One thing around this pandemic is that I’ve began to recognize no as a clear option when a situation or person feels wrong or risky. Maybe this is also age talking. I hear tell it’s a helluva lot easier to stop pleasing people for the sake of it after you’ve been on the planet a while. I’m finding that more-or-less true.

Back in the day, I was much conflicted around saying no or offering up differing opinions because I felt I was being disagreeable, which (alert: gender observation to follow) as a female had been woven into my soul as a bad thing to be. The words strident, harpy, bitch were all the sprinkled-on-top descriptors used when a woman spoke up and out. (Again I refer you to this brilliant book, Rage Becomes Her and thank you, Windy, for turning me toward it.) Story assignment meetings at SPIN were particularly tough times for me given my only-female-music-editor-in-the-room status. I’d work extra hard to come in with a well-crafted idea that I’d have spent time circling round and round checking for leaks, making sure it was sea-worthy and air-tight—no room for changes—only to walk out of the meeting with a saggy dinghy loaded with extra ideas and angles. Unwanted passengers hanging over the sides already drunk and disorderly dragging me down. (Example: Story on Soundgarden. Simple and straightforward. Take the band out to dinner. Have conversation. Write it up. Everyone on the same page. But instead somehow it was decided I should take along a musician/artist who, although brilliant, was decidedly more edgy than the band could handle. And while I’d sensed this meeting of the minds might not be a dream for anyone, I did not say that. I nodded and when the time came for the interview, it was a nightmare for everyone and almost from beginning to end I wished I could slip under the restaurant’s table and into some hole in the floor.)

So I lived in this mental space of conflict. Follow my dream, which I was doing as a music writer. Develop relationships in order to understand the minds, lives of the people I interviewed. Become friendly with the gatekeepers who guarded said people. Try not to get pushed around. In this last thing I probably failed more times than I succeeded…at least that’s how I remember it. But I did have some eye-opening times that I wouldn’t trade. I also came face-to-face with some self-knowledge I wouldn’t have otherwise paid as much attention to. For instance, I’d always admired women who spoke their minds and didn’t seem to give a toss what people thought about them. Naturally I wanted that bravery, so I’d get as close as I could and hope some of their forthrightness would rub off. Courtney Love was one of those people. At least her outward-facing self told me she was would not put up with BS whether from men or women. She would get where and what she wanted. No one doubted that. At the time we met, her band Hole was on Caroline Records and their release Pretty on the Inside had just come out (1991). I had a really good friend who worked at Caroline so there would be plenty of times we’d go to shows, be with the label’s bands, and so on and so forth. My initial impressions of Courtney were a sampler of fascination, awe, and terror. For a hot minute during our acquaintance, she would call me in the wee hours and just talk. Pre-cell phone, I’d lay my black clunky rotary receiver on the pillow and listen, occasionally saying something. Topics may have included science, humanity—the plight of, current bands, or shoes…I don’t honestly remember yet I did feel flattered. When the calls stopped I was disappointed but also fully expected it, knowing she’d moved on and that although I existed in her universe, I wasn’t a close pal, which was an initial lesson learned around how these kinds of relationships worked. It wasn’t personal, until…

In 1992, Lynn Hirschberg wrote a piece about Courtney and her husband Kurt Cobain in Vanity Fair. This article has been much discussed and dissected over the years. Some of the details included in it led to a temporary removal of the couple’s newborn, Frances Bean. This ignited a hell-storm from Courtney and Kurt that grabbed me inside its funnel. When I’d worked at Rolling Stone, I’d gotten to know Lynn pretty well. My first paying job (after becoming the intern who wouldn’t leave) was as the executive editor’s assistant, which meant I came in contact with quite a few of the magazine’s writers. Lynn was one of those. I’d sometimes transcribe her interviews or chase down payments, get her contracts sorted, and generally be a go-to troubleshooter. She gave me cards at Christmas and once even a fancy-schmancy scarf from Bergdorf Goodman across the street. We weren’t pals but had a pretty solid work friendship. After I decamped for SPIN, we didn’t really stay in touch.

When the Vanity Fair article came out, Courtney went into full retaliation mode and because her memory was a venus flytrap and I’d apparently mentioned having known Lynn at Rolling Stone, she decided I would be enlisted to help her and Kurt get revenge. On so many levels this was a bad, terrible, career-ending idea. I was asked to do and say various things while taping a phone call Linda-Tripp style with Lynn, then Courtney and Kurt were probably going to do something no-doubt nefarious with that information. I demurred. I skirted and hedged and explained why this was in no way a good idea for anyone. I found the strength to stand up for myself and say NO. But none of that mattered. It took my friend from Caroline Records, at that point a high-powered manager, to intervene and kibosh the situation. And that, I thought, was that. But it wasn’t.

Courtney carried on and put Lynn on the receiving end of giant-size drama deliveries. Lynn called me. Asked if I’d appeal to Courtney and/or her people to get it all to stop. Although that was impossible. I had roughly the same ability to influence the ways of Ms. Love as I did to control weather or the NYC budget, which was to say zero. No power. This was a good lesson in power dynamics and relationships. I was in many cases star-struck and therefore not able to clearly call out where an advantageous work relationship and a true friendship began and ended. And while power dynamics exist everywhere, in every single facet of life, the ability to see clearly what place folks existed in my life was an eye-opener.

In the end, the Courtney/Kurt/Lynn troika played itself out. I can’t altogether remember the details, but everyone moved on to the next shiny object and no one got hurt in the transition—except for the emotional upheaval Frances Bean no doubt suffered at the time inside her tiny self. For me, a steep learning curve around boundaries. The consequences of oversharing. Understanding the difference between work relationships and true friendships. Naturally, it’s weird when a good portion of the work involved trying to get at a deeper level of a person involves bars, clubs, hotels, and other like-minded places. Locations where intimacy thrives. After a little more than a decade, I moved out of that particular house of secrets and sharing. Left the music industry to teach writing workshops where there was no confusion about who was my good friend and who was my workmate. Honestly, I admired whole swathes of six-year-olds for their ability to say exactly what they wanted out loud, even when the ask was wildly out of the question (ice-cream after writing wasn’t the worst idea ever, but the teachers in the classrooms I visited knew hell would follow if they got their way). I recognized a lot of the behaviors of the nine-year-olds as some of the acting-out I’d seen in the music biz. But these were actual nine-year-olds, so they were in fact right on track. I didn’t build any ongoing relationships with those kids, though I still have some very good friendships with music business pals, which happened after I learned what the word nuance means and how to express myself. Learned how to say no and get my own ice cream—whenever I want it.