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Not All Bad Things
04/2007
About "Not All Bad Things"
Payton and I met in the car. We got to know each other on rides to and from Washington state prisons. I was working with a Girl Scouts program for girls whose mothers are incarcerated. The girls have troop meetings and monthly visits to state corrections facilities; Payton had been in the troop for about four years.
Payton's the kind of kid who wants to enjoy everything. She looks for pockets of fun in any kind of bleak situation and desperately wants everyone around her to be happy. She's also the kid that taught me about how complicated it is to have a parent locked up. She maintained pure adoration for her mom when I met her although that changed over the first year I knew her.
Last summer when there were murmurs of her mom getting released early, I brought up the idea of her recording her thoughts about her mom's release. At that point she was adjusting her countdowns each time the release dates changed on her. Still, she didn't talk about disappointment, loss of trust, anger and endless frustration. She was always too busy trying to make sure everyone was having a good time.
"Not All Bad Things" is a mix of my interviews with Payton and her recording on her own for about five months. Once a week Payton and I would interview in the car parked outside a McDonalds or Subway. Sometimes we'd sit and listen to tape she'd recorded and talk about it (on mic). Those ended up being important moments where she'd say, "that's not the point Chana, the point is..."
Joe Richman's non-narrated, intimate Radio Diaries are what first got me excited about radio, and I've always wanted to do pieces like them. Producing a non-narrated piece that is true to Payton's experience was fascinating and totally frustrating. I got lots of help: the Transom operation, (with Viki at the helm) swooped in and did their magic; my step-mom Ellen told me where the emotion was once I'd forgotten; Yvonne Vasquez shared my excitement for Payton and her stories; and my favorite man Lincoln listened over and over, then pulled me back enough so I could see.
Payton's magic for me was that in conversation she brings this large bureaucratic system down to one twelve year-old: how it affects Payton. I want the piece to reflect that remarkable quality in her.
From Payton Smith
One day we were going to prison and Chana asked me to take a recorder around and record things while my mom is gone. I wanted to talk about my mom because I thought it would make it easier to deal with it. It would take it off my chest. I'd have a lot to say.
 I started recording my brothers' birthdays, us at my cousins' house and stuff at school. It was crazy, everybody kept trying to sing into the mic. My teachers thought it was a CD player and the principal even took it away for a while. It made me feel different because I was the only one who got to do it and everyone was like "oh you're lucky." During my interviews I felt special, I felt like a reporter from The New York Times.
In my interview with my mom, I found out she was going through a lot and was struggling while she was away. She was trying to get all her stuff together, figuring out where she was going to go and what kind of job she was going to get. The more I got into the conversation during the interview it made me realize how much I really love her and that it's all going to be OK and that I really need to support her more than I have been.
My sister Jasmine was feeling different. She was like, "I know she's not going to be here and there's nothing we can do about it." My grandma just talked about how concerned she was about us and how we should stay in church. She's the type of grandma that likes to get her point across. If she's not right, nobody's right. It made me irritated at times. While Jasmin and Grandma was sitting there talking about how I have to deal with it, I was thinking of another way — like giving mom support.
My mother came home finally. Since my mom has been home I've gotten my own room, $5 for cleaning her room, money just because, and I get to go more places. My attitude has changed like I'll clean up just because and I'll get my brother ready for school just because. Its important for her to be in my life because without her we'd all be extra bad because a whole bunch of kids need parents guidance. You need some kind of support behind you.
From Viki Merrick
There have been a myriad of variations in approaching the edit on this tape. There are so many sides to Payton, a young girl finding her own path through these unusual circumstances. Payton's revealment of hurt, defiance, acquiescence and resilience all in 10 minutes is extraordinary and exquisitely painful. From the very first, I felt like a guard dog making sure that the listener remain invested in Payton at all times and not be distracted by her sister Jasmin or Grandma or her Mom. That made for an interesting exercise. Chana would deftly move around the pieces like playing with the light on a diamond necklace; A process that lends itself to going after just one more gem to add to the string to make it better. The lack of chronological importance lent itself to us being able to try that – fodder for further discussion once you’ve listened to the piece. Come back and talk!
About Chana Joffe-Walt
I fell for radio my first summer out of college. I was working with a documentary arts program for youth in Durham, North Carolina. The students and their fiercely passionate instructor Jones Franzel taught me how to use Pro Tools and showed me how potent radio could be. Then I fell further for radio when I started working with Erin Hennessey and Cathy Duchamp in Seattle (more fierce women). These days I work in radio full-time. I freelance for local stations in the northwest and for national public radio programs.
About Viki Merrick
Viki Merrick was a radio producer and production coordinator for ABC News in Rome, Italy, and location/production manager for film documentaries. Since the founding of Atlantic Public Media in 1995, she has been producing essays and features for national broadcast on NPR and for the Cape and Island public radio stations, WCAI/WNAN/WZAI. Viki is an editor on the Peabody award-winning website, Transom.org, and a collaborator on the two Peabody Award-winning series, Lost & Found Sound and The Sonic Memorial Project. More recently, she is the Senior Editor on the NPR series This I Believe. Viki lives in Woods Hole, Massachusetts with her kids Allegra and Ben.
About Payton Smith
I am Payton Carmella Smith. I'm now in the 7th grade and I live in Milwaukee, Wisconsin with my auntie and father. I enjoy swimming, dancing, drill team and performing for people. In my spare time I swim and listen to music and hang out with my friends and family. My favorite singers are Chris Brown and Omarion, Sierra, Beyonce and Little Mama. I also enjoy school activities like Gear Up which helps you get ready for college. And I like cooking and trying new things.
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