Emily:
Hi, I’m Emily Ladau.
Kyle:
And I’m Kyle Khachadurian.
Emily:
And you’re listening to another episode of The Accessible Stall.
Kyle:
What are we going to talk about today, Emily?
Emily:
Books. All right?
Kyle:
Books.
Emily:
I’m super excited. Okay. No, not books plural, actually, book singular, a specific book. I’m really pumped about this. We have a really cool sponsored episode today, and we’re specifically interviewing an author, the new book, The First Thing About You. Chaz Hayden is our special guest, and I am super excited to chat about this because, honestly, I feel like we don’t do enough talking about disability representation in the media on this podcast. I’m being sarcastic. We talk about it all the time. But anyway-
Kyle:
It’s always cool to bring it up again though.
Emily:
So I’m really excited to turn it over to our special guest to introduce himself. Chaz, can you tell us about yourself? We know you’re an author, but what else is there to know?
Chaz:
Yeah. Hey, everyone. Thanks so much for having me on this podcast. I’m super excited. Like Emily said, my name is Chaz Hayden. I have a disability called spinal muscular atrophy, SMA for short. There’s different types of it. I tend to have type one to type two is what I tell people. I’m in a powered wheelchair. Been in a wheelchair since I was two years old and just going full throttle on the joystick all the time.
But yeah, I’m an author. My debut novel, The First Thing About You, coming out September 6th, and I’m super excited about that and just trying to represent the disability community as best as I can.
Emily:
Congratulations, first of all.
Chaz:
Thank you.
Kyle:
Do you know that I’m the only person on this call that hasn’t written a book?
Chaz:
Don’t feel bad. Don’t feel bad.
Kyle:
I feel like I really should join the club.
Emily:
But you were quoted in mine.
Kyle:
That’s true.
Emily:
You have a really good quote in there. So it’s basically the same thing as writing a book.
Kyle:
That’s true.
Chaz:
I did that to one of my best friends is a librarian, and I put her in the acknowledgements of my book. So now I’m like, “Your name will forever be printed in a published book.”
Kyle:
It’s a very beautiful thing you can do for somebody, honestly.
Emily:
See, that’s super lovely. But also, I learned this the hard way. In the acknowledgements of my book, I thanked my ex-boyfriend.
Chaz:
Oh, no. You never do that.
Emily:
So now that I’m not with him anymore, I emailed my publisher and I was like, “Guys, we need to take this out.”
Chaz:
That’s like getting a tattoo. That’s like getting a matching tattoo.
Emily:
At least I do not have the tattoo, but the book still feels permanent. Anyway, getting off track here. Do go on, Kyle.
Kyle:
So yeah. I mean Emily and I both read the book. We loved it. But just for our audience, can you give us a summary of what readers can expect from The First Thing About You? What’s it about? Who’s your audience, the whole spiel?
Chaz:
For sure. It’s a young adult, YA, [inaudible 00:03:12]. That’s what they say. I love reading YA. I just think young people and teenagers, that’s when I think we’re our most authentic self, to be honest with you. The protagonist is a 15-year-old boy named Harris Jacobus. He also has SMA, and his family just moved from California to New Jersey. He’s going to take this as an opportunity to reinvent himself, being known as more than just the kid in a wheelchair.
But he has this one issue of wanting to know everyone’s favorite color. He thinks by knowing someone’s favorite color, he can judge their personality or judge them the same way he thinks others judge him based off of his wheelchair. So along the way, he’ll befriend some people. He’ll make some enemies. And then he’ll meet a really awesome, confident nursing student who’s going to accompany him to high school. Her name is Miranda.
She’s the perfect blend of orange and red, in his opinion, which is the best top color to his favorite blue. But she’s kind of battling her own demons at the same time. So we’re not really sure if Miranda’s helping Harris, if she’s hurting him along this journey. It’s really fun to see their dynamic kind of play out.
Emily:
There’s a lot of elements at play in the book, and there’s a couple of different storylines to follow. I know that it’s young adult fiction, but I have to ask if there are any autobiographical elements that inspired the book.
Chaz:
It’s funny. When my family reads it or very close friends, they always say, “Oh, I can I hear your voice,” or whatever, when my brother’s reading it. Now my grandparents read it. I was like, “it’s not a biography. Don’t be offended.” They’re like, “Yeah. But this thing kind of happened. I remember.” I’m like, “Yeah, something similar like that happened.” I think what I did is when I first started writing the story, I didn’t want to write a biography just because I hate writing about myself. I just think it’s really hard to do.
I wanted to still share my experiences, but in a fun way. I felt like I could do that. I could share the journey I’ve had, the roadblocks I’ve had to overcome within education and relationships and making friends. Maybe there are specific scenes in there that I’ve encountered, but I’ve fictionalized them, if that’s a word, in a sense to make it more-
Emily:
It is now.
Chaz:
Yeah. I wanted it to be more universally relatable than just me saying, “Hey, this is what happened in my life. I hope you can relate to it.”
Kyle:
It’s interesting because when I read it, I didn’t think the whole thing was a biography, obviously. Like you’re saying, it was like, “I wonder how much of this actually happened to him in some way or another?” I’m sure a lot of it was dramatized, but-
Chaz:
I would say like this is there’s specific scenes in it that have happened, but the overall generalized story never happened. That’s completely made up. Yeah.
Kyle:
I see. Harris, the character, we noticed in the book goes through a lot of what we interpreted as internalized ableism through his insecurity and-
Chaz:
Yeah, 100%.
Kyle:
Emily and I and, very likely, you could probably all really relate to that. We definitely felt that way when we were Harris’ age. So take us 15 years into the future. When you’ve written the sequel to this book. What would you have 30-year-old Harris tell 15-year-old Harris?
Chaz:
Oh, wow. That is an awesome question. I-
Emily:
We said there weren’t going to be any trick questions, but we didn’t say there weren’t going to be any, oh, you really have to think about it questions.
Chaz:
Yeah. No one has asked me that before, and I super love this one. It’s definitely unique. I think Harris changes a lot throughout the book, specifically at the end. I hope you see a transformation that he wants to become a better person not just for his friends and family, but for himself as well. I look back to my own at my younger self and I’m just like, “Hey, it’s okay to feel the way you’re feeling right now. Just don’t let it stop you from doing the things and living your life.”
I feel like that’s how I’ve always lived my life is people around me always say, “Oh, you’re always smiling. You’re always laughing. You’re always having a good time.” I’m like, “Yeah.” I think when you’re disabled people say, “Keep smiling for me.” They want you to smile for them. I smile for myself even on my darkest days just because I know I have to. I can’t let myself really dive deep down into that pit. I think that Harris will soon, as he gets older, learn how to deal with some of those emotions better than he does through this story.
Emily:
I mean I think there’s a balance where we can totally feel our feelings and some days it’s like, “Wow, being disabled, kind of hard, kind of sucks.” But also, there’s this expectation that society has on us that we always have to be putting on a show for them and showing up in a certain way. So it’s really challenging to balance that dynamic. I can tell that that is something that Harris is definitely grappling with.
Chaz:
Yeah. His family is interesting because they don’t treat him any different. You should never be treated differently by your parents or family, whatever, your friends. But he treats himself differently. So, like you say, Kyle, it’s internalized ableism in the sense where it’s like no one’s ever told him that he has to think this way, but he thinks this way just because he’s a teenager and he has normal teenage body anxiety.
It also just happens that he’s in a wheelchair, too, on top of that. People always ask me, “How did you balance disability and the teenage side?” It was just a part of him. There was never a separation of like, “Oh, now I have to explain his disability and now I have to explain his teenage side.” It was both all the time.
Emily:
I actually really appreciate that. Yeah. It’s not like disability is this separate thing over here. It’s I’m dealing with all of this.
Chaz:
Yeah. Yeah, 100%.
Emily:
Yeah. I really appreciate that. We’ve been talking a lot already about disability representation, but I’d say, and I think we can all agree, that disability representation in the book world is still lacking, to say the least, although we’re definitely seeing progress, books like yours. We would love to know are there books, are there authors that specifically served as models for you as you were pursuing your own writing journey?
Chaz:
I don’t think there was any author out there that wrote disability in the way that I wanted to or at least I hadn’t found any that were similar. I think more are coming out now, which I think is amazing. There was a book written early 2000s that has not the best title. It’s called Stoner & Spaz. But it’s not written by someone who was disabled. I think the author’s wife worked with disabled children. But what I liked about it was the main character’s disabled, and it’s him befriending this outcast and them figuring out how to be outcasts together. It felt really authentic.
I think the character has cerebral palsy, and there’s a really intimate scene where he’s self-conscious about the parts of his body that are a little bit maybe not beautiful in his eyes and them having this physical intimacy and her not caring. I think even if the author isn’t disabled, I think that scene was really well-written. So that was a book I read a long time ago that was like, “Yeah, I think this is on the right track.” It could be a lot better, obviously.
But I hope I’m the beginning of a phase of authors. I think specifically within fiction, we need … There’s a lot of books out there that are memoirs or, whatever, autobiographies that talk about disability, but there’s not a lot of fiction, not just within literature, but film and TV as well, that I think authentically represent the disability life.
Kyle:
I have not read the book that you mentioned, but as somebody with cerebral palsy myself, I can’t imagine the effect that that scene would have had on me at an age like that. I mean I think I turned out okay. I remember those days and I’m like, “Man, that would have really stuck with me.”
Chaz:
Yeah. I think even in mine, I wanted scenes where I pushed the boundaries a little bit. Although it never becomes too provocative, there are intimate scenes where Harris is lying next to … There’s someone in his bed, and he’s thinking about this and how the other main character, Nori, who he has a crush on, her just kind of sitting on his lap at the concert or feeding him lunch when they go on a date.
It’s all these things where if I can put this out there and be like, “Hey, this could happen to you. This is how you can approach this situation,” I hope it makes someone or a young reader with a disability understand that this is a possibility for them to put themselves out there and live a “typical” relationship with someone.
Kyle:
It’s honestly really refreshing to see it. I mean I’m disabled, but I can imagine that seeing those words and that character and those actions, like feeding someone, being put in print, reading those words to a non-disabled reader just to normalize situations like that could potentially have a very big impact on somebody, which Emily and I both really love.
Chaz:
I hope so. Yeah. Thank you.
Kyle:
So let’s talk about actually getting the book in print, into people’s hands. We know, well, Emily knows that the publishing world can be a challenge for disabled authors to get through. So tell us about the process of getting the book out there from your head to the book’s behind you. Did you encounter any barriers, any rejections, any stumbles, stuff like that?
Chaz:
So I started writing, not this novel, but a novel that’s not published back, I don’t know, maybe six, seven years ago. It was the first thing I’d ever written. At that time, I didn’t have a job. I had a lot of free time on my hands, and I was reading a lot. I was like, “Hey, maybe I could try this out.” So I wrote a novel. I had no idea what I was doing. It was not about disability. It had no disabled characters at all.
I shopped that around for a while and just went to writing groups and getting feedback and working on poetry, working on short stories, just any other type of writing medium to get better at it. I was like, “You know what? I really love doing this.” It was probably the beginning of 2019. I had the idea for The First Thing About You. I was like, “You know what? I think I need to tell a disability story. I need to tell my story, but in a way that feels, like I said, more relatable and open to everyone.”
So I just started jamming that out. I use an eye tracker to write. I know some people use voice dictation. I find that kind of hard. So I use eye tracking as the closest I can get to the vibe of typing with my hands. So it probably took me about, I don’t know, seven or eight months to write the first manuscript. I had some friends and family read the first draft, just beta readers, and just give me some feedback. I was fortunate enough where I had a literary agent in mind that I’d been following for years.
I just loved the authors that he puts out. He was the first agent I sent to, and I must have hit him at the perfect time. I remember sending my query, my submission to him, but just the opening five pages and him responding in five minutes and being like, “Hey, send me the rest of this.” I was like, “Wow.”
Kyle:
Nice.
Chaz:
He was just like, “I just happened to be at my desk when this arrived.” So it was just perfect timing. I ended up signing with him. We revised it together for about, I don’t know, half a year before we both felt comfortable that it was in a position to be with publishers and editors. So in the summer of 2020, he submitted to a handful of publishers and editors, probably a couple dozen. I just was really fortunate to get such immediate positive feedback from everyone, a few offers. So I was able to choose who I wanted to sign with.
I ended up signing with Candlewick because my editor, Caitlin, just fully understood the story. She understood the characters deeply. Some of the other publishers, no offense to them, there was just things that they wanted to change about it that I felt like kind of took away from what I was trying to say. So yeah. My experience has been a huge just learning experience, but also just truly just honored and fortunate with how smooth it’s gone so far. Yeah.
Emily:
I feel like there’s so much to unpack in that.
Chaz:
Sorry. It’s a lot. I ramble sometimes.
Emily:
No, it’s great. I mean I think the first thing that really stood out to me is the fact that you initially were working on something that was not at all disability-related. This is something that I think about a lot because I am all about disability representation in the media, but that doesn’t always necessarily mean having to tell a story about disability, although I want tons of stories about disability in the media.
But it is interesting that a lot of disabled people that I know end up gravitating towards writing the stories that we are not seeing instead of being a disabled person who happens to be writing a story that has nothing to do with disability. I think about that a lot because I write about disability. I’m a disabled person all the time, 24/7, professional disabled person. I’m not 100% sure where I’m going with this, but it’s just interesting to think about the fact that-
Chaz:
I see what you’re saying. Yeah.
Emily:
Yeah.
Chaz:
I agree with you. I think, for me, I had this assumption that if I wrote about a disabled character, it would feel really contrived. I think at that time, I wasn’t even sure how to do that just because I was so new to creative writing when I first started. When I first started writing The First Thing About You, I had this totally different feeling than when I was working on the other novel, where within the first 10 pages, I’m like, “Yes, this is it.”
People always say, “Write what you know,” and I truly believe that now. You know what I mean? The other things I tried to write maybe were not fully lived experiences for me, and I wasn’t able to authentically tell a story or give a voice to someone. But I think with this, just going into it, I had so much more confidence. But I see what you’re saying, and I agree with you. For me, I don’t think all my stories, all my books are going to have a disabled main character.
Maybe someone in the story will have a disability, but I hope that readers and everyone in the community can understand that even just me as a disabled creator can make content, make stories, make books, write books that don’t just have to be disability-related, but is me as a disabled person putting content out there. I hope that’s okay for everyone.
Emily:
We talk about this all the time with our podcast. People come to us because they want to listen to disability-related stuff. But at the same time, we’re not only disabled people, right, Kyle?
Kyle:
Yeah. Yeah. It’s a battle that we face every time we record an episode. But I guess the way we see it is if we can help one person …
Chaz:
Yeah. That’s how I feel, too. I think if one person picks this up and reads it and they feel a connection to it, disabled or not, honestly, but I’ve gotten so much amazing feedback from able-bodied people just saying, “Hey, I learned a lot just reading this, not only SMA, but just someone in a wheelchair in general, how I should interact with …” It’s sad that someone’s like, “I didn’t know how to interact with someone in a wheelchair.”
But if my book or anybody’s book can teach them how to do that, I’m fine with it. Someone has to do it.
Emily:
Yeah. There is a lot of value in that, and I’m a big believer in the ripple effect. So if one person, as Kyle was saying, hears something, reads something, sees something and says, “Wow, I feel like maybe I understand a little better or I feel a little less alone,” then I think that’s totally worth it. The other thing that I keep thinking about from what you said earlier is that you had a lot of right place, right time, it worked out pretty well scenarios.
I know a lot of disabled people who I’ve talked to have actually struggled a lot when it comes to getting fiction connected to disability published. So I think I just want to lean into that a little bit because I know it’s a different story for everyone.
Chaz:
I think that’s unfortunate. For me, when I submitted to my agent, and this is a really unfortunate possibility. I don’t know if this is the truth or not, but I did not rely heavily on the disability side of the story in my synopsis that I sent to my agent. I just talked about the favorite color part and that this main character was also in a wheelchair. Obviously, when he read the first five pages, you pick it up, okay, this person’s in a wheelchair.
Yeah. I don’t know if it’s some people are just like, “Hey, I remember disability story. This has to be about this.” I think it’s all about how it’s portrayed. Unfortunately, that just might be the truth, where I just was like, “Hey, here’s a story about a teenage boy. It also so happens that he’s in a wheelchair, too,” kind of like that.
Emily:
Actually, that makes a lot of sense to me. This is part of the story and it is a central theme of the story, but also we don’t need to just lead on it as the only theme in the story.
Chaz:
Right, exactly.
Emily:
There’s also a lot of other character growth and development. You said earlier, “Write what you know.” I think that’s a huge piece of helpful advice. But now that you’ve been through this process and you’ve been able to reflect on it, do you have other advice that you would give, I would say, to all writers, but also to disabled writers? Because, as we were just saying, not everybody has had as easy a time, I guess, navigating that system. So what’s your advice?
Chaz:
My general advice when people ask me is to find what your voice is. What do you sound like as a writer? Don’t try and sound like anybody else. Don’t try and write a story like anybody else. To be honest, when I’m writing, I don’t even read because I don’t even want that author’s tone or story to influence what I’m doing. So I don’t even read as much as I would like to because of that. That’s what I would say. Just figure out who you are and, once you figure out who you are as a writer, you’re going to have a lot more confidence in what you’re doing.
And then the other part for disabled writers, a few people who are able-bodied that have reviewed the book publicly have said that it taught them without being preachy. It didn’t lecture them. That was something that was really intentional when I wrote this is that if disability and activism and inequality was right at the front of my mind the entire time, I would have written the entire thing from a place of anger, where Harris, the main character, and the story is not an angry story.
It’s a story about learning from a bunch of different people. So I had to make sure that his problems and barriers were sort of woven into his everyday life of being in school and not having the technology to be independent and finding a nurse to be with him and just accessibility when he’s out with his friends. There wasn’t one thing for me to stand on top of a box and shout about. I think, because of that, so many people who are able-bodied have been like, “I’ve learned so much, but it wasn’t in my face and it didn’t yell at me.”
Maybe in certain contexts, we have to do that in certain situations. But I think also it’s like how can I say what I want to say and make it get absorbed in the most efficient way possible by people that are not living this life?
Emily:
You’re speaking our language.
Kyle:
Yeah. I mean that’s something that I think if we had to say one not issue, but one barrier that we face every time we record an episode, it’s how do we sound friendly enough to be listened to while still getting our message across?
Chaz:
Yes.
Kyle:
It’s funny. While I was reading it, I didn’t get that vibe. I think that’s the point.
Chaz:
That is the point.
Kyle:
But when you say it to me now, it’s very obvious. I think that’s part of the reason why the book, at least for me, was so very enjoyable and also easy to read.
Chaz:
Thank you. Yeah.
Kyle:
I know we said there’d be no gotcha questions, but I have a little one. I’m going to apologize in advance for this. Sorry. But it’s driving me crazy and I have to know. If you’re willing to tell us, what is Nori’s favorite color? Are we ever going to get that out of you? Is that a secret?
Chaz:
Oh, man. You’d have to hack into my computer and read the original manuscript because in the OG, she tells him. Around the third revision, my editor and I were like, “But what if she doesn’t tell him? Isn’t that better?” There’s actually a discussion guide that Candlewick Press is putting out, and that’s one of them for teachers to talk about with students. It’s like, “Hey, what do you think her favorite color is? Find evidence within the story to support that.”
I don’t know. I think she’s everything. I think that’s the thing about her is that there’s not one thing that pinpoints her down and defines her, just Harris soon learns that he can’t just pick at someone’s favorite color and say that’s who they are. I think Nori is the person that teaches him that because she never reveals what her favorite color is.
Emily:
Oh, man, that was such a good answer. I was just like, “Come on, tell me her favorite color. Is it fuchsia? Is it turquoise?” And then he’s like, “Oh, wait, you can’t actually be that reductive.” Okay. But I mean challenge accepted. We’re definitely going to hack into your computer system now because I really actually want to know.
Kyle:
Yeah, sorry. I had a feeling she started to wear green just to drive him nuts, to get him to believe that green was her favorite color. But sort of related, I mean this is a little off topic, but I like the mom. There was one moment in the book where she was like, “I just said that to you so that you’d know what to say. It was not supposed to be that serious.” For a brief second, his whole world was like, “What?”
Chaz:
It shattered. Yeah.
Kyle:
Yeah. I think that goes to what you’re saying. It’s not everyone really needs a favorite color, but-
Chaz:
Yeah. It’s funny you brought that up. That scene, in particular, was really difficult to get right for the reason you just said where it had to feel like they’re having this authentic conversation and it’s news to him that this wasn’t how he’s supposed to be living his life. But it was also the mom being …
It couldn’t feel manipulative to the reader, and it couldn’t feel like this huge earth-shattering reveal because it wasn’t really the climax of the story. It was, but it wasn’t. So the reveal had to feel like, “Hey, you weren’t supposed to be doing this,” and Harris is like, “Pardon me? What?”
Kyle:
But this is my whole life.
Chaz:
This is my life.
Emily:
Right. I shaped everything around this.
Chaz:
Yeah, right. Yeah.
Emily:
But I also really like your framing of it in the sense that other people placed judgment on him, so this was his way of trying to find a way to judge and understand and figure out other people. The color dynamic of the story is really, really interesting, and I hope that’s what piques people’s interest to read it.
Chaz:
Yeah. I hope so. It was not a part of my original idea of the story. I was probably 50 pages into the first draft, and I was having a conversation with a friend about why people wear a certain color clothing on certain days. We just got into a conversation about color theory in general. I had heard of it, but not really done too much research. I went home that day and just dove into website after website about color theory.
At that time, I was trying to find something to dilute all these themes of judgment that the book talks about, and I just couldn’t find something that felt super silly and not that big of a deal, but also was an interesting plot line to the story. I was like, “Yeah, this is it. It has to be this.”
Emily:
It’s a unique one, for sure, and I enjoyed it. I know that you’re literally still processing the release of this book. I know when people were saying to me, “Okay, cool. You did this one thing. Now, what’s next?” I was like, “Can you slow your roll, please?” But at the same time, I’m going to be that person. Now I’m going to be like, “So you put this really cool book out into the world. What else is on the horizon for you?”
Chaz:
So in terms of writing, I just finished the manuscript to my second novel. It is not a sequel. Sorry to disappoint you all if that’s what you were hoping. It was fun to write. That’ll be out I don’t know when. I’m revising it now. Two or three years, who knows? But for that, it does still involve disability themes. The narrator is not disabled, but I would say the second main character is disabled. Their relationship together was really interesting.
People ask me what it’s about and I say, “If you read The First Thing About You, you get a good handle on Harris’ family, something overall, that they’re a loving, supportive family of him.” Something that I just didn’t have the space to fully develop and talk about was his relationship with the older brother. It kind of comes in towards the end, but I’m like, “What if I designated an entire story to a relationship of a sibling that has a disability and one that doesn’t, but I also flip the family dynamic of Harris’ family on its head? What does that look like?” This one was really fun to write, and I’m looking forward to eventually putting that out.
Kyle:
As a disabled sibling to a non-disabled younger sibling, I don’t know which is the non-disabled sibling in your book, but I’m very much looking forward to that already.
Chaz:
Yeah. Yeah. Me, too. It was interesting to write just because I had to write it from that perspective. I’ll be honest. It’s from the perspective of the non-disabled sibling, so their anxiety around the whole thing, but also making sure that the sibling that is disabled still has his voice and isn’t just this helpless person, but is impactful to the story in a meaningful way and isn’t just a side that needs to … not just a person that needs to be saved or protected, but also is important to the plot of the book. Yeah, I can’t wait for that to be out.
Emily:
Well, if non-disabled people can always be trying to write a disabled character, then disabled people can write a non-disabled character.
Kyle:
It’s only fair.
Chaz:
100%, yeah.
Kyle:
Well, I mean, hey, thank you for your time. Our last question is where can people find you? Where can they get the book? When’s it coming out? Do you have social media? Just give us all your links.
Emily:
All the details.
Chaz:
All the deets. So September 6th in the US and Canada. September 1st, it’ll be published in the United Kingdom, Australia, anything UK. It’s soon to be in Italy. I don’t know when-
Emily:
Whoa.
Chaz:
And then also in Poland in the near future as well.
Kyle:
Nice.
Chaz:
There will be an audiobook also released at September 6th as well. You can find it anywhere a book is sold. People ask me. My friends, I feel like they’ve never read in their entire life. They’re like, “Where can I buy a book? Can I buy it on Amazon?” I’m like, “Yeah, you can buy it on Amazon. You can buy it at Target, Barnes & Noble. You can buy it from the dude on the street. I don’t know. Where do you buy books?”
Kyle:
I’m definitely getting my copy from a dude on the street.
Chaz:
Yeah, if you I have to.
Emily:
Well, it’s really funny though because people are always like, “Where can I buy your book?” I always want to be like, “Have you heard of Amazon?” But at the same time, I’ve decided now that I’m trying to at least direct people to a local bookstore or something-
Chaz:
That’s what I do, too. Yeah. Yeah, I do the same.
Emily:
But yeah, it’s wild to me how people are just like, “How do I buy a book?” And I’m like, “The internet.”
Kyle:
Yeah, the internet. [inaudible 00:37:26].
Emily:
A bookstore.
Chaz:
Yeah. Those exist you know? Yeah. You can buy it anywhere. If you want to keep up with me, I’m on social @thechazhayden on Instagram and Twitter. So yeah. If someone wants to DM me, talk about your favorite color, music, sports, whatever you want to do, just look at my beautiful face on there, I don’t know, they can Follow me on there.
Emily:
Not just Chaz Hayden, but The Chaz Hayden.
Chaz:
The Chaz. My family tells me The Chaz.
Emily:
The Chaz.
Chaz:
But The Chaz on, I think, Instagram and Twitter was taken, unfortunately. So I do The Chaz Hayden, but that’s fine.
Emily:
Yeah. Well, very official. But this was super fun.
Kyle:
Yeah, this was super fun.
Emily:
Thank you so, so much for joining us. By the time this episode is out, I believe your book will be out. So that’s super cool. Congratulations again.
Chaz:
Thank you.
Emily:
I hope that everyone will take some time to check out The First Thing About You because Kyle and I both really enjoyed it. Also, thank you again so much to Candlewick Press for sponsoring this episode. We had such a great time chatting with you.
Chaz:
Same.
Emily:
Kyle, what’s the last thing that we have to say before we sign off?
Kyle:
Are you talking about our Patreon or are you talking about how-
Emily:
I am.
Kyle:
… we say everyone looks great today?
Emily:
I am.
Kyle:
Okay. Well, if you want to support the show, dear listener, you can go to patreon.com/theaccessiblestall. Just $1 a month ensures that all current and future episodes of The Accessible Stall remain, what is it?
Emily:
Accessible.
Kyle:
Hooray. Yeah. This has been another episode-
Emily:
You almost did that in one breath.
Kyle:
This has been another episode of The Accessible Stall. I’m Kyle. She’s Emily, and he’s Chaz. Might we say you look great today. I mean, seriously, those sweatpants are doing wonders for you.
Emily:
You look fabulous. Thanks so much for listening.
Kyle:
See you next time.
Emily:
Bye.