STORIES by Lea Thau

Producer Lea Thau embarks on a strange online dating adventure. 

While doing a story about online dating, Lea gets her heart broken (yet again). Get the full story here. The original Love Hurts series had four epsiodes, which were dowloaded millions of times and  was the most popular series Lea has ever created. Only the first two of those episodes are available here (this one and the next one), the others are for paying subscribers only (who also get access to the entire Strangers archive, ad-free).  Join for $5 at Leasplace.substack.com or Leasplace.supercast.com to gain full access  and support my work! 

Strangers, at its core, is about the beauty and the struggle of human connection and what happens in those moments when we get closer to someone else, or, say, further removed from ourselves. Often that change is subtle and slow, but sometimes it is sudden and monumental. Here is Lyena Strelkoff. A version of this … Continue reading Falling Slowly → Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Our storyteller today is Erika Warren-Yarber. She’s the COO of the Wind River Development Fund and the Wind River Sage Fund. Please consider supporting their work.And please consider supporting my work by becoming a paying subscriber on Patreon or Substack. Thanks to the Just Transition Fund for connecting me with Erika. I directed a storytelling show for their partner convening, and Erika was one of the storytellers. If you’d like to hire me to direct a storytelling show, or teach a storytelling workshop, or help you craft your story, email me at stories@leathau.com.The champion song that played when Erika got the big news was by Indian Hill at Sho-Ban Festival Powwow 2022. Thanks, as always, to Paul Dreux Smith for making the music and mixing. Also big thanks to my Associate Producer, Vix Jensen, and my Project Editor, Christina Thyssen, and to Pernille Clifforth for illustrating the series, to Avi Odenheimer for making The Hopeful Locals logo, and to Heather Kitching and Jen Alevizos for their input and support.

Today you're going to meet some members of the Wind River community and hear their stories. This episode is a continuation of last week's episode with Erika Warren-Yarber. If you missed that, you might be glad to hear it first, but you can also jump in right here.This is Episode 7 of The Hopeful Locals for my paying subscribers and it's the Episode 2 here on the free podcast. If you would like to support my work and unlock the entire Hopeful Locals series + my member-only series The Way Forward + the entire Strangers archive of nearly more than 90 episodes, you can join us at STORIES by Lea Thau on Patreon and Substack. Big thanks this week to Art Lawson and Wilma Wagon of the Wind River Fish & Game and Jason Baldes of the Tribal Buffalo Initiative, as well as Paul Huberty and Erika Warren-Yarber, who run The Wind River Development Fund and The Wind River Sage Fund, where you can track the progress of their Recompete grant projects and support their work.I also want to thank the Just Transition Fund for introducing me to Erika. They’re the only philanthropic initiative focused on coal community transition in the U.S., working to create economic opportunities for the frontline workers and communities hardest hit by the transition away from coal.Huge thanks to my Associate Producer, Vix Jensen, to Paul Dreux Smith for making the music and mixing, to our resident artist and illustrator Pernille Clifforth, to my project editor, Christina Thyssen, to our production intern Jen Alevizos, and a special thanks this week to Heather Kitching for her help.Questions, comments, story pitches, feedback? Email us at stories@leathau.com or find us on Facebook and Instagram.See you next week!

The hope holds strong in this final episode about the people on the Wind River Reservation. It is brought to you by our supporters on Patreon and Substack. Huge thanks to the visionaries of this episode: Jackie White, Kelly Pingree, and Erika Warren-Yarber. Please visit The Wind River Sage Fund, which was established by The Wind River Development Fund to manage their Recompete grant projects, and please check out and support the Sweetgrass Food Lodge and the Wind River Food Sovereignty Project.We have a COMMUNITY HANGOUT, open to all FREE & PAID members, TOMORROW:Thursday, May 21: 11:30am PT – 12:30pm MT - 1:30pm CT – 2:30pm ET – 7:30pm GMT – 20:30 CET – 4:30am (Fri) AEST. Become a FREE member on Patreon or Substack to see photos from this episode. Or become a paid member and join our IN-PERSON hangout in Copenhagen June 25th! INTERN WITH US:We’re looking for a summer intern. If you think that might be you email us at stories@leathau.com and tell us a little bit about yourself — your interests, relevant skills, and availability. Position can be remote. Thanks to our sponsors, Tink Media, a woman-founded, gender-inclusive podcast growth and discovery company, and Podcast The Newsletter, which is a weekly roundup of the best things in podcasting from Lauren Passell. If you like my work, I think you’ll like the things Lauren writes about. And thanks to the Just Transition Fund for introducing me to Erika, and for supporting communities like hers and helping organizations like The Wind River Development Fund secure the grant funding they need to make a real difference.As always, I’m grateful to my associate producer, Vix Jensen for all her help, to Paul Dreux Smith, for making the music and mixing, and to Pernille Clifforth for illustrating this series. Also big thanks to my project editor, Christina Thyssen, and to Heather Kitching and Jen Alevizos for their help.Last but not least, thanks to all of you for listening. If you like what we do, please rate and perhaps review the show wherever you listen to podcasts. It helps our rankings!Questions, comments, story ideas? Email us at stories@leathau.com.