Poured Over: Stephanie Land on Class

By Jenna Seery / November 9, 2023 at 6:00 am

“I think the bigger stuff isn’t going to happen if we can’t change the fact that we’re not really seeing each other.”

Class by Stephanie Land is a portrait of motherhood, the institutions of education, and the realities of life for those under the poverty line, full of heart, compassion and wit. Land joins us to talk about her hopes for the book, her experiences with secondary education and motherhood, her identity as a writer and more with guest host, Jenna Seery.

This episode of Poured Over was hosted by Jenna Seery and mixed by Harry Liang.             

Featured Books (Episode):
Class by Stephanie Land
Maid by Stephanie Land

Full Episode Transcript
Jenna Seery
I’m Jenna Seery, a bookseller and the associate producer of Poured Over and today I am very excited to be joined by Stephanie Land, I know that you will all remember Maid, incredible memoir, as well as TV series that came out on Netflix. But now I cannot wait to talk about her newest book Class: A Memoir of Motherhood, Hunger, and Higher Education. And I want to talk about all of those things, because I think there are so many pieces of your story that will really relate to so many people in our country that I think don’t get their stories told very often, or don’t get them told in a way that is understandable and authentic. Because in our country, I don’t think we look at a lot of things that are really important. And so I’m very excited that you decided to continue your story and to continue this journey for us. So I’d like to start by setting up where we are at the beginning of class versus the end of made and sort of what started this piece of the journey for you.

Stephanie Land
Well, thank you for having me, as I did the Barnes and Noble podcast for Maid as well. So this is this is quite a treat. So Maid ended, like right after we moved to Missoula, I think like three or four months after, it was like our first spring there, which was 2012. And Class begins at the beginning of fall semester, for my senior year of college. And Amelia is kindergarten year, so first year public school. And that is the beginning of or the fall of 2013. So a little bit of a lapse, and I do kind of go back and talk about stuff that happened before between those two time periods. But for the most part, it picks up right where made left off. And it’s just kind of a pivotal year for both of us.

It’s definitely a moment of transition, I think we hit that pretty quickly, you realize, Oh, this isn’t exactly where we were before. And though some struggles have maybe alleviated a little bit, there’s always something on the horizon, that seems pretty daunting and pretty heavy. And yet, I think the thing that came through to me so quickly, and so prevalently with both of your works, but with this, specifically is this idea of resiliency. And I think that means something different to you than I think it would mean to a lot of people, that idea of just pushing forward and just continuing. I mean, as I was reading I there’s moments where you can’t imagine what could possibly come next. And yet, you continue and you still write. And I just think that resilience you show through this and through all of your life is something that people will really key into quickly.

One aspect of the book that I very purposely did was really challenged that idea of resiliency and point out that a lot of what we think of as resilience to marginalized communities, it’s more of a forced acceptance. And I call it resilience training. And what that really meant to me was, I was not allowed to have a motion, there’s a line in the book that I say I didn’t have the privilege to feel, because it would it was the societal aspects that that were surrounding us were so relentless, I couldn’t stand up and argue about things or get angry about things. Because there was no point in, what mattered was finding food and staying marginally, you know, housing secure, and getting some bills paid, and seeing the college through to the end. And so, I think this, the year that I chose to write about is kind of peak stubbornness for me. And just seeing things through, you know, no matter what gets thrown at us.

I think so often, resilience is like, a trait that people are like, oh, isn’t that child so resilient? Isn’t that you know, young person that they’ve had to deal with? Because even in this, you know, you’re older than a lot of your peers but you’re still a young person as you’re going through this and you’re navigating life with another young person. And I think we’re so often people are like, Oh, the resilience but are we is that really like the trait that we’re calling it? Is that really what it is because So often, like you said, what people are calling resilience, there’s no choice. What’s the alternative?

It really started bothering me, even at the time of the book, when people started calling my child resilient. And even I then, you know, saw it as like, well know, she just can’t really communicate, you know, the things that she’s going through And I think people mistake that for resilience. But it also seems like the ,you got this culture, and this like, call upon your inner strength and all of that, I think it’s easier to do that than to recognize that there are a lot of systems in place that are forcing me to live that way and to be in this situation where we didn’t have enough and we are struggling to survive, to put all of the responsibility on me to be, you know, quote, unquote, resilient is a lot easier than saying, well, actually, we are not taking care of our children in this country. And we are not supplying them with adequate food, you know, that, like, food is a pretty basic need. And, and it’s still a debate whenever we talk about even, you know, free lunch programs, I mean, there are children in this country with of school lunch debt. And, and that just baffles my mind.

And I think it’s such a blatant like misunderstanding and choice to not engage with the reality of class divide and of poverty in this country. I mean, you, you’ve talked about kids with school lunch debt. And it’s also like, the idea that even children shouldn’t get to enjoy, you know, if you’ve got a hot lunch at your school, which is pizza and a burger. But if you have free lunch, or you know, reduced lunch, you get a peanut butter sandwich and a milk, and we have this idea that these kids will be fine, or these people will be fine on less because they’re used to it or because that’s, you know, the expectation. And it just perpetuates this continuing stereotype and view of a group of people that have enough things that they’re already managing.

Yeah, I mean, I’ve been writing about this stuff for a while. And I’ve been writing about it very publicly, at first, like on the internet, where there’s a lot of comments sections, and, and people can form a lot of opinions and, and make those opinions known. And I think it’s really easy to blame mothers, especially single moms, and that, that was a lot of my motivation in in both of these books was trying to show that single moms are actually very good mothers and their children are deserving of everything that two parent households with, you know, a decent income have, for me, it was it was trying to create some empathy for poor parents and parents who are working all the time and may seem neglectful because of that.

I think there is such a distinct stigma and sort of narrow view of motherhood in this country as what is a successful mother and who is a successful mother and who is a worthy mother. And yet, that narrow view doesn’t apply to most people, even if they’re in any walk away for any circumstance. I mean, I think most people, if you ask them to describe that thing, it’s such a specific view that most people didn’t have.

I mean, I think mothers are judged widely. Anyway, you know, even very privileged moms, you know, whether they’re working or they’re not, like, if they homeschool, they put my kid in private or public school. And I mean, you can get judged for everything. When you’re a mom, you can get judged for staying in your pajamas all day, I mean, but when it comes to single moms, it, I just felt like I could never be enough. And any choice that I made was considered a bad choice, because I didn’t have any good choices. And I think that’s something that people don’t really know or realize is, is that when you are in that position of just struggling to make ends meet, and every dollar that you get is very meaningful and important. There really aren’t a lot of great choices to make. I mean, you’re kind of choosing the better of two, very bad, you know, I can’t think of any other words to say but you know, what most would consider a bad decision. And, and I think you know, a lot of what I’ve been thinking about you know, since I’ve written the book and just kind of trying to get an outsider’s view of me as a character in that book from the privileged position that I am now, I still struggle with a lot of mental health issues, like I have anxiety, I have PTSD. And I still had all of those things, when, when I was extremely poor. And I didn’t have access to therapy, or medication, or very good coping mechanisms, even, I tried to keep that in mind, as well of, as I go forth on this book tour and talk to a lot of people about my decisions in this book, I want to keep that at the forefront of my mind and just have a lot of compassion for myself, then, is, you know, I, I personally don’t know how I got through that year. And somehow I did. So I mean, any decision that I made to have my roommate, watch my child, so I could go out for the night and see a band. I mean, that was coping.

And again, I think it goes to there’s this idea, you know, not to keep going to them, this greater them, but the idea that, Oh, if you’re in those situations, every cent must go towards these what are quote unquote, necessities, even though human beings cannot live in without a Happy Meals sometimes, or, you know, getting to go out and experience human things like going to a concert or rock climbing or the things that you enjoyed. And there’s this like, weird thing of well, but I wouldn’t do that, even though most of the people saying that have never even been relatively close to having to have to make that decision of how to spend their money in that way.

Oh, yeah. I mean, I, I’ve heard it all, the rice and beans diet, you know, like, I should just live off rice and beans. Well, you live off rice and beans.

It’s so easy. Everyone would do it and be millionaires, right? Like, it doesn’t work like that. And I think especially because, like you said, you were faced with all these sort of impossible choices. And one of the things that you were so determined to do, because it felt like the right choice was to get an education. And so many people would say, well, you need an education in order to better yourself, improve your standards of living, whatever. And yet, education is not designed for anyone outside of the traditional student of you know, right out of high school with parents support, family support.

Yeah. And I think that is really the most important part of what I’m trying to show in this book of just, when you are designing a curriculum, and you only have one type of student in mind, you’re doing one in five of your students a disservice. I mean, there’s a good probability that that one in five of your students is a parent and is probably working full time and or have people that they care for at home. You know, I think the statistics right now are pretty grim. But close to 25% of your students are, are food insecure. And so when you start to consider the possibility of your classroom being diverse and having individual needs, then your curriculum might possibly bend a little bit to, to meet some of those needs. And, and I think just the smallest changes can make or break whether or not a person signs up for the next semester.

And I think it’s so I mean, you face people telling you, both things of you have to go to school, you have to finish school and people saying, if you just got a real job, if you just quit, if you just, you know, buckle down, don’t think about being a writer, because that’s, you know, how are you gonna make money doing that all these things, there’s everyone has their own opinions. And I think when you are at a certain place in life, everyone thinks that their opinion applies to you. And they could just freely tell you, regardless of you know, whether we should be doing that to other people or not. And the way that you were able to articulate those moments of being so uncertain of whether or not you were doing the right thing, like I could just feel that though I’ve not been in those moments, exactly. That feeling of your life and two paths in front of you, and you have to make that choice. And I think watching you through this work, continue with your school because it was clearly something that was survival for you. I think writing, it seems, is your survival. And I think people will really be able to resonate, even though they’re coming from different places.

I do consider myself a pretty good mom. I mean, my, my kids are amazing, but I don’t really take a lot of credit for that. But as a mother, you know, even when I was in school, I always kind of imagined me, and you know, the words that I would describe myself with, you know, as, like a shelf, a shelving system. Because I’m a Virgo, and I’m very, very much like that, but, the top shelf was always a writer. And it was, I didn’t call myself a mom, when people asked me will like, what do you do? Or, you know, like, I would never put like, I’m Amelia and Coraline’s mom in my like, bio for Twitter, you know, something like that. Like, now I’m a writer. And I really felt that that was important to keep that identity. I didn’t want to raise kids who think that that is their life’s purpose is to like, well, once you have kids, you’re just a mom. And that’s it. Like, that’s, that’s, that’s absolutely not true. Once you have kids, you just have children to care for.

I think also, I mean, I’m not a parent. But that idea that keeping that trueness to yourself and saying, you know, I’m a writer, and I care for these children, I think it shows so much more commitment, because you’re not losing yourself in it, you’re not losing yourself in this world, that it’s very easy to sort of flatten out and lose the things that define us. Because life is hard. And it will always be hard. But the way that you write and the voice that you have on the page, I mean, I don’t think there was any way that you wouldn’t be a writer. Well, thank you. And I think especially this idea of writing is survival, there’s so much in this where the urgency of what you were telling, I mean, obviously, this is you looking back, but you can feel how connected you were in those moments of like, this is who I have to be in order to keep going.

Part of, you know, my, my college journey was a lot of uncertainty. And I started off, you know, just taking classes to work toward a, an AAA degree, you know, you get a two-year degree from community college. And then I declared, you know, I was going to be a paralegal and then like, I was going to be a sociologist or kind of, I wanted to be like a DV, domestic violence advocate. And, and went through all of these things that I felt like I was supposed to do. And just once I got to campus, and walked around and saw all of these buildings, it was just like, no, like, I gotta try, I have to try. Because I just I knew if I didn’t, at least try to be a writer, I didn’t really think I could ever truly be happy. And, and that mattered a lot to me, I feel like I was entitled to that. But there are a lot of people who don’t believe that just because I, I should have just gone straight and gotten a job and worked and did what I needed to do to be a contributing member of society, and you know, all of that and get off of food stamps, but I was doing that as just finding a different way.

And I think the idea that we have to sort of give up our passions and our dreams and our pieces of ourselves, that our core tenants and things that are a part of us, just to contribute, and just to you know, do what society what other people tell us to do, which sounds very easy to just say, Oh, no, I’m gonna follow my dreams no matter what, but sometimes when they’re in front of us, and we can see a way even if that way is challenging and has uncertainties. I think like you said, we owe it to ourselves. We deserve it to continue and to do that.

I think, you know, when you’re talking about the arts and humanities, and just making art, usually when school systems are making budget cuts, that’s the first program to go. And I think that’s a tragedy. I think there are a lot of brilliant artists in this country who just cannot afford to be that and, and I, I think that you know, the investment into that would, would be amazing expression of art is how we learn about people and how you know, You’d have a stack of books behind you, like that’s learning about people. If we only support a certain type of person in order to do that, then we’re not going to learn anything, we’re just going to learn about white men.

Absolutely, I mean, there’s nothing more connecting, I think, for so many people than to enter into a book, whether it’s fiction, whether it’s memoir, whether it’s social sciences, we seek these stories different from our own, or we would hope that people are seeking stories different from their own, in order to form a sense of community that’s bigger than something you can create just by, you know, going online. And, you know, there’s so many other ways to create community, but there’s nothing quite like finding a book that like speaks to you, or a writers voice that speaks to you in a certain way, it really opens your eyes in a specific way.

I hear the word brave a lot to stress in my presence to you know, describe me, writers often writes to no longer feel alone. For me, personally, I’m writing the story that I desperately needed, when I was going through it. Because there just there really weren’t any out there. And I searched for him. And it was, it was so hard, you know, to be so alone, and, and to just try and find anyone out there who was going through what you were going through and not be able to find it. And so it’s very important to me that there’s access to my story, first of all, and, and that people are able to read it and feel validated.

Absolutely. I mean, so often people say like, I think people maybe who aren’t as into reading or as used to it, they think of it as like a reading and writing is like solitary experiences. But for me, it’s like the complete opposite. That’s when I feel like the most connected to the world is when I am hearing someone’s voice and getting to know it and getting to understand it. And I think there’s so much like you said, of being able to have this wealth of stories, this wealth of experience, because not everyone is going to be a writer, but I think everyone can be a reader, everyone, there is a story for everyone, there is a book for everyone. And that doesn’t just mean physical, it’s audiobooks. It’s ebooks, it’s all of it. And I think there’s so much processing that we can do about ourselves when we see someone else’s story and go, Oh, they went through that, too. It just is that extra thing so many people will need.

Absolutely, yeah. I mean, the first person narrative, I think is the thing that has the chance of creating a lot of change in our country as a whole. You know, I think that is what turns into empathy and compassion for others. I think that it’s so important to lift up other people’s experiences as well.

And I think especially in your narratives, there’s no like, you don’t pull a lot of punches with us, you’re putting things out there, you know, as they were in a way that I think will make some people uncomfortable or make some people unsure. Because it is raw, and it is real. And you’re talking about things that go beyond just okay, here were my struggles, but you’re talking about really the long-term effects of poverty on a human being meant, like mental health, physical health, there’s so much more than just, oh, I used to not have a lot of money. And now I do so it’s okay. You know, that that is not what you’re putting out there for us?

No, I mean, I kind of feel that way sometimes. Now. I mean, like, I’m a public speaker. And so I travel around the country talking about, you know, I feel like this one time that I was poor. And so I do kind of feel that way sometimes. But I mean, in the, in the books, it was very important to me to almost literally put myself back in that place of, I’m a very visual writer. And, and, you know, can kind of like put myself in a room in my head and like, look around and see like clutter that needs to be cleaned up. And as a writer and as a human. It’s very hard to live through all of that again, and talk to people about it all the time. But the I think it’s really important to be able to put yourself back in those places.

And especially in the sense that as I was reading, I mean, obviously there are incredibly hard things that you have to put back on the page and the readers have To encounter, but at the same time, you find this balance in your voice, which is biting and funny and has, you know, a wit to it that I think people will really appreciate. But also in both Maid and Class, something that strikes me again and again is just how much love is in these books that you know, the love for your daughters, the love for, you know, the little moments in your life that make everything else sort of fall into place that without those things as well. Yeah, this book can be really hard to read. And there are definitely times where it still is hard to read. But there is a balance. And there is, like I said, just so much love that you can feel when you read.

I mean, and selfishly, those are my favorite parts, I didn’t have baby books for my kids, and I didn’t, I took a lot of pictures, these two books have kind of been an opportunity for me to preserve that time. And my oldest goes by her middle name now of Story and she’s 16. And so, she has been written about for quite a while now. And but I really wanted to capture those moments of, of when she was three and four and five and six. And, and because it was just us against the world for so long. And it was really hard, but it was really beautiful. And I really wanted to encapsulate, you know, those moments with her.

I really related to her love of ice cream. Like that’s when I would want to and still do it any opportunity.

There’s a lady on Goodreads that was like, upset that my kid had so much ice cream, and I’m just like, come on lady.

What is being a kid, if not to have the opportunity to eat so much ice cream. I mean, we I mean, I just want to tell that like toddler, like, wait till you’re an adult, it’s there. But I think that putting all of that out there and having sort of your life on display, I can’t I’m sure you have been asked like what it feels like to have your life out there for people to read, especially when I think there is also an expectation when you are receiving assistance, or when you are under these things that people have access to your story more than they normally would. Because you have to provide all this information to agencies and to schools and to it feels like you just have to keep putting yourself out there in order to get these things. And now again, to put it out there for the world. It has to be like I can’t imagine it, I guess is what I’m trying to say because it’s got to be a lot.

It is and I guess you just kind of helped me realize something. Like, it has been that way. I mean, I have a horse now and he just had to go see the vet. And it turns out she’s a fan of mine. And she was talking about like the same thing, like, you know, I just can’t imagine just putting it all out there all the time. Like I don’t know how you do it. Because in real life, I’m a really introverted and try to be private person. And that’s true. I mean, the government assistance and safety net programs are so invasive. And it was, it was almost alarming to me to go from being in programs, you know, like, housing assistance, and childcare and, and all of this like to, to not needing those programs and to just pay for it. And I didn’t have to tell them my work schedule, I didn’t have to tell them, like, when I’m working and when I’m not working like down to the minute like I didn’t have to, I didn’t have to tell him anything. I just I paid the same bill that, you know, these government systems programs are paying. But in order for the government to pay for it, I had to somehow like, prove that I was actually doing the thing that I said that I was doing. And it took me a long time to, to kind of get over that impulse of, of feeling like I needed to explain everything and it took a long time to get used to being a freelancer who worked at home and I could afford childcare at that point. Because most of freelancing is administrative work. And, you know, invoicing and pitching and emailing and. And I just I felt like I wasn’t working. And I had to keep telling myself like No, no, no, I’m working. It’s fine. Like, because I didn’t feel like I deserved childcare. And it was just wild to me. But yeah, I maybe it’s just It’s normal for me to tell everybody everything, because I kind of went straight from food stamps to, to a book deal.

And then to a series, a streaming series where everyone really gets the opportunity to see what your life was and, you know, have form their own opinions, but I can’t even imagine I mean, writing a book is one thing, but then to sort of see on a screen, someone acting out your life, I mean, that has got to just be like, around the bend of strange.

It was helpful that they fictionalized it, and, and, I mean, I knew that they were, to an extent, like I knew that there was going to be added characters, and that we were going to have different names. And I was really relieved to hear that, especially for story because I knew that they were going to focus a lot on the emotional abuse and, and so I think it would have been really hard if they had even used the fictionalized name that I used, and to just make it even that much more real. Because it was, it was, it really messed me up. Like, what was really hard was when the trailer for the series came out, and everybody was, you know, understandably very excited to watch the series. But I had already seen the screeners and, and I knew what was included in episode one and two, and, and it was just like, that’s the worst time in my life. And it was really hard to separate. People being excited to watch the series, and people being excited to watch the most horrible things that ever happened to me. So it was, it was a hard time.

I couldn’t I mean, I was gonna say I can imagine, but really, I can’t. And I think that that’s what puts it beyond is like, you’ve created this works that provides so much good for people because it offers them an outlet, it offers them connection. And yet, we have to remember, I think, in so many things like memoir that there’s a person behind that, that there’s a person who has lived that. And it’s easy to say, I loved these books, or I loved that show, but I can’t imagine being the person on the other side, there’s sort of like a grief that comes with some of it as well.

I think, you know, with the series in particular, I struggled a lot with just identity. I struggle with that anyway, because, you know, I’m Stephanie, the person in my, my house, and then I’m kind of like Stephanie, the author, and then you know, suddenly I was this like, Netflix character named Alex, who has this bipolar mom, and you know, a lawyer friend named Regina, and people were asking me about all these fictional things. And it was really weird, from my perspective, to have to respond to these questions. And, and none of them really were asking about me as a person. And so I it was kind of on me to remind myself that I am just a person, very much a human being. And as much as I try and tell people that, you know, it’s, it is something that I have learned just to give myself some grace.

Does it feel different on the verge of Class being published as it did for Maid?

Yeah, I mean, writing the books were very different. Because with Maid I didn’t think anybody was going to read, I mean, most books are, they get printed 5000 copies, and I thought that that’s a good number. Like, I’ll be happy with that. And this book, it’s, you know, there was a lot more marketing involved. And, and I have a huge platform, you know, and all of this stuff, and it’s, and people are excited about it, and they’re talking about it, and it was hard to ignore, just kind of knowing that there are going to be a lot of people reading it. But going into book tour, I mean, book tours, book tour, it’s, you know, it’s the kryptonite of a writer’s soul and, but I feel like I can be angry, you know, and, and to really embrace that and to be kind of proud of that I did have a motion and that I’m not apologetic and that I am very broad and, you know, going through some stuff and I’m out there, you know, climbing fire escapes and having sex and you know, and so, there’s stuff in Class that probably at the end of the day, I am still kind of mortified that people are reading about but like, it’s also like, well, you know, what the hell.

In relation to that fire escape situation? And there were some descriptions in there that I was like, oh, no, like, I’m getting a little nervous just reading, because I pictured it too much. But I guess I have to say, because I want to talk about Stephanie the person a little bit and some of your biggest writing influences because your voice is so strong. And you see, you know, the way you put emotions and description on the page is so distinct. And I’d love to hear some of your sort of influences as you write.

I’m really visual. So I surround myself with photographs and music, I have my playlist of very sad songs, to put myself in this place, and I just, I really reflect on moments that I remember so clearly, and, and that I can recall, and, and that, and good moments, too, that I that I have kind of lived in at times that I needed to, but as far as you know, influences on finding my voice and stuff, I read memoir, like textbooks, you know, because I just I knew, I’ve been a daily writer since I was 10. So, I mean, finding my voice wasn’t really an issue for me, it was more the craft of, of how to put it into a story arc. And, you know, and all of that and how to make it interesting and, and, you know, cut out all the adverbs and stuff like that. So it was it was more of just really learning how to shape it into a story.

And how I’d like to end it is something I always like to ask people, but what do you hope people leave class with when they finish the book?

Selfishly, I hope people just look at children of poor parents a little differently, with a lot more understanding. Some of my favorite comments are hearing from elementary school teachers, who look at the poor kids in their class a little differently and have said, like, I did think that their parents were neglectful and you helped me see that they’re not, because I I feel like it’s such a tragedy that we’re not taking care of our kids in this country. And, of course, I hope for bigger things, you know, I hope for a lot of change in in government assistance programs. And you know, that we abolish work requirements, and we have health insurance for everybody, and childcare. And I think the bigger stuff isn’t going to happen if we can’t change. Just the fact that we’re not really seeing each other.

I agree. And I think there’s a pretty good chance that people are going to experience that because what you’ve done with this is really something pretty amazing. So Stephanie Land, thank you so much for joining us today. I can’t wait for people to read Class. It’s out now. And if somehow they’ve missed it, I think they need to pick up Maid to so thank you so much for being here.