Episode 3: Prose City Podcast

Title: Dolly’s Legacy, the Alberta Street Book Row, and the Great Word Loss

Be sure to see detailed show notes with links below, followed by the full transcript!

Show Notes

Dolly Parton‘s passing leaves a giant hole in the world — but before anything else, Iris and Cricket pay tribute to the legacy she said she wanted to be remembered for: not the queen of country music, but the book lady. They dig into the Imagination Library, which started in 1995 in her Tennessee home county as a tribute to her father who couldn’t read, mailing one free book a month to children from birth to age five — and which, thanks to Governor Tina Kotek’s 2024 statewide expansion and 2026 legislation, now reaches every Oregon child under five in all 36 counties. Cricket remembers the mail-order Pickle Things days of the Parents Magazine Press Read Aloud Originals, Iris gives a shout-out to Mrs. Munson at their hometown library and the Multnomah County Library, and both agree: being read to as a kid is part of why they’re here.

Then: the first leg of the Prose City Portland bookstore tour, on the stretch of NE Alberta Street known as Alberta Street Book Row. Highlights include Green Bean Books (children’s, in a converted house), Midslumber Media (queer, woman-owned horror, guarded by a life-size alien), Parallel Worlds Bookshop (small, tightly packed speculative fiction heaven — Klune, Anders, Le Guin), Monograph Bookwerks (art monographs and rarities, just steps off the row), Vivienne Culinary Books (cookbooks, vintage cookware, cooking classes — like visiting the home of a talented friend), and Melville Books (self-proclaimed Portland’s smallest bookstore, easy to miss, impossible to forget). Plus Botanica La Sirena, stellar coffee, and more in the newsletter.

The big topic: a July 2026 study in Perspectives on Psychological Science found that between 2005 and 2019, we spoke an average of 338 fewer words per day each year — 28% fewer, or more than 120,000 words per year — with participants under 25 losing about 44% more than those over 25. Iris and Cricket connect the dots to the loneliness epidemic, screen time, and headphone-induced solitude, and share their own antidotes: Confluence Cafe, their monthly curated discussion groups, and the quarterly Undercurrent Salon. Want to join or start your own? Email dear@prosecity.org.

Iris also recounts a moving Friday night at Interviewing the Audience with Leif Olsen of the Life Recording Company — four strangers, twenty-minute live interviews, and a potent reminder of what happens when we’re in a room together.

And save the date: the Buckman Journal celebrates the launch of issue Shed on September 12, 3–7 p.m. at the PALS building — free, ADA accessible, complete with cake, crafts, a gallery, literary tarot, and the return of Up Up Books to brick and mortar. Iris and Cricket will be there — come say hey.

Links in the show notes on our website: the study and coverage, the Imagination Library, all the Book Row shops, Interviewing the Audience, Willamette Writers, Literary Arts, and more. Sign up for our newsletter at prosecity.org.

Keep the conversations going out there. Keep reading. We’ll talk to you in about two weeks.

Dolly Parton & the Imagination Library:

Alberta Street Book Row:

Community Events:

  • Interviewing the Audience — Leif Olsen (Life Recording Company) & Brandon Giles (LB Collaborations) — The Social Good Place, SE Portland
  • Buckman Journal: Shed — Grand Opening Party — September 12, 2026 — PALS Building, 1448 NE 28th Ave — buckmanjournal.com

Full Transcript

Iris: Hello and welcome to the Prose City Podcast, episode three. I’m your host, Iris.

Cricket: And I’m Cricket.

I: And we have a whole lot of goodness to share with y’all that has happened since our last episode. A couple of the things we’re going to talk about today: recent bookstore visits since our last episode — we kept our promise to kick off our Portland bookstore tour and report backs. And we’re also going to share our take on a recent study that looks at how we are speaking less and less each year as a society. In fact, it’s not just in the US, it is in other countries as well. And we’ll talk about how it relates to the loneliness epidemic and overall social well being.

C: But before we dive into our main topics of the day, we first have to pay tribute to Dolly. I was super sad to hear about her passing last week after her battle with cancer. She was such an amazing country music icon and cultural icon, a fierce advocate for the LGBTQ community, and she was also a philanthropist. And among her many philanthropic contributions was her Imagination Library. So, I want to talk a little bit about that. Just an amazing, successful program. The Imagination Library program started in 1995 in her home county in Tennessee as a tribute to her father who couldn’t read. And over the years, it spread out all over the world. And the program mails one free book per month to children from birth to age five at no cost to families. So, I didn’t realize how prolific this program was and that it was a worldwide program until recently, doing some research for this podcast, but just such an amazing contribution to children and to the literary community at large.

I: Yeah, I had heard of the program and I think I heard about it around the time it launched a couple times over the years, but I had no idea how much it had grown and its reach and the incredible number of books that Dolly got into the hands of children. And they specifically specify that they are distributing high quality books. And in May 2024, just to bring it closer to home, Governor Tina Kotek here in Oregon announced the statewide expansion of this program from Dolly with the goal of making books available to all children ages zero to five in every single zip code in Oregon, regardless of family income. And as of last year, all of Oregon’s 36 counties had active program coverage. That blows my mind. I don’t think there are a lot of programs out there that can say that. And so in June of this year, June 2026, Governor Kotek signed legislation officially codifying the Imagination Library into Oregon state law, guaranteeing that every child under five in Oregon can receive a free book each month.

C: So that’s amazing. And I did not know this until recently, but Dolly said that she wanted to be remembered as the book lady more so than the queen of country music, which is just awesome. And I really think — I can’t stress the importance of exposure and access to books for children at an early age. And I really credit my early exposure to books and also being read to all the time by my mother as shaping who I became as a child and young adult, and even now. And I remember as a kid, even before I was in kindergarten, I had a subscription to these children’s books, and they were through Parents Magazine Press, which is the book publishing arm of the well known Parents Magazine. And they had this popular series of children’s books called the Read Aloud Originals during the 1970s and 80s. And my mom must have gotten a mail order subscription from the magazine at some point. And I guess that was the primary way that children’s books were sold back then. So through mail order — this is before online orders, before Amazon, and even before there were very many children’s bookstores. But so every month I would get a book in the mail, and it was so exciting to receive a new book every month. And I have really vivid memories of these books — specific titles. I can remember in some cases, like, actual verses from the books, because a lot of them were really simple, rhyming books or had like repetitive lines to kind of help — I mean, they were meant to help you learn to read. And so I was so excited about them. I would memorize like whole phrases, or like in some cases, I remember one book that was a rhyming book called Pickle Things. And it was like, “pickle things you never see, like pickles on a Christmas tree.” And I remember memorizing this book when I was like four years old, and so I thought that meant I could read. I would open the book and recite from memory the verses in this book. But this really shaped my love of books. And, and then going on into kindergarten and elementary school and beyond, having story time was really powerful magic for me at that point in time. I loved being read to as a child and I think just having access to books and being read to helped me to cultivate such a vivid imagination and a sense of curiosity and wonder in the world, and also a deep love and appreciation for the natural world and animals. Because lots of children’s books feature prominently animals, real or imaginary animals. And so I really credit, again, my mom reading to me a lot and getting me access to these books when I was really young. And I think that that’s one of the reasons I really like audiobooks today. I know there’s sometimes some debate about is listening to an audiobook really reading a book? But I just love being read to. It just feels really magic and cozy and reminds me of my childhood. So, kudos to Dolly for doing that amazing work.

I: Yeah, absolutely. And I have to give a shout out to Mrs. Munson. There were multiple librarians at my library growing up, but I distinctly remember Mrs. Munson, and we would go there, and there was this little children’s section in the library, and we did not have money when I was growing up, my family. But to my mom’s credit, she would take us down to the library, and we would just sit there, and she would read to us. We would sit and read there. I think they had some toys as well, and then we would pick out books and take them home, and she would read those to us. So, similar, I think that I really credit the strong start that I got in school as well, which my teachers commented on. I think it’s because my parents had books all over the house, and my mom read to us all the time.

C: Yeah, kudos to all of the librarians out there, all of the teachers, all of the elementary school teachers that read to us as children and continue to do so, all of the literature teachers. You’re doing amazing work.

I: Absolutely. And I’m glad that Multnomah County is one of the best library systems in the entire country. So appreciative of that. So, we mentioned we would talk a little bit about the start of our bookshop tour, and we decided to start off with what has been dubbed by a local weekly as Alberta Street Book Row. It is described as Portland’s longest bookstore row, covering every genre from children’s lit to horror, sci fi to cookbooks, literary fiction to fine art. You can find all of that within a dozen or so blocks on Northeast Alberta Street — very walkable. So we went up there this past weekend, and there are some really stellar coffee shops, food carts, etc. And then off you go. And I believe the first bookstore [to open] there was Green Bean Books, and that’s at 1600 Northeast Alberta. That’s a children’s bookstore. Really cute. And it was founded in 2009 by a former school teacher. So we were just giving shout outs to that, and now helping to get more books out into the world. It’s in a converted house. You’ll recognize that right away. And it’s just a very playful environment. Interestingly enough, right across the street from that is Midslumber Media, which I believe is the newest bookshop there, and that is a queer, woman owned horror bookstore. And they have a lot of videos too. Did they have both VHS and DVD? I think Blu ray, is that right?

C: I believe so. And to me, they seemed like they had more video than books, even. A lot of video, a lot of DVDs, and also horror movie posters as well, and some stickers and other things like that. But yeah, it was really cool. I had never heard of it before.

I: Yeah, and they had some vinyl of soundtracks, CDs, magazines, gifts. In fact, greeting us as we went in the door was this giant, life size alien from the movie Aliens, if I’m getting that right. So that set the mood right away. If you’re into horror, that has got to be a stop for you. You’ll have found your people when you go in there. And then what was the next one that we went to? I think the next one we went to was Parallel Worlds Bookshop.

C: Yes. I was super excited to find that bookstore. Again, I’d never had gone there before. And we live in the far southeast. So we don’t really — I mean, we haven’t gotten out to Alberta very frequently in the last couple of years. So I was not familiar with this bookstore, but I was super excited to discover it. They have a really nice selection of both new and used books. I was able to find some of my favorite speculative fiction slash kind of sci fi fantasy authors. There’s T.J. Klune — he’s one of them. He’s an Oregon author who does some queer, romantic sort of science fiction, speculative fiction. And then Charlie Jane Anders, one of my faves also for sci fi and speculative fiction. And of course, Ursula K. Le Guin, which we would expect them to have as she’s also an Oregon author. But yeah, just — I mean, it’s a small bookstore, but really well curated. Something for everyone there.

I: Yeah, high shelves, including overstock at the top. I’ve heard it described as a tightly packed, well curated little shop. So, not a ton of square footage, but pretty impressive inventory, a pretty impressive selection. And there were even two or three shelves or so in a section of non English language books as well, which was super cool. And then the next one, we were kind of bummed. Fortunately, we’ve been into it before, but I say that we were bummed because when we got to Monograph Bookwerks — which is technically just around the corner, not on Alberta, but truly steps off of Alberta — they had a sign in the window that said that they had to close unexpectedly that day. So we didn’t get to go in this time. We have in the past. And that is a bookshop that specializes in books about fine art, contemporary art monographs — thus the name — rare exhibition catalogs, original artworks, and art world ephemera. So, if that’s your jam…

C: Well, I think it’s a really great place to go if you’re a collector or if you’re getting a gift, you know, a really nice gift for a collector, because they do have very beautiful, rare art books. And I believe that the shop was founded and is owned by artists as well. So, really beautiful selection there. But it’s been a few years since I’ve been able to get inside. And yeah, I was kind of bummed that they were closed when we were there this weekend.

I: And then we went into, for the first time, Vivienne Culinary Books.

C: I cannot believe that that is the first time I’ve been in there because you know me. I love me some cookbooks. I read them for fun a lot of times at night in bed, just for the joy of looking at gorgeous food pictures and plotting and planning what I want my next creation to be.

I: Yeah. And again, just kind of like with Summer Beam books that we talked about last time, I like cookbooks as well. I love good food, but I just, for some reason, was like, eh, culinary books… not sure, you know, that I need to go in there. I so wish that I had [sooner]. It was far more than just books. The books alone, I think it’s a really great selection, but they had a lot more than that.

C: Their vintage cookware! You know, they had all kinds of vintage cookware, and they also offer cooking classes as well. And so it’s a really cute shop. They have all kinds of cuisines, books on fermentation. Of course, I gravitated towards the vegan and vegetarian section, but don’t be fooled because they have lots of vegan books in culturally specific or regionally specific cuisines mixed throughout the store. So just a really cute place, really friendly as well.

I: Yeah. And I heard or saw it described somewhere as — you feel like you’re visiting the home of a talented friend with great taste and an eclectic palate. And that definitely felt right to me. And then finally, we made it to Melville Books. I have to say, I don’t blame myself too much for missing that in the past. It’s not really what I had imagined based on what I had heard, and it’s pretty easy to miss. So that’s why I say that. If you’re walking down Alberta, there’s just kind of this wooden archway with a smallish round sign that just has the letter M overlaid, kind of sitting on top of an open book, which should have clued me in, but it truly is easy to miss if you’re not essentially looking for it. But wow, it felt very enchanted, like stumbling across this really magical treasure. And Cricket, you had talked about your experience…

C: I just love the pathway with the really adorable apple tree draping over it. And then they had some bookshelves that were outside. So the store itself is incredibly small. I mean, there’s a sign in the store that says, “Portland’s smallest bookstore,” and I believe them. But it was very, very small, but they wheeled carts out into the little foyer outside, and they had a really great selection, as well. I think mostly used…

I: Mostly used. I think there was some new.

C: Yeah, literary fiction, but there were also philosophy books. I picked up an Alan Watts book there. There were some nature books as well, so just a really eclectic selection and really fun to look at all the stuff that they had.

I: I will definitely be back. It was so well curated and so tightly packed that I literally got through only half of it. I told the person at the counter — not sure whether it was the owner or not — I’m like, I only made it through half the selection, so I will be back. And just on that first wall I looked at, I found a lot of stuff that really wanted to come home with me. So, we have to make a return there.

And then we should note too that there are a lot of other great shops up there that are not technically bookstores, but have a lot of books, such as the wonderful Botanica La Sirena. We chatted with the person who was working there when we went by, and then some really stellar coffee shops as well. And when we send out our next newsletter, we’ll probably include some photos and a bit more information about both the bookstores we’re talking about as well as some of the other places that we went for coffee.

I: Okay, so we have been talking a lot lately, the two of us and with friends, about something that you all have no doubt seen in the headlines if you are readerly types like us. And that is the fact that — whether you’re looking at Poets and Writers Magazine, Publishers Weekly, the headlines — folks are talking about how people are reading less. And some people have even put forth such ominous ideas as we may be turning into a post literate society, which of course, is not true because we still are able to read and write. But we might be at risk of becoming a post-literary society. And of course, there’s pushback against that as well. But there are a lot of studies and other evidence that folks are reading less and that it is seen as more of a niche hobby than something that is broadly done. I would want to verify more of this evidence, but it is that among young people, according to one YouTube video I watched, when they interviewed folks, they thought of people who were reading, oh, that’s really cute. They’re engaged in this really novel and cute hobby called reading. It wasn’t seen as something that everyone does with any kind of regularity. Am I getting that right?

C: Yeah, and I think that’s sometimes alarming to those of us from Gen X or older who grew up being involved in all of those book clubs in elementary school and whatnot. And reading all the time, reading for fun and getting gold stars for it. So, alongside that, though, it’s like, okay, so people are reading less. That’s wild. I want to learn more.

I: But now this study comes out in July, so last month, and it was in Perspectives on Psychological Science. And now, of course, it’s been covered in The Guardian and all sorts of other news outlets. But the title of that article is, “Sliding into Silence? We Are Speaking 300 Daily Words Fewer Every Year.” That’s an attention grabbing headline. I was like, what? I had to learn more. And so bear with me here. I want to share the facts, right? Because, how are they arriving at this conclusion? So for everyone listening, I want to first kind of lay the groundwork of what these folks are saying in this study. Because again, this has gained quite a bit of traction, and I think justifiably so from what the data tells us. So it says, quote,

“These data feature estimates of daily spoken words for 2,197 participants based on a careful analysis of passively sampled ambient audio recordings of their daily lives. The participants, ranging in age from 10 to 94 years old” — I added the “years old” on the end there — “were part of 22 studies conducted over the span of 14 years and resided mostly in the United States as well as Mexico, Australia, and Europe.”

So, some of the findings there were that for each year between 2005 and 2019, on average, 338 fewer words were spoken per day, which is 28% fewer words spoken per day — more than a quarter. And then another quote:

“It means that each year we speak more than 120,000 words fewer than the previous year.”

So, I wanted to share that because that too is staggering. You hear the monthly number that has decreased, and that’s significant, or the daily — but when you think that over the course of a year it’s 120,000 fewer words, that is pretty sobering. And of course, the authors acknowledge that it is currently unclear whether digital conversation contributes to and can make up for a loss of spoken words, because clearly we’re all texting, sending emails, communicating in other ways. And so the authors don’t know if some of the negative ramifications of communicating with one another less by speaking to one another in person can be made up for via those digital channels. But it’s interesting, because a lot of times these sorts of studies, especially in a scientific publication like that, an academic publication, really try to stay relatively neutral. But these authors’ take on this kind of comes through. And so they say in that paper,

“If pressed for an opinion, we as psychologists would argue that spoken live conversations involve different social and cognitive processes than typed conversations, and that such live conversations can elicit benefits in wellbeing that apps and social media cannot readily replace.”

Also, the thing that just about knocked me over was this: the younger participants, those under 25, lost about 44% more words than folks over the age of 25. So that’s pretty wild.

C: Yeah, I mean, I definitely wasn’t in this study because I think I’m talking more now than ever in my life.

I: [Laughing] Same!

C: I’ve always, always loved talking since I was a child. So this does not apply to me. And I always try to be careful when studies like this come out. I work at a university, so I am often around young 18 to 25 year olds pretty regularly, and I have observed this. I have certainly observed this with the young people that I work with. And I’ve also taught classes at university, and I do notice an uncomfortable level of silence sometimes in my classes and really encourage students to speak out more. But I always try to be careful about not projecting my age and my upbringing on the younger generations — like, oh my God, we’re doomed, society is doomed, it’s collapsing because young people today are not doing what we did when we were younger, right? But at the same time, this is concerning to me a little bit because I think that, like, how we’ve evolved as human beings… I mean, I’m an anthropology major. I love thinking about how human cultures have developed through time. And of course, I love storytelling, and I think that’s a huge part of who we are as human beings. And so, yeah, it is concerning to hear this. I think communicating with people is what helps us feel connected. And with the loneliness epidemic that we keep hearing about as well — I mean, obviously, this has got to be somewhat connected to that, or fueling it, or a product of it, or something.

I: Yeah, totally agree. And, you know, Cricket mentioned that she is an anthropology major and I have studied sociology — my master’s was in essentially the theory and practice of how adults learn. So this is concerning for me as well. I absolutely understand that things can change and that habits change, the ways we interact and communicate with one another can change. But when we’re losing that level of verbal communication with one another, it does give me pause. And I don’t want to be swift to make decisions about what that means for the future, et cetera, but one thing that the authors say is,

“When we speak less, we connect less. With every lost word, we wear away our connections with others. This loss is alarming because we are already in the middle of a loneliness epidemic” — and the U.S. Surgeon General, Vivek Murthy, said that back in 2023 — “in which social isolation and a loss of connection to others have become a problem of societal dimensions. By bleeding words, we bleed everyday social connection, possibly daily wellbeing. There are clear links between loneliness and poor health outcomes, and there is equally clear evidence for a relationship between daily conversation quantity and wellbeing.”

And I’ve got other things that I thought about sharing here from The Guardian — they have an opinion piece on this that I really liked what they had to say. But I just think that if you take a look out there, you’ll find other stories, opinion pieces, news pieces, et cetera, about this study, and we’ll link to all this in the show notes, including to the study itself. We just thought that this was worth talking about because I think it has implications for the literary community as well.

C: Yeah, and part of what we’ve done at Prose City is, we’ve been doing some discussion groups for the last couple of years, in our home. We have a couple of different cohorts going. We call it Confluence Cafe, and the origin of these discussion groups really came about with Iris and one of their close friends who were talking about their desire to have more indepth and nuanced conversation, and how in our modern day society, a lot of our conversations are either incredibly polarized, as you see in the media, in politics, or very shallow, transactional, superficial. And so they started the Confluence Cafe as a way to bring people together who are interested in reading articles, having some discussion prompts, really getting deep into these conversations. And so that’s really taken off. And we have two of them going on with about 10 members in each one, and I have really value that experience for a number of reasons. I mean, one is, I have friends in some of these groups who I’ve known for well over a decade, and I am still discovering new things about them all the time by virtue of these discussion groups that I would never otherwise know. Because when we meet to hang out or we go to a show together or whatever, we’re not necessarily having these specifically curated topical conversations, these nuanced conversations. You know, it’s more like catching up. “How have you been? What have you been up to? What’s going on with your dad? What’s going on with your business,” et cetera. And so that’s been really amazing. And I think that those who have been coming have enjoyed it for that reason as well. And I just think that we don’t get a lot of opportunities in our lives to do that. I mean, even if you’re a very social person and you’re going out to parties and you have friends, there’s just not that many opportunities to have these kind of depthy, nuanced conversations. And again, we meet monthly, we take turns choosing topics, and usually it’s centered around an article or two — sometimes maybe a YouTube video or a TED talk or something like that — and then some discussion prompts to kind of guide the conversation a little bit. But we get all over the place, you know, we really get out there, and oftentimes in the midst of our discussions we identify other topics we want to get into more in depth. So I really think that this is one, I guess, antidote to loneliness, to isolation, to feeling a lack of connection — to either host something like this yourself amongst your friends, or, you know, if you don’t have the capacity to do that, or you don’t have a lot of friends who are interested in this, there are lots of different opportunities to plug in with events in Portland as well.

I: Yeah, I saw a video — it was shared with me actually by someone in a workshop last week — where someone was talking about the difference between having what you might call a network. Like, people are like, oh, but I have 200 friends on Facebook and I have X number of followers on Instagram and I have X number of likes on TikTok, whatever those measures might be. And yet people feel lonelier and more disconnected than ever. So clearly those things not only aren’t helping, but I think in many ways are making it worse. And for that reason, when I first read some of the information from this study, I just started thinking about possible contributors. And of course, social media was there, but I wasn’t entirely surprised. But when I saw it quantified, that’s when I was blown away, because the numbers are pretty shocking. But on the whole, it makes sense. And now we layer AI on top of that, right? And so it seems like our technologies and overall societal infrastructure is increasingly engineered to put us into silos where we will consume more, where we’re reliant on certain entities to provide for us. So there’s that, there’s screen time. And then I also just think about how many people I see walking around with headphones on. And I think that that was mentioned briefly in something I saw around this study. And I get it, because when I’m walking around, I will often call it my, like, “don’t mess with me” face or something like that, because I don’t want to be approached and aggressively sold on one more subscription, and frankly, sometimes just not even signing something else. Or we just sometimes need to just get from point A to point B, and I super get that, but we’re missing those little interactions. And then we have groceries delivered — perhaps we might have dinner delivered, you know, food takeout — and every one of those are possible places for human interaction if we’re elsewhere in an in-person setting. And that’s just scratching the surface, but there’s just so much to this.

C: Yeah. I mean, I do think that under capitalism, we’re constantly bombarded by — buy this, do this — social media, advertisements, trying to be sold something left and right. And so I do understand why some people just want to totally check out. And at the same time, I’m really heartened by the fact that I keep seeing headlines and reading articles about Gen Z going analog — they’re ditching their iPhones for flip phones, or they’re going back to iPods and DVDs or VHSes or CDs. I love that. And I think that our youth are actually kind of getting fed up a little bit with having the latest tech just shoved down their throats. And I think that some of them are really missing that human connection, or that connection to art, that connection to music. And so I love that. And I feel like just having old school discussion groups and salons and whatnot is like the analog version of whatever social media is nowadays. So, I love that.

I: Yeah. So look for a cassette tape version of our podcast in a shop near you soon. [Both laugh.] Maybe we’ll start a radio station. [Laughs.]

C: Although I mean, I think to purchase a cassette player nowadays is probably hundreds of dollars on eBay. That’s the cost of that. The demand is so high that the cost of it is going up. I just feel really happy that we still have an old school CD boombox here. So, yeah, so if the internet ever dies, I still have, like, the Smashing Pumpkins B-sides box set — hello! — and a CD, DVD, Blu ray player.

I: Oh, yeah, we have that. I think I have a crate of — and we have the Singles [movie], yeah, Singles on VHS.

C: So, yeah, we need a VHS player.

I: So, we’re right there with you, y’all. And Cricket talked a little bit about these events that we have been holding here at our house, the Confluence Cafe. Once in a while, every quarter or so, we have a bigger gathering that’s our Undercurrent Salon, that tends to have, you know, 18 to 22 people there. So, these are curated discussion groups where we are in person — hopefully we don’t have screens in the mix — and we’re just looking each other in the eye and having nuanced conversations as humans, which feels delightful.

C: And if you ever are interested in hosting your own and you want some tips, I would be more than happy to connect with you. Just reach out to us at our email, which is dear@prosecity.org. So, it’s like you’re starting a letter: D-E-A-R at prosecity.org. And I’d be happy to connect with you and talk with you about how to create something like that.

I: Yeah, we might talk a little bit more about that, either on an episode or a bonus episode or post on our blog or something like that. But yeah, it has been incredibly fun. We’ve met some of the best people, had some of the most heartfelt conversations. I am a better person for having them, for sure.

C: The group has actually changed a little bit over time — some people have dropped off, new people have been added — so that kind of keeps things a little interesting. Fun. But some of them have said this is the highlight of their week or their month. So we’re really excited that we can provide that space.

I: Yeah, and it has been that for me for sure. So, on a similar vein, a dear friend of mine invited me to an event on Friday night, this past Friday night, that I had not heard about. And it was something called Interviewing the Audience. And that immediately caught my attention, because I used to fantasize about being a journalist. I subscribed to the American Journalism Review, the Columbia Journalism Review, and I still kind of track that realm. And so I love interviews. I love oral histories and so forth. So this event was called Interviewing the Audience. It was at a space called the Social Good Place. It’s a couple blocks off Hawthorne [in Southeast]. And they have a coworking space there. It seems like a really incredible physical space. It was pleasant to be there. But this particular event was run by Leif Olsen of the Life Recording Company, and it was organized by Brandon Giles of LB Collaborations. And just so I can do it justice, I’ll just share what they said on the little half sheet flyer that I saw. So they described their event this way:

“Every so often you stumble into an interaction with a stranger. For a moment, you connect with a random person having a brief conversation you didn’t know was coming. Through that chance encounter and surprise conversation, you may find yourself reminded of other ways to live your own life. You get a glimpse of the world you know recombined into something foreign but familiar. Our goal is to illuminate the worlds of four people in the audience this evening. Interviewer Leif Olsen leverages their playfulness and curiosity to encourage members of the audience to talk about themselves for a while. The remaining audience listens and learns from the gems and insights of people living lives different from their own.”

First, I have to say, Leif was really good. But then, to hear 20 minute interviews with each of these four people selected from the audience was not what I expected. It was really cool. I’m still thinking a lot about what I heard on Friday. And that just made me think again of the power of sharing stories, talking with one another, gathering in person, and so forth. So, yeah, I really enjoyed that. We will include information in the show notes, because this is what Leif actually does for a living, from what I understand: your friends or loved ones get interviewed, and then Leif will edit and remix that with some chill electronic music, and then it becomes something that you own with the stories of these folks that you value. So that could be a great gift or whatnot. Leif is not a sponsor. [Laughs.] I was just so impressed by that that I wanted to share it.

C: And I also want to add that Willamette Writers has a lot of really amazing events for writers in Portland, including write-ins through Zoom that do have a conversation and connection component. And Literary Arts also has a lot of different events that they host — some of them are free, some of them are paid — and those are other ways to connect with people in deeply meaningful ways, in terms of discussion, literary elements, etc.

I: There are definitely points in our day to day when we don’t feel like engaging, but when we do, there are a lot of ways to do that. And then, while we’re on this topic of the importance of getting together and seeing one another in person and celebrating one another in a literary context for our purposes here: some dear friends of ours in the literary community that we have been enjoying what they’ve been producing and publishing, and have just known from the neighborhood and the area, is the Buckman Journal. And they’re having their upcoming release party — and I think it’s also perhaps a bit of a grand opening for their new building space. So that is on September 12th, and it is at PALS, or the PALS building. And PALS stands for Portland Arts and Literary Society, which is, I think, some new nomenclature that came with that building. So, they’re celebrating the launch of the current issue, which is called Shed — that is the kind of theme and name of the latest issue of the Buckman Journal. And as always with their launch parties for each new issue, they have snacks, drinks, they’re going to have some cake, crafts, visual arts in a gallery that’s there in the space. And I’m also really excited to say that Up Up Books is going to be in that building as well. So, Up Up Books used to be over in what we used to call the Vegan Mini Mall on Southeast Stark. And then at some point — I think perhaps during the pandemic, I don’t recall — they went from being a brick and mortar space to an online only store. And now they’re back with a physical space inside of this new building. So, really excited by that. It’s again on September 12th from 3 to 7 p.m. There are also going to be free literary tarot readings. So, that has definitely piqued my interest. And I want to note too that it is entirely free, open to everybody, and it is ADA accessible. So, I’m happy they’re putting that messaging out there, and I’m happy to know that that’s the case for that building. So, we will be there — if you see us, come and say hey.

C: We used to live in Buckman, and we were really close neighbors, right next door, to one of the instigators of Buckman Journal. So, we will be there. Come say hi.

I: I’m looking at my list of show notes for this episode, and it is long. What that means for y’all… including the list of all of the bookshops we talked about, we might mention some of the non bookshop spots that we visited while we were up there on Alberta — coffee shops and other little shops. We’ll link to the study that we talked about and to some of the other coverage of that study. So the show notes are going to be chock full of goodness this time. And we also will have a full transcript. We’re really committed to that. And I think that that might be a wrap for today. Anything else that we need to share, Cricket?

C: We’ve talked so much, we’re going to turn that study on its head. [Both laugh.]

I: Absolutely. We’re making up for everyone else.

C: Making up for lost words.

I: Yes. All right, y’all. Well, we will continue our Portland bookstore tour. If you’re not getting our newsletter yet, definitely visit prosecity.org and sign up for that, because you do get some additional goodies in addition to what we share in the podcast. And keep the conversations going out there. Keep reading. We’d love to know what y’all are up to. And we will talk to you very soon — in about two weeks.

I: What’d you think?

C: Best one yet.

I: You liked it?

C: Best one yet.

[Both laugh.]

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