EP. 1, “TRANSFORMING”: ACTIVIST HISTORIES + CLIMATE AFROFUTURES

Episodes

Georgia and Jules recap the last couple years of changes for the show and the climate movement, with help from climate activists Racheal Baker and Nik Evasco. Then, storyteller Jasmine Butler invites listeners into an immersive, Afrofuturist short story about humanity’s new relationship with other organisms.

About the Storyteller: Jasmine Butler (they/them) is a queer southern cowboi who finds connection and purpose through storytelling, writing, and music. They graduated with a B.A. in Geography from Dartmouth College in 2021 and currently work as a Network Organizer for Powershift Network, a youth climate justice nonprofit. 

Jasmine is most interested in weaving stories of the past and present to showcase the long lineages of Black resistance and survival, particularly in the U.S. South. Outside of writing, Jasmine is an herbalism student, avid book collector and sometimes reader. Learn more about Jasmine’s work at jasmine-butler.com as well as on their substack, Black, Blue and Green Futures. You can also find them on Instagram @jasmrenea and Twitter @__reee__. 

Inherited is a production of YR Media and Critical Frequency. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram @inheritedpod. You can reach us at inheritedpod@gmail.com.

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Episode Transcript

Jules: Hello!! Welcome back to Inherited, everyone! I’m Jules Bradley. 

Georgia: Hey! I’m Georgia Wright.

Jules: We’re the show’s co-creators, and season 1 hosts. 

Georgia: And we’re so excited to return– 

Jules: – after a TWO YEAR hiatus!

Georgia: – to bring you even more stories about what it’s like to be a young person in a rapidly transforming world. 

Jules: Things have for sure changed a lot these last couple years, and our lives are no exception. Georgia and I are solidly in our late 20s – 

Georgia: Ugh. 

Jules: – which is honestly pretty awesome. 

Georgia: We live in wonderful little cities, and are each parents to silly little cats. 

Jules: But one thing that hasn’t changed? Our gratitude for all of the folks out there who supported Inherited from the jump, like the young people who contributed their perspectives to season 1, the media that singled us out as a podcast worth listening to, and especially to all the listeners who expressed their enthusiasm for climate storytelling..

Georgia: Yeah, I think it’s safe to say that Inherited has transformed the trajectory of my career. And life.  

Jules: Mine too.

Georgia: Cuz even though we’ve been working as audio producers for other shows the last couple years, those jobs were made possible by producing Inherited from the ground up. And the lessons we learned from making season 1 have made us better activists, collaborators, and people.   

Jules: And we decided we wanted other people to experience that too! We loved having the space to process a hard subject through joyful creation, to play with stories and sound, and actually get paid to learn in community with each other. 

Georgia: That’s why we’re SO FREAKIN grateful to have found partnership with the podcast department at YR media, which has made it possible for us to open this show up to more people. 

Jules: That’s right. We have nine amazing young storytellers to introduce to you this season. Their climate stories are going to transport you to different organizing spaces, environments, emotions, and even alternate worlds. 

Georgia: Which means you’ll be hearing a lot less from the two of us. 

Jules: And we’re truly so excited about that! This show was always meant to be a community project, and season 2 is a huge step in that direction. So… roll the tape?

CLIP: [tape deck whirs] 

Georgia: Wait! Before you meet our first storyteller, we’ve gotta catch you all up! Because the youth climate movement of 2020 is now two years older. In that time, we’ve changed presidents– 

CLIP: [Newscaster says “He is president elect Joseph Robinette Biden”] 

Georgia: Seen climate disasters play out on a grand scale – 

CLIP: [Newscaster says “Ida is already one of the worst hurricanes in Louisiana’s history”] 

Georgia: And, of course, endured well over two years of a pandemic. 

CLIP: [Newscaster says “Over six million people across the world lost their lives”]

Georgia: As you know, that takes a big toll – on climate activists just as much as everyone else. So we asked 2 organizers, one whose voice you might remember from last season, to walk us through where the movement’s been, and where it’s going.

Rachael: So my name is Rachael Baker.

Nik: My name is Nik.

Rachael: I use she/her pronouns. 

Nik: I use they/them pronouns. 

Rachae: I’m 24 years old as of like two days ago.

Nik: My birthday was just this Monday, so I just turned 31. I’ve got a little dog, name’s Basura, which is Spanish for trash. 

Rachael: Yeah, trying to figure out how I want to live my life, and the person I want to be. 

Jules: I met Rachael just a few weeks before the pandemic hit, when we were both living in Providence, Rhode Island. 

Rachael: And then you came over to my house! And that was that was awesome. Yeah, and we sat on the couch and talked about stuff. 

Jules: At the time, she was organizing with the local chapter of the Sunrise Movement, a youth climate group we highlighted in the first season of Inherited. And in the time since then, Rachel started a leadership position with Sunrise at the National Level, moved to DC, helped launch and lead Sunrise’s first black caucus, and ultimately left the movement. 

In short, the last two years have been a lot for Rachael. 

Rachael: There was a global uprising for racial justice and… I literally just touched my neck because I remember I remember, like, knowing that something happened, like, maybe like a couple days after, like, George Floyd was murdered and all those videos came out. Like, I felt it in my body, like. Like I felt the pressure on my neck. Um. And I was so angry – and anger is not even the right word. It’s like hollow. 

So that’s summer of balancing like this huge field program that would cause major progressive upset to, like, the status quo, which was really great – really hard to figure out. Like, okay, do we knock doors because of COVID? Like, how do we be safe? And at the same time, like, how do we get out in the streets and like protest for however long it takes? And then how do we not burn out? So that’s what I was juggling. 

Rachael: And so, like, everything had to be put on pause and we had to like figure out like, wait a second, how do we actually build a multiracial cross-class movement? I don’t know. (giggles) A lot of us had no idea!

Georgia: While Rachael was in DC working with Sunrise, Nik Evasco was also doing cross-movement work… on the other side of the country. The child of immigrants, Nik has played many organizing roles –in immigration justice, as a teacher, and in the climate justice movement. Currently, Nik’s are a sort of movement mentor with the Bay Area chapter of 350.org, an international climate organization. At 31 years old, Nik doesn’t really identify as a youth anymore. Instead, they call themself a “yelder.” 

Nik: So what is a yelder? Just in short, a youth elder, or an older youth. Knowing that, you know, we’re moving into our thirties and forties, but we’re identified from older generations as young people. And we’re definitely not young people. But we’re still kind of lumped in this like generational solidarity with folks that are younger than us. 

There are yelders now who, like, do have the skills and the knowledge and unfortunately have a lot of the the losses with them that can, you know, reengage with young folks who are who are maybe lost, right? 

Georgia: Nik and Racheal represent a different sort of climate activist than the ones we featured  last season. They are less shiny-eyed, more world weary. And honestly, who isn’t these days! We’ve lived through multiple years of a pandemic, zoom fatigue, new diseases, economic strife, and lots and lots and lots of lots of stymied legislation. (We did record this before the new climate bill was signed into law, for what it’s worth.)

Regardless, the energy of the youth climate movement, on a community and on a personal level, has shifted. Which makes sense! But I’ll let Nik and Rachael tell us the rest.

Nik:  The election cooled activism a lot. You have folks during the entire Trump administration who are just running on anger, running on fear, running on these emotions that like really tear at you. At the same time you see activists leaving the movement, there’s nothing else to support bringing them back in. 

Rachael: As somebody who dropped out of college but also was in college age, I feel like I just had more time to just kind of like figure things out and like screw around a little bit. So, and I just, like, don’t have that,, luxury right now. And also, like, I’m older and my body is just not as happy with me. This sounds so cliché. The weight of the world, though, is bringing me down and making my back hurt. I’m, like, sick every few months now. I am not as hungry to get into it right now, you know?

Nik: You know, we’ve talked a lot about the youth movement, kind of this burnout and this like malaise. But I do work with a lot of older activists who it’s not burnout anymore. It’s like a deep sorrow, right? It’s the older folks who are just like, (cough) I have failed. I have failed young people. There are folks who do this their entire lives, who die not having seen anything. 

Rachael: We go through seasons of leadership. You have fall, which is kind of like breaking down and like getting ready to settle a little bit. And then you have spring where you feel like you’re about to ramp up. So I think, like, being okay with the fact that, like, you can’t push as hard as you did a couple of weeks ago. And actually that’s natural. And you know, like if we had summer all the time, then that wouldn’t be sustainable. It’s July, it’s hot, but I also feel like I’m in the winter of my leadership, trying to figure out how to find my power, what gives me energy truly, and how to take care of myself. 

Nik: What the youth hope industrial complex does, is it creates this entire machine of extraction of young people’s ability to hope. You have really well funded, whether they’re nonprofits or, you know, political parties or they’re just like movement people who like start tokenizing young people as this savior. If the young people just hope hard enough, they will bring us to the promised land. They will topple these systemic inequalities. through the sheer power of hope. Which isn’t a good thing. Hope is a great thing if you can let it have its own space. But if you’re really trying to push hope into this perfect diamond of resistance, you’re just going to burn out, like, so many people. 

Rachael:. I feel like symptoms of burnout have always been in my life. I think what like made it different in organizing was that I could put my finger on what was making me so tired and also, like, I just wasn’t able to do the thing anymore. And I think the most vivid time this happened for me was like right at the end of the, the field program in 2020.  And I was so tired, like, I just like, no matter what I did, it just wasn’t working or wasn’t good.

Nik: During the pandemic, you have young people who lose their entire social network, their entire ability to socialize because of the pandemic, right? Schools are typically the places where young people engage the most – socially, actively, whatever. And it’s just gone in an instant. So, I mean, you know, it’s not all Joe Biden ruining the movement. There was a global pandemic that takes steam out of people. 

Rachael: I think there’s a frustration, uh, and not like the energizing type of frustration. It’s like you’ve been taking the SATs and you’re 4 hours in, and still you have, like, 150 questions left. It’s like, I just don’t want to do this anymore. 

Nik: Folks need to hear that it’s okay to take a break. (laughs)  You know, take a breath, you know, go away for a couple of months, a year, and that’s fine. You have not failed as an activist or as a person who cares about things. You will always care about things. And whatever someone has to do for themselves is valid and just. And that is also a part of movement work. Right. And on the flip side of that, you know, if you’re an organizer, be an organizer who you know, supports that. You know, don’t be an organizer who like, writes people off because they didn’t show up to your Wednesday night meeting at 9:00.

Nik: I think finding as much time to be happy is like something that I’m now kind of personally exploring. You know, I’ve spent so much time on the outside of like, you know, what is considered safe and normal, right? (laughs) I’m a queer, trans Filipino person from the South. Like that’s a weird person in America. And so it’s been like a long struggle to finding places to be happy. So for me, like, the values are just like fostering happiness for yourself? 

Rachael:  We have the climate crisis because we have a system of isolation, like everybody’s doing their own thing and feel like they don’t have to worry about other people. I feel like especially in times where the world is literally on fire and there’s bad news every single day. Like it really does feel like, okay, if I just take care of myself and I take care of my family, then we’ll be okay. That mentality is exactly what’s fueling all these things from happening. They don’t want you to connect with people because they know that when we connect, we have power and we’re able to like, dream about a world that, like, we actually deserve. 

Rachael: So I think my blue sky is really just like building community in radical and, like, kind of quirky ways. I have a bunch of apples and I plan on making applesauce for my neighbors. And I think something that I would really like to do is just… have a big dinner where I don’t cook because I suck at cooking (laughs) but it’s like a potluck and we talk to each other about how do we want our community to look, of your wildest dreams? Conversations that aren’t bounded by reality. And can just flourish, and hopefully give some people hope. 

Yeah, I think my mission right now in this time is to, like, remind people that, like, this world is still ours. And everywhere you look, there’s something to be grateful for. And in that gratitude, there’s hope. Yeah. 

[music] 

Georgia: The world is still ours. If we can imagine it, we can make it. I mean, that’s how Inherited started. And now, we get to experience the profound joy of sharing in new stories, from new voices. 

Jules: And now, it’s time for us to step aside and let the season’s first storyteller take the spotlight. Jasmine Butler is a self-described “queer southern cowboi who finds connection and purpose through storytelling, writing, and music.” They’re going to drop us into an Afrofuturist story set in a beautiful, mysterious new world. 

Georgia: Right after the break. 

[music and ads] 

Georgia: Blessed Magnolia, a short story written and read by Jasmine Butler, and sound designed by Armond Dorsey.

Jasmine: Because revolution takes a lot out of you, but living in darkness takes more. To mental, spiritual, and collective revolutions that dare to rekindle the people and the planet.

[sounds of a rainforest treehouse, morning sunshine, a new day settling in; crescendo of birds chirping, serene sounds of a home in a swamp landscape]

Jasmine: Every morning, Sweetgum says her prayers to Dunia for endowing her people with natural abundance and light, and for sending them an ally when they needed it most. 

“At the end of The Darkness, when our people and planet were suffering most, you sent Grandmother Silk the life force, the Blessed Magnolia, that would propel us into the light. Its mysterious healing power is nothing short of divine. You felt just how biologically, spiritually, emotionally, and physically malnourished we had become, and blessed us with a gift that heals us from the inside. Every day we thank you, Dunia, planet Earth, for another chance to be in right relation with you. Ase.”

[slightly quickened pace for foreshadowing]

[momentary pace quicken or ton shift; brief ominous sound]

This morning during her prayer, Sweetgum felt a nagging sense that something was different, or else that she would be different by the end of the day. The strange feeling radiated throughout her whole body, as if she woke up today with warmer blood in her veins than usual. She did her best to shake off the foreboding energy, and continued on with her morning routine, but she should’ve remembered one of her first lessons: always trust your soul and your ally, Blessed Magnolia, as they will never lead you astray the way outside forces will. 

When she finished praying, the sun was already peeping through the canopy of weepy willows above her home so she knew her Grandmothers had already left for the ritual grounds. 

Sometimes, Sweetgum and her best friend Juju joined the grandmothers on their walk to the grounds. This time together was usually pockmarked by them taking turns to call out the name of a favorite herb, tree, or fungus they observed along the way.  If anyone spotted an ally, the Blessed Magnolia fungus, out in the wild, it was seen as a good luck omen for the day. 

Juju and Sweetgum grew up together, and her grandmothers trusted them both with the stories of how their community fought their way to freedom. They redesigned their way of life from the ground up to be in better relation with the planet, and made sure that those memories lived on. 

[mosquitoes and cicadas buzz]

Every day like today, the Grandmothers rise with the sun and make the long trek to the swamp, past the towering sunflowers and puddles of marshwort. Along the way, Grandma Silk’s chestnut brown hands pull dandelions up by their roots and handle nettles as if the stingers have no effect on her. 

The ritual ground is a raised wetland marsh surrounded on all sides by swampy mire. It is reachable by a creaky but stable wooden footbridge, and completely surrounded by drooping, semi-submerged trees, dense clouds of gnats and mosquitoes, and wetland vegetation. 

The air is thick with humidity, and smells faintly of wet ground and still water. Earthy, pungent, but familiar. Comforting.

When they arrive, Grandmother Lily, Grandmother Hawkweed, and Grandmother Silk sit at the center of the raised wet meadow. Grandma Silk and Grandma Lily both have long, flowing smoke gray locs that they adorn with beads, shells, bone fragments, and Grandma Hawkweed wears her silver hair cut short. She prefers to feel the sun against her scalp at all times. 

Grandma Lily opens her thermos and pours hot water over the herbs that Silk has collected. Her hands are buttery brown and pockmarked with sun spots, war scars, and love marks, and they tremble just so when she pours. All three hum quietly to themselves, different tunes filling each of their souls’ as they enjoy their ritual tea.

Sweetgum arrives at the treeline just as they’re getting started, and leans her tall frame against a towering Cypress tree just over the bridge at the edge of the swampy woods. Many of her neighbors have gathered as well. Most people don’t come everyday, except for her and Juju, but often stop by to witness the ritual and start their own morning slowly. Today there are over a dozen folks dotted between trees.

Just moments after she arrives, Sweetgum is overcome by the unmistakable feeling of an energy shift vibrating in the air. A new electricity that wasn’t there a moment before tickles her senses. She looks across to the treeline on the other side of the marsh, and sees her best friend Juju emerge from behind the thick trunk of a Bald Cypress. 

About time, she thinks.

She scans the treeline and quickly realizes he’s not alone. Juju has a whole krewe, a dozen or so young people they grew up with, each perched between Cypresses and Tupelos. They’re all dressed alike in dark clothes and combat boots, and they  resemble swamp frogs wound tight and ready to lunge. 

They all stare in silence at the Grandmothers, making Sweetgum uneasy. She senses something is wrong as soon as they come into view – the hairs on her neck stand sharp as quills. 

Sweetgum’s veins suddenly feel warm under her skin, pulsating against the mycelium threads supporting and constricting their blood flow. 

A warning. She doesn’t know how she knows this, but she feels it. A unfamiliar warmth radiates under her skin.

She notices even from this distance that Juju’s skin is unusually sullen and pale, his usual berry ripe black-blue tone now an ashen gray sheen with an eerily green glow. He usually flashes his pearly, crooked smile at her when he sees her, but now he seems to be scowling. 

Still, his face is determined, and his aura calm. He raises a hand and makes a gesture that she doesn’t recognize. The swamp comes alive in an instant.

All at once, the people dressed like Juju brandish makeshift weapons and chase after their neighbors and friends. She sees Malik capture Mala, the librarian, and force her to the ground  at knife point. Callen does the same to Uncle Junior, and the old farmer goes down easy on weak knees but with a defiant set to his face. The traitors force their captives onto the ground with their backs to each other and bind them like livestock. 

Their motions are quick and decisive. Their faces are set, and their movements practiced and precise. The moves they’ve all been taught in community defense classes are now being used against their own, and Sweetgum’s mind isn’t processing what’s happening fast enough.  

She looks back to the catalyst, Juju, and sees that he hasn’t moved an inch and his hand is still in the air. His eyes are set on her and the grandmothers, but still, he does not move.

By now the rest of the morning crowd have caught wind of the threat in their midst and move into defensive stances. Confusion, fear, and disappointment is clear on their faces as they resist the force of their own children, niblings, and other youth who have suddenly turned on them.

This whole time Sweetgum has kept her eyes trained on Juju, trying to appear stable even as she feels like the world is crumbling beneath her. She’s disoriented, and her mind is ablaze with shock and an unfamiliar, bubbling rage. Before she can plan out what to do in her head, Juju – previously motionless – moves first. 

He sprints across the shallow swampy bank that separates them and comes up behind the Grandmothers. Sweetgum moves just as fast, crossing the creaky bridge in record time, and they arrive at the outer edge of their circle at the same moment. 

Grandmother Lily calmly raises her hand, palm to Sweetgum and the freckled back to Juju behind her, and surprisingly, he stops and begins speaking. 

“You know what my pops did before the war? Picked vegetables, ever since he was 10 years old. You know what my pops do now? After he lost all his kin, his eye, and half his mind to y’alls so called freedom war? He picks fucking vegetables. Ain’t that bout a bitch?”

The woods erupt in shouts and stomps and raised fists replicating Juju’s hand gesture. Sweetgum’s veins are lava hot now, but she feels numb as she looks to her grandmothers for guidance.

“Y’all did all the fighting, and managed to get loose from those Cons that left y’all for dead in the Dark, and for what? You might’ve fooled my grandaddy into taking just 40 acres and a mule, but he aint got all his wits about him. Y’all let his head get battered at war then took advantage. 

That’s over now. We want it all. We want the riches, the good shit. My grandaddy ain’t do all that fighting to be broke and proud. And from now on, we want to make the decisions. And nobody’s gonna stop us.”

He floats his hand to the knife in his waistband, and looks at the Grandmothers expectantly. Sweetgum can tell just by looking at his face, the face she’s looked at every day of her life, that he means it – he won’t be stopped, and won’t take no for an answer. The blood drains from her face all at once.

Grandmother Silk speaks first. Her warm, steady voice is calm as if this was just any other conversation with Juju.

“But you see, my Juju, you’ve misunderstood a deep, profound thing. 

Your grandfather was rewarded with exactly what he wanted from the Freedom War, just like the rest of us. He has a great life. A plot of land that he loves to tend with his neighbors, a little home on the edge of the village that he shares with you and your siblings because he loved the idea of watching his grandkids grow. 

And above all, he has freedom. He owes no one anything other than to be a good human and a good neighbor. He has all that he fought for. Haven’t you asked him?”

“But he’s wrong!” shouts Juju. “He should have more! He lost so much, sacrificed so much. He should have been rewarded wealthily. He should be rolling in riches and lavishing in the luxuries you’ve outlawed.” He’s boiling past a tipping point, but still Grandma Silk’s tone is steady, reassuring.

“If you want different than your grandfather, if you want more, you can create more for yourself here. Anyone can. But you won’t do it by wielding power over others. We won’t allow it.”

Sweetgum chimes in now, rebuking cowardice and the impulse to let her Grandmothers fight yet another battle for them. 

“We refuse to go back to a time when a few had everything and the rest of us had nothing. We won’t go back to unfreedom. Now we all have abundance, thanks to those grandmothers’ you’re threatening.” 

Her voice is nearly swallowed by the vibrant buzz of Juju’s supporters impassioned by his speech. She can’t disguise the vitriol in her voice, nor the hurt underneath.

She stares at Juju, searching his eyes and soul for a semblance of the person she thought she knew.

Did he never believe any of the things they were taught? Did he really want to restore the same imbalances that almost drove them to extinction? Did he really plan to overthrow the beautiful little world their folks worked so hard to create for them? 

Her mind is racing with anger, fear, disappointment, confusion, betrayal, and more all at once.  Her mind is made up. 

The grandmothers don’t deserve to see the world move backwards. Her Grandmothers will die liberated. 

They’ve fought for it, they deserve it. 

Before Sweetgum is able to decide on a plan of attack she looks down to finally see the source of the burning in her flesh she’s been feeling all day. 

Her heart skips a beat as she realizes that it wasn’t just anger or the swamp’s hues that made Juju look green and glowing – she’s glowing too, except it’s a pale red that seems to radiate from her insides. 

She looks to Grandma Lily with fear in her eyes, and finally realizes that it’s not just her and Juju who are glowing, either. The Grandmothers are just as vibrant, along with everyone around them, lit up like fireflies in the night. Sweetgum is frozen in place by fear.

The community doesn’t actually know much about their miracle kin, the Blessed Magnolia. Grandma Lily studied mycology for years and never found anything like it anywhere other than there in the South, nor had she ever seen it before the war. Yet they’ve trusted it with their lives, and it lives in all of them. 

Yes it was a bold choice to trust it, but they didn’t really have any other options.

But now, Sweetgum can’t help but question whether this was a huge mistake and they were now about to find out the true cost of this strange organism and their relationship with it.

Grandma Hawkweed always says, though, that the divinity is in the fungus itself, and that’s how she knew to trust its healing power. Sweetgum believes her. 

But then, as if the situation couldn’t get any weirder, the glow grows brighter, if that’s at all possible. And not just in her, but in everyone.

Varying shades of red and pink or green and blue, the former emanating from those under attack and the latter coming from within the traitors.  

Again, Grandma Lily raises a luminescent hand, and the swamp hushes to an eerie quiet brimming with unsettled energy. 

Sweetgum’s heart is racing, and she realizes that she can hear other hearts as well. As if they were all standing next to each other, her ears pick up the sound of their hearts beating in unison, an anticipatory harmony of blood coursing through flesh.

And then, all at once, bodies begin to drop, the blue and green flames extinguished in one fell swoop. In an instant, the community is left with yet another field full of corpses expired before their time. The remaining reddish glow in the rest of them slowly flares out, bringing many elders to their knees with it, and those not glued to their spots in shock rush to their sides.

Their fungus partner, the other half of their life-giving symbiosis, recognized a threat and extinguished it to save the whole organism. The community. It was that simple. Balance has been restored, their carefully crafted ecosystem safe from the threat. Yet none of them feel rejoiceful about it right now, aren’t yet ready to see it that way. All they can feel, all they can see, is the weight of more loss.

In an instant, Sweetgum lost her best friend, her neighbors, her crushes, her kin. In a moment, everything can change, and there’s no turning back. 

Jules: Inherited is brought to you by Y-R Media, a national network of young journalists and artists creating content for this generation. We’re distributed by Critical Frequency, a women-run podcast network founded by journalists. 

Today’s episode featured the writing of Jasmine Butler, sound designed by Armond Dorsey. 

Our co-creators and senior producers are Georgia Wright and Jules Bradley. Our Executive Producer is Amy Westervelt, and our sound engineer is James Riley. Our Director of Podcasting is Ray Archie, and our interns are Ichtaca Lira and Chaitanya Dendekar. 

Georgia: Original music for this episode created by these young musicians at YR:

Christian Romo, Anders Knutstad, Noah Holt, Jacob Armenta, Chaz Whitley, Michael Diaz, 

Sean Luciano Galarza

Music direction by Oliver “Kuya” Rodriguez and Maya Drexler. 

Art for this episode created by YR’s Ariam Michael. Art direction by Brigido Bautista and Marjerrie Masicat.

Special thanks to Jordan McDonald, Ru Kenani, Rebecca Martin, and Kyra Kyles. 

Please throw us a rating or maybe even a review on the Apple Podcast app – it goes a LONG way towards getting these stories out there! You can also follow us on Instagram and Twitter @inheritedpod. 

If you want to learn more about our show and this season’s cohort of storytellers, head to our website at yr.media/inherited.