Beautiful Stories From Anonymous People

This week, Geth talks with a railroad worker who shares what it’s really like on the job. They get into the nitty-gritty of trains, unions, and infrastructure, and explore how the rails often reflect bigger truths about where the country is headed.  Sign up for Beautiful/Anonymous+ to get ad free episodes and access to exclusive audio including 5 Random Questions with this week’s caller.  Leave us a voicemail at (973) 306-4676 Head to punchup.live/chrisgethard for tickets to our 500th episode, recording live at Smodcastle Cinemas in New Jersey! Listen now to the Life Kit podcast from NPR. Keep it classic and cool this fall—with long-lasting staples from Quince. Go to Quince.com/beautiful for free shipping on your order and 365-day returns. Your first great love story is free when you sign up for a free 30-day trial at Audible.com/BEAUTIFUL. Text BEAUTIFUL to 64000 to get twenty percent off all IQBAR products, plus FREE shipping. Message and data rates may apply.  

This week, Geth talks with a firefighter/EMT who’s training to be a paramedic. They get into the vital importance of volunteer work, what it’s like to serve in rural communities versus tourist towns, and how showing up in moments of crisis can remind you what humanity is all about. Sign up for Beautiful/Anonymous+ to get ad free episodes and access to exclusive audio including 5 Random Questions with this week’s caller.  Leave us a voicemail at (973) 306-4676 Head to punchup.live/chrisgethard for tickets to our 500th episode, recording live at Smodcastle Cinemas in New Jersey! Head to letsliveitup.com/BEAUTIFUL and use code BEAUTIFUL for 15% off your first Super Greens order. Visit Upwork.com right now and post your job for free. Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to joindeleteme.com/BEAUTIFUL and use promo code BEAUTIFUL at checkout. Feel the difference an extraordinary night’s sleep can make with Boll & Branch. Get 15% off, plus free shipping on your first set of sheets, at BollAndBranch.com/beautiful Text BEAUTIFUL to 64000 to get twenty percent off all IQBAR products, plus FREE shipping. Message and data rates may apply.

Raised by a zoologist in a house full of wild animals, this psychology professor’s life has remained just as untamed: coaching junior roller derby, a stint making high-end chocolate, parenting a trans kid, and that’s just for starters. Unpredictable but never aimless, her conversation with Gethard is just as wide-ranging as her life. Sign up for Beautiful/Anonymous+ to get ad free episodes and access to exclusive audio including 5 Random Questions with this week’s caller.  Leave us a voicemail at (973) 306-4676 Head to punchup.live/chrisgethard for tickets to our 500th episode, recording live at Smodcastle Cinemas in New Jersey! Get early access to Gethard’s special A Father and the Sun! Your first great love story is free when you sign up for a free 30-day trial at Audible.com/BEAUTIFUL. For a limited time, Wildgrain is offering our listeners $30 off the first box - PLUS free Croissants in every box - when you go to Wildgrain.com/BEAUTIFUL to start you subscription. Keep it classic and cool this fall—with long-lasting staples from Quince. Go to Quince.com/beautiful for free shipping on your order and 365-day returns. Text BEAUTIFUL to 64000 to get twenty percent off all IQBAR products, plus FREE shipping. Message and data rates may apply. Whether you want to lose weight, grow thicker, fuller hair, or find relief for anxiety, Hers has you covered. Visit forhers.com/BEAUTIFUL to get a personalized, affordable plan that gets you.

This week’s caller takes us into the complicated, messy, and deeply human world of sex work. The conversation stretches from personal experience to bigger questions about society. It's thoughtful, challenging, and impossible to boil down. Sign up for Beautiful/Anonymous+ to get ad free episodes and access to exclusive audio including 5 Random Questions with this week’s caller.  Leave us a voicemail at (973) 306-4676 Head to punchup.live/chrisgethard for tickets to our 500th episode, recording live at Smodcastle Cinemas in New Jersey! Your first great love story is free when you sign up for a free 30-day trial at Audible.com/BEAUTIFUL. Keep it classic and cool — with long-lasting staples from Quince. Go to Quince.com/beautiful for free shipping on your order and three hundred and sixty-five -day returns. Whether you want to lose weight, grow thicker, fuller hair, or find relief for anxiety, Hers has you covered. Visit forhers.com/BEAUTIFUL to get a personalized, affordable plan that gets you. Get 15% off, plus free shipping on your first set of sheets at BollAndBranch.com/beautiful Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to joindeleteme.com/ BEAUTIFUL and use promo code BEAUTIFUL at checkout.

Does what it says on the tin. Gethard talks to a polyamorous witch librarian who once worked the front desk at a brothel, surprisingly perfect training for library life. They get into the realities of coven community, late-discovered neurodivergence, leaving a faith tradition, and why public libraries are such vital spaces, now more than ever. It’s wide-ranging but never scattered. More like a life filed neatly into sections by someone who knows how to organize a catalog. Sign up for Beautiful/Anonymous+ to get ad free episodes and access to exclusive audio including 5 Random Questions with this week’s caller.  Leave us a voicemail at (973) 306-4676 Head to punchup.live/chrisgethard for tickets to our 500th episode, recording live at Smodcastle Cinemas in New Jersey! Your first great love story is free when you sign up for a free 30-day trial at audible.com/beautiful. Listen now to the Life Kit podcast from NPR. Visit Upwork.com right now and post your job for free. Keep it classic and cool — with long-lasting staples from Quince. Go to Quince.com/beautiful for free shipping on your order and three hundred and sixty-five -day returns.

Here’s the pitch: Engineer by day. International award-winning clown by night. Learned to read and walk in her 20s. This caller has a lot going on, and every story branches into a whole new world of surprises. Sign up for Beautiful/Anonymous+ to get ad-free episodes and access to exclusive audio, including 5 Random Questions with this week’s caller.  Leave us a voicemail at (973) 306-4676 Head to punchup.live/chrisgethard for tickets to our 500th episode, recording live at Smodcastle Cinemas in New Jersey! Head to LETSLIVEITUP.com/BEAUTIFUL and use code BEAUTIFUL for 15% off your first Super Greens order! Plus shipping’s always free.  Warby Parker has over 300+ locations to help you find your next pair of glasses. You can also head over to WarbyParker.com/BEAUTIFUL right now to try on any pair virtually! Get 15% off, plus free shipping on your first set of sheets at BollAndBranch.com/beautiful Text BEAUTIFUL to 64000 to get twenty percent off all IQBAR products, plus FREE shipping. Message and data rates may apply.  Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to joindeleteme.com/BEAUTIFUL and use promo code BEAUTIFUL at checkout. 

A couple weeks back, Gethard talked with a lawyer whose husband came up a few times. We learned two key facts about him: he’s got a lot of birds, and he works on a tugboat. Well, he got through this week, and that means Geth got to ask him a few questions about the birds and a million more about life aboard a tugboat. It’s a conversation packed with oddly fascinating details about this very specific, rarely discussed job. Sign up for Beautiful/Anonymous+ to get ad free episodes and access to exclusive audio including 5 Random Questions with this week’s caller.  Leave us a voicemail at (973) 306-4676 Head to punchup.live/chrisgethard for tickets to our 500th episode, recording live at Smodcastle Cinemas in New Jersey! Tackle your to-do list today and get $15 off your first task at taskrabbit.com or on the Taskrabbit app using promo code ANONYMOUS. Keep it classic and cool — with long-lasting staples from Quince. Go to Quince.com/beautiful for free shipping on your order and three hundred and sixty-five -day returns. Whether you want to lose weight, grow thicker, fuller hair, or find relief for anxiety, Hers has you covered. Visit forhers.com/BEAUTIFUL to get a personalized, affordable plan that gets you.  

A Vietnam veteran shares a lifetime of powerful stories, revealing the impact of war on his identity and family. He discusses harrowing experiences from his childhood and the catastrophic day in Vietnam that altered his life forever. Themes of trauma, memory, and survival emerge as he illustrates the importance of storytelling for healing and preservation. The candid reflections on loss and resilience, especially influenced by his granddaughter, highlight the ongoing relevance of veterans' narratives in understanding both personal and collective histories.

This week’s caller is a medical device engineer with a deeply personal stake in the healthcare system. She talks with Gethard about living with a rare liver disease, how Martin Shkreli changed the course of her life, and the three-legged, half-tailed foster cat who might just send her back to therapy. Check out The 100 Best Podcasts of All Time as decided by TIME Sign up for Beautiful/Anonymous+ to get ad free episodes and access to exclusive audio including 5 Random Questions with this week’s caller.  Leave us a voicemail at (973) 306-4676 Head to punchup.live/chrisgethard for tickets to That Show hosted by Gethard at UCB Theatre. Listen now to the Life Kit podcast from NPR. Stick to the staples that last—with elevated essentials from Quince. Go to Quince.com/beautiful for free shipping on your order and 365-day returns. Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to joindeleteme.com/ BEAUTIFUL and use promo code BEAUTIFUL at checkout. 

This week’s caller joined Gethard at 10:30 on a Friday night to talk about wrestling and her love of a New Jersey ska band, but the conversation quickly turned into something else entirely. We hear about her tugboat captain husband (who happens to have Geth’s secret dream job), her own work representing our most vulnerable population, and the utterly baffling hobby that’s taken over her home. Somehow, this one-hour call manages to hit all the Beautiful/Anonymous sweet spots: unique jobs, highly specific interests, and someone doing the kind of quietly heroic work that keeps the world turning. Sign up for Beautiful/Anonymous+ to get ad free episodes and access to exclusive audio including 5 Random Questions with this week’s caller.  Leave us a voicemail at (973) 306-4676 Head to punchup.live/chrisgethard for tickets to That Show hosted by Gethard at UCB Theatre. Start your free online visit today at http://forhers.com/beautiful Stick to the staples that last—with elevated essentials from Quince. Go to Quince.com/beautiful for free shipping on your order and 365-day returns. Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to joindeleteme.com/ BEAUTIFUL and use promo code BEAUTIFUL at checkout. Get twenty percent off all IQBAR products, plus get FREE shipping. Text BEAUTIFUL to 64000. Message and data rates may apply. See terms for details.