Liza Mundy is a Washington Post staff writer and the author of The Richer Sex: How the New Majority of Female Breadwinners Is Transforming Sex, Love and Family. Before talking about the future of coupledom in America, she sat down in the Zócalo green room to talk about her ice hockey defense, how being nice can make for good investigative journalism, and taking any opportunity she can to embarrass her kids.
Q. What’s the least profitable job you’ve ever had?
A. Does babysitting when I was 11 for 50 cents an hour count? Pool attendant was also fairly low paying. I was a pool attendant for $2 an hour also. Somehow it was OK to make below minimum wage.
Q. What’s your favorite cliché?
A. It would have to be a Southernism because I’m Southern. I’m thinking of the Carson McCullers novel [The Member of the Wedding] where the protagonist, Frankie, who wants to be a writer, talks about liking clichés because they’re how people really speak.
Q. What’s the secret to getting people to open up about personal subjects?
A. I think it’s being nice to them. Here’s the cliché: You catch a lot of flies with honey. We have this notion from investigative journalism that if you throw people up against the wall you’ll get them to talk to you. But I think if you want people to open up, sympathy and understanding are a much better means.
Q. How do you take your coffee?
A. With cream. Because with milk it’s just coffee, but with cream it’s a treat.
Q. Where do you sing out loud, if anywhere?
A. In the car, with my children-in public if it were to embarrass them, I would definitely sing out loud. Any opportunity to deliberately embarrass my children I seize. They’re 13 and 16-I’m going to do it anyway, so I might as well do it deliberately.
Q. What movie have you seen the most times?
A. Probably The Sound of Music.
Q. What’s the biggest difference between writing your first book and writing your third?
A. Every writing assignment, small or large, is a new challenge that’s not any easier than the one that came before. But I would say with my third book there’s yet another dog snoring under the desk-we’ve got yet another animal.
Q. How many animals do you have?
A. Five. I’m the instigator, but my husband’s the enabler.
Q. When is it OK to lie?
A. When your children ask you how you spent your youth.
Q. What habit are you trying to break?
A. Excessive worrying. But also-I’ve taken up ice hockey-and I’m trying to break the habit of getting too close to the goal when I’m playing defense and not guarding the points. I keep getting yelled at by my teammates for not guarding the points.
*Photo by Aaron Salcido.