Creative Chats With Guest Margo Guernsey (Capturing and Sharing Unheard Stories Through Film)

This is a recording from a series for the podcast at the Mosesian Center for the Arts called Creative Chats. This conversation was with Margo Guernsey, documentary director/producer, impact strategist, and founder of Time Travel Productions LLC. The conversation digs into Margo’s approach to outreach and impact through discussing some of her recent projects, including THE OFFICIALS, a documentary about the work of US election officials.

Find out more about Margo and her films at:

timetravelproductions.com

civicsfilms.com

Chapters

• 0:00 Live Creative Chats At Mazetsian
• 1:12 Meet Filmmaker Margot Guernsey
• 2:32 From 2020 To No Time To Fail
• 4:02 Threats, Visibility, And Being Seen
• 5:25 The Officials: Four States, Many Roles
• 7:05 Outreach Starts Before The Edit
• 9:10 Emotion As The Core Story Tool
• 11:12 Partnerships That Carry The Film
• 13:02 Mental Health And Community For Clerks
• 14:32 Bridging Partisan Divides In Practice
• 16:02 Choosing Time Studios And Streaming
• 17:20 Outreach Over Impact Targets
• 18:20 Audience Q&A And Curriculum
• 20:10 Free Access And How To Share
• 21:20 Host Wrap-Up And Local CTAs

Transcript

Matt: 0:07

Hi there. Welcome to the Little Local Conversations Podcast. I'm your host, Matt Hanna. Every episode, I sit down for a conversation with someone in Watertown to discover the people, places, stories, and ideas of Watertown. This episode is a recording from one of the monthly Creative Chats, live podcast events I do over at the Mosesian Center for the Arts, where we gather creative folks to come together to hear a conversation from a guest on the topic of creativity and the creative life. We gather on the first Friday of every month at the Mosesian Center for the Arts. So come join if you'd like. So this creative chat was with Margo Guernsey, who is a documentary filmmaker here in Watertown. And we get into a conversation about her recent work with her film THE OFFICIALS. So we'll get into the conversation. Hope you enjoy. So, welcome. This is Creative Chats, and this is part of my podcast called Little Local Conversations, where I interview different people in the community. And this is a special live podcast where you can be here. Thank you for those of you who came out to experience this little community here and people who are listening later on. Thank you, Cable Access, for taping this and sharing on their media as well. Today I'm gonna be talking about film, documentary filmmaking with Margo here. And yeah, do you want to just give your like two-minute introduction, who you are, what you do, in this hat, this capacity today?

Margo: 1:25

Absolutely. Thank you, Matt, for having me. I've been a big fan of your podcast for a couple of years now. And thank you, everybody who came out. I'm really thrilled this is a live podcast because as a documentary filmmaker, one of my favorite things to do is interact with people. That's what we do. So I, for those of you who don't know me, I've lived here in Watertown about 15 years. I'm an independent documentary filmmaker. So that means that we ideate. So we come up with the ideas, we finance, we put together the teams, and we see them all the way through distribution. I also wear a couple other hats. I teach at Emerson College and I work with nonprofits and small businesses on their storytelling needs. But today we're going to talk about film, which is my passion. Yeah.

Matt: 2:07

Yeah. Your most recent film, The Officials, kind of focuses on. Well, yeah, you tell me about your film. You know it better than I do. So yeah, tell me about your recent film.

Margo: 2:16

How about this? I'll tell you about it and then you tell me your first reaction after watching it. 

Matt: 2:20

Yeah, yeah, yeah. 

Margo: 2:21

Because I've gotten some fun first reactions recently. So The Officials is what we call a sister film, which is really probably an internal word, but we made a film, I just need to back up for a minute. During the 2020 election, if you take yourselves back, we were all mostly under lockdown. There were no vaccines. None of us really knew how to navigate staying healthy. And my filmmaking colleague and I decided to, in partnership with some folks we knew in Rhode Island, to embed with the election officials in Rhode Island and make a film behind the scenes of that election. So that film is called No Time to Fail. And the original idea of that film was to pull back the curtain and see some invisible work. So really important work for our community that is largely unrecognized, unseen. We assume we just get to vote, we don't understand what goes into it, which is the theme of a lot of my work. What is the regular work people are doing and dedicating themselves to that is invisible, that we as a society, we just don't appreciate it or see it. And it became something else because as we were filming, or it didn't become something else, it is still that. But as we were filming, the attacks from the president and from his supporters just started to grow. They were very small and quiet, and then they started to grow and grow. And then we started to see the death threats and election officials going into hiding. So that film from behind the scenes really documents that happening as it starts to creep in. So fast forward a couple of years, we heard from election officials around the country that they loved that film because they felt seen. So people around the country literally over and over, are you sure this isn't Utah? I'm in Arizona. It looks like my office in Arizona. That's what was happening in Arizona. I mean, and so it was clear that even though we were in a what we call in our divided country a blue state, so you know, voting majority blue, that what was happening was consistent. And so that led us in conversation with election officials around the country to make a second film to just show what was happening and tell it from the perspective of other states. And that's what The Officials is.

Matt: 4:20

Right. Yeah. And how many states were you in that in that film? I'm trying to at least three. Was there four? 

Margo: 4:26

Four. So we were very mindful of a diverse representation and what that means in election administration is rural and urban. So we were in rural conservative area of Florida and a rural conservative area of Ohio. And then we were in Detroit, so our Michigan representation was urban, and then also local and statewide officials. So election officials is a year-round job. So we have a town clerk here in Watertown. She works full-time. She does some other things also, but one of her jobs is to be in charge of our elections. But there's also state-level administrators. So the state administrator of Wisconsin's in the film. So we wanted to show the local and the state roles.

Matt: 5:03

And so with this film, kind of the two prongs we wanted to attack today was impact and outreach. Which one of those do you think would be best to dive into first for you?

Margo: 5:14

Can I first ask you what was your reaction when you saw that?

Matt: 5:17

What was my reaction to the film? I mean, so I've heard about these stories before, so I wasn't surprised, but it was still, you know, tugs on the heartstrings to see these people reacting to some of the scenes where you have someone playing voicemails that they're getting or reading the comments online that they're getting, and just how you can see how it just brings them down. And they're just trying, you know, you see that they're honest people trying to do the work. So it was effective in getting that emotion across. Yeah.

Margo: 5:48

We have now a curriculum. Facing history and ourselves wrote a curriculum for use with middle and high school students. And so we're just starting to get some feedback from classrooms. And yesterday I was told by a teacher that the student said three things, if I can remember them. One, is this real? Two, I didn't know this was a job. And three, I didn't know, did they really go through that? And in particular, I think in this environment that we are now, this media environment, it's pretty logical that a teenager would say, Is this real? Right. It's hard to know what's real and what's not. And so it I think this leads to outreach. It makes the work of outreach even more important.

Matt: 6:27

Right. So how do you go about? So you make this film, when does the outreach start? Does it start while you're still making it? Is it after you have the finished product? Like what is what is the scope of outreach for you with this type of project?

Margo: 6:39

My work as a filmmaker and as a creative, I love that you invited this conversation to be for creatives of all kinds. But I want to open this up to creatives of all kinds because our work is, we see it as creative, but we follow from beginning, middle to end. So we are not always in production on a film. So part of the creative work is building community around the film. We spend a lot of time. I mean, I have spent so much time with election officials and I love them. You know, it is a whole, it's a space. It is so, I don't want to say religious and it is so faithfully nonpartisan, right? Some of them are elected under a partisan hat, and some of them are elected as not or are chosen, some of them are appointed, some of them are elected. It really depends on where you are. They take those off. They are so committed to everyone votes, everyone gets to vote, everyone has the right to vote, and we are going to make sure you can vote. And I don't care what the outcome is, right? That's not the point. The point is to count the votes and report on them. So we spend a lot of time building community around the films, partially because it will make for better storytelling, right? If we're really understand the people who are in the films, we're really going to tell a better story. And then that leads to a lot of time when the film comes out, sharing films in community, having conversations about what this means. So it's a big part of the work.

Matt: 7:53

Right. And when you say, so yeah, that reminded me when you say like getting to know them, the one part in the film where what's her name, Janice?

Margo: 8:00

Yeah.

Matt: 8:00

Yeah. And she's talking about her husband had just passed away, and people who were, you know, against the stealing the vote were making her do extra things to verify it, and she had COVID and like so I mean, that's in the film too. But how are you taking those stories and using that to get across the outreach part of it that you're going to these communities and sharing that these are real people going through these things? 

Margo: 8:27

Yeah. I mean, the power of film is that it has the ability to connect emotionally with people, which is what I love about it. I'm a fanatic. I actually read more books than watch films in my free time. I love reading. When we read, the emotional connection isn't as real. It's more of an intellectual connection. And with film, film has the ability to connect emotionally. And that is the power of it. And so we lean into that. You're not going to watch one of our films and learn from A to Z what happens to your ballot. That is an important piece of education. How is my ballot cared for? What is the chain of custody? What happens if the machine breaks? How do we do a paper count? Those are really important pieces of education, but that's not what we do. What we do is the emotional connection. That does mean that once somebody says, yes, I'm going to partner with you on and I'm going to put myself in your film, it can be a very vulnerable experience. And we take a lot of, we take that very seriously and take a lot of care with it. You know, in this case, election officials have been so under attack that they have been eager to participate because they haven't been given the opportunity to tell their own stories. They have been either attacked and then the media will come and maybe give them the chance to respond. So, you know, we heard that, you know, somebody is claiming that you are stealing, you know, you're shoving ballots in the ballot box. And so it's a chance to say, no, we're not. But that's not telling your story. That's somebody's accusing you falsely and you're just trying to vindicate yourself, which is unfair, right? So being able to tell your own story. So I'm saying as vulnerable and hard as that was for Clerk Winfrey, seeing the need to have the a chance to tell her side of the story, I think is what led her to say, okay, I'll do this. But it is, it was hard. She didn't want us. She always jokes, like, I love you, Margo, but I just, I don't want to have to do this today. It just brings up so much grief. But then and and then, yes, of course I need to do this. I have no almost like having had no choice because it's a chance to say what happened.

Matt: 10:21

Yeah. Yeah. That was the most powerful part in the movie. Like you can, again, something you can't get through like a book is you could hear her saying it, but you can just the look in her eyes of how she's you can see how she's holding it together for that moment, but how she's really impacted. Yeah. And then, so then how do you go about like figuring out where to show it and Q & A's and talking with people after the film, too? How do you go about that process of setting all that up?

Margo: 10:46

I mean, everything we do is in partnership. That's one reason that I love this being a room of a live podcast. I think we're stronger together. I know that sounds cheesy, but it's also true, you know, this film, for it to actually do the work of us listening to election officials and understanding who they are as people and what their work is, can only really happen if other people around the country want to participate in telling this story, right? We need, you know, me in Watertown, Sarah, my colleague in Rhode Island, we're just one person. It needs other folks around the country interested in telling the story. So, how do we go about that is with partnerships. So examples are the League of Women Voters has been an ally since our film, No Time to Fail. There are leagues around the country showing the film. Sometimes they're showing that we don't know about it, and then we'll find photos on social media. It's really kind of fun. Um, and so, you know, we've been working with the Carter Center, the Brennan Center, any name the organization that works on election integrity voting rights. We've probably been partnering with them because we've been doing this for a number of years. And then also now with actually shout out, if you know a teacher for with this new curriculum, we're running a teacher ambassador program. So we're gonna have 15 public school teachers throughout next year using the curriculum and then sharing it publicly. So sharing their experiences using it to encourage other teachers to use it. Um and we still have space for a few more teachers. So if you know of anyone, let me know after the podcast. Probably if you're listening, it's probably too late. But for those of you in the room. 

Matt: 12:10

Gotcha. And what is there our most surprising partnership that has come out for you?

Margo: 12:15

That's an excellent question. I think the most surprising thing through both of these films has been the interest from election officials in sharing it with other election officials. It has become a way for them to be in community with each other and to not just to feel seen, but to talk about what they've been through. When No Time to Fail was touring, the Carter Center, after noticing that the film was having this effect, held a mental health awareness day for election officials. They did programming with professionals. Everyone watched the film, there was some resources available. So that was a surprising way that the film was resonating.

Matt: 12:54

Gotcha. And how about staying on that surprising, was there a surprising interaction you had through showing it to, like you were talking about, with the schools and getting some of those things? But hasn't there been a really impactful interaction you've had with somebody based on after watching the film and then a question and answer type situation?

Margo: 13:10

What's coming to mind? I'm gonna pivot your question, if you don't mind, is a surprising thing about filming for me was building relationships with the in the officials. There are two election officials who are in very conservative areas of the country and they're both Republicans. And I, you know, self-identify as someone who votes on the on the other side of that aisle. And the friendships and the bonds that we built were really strong and very real. I mean, it's another thing that sounds a little bit overstated, but we do, as Americans, want mostly the same things. And we do have more in common than we don't. And I spent a lot of time filming in both of those places, and it was healing. It was actually, it was really a surprisingly wonderful part of the process.

Matt: 13:53

Yes. It's everyone needs to hear that there's good people on the other side. Yes. Yes. And then so you partnered also with Time Studios for this. Do you want to talk about how that came about and the extra reach that might have given you in that process?

Margo: 14:08

We intentionally looked for a journalistic outlet for this film. And we wanted one that would go straight to streaming so that it would be available before the 2024 election. So, you know, anytime you start a film project, there's a million ways to approach it. There isn't just one way to tell a story. There's a million different ways, even to document once you decide how you're going to approach the film, there's different ways to film it. So some of the choices we made for the officials were that it would be a shorter film. So it's 26 minutes long, a little bit easier to watch if you want to then have a group discussion afterwards, and also shorter for a classroom and hopefully holds people's time if they're even just at home watching. It's 26 minutes, it's not a big commitment. And that it would go straight to streaming. So we weren't going to film during the 2024 election as we had with the 2020 election. We wanted something that would lift up the integrity of and the profile of these folks ahead of that election. So it needed to go straight to streaming ahead of the election. The reason for a journalistic outlet was the integrity of the fact-checking. So we ourselves fact-check, but as independent folks, you know, people should check on us, quite frankly. Nobody should just go out there and trust somebody who's but having, you know, Time magazine has at least a century. Somebody fact-check me. I don't remember. But they have a long track record of journalistic news. And so it was really important to us. We reached out to a few journalistic outlets, but that was the best fit. And it was important to us that we be a partnership in that way.

Matt: 15:27

Yeah. Cool. So why don't we look at the the other side of the equation now is the impact. So I know you have your own definition of impact and what that means. So why don't you tell us when you're looking at the impact of your work and strategizing that, what does that mean for you?

Margo: 15:42

I mean, amongst filmmakers, we talk about impact. I actually think a more helpful word is outreach. It's really about using the film as an outreach tool to bring more people into the conversation. There are projects that have specific goals that may be a policy change. You know, as we with this project have supported election officials calling for some specific things like additional funding to support infrastructure for elections in this country, but we're not using the film isn't being part of that discussion really. The film is a tool for discussion, right? You know, the records show the courts have weighed in. You know, there's been many, many, many recounts and machines checked that the 2020 election was actually the most secure in our history. And so these are facts, and we always want to bring people into that conversation because the people who did the work during a global pandemic to make that happen haven't been recognized. So, really, I would say outreach. It's about outreach and inviting people into a conversation and maybe another conversation. How is it that we are so easy and quick to blame people? Like, why how is it possible that it takes off like wildfire to blame your neighbor and they're working hard, right? And humans make mistakes. Have there been mistakes? Yes. Does that mean the election wasn't secure accurate? No. Right? If a mistake is made, it's caught. I mean, what other profession is 100% perfection expected? Like there will be mistakes. And if you watch No Time to Fail, as Rob Rock in Rhode Island says, we're gonna make mistakes, but we're gonna find them and we're gonna fix them. And the election is secure and we're transparent. You know, they're among the most transparent of any workforce. We are going to tell you what happened and what we did to fix it, and we're gonna document that. Like no one else has to do that, right? But that is part of being human, and it's also part of the integrity of our system.

Matt: 17:26

I guess, and then maybe personal impact. What has been the most impactful thing for you coming out of this project?

Margo: 17:34

So I have to think about that. 

Matt: 17:36

Yeah, yeah. You can just you can take a minute. There's no pressure here.

Margo: 17:40

The most impactful thing of these films, I think it's not a space I think I would have imagined myself in. I was a union organizer after college. I spent five years in that work. So I've always really had a sense of the, you know, the amount of work most Americans are doing, and they're either not recognized because of the pay is low or not recognized because of the working conditions, or being accused of, you know, not having enough money and needing SNAP benefits when they're already working two jobs, right? The lack of recognition is everywhere. And so that felt like a very natural fit. But to find myself because of what was happening on the ground in this space of the integrity of our elections was not expected. But that's the thing about being a documentary filmmaker. You're not making up the story, you're following stories that unfold. And so it, you know, here we are, and it's become a very important thing, and it will continue to be as we know in the future.

Matt: 18:32

Yeah. Well, is there anything else specifically about this project that you want to make sure you talk about before I open up to some questions from the audience? Is there anything we didn't hit on that you feel like was important to mention here?

Margo: 18:44

I will say, while we have a minute, is that both of our films about election administration are online for free. So go to civicsfilms.com to find links for the trailers and both films. Civics with an S, Civicsfilms.com. Yeah, and share them. Please share them.

Matt: 19:01

Yeah. Well, does anyone have questions? Roberta. You're always good for a question.

Speaker: 19:08

I'm a little intrigued by your and stop me if I'm characterizing this wrong, but your transformative conversations with your conservative communities. Because that's the kind of fundamental, well, from my perspective, that's the fundamental issue that we have right now, that we are so easily divided, and Trump is so incredibly successful at keeping us divided. But that conversation for you and how that happened because you are so clearly identified with the left, but you managed to bridge that. Could you talk a little bit about how you did that and how that transformation can maybe roll out in a larger way? 

Margo: 20:00

Thank you for the question. I'll share just how we did it, which isn't going to be the natural route for everyone because it had everything to do with the film No Time to Fail. So as I shared before, we made No Time to Fail embedded in Rhode Island with nonpartisan election officials, but in our this little, you know, northeast corner of the country. And it really resonated with election officials, including very conservative election officials around the country, because they felt seen. Like this is what was happening to me. And that gained trust for us. So when I was reaching out, so the uh Wesley Wilcox is the election administrator, I think his title is supervisor of elections in Marion County, Florida. If I had cold called him, he would have been like, who is this woman? But I called him and then we were texting as he was watching, No Time to Fail. And he, even that, he just kept, oh my gosh, oh my gosh. He was as he was watching in real time, he was texting me. And it just immediately we could connect. And we were connecting about honesty and truth. That is what we connected about. We both feel, you know, in our core are just very honest people and we care about truth and honesty. And we were completely aligned. And we never talked about like taxation or other things we might have a cordial disagreement about and we would respect each other in that disagreement, but it didn't matter because all about integrity and respect and honesty. And so when we came to film in Marion County, when we showed up, because we had already connected, it was just so fluid and we were just on the same page and he gave us complete access, right? If he questioned us, he wouldn't necessarily want the cameras. Like, well, which where are you? Why are you in my office? And, you know, it just was really a natural fit. And it had to do with having gained some respect from that film. And I had the luxury, I should say, the blessing of being able to film in Defiance Ohio with Tanya Wickman and her team. Now, in Ohio, by law, it's a bipartisan team. So she's a Republican and she's the director, and then her co-director, or I forget the title, but the other woman in the office is a Democrat. So it's a bipartisan team, but Tanya and I really, really connected. I would say like 90% of the things we both care about are the same, to be honest. Like, but we had to bridge that through the filming to be able to have those conversations, right? They're worried about the elderly care center and her community being unfunded. They're worrying about meals on wheels and not having money anymore. They're worried about, you know, it's all the same stuff. And I think the way that election officials were vilified, and she was vilified by someone who goes to her church, right? She had a stalker, as she called him, who was just horrible to her. And she almost quit. And then she's like, who else is going to run these elections with integrity if it's not me? The people get to vote. And she's the one, when you see the end of the film, she says, at the end of the day, it's not up to me, it's up to the voters, right? Which I think it sounds so elementary, but it is true, right? It is, it is up to the voters. That's who's up to. That's who's gonna lead our country, depends on who the people vote for. But I think being willing to just talk to people, I think what's important to note is how quickly we attacked. We, our communities, our nation, including people here in Watertown, are willing to attack based on a piece of information they heard and then willing to attack and dehumanize. It's all about the dehumanization. No longer are you, our town clerk does a fabulous job. You should go in and thank her sometime. Go to town hall, just thank her for her work. But she's no longer human. She becomes no longer human. She becomes somebody, instead of looking at the whole the humanity, it's like, oh, you're just a liar, a thief, a fraudster, right? We can't be just looking at each other online. We have to be looking at each other in the face, or we can't get through that. So I don't know, how does somebody do it without having made a film? Yeah, I think it's just reaching out, starting conversations. I think spaces like the League of Women Voters, other spaces where these conversations can start, can be helpful. And particularly, you know, there's some things we all care about dearly, freedom of speech, right? There's things that we can start to talk about together that are pretty commonly held beliefs that might be a good place.

Speaker: 23:46

Well just to have a follow-up here. Um but you had a film which really created the conditions for that conversation. So whatever he was seeing when he was texting you, he was recognizing a level of integrity and truth in that. And I think that's the piece that we're having a really hard time with in the country is where is that truth and integrity that we can all trust? And so I don't have an answer to that, but I thank you for creating that film because it's clearly had that kind of, and I'm gonna go home and watch it.

Margo: 24:24

No, I agree. And PBS has been for a long time the most trusted media source in our country. And, you know, now it's lost some funding. So, you know, there are fewer and fewer public spaces. That's I don't mean to be a doomsday person, but it is true. The lack of a shared source of factual information that we can trust is a big problem. So we're gonna have to try to make up for it as citizens.

Speaker: 24:48

Hi, my name is Alan. Could you talk about this curriculum that you have helped create?

Margo: 24:54

How many people here have heard of the organization facing history and ourselves? Okay. It'll come up if you do a search for it. They, I'm not gonna try to give their history, but you'll find it online. But they've been around for a long time creating curriculum for middle and high schools and maybe other age groups as well. Again, it's this strength of partnership. We are not educators. We're not really the ones who should be writing curriculum. We don't understand what it is to teach that age level, but they partnered with us to write this curriculum. So it's a two-day lesson plan. Part of the lesson plan is watching the film. And then the lesson plan explores from themes in the film free and fair elections and what's important about them and what we need to do to defend them. It's part of a larger lesson plan on democracy that they offer. But what they take from the film directly is the role of voters, the role of election officials, and the role of candidates, right? Part of the reason our system works is the candidate who loses needs to concede, right? That is part of the system. That is part of the tradition, and that is what holds it together. And that is lifted up in the curriculum as well. And it's well cited and it's available for free for any school teachers to use.

Speaker: 26:01

Facing history was high school. So is this a high school level?

Margo: 26:05

Yes, it's high school level. They're promoting it also for middle school. Yes, middle school and high school. I will say about the more about the curriculum. You know, I was never taught in school, nor did I even fully understand before I made these films the job of an election administrator. It is clear moving forward that as a country, we need to understand what that job is. We need more people to get training and want to go into the field, right? It's an integral part of maintaining our constitutional right to vote because those are the people who do the work to make it happen. So I'm grateful that the curriculum includes that so that younger people now will be taught what that job is.

Matt: 26:38

Any other questions? Sure.

Speaker: 26:42

I'll probably have questions when I leave here, Margo, but to just reiterate, I just want to say thank you for doing this work. You know, I think so much of what we're seeing now, I keep thinking about the division, and the word integrity actually means undivided. And I've done some work with that because it fascinates me. And I just think the more messages come out about rather than pushing against what we don't want, but standing in truth for what we do want, we're gonna find more commonality and just a better energy to move forward. So I just thank you for doing this and for getting that message out in this area of our world and the same as me. I'm gonna go home and watch it and share it with as many people as I know. So thank you very much. Great.

Matt: 27:23

Great. Well, then to re reiterate in my own way. Yes. Thank you for sharing your thoughts here. I hope this helps share some of your work and any way that people can shed more light on the human stories in the world I'm all for, obviously. So thank you. Is there anything you want to share with people at home again with anything to go check out that we haven't mentioned already or any place to go or feel like you got all that out?

Margo: 27:46

If you're listening at home, check out my website at timetravelproductions.com. You can link to all the films. And also if you're interested in chatting about storytelling, just reach out. Happy to talk to anyone who wants to talk about storytelling.

Matt: 28:01

Great. Well, thank you. And we can continue to chat afterwards, but that's it for the podcast. Thank you.

Margo: 28:05

Thank you, Matt. Honored to be invited to be part of the conversation.

Matt: 28:11

So that's it for my conversation with Margo. I'll put links in the show notes so you can check out the films and other websites that she mentioned. And if you'd like to come out to the next Creative Chats, if you're listening to this when this comes out, the next one is coming up on the first Friday in December, December 5th. And that one is going to be with artist, musician, and community organizer Maria Draskic Brancazio. Head on over to Little Local Conversations.com slash events to see more information on that. And also at the website, you can see all the other episodes I have up, from one-on-one interviews to roundtable episodes to live podcast events. You can sign up for my newsletter to know when new episodes drop and new events are coming up. And you can also support the podcast as a little local friend to help keep these conversations going. Just click on the support local conversation button in the menu. Alright, and I want to give a few shout-outs here to wrap things up. First one goes to podcast sponsor Arsenal Financial. It's a financial planning business here in Watertown that's owned by Doug Orifice, who's a very committed community member, and his business helps busy families, small businesses, and people close to retirement. So if you need help in any of those areas, reach out to Doug and his team at arsenalfinancial.com. I also want to give a thank you to the Watertown Cultural Council, who have given me a grant this year to help support the podcast, so I want to give them the appropriate credit, which is, this program is supported in part by a grant from the Watertown Cultural Council, a local agency, which is supported by the Mass Cultural Council, a state agency. You can find out more about them at Watertown Cultural Council.org and Mass Cultural Council.org. And a couple more shout outs to promotional partners. First one goes to the Watertown Business Coalition, which is a nonprofit organization here in Watertown that's bringing businesses and people together to help strengthen the community. Find out more about them at Watertown Business Coalition.com. And lastly, Watertown News, which is a Watertown focused online newspaper run by Charlie Breitrose here in the city. It's a great resource and a great place to keep up to date with everything going on in the city. Check that out at watertownMAnews.com. So that's it. Until next time, take care.