I’ve been wanting to do one of these since we launched the Interview With My Significant Other series, but Sadie is an elusive human and it took us conducting this interview over multiple sessions in the woods to complete it. After nearly five years together, one thing is abundantly clear. We’re very chatty. Thanks for tuning in.

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How do you identify?

Nico: All right. So how I identify… Because we’re going to both talk about how we identify.

Sadie: Right.

Nico: Sure. Beautiful. I identify as a gender fluid/gender queer person. I’m white. I’m in my thirties. I use they/them pronouns, and I am a bisexual.

Sadie: You said that with such a sexy voice.

Nico: Yeah, because it’s the part of me that’s sexual.

Sadie: Two sexuals, not one every other sexual.

Nico: Yeah, per month.

Sadie: Right. And I am Sadie and I use she/her pronouns. I am gender nonconforming and butch. And I’m on the precipice of 40 and am white and Jewish and a lesbian.

Nico: Yes. Love you. Okay.

Sadie: Oh, we should also mention that we’re in the woods right now, so if you hear chopping, that’s not us.

How did we meet and get together?

Nico: Yeah, we’re in the woods doing this interview. It’s wonderful in the Allegheny National Forest. It’s September. The sun. Sadie’s just gave me the symbol we’ve devised for when I’m rambling and I did just start a sentence with the sun, so we’re going to move forward. How did we meet? How did we get together?

Sadie: It was 2018.

Nico: Yeah, it was.

Sadie: Early February is when we met at a dinner party.

Nico: I could have sworn it was late January, but you know I-

Sadie: It may have been late January. I don’t know. Maybe. It doesn’t matter. So-

Nico: It was several days before Valentine’s Day, so it was either incredibly late January or early February.

Sadie: Right. So we met at a dinner party-

Nico: Oh, shit. Sorry-

Sadie: What did you do?

Nico: … there’s just a spider spinning a full web on my mug. Okay, keep going. Sorry.

Sadie: So a friend of ours was having a dinner party that began at 9:00 PM because she is Portuguese. And I at first was not going to go because it was at 9:00 PM and there was a blizzard, and if you know anything about Pittsburgh there are a lot of hills and they don’t really plow them, so there’s lots of ice. And I was just like, “Hmm, don’t think so.”

Nico: It’s literally the scariest place to drive in the snow that I’ve ever driven in the snow.

Sadie: It’s harrowing. But I had been practicing for a tour, it was a last-second thing, and so I had a week or so to learn 20 songs. And-

Nico: A week?

Sadie: Yeah, it was like a week. Week and a couple days.

Nico: That’s intense.

Sadie: Yeah, it was really intense. I hadn’t talked to anyone because I was so focused. And I thought, you know what? It might be good for me to get out the house and-

Nico: Oh, I’m sorry. For the people reading. What instrument do you play?

Sadie: I play bass.

Nico: Fretless.

Sadie: Well, that doesn’t matter.

Nico: All bass.

Sadie: I play all bass. I’ve been to all the bases.

Nico: Okay. Wonderful. Keep going.

Sadie: No, you can tell your side of the story. That’s about it. I showed up. I also thought I was going to go for an hour and then leave. That was it. So I showed up at 9:00, I was like, I’m going to leave at 10:00.

Nico: So… I showed up an hour late on the tail end of my marriage. Basically when we went out that night, I was like, “This is the last night of our marriage,” me and my ex. And we had several engagements to go to. And so we arrived at the dinner party around 10:00, an hour into it. And I walk in the door and I’m pissed. I’m pissed at my ex, and it’s clearly over, but anyway… it had been over. And so I shake hands with this very hot looking person who just to my… according to my perception, glares at me while we shake hands, but also grips my hand with an abnormal firmness.

Sadie: Yeah, I held it a little bit too long. That was by design. And I mean, I do have resting-bitch face and resting-bitch swagger, so I mean that’s real. But also, I was just absolutely exhausted and-

Nico: Oh, you poor thing.

Sadie: But then you walked in the door and I was like, “Maybe I’ll stay for a little bit longer.” And I did.

Nico: Oh, right, because you were going to leave.

Sadie: I was going to leave. I was about ready to leave. I was about to say my goodbyes and just see my-

Nico: And then I showed up.

Sadie: And then you showed up.

Nico: Can you talk a little bit about your perception of me and my ex? And-

Sadie: Oh my god.

Nico: … whether or not you thought we were together?

Sadie: I couldn’t tell whether or not the two of you were together. I honestly thought that he… the impression I got was that you both knew the host and he was your gay roommate because you had no connection. He was being super flamboyant and very twink-ish, and you were just kind of… seemed like you were there. So it felt like he really wanted to go to the party and dragged you along.

Nico: Oh my goodness.

Sadie: And then we got to shit-talk Anselm Kiefer and it was wonderful. That’s how we really bonded.

Nico: Right. So how we really bonded was somebody was going on and on about how they like Anselm Kiefer at the table, and Sadie and I said that if you do not have that history grounded in you or your family being victims of the Holocaust, you simply cannot just make Holocaust art.

Sadie: To talk about your guilt, to elevate-

Nico: To elevate your art, and therefore become famous off of that.

Sadie: Right. And so you and I just really bonded over that. We were riffing off each other and just cackling. It was ridiculous.

Nico: We made eyes across that table at each other with all those people around us. It was very romantic.

Sadie: And one woman at the table, she’s like, “I know it’s fucked up, but his art’s so beautiful.” I’m like, “I don’t”-

Nico: And then I saw a piece in person and I was like, no.

All right, so wait, so what happened was…Immediately following the party, you and my ex exchange information.

Sadie: Correct.

Nico: Emails. And then what happened was, this is like 12 hours to the point where my ex storms out on me. I don’t care, I’m putting it in. It’s behind the A+ pay wall, it’s fine. It was like 12 hours, like countdown clock to when my ex storms out on me. And I was like, “CC me on that,” when he emailed you to follow up.

Sadie: Oh, yeah. Yeah. No, I emailed, “Hey, it was really great meeting you and Nico, and I’m about to leave for tour in two days for eight weeks or something, but we should hang out when I get back.” And he responded, and he CC’d you.

Nico: Okay, so then you went on tour. For how long?

Sadie: A couple months.

Nico: Very nice.

Sadie: And then I came back and was exhausted and didn’t really feel like talking to anyone.

Nico: Meanwhile, I thought, I was like, “This wonderfully hot person, never going to see her again in my life.” That’s nice though. I was like, “It’s nice to know that there are hot people in the world. That there’s hope because there are hotties out there.”

Sadie: Right. Yeah, and I got back from tour and I was about to hit reply and then something was just, “Just check the CC line,” and saw that you were also included. And so I did reply all, something like, “Hey, I’m back from tour. Do you want to hang out?” And he didn’t respond, and you immediately responded, “I’m having a party tonight. Do you want to come?”

Nico: I believe I said… Do you remember? I said, “My ex and I are no longer together.” And then in parenthesis said-

Sadie: You said, “We are no longer functioning as a couple,” in parentheses, “pending divorce.”

Nico: Yes, I was like… I said something very dryly to you. Okay, yeah.

Sadie: Yeah, and then we just kept hanging out.

How do we feel about our big three astrological signs?

Nico: Okay and sharp transition: How do you feel about your big three astrological signs?

Sadie: You go first.

Nico: No I asked you.

Sadie: I thought a lot about it and I have a lot of feelings. You should go first so that way I know how long I should talk.

Nico: No. All right. So you are-

Sadie: I am-

Nico: A Capricorn sun.

Sadie: Oh my goodness. You’re going to answer the question for me?

Nico: If you don’t answer it.

Sadie: All right. So I am a Capricorn sun, Taurus moon, and Scorpio rising. And I think it’s great. I love being a Capricorn.

Nico: I know. You’ve got a long list of all the famous Capricorns that you like.

Sadie: Yeah. I look to famous Capricorn visionary artists as a kind of structure for myself. I guess I should talk about why I like being a Capricorn.

Nico: Yeah. Go ahead.

Sadie: I think with those signs, the three of them, they’re incredibly loyal and trustworthy in terms of friendship. I’m really deeply invested in my close long-term friend-

Nico: I think in a lot of ways, that’s part Scorpio too.

Sadie: Yeah. And also Taurus.

Nico: Scorpio and Taurus. Those are two very friend-oriented, in a lot of ways, loyal signs.

Sadie: And long-term relationships.

Nico: Right. Right.

Sadie: Which does make making new friends somewhat difficult because it’s just really hard too.

Nico: But you are someone who has really prioritized friendship in a lot of ways, and treats your friends in a way that I find admirable.

Sadie: Oh, thank you. I think also it can be a little bit difficult with those three signs because I just have a really great barometer for detecting bullshit. A downside to that is I don’t really have time for it, but I also don’t have the aptitude for just kind of going with the flow with it. So it just… it can make things difficult in social situations.

Nico: Okay. What do you like about your signs?

Sadie: Well, I like that I can detect other people’s bullshit. It’s really good for not wasting my time.

Nico: Okay. Okay. Great. What else?

Sadie: I like that I’m a really hard worker. I like that I can see the long game in a lot of things so I’m able… It can get a little distracting because I think in terms of decades. When I think of my career, I don’t think about my career today. I think about where I want my career to be in 30 years, which is really great because it means I have a long-term vision.

Nico: 70.

Sadie: But it also means that I can kind of get hung up in the future, and it’s kind of difficult for me to see myself in the present.

Nico: Yeah. It’s very difficult for you to be where you are now. When you have goals that you’re trying to get toward.

Sadie: Right. Because it’s like I can see myself where I’m going to be and I know I’m going to get there, and so seeing where I am now can be a little bit frustrating, but the thing I like about it is that that doesn’t necessarily discourage me so much. It’s just I know I’m going to get there.

A thing that gets said about Capricorns is that we’re rocks. We’re solid and dependable, at least this is how we outwardly appear, and sometimes this can come off that we’re boring. But if you lift a rock, there’s so much weird stuff happening underneath. It’s visceral and alive. But you can’t just remove the rock and expect for that ecosystem to just continue on. The rock is what allows for that hidden life to thrive.

Nico: Okay. Can we talk about your Scorpio rising?

Sadie: What about it?

Nico: How mysterious it makes everyone think you are?

Sadie: My Scorpio rising is so sexy. Don’t even.

Nico: At shows, people will be like, “Who is that bassist?” You have like… Yeah. Because you just look really fucking sexy when you’re on stage and dark-

Sadie: Well, this is just me being very conscious of also being perceived, which is something that-

Nico: So you just throw up the Scorpio wall, just a wall of scorpions.

Sadie: But it’s funny because you’re like, “Oh my God, Nicole Kidman, she’s so hot. She’s so mysterious. What is it about her? It’s her murder eyes.” I’m like, “Honey, that’s just her Scorpio rising.”

Nico: And then you were like, “Do you want me to do the murder eyes for you?” And then, you did them, and I was like, “Ah.”

Sadie: Yeah. You were very excited about them. I was like, “You just don’t see the murder face because we’ve gotten to that point where I don’t give it to you.” But it’s-

Nico: Give me the murder face.

Sadie: It’s just like looking through someone. That’s all the murder face is. It’s like I’m seeing-

Nico: So it’s not that you’re looking into my soul. It’s that my soul’s transparent?

Sadie: It’s through layers. I’m looking into your soul, but I’m also looking beyond your soul.

Nico: Like dark matter.

Sadie: Yeah.

Nico: All right. And then your Taurus moon is actually very critical to your personality because you also may be a hard worker, but you also know how to prioritize comfort.

Sadie: Oh yeah. I think honestly my Taurus moon does a lot of the heavy lifting in making sure that I’m just not a complete workaholic. Capricorns are very pleasure delay. As I was saying earlier about long term goals, it’s like I have to do this and then once I do this… I guess I shouldn’t speak for other Capricorns, but this is something I’ve noticed, and especially something I see in myself, is the idea of like I’m going to set an impossible goal for myself. And then once I… But what I’m going to get myself as a reward is going to be worth it too. Not just accomplishing it. Because accomplishments, I don’t know, I don’t really enjoy my accomplishments because I just feel that they’re the inevitable conclusion of my hard work.

Nico: If I wake you up in the morning on a weekend and tell you, “I’m going to go get us breakfast sandwiches,” your face is unrivaled. The contentment that radiates off of you is palpable.

Sadie: I know. The only thing that would make them better is if they-

Nico: What?

Sadie: Breakfast sandwiches were delivered so that way we could just hang out.

Nico: No. I have to go get them…

Sadie: But I also love that you bring me coffee in the morning in bed.

Nico: Yeah.

Sadie: We did set up the coffeemaker in the bedroom, so that’s just like walking five feet.

Nico: But I still ferry it from the coffeemaker over to you.

Sadie: And it’s so wonderful.

Nico: So you don’t have to even lift up the covers.

Sadie: I don’t. I don’t have to lift up the covers. I just kind of sit up.

Nico: Yeah.

Sadie: It’s great.

Nico: Yeah. Okay. Who are some of your… Wrap this up. Who are some of your Capricorn idols?

Sadie: Oh goodness. There’s so many.

Nico: Name your top three.

Sadie: I can’t do that.

Nico: Just name three, first three that come to mind.

Sadie: Oh my God. I can’t. Obviously, Louise Bourgeois and Mark Hollis and Scott Walker.

Nico: There you go.

Sadie: And Janine Antoni.

Nico: Okay.

Sadie: And Lee Bontecou.

Nico: Okay. Excellent. My big three. Aquarius sun, Sag moon and rising on the front. I think it’s really important for people who are wondering how the heck I get anything done to know that I do have a five sign Capricorn stellium on the back end.

Sadie: I think in some ways, you appear as more Capricorn.

Nico: Right. But yeah. I’ve just got a very dry chart… It’s just like, yeah, we might be just aliens on fire, but there’s a bulldozer behind it pushing everything forward. There’s hardly a drop to drink. I think there’s a couple drops, but they’re very far out.

Sadie: You’ve got your Cancer in Jupiter, which you refuse to acknowledge.

Nico: No, I don’t refuse to acknowledge it.

Sadie: Or Jupiter in Cancer.

Nico: Yeah. Jupiter in Cancer. Yeah. It’s very… And my Lilith is in Scorpio. And that’s it.

Sadie: No. Your Pluto’s in Scorpio in the 12th house.

Nico: Oh.

Sadie: Because I’m a creep and I remember facts like that.

Nico: Thank you. But so, I share the same top three with Oprah and Lewis Carroll.

Sadie: Yes.

Nico: Yeah. Both of whom I’m convinced have probably done their part to precipitate Dr. Oz running for the PA Senate seat.

Sadie: Why Lewis Carroll, do you think?

Nico: There’s got to be something there, butterfly effect. It’s the caterpillar effect.

Sadie: Stop.

Nico: And who else? Aquarians also include Angela Davis, and problematic faves like Charles Dickens, and also I just have… In terms of my relationship to being an Aquarius and having a January Aquarius sign is that I have worked for two separate January Aquarian leaders in the arts, and they both have been visionary and fucked up in their own ways, that has been sort of a cautionary note for me about the Aquarian God complex and seeing it play out live. But also, inspirational at the same time in some ways.

And in terms of the Sag rising and moon, I think that actually a lot of my stuff comes across as Sag. I can be very… I’m always torn between the Aquarian sort of introversion and Aquarians can actually be very stubborn and very staged because they are a fixed sign. But then, so I have that push and pull between that and the Sag, like get up and go, just fucking disappear.

Sadie: The thing is, that’s something that I really love about you, is because for me having the Capricorn and especially the Taurus, being grounded and having that comfort is just… In my environment in order to feel safe before I can then venture out is something feels like a priority to me. But then, I have the Scorpio and I also have my Jupiter is in Sag, so expansion is through that risk taking and is through ideas and is through travel and is through that spontaneity.

Nico: In a lot of ways, I feel safe when shit is on fire.

Sadie: Right. And so, I am craving of that transformation and that expansion and that discomfort in order to grow. It’s something that I know that I need but I can also be so invested in- Needing to feel safe before I can do that, and you’re just like, “Fuck it. Let’s roll.” So seeing you just be really able to harness an idea amidst chaos and be able to see it through and make space in that chaos for that expansion is something that’s really inspirational to me.

Nico: Oh why thank you. Yeah. I feel like thriving in chaos is kind of eh, not really the truth.

Sadie: Chaos reigns.

Nico: Not really the truth because I’m not thriving. I’m surviving and making the most of it. But like-

Sadie: Did I say thriving?

Nico: No, I’m saying it. But like-

Sadie: But the thing is, you’re not thriving in a way. You’re able to do it just… It’s like carving out a little section of mountain for you to build shelter to get through the night. That’s kind of what you do.

Nico: Right. Because we can’t help it if we’re thrown into chaos, or if we have to perhaps incite chaos because that’s what is needed for the moment. Sometimes, you have to tear down an institution. Sometimes you have to do that.

Sadie: Okay Aquarius.

Nico: But you can really… I think that it’s important to also not lose yourself during those times, and that I sort of do that well, and that that is linked to my-

Sadie: Yes.

Nico: In a lot of ways. I also just love an adventure. I’ve been really limited during the pandemic, but I think my coworkers are starting to see it as I’ll just put on the calendar like, “You’re on your own, I’ll be off grid in the woods.”

Sadie: Yeah.

Nico: For like several days at a time as I leave and just disappear into the forest with you, or run off to… Or like the A+ members who we randomly met up with in-

Sadie: You were like, “I finished the fundraiser early. I’m going to organize some A+ meetups.”

Nico: Yeah. Yeah. I’ve been limited in my ability to do that because of the pandemic, but actually that is sort of the status quo that we are returning to, is that level of spontaneity, and I’m looking forward to letting that part of myself sort of shine again.

Sadie: Yeah. I think also for me, and you both, something to keep in mind is both of us have kind of blown up parts of our life, and just kind of trusted that we’ll see it through or just trust that it’s moving toward something better. And so, just that… I think both you and I, even though on the surface we’re very different, we just both have an innate trust in-

Nico: Ourselves.

Sadie: Ourselves and our skills.

Nico: Our cat-like reflexes.

Sadie: Oh God. Which is just really interesting to see how both of those things have manifested in how we kind of approach the world.

Nico: Yeah. Yeah. And I think also, we make each other better.

Sadie: Do I make you better with my- “I just want to get takeout and watch a movie?”

Nico: Well, I wasn’t resting. Before we got together in ways that-

Sadie: I keep saying takeout, but-

Nico: You keep saying… It’s very food oriented, but it’s okay.

Sadie: I just really love food.

Nico: But also before you, I was making some bachelor meals, and you were just kind of like, “I can’t live like this.”

Sadie: I can’t have everything be one texture.

Nico: Listen, if you put all the vegetables in a pot and you swish them up and then you make smush, nom nom nom.

Sadie: I don’t think people are ready to know about smush.

Nico: Ratatouille. Emphasis on the rat.

Sadie: Are we done?

What do you enjoy most about your relationship?

Nico: Okay, three, what do you enjoy most about our relationship?

Sadie: I enjoy how much fun we have together. I don’t know, we just find each other really funny and-

Nico: Yeah. I crack up so much with you.

Sadie: I don’t know. I don’t know, just anything could come out of your mouth and I’m just endlessly delighted. And we’re both pretty spontaneous and up for any adventure.

Nico: Mm-hmm.

Sadie: Even if we have things that we’ve planned to do in terms of work around the house or something, if one of us mentions like, “Oh, I heard about this art show happening,” or, “I just heard about this movie that’s only playing in town for a couple days,” or, “There’s this craft fair going on,” we’re pretty up for just doing it and being okay with just going out and seeing what happens.

Nico: I think one of the things I love most about our relationship is that we’re really strong together. We’re going to talk about this later, but I got to hope that it gets better in a lot of ways because we’ve been through some hard times, and emphasis on the hard times. But we’ve been able to, together, maintain our dignity, to maintain respect for each other, to see each other as individual people, to foster our creative practices.

Sadie: I love how we were so open to making space for each others’ creative practices. How sometimes where we had planned to do something or hang out together or something… This happens if you’re planning fundraisers or things like that, and we don’t get to see each other a lot, and we’ve planned downtime to hang, but you’re like, “Can I just spend the night actually working on writing?” And I’m always like, “Yeah.” Because you need to recharge, and so whatever you need to do. f you can get an hour or two in for your writing, that’s valuable.

Nico: Yeah, I would say that, definitely, our mutual respect for our creative relationship is key to our overall relationship. I think that when we first started dating, we explicitly… you explicitly said your first love is your bass.

Sadie: It is. And you said your first love is writing, and-

Nico: And I think that’s something that we respect about each other.

Sadie: Right.

Nico: And I think that’s really cool.

Sadie: Right.

Nico: And it’s not for everyone.

Sadie: But-

What hurdles or obstacles have you overcome together in your relationship?

Nico: It’s for us. All right, what hurdles or obstacles have you ever come together in your relationship? These can be within your relationship or things that you face together.

Sadie: So the first two years of our relationship we had no money. Broke.

Nico: Okay, so we were so broke when we first got together, I was on a Pittsburgh Arts nonprofit salary, which is very low. And-

Sadie: Do you want to tell people how much you were making?

Nico: When we got together I was making like $35,000 before taxes.

Sadie: Okay. I wasn’t making anywhere near that because I was trying to get touring work, so it was completely feast or famine. And even when you’re touring, you’re not making that much money. And when I was in town, picking up odd jobs here and there. I mean, it was really rough.

Nico: It was okay when I was renting in a place full of roommates, but then that also wasn’t okay because they were really homophobic.

Sadie: Yeah, and I was renting a place and my rent, because it was a room and a house and it was, again, Pittsburgh prices, so-

Nico: Mm-hmm, same like mine, was also a split house. But yours was like a room in a house somebody owned.

Sadie: Right. And so my rent was super duper cheap and it allowed for me to kind of live that lifestyle. But we really, thinking about it, we had no business buying a house, but it was so cheap and it required so little as a down payment, and-

Nico: They were like, “Yeah, you make $35,000? Buy a house.” And I was like, “Okay.”

Sadie: And we knew I was going to work on it.

Nico: Right, we knew you were going to renovate. So we got a house that we could live in, that we could also renovate while living in it on purpose.

Sadie: Do we want to tell people how much we paid for our house?

Nico: $78,000 is the price of the house. Yeah, and the thing was, by the time we got the house, you… What were you doing for work? Or you weren’t at that point doing much?

Sadie: At that point I was just kind of doing odd jobs with a friend of mine who was doing carpentry.

Nico: Right, right. You weren’t even doing anything consistent. I don’t want to say not doing much, but you weren’t doing anything consistent.

Sadie: Yeah, it was definitely like a friend of mine would call me up, “I need someone to help me on this project that’s going to last for a couple weeks.” So a lot of freelance stuff, but just kind of hustling and trying to get touring work. So we actually wound up having a time crunch in terms of both of us moving in together that was just economic ultimately.

We had three months between the time that you decided that you weren’t going to renew your lease on your place, because you didn’t want to keep having to find roommates.

Nico: Well, because my roommates… My one roommate. My one roommate wound up moving in with us. The other one was this terrifying straight woman…

Sadie: She was intense. Like, in a not great way. She had a lot of white feminist energy. Straight, white feminist energy.

Nico: In a way that was just mind boggling. Anyway-

Sadie: She picked going to yoga over her best friend’s dad’s funeral.

Nico: Staahp.

Sadie: She did that. That was a choice she made.

Sadie: And there was a period of about a year or so… I mean, really until you got the part-time job at Autostraddl,e where any surprise expense over $50, we would just cry.

Nico: Right.

Sadie: It was really rough. Because Mya, she started having some health problems and we would have days where we would just walk her and cry because we thought we’d have to put her down. She kept having to go to the vet.

Nico: Right. And honestly, when I went part-time at Autostraddle, it changed our lives completely.

Sadie: Right, because you were doing that on top of your other work.

Nico: It changed our lives completely. So basically, we were rationing our food and I remember getting mandarins from Aldi and just counting them, and basically doing one per each of us per day and making them stretch as far as we could. And-

Sadie: There were times where we would get one mandarin today and we would get half… like, when you made breakfast, you’d give me half the mandarin and then we’d eat the other half of the mandarin with lunch or dinner.

Nico: Right. And yeah, there were times where I was rationing essentially our fiber. And I became very adept at rationing our grocery budget and figuring out how we were going to feed two people on as little money as we had, and nutritiously. And also with dietary restrictions that wouldn’t activate either my lactose intolerance or your migraines. We both have dietary restrictions, too, so it wasn’t easy, but-

Sadie: Also in terms of home reno stuff, too, because we bought this house knowing that I was going to have to do… I mean, we were going to have to do work, but I was doing the majority of the work on it. And we couldn’t afford stuff to actually fix the house, so it was figuring out what’s the bare minimum that we need. So for a long time we couldn’t afford a saw, so I just… like anything electric, so cutting anything, we had a miter box and a $10 saw. And then the paint, we were getting the cheapest paint possible. AndI know this will fleck off and stuff, but I can just do touch up work as needed because we can’t afford nicer paint. And just really being like, okay, really budgeting, doing one room at a time, how much will it cost us to do this one room? And then moving on to the next room and seeing if we had the money to do another room.

Nico: And let’s be real, we lived in a room we called The Creepy Room.

Sadie: I mean, it still is a creepy room, but at least now…

Nico: We don’t sleep in there.

Sadie: Right, there was a huge hole in the ceiling where the plaster had collapsed. We didn’t even set up a bed because we thought, “This is just temporary.” We just slept on a mattress on the floor underneath the hole in the ceiling, thinking, “Well, if the ceiling collapses, at least it won’t fall on us because this section of ceiling is already missing.”

Nico: Right. And every day we would wake up with crumbled bits of-

Sadie: Crumbled plaster in bed with us.

Nico: Not just white plaster, but sooty plaster.

Sadie: Well, it’s an old house.

Nico: It is. And it’s full of soot-

Sadie: It really is.

Nico: … because they built natural gas and coal fires. They have a coal chute buried in the basement. So it’s full of that and…

Sadie: It’s kind of nice. It’s caramelized. It’s got a nice char to-

Nico: It’s caramelized.

Sadie: Our house is caramelized.

Nico: It’s just got good character. And we slept in that room for two years when we thought it would be six months. And we wound up sleeping in that room through the first part of the pandemic, and that was very hard. So that room was like… It was messy. We didn’t properly set it up. We didn’t think we were going to be in it for two years, and we were. Yeah, I think we had been sleeping in there for maybe one year when the pandemic started. Or less than a year, actually. Because you moved in officially July 2019.

Sadie: Okay, so I officially moved in, but I was-

Nico: I mean, we were shacking up.

Sadie: I was definitely sleeping there before-

Nico: Oh, baby, of course.

Sadie: It’s just when I moved my records over was in July.

Nico: All right, everybody here, when Sadie moves her records in, that’s when it’s the time.

Sadie: Everyone who has records knows that that’s a commitment.

Nico: Okay, so but not even a year actually when the pandemic hit. And so then we’re in the shitty room, and also… I’m going to let you take it, but as the pandemic started there was some specific concerns.

Sadie: I mean, for me… And you and I have talked about this, but you and I have both been in relationships where we had our movements restricted and there was-

Nico: Correct. Well, one of the things that we bonded about is that we have both come from abusive relationships.

Sadie: Right. And specific abuse where it was financially… It was financial abuse, and this feeling of not being able to leave because we couldn’t afford to leave, being restricted. If we left, even to go out and see friends, there would be consequences.

Nico: Being monitored.

Sadie: Being monitored, and just not being able to have support networks, not being able to see our friends. Or we could, but there would be consequences. I mean, for the first six to eight months of the pandemic, I mean, you can speak to your own experience, but for me it was hugely triggering because it was like leaving the house… I mean, we were really battening down the hatches because I have a chronic illness that I’m managing already, and also we just didn’t really know… I mean, people were dying. And-

Nico: Right. Well, can I say?

Sadie: Yeah, go ahead.

Nico: I mean, you’re at increased risk for a stroke, right?

Sadie: Yeah.

Nico: And that was one of the things that came out initially. And asthma. So you have both asthma and… So we just identified those things and we were like, “Uh oh.”

Sadie: Right. And so the flip side of that is that you and I were being super triggered not being able to leave the house. I started doing coping mechanisms that I had done back in my 20s in that relationship. I started listening to the same music; I was listening to a lot of ’80s New Wave, Brit Pop, and really bad ’90s goth on repeat. And it’s the same stuff that I listened to then. And it was really weird because in some ways it was also triggering, but it was also really comforting to be like, okay, well, I already have a roadmap for how to deal with what I’m feeling right now. And it’s listening to Jazz Butcher.

Nico: Okay. And to talk about that a little bit, in terms of being the slightly less medically vulnerable… Although, who is medically invulnerable to COVID? Nobody… But person in the relationship, I also went out and did the errands.

Sadie: Right.

Nico: And it always felt super heavy to have to be very careful, to-

Sadie: Yeah, you had this feeling of responsibility for everything that you did.

Nico: Exactly. And just be incredibly sterile. And I was always worried that I would’ve fucked up. And on top of that, I also was experiencing similar things in terms of flashbacks to abusive relationships. And then also, on top of that, I think when you’re experiencing those flashbacks, you’re looking at the other person, the only other person you’re around, and you’re wondering, are they responsible? And I felt like we were constantly negotiating that in terms of traumarama. In terms of just getting to the bottom of it and realizing that we weren’t each other’s enemy, but realizing that we could look like it.

Sadie: We really took a crash course in communication, I would say, inthe first six to eight months or so of the pandemic. It was just that we needed to figure out how to actually communicate effectively and make each other feel safe, but not feel that we were coddling each other or that we were doing things that were unhealthy. Because sometimes you can validate someone to the extent where they don’t take responsibility for managing their own triggers. And so we had to navigate that as well, to give each other space, but also have boundaries with each other.

Where do you locate your relationship on the monogamy / polyamory spectrum? What philosophies do you have around how you handle monogamy / polyamory? How do you feel this impacts your relationship?

Nico: Niiiice. So, next question: where do we locate ourselves upon the monogamy/polyamory spectrum? What philosophies do we have around how we handle monogamy and polyamory, and how do we feel this impacts our relationship? Go.

Sadie: I mean, even before we became really serious, we started having conversations about checking in with each other about how we felt about being monogamous versus open. I would not define myself as polyamorous, but I would define myself at specific times as maybe being open to an open relationship. But right now, we’re monogamous and we’ve been monogamous. It’s an ongoing conversation. By having that open conversation, we’ve allowed for us to check in with where we are.

Nico: I think we’ve been really communicative, and that when we first started dating, we decided that we wanted to just spend some time just with each other. Of course then, about a year in, the pandemic hits. And so by default, because of the precautions we were taking, we’ve become monogamous. And I think that we’ve unquestioningly, and I have no problems with it, held to that in order to keep each other safe. And that has been something that we’ve done that hasn’t been necessarily about monogamy or polyamory, but actually has been about, in a lot of ways, pathogen.

Sadie: That’s such an odd way to put it.

Nico: It is, but it’s true. And so it’s like, we’ve been monogamous. I’d be fine with you fucking other people, except for the pathogen.

Sadie: Except for the pathogen.

Nico: Well, it’s true. And it makes it more complicated.

Sadie: Which is so funny. I’m sorry, but it just reminds me of some ’90s, like Michael Crichton- Yeah, it’s fine. I mean, if we feel opening up the relationship in the future, that’s something that we’ll have to discuss based on where the world is and how we feel about our own risk appetite in the future. Obviously, we have an open agreement that if some hot celebrity wants to fuck us, no questions asked, like obviously-

Nico: Oh, well, you see, it’s so funny because you say obviously, but you haven’t introduced this concept to the reader. So please introduce the concept.

Sadie: … if Cate Blanchett or someone is in town and one of us just happens to be somewhere and we catch her eye and she’s like, “Do you want to come back to my rented loft?”

Nico: Which, I happen to know-

Sadie: Yes, you happen to know… Don’t put this in print. People are going to ask, “Where does she stay in Pittsburgh?”

Nico: I’ll never tell you.

Sadie: But it’s one of these things where we are completely in support. Honestly, if you don’t take that opportunity, we would be disappointed in each other. Like, why would-

Nico: I would so sad. Like, why wouldn’t you?

What’s wrong with you?

If you came home to me and you were like, “I didn’t fuck Cate Blanchett for you,” I’d be like, “Ew.”

Sadie: I almost fell down this embankment. Wow.

Nico: Oh, no, right into Cate Blanchett’s arms.

Sadie: laughing

Nico: Wait, no, Kirsten Dunst. I’m sorry, she’s looking for ammonite on the shore.

Sadie: That’s Kate Winslet.

Nico: Which one did I say?

Sadie: You said Kirsten Dunst.

Nico: Kate Winslet is down there waiting with open arms and a shell in each hand for you to tumble forth. Okay.

Sadie: Anyway…

Nico: Ah, it’s a bee. Ah, I’m going to die.

Sadie: Oh, it’s on you.

Nico: Fuck, get it away. Get it away. End it. End it.

Sadie: I’m sorry. Okay.

Nico: Where is it?

Sadie: It’s coming back for you.

Nico: I’m going to run.

Sadie: You’re not.

Nico: Tell me where the bee is.

Sadie: I think it’s gone.

Nico: Wow. A brief interlude in which I was chased by a bee.

Sadie: It landed on you. It was so chornky. It was like, “I live here now.”

What’s your living situation like (together, separate, long distance with long visits, something else), how often do you see each other and why?

Nico: What’s our living situation like? We live together.

Sadie: We do live together.

Nico: How often do we see each other? Can you just briefly explain?

Sadie: All the fucking time.
You’re an early riser. I’m not an early riser.

Nico: Oh, tell me more?

Sadie: That’s it. You get up early-

How do you all share expenses or work out finances? How do you share or split up labor in the relationship? Can you talk about why that is?

Nico: Okay, how do we share expenses, and how do we share or split up labor? Can we talk about why that is? Talk about expenses and labor. And we see each other a lot and we both work from home-

Sadie: You’re in the house, I’m in the house. It’s the same house.

Nico: How do we share expenses or work out finances? How do we share or split up labor in the relationship?

Sadie: I mean, you’ve got this big steady job I would say. How we split it is, you make the majority of the income and right now I’m working, I got a little part-time job, but I’m responsible for most of the home reno and paying for the home reno stuff, but that’s just materials because I’m doing the labor.

Nico: Yeah, you basically, you forewoman it and then if I help, I’m following your lead.

Sadie: And then you take care of the mortgage and then we are splitting utilities.

Nico: I get most of the food and stuff and all the various expenses.

Sadie: All the various expenses. I do all the fun stuff.

Nico: I never get to buy anything fun.

Sadie: I’m like, “Hey baby, you want that pair of sandals? Your feet are really hurting. Let’s do that. I can get you the sandals.”

Nico: Thanks, babe. In terms of labor, we’ve kind of worked out our chores. We split the dishes because there’s just so many dishes. I take out the garbage mostly. Sometimes you help but you don’t like doing that and I do-

Sadie: Right, and I do the majority of the home reno. That’s like… And then the cleaning, the straightening up.

Nico: You do tidying and I’ll do deep cleaning. And I am the only one who can fix the shower drain.

Sadie: Yeah. As we said, I’m a tidier and you’re a deep cleaner, although I’ve realized that one of my love languages is asking you to leave for several days every few months so that way I can clean and rearrange things without you around. Deep cleaning is like, you have to leave because it’s going to get ugly before it gets better.

Nico: Yeah. Also, you work a part-time job just because working part-time works better for you.

Sadie: Well, it’s better for me to be able to manage my migraines just because they are chronic.. I’m able to take fewer days off of work just because being able to only work four hours is a lot easier to manage than working eight hours. I can kind of rally and do that, but then also so much of what’s not really talked about with chronic illness is how much time you have to spend recovering. You do the thing and then you have to spend all that time recuperating from having done the thing. I have less to recuperate from only working part-time.

Nico: Right. When you’re working eight-hour days, we’ve seen that with you doing volunteering with Girls Rock and stuff, the entire rest of the time is just recovery.

Sadie: Or I’ll have my part-time job and then I’ll pick up a freelance thing just to make some extra money. If I work full-time, I’ll spend my all my time off just recovering and not really able to help out with much else.

Nico: But I feel like this works out okay.

Sadie: Also you’re fine with grocery shopping, I hate going to the grocery store. I feel completely overwhelmed with options. I feel like it works out all right. It’s a way for us to distribute labor that really kind of works to our strengths.

Do you have kids, pets, plants, all three? Do you not currently have, but want any of these things? Why? Are you in agreement?

Nico: All right. Do we have kids, pets, plants, all three? Do we not currently have but want any of these things? Why? Are we in agreement?

We lost our dear Mya.

Sadie: I know.

Nico: Poor baby angel. We had a wonderful senior floof.

Sadie: She was the best.

Nico: We have no interest in another dog.

Sadie: You have no interest in another dog. I want another dog in… Not right now because we’re still recovering financially from end-of-life care for Mya and we also want to do some traveling without having to figure out-

Nico: Worry about a dog.

Sadie: Yeah. I mean, I would love to get another dog in the next few years, but I know you’re very much, “Maybe in 20 years or never.”

Nico: I just don’t know if I can ever open myself up to that kind of emotional vulnerability again in my life.

Sadie: Yeah, but you’re also saying that you’re not willing to open yourself up to receiving that kind of love again, which-

Nico: You know what? I don’t need to be loved. It’s over.

Sadie: Lies.

Nico: We don’t want kids and we’re in agreement, is my understanding.

Sadie: Yeah. I asked you I think by our third date. I have this rule where I ask someone within the first couple of dates whether or not they want kids because I feel like if someone wants kids, then that’s awesome. They should have them and they should be with someone who wants them. I wouldn’t want someone to say they don’t want kids because I don’t want kids and then they’re missing out on… Either it becomes a thing, that becomes a problem later in the relationship after we’re established or it’s something that they feel like they’ve missed out on. That’s not-

Nico: And then they die.

Sadie: What?

Nico: Then they die having not had kids. The end. It’s so sad.

Sadie: I suppose, yeah.

Nico: We have plants. In terms of plants, I have my veggie garden and you do most of the flowers.

Sadie: I know. I’ve really been slacking this year on the flowers. I just haven’t really had the time.

Nico: I actually planted a wildflower patch out front.

Sadie: The wildflower patch was probably one of the best things you’ve done. You just tore up that grass and threw out wildflower seeds and now it’s beautiful.

Nico: The bees and the butterflies are always there. They are always present.

Sadie: I also grow herbs. I actually managed to… I mean, I grow dill every year but last year I think…

Nico: This year’s dill is really good.

Sadie: And then we have some house plants that I’m desperately trying not to kill.
I would like more house plants, but we get so little sun.

Nico: Yeah, it’s hard and they’re so expensive.

How would you describe the sex we have together? Do you believe in lesbian bed death and, if so, has it or do you think it could visit our relationship? What haven’t we done together but would like to?

Nico: Okay so this question is “How would you describe the sex you have together?”
Sadie?

Sadie: People don’t need to know everything about me.

Nico: Okay, all right. Well, we don’t have to get into too much detail. I would say that it was one of the things that we connected deeply about when we first got together.

Sadie: Yes, I would agree.

Nico: We were like, “This is fantastic.”

Sadie: Yes. I do like that we openly communicate really well and we’re really good at expressing our desires and trying new things.

Nico: I think we’ve cultivated a practice of that, which is good.
Okay. Do you believe in lesbian bed death and has it, or do you think it will, visit your relationship?

Sadie: I don’t really believe in lesbian bed death-

Nico: Neither do I.
Actually, this very website published a take down of lesbian bed death. Apparently, its origins are in-

Sadie: Misogyny? Let me-

Nico: … are in a survey of heterosexual Christian women so I’m not even sure how we got to this conclusion.
I do think obviously in a long term relationship sex ebbs and flows, and especially with health issues and stuff as you get older, can sometimes get in the way, but that’s a whole thing in and of itself.

Sadie: Well, not just in health issues. You go through ebbs and flows of how busy you are with your work.

Nico: Right. True, true.

Sadie: You ebb and flow with… I don’t know.

Nico: Yeah.

Sadie: Saying everything ebbs and flows-

Nico: Yeah, Sadie. Profound. Okay. What haven’t you done together, but want to?

Sadie:I want to get those under the bed straps.

Nico: Ooh, you know what I really want to do?

Sadie: What?

Nico: All right, so you know in The L Word, when they have-

Sadie: Wow. You said, “You know in The L Word?” This could go anywhere. This could go…

Nico: Well, we’re camping right now, right? I just really want to have strap on sex with you, but in a tent like lit from behind and then film it.

Sadie: You are a Jenny Sun. I knew it.

Nico: But I don’t know, it’s just been a vision I’ve been having.

Sadie: It’s a vision. It appeared to you?

Nico: It keeps appearing to me like that. Like the Virgin Mary.

And we need a tripod to set up the camera. All right, you know what? we’re going to… I’ll put a pin… Definitely going to put a pin in under-the-bed straps.

Sadie: Just let me know so I can add it to our packing list. Oh, that’s the thing we didn’t talk about last time, how I’mthe person who does the research-

Nico: Yes, you do the research. Send me the spreadsheet with the various under-the-bed strap options and we’ll take a look later.

Sadie: I do. I just kind of compile a list of, “This is what we need to do. These are the top three things that I’ve found. These are the price points, these are the pluses, the pros and cons. Do you have a preference?” And you’re like, “No, whatever you want.”

Nico: Oh my god.

Sadie: And I make a choice.

Do you think your relationship will more or less continue to exist as it currently is? Why?

Nico: This is incredibly efficient.

Do you think our relationship will more or less continue as it currently is? Why?

Sadie: I mean, this is going to sound harsh, but I hope not because if it stays the way it currently is, then it means that we haven’t really grown.

Nico: I would say that I’m a completely different person from when we started dating, so how can you not expect me to completely transform-

Sadie: I mean, same.

Nico: … every several years?

Sadie: Same. I’m a much different person than when we first met.

Nico: That’s true.

Sadie: Which I’m fine with and for the better. I think part of what excites me about our relationship is knowing that, seeing how we have grown together and knowing that we do have the capacity to grow more and being excited to see where that goes.

Nico: Yes. What would you-

Sadie: Wait, do you have anything to add?

Nico: No, I think that sounds good.

Sadie: Really? You’re not excited about the… You’re very much like-

Nico: I’m not excited about the future.

Sadie: You’re not excited about the future. You’re just vibing. You’re just vibing about the future.

Nico: I mean, it could be really bad. You don’t know.

Sadie: Don’t bring that energy.

Nico: Okay.

Sadie: I mean, it could be, but it could also be really great.

Nico: Maybe. I don’t think I’ve allowed myself to consider that my future might be cool.

Sadie: You said that when we first started dating and look at you now.

What would you say are your most fundamental differences?

Nico: What would you say are your most fundamental differences?

Sadie: Besides that you’re an agent of chaos?

Nico: I’m not.

Sadie: You say that so convincingly. I really wish that when they transcribe the interview, they could just pick up that slight whine in your voice, insisting…

Nico: All right, well, are you not an agent of chaos? You are kind of grounded.

Sadie: I’m pretty grounded, but-

Nico: Agent of order.

Sadie: I’m much more of a planner than you are.

Nico: Planning.

Sadie: I know, you get so bored. I just love talking about how we’re going to redo the kitchen and you just… I can see your soul leave your body when I talk about paint swatches. You’re just like, “I don’t care. It’s green. I don’t care.”

Nico: Yeah. Green’s a good choice.

Sadie: But I’m trying to think what else. You definitely tend to lead more with intuition and you trust that things won’t turn out terribly. You don’t necessarily trust that they’ll turn out great, but you’re just kind of like, “Whatever.”

Nico: Yeah. Okay.

Sadie: I’m definitely… That’s something that I really get from you is just kind of that trusting and moving forward. I kind of feel like I need to know all the information, which can be really paralyzing in a way.

Nico: I mean, I would say that you’re more social than I am.

Sadie: I am. I do love a good schmooze.

Nico: Whereas I will just hermit if left undisturbed.

Sadie: I’m definitely more open. It’s interesting because for a lot of things, you are more open to the uncertainty of a good outcome than I am except in social situations.

Nico: I’m just like, “No, this is already hard.”

Sadie: But I mean, I’m definitely not an extrovert, but I’m-

Nico: I make you look like one. Do you all have any shared dreams or goals for the future or each other? What are these?

Do you all have any shared dreams/goals for the future or each other? What are these?

Sadie: Well, we both want… I mean, maybe you’ve changed your mind, but we did used to talk about having a pack of malamutes.

Nico: Oh, they’d be so fluffy.

Sadie: They’d be little raptors. They’d be such hot messes.

Nico: I mean, yeah. We’ve definitely talked about a house in the woods, pack of dogs.

Sadie: Yeah. I’ve waffled between wanting to live in a small city and living in middle of the woods. If I could find a way to have both, I think I would be happy with that.

Nico: I know. I’m like, I either need to live downtown or live in the middle of nowhere. No in between. Leave me alone.

Sadie: I would like to have a place where I can build a big fire every now and then. That would be nice.

Nico:Well, I have dreams for you, for your artistic practice.

Sadie: Same, and I have dreams for us too.

Nico: Yeah. I’d really like to, I don’t know, travel more with you, see more things. Probably we might have done more of that if it weren’t for the pandemic.

Sadie: Yeah. And also Mya-

Nico: I know.

Sadie: … who was so old for so long that we couldn’t-

Nico: So old for so long.

Sadie: She was so old for so long.

Nico: She really was. She went on good adventures though. I do dream of you finally going back and getting your PhD. I dream of that for you.

Sadie: Yeah, that’d be nice. I mean, I don’t think getting the PhD would be nice, but I think having one would be nice just to say I have one.

Nico: Wow. Bye.

Sadie: Also, just kind of… I don’t know. I don’t really want to be in academia, but having it as an option.

Nico: I mean, in terms of our future, I just picture us… You know what we’ve talked about that’s been our dream, is a shared studio space where we can just work on our various practices and projects together in a space that is designed for that.

Sadie: Well, we’re going to have one once I take out that chandelier and rip up that carpet.

Nico: This dream may be more achievable than anyone ever thought.

Sadie: The dining room is actually becoming the shared studio space.

Nico: It actually is, yeah. Fuck dining rooms.

Sadie: Who uses a dining room? We don’t entertain more than once a year at most.

Nico: Even then they can just, I don’t know, stand.

What piece of pop culture do you share or what piece of pop culture reminds you of your relationship? What’s your movie or your show or your book or your song?

Nico: All right. What piece of pop culture do you share or what piece of pop culture reminds you of your relationship? What is your movie or your show or your book or your song?
I’ll go first.

Sadie: Oh my god.

Nico: Our song is “Babooshka” by Kate Bush.

Sadie: That was so funny. That was so funny. Should we tell the story?

Nico: Yeah, go ahead.

Sadie: We were first dating and we were walking Mya early in the morning and it was chilly outside so we both had big scarves. At this point we didn’t know that the other person liked Kate Bush, but it was cold and we both put the scarves up over our heads and then we both skipped a beat and just turned to each other and said, “Babooshka, babooshka, babooshka ya yaaa.” Just completely spontaneously and it was just one of those magic moments.

Nico: It was a magic moment.

Sadie: I would say Kate Bush in general is just a big-

Nico: A big, a cultural touchstone for us. I definitely feel like the first movie we ever watched together was The Witch.

Sadie:
It was. The Vivitch.

Nico: Yeah, the Vivich. That was when you came over for a sleepover date.

Sadie: Yes. I didn’t know at the time it was going to be a sleepover date, but I had hopes.

Nico: You were ready.

Sadie: I was ready. I packed a toothbrush.

Nico: And then we watched that movie that I called “the Footloose movie.” You were like, “I’ve not seen Footloose.” I was like, “No, the movie we watched.”

Sadie: Oh god, what was that movie called?

Nico: What is it actually called? Finder’s Keepers.

Sadie: Finder’s Keepers, a documentary-

Nico: It’s a documentary.

Sadie: … about-

Nico: … a foot-

Sadie: Just everyone… Just don’t.

Nico: … in a grill.

Sadie: Just don’t tell them about it. Just say, “You got to watch Finders Keepers. It’s a documentary.”

Nico: Those are the first two movies we watched together.

Sadie: But what are pieces of pop culture that are specifically… We just love trash. We watch a lot of trash. We watch a lot of really good movies.

Remember before we started dating, I texted you because there was a Bergman marathon happening at Row House-

Nico: Yes.

Sadie: … and it was on a Monday.

Nico: I was like, “I’m literally at work right now. I can’t go to the movies.”

Sadie: I was like, “Well, I’m going to this movie, you should come.” And then I tried, “Well, they’re playing Persona on Wednesday. Do you want to go?” And you’re like, “I don’t think I can.”

Nico: I do like Persona.

You know what? You know what? When we first got together, I was trying to finish the fantasy novel I was working on. My workspace was in the attic of the house that I shared with several roommates. It was incredibly hot up there, and it was just getting hotter and hotter and I would just go up and then become delirious working on this book.

Sadie: Yeah. You talked about how you were going to pass out.

Nico: You made me a playlist called Attic Delirium.

Sadie: I know. It’s how you got into Diamanda Galas.

Nico: I knew about Diamanda Galas, but I was like, “Oh, this is good. Thank you for reminding me.”

Sadie: Yeah, that was a fun playlist.

Nico: That was a great playlist.

Sadie: I was just kind of in this place where I didn’t try to pick songs that I specifically thought you would like, I just put on songs that I would normally be afraid to put on playlists because I thought they would be perceived as too weird. I just kind of said, “Fuck it,” and put…

Nico: I loved it. I was like, “This is such a gift.” I think that that is definitely a piece of culture that will always be ours, is that playlist.

Okay. To wrap up, tell us a funny story about your partner.

Sadie: Okay so it was a couple years ago. 2019?

Nico: Yeah, we were visiting your family, down by the seashore.

Sadie: I would not describe where I grew up as “down by the seashore.” But yes, a beach is a thing that exists there. It’s like this tourist trap. We went to the ocean and I was feeling nostalgic. And we were just walking on the beach and it was really nice.

Nico: It was December.

Sadie: Which is the best time to go to the beach because no one is there and everything is gray. It’s nice. It’s like you’re in a Cure song. So we’re walking along the water and since I grew up there, I kind of know how to gauge the waves to see…every now and then you just get a big wave that comes up further than the other ones and you just did not understand how the ocean worked. So you’re just dancing along and you’re looking really cute, super super cute.

Nico: Okay yeah, I was just having a good time.

Sadie: Just vibin’.

Nico: Just vibin’.

Sadie: Yeah you were and it was so cute. I just knew, I could see it that eventually you were gonna get hit with a wave and so I backed off and just started taking photos. I was just like, oh my god, my toots is dancing.

Nico: And then a big wave came! And it got in my shoes.

Sadie: It was so funny though because it took a moment for you to realize what had happened like you were still dancing. And then like the water came up above your ankles and you just had this moment where you just stopped, like “What is happening? This sensation! I did not plan for this.”

Nico: And then there’s a photo of me running toward the shore with my thumbs up.

Sadie: There’s like a whole photo series. And then you wrang your socks out and we went to a beach shack.

Nico: It was great. I think we got prosecco.

(The photos in question.)

Nico: Okay, so, the problem with Sadie is that her stories about her are she works really hard and then she does the thing and then it’s excellent because of course, because she worked really hard.

I don’t know. When I was away visiting my family the other weekend, you just tore apart a room and completely redid it while I was gone.

Sadie: We needed storage.

Nico: I just kept getting updates. “Carpet’s gone.”

Sadie: This was going to be a surprise.

Nico: “Sub floor is gone.” I was like, “Wow, she’s going to town.” Which of course my dad loved because he loves you.

Oh my god, Sadie and my dad get along really well and it’s not a story, but it is just funny how freaking cute you two are.

Sadie: Yeah. Every time I go to visit your dad’s like, “Sadie, I got the good stuff,” and then he goes into the closet, pulls out a bottle of Tullamore D.E.W. and motions toward it and is like, “The good stuff.”

Nico: He holds it up like Vera White and he’s like-

Sadie: Vanna White?

Nico: Vanna White, and he’s like, “The good stuff.” And then he’ll be like, “Sadie. Sadie. You got to come see my workshop,” and then he’ll take you to his workshop that he doesn’t use and show you his tools where they’re all lined up.

Sadie: They’re so shiny.

Nico: They are so shiny. I’ll be like, “I also use tools.” He’s like, “Nah.” I’m like, “You taught me to use tools.” He’s like, “Nah. Sadie, Sadie.” And then-

Sadie: He just likes that I make you happy. If I like all those things and you did not seem like you were happy, then he would not care.

Nico: Correct.

Sadie: I wouldn’t get to see his wrench collection.

Nico: No.

Sadie: That would be forbidden knowledge.

Nico: Okay so, funny story about Sadie. Okay. So I’m going to talk about the time Sadie got haunted.

Sadie: I mean, technically we’re all haunted.

Nico: Yes, of course. But now, so Sadie, as you know, does the fore-woman-ing of a lot of the home reno. So we were going hard at it for the first year in the house because there was a lot to do. And then I would say around the fall, it was always spooky.

Sadie: We were doing the living room.

Nico: That was when it started, was when we started redoing the living room was when the haunting really started in earnest. So then we’re starting to see out of the corner of our eye, a guy walking around. We’re starting to smell cigarette smoke for no reason. We’re hearing footsteps. Especially when one of us was home alone, we would start to hear footsteps and doors opening and shutting. And one of the things that I noticed was Sadie… So the people who had done renovations previously or any home work previously, sometimes took a lot of shortcuts and Sadie would be criticizing them out loud. And I would notice that I would get an ominous feeling when Sadie did that. And then the hauntings would escalate after her criticism.

Sadie: I will say that I have come to have a little bit more of a nuanced understanding of what their socioeconomic situation was and why they made some of the decisions that they did. However, there is a big part of Boomer culture where they think that knowing how to DIY something is just doing whatever or knowing a guy. And that because the house did not immediately burn down that they actually knew what they were doing. And I was very frustrated with some of the decisions that they had made concerning some of their supposed updates. And on one hand, they’re probably thinking, “We’ll just do it like this and we’ll never have to deal with it again.” And I mean, they were right. But I did become very vocally frustrated with some of the decisions that they had made, like I don’t know, covering this gorgeous hundred-year-old tile with tar.

Nico: I mean, look at this beautiful tile. And what I do when I see something beautiful is I put tar on it.

Sadie: I know. I’m constantly looking around in the world to see what I can cover in tar.

Nico: Okay. So then this was coinciding with the fact that I had a big fundraising event coming up. So it’s October, again. It’s October 2019.

Sadie: And I had a big composition that I was working on… A commission for a dance piece.

Nico: That’s true. And so we were both working really hard on top of doing home reno. And the first thing that happened was in terms of bigger hauntings, besides what I had mentioned before, was we were both up in bed, really on a mattress in the creepy room, as we called it at the time. And I was snoozing.

Sadie: No, this is one of the last things that happened.

Nico: Was it one of the last? Oh, okay. Nevermind. All right. Well, I’m all a jumble.

Sadie: No. I remember one time I put Mya’s leash on the counter and then it immediately got knocked off.

Nico: Okay. So basically Sadie started to… As we’re getting busier and busier, it’s October. And Sadie starts to experience Poltergeist activity essentially while trying to renovate the living room. She would put stuff on the counters. I watched her put Mya’s leash on the counter and then watched it slide to the edge and fall off.

Sadie: Yeah. And this was especially annoying because when I was working on this composition, I had my phone or other things on my desk, like pens on my desk or whatever, my notebook for taking notes. And they would just get knocked off while I was trying to work. And at one point I looked over and saw my phone moving toward the edge of the desk and was just like, “I don’t have time for this.” I literally said, “I don’t have time for this,” out loud and just put my phone in my pocket and just kept going. But I was very much undeterred by the ghost activity.

Nico: It just seemed to make it more persistent.

Sadie: I don’t know what you’d expect doing…

Nico: Oh my God.

Sadie: What?

Nico: Look at that bird.

Sadie: Oh my God.

Nico: Okay. Okay. Well, let’s talk about one of the climaxes of this.

Sadie: So it just kept escalating. And again, me being very much a… I didn’t feel like I was in the wrong because I’m having to fix their mistakes.

Nico: At that point, I had stopped verbally shaming them. I had stopped. So the focus then just really went to Sadie in terms of the hauntings.

Sadie: I wasn’t shaming them, I was just giving some constructive criticism. It may have been a little bit pointed…

Nico: Shame.

But then one night, I’m sleeping and what Sadie experiences is the sound of, and tell me if I’m wrong, you hear a rhythmic sound at first, right?

Sadie: Okay. So what I heard…

Nico: Go ahead.

Sadie: It definitely woke me up and then I went back to sleep. And then the next time I heard it, I heard this fan sound, like an overhead fan. And it just kept getting louder and louder. And I forced myself to sit up so that way I knew that I wasn’t asleep. Before, I just thought it was a dream. And it started downstairs in the living room basically where we were doing the work. And it came up the stairs and I heard it outside of our bedroom door. And I saw the shadows of someone walking in front of the door. And I shook you awake and was like, “Do you hear that?” And you said, “No, you’re probably being haunted.” And then you went back to sleep.

Nico: Right. And then to add insult to injury, as we’re working in the living room, we experienced a gas leak and then have to get the gas shut off for 10 days, 11 days.

Sadie: We did not start the gas leak. What had happened was they put subflooring over an old gas line that was being used for the gas fireplace, so they didn’t properly cap it.

Nico: Right. They just let the gas keep hanging out in there. And then, so we pulled the subflooring off, and smelled gas. And then basically plumbers found that basically the whole thing was leaking every which way all through this spiderweb of copper piping. And so we had to get a new gas line before we could get the gas turned back on.

Sadie: Right. So again, I just feel like it’s really rich that they decided to haunt me because they did a poor job.

Nico: So then I’m trying to get ready for this fundraising event and we have no gas and we’re being haunted. And I had a stern talking to.

Sadie: And also they were keeping me up.

Nico: I was like, “This is unacceptable.” And they have not woken us up in the night since.

Sadie: They haven’t. I also toned it down and maybe just kept my feelings inside, which is fine.

Nico: Anyway, that was the time Sadie got very haunted because she was a little bit cheeky about somebody’s workmanship. This is somebody who was dead and was right there.

Sadie: They’re really lucky they didn’t burn the house down.

Nico: They’re really lucky the ceiling didn’t fall through the drop ceiling and crush them in their sleep because the plaster was not attached.

Sadie: Yeah. But if that didn’t happen, then you wouldn’t have had your number one lesbian hole.

Nico: The big daddy hole.

Which has been shut at this point. RIP big daddy hole.

Sadie: It lives on in our hearts.