This is Rumblestrip. I'm Erica Heilman.

Yesterday morning, I called my health insurance company with some questions about some things.

They weren't, you know, big things, but they were things that I wasn't reimbursed for

that I thought I should be reimbursed for. And I talked with five customer service people. I repeated my

address and my social security number five times. Number three, customer service representative I was

disconnected from, so then I had to start again. And I was on the phone with my health insurance company

for 49 minutes. And then I started to cry and I cried all morning. And I didn't even really know

why I was crying. But it has to do with being, I think, at the mercy of failing systems and failing politics and climate disasters. Los Angeles is burning.

Donald Trump will be sworn into office on Monday. If you want to go to your primary health care

doctor, you might have to wait until July. During the pandemic, I asked you to send in audio from wherever you were

so we could make a show about what the pandemic sounded like. I'd like to try that again now.

I want to make a show about the sound of what I think of is like diffuse despair. Again,

systems that just don't seem to be working anymore, towns that are obliterated by flood and by fire. I don't want to make a show about why everything is so chaotic or even what we

can do about it, because I feel like there's plenty of that. I want to make a show about what this time sounds like.

Maybe you can record a call to your health insurance company or a call to the cable company

or that self-checkout at the grocery store, but actually you almost always have to talk

to someone who works there anyway.

You could describe

something that you ordered online that doesn't work. If you're in a place that recently flooded,

maybe you can walk around and describe what you see and what it feels like there now. If you're in

Los Angeles and you're safe, I would love to hear what Los Angeles sounds like right now.

You could record a TikTok video or the inauguration or a dinner conversation or a song or a school board

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