Lockdown Lesbian Love Story
6/18/21 - Queer women aren't exclusively looking for longterm monogamous love - but some are! As part of our Pride series, a lockdown lesbian love story featuring musician Abby Diamond and actor and director Rachel Cora Wood.
Transcript below.
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CREDITS
Executive Producer: Gina Delvac
Hosts: Aminatou Sow & Ann Friedman
Theme song: Call Your Girlfriend by Robyn
Composer: Carolyn Pennypacker Riggs.
Producer: Jordan Bailey
Visual Creative Director: Kenesha Sneed
Merch Director: Caroline Knowles
Editorial Assistant: Mercedes Gonzales-Bazan
Design Assistant: Brijae Morris
Ad sales: Midroll
TRANSCRIPT: LOCKDOWN LESBIAN LOVE STORY
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Gina: Welcome to Call Your Girlfriend.
Jordan: A podcast for long distance besties, everywhere.
Gina: I'm Gina Delvac, executive producer of CYG.
Jordan: And I'm producer Jordan Bailey on this week's agenda, a lockdown lesbian love story.
[theme song]
[interview begins]
Abby: I am Abby Diamond. My pronouns are she and her? Oh, I'm a lesbian.
Rachel Cora: My full name is Rachel Cora Wood. And I go by her/ she and a lesbian. Yeah.
Gina: How'd you meet?
Rachel Cora: We met on a hinge and then we did the first date was a zoom date. Cause like it's pandemic, so you learn really quickly that if you really want to spend time with somebody, you're gonna go on zoom first. Um, so yeah, we met on Hinge and, and I think I'll let Abby take it in terms of like how quickly we met. It was very like we were chatting and she was like, um, so zoom tomorrow night. I'm like, uh, yeah, yeah, right. To the point.
Abby: Well, I think also at that point, it's like, it's, COVID you really want to make sure that if you have to quarantine for two weeks, between actually meeting people, it's very important to do that screener beforehand, because otherwise you're going to find yourself on a very awkward date and even more resentful than normal because now you can't see anyone else. So yeah, I was pretty, and I didn't want to get into a penpal relationship with anyone I had gotten into like a weird penpal relationship in a very lesbian way with a woman who lived in Arizona. So like I wasn't about to go there and yeah, on the zoom, I believe I asked her about 700 questions.
Gina: It's funny because you touched on what I think are two of the biggest tropes about lesbian relationships, which is that lesbians are always looking for love, always pretty much monogamous and always moving fast. Even though we know many queer women in our circle who have every range of appetite, interest in different types of relationship. When you first met on the FaceTime zoom date, that the like over quarantine date, how did you feel? Like, were you, do you want to meet up and I guess like, did you know you were looking to fall in love at that time?
Rachel Cora: Um, I, I mean, I knew right after the zoom, I was like, I really want to meet this person in person. I really hope we have chemistry. Cause like I felt a vibe on zoom, but like when you get in person, like, is it going to be hot and heavy? Is it not going to be hot and heavy? I think goodness, it was hot and heavy. [laughter] I mean, yeah. Yeah. But it was, it was like, but it was, it was good stuff. Um, and, uh, and, um, and so yes, I wasn't necessarily looking for love. I was looking for a relationship, like a quality, like I wanted a long term partner. Um, and I knew I was ready for it to have, did all the work to be ready for that. And um, and uh, I was happy that like I knew, I felt deeply like after our zoom, I was like, I feel a term thing with this person. And I, that's also why I was like, okay, the intimacy is important, so hopefully it's there. And so when we did meet up in person, I was happy that it was there so.
Gina: And Abby, where were you at the time that you were talking to Cora? Did you know what you were looking for? What did you feel on that first FaceTime date?
Abby: Well, I think, uh, the podcast interviewer herself had told me that it's okay to want what you want. And so I had, um, I had, you know, this whole, COVID, I think for a lot of people had been an exercise and you have a lot of time to think and you have a lot of time to sit with yourself and ask yourself really tough questions. And yeah, I think, you know, I ultimately, even though I did end up like hooking up with another person in the summer, it was a very superficial relationship. I knew that, um, we weren't compatible, I didn't feel a deep connection with her and for me, um, yeah. Um, uh, horny Abby is weird. [laughter]
Gina: So Abby and I have been friends for a couple of years now and we met among friends. And so we have kind of that like, you know, gay men at brunch vibe a lot of the time. And you were, I think looking for different kinds of connection was my sense at the time. And I think you're, you know, uh, experienced business woman. So you were doing kind of, you're like, let me get a lot of dates. Let me like schedule some things, see who's out there, see what's going on. Um, but it was my sense from our conversations that like you were looking for something more meaningful, like you were sort of alluding to like maybe needing to get laid like lots of people in the summer, but that wasn't necessarily all you wanted. What did it feel like when he met Cora in person?
Abby: Yeah, so I think by the time I'd had my like summer fling, um, that was sort of an eye opening thing for me that like, this is fine, but I'm not looking for fine. I think the cliche of being with someone, but being alone has been, is true and is a cliche for a reason. And also because COVID, you spend a lot of time by herself at that point, I'm like, oh, I'm pretty cool. I'd rather would hang by myself. Then beyond this date where I really don't feel like I connect with this person. So by the time that I met Cora, and I think part of what you, that what we were alluding to and me asking a bunch of questions is to make sure do you want in the way that I want, um, which obviously, which is also completely ridiculous for me to be asking is in an interview, rapid fire, because a lot of these things are revealed over time, but I think there was a certain, I guess, not desperation, but just like an, I don't want to waste my time thing of like, not wasting my time and sort of an urgency of, um, having children or anything like that. But just that I think COVID has taught us that time is valuable. So I want to make sure that the person that I'm with that, even if, um, yeah, that, that there's something here, you know, you can never tell, you know, I've been married, I've been divorced. You can never tell the permanence of something, but at least that there's the goods there. And I wanted to make sure that the person that I was meeting had the same love language that I had that was looking for very particular quality, someone that was in therapy, which is, we were just talking about how that's become a hot turn on for people now, as to say that you're in therapy, all of those things were really important for me. And so that's, I think that was one of my questions. Is, are you in therapy? It was probably like number two.
Gina: So take us to the first date. Cora, how did it go from your perspective?
Rachel Cora: It went really well. I mean, we answered the hot and heavy question. Um…
Gina: And tell us about the time that it was happening when you first were, when you went on your first date, if I'm recalling correctly, it was in the fall of 2020, and we all live in Los Angeles where we were just approaching a really scary part of the pandemic was the beginning of our surge. We were in extreme lockdown. It was a really scary time. A lot of people were dying. Right. So it was not a joke to be having these conversations around boundaries, consent. Who else are you seeing? Everyone was kind of fearfully podded up. So what did, what kind of emotions did you go into the date with?
Rachel Cora: Yeah. And you thankfully, like it was December around December. Um, it was December, uh, yeah, December 10th that we had the zoom and then December 13th when we met up in person and yeah, I mean, you, it helps to be in California. I mean, weather-wise um, so we met up, uh, for a hike that I thought it was a hike, but it was actually a walk because, so I came dressed in hiking gear and she looked like, oh, cute to her, like neighborhood walk gear, super cute. And I was like, oh my God. Um, but I embraced it. I embraced it because I was dressed like ready to go on a hike and I, different clothing, but it we, you know, I owned it and didn't let it affect me. And we had a great walk, but I definitely felt the sense of like, I want to sit down and get to know this person. So thankfully Abby has a wonderful backyard and invited me to the backyard. And that's when, like I already knew, but I was just like, I just want to look at this person, like, just talk to them, like walking side by side, I didn't feel like I felt connected, but I wanted to connect more. And I was so thankful. She invited me to her backyard. And, but the connecting in the backyard was where it was like, we could actually sit and look at each other and like have a conversation in even deeper conversations. So that was nice.
Abby: Yeah. I think I'll just add to the more, the seriousness of it, of meeting up, which we already alluded to in a lighter, more subtle way of the two week period of meeting people, but it's also the holidays, right? So it's this extra layer of, yes, I've been alone during quarantine this whole time, but now I've been separated from my family for a year and now I'm going to truly be alone on the holidays. So if I am going to spend it with a person or meet someone around this time, it has to be someone who's worth it. For me too, I knew that Cora had just moved here from New York, which in the dating world and dating world in general, everyone has this dickish thing. That's like, you know, I don't want to be someone's tour guide and that kind of thing. And I knew that Cora knew LA well enough. And also that idea of being someone's tour guide during COVID doesn't even exist, that cliche can exist cause you can't go anywhere. So in that way it becomes a level playing field because you're just, you're just two people that are looking for connection. I think for me around the holidays too, it was the sense of like, she's come from New York and New York was my home for a really long time. Um, so for me, she also represented this feeling of home in a really, really turbulent time but yeah on the date. I obviously she's smoking hot and when she walked up, I was just like, holy shit. But yeah, she did walk up and full on hiking.
Rachel Cora: In my hiking boots.
Abby: Yeah. She really rocked those hiking boots. Um, yeah. And I liked that. She was, you know, we both had these journeys of being late in life lesbians and I really, I think a part of me also was living vicariously through her because I never got to really be a lesbian in New York because I kind of came out toward my tail end of it. So hearing her adventures of her, there are some similarities in terms of, you know, she grew up on in the river in West Virginia and Maryland. I grew up in the country and then she's in New York. I was in New York. Uh, we're both weird creative girls who didn't quite fit in. We didn't know why there are all these shared experiences. And then just the curiosity thing and the voyeurism for me of just hearing on the river path of her, you know, going to skirt club and stuff. And this is like, uh, like an hour in of to our walk and, uh, yeah. And then she came back to my place and um, I just thought she was really smart and really warm. And that was one of the things that in, woowoo language, I had really manifested as I really, and I was telling Gina about this as I really wanted someone who was warm and I just wanted her. Um, I just wanted her in my home and yeah, just to speed this up, she made a tahini and she used my blender. She was the first person to ever like deflower my blender.
Gina: So having spent some time around the two of you, I have the sense that there's lots of times in places you might've met, that you would have felt a connection. Do you think that, like, do you think there was something slower, faster, different about getting together during this crazy pandemic time? Or do you think if you'd met under another circumstance, he would have felt this kinship?
Rachel Cora: I definitely think we would have still felt the kinship and like the connection. And I feel we'd be, if I feel like we'd be going a similar speed, I feel like we'd just have a lot more activities in between. There'd be a lot more like parties we'd be going to. And a lot of the things that we've done together, I feel like have been at the perfect time. Like we just went recently, went to like a party together rather than that probably would have happened much earlier in our relationship. Um, because we, it was an outdoor party that we went to there. And so where is that something you may have experienced sooner, um, and navigated those things of like maybe possibly people coming up and hitting on you and like navigating those things early on in your relationship. Whereas this was later, we're like solid. Um, and I'm very happy that there hasn't been a lot because we really get to know each other and take our time. I'm definitely a slightly introvert. So it could be overwhelming for me, especially having just moved here. I feel for me, it would have been almost too much where it's been nice to like, gradually get into the grove things.
Abby: I mean, I think one of the things, speaking of meeting the friends later in the game, right, because it's COVID, and you don't meet friends. We had taken a new year's trip to Cambria about a month in, because again, you can't really do much. And what are we going to do? And we had smoked a little bit of weed and Cora brought out a new notepad and we started to do what she called a collaborative drawing. And I had seen her friends, Sonia and Maya, and her had done these collaborative beach drawings of like vaginas and all this stuff. And I was like, oh, okay. This is, I could totally, without meeting her friends, I got to meet her friends on that notepad.
Rachel Cora: In terms of meeting each other, Abby manifested me. Cause I moved here the day of her birthday. So we're going to get woo. And she, she called me I'm, I'm not actually real. I'm just an angel. And I arrived on her birthday.
Gina: I can attest for the listeners out in podcast-landia that Cora is real. She has her own person. Um, when did you know you were falling in love?
Rachel Cora: Oh, goodness. Um, I mean, I definitely felt the long term thing right from the zoom. Oh gosh. Wow. I think I might cry. Um, the falling in love. Um, I felt the longt erm thing right off the bat. So I think for me, I'm, I'm trying to recall exactly. Cause it, it just, it, from there it sprouted, like I think it was, and I don't think I'm like being like, oh, I needed love and it, I think it was there. And then, then just being willing to fall and fall into it and trust it. Um, yeah, I think it was always there. And then the willingness to say it and believe it and do it. Cause it does take doing yeah, because yeah, right from the zoom, I was like, oh, I feel this like really like, yeah. So that was for me. Um, I, I don't have a pinpoint. It might come to me after I hear Abby, but I think it was always there.
Abby: I have a music project outside of this called Beverly, which is all about endings and the feelings of the between. And so much of COVID is a long between and not knowing. And when I was asking her coming out story, she said that, um, when she was with women, when she was with men, she was always waiting for it to end now because she hated the men, but just, it was she's waiting for it to be over with. And when she was with women, she had this feeling of infinity that she never wanted it to. Um, like I feel like I'm going to cry, um, that she never wanted it to end. And as soon as she said that, because I knew like, holy shit, this person speaks my love language because of course we can never promise each other forever. But just the idea that this person wants to be committed to someone. And she has a lot of love to give, um, was really cool for me. And also just when we were wearing Cambria over new year's I was looking at, cause I have a tendency, she's very, Cora is very present and she meditates. And also it was like a thing where I had just started meditating during COVID. Um, and she's very present. Um, and I have a tendency to be overly nostalgic and I was looking at the sunset and she said to me, uh, are you in memory right now? Or are you in reality? I was like, are you in my head? Like, what is, what are you a witch? So it was little moments like that, where I just felt she understood my feelings without judgment. And I really, I really am like a little baby bird that like needs to be held very delicately in the palm of someone's hand and I'll stay there forever. But also I need to be left alone sometimes. I'm a very complicated person as we all are. And she also said a thing about, you know, on the codependency front, which I think is really important for queer people is that women can get attached and all that stuff. Um, she had talked about her feelings about love. And you said this thing about like two feet and four feet and that you've got to be able to stand on your own. And I was like, oh, so basically you're saying like, when you fall in love, you have to be like a dog or a horse or something. I was like, I'm down.
[music]
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Gina: I love hanging out with mom and mom on date night. [laughter] Oh my God, can you guys see my gay moms? Uh, great. Yeah. I was alluding earlier to some of the kind of lesbian tropes about, you know, like, oh, women are always like rushing to get into relationships are like fiercely monogamous. And I think that there were specific conditions that might make your pace look that way. But that, wasn't my sense of talking with Abby at the time meeting you Cora, that it seemed like you both were really taking your time and like really starting to connect and experience one another. Um, and that like some of that monogamy may have at first been forced by COVID. How did you navigate the like, are we going to be together, in what's circumstance versus how open do we want to be? Because of COVID I made it clear at the beginning.
Rachel Cora: I was like, I'm committing to you right now in the sense of like, I'm still, like, I still want to keep getting to know each other, but I am in the sense of who I'm seeing, I'm only committing to you and if we want to see other people let's have a conversation about it. Um, so, but we're still in that I'm getting to know you phase. Like let's not for, I believe we had that conversation. I was like, so, and then we can have another conversation about committing, committing to each other monogamy. And so, yeah, I, I, we had, I made it and we a conversation about it and cause just safety wise it's it was better for everybody and myself.
Gina: How do you think that impacted your communication? Because like anyone who started a relationship during this time that's doing as well as the two of you are like, you had to have some much more rigorous type of consent and boundaries convo. Abby, did that feel different from other things that you've been in?
Abby: I think this is one of those things that with, or without COVID, Cora's is a very communicative person, which threw me for a loop because I'd never been with someone who could just say, this is what I want. Or there were some meme that I think I sent you where there's a lesbian, that's like what this person's like, anticipating me every feeling. If I'm upset about something or say the wrong word, you want to talk about it almost immediately. What's wrong with you? Do you want to murder me in my sleep? So like that's where I was coming from because I had had very toxic relationships including up until COVID, which so I think that would have been her without COVID, but COVID just brought that even to the upteenth level. Yeah. So it was, it was refreshing for me that, and it was refreshing for me also because I've often felt the need that I have to be the person that does the work in the relationship, whether that's a friendship because so much of my life being in music and I do music for advertising and all that stuff is sales. Like I have to like do the dance, get people here's the thing. And, um, that becomes really hard for me in friendships or in romantic relationships is I, I really crave balance. And so, and I've never experienced that before. And that was something that my therapist, um, very early on, pointed out when I was getting scared in the beginning was you're getting scared because this isn't you've. Did it ever occur to you? It's because this is new to you that someone is raising an issue or doing their part of the work. Um, it was shocking to me in a way that was like, oh my God, I got to go inside of my little crab shell because this is scaring the out of me right now. But then I realized like, oh, this is like, what a healthy relationship looks like for me.
Gina: I love it. I think a lot of people are, you know, we're exiting the pandemic in pride season. Everyone's suddenly vaccinated. How are you each reckoning with hot vaxx summer coinciding with like your summer of debuting your love or getting to be together in a new way?
Rachel Cora: Well, um, we have some things coming up, so I feel like I'm savoring a lot of my time. We have a vacation coming up, so that'll be already planned before things are opening up. So I feel like right now I'm actually saving a lot of my energy and not going to all these like hot things. I mean, we are, um, and I'm excited about them. Um, but for I'm I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm mixed bag. I'm a mixed bag. Cause I'm just like, I'm ready, but I'm like, am I ready? I don't know. And it, I think that's more of my own personal, not rather than like us as a couple. Um, and, and I, and I'm excited to also navigate that as a couple and be like, oh, you're going to do that thing. I'm not going to do that thing. Go enjoy that thing.
Abby: Well, I guess you would talking specifically in terms of hot vaxx summer. So you mean in terms of us being a couple now and seeing other queers out on the loose, I very much, I've spent so much of my life, uh, thinking about fantasy and unavoidable or not unavoidable, unavailable, unavoidable and unavailable women. So I like that Cora is real, you know, even when we like went to a party together this past weekend, it's just like that feeling of like, we can do our own thing and be off, but like you feel this like sixth sense of like the other person in the room, which is really nice.
Gina: What are your secrets for the hottest lesbian sex for people who are looking for that this summer and doesn't have to be techniques, but I feel like in your conversations about communication and boundaries, I feel like that must extend outside of other, into other forms of intimacy.
Abby: Well, yeah, I just did something for Cosmo where they asked you for the hottest lesbian things. And I just said like, communitcation, it was just like that. Yep. I'm gonna, um, pass.
Rachel Cora: I know it's funny as I was going to say communicate, but also be okay with what you like, like, even if it's something you like, like if you like, what you like, and that works and that, and you'll enjoy that I'm here for you and I want to be here for that and I'm turned on by it too. Like if you'd like, yeah. So like embrace that.
Gina: What's your advice for our fellow women who are looking to fall in love, amidst the like horny chaos of the summer. Did you learn any lessons either from how you two connected or how, what it took to connect during COVID that you think can apply as the world reopens?
Abby: I think co you know, I'm 33 and this is the, and I was telling this to you too, is that this is the first year that I started meditating. I think, you know, I've had there been a lot of moments, including even recently where I've just keep having these realizations, that the only thing I can control in life is myself. And, you know, that comes from my own history and my own traumas of thinking that if I behave the right way or do the right thing, I can get someone to love me, or I can get someone to not hurt me. And ultimately nothing I do can control another person. I can only control myself. And during COVID, it really was a journey for me. And, uh, for the first time learning to have compassion for myself. Yeah. I think I'd gotten to this point where I was like, I'd rather be by myself or with my friends than be with someone who's not fulfilling. And I'm actually okay. More than okay with that, because I have liked myself really for a very long time was looking for balance and it didn't happen until I like found that within myself and with a solid group of friends.
Rachel Cora: I feel like my answer to the question is, um, talk like, figure out what you want and talk about it. And if you need something, ask for it, like, cause yeah, if you don't want to be monogamous, are you, do you want to be monogamous? I mean, especially now talk about it. Just yeah. Have those awkward con conversations.
Gina: How have you gone about cultivating that inner voice that you have Cora?
Rachel Cora: It's very sweet question. Um, I do actually literally talk to myself. I will be like, Hey, can we talk? And then my inner self and I will have a conversation inner selves. I talked to both my inner child and I talked to my inner teenager, both of whom were highly neglected. And so I reassure them daily that I've got their back. We're now adults. And we've got this, I do that daily every morning. I, so after meditation I talked to myself, um, and that is a whatever concerns they have. I, we talk about it. Um, and I know that may sound silly, but it's been very helpful for me. And, um, that's how that's that's, that's it.
Gina: Cora, thanks so much for being on Call Your Girlfriend.
Rachel Cora: Thank you for having me.
Gina: Abby, thanks for being on the show.
Abby: Thanks Gina. You're sexy.
[laughter]
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Aminatou: You can find us many places on the Internet: callyourgirlfriend.com, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, we're on all your favorite platforms. Subscribe, rate, review, you know the drill. You can call us back. You can leave a voicemail at 714-681-2943. That's 714-681-CYGF. You can email us at callyrgf@gmail.com. Our theme song is by Robyn, oriGinal music composed by Carolyn Pennypacker Riggs. Our logos are by Kenesha Sneed. We're on Instagram and Twitter at @callyrgf. Our producer is Gina Bailey and this podcast is produced by Gina Delvac.