Hello Rainy Dais Family!
I’m going to start a series of posts where I’ve transcribed my interview with Cody Stauffer and the All That’s Holy: Blue Collar Podcast. You’ll be able to read the interview in weekly snippets, but you can also listen to the entire interview here. Cody and I discuss everything from overcoming insurmountable obstacles, finding God outside the church, having the moxie to demand where He is when really bad things happen to us, coming out of the closet with your pain, how American Christians are socialized to do religion, being a Hope Giver before DINNER, swinging swords, peeing in the right bathroom, changing the world one snarky Facebook meme at a time, Hope for perpetrators of abuse, how Hope divides us, inviting people over for dinner who fly Confederate flags off the back of their trucks, a church who had to close its doors because a former victim of sexual abuse sued them and won, this liberal who found grace among very conservative people, a downloadable curriculum for churches in dealing effectively with child sexual abuse within their own congregations, and even some talk on writing, the writing process, Dr. Gary D. Schmidt (of course — I love that guy!), switching to fiction, getting published, working with writing groups, and being terribly late to the Harry Potter party.
How could you pass this up?
You can’t. So here’s the first installment:
CODY: So, Daisy, you’re my first live, in-person interview, so that’s historic.
DAISY: Good! Good!
CODY: I guess my first question should be… did you think you could get away with it?
DAISY: (Laughs) I always get away with it.
CODY: (Laughs)
DAISY: Yes!
CODY: That’s funny. So, you’re on your Hope Tour…
DAISY: Yes, I am.
CODY: …2016.
DAISY: Yes.
CODY: And it’s going to go into the fall?
DAISY: It is because I’m running out of summer.
CODY: Right.
DAISY: And, uh, you know right now I have this momentum going and things are all coming together just about the same time that I’m getting ready to go back to my other job which is teaching middle school…
CODY: Right.
DAISY: … and I’ve got to be really engaged and present and focused on my kids, 7th graders, 12-year—olds… the coolest people ever in the history of the world.
CODY: Yeah…
DAISY: And there are just more churches that are interested in having me come and speak and so we’ll just go into the fall and ride this wave as long as it goes.
CODY: So, give our listeners of the podcast just a brief biography – who is Daisy Rain Martin?
DAISY: Goodness. Crazy…
CODY: (Laughs)
DAISY: You know what? I am just a girl, I think… they call me the “Hope” girl, bless their hearts. I wasn’t always the “Hope” girl; I was raised in kind of a juxtaposition which is the reason that my first book is called Juxtaposed. It’s a comedic, spiritual memoir… and I was raised in two different halves: Uh, the one half of my life was my grandmother, who was the manager of The Platters singing group back in the ‘50s and ‘60s, and so she moved to Las Vegas and was… I mean, it was wildly popular but then, you know, The Platters had their sweet spot – that decade…
CODY: Shelf life? They had an expiration date?
DAISY: Well, they had some lasting power. I mean, she [Daisy’s grandmother] still receives royalties and everything on the music, which is great. That’s mailbox-money, right? But she closed down all of her offices in New York and Chicago and LA, and she… she settled in Las Vegas in ’65? ’66? And just loved that town and so I had that half of my life that was all glitter and glamour and, you know, you pick up the phone and Dick Clark was on the other end, and there’s all these music rehearsals and showbiz people and there’s all of that…
CODY: Right, right.
DAISY: … but then there’s the other half of my life that was not as glittery and glamorous. I was raised in an uber-fundie, very religiously conservative home, which is all fine and good except that it was also very abusive. One of the reasons that I am an advocate for child sexual abuse is because that is where I came from; it’s a block I’ve been around. So, you know, people’s faith… I have all the respect in the world for a person’s faith…
CODY: Right.
DAISY: … but our home was just mixed with a level of hypocrisy that was just phenomenally … overwhelming. And so I grew up… and I told… what happened to me and a couple people didn’t believe me. So I wrote a book and told the whole world. My first book, Juxtaposed: Finding Sanctuary on the Outside, was my publisher’s #1 top-selling book in 2012.
CODY: Awesome.
DAISY: So then I’m going to churches, and I’m speaking about child abuse… I had a little bit… you know, that’s not an easy sell…
CODY: Right.
DAISY: I didn’t have gigs booked Sunday after Sunday. It’s kind of a really hard subject.
CODY: Yeah.
DAISY: But, people in the churches that I did go to would start… would come up to me and would just tell me their deepest, darkest secrets and I’m trying to pour out hope! I had one lady, she was at least 127 years old, she came up to me… it was at my own home church in Las Vegas, Trinity Life Center, and she came up to me and said, “What I am about to tell you, I have never told anyone.
CODY: Oh, wow.
DAISY: She said, “Not my children, not my husband who’s been long dead…” and she told me about her grandfather being a perpetrator… I just didn’t want people to wait 127 years before [telling someone]
CODY: Right!
DAISY: So, I started talking about hope, and this book Hope Givers was born. That little book, though, has had so many challenges! But, boy, we pushed through every one, and it took me a while to figure out what Hope Givers needed to be.
CODY: Hmmm…
DAISY: And so here we are.
Daisy Rain Martin is an author, speaker, advocate, and educator as well as a founding member of The Flying M-Inklings Writing Group. She lives with her husband, Sean-Martin, in the beautiful state of Idaho and teaches English and Literature during the school year to the best 7th graders the world over. Daisy spends her summers writing, speaking, researching, creating, gardening, and canning.
Hope Givers: Hope is Here, is the sequel, of sorts, to her comedic, spiritual memoir, Juxtaposed: Finding Sanctuary on the Outside, which was Christopher Matthews #1 top selling book in 2012. She has also written a free e-book for anyone who has or is currently being sexually abused called, If It’s Happened to You.
Please follow her weekly blog, SATURDAISIES, which addresses a plethora of current issues including child advocacy, all things hilarious, and matters of the heart. She would love for you to join the Rainy Dais Community by friending her on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.