Rachel Kirkpatrick, Creator of INCONCEIVABLE

“One day we won’t have to ‘come out of the closet.’ We’ll just say we are in love and that will be all that matters.” – Unknown

Talent – Rachel Kirkpatrick, Creator / Writer of INCONCEIVABLE @therachelkirkpatrick

Black Chalk – Writer/ Editor, Justin Howard @jthnomad

As an openly gay male, I spend a lot of my time explaining the basic’s of being a ‘homosexual’ to lovely yet slightly confused straight couples who really want to ‘understand’ what it is like. I do this because I want everyone to know that Love is by its very nature transcendent, and yet familiar to us all. It is something we all hold within us. That is why the story behind the web series, INCONCEIVABLE, is utterly near and dear to my heart.

INCONCEIVABLE, follows the story of young lesbian artist Rachel Kirkpatrick and her straight friend filmmaker Joel McCarthy as they literally deal with the one of the toughest life choices facing individuals today – a baby. As a dishy friend recently told me “Love is the object of life” and what could be more of both then having a child? So one crazy party of a pregnancy later – both Joel and Rachel turn their fabulous comedy of life into a marvelous web series exploring the definitions of modern romance, and what exactly is the nature of love in todays world. With that in mind, it was my pleasure to sit down with Rachel for an interview with Black Chalk Magazine.

Justin Howard, Black Chalk Magazine – What is Love? Define that word for me.

Rachel Kirkpatrick, INCONCEIVABLE – To me love is what we’re made of. It’s not a feeling or an action. It’s a state of being. It’s always happening to and through us whether we know it is or not. I like how Alan Watts describes humans as being a part of what the universe is doing in the same way that a wave is what the whole ocean is doing. To me that is what love is also. The stars are love the plants are love, the dirt is love. Eckhart Tolle points to it in saying that it’s the spacious aware presence behind everything that is happening. It’s calm. It’s peace. It is beyond thought. It can feel any emotion alongside itself. It’s the ability to see a situation and not add any judgement to it. To be in alignment with reality no matter the conditions. It’s complete acceptance of what is.

Justin Howard, Black Chalk Magazine – You just mentioned that as a kid you had a very clear ideal as to what love was meant to be. Tell me what love meant to you as a kid.

Rachel Kirkpatrick, INCONCEIVABLE – I don’t think I knew what love was as a kid. To be honest I think it’s something I’ve grown into as an adult. I mean I guess technically kids are born with an intrinsic sense of love, but I don’t think I really knew a relational love. I grew up in a super religious environment and was always taught that a God who loves me dearly is also watching me when I do bad things and wants to send me to a scary place filled with eternal torment. Being taught that love is punishment can sure set a person up for some major failures heading into adulthood.

Justin Howard, Black Chalk Magazine – People always talk about that transition from childhood to being an adult. In your own tell me what is the difference between being a girl and being a woman?

Rachel Kirkpatrick, INCONCEIVABLE –Omg are we going to talk about menstroooation now too? I feel like I have no idea to the answer to your question. I have only recently started learning what I think it means to be an adult. A few months ago I saw a youtube video of Mel Robbins talking about how there is this crazy transition between your 20s and your 30s where we have to become our own parents. That really resonated with me. I feel like I’m still learning to do all the things myself.

Justin Howard, Black Chalk Magazine – Is there still a little bit of the girl in you?

Rachel Kirkpatrick, INCONCEIVABLE –Is Donald Trump the current President of the United States? Yes. I believe there is a little child in all of us wanting to be loved, and once we learn we can nurture the little cutie ourselves, that’s when everything changes.

Justin Howard, Black Chalk Magazine – ‘Inconceivable’ revolves around the concept of what it means to become a mother… Why choose to do a whole series about it?

Rachel Kirkpatrick, INCONCEIVABLE –I don’t think we necessarily set out to create a show about becoming a mother. I mean obviously that is what happened… we just put our life story on paper.

To be completely honest, becoming a mother wasn’t something that really crossed my mind when deciding to keep my kiddo. When I was 19ish I went through this phase where I was pretty obsessed with the concept of birth, and labour, and I watched all of these natural birth videos on youtube and just sort of went like ‘woah! – that’s nuts! – I want to do that one day!’ (Weird – I know!). It was around this time that I decided I wanted to give birth to a new human at some point in my life.

I don’t really look or act like a ‘typical mom’ so growing into that role has been a process. I feel like I’ve grown up with my kid. I mean, now I love being called a mom. And I’m not just any mom – I’m Bowie’s mom. That’s the damn best title there is. Plus I’m lucky I got a good one. He’s so damn sweet and gorgeous to boot. Creating new people is really like the weirdest lottery there is. You could get anyone.

Justin Howard, Black Chalk Magazine – What is the message you wish the audience to get out of watching the series?

Rachel Kirkpatrick, INCONCEIVABLE –I want millennials to feel like they could have kids if they wanted to. There’s so much pressure on millennials right now with the state of the world and how the next 50 years are going to look. We generally have pretty bleak ideas about the future and we all seem to think that bringing humans here would further fuck things up. I see new humans as a way to help unfuck the world. Co-parenting really is a valid option in raising a kid. It’s not easy- but nor is raising a baby with a spouse. Joel and I are not best friends, we’re not lovers, but we are family, and our son is the basis of our relationship. That takes a lot of pressure off and guides are relationship. To be honest I think in a lot of ways our situation is better than a ‘regular’ relationship/child-rearing situation.

Justin Howard, Black Chalk Magazine – Let’s talk about the modern mother… What does that look like for you?

Rachel Kirkpatrick, INCONCEIVABLE – Good gawd. Polyamorous, smokes pot, lives in her own apartment, supports herself, does whatever she damn well pleases and brings her kid along with her on adventures.

Justin Howard, Black Chalk Magazine – I want to ask how you personally dealt with turning your life into a series for the world to watch? It is a very ritualistic thing for you to do. A very powerful thing for you to do. That claiming back of your own power, yet being able to vulnerable with the truth of the experience.

Rachel Kirkpatrick, INCONCEIVABLE – I always joke that we never wrote the show – we just ‘wrote it down’. When we first found out we were pregnant, it felt like our life was ripe for comedic gold (which it is/was), but as time went on and the show progressed, I started to develop a sense of wanting to share my story because it could actually help others, not just because our circumstances were seriously ridiculous.

It was definitely cathartic to write the show based on our experiences, but to be honest the magnitude of how vulnerable that might feel to know people watched it never really occurred to me until I watched it for the first time in a theatre full of people. I felt pretty naked.

Justin Howard, Black Chalk Magazine – Talking about being vulnerable… Why start and finish the series becoming a lesbian mother? Clearly you dealing with the themes of life, death and rebirth.

Rachel Kirkpatrick, INCONCEIVABLE – Neil Gaiman has a quote that goes something along the lines of ‘the moment that you feel that just maybe you are walking down the street exposing too much of your heart and mind and what exists on the inside – that is when you are starting to get it right’. I’ve learned in my short life that the more I share my heart, the more love and reward I get returned to me, even if it’s terrifying doing it.

I’m gay, and I’m a mom. There are a lot of us out there living in a reality with blurred lines of sexuality and gender and we definitely need more representation of what our lives look like.

Justin Howard, Black Chalk Magazine – Let’s talk parents… How did yours influence you becoming a mom?

Rachel Kirkpatrick, INCONCEIVABLE – Oh shit – can I plead the 5th on this one? They’re still alive…

Let’s just say that I want to be someone to my kid that I never had. I never really felt like I could talk to my parents about anything without being judged. I can already sense that Bowie and I will have a very open and honest relationship. I already don’t sugar coat anything with him and he’s two.

Justin Howard, Black Chalk Magazine – What was the moment you awoke to the fact that you were a ‘woman?’

Rachel Kirkpatrick, INCONCEIVABLE – There definitely were some moments in early pregnancy that really hit me over the head in terms of realizing I was a woman. I was like ‘what!? That is coming from where??’. I remember feeling so angry that the magnitude of what was happening had never really been expressed to me before. I remember saying to Joel – “you know – it’s crazy that people have so much fuss over having cloned a pig and the potential to clone humans – did you know that you can just MAKE NEW ONES – from scratch?” That shit is wild.

Over the course of my pregnancy I really got a sense that women have a sacredness to them that is simply not acknowledged in our society. It was an infuriating awakening, but also one of deep knowing who and what I really was. A creator. A life-giver. A goddess. God in the flesh creating another God in the flesh. Wombman.

Pregnancy was by far the most humbling experience of my life. On one hand you’re privy to all of the physical responses to the process, and on the other hand you’re creating new life.

Justin Howard, Black Chalk Magazine – After watching the series I got the idea that accepting responsibility is a big thing for you? Why?

Rachel Kirkpatrick, INCONCEIVABLE – Do you mean like accepting the responsibility of having the baby? I just knew I wanted to give birth and that I likely wasn’t gonna be pregnant that easily again. I was 24 and figured that I had 10 years of healthy child making potential. When I looked to my future 10 years down the road, I saw a career, and female lovers. I knew that I always wanted kids but I figured that actually having them was an ‘if’ in my lifetime. I figured that I would have to have a long term partner, and then we’d end up turkey basetering it or whatever. I Imagined that the process of having a kid would be a mindful process but at the same time I didn’t know if it would happen in that time period. Looking at it from that perspective made me see that it was a now or never decision. And I was definitely in.

Justin Howard, Black Chalk Magazine – Is there a situation in your life, that you want to share where you messed up but you chose to own up to it? A moment where you are brave enough to admit your mistake and comfortable enough to deal with the results of that mistake in a honest way.

Rachel Kirkpatrick, INCONCEIVABLE – Not really.

Justin Howard, Black Chalk Magazine – One thing I love about the series is that it is full of hard-earned wisdom. What figures where role models for you on your quest to womanhood?

Rachel Kirkpatrick, INCONCEIVABLE – When I was in kindergarten it was my Kindergarten teacher. When I was in grade 3, it was Mrs. U-ming. When I took taekwondo it was my instructor Nicola Ford. At one time it was my Auntie Ginny. In high school I had 4 really prominent teachers that took me under their wing because they sensed I wasn’t getting much support at home. Then in my post high school life it has been more general spiritual teachers like Gandhi, John Lennon, Alan Watts, Eckhart Tolle, Byron Katie, Abraham Hicks, and I’ve had a few therapists and psychics in there that I have leaned on in the in-between. I’ve had decades of silence and contemplation on my own and I think that type of aloneness leads to some very serious spiritual realizations. I’ve pretty well silently watched the world happen around me for most of my life. Only now am I really starting to speak about some of the things I’ve seen and experienced and the conclusions that I’ve come to as a result.

Justin Howard, Black Chalk Magazine – What female figures where you aware of, and used as examples of ‘how to be’ a woman? How did they influence you?

Rachel Kirkpatrick, INCONCEIVABLE – Ellen Degeneres, Amanda Palmer and Kat Von D. Ellen for cliche reasons of having a lesbian role model to look up to. Amanda Palmer for showing me that you can be a woman and not shave your body hair and more importantly for showing me that you can ‘make it’ as an artist. Kat Von D for being her boyish self but still looking and acting so beautiful and showing me you can be a badass entrepreneur.

Justin Howard, Black Chalk Magazine – Do you remember one individual that touched you, and helped you to realize that was the kind a of mother you wanted to be?

Rachel Kirkpatrick, INCONCEIVABLE – Fuck yeah – Amanda Palmer all the way. I remember when I was 10 weeks pregnant I went and saw one of her shows. When I walked into the venue, she was onstage, hosting the show with a 9 month old in her hands. During the course of the show she breastfed her child on stage, had a nanny on stage, and still rocked the house. She’s paved the way of a different kind of motherhood in my brain. The other role model is Sarah Blackwood from the band Walk off the Earth. Lucky for her her husband is also her bandmate so they tour around as a family. She’s currently toting around 3 small humans in her entourage and that could not be more inspiring to me.