Cole: Also just a quick note, but we do call Doug “Doug” at home and always have. I consider it a term of endearment. “Doug” and “dad” are both one syllable; they sound similar so it almost felt like a nickname. And now I just can’t stop.
Ella: Yeah, I write all emails: “To Mom and Doug.”
What was it like when your parents split up?
Cole: There was like a period of, I don’t know how many years, when we called ourselves the “Palazzo Crew.” Because when Doug moved out, he moved into this apartment complex called the Palazzo.
Ella: It definitely, for the three of us, was really bonding. And I think we do have that sense of like, we made it through the random apartments, figuring out the dynamic of it being just us.
Cole: There was definitely a lot of learning to be done for everyone involved. Ella was in elementary school. I was in middle school. There was a time when we’d go almost every night and get a sandwich for dinner at the Whole Foods deli counter next to our house. And Doug was like, “We need to eat better.” So we’d try to cook — and Kamala has turned Doug into, like, actually a good cook — but there was a period when Doug made what he thought was a great decision. He was like, “What if I order premade meals for us that we can heat up once a week?” But this
