The NPR Interview

I’m a thinker and a dreamer, sometimes to my benefit and sometimes for my detriment.  But I’m not very good at just sitting there thinking like a normal person.  I have to work out my ideas and dreams externally.  This blog, for instance, is a tool for me to develop my ideas and examine myself, but I can’t blog all of the time; especially not in the car.  Enter the NPR interview.

I listen to a lot of National Public Radio;  shows like Morning Edition, Here and Now, All Things Considered, This American Life, and Fresh Air.  One thing that all of these shows have in common are interviews.  I’ve listened to every kind of interview imaginable on these programs:  authors, inventors, politicians, civil servants, military personnel, musicians, journalists, scientists, actors.

I suspect it’s not an uncommon fantasy to be interviewed.  We’ve seen regular folks live out these kinds of fantasies in the form of wildly dramatic eye witness reports. People who have been ready for this moment for years.  People who have done absolutely nothing but witness something.  It’s produced it’s superstars:  Sweet Brown (Ain’t nobody got time for that), Hide your kids, hid your wife, Sir John, and many others.

I admit, I have fantasies of being interviewed.  I imagine being interviewed for just about anything: music, programming, writing, viewpoints on any topic, career, and job interviews.  I’ve heard enough NPR interviews that I can simulate one very easily.  Although there is some vanity and narcissism involved in these fantasies, it is primarily for working things out.

I’ll be driving home from work, and I can’t focus on my audiobook, NPR, or music.  My brain is wrestling with something.  So I turn off the radio and begin the interview. I can interview the whole thirty minute commute.  In fact, I will sit in the car in the driveway to finish up an interview if it is important enough.

Often the interview’s focus is on circumstances which haven’t occurred that I wish would occur, or I think I wish.  I won’t know if I really wish it until I’ve worked through the interview.  It is a way of in envisioning and even manifesting the future.  My hope is that by taking the time to imagine what I want, it will become manifest.

I suspect that many people have witnessed me talking to myself at the traffic light.  I hope that they think I’m on a hands free phone call, but I don’t really care all that much.  Actually, I enjoy catching someone doing something odd in their car.  Why would I deny that to someone?

An interview might go like this.

[Before I continue, I must point out that NPR interviewees tend to use the phrase sort of lavishly, and even though I detest it it’s important to be authentic,  so sometimes I do it out of a desire to fit the NPR interviewee mold. The proper way of saying it is beginning with a very brief pause followed by a very quick “sortof” which runs quickly into the subject.  I’ve written a [pause] sortof-web serial.   The purpose of sort of being to avoid making any [pause] sortof-absolutes.]

Interviewer:  I’m speaking to David Wilson-Burns, author of the web serial The Smell Collector which is being made into a major motion picture.  David, it’s good to have you on the show.  First of all, why don’t you explain to our listeners what a web serial is?

Me: A web serial is a novel which is sort of broken into a series of publications; chapters or parts or sort of episodes.  My hope is that it will be a sort of renaissance of the form so powerfully sort of championed by writers like Charles Dickens.  That’s what makes The Smell Collector exciting to me.  Rather than novelize my story and try to sell it, I’ve serialized it for anyone to read for free.  I published it sort of one week at a time.  This creates a sense of suspense with my readers that you just can’t get from a novel.  It becomes a sort of community of readers.

[etc.]

Although this was a fantasy, several readers did express that they thought it was cinematic.  I saw it that way from the beginning, so much so that I even cast it with actors just for fun.  I really wanted this serial to catch on.  Although it was not great writing in a tradition sense due to it’s eccentric form, I felt that it was my most original idea, but it never really gained any traction.  You might say, well of course it didn’t, no one reads web serials.  But that’s not true, Worm has had millions of views. In fact the author of the Worm even reviewed The Smell Collector. He entitled it The Smell Collector Doesn’t Stink.  It was a mixed review at best.

The interviews helped me envision what I wanted for this work.  It was a fantasy, sure, but it was the expression of my desire for it to be successful.  Powerful intent can make things happen.  The Universe has a way of responding to our fervent desires.   But alas, I think some things are simply lost causes.  But I enjoyed the interviews.  I enjoyed the fantasy.  And there’s nothing wrong with that.

Sometimes I have an idea which bears developing.  It may be a spiritual idea, for example.  Through a series of questions and answers I become more able to articulate my idea or I may find that it does or doesn’t have merit.  If it does have merit, I might write about it, or I may just tuck it away for a future conversation with an actual person.  I interviewed myself daily when writing The Eight Fold Path to Beatific Living.

Finally, there is the job interview.  This isn’t the same thing as an NPR interview, and it’s the most important interview I practice.  When I begin to get the sense that I might have to interview for another job, I begin practicing.  I’ve been in enough interviews to know what most of the questions will be.  I practice answering them, especially the ones that might trip me up.  But this is far more than Q&A, this is the practice of a method.  My best interviews have been the ones where I talk the least and they talk the most.  I become a consultant.  I ask questions like “What is the number one challenge that your business is facing today?”  “What technical issues are standing in the way of accomplishing your companies goals?”  These kinds of questions put me in a position to consult instead of interview.  It puts me in a position to propose solutions. When they explain their most complicated, troublesome issues and I listen actively, I suspect that they get the impression that I explicitly understand their issues.  I’m much better at that than answering technical programming questions.

There is an art to any kind of interview; even a fake one.  I don’t really use the “sort of” crutch when I interview.  There are “sort of” gray areas, but I’m not afraid to state a fact outright. I believe in choosing words which are custom fit to my ideas.  I rarely use words like thing, stuff, good, bad, or nice; rather, I’m specific.  I rarely use idioms.  I use illustrations for more complicated ideas. I don’t take it to a negative place.  I don’t ramble.  I know when to let NPR ask another question.

Oddly enough,  I’m not the only member of my family who does this. My twin and my cousin have been doing this all along without knowing that I was doing it.  I don’t know what this has to say about my genes, but it does suggest that it is my nature. I’m a born interviewee, and I look forward to the day when NPR finally calls me.