Transcription of Sisters #41
Speaker 1: You are listening to the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast recorded at the studios of Maine Magazine in Portland, Maine and broadcast on 1310 AM Portland. Streaming live each week at 11 AM on WLOBradio.com. Show summaries are available at doctorlisa.org. Download and become a podcast subscriber of Dr. Lisa Belisle through ITunes. See the Dr. Lisa website or Facebook page for details.
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Dr. Lisa: Hello. This is Dr. Lisa Belisle and you are listening to the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast, show #41: Sisters, airing for the first time on WLOB radio 1310 AM on June 24, 2012. Today in the studio I have with me today Genevieve Morgan. Hello Genevieve. Good to see you again.
Genevieve: Good to see you, Lisa. I’m excited for our show today.
Dr. Lisa: Yeah, we have two sets of very interesting sisters coming on to talk to us about sort of the sisterhood. What’s your experience with sisters been Genevieve?
Genevieve: Well I actually have two brothers, but I have four step-sisters so though I never really had the blood bond with sisters I got to see it and then I got a little taste of it on the periphery. I would say my experience with sisterhood is that it’s exceedingly close and exceedingly volatile.
Dr. Lisa: I think that’s a good observation. I have four sisters. There are ten in my family as we’ve talked about before and I’ve seen both sides. Although in general I get along very well with my sisters. They’re all younger, but there is definitely a female thing that seems to kind of intertwine sometimes there.
Genevieve: Well it’s interesting too because I think that birth order and siblinghood can really impact your sense of health and well-being and self-esteem because it’s your tribe. It’s your tribe of origin. How was it being the eldest of a large tribe of origin?
Dr. Lisa: I love all of my brothers and sisters and I always say this, I have a great relationship with each and every one of them now. They’re all around the country. Being the oldest in a family of ten was not an easy … it was not an easy thing. The next sisters down from me were 19 months and they were twins and they’re very strong … they were very strong little women even then and they’re very strong women now. I do think it really shapes the person that I became as an adult.
Genevieve: Are they supportive of you now?
Dr. Lisa: All of my brothers and sisters are supportive of me now, and I see this in my own sisters … I mean my own daughters as sisters. I see them … I have my Abby who’s 16 and my Sophie who is 11 and they equally kind of fight and don’t get along but then also are fiercely loyal to one another, so it’s such an interesting thing to watch.
Genevieve: I went to an all-girls school and I think that even when you don’t have sisters women tend to create bonds of sisterhood with their friends. I think it must have a huge evolutionary reason behind it that we tend to, as females, put our feelers out and try to find similar women that we can really share with. I think there is some data shows that when women are together and sharing their confidences they release oxytocin, the attachment hormone, and so there is actually a sisterhood hormone.
Dr. Lisa: I also think that … I can’t speak to this exactly evolutionarily, but if you have the women who are taking care of the children and they share the responsibility of taking care of the children they also are going to want to really contribute to the sustainability of a community. Whether you’re … it’s a sister that you’re working with or you’re working with another person who’s a pseudo-sister but another female in the community I think you are interested in making the community work for your children and for other women’s children, and not to say that men don’t do the same thing. I think they just do it in a slightly different way.
Genevieve: Do you find that being a female health care practitioner that the women who come to see you want that kind of support from you as well? That kind of sustained … it’s almost … I wouldn’t say it’s maternal, but there is a different … if we’re talking about sisterhood here, is there a different bond that you have with your female patients to your male patients?
Dr. Lisa: I think the one thing that I have with my female patients that I don’t have as much with my male patients is just the shared understanding. I mean to be able to know what it’s like to be a working mother, to be able to know what it’s like to be a sister, to be an aunt. I think I am able to really relate well to the men and understand what they’re going through but I will never understand to the same extent, and I think any woman that comes to see me as a health care … looking for health care is looking for somebody who understands, who’s looking for somebody who can sort of share that experience.
Genevieve: Maybe that’s really the secret of sisterhood. It’s not necessarily the blood bond but that shared sense of understanding whether it’s in times of challenges or in times of victories, that there’s somebody out there that gets you in a way that nobody else does.
Dr. Lisa: It’s interesting as I’m sitting here and I’m thinking about you and I and our relationship. You and I started knowing each other about a year and a half ago when you wrote an article for Maine Magazine for their first wellness issue. You and I and John McCain who worked very closely for the past, almost a year on this radio show and there’s been this interesting bond that’s developed even then that you and I have gone through our individual personal challenges. We’ve gone through the radio show challenges, and I often have the sense that there are things that you understand about me and my situation that … I have to give John credit too. He’s not our sister but we’ll let him be a pseudo-sister.
Genevieve: He’s in the bond of sisterhood.
Dr. Lisa: He’s in the bond. Yeah, lots of love going on here. I think that you do start to understand things about one another and you actually can sort of feedback information. That’s so helpful. It’s been an interesting experience just to develop an additional sister.
Genevieve: Well we’ll have to see what the other sisters in our show today have to say about that.
Dr. Lisa: Yes. Absolutely. Today we have coming in Beth Shissler who is the President of SeaBags and Linda Greenlaw who is a New York Times best-selling author, and we also have the Tomlinson sisters, Sonya and Jessica. I suspect that they’re going to have a lot of very interesting things to say about sisterhood and to say about creating a sustainable business and personal interactive community, so I look forward to having them on our show.
The Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast is pleased to be sponsored by the University of New England and as part of this sponsorship we have, every week, a segment we call Wellness Innovations. This week’s Wellness Innovation came from a study called “Who Said You Could Wear My Sweater: What Adolescent Siblings Fight About and How It Effects Their Relationship” which was recently published in Child Development.
Whether it is about who gets to ride shotgun or who wore a shirt without asking, siblings fight. While seemingly innocent a study at the University of Missouri reveals that certain types of fights can affect the quality of sibling relationships. Researchers identified two major types of conflict among adolescent siblings and found that conflicts about emotional and personal space have a negative impact on trust and communication between siblings. The second conflict area includes equality and fairness issues such as taking turns and sharing responsibilities. These conflicts have no impact on relationship quality.
While both younger and older siblings reported personal space conflicts, older siblings reported these conflicts more frequently according to the researchers. This suggests that older siblings are more sensitive to personal space issues and may indicate the beginning of their separation from the family. The findings of this study can help parents, psychologists, and other individuals who work with teens understand the impacts that conflicts can have on sibling relationships and the importance of setting up family boundaries to reduce sibling conflicts about personal space.
For more information on this Wellness Innovation visit doctorlisa.org. For more information on the University of New England visit UNE.edu.
Speaker 1: This portion of the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast has been brought to you by the University of New England. UNE, an innovative Health Sciences University grounded in the liberal arts. UNE is the number one educator of health professionals in Maine. Learn more about the University of New England at UNE.edu.
Dr. Lisa: Today on the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast we are thrilled to be able to have a conversation with sisters. Two sisters in here, both very interesting in and of their own right. Beth Shissler is the co-owner and President of SeaBags, Inc. and was born and raised in Maine and her older sister … am I allowed to say that you’re older, Linda?
Linda: Absolutely.
Dr. Lisa: OK. All right, so her older sister, Linda Greenlaw is America’s only female sword fishing captain and author of three New York Times best-selling books about life as a commercial fisherman which we’ll talk more about later, but thanks so much for coming in today.
Linda: Thank you for having us.
Beth: Thank you.
Dr. Lisa: Now, I talked to Beth a few weeks back and I was fascinated to hear about your growing up in Maine. What was it like to grow up in Maine and then both of you take very sort of international kind of paths? You started here but you’ve gone lots of places now. How do you think growing up in Maine shaped that?
Linda: I think that our family had a lot to do with how my sister and I sort of developed through the years. We had a very close-knit family, but we were exposed to a lot but it was a lot of natural things. We didn’t travel. We went between Topsham, Maine and Isle au Haut which is our summer home, which is where our dad’s family is from. We didn’t do vacations. Our family did not go to Florida. We went to Isle au Haut and it was always just such a … our first love was going to the island. We lived for it.
Beth: I think that’s where we learned that hard working is really having fun too. We spent our summers up there from the minute school got out to the minute school went back in again, and we didn’t have electricity. We didn’t have plumbing. We didn’t have TV up there. We didn’t know any better. Our fun was lugging things up to the lighthouse. It was helping our dad create a road when we needed to. It was bushwhacking. It was putting around the shore. Whatever it was.
Linda: Right. If we needed fresh water we had to travel up and down a huge hill and carry it by hand. Dip it out of a well by hand with buckets and dump them into containers and carry them up the hill. Actually, our punishment if we were doing something wrong mother didn’t like is we’d hear this glug, glug, glug. She’d be dumping the water down the sink and say “Time to go get water.”
Beth: And it would take us all day because we found a few distractions along the way, but I think that that’s when we really learned that working could be fun. I’m not sure we every considered it work. I’m not sure we still do.
Linda: Especially once we had a vehicle down there that whenever we went to get water we’d steal the car, but clearly life on an island as a kid you do have so much more independence, so much more freedom. I like to say that our nephews … I love watching them because they do all the things that we did as kids and it’s just kind of fun to relive our childhood through them. I think like the safety of the kids is checked at the high water mark. If they’re below the high water mark they have life jackets on. If they’re above the high water mark they probably have a helmet on because they’re going to be on a bicycle or a motorcycle or a four wheeler. It’s a pretty special place to grow up. We had a really nice childhood and our friends would probably tell you we’ve had a really long childhood, but that’s OK too.
Dr. Lisa: Let’s back up a little bit. For people who are listening, I know that Isle au Haut is a very special place for lots of different reasons, but tell us a little bit about that. What is so special about Isle au Haut?
Linda: Well a lot of things are special about Isle au Haut. Half the island is Acadia National Park so it will never be developed. There’s beautiful hiking trails, but because it is so remote there’s not a lot of use in that park. You have to get there by mail boat. There’s not a state run ferry so you can’t bring a car over. You have to really want to get to Isle au Haut to be there so it makes it a pretty special experience for visitors. As far as having family there, it’s a very close-knit group. They say it takes a village to raise a child. It’s true on Isle au Haut. There are four kids in the Isle au Haut schoolhouse. One of the very few remaining one room school houses on a remote outpost, probably in the world I’m guessing.
It’s just special for a lot of reasons. There’s one little general store. One fuel pump for gas. I mean the store’s open, right now, about four hours a week. Very small window of opportunity to get your groceries so you really have to plan ahead or have good neighbors that you can bum stuff from.
Dr. Lisa: Is there now electricity or water or any of the modern conveniences?
Beth: Oh yeah. Yeah, we have internet. Although I don’t have it at my house yet, but we do have internet. Plumbing and electricity, but I can check my email at her house. We have all the things that people need.
Dr. Lisa: Linda, I want to talk a little bit about your sisterhood. Your name came into international renown with Sebastian Younger’s book “The Perfect Storm”. Did you know how dangerous her job was when you were … she’s older than you are so did you know? Do you worry about her? Beth.
Beth: I absolutely do worry about her now. Back then, at the time where she was fishing I was actually living in Japan. I didn’t know any better. Linda’s eight years older. When she started sword fishing it was to put herself through college I just thought it was kind of cool summer job. Now I’m fully aware and it’s a little bit easier now than it used to be because we do have radios and we do have satellite telephones so when she’s been fishing the last few years I’m the pain the butt sister that tends to call in at $80 a minute when I shouldn’t just to make sure she’s OK.
Linda: Listen, I was in Kenya a couple months ago working as a consultant for fisheries and I think the guy that hired me got a very panicked email and phone call because I hadn’t done a daily check in. I’m in Kenya. I need to call my sister every day.
Beth: Yeah, we have a little separation anxiety at this point, but … actually I do. You don’t.
Linda: No, I do too.
Beth: Thanks.
Dr. Lisa: You feel that in a psychic way as well as in a …
Linda: Yeah, we are. We’re never …
Beth: Not so psychic. She didn’t check in.
Linda: Yeah, right.
Beth: There was no psychic going on.
Linda: We’re a lot of things. Number one we’re very close sisters. Number two we’re best friends. Number three we’re business partners so there’s a lot of connections there. There’s a lot of reason to be checking in on a daily basis.
Dr. Lisa: What made it possible for you to have such a successful relationship? There are some sisters that don’t get along at all, so what do you think were the things that contributed to this really positive on-going interaction?
Beth: I think that our whole family is very … our entire family is very close. I have a twin brother who’s … Linda and I are both extremely close to and adore his children. We had another sister that we were also very close to. I think we have to credit our parents for just instilling family as a really important thing because at the end of the day we know that we can count on each other.
Linda: Yeah. I agree to that and I think that’s the bottom line of it. It’s the way we grew up. A close family. We were like actually horrified, and we have this conversation occasionally because we have friends or whatever who are like “Oh, they haven’t spoken to their mother in … They’re mad. They’re having some big fight or they hate their sisters.” Like, what? Are you kidding me? We’re like wow, and we find out that actually we’re the strange ones because we don’t fight.
Beth: Yeah, we actually horrify a lot of our friends because when they come to Isle au Haut … We’re really clannish. We all have our own houses out there so we go back to our own pillows at night but we actually spend every meal together. It’s a little bit weird. I mean we thought it was normal until we have friends out there that are like “Oh, we’re going to eat with your family again.”
Dr. Lisa: And you have a good relationship with your mom, too. She was also was part of a business venture recently. Do you want to tell us about that?
Linda: My mom and I have co-authored two cookbooks which is a really special thing. I’ve always been a huge tomboy and I did a lot with my dad growing up and did a few things with my mom but it was mostly just like hanging around the kitchen if she was cooking. I might stir something, but doing a cookbook with my mom was a very special experience. We did the first one when she was 70 years old and it was very cool and the cookbooks are something we’re really proud of. They’re beautiful. The publishers did a great job so it’s be really nice.
Dr. Lisa: For those who are listening who want to get one of those cookbooks, can you tell me their names?
Linda: Well the first one they can’t get any more so I won’t even bother with that one. The more recent one is “Maine Summers”.
Dr. Lisa: What type of food does that have in it?
Linda: It’s what everyone’s doing. It’s local, fresh ingredients. I think the difference is you know people say local and fresh. That’s nice, but on Isle au Haut there’s not another option. You have to eat what you have there.
Dr. Lisa: Beth, how have you incorporated your mom into your … maybe your business life or adult life?
Beth: There’s no option. Our mother incorporates into our lives. We should mention that we’re really close to our dad. My dad is the best business guy I know and he’s still kind of my go to for questions. When I just want to settle down and talk things through he’s the guy. At 82 he’s doing great.
Dr. Lisa: Tell me about your older sister. I think, Beth, one of the first times I ever spoke with you was right around the time that you have this tragedy occur in your family and I know it was really hard for you.
Linda: Yeah, our older sister Rhonda was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and sadly passed away eight months later, which we’re coming up on the one year anniversary. I don’t think I’m tougher than my sister, Beth, but she’s still tears up a little bit easier than I do. Again, we have a very close family. It was very tough. It was very difficult for my parents. You know no parent is supposed to be losing a child, but we all got through it and life goes on and we have great memories. Still, by the same token, it’s very sad to lose a sister.
Genevieve: Was Rhonda in between the two of you?
Beth: No, she was our older sister so she was ten years older than I am and two years older than Linda. A lot of silver lining to the whole experience … I say now that Rhonda really took one for the team. There were so many blessings through the whole thing. We all came together. We were there. We’ve always been there for each other but we were there from the minute she was diagnosed, as a family until the minute she took her last breath and celebrating her life still. It was a very difficult time I wouldn’t wish on anyone. It’s just a horrible, horrible disease but some good things happened too.
Dr. Lisa: Well, I’m very sorry about that and I know that … I can’t remember the exact percentage of DNA, but the closest people in the world are siblings. We all share about 99.89% of our DNA with our siblings which is kind of remarkable when you think of how different siblings are, but when I think of you and your sister I think well here she is. Right here in front of us.
Linda: Yeah. Thank you. I take that as a huge compliment, and I also take it as a compliment when I look at the sister next to me. It’s like yep. I’m sharing that DNA. I want all of it.
Beth: It’s nice that you say that. I feel the same way, but you might be horrified in some respects.
Linda: No, and what a difference a year makes. We’re coming up on the one year anniversary and so many great things have happened, and this year that is just amazing to think and we do credit Rhonda for being there and guiding us through it. However hokey that might sound to some people. Some remarkable things have happened to everybody in our family and we know that she’s really there watching out for us, so it’s a good thing.
Dr. Lisa: Tell me about some of the things that you learned during this difficult process.
Linda: I think the most obvious thing that I learned is that … and people say it all the time and you don’t pay much attention, is just how short life is and how you really need to just live and love every minute of your life because guess what? We’re not all here forever. None of us are here forever and some of us are here for a very short time.
Beth: Yeah, and think that in the last year we’ve really identified with that. We’ve made some decisions more easily and more quickly than we might have otherwise because life does change on an instant and on a dime. I think that we also learned that as strong as we want to be there was nothing like hospice for us. It was really nice to have, as close as we all were and were there every single minute, it was really nice to have somebody that’s actually trained to guide us through the process and it was a real relief for our sister, too to have that unbiased, impartial person to come in that she could say anything and not worry about disappointing anybody. As much as we think that we can do it all, we just can’t in some cases.
Dr. Lisa: How are your parents doing with this?
Beth: Better by the day. It was a tough year for them. Like Linda said, no parent should have to go through that and they were there for all of it up until the very end. I think they’re better.
Linda: Yeah, they are much better.
Genevieve: How did your brother do in a house full of girls? A house full of sisters?
Beth: Oh, you mean the king?
Linda: I thought you were going to say “Oh, the other sister.”
Beth: He’s great. He’s great. He is one of our best friends.
Linda: And he is. Yeah, no doubt and I tell people this all the time about our brother, Charlie or Chuck. He is probably the best husband and father that I know and I take a little credit for that. Coming up in a house full of girls he knows how to treat women. Coming up with a father who is wonderful he knows how to be a good father and I think his wife, Jen should be thanking us. I’m sure we’ll remind her this weekend.
Beth: Yeah, he’s great in his own right and very much handled all the women very, very well. Ironically he has two boys so he’s probably grateful for that.
Linda: I’d say so.
Dr. Lisa: Now, he was a twin. You are a twin, Beth. Linda what was it like to have twin baby siblings?
Linda: It was actually a lot of fun and I remember when they were born because I’m eight years older I was eight years old. I spent a lot of time with my younger brother and sister. I babysat a lot. We always had chores as kids and my older sister and I, we took turns. One night we’d have the kitchen or we’d have the twins and if your duty was twins it was make sure they’re in the bathtub and make sure they get in their pajamas. We spent a lot of time together that way, and I remember when I got my driver’s license. I was 15 years old and of course the twins were seven, and if I wanted to use the family car it was like “No problem. Take the kids.” Which was great if you’re going for an ice cream cone but the high school dance was a problem. “Do I really have to take them to the dance, mom?”
Beth: We didn’t mind it.
Dr. Lisa: What was it like for you, Beth to have a twin brother?
Beth: It was great. My friends were always his friends. His friends were always my friends. To a lot of extents that’s still true. I always had a confidant I think because we were a boy and a girl. There wasn’t really any competition we were just really, really close.
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Dr. Lisa: Do you feel that there is something different that you felt with your brother than with your sisters in terms of the nature of the relationship and what you learned?
Beth: I think anything different was really just age based because my sisters were eight and ten years older so growing up when we were in junior high or high school they were already off and starting their lives. I think really that degree is really just because of the age differences, but we’re all extremely, extremely close now. Ironically we all went off and did our thing out of state and we all came home. I tell every Maine parent that laments because their kids are leaving, don’t worry we all come back and we’re all back now and we’re all living very, very close to each other.
Dr. Lisa: Tell me about that. Beth, you’re the President of SeaBags and Linda, you’re an author of many best-selling books and you each have other ventures also and you’re also business partners. Tell me about some of the conflicts that have arisen. If there have been any. I just can only assume there have been and how have you dealt with them?
Beth: Well we’re not really fighters or arguers. I mean we’re both very opinionated so we both say what’s on our minds, but by nature we’re not really fighters.
Linda: Yeah, I think no we aren’t. I’m totally non-confrontational but I will say that I think one way that we’re very successful business partners is that … and these are my sister’s words, not mine … we each know what we don’t know. My sister has a business head. I do not.
Beth: Yeah you do.
Linda: OK, well thank you, but not really. OK. Different styles of communicating. We communicate very well together. I’ll just give you a very small example. Our writing styles are totally different. I’m a writer. I send something to my sister and she’s like “Oh my God. I could have said that in three bullets.” Now I just spent like all day writing like ten pages. Like no, bullets. But I’ll send her a few bullets and she’ll say “Is there more?”
Beth: Exactly.
Linda: Such a small thing, but I think we each shine in our own way and we complement each other very well because we do know two totally different worlds and I definitely … I say she’s the business head. We both have a lot of energy and positive energy so it just … it works well together.
Genevieve: OK, but Beth. She’s a captain. Is she bossy? Tell us secretly. A little bossy, older sister?
Beth: Probably on the boat, but boating isn’t my real expertise although she did put me through docking boot camp this weekend.
Linda: That was fun. Yes. My sister just bought boat with her husband.
Beth: Yeah, not necessarily bossy. I think that she’s really … for the longest time, being the captain of the boat she has everybody’s lives in her hand so she really has to take a positive direction and a strong direction on any decisions that she makes and I really admire that she can make a decision and not look back on it. I think that probably comes from that. I don’t know. No one’s bossier than I am, so I don’t know.
Linda: Except for mom.
Beth: Right, we’ll give her that.
Dr. Lisa: One of the things I’m interested in is you’ve each done these very successful businesses in and of your own right but you do have this joint venture that you’ve been working on recently. Can you tell us a little bit about that?
Linda: We’re working together on … we formed a company called Linda Greenlaw Enterprises and it’s basically a branding company and licensing. It’s a new venture for us and right now what we have going on is Linda Greenlaw Select in which we’re branding fresh sword and tuna with my name and it’s somewhat successful for where we are. It’s a brand new thing and we’re moving ahead with it and we’re excited about it.
Dr. Lisa: And I understand that there are people who really want to be involved in this business that you have. People who have gone on your Facebook page looking to come on your boat to help you out with this.
Linda: Oh yeah. That’s another thing altogether. I’m going to spend the summer fishing for blue fin tuna right out of Portland here and the last three years … well last year tuna fishing and the three years prior to that sword fishing. Once my sister finally got me into this “OK, you really need to have a Facebook page.” Most of my fans want to go fishing. That’s most of the activity on my site is “Can I go fishing with you?”
Beth: We decided that this year we’re going to make that happen. It was really hard to do when she was sword fishing because it was 30 days out at a time and you really can’t take a relative stranger out 30 days. It’s just too much at risk, but tuna fishing, it’s three days at a time so we decided that we are going to have a contest to be Linda’s crew member for a week and then you’ll get the answer to the question of is she really bossy? Starting in July we’ll post the contest to be a crew member with Linda for a week and let the Facebook fans decide on the … up to the top ten and then Linda and her crew, her real crew, can decide on the top ten to pick one. They’ll be coming in September so it’ll be really exciting.
Linda: This is really fun actually because I am looking forward to seeing some of these videos submissions. I think we’re going to give them 30 seconds or a minute to do their pitch and why you should take me fishing and that is going to be … I have a lot of fans in India, Germany. We might be springing for a big plane ticket.
Beth: Italy…
Linda: Italy…
Genevieve: What are the core values of this new company, Linda Greenlaw Select?
Linda: The fish itself is fresh, all natural, wild caught, sustainable and the company core values my sister can …
Beth: Yeah, our company core values are about promoting eating fish, promoting the education of buying, cooking, and serving fish and maintaining our working waterfront.
Dr. Lisa: It’s interesting to me that both of you have this ability to risk but also this sort of stable foundation and both of you seem to have a little bit of an introverted side with the writing and the business mind, but also an extroverted side with going out and Linda, you’ve been on radio a lot. I think, Beth, you’ve actually done a lot of this type of interview before as well. Talk to me about that. Is that a similarity you share that you have these very disparate aspects to your personalities?
Linda: I think we do share it and I think something we share about it is that the introverted side comes quite naturally and the extroverted side is a learned thing. I’ve had to promote my books. I have to promote my work. My sister’s had to do the same thing. Fortunately … I mean I like to think that we both do it very well, but it is work. It doesn’t come naturally at all.
Beth: No, it’s hard. I think that Linda’s still more comfortable than I am. My idea of a great night would be a close dinner for six. Linda’s would be a close dinner for the whole island.
Dr. Lisa: Yet, I saw you at Pop the Kennebunks the other night, Beth and you seemed perfectly comfortable.
Beth: Sure, I had a great time. What’s not fun about that night? You get to get a little dressed up and drink a little wine and there were a few people that I knew so that was fun.
Dr. Lisa: Well describe a little bit of the process of sort of teaching yourself to become extroverted or teaching yourself to promote something that you believe in.
Linda: I think probably my experience is dramatically different from my sister’s and probably dramatically different from anyone’s. It went from many, many years as being a captain on a sword fishing boat and having basically five people to talk to on the boat, my crew members and an occasional radio conversation, to becoming a best-selling author and being in the public eye. Through my connection with “The Perfect Storm” and going on a 60 city in 60 day book tour in which there was national media, I went from being like wow, on this little boat bobbing around in the middle of the ocean for many years to “Oh wow, I’m going on the Today show.” I’m a nervous wreck. I’m sick to my stomach but knowing that I’ve never had a job where I’ve received a salary or any kind of a wage … I get paid for what I produce whether it’s putting fish on the boat or selling books, so you become very active in getting good at selling and part of that is liking what you do. Although I say it’s nervous time for me, even like right now I’m sweating doing this radio interview …
Genevieve: Which we can’t tell by the way. You guys both look perfectly relaxed.
Linda: Good.
Beth: Oh good.
Linda: Thank God it’s not TV.
Beth: Touch my hands.
Dr. Lisa: You still get nervous? You still consider it somewhat hard
Beth: I get nervous. I do public speaking and I’m still very nervous about that and I’ve done a lot of it, but I know that I’m good at it. I think the nerves are part of it.
Genevieve: Both of you, I know in your business ventures, have a sustainability consciousness in what you do. SeaBags and fishing ventures have to deal with the ocean and the health and the safety of the ocean. Lisa and I both being health care professionals know we want people to eat fish, obviously. The seas are getting over fished. We want them to eat healthy fish. The seas are getting polluted. Do you guys have any insight on that? Where do you stand on all of the turmoil around fishing and the use of the ocean?
Linda: I think the general public is a little bit out of the loop in what’s going on. For instance, you just said the oceans are being over fished. You know what? Fisherman in this country whether it’s commercial or recreational are the most highly monitored, managed, patrolled group of fishermen on the planet, bar none. The future of the fish is very rosy. They’re very protected. As far as the health thing goes I think there are groups in this country who are doing the general public a huge disservice by saying don’t eat this, don’t eat that. If it’s available to you it’s been through a lot of scrutiny. Eat it. Feel good about it.
We’re fatter than we’ve ever been as a country. National obesity crisis. You need to eat fish. It’s good for you.
Dr. Lisa: Just briefly talk to us about the future of fishermen. Living in Maine we know that there are problems with being perhaps maybe overregulated.
Linda: Overregulated and there are other factors and my sister can speak to this probably more appropriately than I can, what about the loss to the working waterfront?
Beth: Yeah, absolutely. It is tough to make a living in Maine on the working waterfront and fishing. What I love about doing Linda Greenlaw Select Fish is that really, really encourages people to eat fish. One of the most rewarding things that we see is when a mother will write in on Facebook because she’s not generally looking for a job and say I got my son to try sword fish today because he saw you on TV and he likes it. Thank you. That’s the best thing that we can do is promote people to eat fish.
Genevieve: Let me just say that sword fish is a fish that many, many children really like because of the texture.
Beth: You hope so, right? You hope that kids like any fish or any kind of shell fish even and just getting them to try it. If it takes seeing Linda on TV to get them to take that bite of something then that’s OK. It’s a really, really exciting thing for me to get people to understand how to buy fish. On the opposite end of the spectrum, for me going into a fish store is absolutely intimidating. Even though I’ve got the best one right next door, and so I go in and I talk to them and I say “What should I have today? What do you recommend?” I think that’s part of our mission that we’re doing is teaching people how to buy fish, how to cook fish, and how to … educate them on the benefits of fish because it’s a local resource that is sustainable here in our state and we need to continue to support it from a financial front, from a job front, but also from a health source front. To me that’s the most exciting part of … taking Linda’s just knowledge that’s second hand to her and sharing that knowledge. That’s kind of fun for me.
Dr. Lisa: Beth, I also know that you’re involved with the Maine College of Art and I know that you’re on the Make a Wish Foundation Board, so there are other things that you’re doing that are very sustainable. I suspect Linda is similar. Why? With all the things that you do why are you choosing to also do those things and why those specific organizations?
Beth: Well, Make a Wish is probably the thing I do in my life that just feels the best. It’s to grant a wish for children with a life threatening disease and any child deserves that. It’s very … the cost of doing that financially is so low based on the reward for the child and for the people that are involved in doing it. I’m a huge believer in that organization and I gratefully dragged Linda in because she’s been willing to be dragged in.
Linda: Yeah, you didn’t have to drag very hard. Yeah, we both really believe in the organization and my sister’s on the board and I’m always very happy to go to the auction and bid my head off.
Beth: That’s fun.
Linda: I usually … I donate something to the auction also so it’s great.
Dr. Lisa: Well we appreciate your coming in and talking to us about Linda Greenlaw Select and the books that you’re doing, Linda and all of the things that you’re doing. SeaBags, Beth. I think what I’m finding from this conversation is that there’s some synergism that can take place when you have two sisters who have lots of shared DNA but also a willingness to really have a good relationship, so we appreciate your coming on and talking to us today about your sisterhood and all the work that you’re doing together.
Linda: Thank you for having us.
Beth: Thank you for having us.
Speaker 1: A chronic ache. Sleepless nights. A feeling of something being not quite right. Treat the symptoms with traditional medications, feel better for a little while and continue on with your busy days. But have you ever stopped to consider the what that’s at the core of a health issue? Most times it goes much deeper than you think and when you don’t treat the root cause the aches, sleeplessness, and not quite right feeling come back. They don’t have to. You can take a step towards a healthier more centered life. Schedule an appointment with Dr. Lisa Belisle and learn how a practice that combines traditional medicine with eastern healing practices can put you on the right path to better living. For more information call the Body Architect in Portland at 207-774-2196 or visit doctorlisa.org today. Healthy living is a journey, take the first step.
This segment of the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast is brought to you by the following generous sponsors. Mike LePage and Beth Franklin of ReMax Heritage in Yarmouth, Maine. Honesty and integrity can take you home. With ReMax Heritage it’s your move. Learn more at rheritage.com. And by Tom Shepherd of Shepherd Financial with offices in Yarmouth, Maine. The Shepherd Financial team is there to help you evolve with your money. For more information on Shepherd Financial’s refreshing perspective on investing please email Tom at shepherdfinancialmaine.com.
Dr. Lisa: As part of this week’s sister show for the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast we are fortunate to have the sisters Sonya and Jessica Tomlinson. Jessica Tomlinson is the Director of Artists at Work at Maine College of Art. She’s the board president of Space Gallery, a graduate of Hampshire College who lives in the west end of Portland with her husband, the artist Henry … Jessica I’m going to have to have you jump in here.
Jessica: Absolutely. Wolyniec.
Dr. Lisa: Henry Wolyniec and their nine year old son Otto. Thank you for coming in Jessica.
Jessica: Thank you.
Dr. Lisa: I’m going to talk about your sister here who a hip hop recording artist and Grants and Outreach Manager at the Maine Women’s Fund, a Telling Room teaching artist, and a nine year veteran of Space Gallery. Thanks for coming in.
Sonya: Thank you.
Dr. Lisa: So sisters. You’ve been I think, Sonya, from what I understand, you were persuaded to move back to Portland or to Portland by Jessica.
Sonya: It’s true. I was going … I moved to North Carolina. I was going to UNC Greensboro and I was in my senior year and I got a package in the mail and it had a green paint stick and an offer to move here. It said this is the color of your new room if you’ll come back and live with us for free. I think I graduated on May 28th and I moved June 1st. Everything in the U-Haul and camped out with Jess and Henry for a little longer than planned. For what was to be six months I think it turned out to be nine, and I’ve never left and it’s 13 years later and I’ve never leaved anywhere more than three years in my life. Four years. Yeah, I was persuaded.
Dr. Lisa: That’s a pretty strong sister pull. You must have a good relationship.
Sonya: We do.
Jessica: Well Sonya also lived with me when she graduated from high school so there’s a little bit of a history of that actually. Sonya’s great company and so she’s not only a great sister she’s just a great human and I think that that’s pretty evidenced by her making Portland home. Portland used to be my city until Sonya moved here, so now it’s very funny I hear “Oh, you’re Sonya’s sister?” I say “No, Sonya is MY sister.” There’s a big difference. I was here first.
Dr. Lisa: Jessica, are you the middle child? You have an older sister as well?
Jessica: We do. We have an older sister so I’m the middle and Sonya’s the youngest.
Sonya: Shout out to Andrea. She’s in New Hampshire. Not far away, but …
Dr. Lisa: What’s the age difference? What’s the age spread?
Sonya: I just figured this out the other day. Jess is exactly four years older than I am, and then Andrea is seven years old than I am, so then there’s about almost three between them.
Dr. Lisa: What I like is that each of you is in the arts field, but each of you does something pretty different. Talk to me about why you made the choices you did in your career paths and was it influenced by what your other sisters were doing?
Jessica: I can start with that. I was really influenced in this interesting way by Portland and when I came to Portland it was a total accident that the first thing I did was open an art gallery. I was looking for an apartment and instead found a great space that turned into the Dead Space Gallery with Tanja Hollander so that’s how I got to Portland is by starting a gallery. It’s quite amazing for me that that was my introduction to the city and everyone was so warm and so welcoming. Tanja and I did that for several years. For me it’s very much about the visual arts and so Sonya is on the other side which is the performing arts. Then there are definitely some areas where we cross over, but I think it’s a really good line of visual and performing.
Sonya: Yeah, I think the irony is I’ve been at Space for nine years. I started off performing there. I had my CD release party there and then I became on their event staff and here we are nine years later and my sister’s the board president and it’s just … it’s ironic and it’s really telling of who we are as people. Jess is in the professional role and I’m house managing or performing or getting hip hop artists in or slinging drinks or working the door and it’s funny that that is where our worlds eventually collided.
Dr. Lisa: Do you use some of these middle child and youngest child kind of traits to do the jobs that you do?
Jessica: That’s a good question. I’m a connector. I really see my job as being … I think of myself as an arts ombudsman in a way. Is that people bring issues to me and then I try and then solve them in a way. I think about it as creative problem solving and so that’s what I do in the arts world both at Maine College of Art and at Space Gallery and just the work that I do as an arts advocate in this city. Really interested in how can we move the needle on the arts and raise the bar and have a different kind of conversation and create change. That’s what I’m really interested in doing. I think Portland’s at this really interesting moment. When I came here almost 20 years ago it was a very different city. This is the city I wanted 20 years ago and so I’m thrilled and in a way what’s really interesting is I’ve always wanted to make things better so that Sonya has a better city, so that my son has a better city, so I’m really interested in that. I think that those skills that you have in your birth order, mine for the middle child, definitely play into that.
Sonya: I agree. Like I said, as the youngest I think you often feel like you have this safety net. You’re taken care of. There’s people looking out for you, and I think Jess has done nothing but push me further on that limb since I moved to Portland. I funded my first album through a grant from the Maine Arts Commission completely. Then I’ve branched out, Genevieve knows, doing teaching artist gigs at the Telling Room. I think Jess has pushed me to take risks and really explore what I’m feeling and because that is her role to sort of be that stable anchor in life I felt good about knowing that she knew what she talking about, that she had done the leg work for me and that these were going to be successful avenues for me to take risks in the arts world.
Dr. Lisa: It’s also interesting that you work with the Maine Women’s Fund.
Sonya: Yeah.
Dr. Lisa: There’s the sister aspect of things and the female aspect of things, and Genevieve and I were talking about this earlier, and you work for the Maine Women’s Fund.
Sonya: I do.
Dr. Lisa: Do you translate some of this sisterhood love into the type of work that you do?
Sonya: I think, in ways. It’s ironic, my relationship with the Maine Women’s Fund, again, Jessica was a new girl in their New Girls Program and encouraged me to apply for a New Girl’s Network for Social Change Fund. I did and then I did hip hop workshops in Longcreek Development Center with a Girl Unit. I did this hip hop workshop there and then did the same at Preble Street Resource Center and …
Jessica: Actually I nominated you, first. That was what was first. I was really proud of the work that you were doing as a female in this very male dominated hip hop world. It’s not rap. I’ve learned that. Hip hop. So Sonya was doing some really interesting work talking about really social issues, gender equity in the hip hop field, and so I nominated Sonya for a Maine Women’s Fund Award. That was where that started.
Sonya: I was an awardee first.
Jessica: You were an awardee. So I was very proud. Nominated and you won. That was the first introduction.
Sonya: That’s right. Then I became a grantee and now …
Jessica: An employee.
Sonya: And now an employee, so definitely there’s some crossover there.
Speaker 1: We’ll return to our interview after acknowledging the following generous sponsor. Dr. John Herzog of Orthopedic Specialists in Falmouth, Maine. Makers of Dr. John’s granola cereal. Find them on the web at orthopedicspecialistsme.com.
Genevieve: So do you ever fight? It all seems very rosy.
Sonya: We really don’t.
Genevieve: What about when you were younger?
Jessica: That’s a different story. I think what’s really lovely is that, I don’t think we’ve said this, but Sonya and I actually live in the same house so the way that it works is I have a two-story home that I own so my family lives upstairs and Sonya and her husband live downstairs. I think the biggest joke about that is I never see her and so when we want to see each other we have to go …
Sonya: We walk to work.
Jessica: Sometimes we walk to work and then we go to lunch. It’s ridiculous but we are both very, very busy and so my rosy fantasy about what I would be to live in the same house just haven’t kind of worked out in that way. Our schedules are too busy.
Sonya: I think I see more of your son than you because I babysit so you can go out. We really don’t fight. It’s pretty crazy.
Dr. Lisa: Or you didn’t fight until you said that thing about seeing more of her son.
Sonya: Historically, we’ve … Jess has always been really even keeled. I think the three of us fought some, but we really have never been that way.
Jessica: I think Sonya’s just very good for me. She’s just very calm and has a very different perspective than I do and I think it’s really interesting because it’s an exchange of learning. In the same way that you think I’m paving the way, Sonya can show me a different way of being, about being a little calmer, a little mellower, just a different more laid back approach. I’m a little high strung and so I do learn from Sonya a different way of being in the world.
Sonya: Yeah, and I would say actually in the last five years it’s been this interesting turn of being the little sister and always being thought of as the little one and needing to be nurtured and now it is great to see this turn and we’re really friends. I think what you’re saying both being out there in the world and trying to do things in Portland, there’s this appreciation for what each other can get done and I think that I’m feeling more like an adult in our relationship in the last five years, which has been great. We do definitely balance each other out. I always say to her I would be friends with you if we weren’t sisters and it’s so true and cliché.
Genevieve: Well of the things Lisa and I were thinking about when it comes to this show is the idea of competition versus collaboration and it’s something, Jessica that you and I have worked as my representation of the Telling Room and you at Space. Space and the Telling Room have had kind of a sisterly, brotherly relationship. I love this idea that you can … that collaboration actually breeds success more than competition and I think that Lisa and I talk a lot about that. That it’s not either or it’s both.
Sonya: Yeah, and that’s funny because I think our dream … we’ve talked about … we’ve never … Space is as close as we’ve gotten to working together and I think there is this idea that we love … I’m at the Maine Women’s Fund doing this good work for women and girls in Maine and my sister’s doing this great work being an arts chair leader and we have this dream of how could we work together at the same job and what would that look like? Would this relationship stay the same? We hope to fully collaborate at some point.
Jessica: Yeah, I think we bring very different things to the table. It’s amazing because I honestly … now thinking about it it’s like do we fight and is there competition? No, I can’t think of the last time I yelled at you. Like maybe in high school.
Sonya: Yeah. Yeah I think. I think I borrowed your clothes once without asking. Really, I think that was it.
Dr. Lisa: Yeah, and it would be a little harder to do that now. She’s a little bit taller.
Sonya: That’s funny you say that, Lisa because I was thinking about the fact that … to see people’s expressions when they finally see us in the same room and figure it out that both of our last names are Tomlinson. The only thing we really have in common is our voice so I think that’s … people will say that. They’ll look at us, and I think I’m 5’ 2” and you’re 5’ 11”, and people will say “Never would have pinned you for sisters, but now that I’m hearing you talk …” So out there in the radio land you see a commonality most don’t.
Jessica: Twins. We’re twins on the radio.
Sonya: Yeah.
Genevieve: I’m struck by the idea that you have created a home for your little sister and that’s very special. How did that kind of bond come about? Was there something in your birth family that created a stronger sense of siblinghood?
Jessica: I would definitely say … our parents are divorced, and I’d say that always does change your family dynamics. The way that it worked when I was … yeah, I was ten and you were seven.
Sonya: Six, yeah.
Jessica: Six? When they got divorced and so then we would go and fly to see my dad once a month. I would be the unaccompanied minor with Sonya flying, so once a month we would fly. My dad moved around a lot in the country so we would fly once a month. We logged some serious miles together on airplanes and it’s an intense bonding experience I would say. The two of us would do these trips once a month. Literally the people … the stewardesses in Chicago knew us by name. It was like we had our own little flight pins. We were veterans of airline travel and so that really did, I think, cement … so I did feel responsible, very much so, to be traveling across the country with Sonya and being responsible for her … obviously her physical well-being but also emotional well-being. I think that definitely created a pattern for life which I’m grateful for, but as Sonya said I think it’s interesting. It might have stemmed from this divorce, creating this kind of intense bond but in terms of responsibility now I do feel like as we’re getting older it’s more of a shared mutual responsibility.
Sonya: Yeah. I looked up and saw these two incredible sisters, this mom who was managing it, and as I get older I have much greater respect for the fact that she was a single mom of three children. Then also are grandmother, my mom’s mom, was this incredible figure in all of our lives and she and her … my grandfather got divorced early, so I just saw this lineage of incredibly strong female role models four or five deep and so I think that bonded us too.
Jessica: Oh God, and I work at the Maine Women’s Fund. Oh wow.
Sonya: Ladies. Yeah, I think that that was huge. Obviously when something happens in your family dynamic and something falls apart you really work that much stronger to keep what’s left together and everybody did.
Dr. Lisa: Well I’m sure that the Maine Women’s Fund is going to be very happy to have you bring in that strong, matrilineal aspect of things. I think that’s a good thing to end on. We’ve really appreciated your spending time with us today and talking about what it’s like to be sisters working in your respective fields. We’ve been talking to Jessica Tomlinson, the Director of Artists at Work at Maine College of Art and Board President of Space Gallery and also hip hop recording artist and Grants and Outreach Manager at the Maine Women’s Fund, Sonya Tomlinson. Thank you so much for coming in today.
Jessica: Thanks to both of you.
Sonya: Thank you for making the connection.
Dr. Lisa: This is Dr. Lisa Belisle. You have been listening to the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast show #41: Sisters, airing for the first time on WLOB radio 1310 AM Portland, Maine on June 24, 2012. For more information on our guests, Beth Shissler, President of SeaBags, Linda Greenlaw, best-selling author, and the Tomlinson sisters, Sonya and Jessica please visit the Dr. Lisa website doctorlisa.org.
Also take the time to go visit our blog on bountiful-blog.com, like our Facebook page under Dr. Lisa, or send us an email and let us know what you’re thinking about the shows that we’ve been putting on this year. It’s been our pleasure to spend time with you today and we hope that you decide to do so again in the future. Thank you for being part of our world. May you have a bountiful life.
Speaker 1: The Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast is made possible with the support of the following generous sponsors. Maine Magazine, Mike LePage and Beth Franklin at ReMax Heritage, Robin Hodgkin, Morgan Stanley, Smith, Barney, Dr. John Herzog of Orthopedic Specialists in Falmouth, Maine, Booth, UNE, The University of New England, and Tom Shepherd of Shepherd Financial.
The Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast is recorded in downtown Portland at the offices of Maine Magazine on 75 Market Street. It is produced by Kevin Thomas and Dr. Lisa Belisle. Editorial content produced by Genevieve Morgan. Audio production and original music by John C. McCain. Our Assistant Producer is Jane Pate.
For more information on our hosts, production team, Maine Magazine, or any of the guests featured here today visit us at doctorlisa.org and tune in every Sunday at 11 AM for the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour on WLOB Portland, Maine 1310 AM or streaming WLOBradio.com. Show summaries are available at doctorlisa.org. Download and become a podcast subscriber of Dr. Lisa Belisle through ITunes. See the Dr. Lisa website or Facebook page for details.