Michelle Obama: The Light Podcast
Elizabeth Alexander, Washington DC
Season One, Episode 7
Little Everywhere / Higher Ground Productions / Audible
Speaker:
Higher Ground and Audible Originals present, Michelle Obama, The Light Podcast.
Elizabeth Alexander:
It is wonderful to be here, and I'm so excited about the evening that we have ahead, and I want to tell you about my beloved sister friend Michelle Obama.
We're here to talk about a long friendship. Michelle and I first met more than 30 years ago in a magical village in Chicago called Hyde Park. President Obama and I were both teaching at the university there, well before he became the president, well before it was even an idea, it was before any of us had children. It was before we moved away to other cities and new adventures. But from that moment on, Michelle and I have been on a life journey together. We were pregnant with our first children, Malia and Solo at the same time, and called ourselves comadres. We called ourselves comadres, and we've been at each other's sides through the changes of motherhood as they grew to adulthood, the changing nature of familyhood, the twists and turns of careers, evolving bodies, growing older, making new dreams. Tonight, I am so honored and so very, very happy to introduce to you my beloved sister of 30 years, Michelle LaVaughn Robinson Obama.
Michelle Obama:
Hey everyone, this is Michelle Obama and welcome to The Light Podcast. Now it won't surprise you to hear me say that Barack is my best friend. It's the standard answer for married people, but it also has the benefit of being true in our case. He is the love of my life, my partner in all things, and someone who has seen me through the good, the bad, and everything in between. But honestly, I don't depend on Barack for everything. As much as I love him, I know that's too much to ask of anyone, and that's why I'm someone who takes her friendships very seriously. Whether I met you three months ago or three decades ago, if we've built a meaningful friendship, I will work hard to foster our relationship and be there for you when you need me. I've got your back because I know you got mine.
And one of those people I know without a doubt that I can count on is my dear friend Elizabeth Alexander. It felt like a warm blanket to sit down with her for a long, soulful conversation about friendship, fostering them, nurturing them, the deep humanity that lies within them. Now, I've known Elizabeth for 30 years, since long before the presidency was even a glimmer in Barack's eye. She's a distinguished poet and writer and academic, but to me, she's even more than that. She's an authentic and genuine friend, and she'll always have a spot at my kitchen table. I hope you enjoy our conversation.
My honey, sister, girlfriend, everything, Elizabeth, this woman, we could talk about her for hours. She is brilliant, and thank you. Thank you for sharing this night with me.
Elizabeth Alexander:
It is so wonderful to be able to do this and to have so many things to talk about, starting in the zone of friendship, the sacred zone of friendship, and long, long friendship. That 30 years surprised me when I added it up. It's like, "The kids aren't 30."
Michelle Obama:
30, really? We don't look it, do we? We don't look like we done anything.
Elizabeth Alexander:
I'm not trying to look it.
Michelle Obama:
We are not trying, trying to look it at all.
Elizabeth Alexander:
What I want to talk about is what I appreciate about our friendship. I've written some things down and I have some more things to say.
Michelle Obama:
Don't make me cry. Don't do that.
Elizabeth Alexander:
We're not going to cry till later. Maybe we'll build up to it. I appreciate its safety. I appreciate its family. I appreciate its honesty. It's sometimes very bracing honesty, but always true honesty, because that's what is so important. Those are just some of the things. And I wanted to go to the part in the book where you write about the weekends at Camp David that we would have with the girlfriends and what it was like to make new friends when you were First Lady and what your friendships mean to you now as the girls have become adults and you and the President have moved into new stages of life.
Michelle Obama:
I write a whole chapter, which I call my kitchen table, and this is a book about the tools that I've adopted over the years that help keep me balanced and upright, because that's a lot of what people write to me about, they ask me about, especially in these times. This is not all the answers, but these are the answers that have helped me. And as we've said time and time again, the goal is to create a conversation because we all have the tools. It's just that we are often not asked to reflect upon them and realize how we're using them. And one of my biggest tools is my kitchen table, and why I call it a kitchen table is that that's where in a lot of families where all the happenings go on, is at the kitchen table. And my kitchen table on Euclid Avenue was that safe space for me.
It was a little bitty house, a little bitty table. But my brother and I, we could come there, we could throw the worries off our backs from the day, we could sit and share, be ourselves, be seen. That table from a very early age was important to me. And as I grew, I just added to it. And when I got to the White House, it became even more important to have a strong kitchen table, people around me who had my back, who were a safe haven for me, who could see me beyond what the world was trying to pin on me, and girlfriends at the table were critical. And our friendship started way back in Chicago, as you said. And seeing the pictures of Solo and Malia, what was beautiful about our friendship then, and what I learned from it was that that was the first time I realized that you really cannot do this life alone.
Elizabeth Alexander:
That's right.
Michelle Obama:
And we would get together at friends' houses. We had an elder group of individuals who would cook a couple of nights a week, and they would invite us over with our kids. And there was just a beauty as a young mother of being able to come to a space where there was a community of people who would pick up your baby. Just give you a second. A lot of mothers are shaking their head, you just needed a minute so that you could get a breather so that they could then show up well for them, we had that space together. We got fed at that table. We were loved at that table. We were unconditionally loved, and our sisterhood grew from there. Solo and Malia were playing on the floor together.
Elizabeth Alexander:
Or sitting next to each other in where we would say, "They're friends aren't they? They are friends."
Michelle Obama:
Certainly they're friends and they're going to be married. They're going to love each other and they're going to be married.
Elizabeth Alexander:
Yes. And I remember also that what you learned from people who have done it before, simple stuff, that one night Solo was fussing and one of our group of friends, and I got upset because I was new mother, new baby, baby's crying, babies aren't supposed to cry ever, just give him two wooden spoons.
Michelle Obama:
Two wooden spoons.
Elizabeth Alexander:
And he just started click, click, clacking away, and he was fine for the next hour. But I think that idea also that our children were welcome because children are welcome, which I think is something that's also really important in this idea of family, not just the children who happened to live in your home. All of the children were welcome.
Michelle Obama:
Yeah.
Elizabeth Alexander:
And I think also, you talk about this in the book, when you became First Lady, things became very different and you couldn't roam the land freely in friendship.
Michelle Obama:
I was in the friendship bubble at the time.
Elizabeth Alexander:
The friendship bubble, you had to be the one to get us together.
Michelle Obama:
And also I knew the importance of having friends, even as First Lady, I had a crop of what I call in the book, my barnacles, people like Elizabeth, those stalwart friends who were with you throughout the years, they are sturdy and hard, and they're crusty, and they last and they're cute. They're cute and crusty. I had my barnacles, but when we came to the White House, Malia and Sasha were still young. They were fifth grade and second-graders, and we were trying to make sure that their life was as normal as possible. And in order for their lives to be possible, I had to be a normal mother, which meant that I had to have mom friends. I had to know what was going on in the school and you know what's going on from the other parents. Yes. And you also know which parents not to be bothered with too.
Elizabeth Alexander:
That's right.
Michelle Obama:
Yes.
Elizabeth Alexander:
Everybody knows that.
Laura:
I'm Laura, and I'm from Oakland, California. This is my best friend, Amanda. We all have a mom's group. We all had babies together. Our babies were born the year that he was inaugurated. And we all came together at the hospitals. And we all had never met each other before and ended up spending every Tuesday and Thursday together trying to navigate the newness of motherhood and what that meant for all of us.
Amanda:
This dates back 14 years. We didn't have the benefit of the instant communication, but we would email each other at all hours because you're navigating how to breastfeed and, "Oh, my baby's not sleeping." And there was always somebody that was available. We had a group email, and it would be three in the morning and there would be somebody else, and you didn't feel quite so alone.
Laura:
Take care of you, take care of the baby, you eat, baby eats, you sleep, baby sleeps. Those were the ground rules.
Amanda:
And you're killing it, even though you're flushing it.
Laura:
If you can do those four things, you win. Here we are 14 years later at Michelle Obama's speaking tour.
Michelle Obama:
I just loved hearing those stories. And when we left off, Elizabeth and I were talking about friendship too. Now, I'll be honest, when our family first moved into the White House, making friends felt pretty daunting. But nonetheless, I knew I couldn't make it through four, or hopefully eight years, living in isolation.
It was critical that I get in there and meet some people. But how do you meet people when you're surrounded by armed guards where people literally cannot touch you. They can't come up and shake your hand because they'll be like, "Down Ma'am." I was like, "Well, that could have been a friend."
They don't care about my friends. In order for me to make that happen, I had to extend myself. And I tell the story in the book of one of those first friends who was now a lifelong friend. Her name is Denielle. I tell the story of, because I picked her. I picked her because to tell the truth, the kids went to Sidwell. It was not that many black kids in the school. And I saw little Olivia who was a little black girl, and I was like, "You're going to have a play date Sasha with Olivia. That's Olivia." Now at the time, Olivia and Sasha hated each other. Sasha was like, "I don't like Olivia. She did something to me." And I was like, "Well, you're going to have a play date with her because I need a friend."
They are now the best of friends, and we make them thank us for that. But I saw Denielle and I liked her because she wasn't all up on me. She wasn't thirsty. And there were those that were always right here. And let me tell you something. And she would always fade into the back, and I was like, "I want to invite Olivia over to a play date." But the experience of having a play date with the daughter of the First Lady is an experience. I didn't realize until afterwards, she told me the story of what that experience was like for her picking up her child from the play date at the White House. She told me, first, she got her hair and nails done.
Elizabeth Alexander:
Of course.
Michelle Obama:
Got her car washed because as a black woman, she was thinking about her mother going, "You are not going to show up in that house with a dirty car and messed up nails." It was a Saturday, nothing was going on, but she got her car washed and nails done. She wasn't even supposed to be getting out of the car. That wasn't the plan but just in case. She wasn't even going to drive it up on that driveway looking messy. You have to leave your social security number. You have to give all of your personal information just to pick your child up from my house. The play date is over. I know Denielle is downstairs to pick up Olivia. And usually the procedure is that the President, First Lady do not leave the residence. The guests are escorted up and down by what are called ushers.
And I thought, "I can't let this child be walked out of a play date by some man. That's not normal." And I know her mother's going to want to know what happened. It's like, "Did Olivia act the fool up in here?" I thought the least I could do normally was just go down and look her and I and go, "Girl, she was good. Everything was fine." That was the normal thing to do. That's what you would do. And I was like, "I am normal. I was just normal just the other day. I'm not going to act brand new now."
I, unbeknownst to all the security guards, walked down the stairs, down the elevator with Olivia through the dip room out into the south lawn, and when the principles walk out, all the security pops into action. CAT team, black vests, machine guns, snipers, slowly start descending on the lawn toward her car. And what they had told her was, "Under no circumstances are you to leave the car Ma'am." I walk out and I'm like, "Hey, Denielle, come on. Get out." She's like, I was like, "Come on, get out." She's looking at me. She's looking at them. I'm looking at them. I was like, "Let her out." She slowly gets out. And I like the way she played it cool. She didn't look like she was shaking in her boots. She wasn't sweating.
Elizabeth Alexander:
She's very cool.
Michelle Obama:
She's very cool. We had a brief conversation. And from then on, another daisy in my life was born. And we are good friends now. We are all good friends.
Elizabeth Alexander:
All good friends. You gave your friends friends.
Michelle Obama:
Yes.
Elizabeth Alexander:
You gave your friends friends and just to say, I want to talk about Camp David and the exercise.
Michelle Obama:
Our Camp David experience, yes. I'm surprised I still have friends after this, but this is the importance of the intentionality of friendship, which is one of the points I make in here, that even before the White House, my friendships are important, but you have to plan it. You have to be intentional about it. You have to schedule it, as Elizabeth said. Being as busy as I was, I needed to black out time. And what I decided, because I was trying to multitask, I need to exercise, be with my friends, all of that all at once. I thought, "What better way to do that than have a bootcamp weekend at Camp David?"
Elizabeth Alexander:
Oh my God. PTSD.
Michelle Obama:
I gathered all my friends, and of course they were like, "Ooh, we're going to Camp David." Little did they know that what that meant was three workouts a day with Marines.
Elizabeth Alexander:
With Marines actually leading us through the exercise.
Michelle Obama:
They would take us through boxing lessons. This is when we were playing dodgeball one time. And it got vicious. We would climb Bertha, which was a hill on Camp David. We would do calisthenics. We would meditate.
Elizabeth Alexander:
It was a bit of a mountain, actually, as I recall. It was a mountain named for a serious black lady. It was called Bertha. And we would go up, it was a mountain.
Michelle Obama:
Would go up and down and up and down. These are pictures in different places. Because what happened is that Camp David, the exercise extended beyond because I wanted my girlfriends to be healthy. And I knew that we were all busy women, doctors, business people, professionals, mothers, that we needed to teach each other how to take care of ourselves. We needed to challenge ourselves. We needed to learn how to sweat together and to bond together. Now, I didn't allow wine.
Elizabeth Alexander:
The first time, the first time.
Michelle Obama:
The first time. And then nobody was going to come back if I didn't put wine back in.
Elizabeth Alexander:
We were so busy, we got so busy because there was no wine, we needed just to relax our muscles after we had used them.
Michelle Obama:
I added wine back in. And we would do our boot camps at least three times a year. And that's how all my friends became friends with each other. And I guess the point I'm making is that we need friends. We have to be intentional about it. There are too many people who are reporting a level of loneliness and isolation in record numbers. And for the young people, Elizabeth and I were talking about this, a lot of young professionals have gotten used to, over quarantine, wanting to work from home. And it feels like that's a good thing because the thing about isolating yourself is that you don't have to compromise. You don't have to adapt. But when you are isolated and don't get into the practice of regular engagement with people, looking people in the eye, sitting across the table and not across the zoom with a person, you don't build up the trust and familiarity and connection that we need as humans.
And I think that's one of the reasons why we're all acting a little crazy right now, that we have been isolated away from each other. With young people, I would encourage you, even if you can work from home to find time to connect and learn how to do that. Because if you can't do it at work, you miss being able to do it among your friends. And that's where isolation and loneliness comes in. And when that happens, you start to not trust anyone. You only trust yourself, what you hear, your world gets small. And that's something that we have to work against. And my point is that if I can do it as First Lady of the United States, anybody can make a friend. Anybody can push themselves out of their comfort zone, and it's a critical thing to do.
Elizabeth Alexander:
That's right.
Dr. Sharon Malone
I will never forget the first invitation I got to Camp David.
Michelle Obama:
Dr. Sharon Malone is a very dear friend of mine, an important member of my kitchen table. I'll never forget the first time I invited her to Camp David with some of my girlfriends. I told her to come for a nice relaxing weekend. She was surprised by what happened next.
Dr. Sharon Malone
I have to tell you, I had no idea what to expect. I'd never been there before, but it was going to be a retreat. I said, "Well, okay." And my idea with of the retreat was, we'll see, we'll be getting massages, we'll have cocktails and we'll sit by the pool. And I have to tell you, nothing was farther from the truth. Our retreats were really based on health and wellness and eating well and exercising, and exercising to a level that I don't think many of us who were there had ever exercised like that before. We would start the day with meditation, we'd have three workouts a day. But the fun part of the whole event was our kitchen table, our dining table, actually, at the end of the day. We had worked out. We felt good, a little bit of fatigue. But this was the opportunity that we got to really hash out what was going on with us.
And imagine a table with 10 women around it where no topic was off limits. We talked about our children, our family, our jobs, what was going on with us personally, and even our parents and families. It was a supportive environment where we could get advice, seek counsel from our friends, and get honest responses. And I have to tell you of all the things that we did in Camp David, I think that was the most nourishing for our souls. We exercised our bodies in ways that we thought we could never do. And we did. And we ended our day always with the love and support and care of the women around us.
Elizabeth Alexander:
We have some fantastic questions.
Michelle Obama:
Questions?
Elizabeth Alexander:
Yes. Questions.
Michelle Obama:
Questions from the audience?
Elizabeth Alexander:
From the audience. In fact, let's start out with Nikki from Crestwood, DC.
Michelle Obama:
Nikki.
Elizabeth Alexander:
Nikki.
Michelle Obama:
Is Nikki in the house?
Elizabeth Alexander:
Nikki, from Crestwood, DC says, "You speak often about the wonderful gift of girlfriends and women friendships, as we have been discussing which role do you play in your girl group?" The jokester, the mother, the therapist, the one who keeps the peace. Which role do you play?
Michelle Obama:
I said this, I think I'm the therapist jokester. That's my role.
Elizabeth Alexander:
We're all funny, I think.
Michelle Obama:
I think I'm funnier than you all are.
Elizabeth Alexander:
She's the funniest of them all. And I think also you are the anchor. I think you are the anchor. You are.
Michelle Obama:
I had the biggest house for the longest.
Elizabeth Alexander:
Very big house. And you had the best snacks. Francine from Baltimore wants to know how you spend a perfect rainy Saturday. What are you doing all day, watching TV, music on? What are you eating? Who is around? How is that day spent perfect for you?
Michelle Obama:
It's a great day if I'm all by myself. I love my husband. Sometimes he peeks in and go, "Why are you watching that?" And it's like, "Get out here. I want to watch Real Housewives and don't judge me."
Elizabeth Alexander:
Get.
Michelle Obama:
Real Housewives with french fries, a glass of wine and a blanket, popcorn.
Elizabeth Alexander:
Popcorn.
Michelle Obama:
But if it's a real special day, it would be french fries, not popcorn. You wanted my ideal day. Popcorn is like, "Eh." French fries.
Elizabeth Alexander:
And what else might make that day perfect, rainy Saturday?
Michelle Obama:
And then I go to bed early.
Elizabeth Alexander:
Yes. And then last audience question is, this is Jenna from Lexington, Kentucky. If I could be a fly at all on the White House wall, what would I be most surprised about? I imagine it all feels fancy and your every move is taken care of. What is the reality?
Michelle Obama:
And I probably will regret saying this.
Elizabeth Alexander:
Take a beat, baby.
Michelle Obama:
It is definitely fancy by all standards. Butlers, florists, ushers that usher people up and down your house, there's gardens and things like that, but it's also an old building. And because politically it is hard for a sitting President to make the decision to spend the money to do repairs because the other party will criticize the President and say, "Oh, look, he, he's taking taxpayer money." I will just say this to the people in here, the White House needs to be cared for. And it is an old house and it needs new wiring. And one day we were in our bed on a Sunday and is across from the dining room, and this was the first term. And Sasha comes in, she's little, and we're sleeping in. She comes in and she's like, "Mom, it's raining in the dining room." And Barack and I are like, "What?" She said, "It's raining in the dining room." And we said, "Okay, go to bed. Get out of here. Get out of here." Because we thought she's just trying to get us up. And then it got quiet and I heard rain.I get up, put on my robe, I cross the hall and it is raining. Literally, a pipe that was so old had burst. And it was pouring down rain. And luckily the staff was there and they moved the priceless art away.
Elizabeth Alexander:
Oh my goodness.
Michelle Obama:
But it ruined the ceiling. But I say that to say that there are old pipes that burst and could destroy that house. It could catch fire. If a president, regardless of party, decides to renovate, don't get mad. Don't get mad. It needs it. It needs it.
Elizabeth Alexander:
Thank you.
Michelle Obama:
Thank you so much. Elizabeth Alexander. Thank you.
Michelle Obama:
I just love Elizabeth. We talked a lot about friendship in this discussion, but one thing I wanted to emphasize is this, friendship really is a two-way street. You don't just want to have good friends. You got to be a good friend too. That means taking the time to check in on your kitchen table, dropping in when you're in the area, even just a text when you think about them. In fact, is there someone in your life that you haven't been in touch with for a while? Why don't you give them a call or shoot them a message right now? I bet you'll be glad you did. All I know is that I'm so glad I had a chance to have this conversation with one of my best friends in the world. Elizabeth is really just incredible, and I hope you got a glimpse of that as you listened. And as always, thank you for listening. Talk soon.
Speaker:
This has been a Higher Ground and Audible Original, produced by Higher Ground and Little Everywhere. Executive produced by Dan Fierman and Mukta Mohan for Higher Ground and Jane Marie for Little Everywhere. Audible executive producers, Zola Mashariki and Nick D'Angelo. Audible co-producers, Keith Wooten and Glynn Pogue. Produced by Mike Richter with additional production by Joy Sanford, Dann Gallucci, Nancy Golombisky, and Lisa Pollak with production support from Andrew Eapen, Jenna Levin and Julia Murray. Location recording by Jody Elff. Special thanks to Melissa Winter, Jill Van Lokeren, Crystal Carson, Alex May-Sealey, Halle Ewing, Merone Hailemeskel, Sierra Tyler, Carl Ray Njeri Radway, Meredith Koop, Sara Corbett, Tyler Lechtenberg, and Asra Najam. The theme song is Unstoppable by Sia. The closing song is Lovely Day by Bill Withers. Audible Head of US content, Rachel Ghiazza. Head of Audible Studios, Zola Mashariki. Copyright 2023 by Higher Ground Audio, LLC. Sound Recording copyright 2023 by Higher Ground Audio, LLC. Voiceover by Novena Carmel. This episode was recorded live at the Warner Theater in Washington DC.
