh. And part of me is like, 
I can do it [00:30:00] live cuz I'm gonna rehearse a lot to the point where, yeah. 
I let the audience feel it. Not necess. I feel it, but not to the point where I'm like, 
can't really sing.

Hang on. So, um, but Maddie did help me write the passage in her words. Mm, 
mm-hmm. , are you gonna be able do that live ? Yep, I am. That's, that's the 
power of rehearsal. You do it again and again and again and again and again, 
and again and again. And then you can pull. That's thankfully, thankfully I wa 
I'm, you know, theater artist for many years.

So the trick there is to is Madeline Langle, the author. She said it best, I'm 
totally gonna par I'm gonna say it wrong. I'm gonna paraphrase her really badly. 
She said something like, you have to totally feel it while you're writing it. You 
can sit there at the typewriter and just sob your eyes out, but then you go back 
and rewrite that passage mm-hmm.

so that your audience. Can feel it. Right. And as an audiobook narrator, that's 
totally true. There's times where I get to like the fourth book and they kill my 
favorite person and I'm [00:31:00] like, I can tell I do this. chapter 14, there was 
blood, Nope, can't do it. Nope. Can't do it. And I'll sit here and sub, I have to go 
out and my dog's like, what's wrong with you?

And I'm like, hang out, I'll be fine. , I'm gonna be okay. And then of course your 
throat gets all thick and get the meat kiss and you're like, and you can come 
back. I've got this chapter 14. Nope. Don't got this. . I think, I think I took like a 
run of five One time . Yes, she did. She killed my favorite C character and I did 
finally get through it in a way that, again, you have just enough distance that 
you feel it, but you're not vocally all choked up and for, you know, singing and 
nasally

Yeah. So, you know, if you're gonna do it five shows a week for two weeks or 
however long the run is. Yeah. Right. , you gotta have that professional. You 
gotta nail it and not nail it. Oh. At the same time, that's a really good tip too for 
the, um, the rewriting it. Yeah. Because I [00:32:00] know that I write even 
emails or stuff and I will have too much me in it.

Yeah. And it needs to connect with the other people. And, and I know all of us. 
All of us heart-centered people. . Oh, no pun intended. No worries. Minus 
jewelry now I have, I have, I have bling in my heart. I have a mechanical heart 
valve. It's Irish No less. I was like, I came home with the coolest Irish, uh, 
souvenir.

It's with you forever. , but making sure that it is going to hit them. Yeah. Which 
is what you had to do with your story. I can't imagine. Have, did you have to do 
too much rewriting do you think? Not too much. I shouldn't say too much cuz 
there was a it lot. Perfect. But there was a lot. Um, and it, to turn it from a 
journal, cuz I mean when you're talking about it, therapy, it's, it feels very 
journaly in my head.

And then a lot of stuff got pulled out. Things that were just unnecessary. I think 
it was, it, this particular show, it's 55 [00:33:00] minutes now with talking and 
songs. 10 songs. Nice. And so it's pretty short, thankfully. Yeah. And um, I 
think we just removed stuff like occasionally David having to a rewrite. and my 
husband, when he did finally have some clarity, he had two rewrites.

Great. Yeah. He's very, really good at that stuff. He, they're like, Hey, you're 
saying it this way, but you, and a lot of it was removing some of me, what you 
just said, it was removing some of me out. Mm-hmm. , because it didn't need to 
be said. It had been said more eloquently. I didn't need to keep going. Yeah.

So occasionally there was just, I mostly was just clearing away, clearing away 
to get to the essence of what it needed to be. Mm-hmm. . So to drilling down on 
that. And so there are changes from the audiobook to the stage play. Yeah. The 
point where I can't use the audiobook to learn lines . Nope. . And it's so funny, 
you'd think it'd be easy to learn my own stuff.

I wrote it. Right. Oh my goodness. So then like always go, but I had two 
strokes. No, I'm fine. I've got . I, so, and I'm older too now. So the, the trick 
right now, and I, I'm already off book, [00:34:00] halfway through the show 
shows in seven. and, and it did. We did a full rehearsal process. The show is 
staged. It all got staged in March of this year.

Nice of last, I guess every last year now, last March we staged it, so it's got 
blocking, it's got, oh, you know, the set scenery, we have the props, we have 
everything. And now I just literally have to get off book. And so I'm halfway 
there now, but I tell you there will probably be a script somewhere on stage and 
a lot of sense of humor in ca in case I'm like, and excuse me, really quick, , 
right.

But I'll find a way to make it really funny. Yeah. Cause I mean, especially you 
lived it, so it's just like I can just, I mean, I can get little flashbacks, Uhhuh I'm 
sure of. So maybe improv will take over. Yeah. . Yeah, , right? Yeah, yeah, 
yeah. As everybody on stage, he goes, shit, really? Well, thankfully it's just me, 
me and the musicians.

And as long as I don't go too far away on the songs, we should be justified. 
Yeah, yeah. You won't ruin their lives, . No, no. And I've known these 
musicians, man, I, Robertson Wooder, Rob and I, we've [00:35:00] only really 
worked together on this project, but I've known of him and of his wife and I, 
I've known him. My husband worked the Seattle Children's Theater with him 
for probably 15 years.

Rob, uh, Rob, uh, Dave, uh, who plays bass. He was on one of my first gigs 
when I was 21 in town. Oh, that's amazing. In Seattle. That's amazing. So it's 
just so cool to be, I mean, I've known these guys forever and it's so lovely that 
they're part of it and sound design and, and such a personal story. Yes. I mean it 
does, it, there's nothing that could get more personal than dying

And if they, they hadn't heard this, this, the show until Oh yeah. How did they 
do with that? Rob had, Rob had, cuz he did sound design, right. So Rob, of 
course. Mm-hmm. . And so he did the full sound design for it. Cause all the 
hospital beeping and things like that. Really cool sounds. And then, um, Dave 
Pascal listened after we did, we did a CD launch, like a , like people use CDs 
anymore, we have CDs.

Um, but we had a CD launch last summer in June, and he listened on the way 
home and he, he sent me an email going, [00:36:00] whoa. . Yeah. When are we 
going to Europe? . Like it's ok. I think we need to go right and we're gonna, 
we're gonna do it here in Seattle too. I need to find the right venue in the right 
timing because the other thing is I don't wanna exhaust myself as you'd brought 
up.

You know, I have a chronic illness. Mm-hmm. , I have to manage that. Mm-
hmm. . And one of the things I'm not supposed to do is get my blood pressure 
over, well, my heart rate when cycling should stay around one 40. , I can 
occasionally take it to one 60 if I'm gonna do like a test. And I used a cycling 
coach for a while and my cardiologist, so I was, I was too terrified without them 
saying, it's okay, you can do it.

Um, theater can be similar when you're standing on stage and you get that 
adrenaline rush. Yeah. Your blood pressure's going up, . Right. So, so one of the 
things I'm gonna do is take my olol before the show . I mean, how silly Some 
people, you know, some people you know, do, do, do, do the heavy bad for you 
drugs to get on stage.

No, no, no. I don't need those , but I'm going to need my [00:37:00] BP meds 
apparently. and, and breathe. Yeah. Breathing and meditation. And I was just so 
that I'm okay that, cause you heard me before, I had just gotten off a call. Right. 
That's not even on stage, but I was all jacked up. I wish I would've looked to see 
what my heart rate was, but I, yeah.

I can't even imagine. How do you keep your heart rate as somebody who's 
excitable, ? I am. I am a Muppet. All of my branding is a Muppet because Yes. . 
I know. And I think some of that's gonna be the balance of great performance. 
And maybe, to be perfectly honest, I probably have directors from 30 years ago 
be like, she's finally calm enough to know, I know , right?
Because you can imagine, I, I got do this before. , can you slow down a little 
bit? Maybe go a little slower. Let's, can you slow all of that fact? Yeah. Just 
don't speak. No, no. I didn't get that note. But um, you know, I was told to slow 
down maybe a few thousand times as a young actor. Yeah. And same with 
audiobook work.

Well, doing voice work will [00:38:00] automatically slow everybody down. 
Right. It just does. We get, we're working in our voice all day. We can hear 
when it's too slow. We can hear when it's too fast and we can, we can adjust it. 
So the new good news is all that voiceover work helps on stage, helps with 
timing. And I did get a note from David at one point, Hey, can you pick that up?

And I was like, are you kidding? Right, . And of course recently I got that note 
from someone else and I did it for him. He goes, whoa, , you took that note and 
maybe half that . Okay. I had, I had somebody email me one day after they, uh, 
took one of my workshops and they're just like, so just in case anybody else 
needs to know this, do not watch your videos on 1.5 speed.

I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, lady, why would you ever consider that? I'm like, I'm 
a, I'm like, there's no, you would understand it. I used to slow all my voiceover 
gigs. The first year I did voiceover, I slowed both books down by 0.5 in the 
editing software and it was [00:39:00] really, really helpful. , I don't do that 
anymore, but I cheated then.

Well, cuz then it, it also helped you learn, okay, this is how I need to speak. 
Exactly. Exactly. This is the correct . not the one God gave me . My mother and 
I speak squirrel. When we're together, we're just gonna go. It's to the point 
where my stepdad's like, I, I got nothing. He's like, I don't know what you guys 
are saying, but it's, uh, it's out of the realm of hearing so come by it now 
naturally.

Yeah, absolutely. That's, that's my entire family. The guys just walk out of the 
room, they're like, yeah, we're not dealing with this. Let the girls just all talk, 
talk . We're like, we, we know we're not getting in. It's not even worth it. And it 
gives us a headache.