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Hi listeners.

Today we bring you the final episode of our annual three-week winter rebroadcast series.

We'll return next week with all new episodes starting January 13th.

Today's rebroadcast episode,

What if a devastating truth only deepen the mystery?

Originally aired as episode 250 on October 11th, 2022.

I have never felt so utterly broken,

absolutely just lost out of time. It was just like everything stopped. The world stopped. And nothing made sense.

From Wondery, I'm Witt Misseldine.

You're listening to This Is Actually Happening.

Episode 250.

What if a devastating truth only deepen the mystery? When I tell people about my background, I usually give them a thumbnail sketch that I grew up a skinny, a feminine black gay boy in the South during the Reagan era, and I have the scars to prove it.

I was the middle child in my family. I have an older brother, 12 years older than me, and a younger sister who's about 22 months younger than me. I grew up in a loving family

with parents who loved each other. They were married for 50 years. My dad was retired military.

My mom was a stay-at-home mom. They met at church. I was raised Baptist, and that was the source later on of some angst in my life about the time that I started to realize that I was different from most of the other little boys. I just didn't know what it was.

I think I was about in the second or third grade, and my school was doing a production of the Wizard of Oz.

Of course, I grew up watching The Wizard of Oz on television,

...