Episode 8 - The One Where I Meet My Brothers

Everybody Knows But Me - Holly Brown, Next Chapter Podcasts, Companion Arts

Holly Brown recounts her emotional first meeting with her half-brothers during a chaotic Thanksgiving gathering, revealing how the surprise encounter turned into a pivotal moment of healing and self-acceptance. The episo

Key takeaways

• Family bonds are chosen, not inherited

Transcript preview

Next Chapter Podcasts. Podcasts. Hello, my little Trauma Club, my everybody's. I'm kicking things off with a very special announcement. Are you sitting down? Everybody knows but me is having its first ever live stand-up show on Thursday, July 16th in Los Angeles. It's at the upright Citizens Brigade Theater in Hollywood. tickets are available now. And if you've been listening to the podcast, then you know UCB holds a very special place in my heart to do our first ever live show. The show is called The Fucked Up Family Hour, and it's a night of stand-up comedy about generational trauma, family secrets, and the people we love who really fucking screwed us up. Along with some incredible comedians, I'll be headlighting with even more insane family stories that unfortunately are in fact fact. all true. For tickets, head to UCB comedy.com or my Instagram at Holly Brown comedy. That's Thursday July 16th at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theater in Hollywood. And if you're coming, let me know. I would... Our show is recorded in front of a live studio audience. like you hall all it's kind of cute how naive you are you actually think will Smith will still want to do television when we're in our 30s he'll probably be winning Oscars. Oh my god Eric shut up don't make me slap you. Hey, you lovable little mutant. How about we play that game where I time you and see how fast you can get me something? Yeah, if you're going to come out here and annoy us, how about making something to eat? I'm starving. Holly, please tell your friend here that I... Oh, come on, one time you made me a crab cake from scratch in under four minutes. I was so shocked at how good it was. Didn't matter that neither of us had any idea what real crab taste like. I'm not a baby I'm 10 years old I don't care about being time three two one okay I'm going to be in time three two one okay I'm going Seriously, though, Hull. You're like so chill and funny. You're not like other girls. Oh, thanks, I guess? Actually, I've been meaning to ask you something. You don't have like someone to go to Homecoming with yet, do you? Wow! Um, Eric, I... I don't know what to say. I don't really see you that way as like a homecoming date. Do you? Wow, um, Eric, I... I don't know what to say. I don't really see you that way as like a home coming date Told you I'd be right back. Hope you like waffles. That was bizarrely fast. Thanks. It's my special recipe. Takes no time at all. Oh no. So stop eating. Spit it out, spit it out now. Why? It's actually pretty good. I think like secret and greedy... Oh God, I'm right. It's bad. Carson, dude, why the hell would you do that to my friend? Well, why the heck are you letting your friend be such a jerk to me? All I wanted to do was hang out with you guys. And it's like, totally obvious he was trying to be a skizoid to you anyways. You could tell that, huh? Duh! I also know that if I don't do your chores for you, the FBI will not be. sending me to Guantanamo Bay. Yeah, I overshot that one, I admit it. I'm smarter and I see way more than you guys think I do. And I thought we were supposed to stick together, what with dad being sick and mom all zonked out all the time. Not that I need you to look out for me anyways. I got my own stuff going on, like, grappling up buildings. So whatever. be annoying. I've just been trying my best to keep it together without being sad all the time and sometimes I need a break from family stuff even if it's just you. Sad all the time? Pth, I wish I knew what that was like. Yeah, I guess you're too tough to get sad, huh? How about you use that grappling hook to climb up on the roof here with me so I can see how it works? Really? screaming and puking in my bathroom. Yada, you know the whole routine. The idea that if someone shares your DNA, you're automatically supposed to love them, help them, and spend every single holiday with them. And look, I get it. Casey, Carson, and I have so much in common. We have the same big smiles. We're all eerily, almost the exact same height. We get freckles in the summer. We have my mom's thick hair. We have the same and we can harmonize suspiciously well because we got our dad's voice. It's obvious when you're around us that we are siblings. But I've never looked at my brother and sister and thought, that's what makes them my family. Because there were plenty of times growing up that I hated my own parents. There were years where I saw them as strangers actively ruining my life and a chance at a future. And I spent a long time wondering family rules only seem to apply in one direction. Family comes first. You have to be there for family. You don't turn your back on family. Okay. Well, then where the hell was everybody? Look, that's not a question I ask nearly as often as I used to. Or at all, really. I've learned a lot since then about my family's lore, what people saw and didn't, what they assumed. But it's also not something. thing you completely shake. Once you've spent years watching people ignore a problem that feels impossible to miss from your point of view, part of you always does wonder. But the bond between my siblings and me didn't just come from mutual genetics and spending every Christmas together. It was in large part because we survived together. We can't drink milk anywhere near the expiration date without it reminding us of eating spoiled food as kids. We hate hospitals after spending so much time in them. We laugh about the same morbid memory of my friend pranking my mom's drug suppliers. We lived through the same impossible situations. Before this podcast, I never understood family as something you automatically inherit. I understood it as something you build and fight for. Something you choose over and over. again. And yet society has always had these designated family days. And historically, you do not get to choose who you spend them with. Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, Flag Day, International Panic Day, which is real and happens to be the day I'm writing this episode. Okay, fine, maybe not that last one, but don't panic, the point remains. The episodes of real life were aunts, uncles, cousins, everyone is expected to show up, sit at the same table, act like a cohesive unit, and pretend everything is normal no matter what. Oh Lord, be honest, are we the most pathetic family in the universe or what? Amen! Did I want to go to my grandmothers for Thanksgiving most years as a kid? Where there was always the risk of her making her making a me cry if my manners weren't perfect or a backhanded insult about what I was wearing. Can't say I did. But it's a holiday. It's the family you know and you have to go. And if you're lucky, family that you are excited to see is around to help you make the most of it. But when two more younger brothers suddenly entered the picture, it didn't even enter my mind at 17, that I would someday spend a holiday that I would someday spend a holiday, that I would someday with them. Surely that would take some time to get to, right? You got to realize those of us on the outside, especially Cage and I, because we've been in those boys' lives since they were little, and we saw so much of mark in them, we saw so much common traits between the five of you. And it's like, why can't they all get together? They're siblings, have siblings, but they share so much in common that we can see on the outside looking in and they've never even met each other. Well, I certainly didn't think I'd be tricked into spending the biggest family holiday with them the first time I ever freaking met them. But then again, this was always how the riders were going to do it, wasn't it? Because sitcom extended family characters kind of have a habit of popping in to unintentionally make things infinitely more complicated. From next chapter, podcast and companion arts, this is Everybody knows but me, the one where I meet my brothers. Hey there, everybody's. Has this ever happened to you? Okay, I'm gonna get some work done today and oh great, non-stop intrusive thoughts, aka my own personal super villain. Ever feel stuck in a loop you can't get out of, full of problems that there's no real way for you to fix. My God, I just want to to enjoy my latte while working in this cute artisanal coffee shop but my brain has decided that today is the day we revisit that weird thing I said to a coworker in 2018 I mean what if they still think about what if everyone still thinks about it.