Modern Love The Podcast is supported by

Produced by the ILAB at WBUR Boston.

From The New York Times and WBUR Boston, this is Modern Love.

Stories of Love, Loss, and Redemption.

I'm your host, Megna Chakrabardi.

Who's the person you turn to for love advice?

Who knows how you're doing and notices when something's wrong?

Is it your mom, your best friend?

Or how about the man who sells you Sharkudary?

On Catherine Down's essay is called Need to Find Me, Ask My Ham Man.

It's read by Jenny Slate. Jenny has a special on Netflix called Stage fright.

She's also out with a new book called Little Weirds.

The man who sells me ham is the first person who would notice if I were dead.

Experience supports this claim.

When my grandmother died unexpectedly three years ago, I left Paris for the funeral without warning any of my local shopkeepers.

This led my Sharkudary salesman to believe that I myself was dead.

Alarmed by my continued absence and aware of my daily dining route, he hurried across the street to my wine guy to see if he had any news of me.

The human equivalent of a stray dog who wanders from shop to shop in search of whoever will give me a snack.

My wine guy hadn't seen me in days either, so he called my friend who explained about the family emergency.

When I finally returned from Boston, there was no need to explain where I had been.

The whole neighborhood had been alerted.

And they turned out with hugs, condolences, even chocolates.

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