Vinny The Fish Man

For our recent episode "Felix The Different", Felix Neals chronicles his journey from being a quiet child in a small subdivision bordering the everglade swamp on the outskirts of Miami in the 1930's, to dodging harassment from the KKK while in college in Pocatello, Idaho. 

I met up with felix after our interview, at the Hudson River Park in Manhattan, and he shared with me a piece of writing that he hesitated to call a poem, but rather called it "reflections on a tin mirror".

For our recent episode "Mama I'm A Girl", Marlo Mack of the podcast How To Be A Girl, tells the story of raising her transgender daughter. 

At the end of our conversation, we wanted to know how Marlo has grown through the process of discovery of her child's identity, how her daughter has transformed her way of looking at the world, and whether or not she has advice for parents with children like hers. 

Produced by Jonathan I. Hirsch

A friend called today asking me how I like New York City.
I wanted to tell her how I really felt:
 
That Frank Sinatra can go fuck himself, 
“If you can make it there, you’ll make it anywhere,“
as if residing here is like making love on a waterbed that’s half-full or half-empty;
 
That New York City is three fingers of whisky that could corrode a toilet bowl, neat;
you mask the mouth fire with a gritty poker face, compliment its notes, 
and check your chest for hair;
 
That the Big Apple is a collection of Greatest Hits compact discs,
and to be a New Yorker is to be a model on a photo shoot for a motivational poster--
posing at the foot of a mountain you’re never actually going to climb;
 
Instead, I told her what I tell the cousin I see once a year at my family Christmas party:
“It’s great. You should come visit sometime.”

Written & Performed Drew Farrell
Produced & Edited Jonathan Hirsch

When he was 15 years old, Jonathan Hirsch met a met in a superhero costume on a train. 15 years later, he found him again.  

Ethan's side of the story can be hear in episode 1 of ARRVLS: "The Blazing Echidna" at:

http://www.arrvls.com 

Hosted by Gabrielle Lewis 
Produced by Gabrielle Lewis & Jonathan Hirsch 
Edited by Gabrielle Lewis & Jakob Lewis 
Sound Design by Jonathan Hirsch 

John Svenson traveled the world as a mountaineer. He settled in the remote town of Haines, Alaska, where he built his home and started an art gallery called Extreme Dreams.  

In addition to local metalworkers, glass blowers, painters, and other craftspeople, John has a drawer filled with odd and dangerous curiosities he has collected along the way that he calls "The Drawer of Eviscerating Instruments". 

It was a chilly afternoon on The Highline, an outdoor park off 8th Avenue in Manhattan, when I came across Jean Andre Antoine. He noticed the camera around my neck and we started talking about the vintage polaroid camera he walks around New York photographing people with. The conversation turned to the challenges and the benefits of using equipment such as his polaroid, and what each process says about the differences between a photo and an image. Jean is a photographer of all stripes, and you can follow him on Instagram here.  

Sometimes I am reminded of how there are, if you look closely enough, remarkable people on every street corner.

A couple of weeks ago, I was walking through the Greenpoint neighborhood of Brooklyn with my friend Melody. In front of a polish food and fish market, a large basin filled with live fish. I peeked in a large bin filled three feet high with water, stuffed with large, live fish. We stopped and took some pictures. Then, a man wearing large rubber gloves approached us. He asked us if we wanted to take a picture with him and the fish. I took it as an opportunity to asked him a little bit about himself. I told him about the program, and asked him if he could remember a moment in his life when an unexpected change had dramatically changed his perspective. And without a moment's hesitation he answered: This is his story.

My friend and I left Vin and headed down Nassau towards Manhattan avenue; both of us a little stunned, and inspired. 

Many New Yorkers will instantly recognize Matthew Silver's face; even some people outside of New York who have caught wind of the viral video for which he was the subject, will recognize the scarcely dressed bearded eccentric dancing in the 42nd street subway station or Union Square Pavillion, making fart noises and preaching his message of love. Why does he do it?

Today on En Route, the story of Matthew Silver.  

I met David outside a restaurant in Soho. Many years ago, David was t-boned by a Domenico Tour Bus on the corner of Lorimer and Driggs in the Greenpoint neighborhood of Brooklyn. He narrowly survived, and found that remarkably after the accident, his life became easier. He was less concerned about the outcome of things. He attributes his survival to the strong constitution of his 1979 Pontiac Bonneville.

"Saturn Returns", the final episode of the month long mini series "Saturn" is available through the link in the bio, at arrvls.com . Check it out! #podcast #storytelling #saturn #migration #transformation #change

A photo posted by ARRVLS (@arrvls) on Dec 30, 2014 at 10:09am PST