Trapped

I’m a Nobody.

Because I’m an English professor, the logical assumption is that I’m referring to Emily Dickinson’s poem that begins, “I’m Nobody!”

While I like Dickinson, I’m making a pop culture reference, for I’m a fan of the podcast Nobody Listens to Paula Poundstone, and the term Nobody refers to us fans who are, in fact, listening to Paula Poundstone.

The podcast is atypical, as Paula herself discovered in its nascence when she would be interviewed and struggled to describe it. She created a contest for Nobodies to offer a descriptive summary of the show, so here’s my attempt. Paula, her cohost humorist Adam Felber, her manager Bonnie Burns (aka Captain Crinkle thanks to her proclivity in the early shows of making noise), and writer/comedian Toni Anita Hull get into long meandering conversations that are cut into various segments (book club, vocabulary song/game, etc.) with each podcast featuring an expert on often surprising topics: happiness, love, libraries, microbes, and child labor, to name a few.

And though this is a podcast with no visuals, one of the occasional segments is Toni’s Craft Corner.

The gang broadcasts from their homes, which became problematic for Toni in January when her apartment flooded. Alas, poor Toni remained displaced for months so that when Toni’s Craft Corner conquered “the spring season” with a “hug-a-bunny,” Toni was still living in temporary housing.

When the craft segment starts, Toni tells everyone they need a piece of paper, preferably white (or brown or grey) because that’s what color bunnies are, but she is going to use pink paper because, due to living in the hotel, she has “limited supplies,” requiring her to take a page from her planner.

Adam quips, “You act like that hotel room is a prison,” to which Toni responds, “It feels like it.” Carrying the bit further, Paula asks, “You are able to leave the hotel room, are you not?” Toni laughs but responds seriously by saying it’s a hassle because of valet parking, which necessitates waiting for the car and tipping the valet.

As the group works to cut out a tracing of their hands, Toni instructs them to save the “scrappies” for later use. Bonnie informs her that it’s too late, that she’s already wadded up her scraps, to which Toni, in a non sequitur, replies, “Well you’re not stuck in the hotel prison.” Bonnie expresses concern that Toni sounds unhappy, and Toni admits that hotel living is taking a toll even as she laughs it off and changes the subject.

Now, none of us are going to argue that being stuck living in a hotel with valet parking is the worst possible fate — I’m sure including Toni, hence her continuing to laugh, but that feeling of being trapped is one that can truly be overwhelming. I imagine that what seems like the minor inconvenience of valet parking reminded Toni of all the uncertainty of not knowing when she would be able to live in her own apartment again, hence feeling trapped.

In addition to being a fan of Dickinson (and poetry in general) as well as a Nobody, I admit to enjoying tarot cards. Whether one believes them to be prophetic or not, the imagery on tarot cards can have the same effect as reading poetry. The symbols make one pause and think.

The eight of swords provides a visual for the kind of entrapment that Toni is describing and that I’ve often felt myself.

But the figure on the card isn’t really trapped.

Swords represent ideas or thoughts in tarot, so the woman is trapped by her own thinking. The woman is blindfolded to demonstrate that she can’t see the easy solution to her dilemma. The chains binding her wrists are very loose. She can take them off. The swords surrounding her are spaced far enough apart that she can leave whenever she chooses.

The Dalai Lama has described meeting with a Tibetan monk who had been imprisoned for a long period by the Chinese. The monk shared that he had felt in danger. The Dalai Lama naturally assumed that the monk was referring to danger imposed by his captors, but the monk responded that, no, he had felt in danger from his own thoughts. His thoughts were the worse captor.

It’s easy to feel trapped and to put off doing what needs to happen whether that be small chores or errands that simply appear to be too much nuisance but that pile up and make us feel like we’re imprisoned by them or the big things, such as leaving a toxic life situation.

Fortunately, we can recognize our thoughts as thoughts, as the Tibetan monk did.

We can remove the blindfold and chains.

And we can be Nobodies who use laughter as a way to feel free.