Welcome to the Maw Podcast. I'm your host for this week John Good. This first month of 2021

has seen the inauguration of a history-making president and vice president, and at the same

time a huge spike in COVID numbers an attack on the US Capitol in nationwide division.

You've heard it said before, we are living in unprecedented times, and in times like these,

we must ask ourselves how did we get here. So this week we have two stories about moments of

reckoning when the president forces us to look back on the past with different eyes.

Up first is Julie Baker. Julie told this story at a Boston Story slam where the theme of the night

was confrontations. A quick heads up, Julie's story includes depictions of an abusive household.

Here's Julie, live at the Maw.

When I was 13 years old, my mother saw my reflection in the kitchen mirror as I was mimicking her

to my best friend. She responded by breaking two mellamine plastic plates over my head.

They were avocado green and mustard yellow. It was the 70s.

That wasn't the first time she was violent or the last, but it was the first time she did it

in front of anyone who wasn't part of our immediate family. I was mortified. My shame hurt more

than the lump on my head. So 20 years later when the midwife said, it's a girl at the birth of

my first child, I thought, fucking awesome. I get the ultimate do over. I get to do everything

right that she did wrong. I get to break the cycle. It was just going to be a piece of cake.

And it was for a while. I read every parenting book. I went to groups. I did meditation. I read

little daily reflections for mothers who do too much. I bought her a little play kitchen and a tool bench.

And then she hit puberty. And I didn't know what the hell I was doing. I was on my own by then.

She had a little brother. And I had no tools. I knew how to yell and scream and swear and take

shit away. That's all I knew how to do. And I thought I was doing okay because I didn't break

...