Hope Comes to Visit
Hope Comes to Visit is a soulful podcast that holds space for real stories, honest conversations, and the kind of moments that remind us we’re never alone.
Hosted by author, speaker, and former TV journalist-turned-storyteller Danielle Elliott Smith, the show explores the full spectrum of the human experience — from the tender to the triumphant. Through powerful interviews and reflective storytelling, each episode offers light, connection, and presence for anyone navigating the in-between.
Whether you’re grieving, growing, beginning again, or simply craving something real, Hope Comes to Visit will meet you right where you are — with warmth, grace, and the quiet belief that even in the dark, transformation can take root.
New episodes drop every Monday, so you can begin your week with a little light, reflection, and hope.
Hope Comes to Visit
The Night Laughter Saved My Life: Ron Blake on PTSD, Community, & 522 Boards of Hope
A gentle heads-up: In this conversation, we name some hard things — including suicide and sexual assault. If that’s tender for you today, please listen with care, skip ahead, or come back when you’re ready. If you need support in the US, call or text 988.
Sometimes hope is a laugh you didn’t expect.
At 10:44 PM on November 2, 2015, Ron “Blake” Blake was ready to end his life. A split-second laugh during The Late Show with Stephen Colbert interrupted the plan—and it changed everything. In this conversation, Blake and I talk about what came next: PTSD after sexual assault, dissociative amnesia, and a 10-year, one-human mission to gather stories on giant foam boards. Today there are 522 boards covered with 34,000+ names, poems, prayers, jokes, and equations. Proof that we belong to each other.
I love this talk because it’s not shiny; it’s honest. We sit with the hard and notice where the light still gets in. If you’re in a long night—or love someone who is—I hope this feels like a hand on your shoulder.
In this episode:
- “10:44 PM” — the laugh that stopped a suicide plan
- What dissociative amnesia felt like from the inside
- 522 boards, 32 Sharpies, and why being heard can be medicine
- A student at SDSU who chose to stay because Blake showed up
- Why his “symbolic goal” (getting on The Late Show) still matters
Find Blake: Instagram @blakelateshow | Documentary I AM (Sinconus Studios)
If you’re in crisis (US): Call/text 988 or visit 988lifeline.org
Thank you for listening to Hope Comes to Visit. If this conversation helps, follow the show, share it with someone who needs hope today, and leave a review - it helps others find their way to these conversations.
New episodes drop every Monday, so you can begin your week with a little light and a lot of hope.
For more stories, reflections, and ways to connect, visit www.DanielleElliottSmith.com or follow along on Instagram @daniellesmithtv and @HopeComestoVisit
When I tell people this, I I don't just say I woke up from a nightmare, I woke up from yet another nightmare. They just kept coming. And at some point, you don't know, I didn't know what to do to stop them. I had tried, I had begun going to some therapy for it. But on that night, when I woke up from that nightmare, I got out my pills, I got out the water bottle, and I knew that was the night I was gonna I was gonna stop the pain.
SPEAKER_01:Hi friends, I'm Dionyelle Elliott Smith, and this is Hope Comes to Visit, where we name the hard things and notice how we grow around them. I'm so grateful you're here. A fortuitous moment of laughter on the late show with Stephen Colbert stopped my next guest, Ron Blake, from dying by suicide at 1044 p.m. on November 2nd, 2015. That spark of hope sent him out on his ongoing artistic mission to overcome PTSD and to become a guest on the late show, his symbolic goal. Ron Blake, I am so excited to have you here on the show with me today to talk about the hope that you are continuing to share every single day. How are you?
SPEAKER_00:I am good. Um it's always a continuous journey. Um, I mean, it's life, but um I'm good. I mean, it could I could tell you all the bad stuff, but I'm choosing not to at the moment. Um, there's a lot of good that's been happening too in my life and still is.
SPEAKER_01:So there's so much more I could have said in your introduction, but I wanted to save that so that we could have this as a conversation. I I'm so intrigued by your story and so inspired by how you have evolved, how you have decided to take difficult times in your life and turn them into moments of inspiration for other people. So if you wouldn't mind, um let's go back to 2015 and tell me about the moment that I mentioned in your introduction. Um you are at a place that is incredibly low. What happened?
SPEAKER_00:That it's it's almost, I mean, it's it's so strange to think that I'm almost at the 10-year anniversary of that night, but it was on November 2nd of 2015. I woke up, and when I tell people this, I I don't just say I woke up from a nightmare, I woke up from yet another nightmare. They just kept coming. And at some point, you don't know, I didn't know what to do to stop them. I had tried, I had begun going to some therapy for it. But on that night, when I woke up from that nightmare, I got out my pills, I got out the water bottle, and I knew that was the night I was gonna I was gonna stop the pain. Um and I had the pills in my lap, I had the water bottle there, and then I happened to look up and I saw the TV was on. And that was confusing for me because I would always shut off the or I would set the timer for the TV, and for some reason it I don't think I did anything wrong with the timer, it just malfunctioned. Um, because it should have gone off after 30 minutes. And for whatever reason, I I looked up at the TV and it was this comedy show called The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. Something made me laugh. And it was it, it's just I want people to imagine what an incongruous moment that is. That you are ready to end your life and you're laughing. And it just that was the moment that I said, there's something good left in me. And I paused the TV and I sat there for a while, and that was the moment that stopped stopped the suicide at 10 44 p.m. that night.
SPEAKER_01:So uh Blake, is this uh had you struggled for a long time with depression? Was it a series of events that had led you to this place where you thought there isn't anything good left for me?
SPEAKER_00:I did. I I had struggled with PTSD um for quite a while, for several years. It was um as a result of uh um a rape and beating I went through um a few years earlier. Three men came into my home in downtown Phoenix. I was held down, I was beaten, and I was raped. Um I had significant injuries from that, but I was also diagnosed um with dissociative amnesia. Eventually the doctors would work with me. So for about three years, I was in this dark place where I didn't know what had happened to me. I almost all the memories from that night were erased. They weren't erased, they were they were there, they weren't accessible to me, is what the doctors and therapists write. And over time, the therapist would tell me it was usually if people have dissociated amnesia, for most people, it might last for days, weeks, maybe months. In my case, it lasted for years. And they said that was highly unusual that I couldn't remember that. Um, and it caused a lot of problems for me. And part of that was what you were talking about, that it led to the PTSD, the depression, the struggles. So I'm having I tell people if they've ever seen those Jason Bourne movies, the Born Identity, the Born, they have a lot of bornes with Matt Damon. But the doctors said you had the same diagnosis as this character that Matt Damon would play. He was always being chased by these bad guys, but he didn't know why. And that was me. For those three years, I'm being chased by these nightmares. I would see visions of what happened that night, but then they would disappear really quickly. And so then I had no idea if it was just a nightmare or if it was real. And it turns out they were real, but um, and that's what I struggled with.
SPEAKER_01:Blake, what a terrifying place to be, to be in a state of mind where you know there's something there, but you're not exactly sure what it is, and you're struggling with a sense of reality. However, you come to this place in November of 2015, it's 10:44 p.m. Do you know what it was on the Colbert show that made you laugh?
SPEAKER_00:No, I'm glad you asked that too, because I I know when I've spoken um at events, a lot of times people in the audience will ask me that. Um, I've had some reporters ask me, but I'm glad they asked because it gives me a chance to share with people. I'll very likely I'll never know what the joke was that made me laugh. It's because it wasn't the significance wasn't about what was coming into me that night that was important. It was what was leaving me. I couldn't believe that I was laughing. That's the part that I recognized. So I'm sure I remembered the joke at the moment, but then all of a sudden it was just this I couldn't believe that I could laugh. There was, you know, because you're in the darkest moment of your life. You're obviously I'm ready to take my life. So that was the focus. And all of a sudden, this goodness, something good inside me came out. And that that moment, I said, I'm gonna get on this show. I'm gonna learn how to tell my story. I'm gonna talk about this. And it all became, and then the next day I was at a staple store and it became clear how I was gonna get on the show. Well, fingers crossed, I haven't been on, I haven't been on yet. But um, but that moment of hope, that's um it was powerful. Obviously, it's powerful because I'm still I spent 20, I'm a little over 24,000 hours of my life trying to get on a TV show for five minutes, and people will ask, why do you keep going? That's the power of a moment of hope to keep me going. I haven't had a full-time job in 10 years, but I I do odd jobs. I find a way to keep this journey alive because that's how important it is to me. And that is also how how powerful a moment of hope can be.
SPEAKER_01:So let's talk about this journey. What have you been doing for the last 10 years on this journey to spread the message about PTSD and assault?
SPEAKER_00:Well, I mean, it started the next day when I went to that staple store. I I woke up the next day and I thought I wasn't supposed to be alive today. It was really, it was very profound for me that I thought, wow, if it wouldn't have been for that moment, I wouldn't be here. So I thought, well, what am I, what do I need to do? And I needed computer paper. So I thought, I'm gonna go to a staple store in Central Phoenix. And I was there, and then I happened to look at these giant foam boards. And a woman that works there came by and said, Can I help you, sir? And I said, Do you have more of these in the back, these giant foam boards? And she went to go look. And before she went to the warehouse, she turned around and said, How many do you want? And I remember I thought, I never said I wanted any. I just wanted to imagine, did she have 10 of them? Did she have 25, 100? I think I was trying to imagine, I was trying to imagine something. And it was that that particular moment that I said, you know what? I'll just take everything you got. And she came out with a whole bunch of them. And I had this idea that I'm gonna go out, I'm gonna learn how to re-engage with society because I had isolated badly because of the PTSD. That's that's another consequence of PTSD. A lot of us will isolate, loneliness. So I thought, I'm gonna go out and I'm gonna take it. And I saw some um Sharpie markers in the store too. So I thought I'm gonna put on the top Blake Late Show, on the top of these to these giant foam boards, and I'm gonna tell people when I walk up to strangers, my name is Blake. I'm trying to get on the late show. Can I tell you my story? And that's the journey, that's how it began. I I've gone out every day for almost 10 years, and I've walked up to strangers all over this country every single day. I can't believe every single day I've done this, but and tens, 34,766 strangers have engaged me, and they've written. I thought they would always just write their name or their initials on the board to confirm that I spoke with somebody that day, I got out of my home, and I have a goal. And what has happened is people started putting their own stories, poetry, Bible verses, they put jokes on these boards, they put mathematical equations on there to try. It's it's very like everybody just has a story to tell back. And so um that's how it began. It was that next day I had this, I guess this light bulb moment, you could call it, at the staples store, and it began the journey. Um, and then along the way, I've become, I've started advocating for people with PTSD, sexual and domestic violence, that it just took on a life of its own. And um, I mean, I could go in depth about all the advocacy that's happened because I do get the critics that said, you know, you're probably never gonna get on the late show. We we would love for you, but you're probably never gonna get on. He would have had you on years ago. People also failed to realize there's there's so much that's happened on this journey, besides, yes, my main goal is to get on the late show because it's that significant for me. Because that's the moment that stopped it all. But a lot of other things have happened, and that's what sometimes people miss.
SPEAKER_01:98,000 miles across the country. Where have you gone? Are you walking? Are you driving? Are you what are you doing?
SPEAKER_00:Everything. I mean, some people think I just walk from here to DC. I don't. Um, I've walked a downtown Phoenix. Um had been, it's just been my home base for so long. So everybody, not everybody, but a lot of people down there have come to know me. I'm at the art festivals every first Friday of the month. Um, a lot of people come running up to me. And it happened the other day. I was there last week. A guy named Richie came running up to me, said, I met you nine years ago at a community college here. He said, I can't believe you're still going. I follow you on social media. He hugged me. He was so happy. That happens a lot. So um, but yeah, so in downtown Phoenix, I will walk around a lot. But people have brought me in to speak at universities. Um, New Mexico State University in Los Cruces, New Mexico, brought me in for a few days. I was brought up to Shadron State College up in Shadron, Nebraska, a very small community, but very tight-knit. And I spoke at um an event there. So they brought me into the Denver airport, got a rental car for me. I drove. So it's been all sorts of transportation. I've been on my bicycle taking my boards with me. I um uh yeah, just it's been it's been a lot. But I've been in uh New York City, I've been in Miami doing this, but I've been in some smaller communities in Indiana, like where I grew up by Gary, Gary, Indiana in East Chicago. Um lots of places. Um Orange County in California, uh, Wyoming in Laramie. I was meeting students there.
SPEAKER_01:Storytelling is so incredibly powerful, right? Um, you telling your story has the ability to change things for someone else just as that moment of laughter changed your trajectory. What have been some of the moments that have felt so fundamental for you on this nearly tenure journey?
SPEAKER_00:People sharing back. I a lot of therapists joined in over the years and said the reason so many, because initially I was really surprised. Like, why would why would people share so much with me? They share a lot. And I mean, in some cases, I I mean I can give you the generalities and so I don't give away any specifics so um to protect the identity of people. But wow, I mean, just what people started opening up to me about uh it's not just always about the traumas, it's also about these triumphs that they've had, um, successes. And sometimes it's the discoveries people have had when they didn't there's there were like the these big surprises that people said, hey, you know, I went through this terrible trauma, but I was surprised to find out that some of the people that I thought would be there for me were not, and some of the people that I never expected to come out and be there for me were. And so there's there's discovery, there's surprise, there's ingenuity, and and so this journey, it's it's a it's a mix of all of that. Uh, but it's also a mix, you have to throw in the mix unity. I mean, we look at our country right now, and I would think overwhelmingly, people would say we're very divided in the United States. Well, I have 522 giant foam boards of tens of thousands of people that have come together from traditionally very conservative red states, you will, um, and then some traditionally very blue states. And so they're all together on these boards. So there's a lot of unity. And so I think that surprises a lot of people to think, but we're so divided. But people, when when people are hurting and people need help, these boards, this journey has shown me that people will come together to help somebody in need, and they will put aside any differences, whether those are philosophical, any ideological issues, um, political, they will put that aside to help people. And that's what I've I've seen happen over and over, and it continues to happen over and over every day. And that's been um really surprising to me.
SPEAKER_01:522 boards. Where do you store these?
SPEAKER_00:Well, there's a big U-Haul um center in downtown Phoenix, a storage center. It's behind where the Phoenix Suns play basketball. Um, I keep a lot of them there, probably 90% of them. They're all protected, it's climate controlled, so um they're there. It's it's if if people have ever seen those Harry Potter movies, there's there's a um one of the movies they take um Harry and his friends go into this vault he has, and it it's what's been left over from his parents and gifted to inherit he inherits it from his parents. And it's all this gold and all these just beautiful things inside there. And that's what it reminds me of when I go in there. I've taken some reporters down there, they wanted to see these boards, or people just are curious. And I take all the sheets off, and it's like Harry Potter showing his friends everything that's been left to him. It's just absolutely stunning. Um, because these boards, this is probably the greatest legacy all the tens of thousands of us will leave society when we're gone. I think I feel like in a hundred years, somebody is gonna see all these boards. My hope is they go into a permanent exhibit somewhere where they can impact people. But this is the legacy we we're gonna leave behind, I feel. Um, and it's a powerful one, but the the most of them are in downtown Phoenix in that storage area. And then I have um, I think 40 or 50 here at the home with me. But I I like to show people or take to places and I read them. I mean, when I have bad days, I'll go through the boards, and it's like looking at Hallmark cards years later.
SPEAKER_01:Do you have any close by?
SPEAKER_00:Oh, yeah, I have one right here. I mean, I could show you.
SPEAKER_01:Um I would love to see one. I figured you'd have one close by. So there are some people who listen to us, and there are some people who watch. So right now we're encouraging people to hop on YouTube and take a look. Look at that.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, that's just one board, if you can imagine. I mean, 522 more of these, but these are just some of what people have put.
SPEAKER_01:Um will you read a few of those for me?
SPEAKER_00:Oh, sure.
SPEAKER_01:I would just love to hear what people are writing to you.
SPEAKER_00:One of them is inside a heart. It says you matter, and then the person signed it, Steph Z. Keep going every day. Sharing your story is empowering. Kristen. Um somebody put something in Spanish on one of them, and I I didn't know what I thought they were referencing somebody else, and somebody said, Oh, honey, they're talking about you. I think they put El Guapo Guerro, I think. Uh it means like you, the cute one or something.
SPEAKER_01:Guapo is handsome.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I think they said I can't find it, but I thought they were referencing somebody else. Um, and somebody's like, Oh no, honey, they're talking about you. And I thought, that's so nice of somebody to put that on.
SPEAKER_01:That's very nice.
SPEAKER_00:And then somebody, um, let's see. Blake, you are amazing and one of the most genuine people I've met. I love your progress you have made and wish you the best of luck. So a lot of times people are they become like a big cheerleader on this journey and they keep me going. Um, and then sometimes people just share stories about their lives um and they want the world to know. Sometimes it's just that they've, again, been through something, and it's their chance to say, hey, I want to be heard too. And I and a lot of people that have been through sexual and domestic violence, especially, we often we never get to have our stories told. Or people don't believe us. And um when I do speak in front of audiences that it's dealing with just specifically sexual and domestic violence, because this is actually domestic violence awareness month. So I've spoken at several events in the last couple of weeks, but so many survivors of that kind of violence, they want to read these boards because usually they're just in disbelief that that many people, because I've had people say, You met that many people that listen to you. And and again, so many survivors don't think anybody will listen. And to see that I've had over 34,000 people not just listen but sign something back, that's really it it lends a lot of hope for people. So these boards really became the rock star of the journey.
SPEAKER_01:Do you find that not only is this journey healing for you in the fact that you are feeling seen and heard, but you're showing other people what it looks like to feel seen and heard, especially in a in a space in that level of sexual assault and violence where people traditionally don't feel seen and heard.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, yeah. I mean, people, it does, it gives people a chance. I I tell people like once I share my story with somebody with these boards, and I say, now the board is yours, I give them 32 uh Sharpie marker colors to do whatever they want with, they get really excited because now they have a chance to add something to that. Um, and now they're gonna be heard, they're gonna be seen. And that's important for a lot of people. Um, but it's also, again, it's very therapeutic for a lot of people because they say they feel like there's this community on these boards, and they're part of that now. And I've had I've had, I've counted, I think it's 22 people now, 22 or 23 that have passed away that they put something in these boards. Um, and one of the moments happened at a coffee house right in the heart of the arts district in Phoenix, and I was meeting people with the boards on this particular day, and a woman, young woman, came in and she said, Blake, do you remember me? I met you maybe, I think it was like a week or two ago, and she hugged me and I said, I do. And she said, I was with my friend, and I said, Oh, I wish you guys would have both been here. I'd like to show you, you know, the boards again, what I've done since I met you. And she said, Well, sadly, my friend passed away. I believe it was an auto accident. And she got very emotional and said, She loved so much what you were doing, and she really believed in it, and she's so happy, she's part of it now. And she said, When she passed away, and she said, Me, her family, her friends, we want you to get on the late show because we want her story to live on. And she felt like, in that sense, when I get on, and I fingers crossed that'll happen someday, she wants that story to get there. And it's just so I'm carrying forth not just her story, but these other 21 people that passed away. Because when somebody does something like that, there's a reason. You know, they don't, I they don't just want to see me get on the show, they want to see us get on the show. And I think that's something that people do miss on this journey is that I'm not gonna get there on my own. And I I feel like I'm I'm trying to get a I think it's gonna start today. Somebody's helping me get a TikTok account going, and we think potentially that could get the attention of Stephen Colbert. It's uh obviously a very popular site, TikTok, and it gets a lot of attention. But I've always imagined over the 10 years, the way I was gonna get on the late show is just somebody's gonna, they're gonna know the right person. So it's not anything that I'm doing wrong. Sometimes you have all these voices out there that are yelling and screaming for attention. And I'm sort of at the back of the line because I'm not yelling or screaming. I'm just going out, I'm doing my thing. But eventually, if you do the right thing, it works. And um, I can't guarantee to anybody I'll get on the late show of Stephen Colbert, but it doesn't mean I'm not gonna get on. And I feel like so uh so again, it's it's it's all these people that are around me. I feel that I will because I have all this energy behind me from these tens of thousands of people, including the ones that have passed away.
SPEAKER_01:So, a question about that. So, what happens when you get on?
SPEAKER_00:Well, I'm glad you asked that too, because um a lot of people at in the events I've been at have asked that. And I I know that's the thing that a lot of us in life, we we want to know what's the next step. But I I've told people the same thing. I have no idea what I'm gonna do when I get on the late show. Uh, like even when I get on the late show, fingers crossed again, um, I I want to let the moment guide me. And then even after the late show, I want to let the moment guide me. If there was one thing that I would want, though, it's it's that these boards be put in a permanent exhibit. Because I feel like just it's sort of sad. It's, it's, it's, it's my um uh dirty dancing moment with Jennifer Gray and um Patrick Swayze, where he says, nobody puts baby in a corner. Well, I feel like these boards are in that metaphorical corner. They're sitting in a U-Haul storage area and they're under covers. Like, how are they impacting anybody there? They're not. And I need to get them out. I need to show these to people. And I would love to take them all with me to the late show someday to share with everybody. Um, but eventually I would want a permanent exhibit. So if there was one thing I'd want after all this is done, is it's that. Because I feel like nine of these boards have been framed, but I feel like um if they were all framed and put in an exhibit, people from all over the world could come to this place of hope. And we could have like there have been two documentaries made about the journey that I've been on, one nine years ago, one this past year. One of that, the one from this past year just won best short film at the Rocky Mountain Emmys. So, I mean, those are visual components beyond just the boards. And people could see that. They could learn more about the journey, and it also could connect them to their traumas or their difficulties they've been through. There are pictures I've taken with over, we think about 5,000 people I've taken photos with where we hold up the boards. I'd love to see those in an exhibit because I want people to see the people I've been meeting, the places I've been, the news stories. Um, it it all tells this big story. So I would love to see that. Um and I just I imagine that people from around the world could come to a place like this and they could meet other people that have been through not just traumas, but people that have triumphed. So somebody comes there and they lost their three children in a house fire and they're from Binghamton, New York. Somebody else could come from Thailand and say, Hey, I heard about this place. You know, I went through a trauma and I'm coming in here, and now they can connect with each other and they could build off of how they can recover. So I just I imagine just these possibilities. Um, but I think it could be very exciting too for a lot of people to see something like that.
SPEAKER_01:Doesn't it almost feel as though you had to have had this journey? Like you weren't supposed to be on the Kobe show in that first year or in the second year, because this journey wouldn't have the boards that it has, or the impact that it had, or the stories that you've had, or the the possibility to be the documentary that it uh that you just mentioned that was just filmed. The the ability to have this collection of community and stories and impact and 22 people who you hope to have uh live on within these boards if you're if you hadn't been going for all of this time. So it's almost as though you weren't supposed to have been on the Colbert show yet. Right? I mean I I I I I know that that's the goal, right? So there's almost to me, I dare I say, whether you get there or not, I feel like you're doing the right thing. I feel as though while I'm crossing my fingers for you too, Blake, we have a limited time considering our lovely Cobert is not going to be on for very much longer, um, as heartbreaking as that is. However, there is this piece of me while I listen to you and I listen to this impact that you've had, and I think about all of the people you've touched and all of the stories you've collected and all of the people you've impacted, that while that is your pinnacle goal, I hope you get there. But I know that you've had to have been through these last 10 years doing this in order to have what you have right now.
SPEAKER_00:Right. And I mean, I'll give you an example, Danielle. Um you said if I'd have got on the late show in the first year, you can start erasing so much. I mean, it reminds me of Back to the Future when Michael J. Fox's character is playing the guitar at the dance under the sea or whatever it was, and he had to get his parents to kiss because if they don't, he doesn't exist. And so he has that photograph on the neck of his guitar, and as he's playing it, he's realizing I have to make this happen or everything disappears. And I feel like in that same way, yeah, if I had got on the late show eight or nine years ago, that photograph that is this journey, this 10-year journey, so much is erased. It's gone. I would have never met you. And I'm gonna give you a story that was very emotional. I was at San Diego State University in the little under two months ago. School was just about ready to start. I was in San Diego. I spoke at an event, shared the journey with people, the boards, I was meeting a lot of people. And at San Diego, I used to live in Carlsbad up in San Diego County, and I had never been to, it's called STSU, San Diego State University. Yeah, I went to USD.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, the University of San Diego. Yeah, so I'm I'm familiar.
SPEAKER_00:So I had never been there, and I thought, why not? So I'm there, and it was um on Saturday. So two days later, classes would begin for the new school year. And this student, he was a freshman, and I walked up to him and I was sharing what I Had and he said, You know what? I'm really glad you didn't get on the late show. And I didn't know if he altogether didn't understand what I was doing. I'm like, okay, you know, like that's my big goal, right? It has been for every 10 every day for 10 years. Because I just really thought maybe he doesn't understand it. And he said, No, I understand it. He said, But if you'd have got on the late show years ago, even weeks ago, he said, I'd have never met you. And he said, and I would not have survived the weekend. And I said, What do you mean by that? And he said, Tomorrow I was planning on killing myself. He goes, I can't do this anymore. And he hugged me and he told me. I shared this on Facebook shortly after that experience. And he said, I just can't do it. And he said, All of a sudden, you walked up to me. You're just you got this random story of hope. And he said, I'm not gonna do it. But he was also reading a bunch of the messages people put on these boards. But the whole thing about that is what you said. Had I got on, and he was right. He told me if I'd have got on, I'd have never met him. And we wonder why people come into our lives. And I so I can't tell you with certainty, is that a higher power? Is that just the universe? Well, I shouldn't say just the universe, because there are people that don't believe in a higher power, but they believe in the universe. I have friends who are wicken, atheist, agnostic. I I've met people from all different ends of the spectrum of life, and so I want to respect that. So everybody believes something differently, but whatever happened, I think I was supposed to be in his life and he was supposed to be in my life. And I and just the same with you.
SPEAKER_01:So just like Stephen Colbert was supposed to be in your life at 10:44 p.m. November 2015, right? I mean, so you were his Stephen Colbert.
SPEAKER_00:Right. And so I I keep going, I keep believing. Um, every day I wake up, I get so and the most the most excited I get is when I meet people because it's it's this energy that I get. It's it's very sometimes it's hard to describe because it's just this. I meet people, I engage with them, but like today I'm gonna meet people. I have no idea who I'm gonna meet. They have no idea I'm coming into their lives. But when I'm done, before I go to bed tonight, Danielle, I will have met people. Not just said hi and bye, not just held the door open for them at a at a store, which is still nice, but I will have engaged with these people. They will hear my story, and very likely I will hear something back from their lives. Um, and they will well, they will definitely share a story back with me. Because I've had people say, Well, I only signed my name or put my initials. How did I tell a story? And I said, You did. First of all, you you chose one of the 32 Sharpie color markers, that's telling a story. You picked a color, and they said, I randomly picked one. I said, Okay, but you randomly pick one. That's a story you're telling me. You decided to do it randomly. You chose a place on the board to put it. So I tell people, like, whether you know it or not, you are telling me a story. And um, and I read it later. So I will have met, I will meet people before the before I go to bed tonight. That's that's pretty exciting. Maybe people don't see it someday. I do.
SPEAKER_01:I I I do as well. Like, how do you define hope?
SPEAKER_00:I'm not sure there is a word for it. I mean, uh, there's a way to describe it. Sometimes it's just a feeling. You you each person, it's it's it's something that it's hard to describe. I mean, I've had all these years to be able to put a definition to it. But it's it's it's everything that I've shared with you, um, but for every person that's gonna be different. It's it's hard to explain because it's just this this feeling that you have that you want to keep going. Um that there's a possibility. But again, I've never found words since that night that can really describe it. It's just um it's just this happiness. It's almost like you're sitting there and the storm has happened, and you go outside and the finally the sun breaks through after days of rain, and you just feel this warmth. I mean, I'll I I'm just doing the best I can to give hope, but it's just this sense of warmth. Um but I yeah, I I I it sounds like I'm fumbling for words because I am. Because it's it's it's more of what it feels like. It's a sensation.
SPEAKER_01:I actually love that because I agree with you. I think it's really hard to to pinpoint hope to some level. It's there are so many different ways to define it, which is why I I ask. I think it's it's a very personal thing. And for you, you are I mean, in in so many ways, hope is a handshake and a smile and the color of a sharpie, and it's where someone chooses to sign their name, and whether or not they use words or colors or or a squiggle on the board. Um, hope is is whether or not they stop to listen, right? So I uh I'm so grateful that you have spent time with me, and I'm grateful to to have a tiny part in your story. I am going to do everything I can to help you reach your goal by sharing as much as I can. Is there anything that I didn't ask you that you'd like to share?
SPEAKER_00:No, I mean, you could ask me 50 other questions. We could talk for a while. I have so many stories I could tell you from there just that's it. I mean, that's why I feel like like individuals like yourself, when you ask me questions, there's a lot still in my head. It's not just on the boards, it's not just in the documentaries, but it's it's that's how all of us in our lives are. We have so much that we only know. And if we don't get those pulled out of our heads, they're gone forever. And so I feel like what you've done today is you're pulling pieces of this journey out of my head so that I could share it with people, whether that's stories of people I've met, moments that have happened. Because again, once we're gone, if we've never shared our stories with people, they're gone forever. And I that's one of the it's one of the saddest things. And I wish more people would say, hey, I want to get this out there because um I want to be able to impact generations from now. So as you know, you've done you've done that today. You've helped pull some of this out of me. And um, you know, I I would hope hopefully people can go to this newest documentary because um obviously we can't cover everything about the journey and the the bad and the good that's happened. But I my hope is that a takeaway for people that are listening or watching this today, they can go to the documentary, they can see it, but they can it's something they can relate to because I'm a human being, even if they haven't been through the exact same trauma, maybe they've never been through a trauma. They can see this and they can see how a lot of people have come together to help me get through it. Um, and that's the hope is that there's a takeaway for everybody today, because it's just it wouldn't do me any good if I shared this story and they're like, oh, it's just this guy talking about himself and his experiences. No, because if if it was just me, I'd be an island. And it's just it's not look at Tom Hanks proved in Castaway. It's not fun to be on an island. You need to get out. And I feel like you're giving me that chance to be get off the island, and I'm sharing it with people, and I want to be together with people. So, you know, whether they watch the documentary or whether they look on Instagram and see the photos of the people I've been meeting, look at the boards. I want there to be a takeaway because everybody has something that they can find that connects to them.
SPEAKER_01:And so what is the name of the documentary and where can people find it?
SPEAKER_00:Um, well, if they go to Synkonas Studios, um, it's S-I-N-C-O-N-I-Sstudios.com. The name of the documentary is I am. Um, or they can just look up Blake Late Show. If somebody did a Google search of Blake Late Show, so much is gonna come up. Um, and again, there's probably something for everybody that people can find that speaks to them. And um, and where can people follow your journey someday? And and we can all we can all successfully make it to the goal.
SPEAKER_01:Fingers crossed, where can people follow your journey? On Instagram, yes?
SPEAKER_00:Yes, the TikTok's gonna come along soon, but um yeah, Instagram's Blake Late Show. Um, or again, if people just did a Google search of Blake Late Show, they're gonna find quite a bit pops up. Um and then, yes, I've been waiting for this TikTok to happen because I gotta learn how to do this pretty good. Um but I share, I've shared a lot over the years, a lot of little videos. Um, I shouldn't call them little because it may it diminishes the impact, but I do a lot of one-minute videos and I share again the journey because um because a lot of people are invested in this. I feel like people they're in a way, like in a business sense, they're shareholders. They they wanna they're invested in in getting this all to the late show because I feel like they see the vision. This can impact millions of people, millions of viewers that day. Because there are people out there, they're like that student at San Diego State University. They're they're at the end. And sometimes it could be two, three, maybe two thousand people that could see that someday on the late show and say, you know what? All these people help this guy keep going. And a moment of and that's another thing. When I get on the late show, I want to share with people the amazing power of laughter that's around each and every one of us, even when all seems lost. Because at that night, it was just so strange to think that I could still laugh. Like just it was it was this laughter that could stop me. And um and you know, I I feel like when I get on the late show as well, I don't want to people think that I I think that Stephen Colbert is a hero. I don't. It doesn't mean he's not, but in my opinion, it's I think Stephen would probably agree with me. It's not about a person, it's about it's about laughter, it's about something that we all share, the power of laughter. And and if there was no trauma and bad stuff in our world, we wouldn't need laughter and comedy. So Stephen Colbert was part of that. And I think it's not just about a person, it's about what we need in our lives. We need laughter, we need comedy, and I want to focus on that. And I really feel Stephen Colbert will understand that.
SPEAKER_01:We also need community, and you've been providing that, right? We need community and we need stories, and there is a piece of that you're providing, and hopefully there's a piece of that that I'm providing, right? Like we need to show up for each other and hold space. So I'm super grateful to you for spending time with me. Thank you so much. Yeah, thank you for being here and sharing your story. And I'm grateful and I uh I will do the best I can to share your story far and wide.
SPEAKER_00:Well, I appreciate that, and hopefully this helps some of uh your viewers and and listeners. So um thank you for the opportunity.
SPEAKER_01:I really appreciate you, and thank you, friends, so much for spending time with us on this episode of Hope Comes to Visit. I so hope that Ron Blake's story touches you and hits you exactly where you needed it to today, and that you will take the story and you will share it with friends and family, and you know, maybe even send it on over to Stephen Colbert so that he can uh can meet with meet with Blake and get him his dream come true. So until I see you again next time, take very good care of you. Thank you.