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Stories, experiences and advice about fatherhood.
Mike: [00:00:00] In this episode, we talk to David, who discusses his childhood in rural Appalachia, Virginia, where he experienced physical, emotional, and sexual abuse from his parents, and how that influenced his approach to fathering his son today.
If discussion of abuse is not for you, you should skip this one. But having said that, this is a story of perseverance, as David shares the wisdom he's gathered along the way. There's a lot to take from this episode, so buckle up.
Luke: [00:01:00] Welcome everybody to this episode of dad pod. I'm so excited to introduce our guest today. David who who's here today has quite the distance traveled quotient. Is how I like to think of it when we look to where he's come from versus where he is today, he grew up the son of a Mennonite father who himself was the son of sharecropper parents.
And today has worked for some of the fastest growing tech companies. Around he's lived across the country from New York to Virginia to Brooklyn, Chicago, and we'll, we'll continue his exploration for most of his life. He was convinced he didn't want to be a dad. And today he is in fact, a loving father.
So I'm super excited to have today with us, David Beal as a, as a guest on our, on the dad pod with that welcome, David. So happy you're here.
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: [00:02:00] Luke. Thanks so much, man. It's good to be here. That was quite the intro. I have chills.
Mike: hmm.
Luke (2): There we go.
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: Yeah.
Luke (2): So, as I kind of mentioned the, you know, your, your distance travel is really pretty incredible. I'd just love to start with this, the kind of core question here, which is talk us through your choice to be a father as it was not necessarily a straightforward decision for you.
Db: Yeah. You know, I came to it around about and, and growing up, there was never a doubt. You know, I grew up in a small town in Virginia and that's just what people did. You know, you grow up and have kids and start a family and keep it going. And you know, I'll be 39 this year and I have kids, I have friends from high school whose kids are going into college.
So it's, you know, it's people get an early start there. Family's really important. You know, my family, On both sides, my mom and my dad side are from a part of Virginia that their relatives, ancestors, whatever have been in since the 1500s. Very [00:03:00] uncommon to leave, you know, we're that 1st sort of, I'm Welsh and Irish and, you know, other Anglo Saxon mud stuff, but we're kind of that 1st generation of of.
Of settlers really to come to America, you know, after like Rhode Island, Jamestown sort of stuff. We had a lot of people come out to Appalachia. I'm from almost Appalachia gateway to Appalachia. Long winded, but you know, like you said, a lot of traveling. I was a touring musician for a lot of my twenties.
I played in a lot of bands, went all over doing that ended up in Brooklyn, kind of for music, kind of for tech ended up in tech. And you know, I've had relationships. I was actually married. Once before in Virginia and I've never been in a relationship that like I would even consider bringing a kid into, you know, I've never had a partner that I felt like I could parent with.
And I think it's because I didn't feel like I deserved it. I didn't think I deserved to be a father, to have a family. You know, my dad wasn't a bad guy, but he didn't, he wasn't really built for it. [00:04:00] You know, when I got old enough for us to be buddies, that was great. When I finally made the decision, it, it came to me in a couple of ways in in 2019 still living in Brooklyn.
I was working at Etsy at the time. And my partner and I went to Fire Island with a couple and they had a fairly newborn. I think he had been born in February. This is probably August, so seven, eight months old. And I hadn't spent time with a baby in a long time. You know, I'm almost 34 years old at this point.
Women talk about their biological clock, but I sure as hell felt mine too. In that moment, you know, I started thinking about what is being a dad, you know, to a young kid in my mid thirties, my forties. Like, what does this look like? Like, you know, I'm getting tired. We'll touch on this later, but I have relapsing multiple sclerosis.
You know, that's a factor to and, and then, you know, shortly after that, that, that partner and I actually moved to North Carolina together right before the pandemic. And then we were closed in together and everything kind of imploded. And I just, I didn't know what to do. And, [00:05:00] you know, I've gone through a lot of existential crises in my life.
In fact, I think maybe my adult life up to this point is kind of just been one long one, but you know, I felt this pull to get back to New York. I had friends there. I had, I had people there that would help me kind of pick up the pieces and rebuild my life. I definitely, you know, my career was floundering.
I didn't really know what to do. So I got back to New York and. Couple weeks into it, I met my now wife and we didn't have a lot to do. So we spent a lot of time with each other and it was a, it was a psychedelic summer in Brooklyn. I'm going to be honest. You know, that's, that's all the rage now, but we were, we were early adopters and it really, it really does open your mind and make you see things different.
I think it's a shortcut to vulnerability for people that struggle with it. And a couple of months into our, Relationship. My wife was just like, I want a baby. Like, I want it now. I went with you. Like we, my wife and I have very compatible trauma. She comes from a family that's different than mine, but, but similar in a lot of ways [00:06:00] too.
And and it just felt right. So I said, yes. And this was, I don't know, September, 2020 we got married in January of 2021. And my wife was pregnant. Our son was born in September. Right. Yeah, so long winded and you know, maybe maybe I never made the conscious decision to be a dad. I think that I just got pulled there, you know,
Luke (2): Well, I think one of the things I'm it's a it's a great story, and it's a huge amount of ground you covered there. I know at one point you, you, you were thinking about making some decisions that would have shut that door off to you.
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: yeah. So
Luke (2): that like?
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: yeah, I mean the partner that I was with at the time really didn't have any plans on, on being a mom. And she she's a great, great woman and great partner. I learned so much from her. Like, I would not be in the marriage I'm in or, you know, doing anything I am without her. She was a big, Stepping stone, but you know, I hate to call someone a stepping stone.
[00:07:00] She was more than that. But, you know, she let it be known that she didn't think all the burden should be on her for birth control and where my head was at the time. I'm like, look, I have ms, like, my mental health is in shambles. No 1, no 1 deserves to be my kid. No 1 deserves that bad of a fate. So, you know, I looked into getting a vasectomy.
And something in my gut just said, no you know, maybe it was just those protective nerves that you feel when you get kicked in the nuts being like, no, don't don't mess with it. But I like to think it's bigger than that.
Mike: Could you, you mentioned you didn't feel like you deserved to be a dad. Could you dig into that a little bit more?
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: Yeah, man. And look, I'm all about honesty. So I'm just gonna let you know that there's some darkness here. I had a really, really bad mom. She was not a bad person. She wasn't a great person, but she was a really, really bad mother. And I've struggled with that because. You can tell a [00:08:00] lot by a man by his relationship with his mom.
You can tell about the husband that he's going to be by the relationship with his mom. Well, my mom was really physically and emotionally and mentally abusive to me. Physically until, you know, I grew. And and one day I just realized I'm, I'm bigger, like, she's going to kill me if I don't stop this bit.
But she had a lot of deep insecurities. She's a narcissist, definitely, you know, borderline personality disorder. Just the, the. The perfect mix of toxicity for a mother and she really hated my dad in a lot of ways. She was, she felt inferior to him and his family and all these other things. And she really just literally used to tell me like, your dad holds his head up in the air.
He thinks he's better. You're not, you're like me, hold your head down. You don't have anything to say to anyone. You don't have anything like, just, just stay out of the way. Like, from an early age, I just didn't feel like I was shit.
You know, I felt like I was just the fucking dirt under, you know, the worst person in the world's shoes. And and the way that I [00:09:00] dealt with that was cynicism. You know, I got into skateboarding. I got into punk rock. It's easy to just let go of all that when you're just angry about everything. When you hate everything, when you know, is this establishment, is this mainstream, is this normal?
Like. And I just, I just live that, you know, I've all I I'm just now starting to like, actually be able to like something that other people like, you know, like, it's, it's crazy. I just went so far down this kind of like, subversive, like, obsession with counterculture because it. That's what I felt like I deserved.
Like it, you know, I've lived in these hipster neighborhoods for a long time and it's like, I'm starting to get a little disillusioned with it. Are we just a collection of, you know, damaged people listening to sad music by other damaged people, like wearing, paying too much money for clothes that other people threw away, you know?
And again, That's another long winded answer. I'm good at those,
Mike: so yeah. How do you get out from under that?
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: man. It's been, it's been a lot for me. And so I've done a couple things, you [00:10:00] know, it's in the year of our Lord, 2024, what white man in his thirties is not practicing stoicism. You know, we're all, we're all like reaching for meditations and and, and, you know, watching what was his name? Ryan holiday.
And like all these guys that are, you know, It's great. It's great. How many ways can you say that you can't change anything except for the way that you react? That's great. So that's been huge. I did this intense therapy called neurofeedback. We're actually like. training your brainwaves to like respond to each other really well.
That helped a lot. I think that got me out of like fight or flight. It's just been a journey. It's been a journey of, of, you know, mindfulness, therapy. I was on antidepressants for a little bit. I know they save lives, but they didn't help me. You
Mike: So how did your, you mentioned an interesting comment that we've, we've heard before, which is your dad being more of a friend than a [00:11:00] dad. How did that then fit into your, your experience and, and kind of like, how do you process that today? Like what did you, I'm more, I'm most interested in kind of like how you, how that has informed Your, your path forward today, kind of in your, in your, in your current context.
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: know, my dad struggled and he, he grew up in a pretty toxic environment. He had an abusive alcoholic father. He carried on that tradition. And he was a really, really good guy and the friendship that we had later in life. And, and I mean, I definitely wouldn't have made it through childhood without him.
I don't think he. Could take on the responsibility of me. You know, I was a special needs kid. I was in a special education A. D. H. D. And trauma and all that sort of stuff. You know, it was not in the zeitgeist in the nineties. And, yeah, you know, I think back on it and mostly I'm just grateful. I mean, how many people out there wish that they had the opportunity to be [00:12:00] friends with?
They're not so great dad and I got to do that for 32 years. So, you know.
Mike: So I want to ask one more time, just were there, are there certain moments that you think about with that were important in you? allowing this to control your life. It's shocking to me that it's a very, it sounds to me like a very challenging environment. I can, I, that's what I'm hearing. I would imagine a lot of people could end up in jail, end up dead, end up in those types of scenarios. What were the moments that got you into a better situation for yourself?
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: Yeah, you know, there's a few things. I think back to a memory, and I was about probably six or seven years old, and my dad was a really bad alcoholic, and this was right before he got sober. And I remember one time, I don't know what had happened, but my [00:13:00] grandfather was at my house, and my sister my brother in law, I don't think, my sister's been married like six times, so this is the first brother in law.
And A fight broke out, something happened. Like I, you know, I'm from the South of my trash family gets to fight and sometimes it's just a thing, but this particular time, my brother in law decided to go get a lead pipe out of his car. And my grandfather, my maternal grandfather, my, my father were fighting and brother in law comes up to my dad, this lead pipe and swings it at him.
And my dad, it's pretty tough, dude. He just held out his hand and grabbed the pipe like, and it broke his hand, but he took it and shoved it in my, my brother in law's face. And And my brother in law called the police. My dad was jailed. I did six months for assault. And every time that we would go visit my dad in jail, I would see all of these other kids seeing their dads.
And I just remember thinking to myself, like, I'm never going to jail. I'm just never doing that. Like, this is like, I'm never putting anyone through this. And so that was a big moment for me. And, and, you know, then. Like I [00:14:00] said, I got into skateboarding. I got into punk rock. I was straight edge in high school.
I was straight edge till I was 22 years old. I kind of rebelled against the society that I grew up in and that's what saved me. You know, the other kids, they started smoking pot and drinking and, you know, by 12th grade, I mean, I'm from Southwest Virginia, man. Oxycontins were flowing around like, you know, like sweet and You know, my best friend, Anthony killed himself in 2012 addiction related.
Our good buddy, Josh followed suit 2014. It's too many people, you know, that's just too, I could go off in a row, but that was the first thing. And then it's just been every, every bad thing that's ever happened to me. It's just been honestly motivation. And and I think the biggest thing is I don't.
I really feel risk. You know, my first marriage ended in 2014. I I threw some shit in a trash bag and drove to New York and slept on my friend Josh's futon for six weeks until I found a job and, you know, could rent a room in Brooklyn and build a new life. Like, I will just pick up the pieces and reinvent.
[00:15:00] And And I think if I hadn't grown up in such a traumatic and crazy environment, I wouldn't have that skill.
Mike: What was the moment like when you found out you're going to then become a dad?
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: And I remember it very, very clearly. My, my wife and I had just gotten back from a trip to Virginia and I hadn't talked to my mom. My mom died a couple years ago, but she was still alive at the time. I hadn't talked to her in years. And I was like, all right, I'm going to marry this woman and have a baby with her.
I actually wanted to see where I come from. You know, I'm not embarrassed. I'm just going to let it happen. And uh, I think maybe a week later, it was a Monday morning, she got up and peed on a stick and was like, I'm pregnant. And that moment felt, you know, I felt some stuff, but I think it went a little numb, maybe disassociated.
But then when we went to the hospital and saw him on the ultrasound, man, that felt real. And I kind of just started spiraling to be honest. I'm not proud of this man, but the first year of his life and the pregnancy, I was a piece of shit. Like I, I worked, I kept the lights on. I, you know, kept us in insurance, like whatever.
But like, I just slowly started checking [00:16:00] out and and numbing out as much as I could.
Mike: Do you, do you think that there was like, did you feel a mix of, cause you had talked about wanting to, wanting to be a dad, feeling the biological clock. There's all of these other influences. And I think of it as almost like you're shaking the snow globe of positives and negatives, and you're trying to make sense of it.
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: Yeah.
Mike: Could you, could you just. Like clue me in a little bit more about the, the pieces flying around in there. Cause it's I, it's like amazing to me that this does inspire a lot of control. Like, and I mean that in a positive way,
but I, I just, you know, I really want to go on this voyage that you were, that you were experiencing.
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: Yeah. You know, no. I'm terrible at good days. Those are hard for me. I'm really bad at like a normal, quiet, everything's okay day. I'm really good with like pressure. Like I'm really good with crisis. I'm really good with chaos. So to be completely [00:17:00] honest, in my like fucked up anxious attachment mind, I was like, well, Ashley's not going to leave me for nine months.
Like she needs my insurance. She doesn't have a job. Like, and then when he was born, it was like, well, these two need me. Like, at least like someone, you know, maybe Ashley will keep loving me. Cause I'm, I'm her father of her son. Like I was still thinking that way. And it, it like thinking back on it, I should have been a lot more afraid than I was.
I was scared. I was nervous. I was anxious. I knew my life was going to change, but. Yeah. I don't know. I don't know if it's maybe just hormones and like, you know, we're built for this. Like you get that adrenaline, you get that like kind of strength, you know, you never knew you had or at least I do. So maybe it was a little bit of that, but yeah, I should have been a lot more afraid.
Mike: How did it change?
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: It still is. Like, like I don't know about y'all, but like, I had, I haven't felt myself change and evolve and, and just been in this sort of constant state of like, Like development improvement [00:18:00] since, since like puberty, it's almost like, you know, you know, my son, like I said, he'll, he'll be three in September.
His conscious memory is starting, you know, he's starting to kind of remember things and things that he might take into adulthood. And all I can say is thank God. Cause like I just now I'm in a place now where I wouldn't be ashamed for him to like have long term memories of me.
Luke (2): So you've talked about it a little bit you know, when some of these stories of your past, how you were brought up a little bit about your mom and your dad, and you've talked about your own evolution. How are you parenting your kid today that's different from the way you were brought up? And we'd love to hear, like, the active parts of that.
What are you actively bringing? What are you actively discarding? But yeah, how's it different for you?
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: man, it's, it's a lot different. You know, for one, like I'm parenting my child and, and I don't know that my parents did that. You know, they, they, they clothed me and fed me to a certain extent. I was always a hungry [00:19:00] kid and You know, gave me a place to live or, you know, at least my grandparents behind the scenes are really the ones doing that.
I'm taking responsibility. You know, I'm taking responsibility for my son. I'm the first man that he'll ever know. I'm the archetype of what being a man means. And, you know, obviously Beau could grow up and decide to not be a man, you know, to be non binary or trans or whatever. But, you know, until then, I'm assuming that Being a good male role model is important.
so the way that we're parenting is, is very, I like to think of it as kind of holistic. We're taking a lot of cues from, from different, you know, methodologies and paradigms. And, and I'll be honest, I've read some parenting books. I've listened to some podcasts. But I can't say that I'm like dogmatic about one style of parenting, you know, but it was really smart.
And he's kind of lead us from the very beginning. You know, he really, he really lets us know what he [00:20:00] needs. He's really good about asserting his needs, his feelings. We use these feelings puppets. And if he's throwing a tantrum, or sad, or whatever, like, he'll, He can really express his emotions through that.
And actually, Ashley and I got in a little fight today and he went and got the feelings puppets and made us express our feelings to each other and it fucking helped. So, uh, you know, a lot of that, a lot of, I mean, man, nutrition and is huge. Like we're a food family. We love to eat. We love to cook. You know, We're feeding him well.
We're making, we're putting a lot of love into meals and into food and nutrition. I think that I'm trying to think about all the things that I have trauma with and baggage with and and just do the exact opposite.
Luke (2): Is there anything that you find either intentionally or unintentionally that you have pulled forward? That's had a positive impact and how you're fathering your son?
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: mean pulled forward as in like, like maybe pulled from my past [00:21:00] or yeah, you know, I hear my dad's voice and words coming out of my mouth all the time, man. You know, like it was a lot that and, and I just got back from the South, spending some time with my uncles and my cousins and got to see my grandma, my sister.
And It was a lot. It was, there was a lot of healing. There was a lot of like, making peace. And, you know, my mom's not there anymore. She died. She can't hurt me. My dad also died, unfortunately. I, I, you know, I'd love for, for him to be a grandpa and to get to, to see my, I think he would've made a exponentially better grandfather than father.
But I, I definitely, you know, I have pretty good manners. I'm southern. I'm trying to bring that on, you know, I want, I want my son to know where he came from. I want him to know that, like, you know, his, his His grandparents on both sides were sharecroppers. We're, we come from, you know, poor Appalachian ish Virginian stock, you know.
And I think that I'm bringing some of those values and traditions that I grew up with into our family. And, I got a good [00:22:00] dad voice. It sounds like my dad. I can, you know, if Bo's acting up, I can I can definitely get him live if I need to. So yeah, I'm bringing some things forward there. I part of the good news to anyone with a past and this has just been incredible for me is like my childhood and my family and the way that I was parented and all that sort of stuff.
It seemed a lot worse than it was. And when you go and you actually just start to think about it, and put it all together, no matter who you are, you're going to be able to find good times. You're going to be able to find, like, things that, that were of value that you learned from. It's just really scary to actually confront it, and, like, kind of put it all on paper.
If you want a journal, or, you know, talk to a therapist, go to a group, any of that sort of stuff. And So yeah, I've been able to, I've been able to mine my childhood for some gold and it's there.
Mike: When you think about your son's kind of his life so far, when you look back to, you know, the almost three years [00:23:00] particularly earlier on, are there, what was surprising to you as a father? A father. Mm.
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: Man, a couple of things. I was not as tired as I thought I would be, you know, we didn't sleep. Like he's a pretty good sleeper. Like, and, and, and frankly, we had a much better time than a lot of our friends, but I don't know. You, you, you can, you can get out of that. Two hour nap that you were in after a sleepless night and hop on a call and show value in software.
It's, it's possible. Like you can do that. And, and that's been pretty incredible. I didn't realize how much more in love with my wife I would fall seeing her be a mom. That's been incredible.
Mike: Yeah, I, did it make you reflect on your parents may have been going through individually or, you know, or together? Because, like, for me, it, it [00:24:00] happened a bit as, just as I got older and I realized my, and my, my image of my parents transitioned from, like, at some point you realize they're, they're just other people. Like they're not perfect. They don't have all the answers and you start to, I started to better empathize with their challenges and all of that. And then for me, it happened again, way more massively once I had a child and it just totally. You can now see, to some extent, what they may have been. You can get a better idea of what their perspective was.
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: Yeah
Mike: just as a, just as being a parent or whatever. And I'm curious just, if, if if you saw, if it changed the way that you reflect on some of that stuff for yourself and for, you know, looking back on them.
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: absolutely. You know, I forgive my parents and I still have some feelings here and there and I still, you know, it still hurts. But like my dad did not have it easy, man. He was the middle kid of [00:25:00] five. He grew up in a two room house in the middle of nowhere, you know, no money. Generational trauma, you know, my mom grew up with means she grew up The first part of her childhood and like a slightly bigger city, Greensboro, North Carolina, before moving to Gratina, Virginia, where, where I grew up.
But her father was, he was just a fucking tyrant, man. He was the worst guy. He died when I was 10 or nine. I was 10. And he was, he was an abuser. You know, my mom was, was definitely sexually abused and she put me in situations where I was and think that left to your own devices, left to your own impulses, you're just going to repeat your childhood.
Like, that's what you do. You know, that her parents showed her that this is how you parent your kid. You, you, you beat them and you, you hurt them and you put them in toxic situations and she just did that. And for my dad, it was like, you know, you, you're pretty hands off. You give what you can, you make a lot of excuses for yourself and you just continue to live your own sort of selfish life.
They weren't doing [00:26:00] it transgressively. They were just repeating what they were tall. And I'm just thankful that, you know, for whatever reason, I decided to stop doing that.
Mike: I have a, what's it been like, Moving to different places. Has that had an impact on your experience? You've, you've lived in urban areas, various parts of the country, country or like, you know, more rural, whatever. Did that geographical change or those geographical differences impact you?
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: This is really interesting because it, yes, absolutely. And, you know, I, I'm a pretty empathetic person and I think that that allows you to kind of, kind of feel at home wherever you are, you know? So, like, it, it was, it's never been hard for me to, like, go to a city, find a cool bar. Start chatting with people, figure out where to eat, where to drink, who to hang out with, you know, be invited to do parties and you know, have three new best friends by the [00:27:00] end of the night.
And, you know, generally speaking, I've probably drink like, you know, 5 to 10 beer and shot combos to make that happen. It's not the healthiest thing in the world, but like, you know, that that was kind of my. You know, I'm a, I'm a firm elder millennial, and I think a lot of us were very influenced by guys like Anthony Bourdain, you know, whomever else.
And so I kind of just, you know, took my, like, Jack Kerouac adventure and, and, you know, just went forth and did it. I've learned a lot. And when I first moved to New York, I remember thinking, like, wow, like, I'm finally in a place where, like, I'm with my equals, you know, like intellectually, you know, culturally, whatever, you know, these people can hang.
They understand me. They get me. And they did to a certain extent, but not completely. And then I moved here and into Chicago. And to a certain extent, I feel the same people are a lot more guarded here. People are skeptical of people that aren't from Chicago or the area. Cause it's kind of like, why did you move here?
Like you, you like cold winters and crime. And I get [00:28:00] that. But at the same time, you know, I feel like people generally understand me, but not completely. And this past weekend I was hanging out with some dudes who, you know, it, like truly, I remember a Bill Maher quote that he was talking to a Klansman on the Jerry Springer show.
And he's like, where you're from, They played the Beverly Hillbillies on PBS. And like these dudes were the epitome of that statement and they grew up two houses down from my dad. You know, they just loved my dad. They were going on and on about him. And and there was something that really struck me.
I never called my dad, dad, I called him daddy with the accent. It just worked like, Hey dad, what you doing? Like, cool. And they just kept saying, yo daddy, yo daddy, yo daddy, this, yo daddy, that. And I was like, These guys, you know, they've never, they've never listened to the Velvet Underground. They haven't read Infinite Jest.
You know, they don't, they don't give a shit about Paul Thomas Anderson, [00:29:00] but they say daddy the same way that I do. And there's something to be said for that. Like they really fucking get it, you know, like, and that was the moment where I made peace with my past. That's not being ashamed of, man. I am white trash motherfucker from Gretna, Virginia.
I pulled myself up. I built a tech career. I did not graduate high school. I did not go to college. I learned all this shit. Just try and shit. You know, I just, just figured it out. So yeah, I don't know. I learned a lot from a lot of places hasn't been until I remembered where I came from, that I truly like accepted myself and feel like a whole identity.
Luke (2): I was gonna make a joke about you being of a certain archetype where, you know, I could see you as a VP candidate here, you know? Hillbilly to tech
Mike: Politics is off limits, Luke.
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: Yeah. You know, I, I like, I like the story, man. I don't like a lot of his politics [00:30:00] and frankly, I don't, I don't even know that he does, he's kind of, it seems like he's a good guy. Who's like, Oh, I found a little niche that I can fit into and this works. And. No, maybe, maybe he'll have a metamorphosis and maybe we'll see a, you know, some more John McCain or George W.
Bush qualities come out. And isn't it weird that that is like a positive, like, man, if only these guys could be more like George W. Bush and John.
Luke (2): My mistake for bringing us there that I did want to go back to your own growth as you were, you know, this question of being in different places and helping you, you know, helping that movement. You help you along the process of discovering more about yourself. I wanted to go back to your relationship with your, with your wife and your partner. And, you know, you said something around how having your child has, you know, you've never been more in love with your wife.
What has that evolution been for the two of you from going from, you know, who you were to who you are, to who you want to be? When you look ahead, what has that been [00:31:00] like?
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: You know, I don't want to speak for her, but like, you know, I loved my wife the day that I met her. Like, I walked into the backyard of a bar in Brooklyn, and I saw this beautiful woman in a white dress. Obviously, she was trying to tell me something. And I was like, man, I will spend every day with her if she'll let me.
And she did. And I pretty much have. But man, just seeing her and my son, you know, my son looks exactly like me. He acts so much like me. And
it's really, I'm about to say something out loud that I've never said before, and it's really hard. You know, I remember when I was seven years old, my mom left me at the grocery store. It was the first time that I remember her doing that, but I'm sure she did it plenty of times. She probably had two or three extra Xanax that day and just forgot. Whatever. I sat there for about an hour waiting for her.
And and I've said in therapy before that I don't feel like she ever came. Like, I kind of feel like I was pretty much alone from that point on. Seeing my wife be a mom, and seeing Beau, the way that he smiles when he sees her, the calm that he feels when he's with her it's [00:32:00] healed a lot. It's really healed a lot. And I'm not saying, like, I'm projecting all my mom issues onto my wife, or, you know, or, even she deserves this burden, and and I'm, I'm, I try to have really good boundaries about these feelings and I almost feel guilty for them.
Like, yeah, like I'm, I'm taking, you know, this beautiful relationship with my wife and son and making it about me. But it's, it's hard not to love someone who's healing such like deep hurt and damage. So I need some Spendrift.
Mike: Spindrift, please contact mailbag at dadpod. fm.
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: Yep. Yep. I already took my A. G. one, so I can't pitch that, but we've opened up the floodgates here, boys. So let's go keep
Luke (2): Well, I, I, I really appreciate you going there. I mean, there's gonna go a little bit, little bit wonky here, but you know, I've, I've, throughout my life, I'd, I've had people argue to me that there's a version of, of [00:33:00] life where you go through and you, you seek to find your whole self. And once you find your whole self, you can then go out and find your partner. and, and build a family. And I've heard that argument and I've heard another argument, which is you can never be whole until you go out and you find who that person is, who makes you whole.
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: am.
Luke (2): for most of my life, I've believed in the first. And I think as I've gone through my, my life as a dad and hearing stories like what you tell, I don't know if it's possible to be a whole version of ourselves.
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: No,
Luke (2): we witness what this kind of thing is like. When
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: You want to, you want to learn to appreciate alone time? Become a dad at 30 minutes in the morning. It's sometimes the best part of my day, but I'm really thankful when it's over.
But yeah, man, I, I don't know that [00:34:00] I feel whole yet. I want to, and I feel close. I deserve to feel whole and, and I want to feel whole and I think it's possible. And I can say that for certain, but I don't know that I completely feel whole. And I want to one day.
Mike: you talk about your, you, you mentioned not wanting to put your Stuff on, on your wife, on your son, could you talk about how, as a partnership, you and your wife have managed each other, like your trauma, you mentioned that she, you know, she may have had some stuff. I think you mentioned that she had some stuff to work through. How do you manage that together? You know, does she participate in you? Processing through your, your background.
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: Oh, yeah. Yeah. We we've had some, we've had some times. We've had some tough times. You know, [00:35:00] we, we get in fights, we work stuff out. We're both pretty temperamental people. And I think that we're just going to be that couple that, that like, we're going to need to like, yell it out once in a while. We have gotten a lot better at our son from that.
And that's, that's been huge. But yeah, We really are partners in crime and, and, you know, we had a little fight this morning. We're, we're struggling every day, but at the end of the day, like, you know, I'm just so happy to, you know, have five minutes to catch up with myself, with her in bed every night.
And like, talk about our day, you know, like we We really get each other. We really understand each other. We have compatible trauma. I don't want to speak for her. You know, like, I know, I know she's been through a lot. I know she's working with it, working through it every day. But for me, it's like, yeah.
Mike: Is there stuff that she does for you? I, you know, like if you were going to give advice just straight from your experience to someone to [00:36:00] like another partner who, who was like, how do I support my, like, tell me how to support my partner
in working through her, her trauma, like just straight from your experience, like what advice would you give me?
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: She's been really, really good at making me feel seen. And she's been really good at, like, giving me the space to, like, project things at her. And, you know, put my issues out there. then she's really gotten good, especially lately, at telling me when I have to fucking stop. We have this, I call it a mantra in our family, and she'll just say, I love you, but it's getting really hard for me to stay calm right now. And uh, nothing makes me feel better than that. You know, like, up, there was nothing I loved more than a hug from my grandma and my, my granny on my mom's side. She's 95 years old. She would always hug me and she would always say everything's going to be okay. And she did that Saturday. It's about Saturday.
It's the first time I've felt that, [00:37:00] you know, 20 years. But I don't know. There's just something about like a secret code to just be like, look, you are fucking out of control. Like you've got to stop. This is just insane. You're, Obviously, in fight or flight, you're offline, you're disassociated, whatever I'm, I can be nice to you long enough to say this last thing.
And after that, like, you know, I don't have any anything left for you. And and I used to cross that line a lot. You know, she used to give me that warning and be like, this is the last nice thing I'm going to say to you for a while. And I was like, Oh yeah, well, let's escalate. How, how can I just fuck this up even more?
But you know, over time I'm like, man, she really loves me. The fact that she's like saying that the fact that she's like, you know, it's getting hard for me to stay calm right now. Like what a gift. And I'm just taking that and squandering it. And I don't do that anymore. When she says that I, if I can't get myself together, I fuck off.
I leave for a little bit. I go skateboarding, I do whatever. And And man, that's just huge. Just boundaries. I guess that's a really long winded way of [00:38:00] saying boundaries.
Mike: you. Individually or as a partnership have specific other ways that you, when the temperature is, is high that you bring it back down, you know, because like, you're never going to avoid getting in fights or someone being angry or frustrated or whatever. But what, what do you do to. To then come back to, to neutral
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: yeah, it always takes time and that's been really hard for me. I'm, I'm very anxious attached. My life's a little anxious avoidant. So,
Mike: what did those mean?
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: anxious, attached, and I'm going to paraphrase and butcher the hell out of it, but there's a lot of YouTube videos you can watch. We'll explain this to you in great detail, but um, when you're, when you're anxious, attached, you know, you get anxious, you feel abandoned and you just, you clean, you know, no one leaves till we figure this out.
Like, we've got to resolve this right now. Like, it's, it's life or death. If we can't 5 minutes, we're definitely getting a divorce. You don't love me [00:39:00] anymore. Like, like, that's where I feel. And hers is like. Yeah. Right now, hearing your voice makes me feel like I hate you and I need to not look at you for two hours and then I'll be okay. And that's fucking hell for me. And gradually it's become a lot less hell. And I'm just finding that like, you know, sitting with discomfort and learning how to like push through it is the only path to growth. And, and, you know, like, David Goggins, you know, would love to hear that from me. And he'd be like, that's great.
Fucking strap two cinder blocks to your shoulders and run a hundred miles and then set your face on fire. And that's what you need to do in order to grow. And, you know, maybe for him, that's great. Maybe his, his hurt locker is a little deeper than mine, but for me, like, I don't need to run an ultra marathon.
I just need to sit for two hours knowing that my wife is mad and it's kind of comfortable. And I've just grown a lot from that now. Like. You know, there's, this is maybe not super healthy of [00:40:00] me to say, but I've got a little mantra and I'm just like, we're really happy. We have a great life. She would be crazy to leave me. And I say that to myself and I don't know, that's confidence to me or the beginnings of it.
Luke (2): I listen and just kind of put together where you've come from, when I, when I look back and I see like kind of that, this, this picture of this kid who never got picked up from the grocery store, the seven year old who never got picked up to where you are today. One of the questions that keeps coming back to me is what's the dream you have for your son? Like project, projecting into his future. the dream do you
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: man. My dream is for him to feel safe, to have a dream. I never felt safe to have a dream. You know, I just wanted the best I could possibly get. Like, you know, I wanted to get out of Gretna. I got out of Gretna. I got out of Gretna. It was very, very incremental steps for me. That was never like, you know, here's what you want to do.
Like, here's the steps to do it. Like [00:41:00] all that sort of stuff. So like, I just want him to feel like he has the support and the, the foundation necessary to even dream, you know, like, I kind of knew I wanted to work in tech when I was a kid, I got the internet pretty early. My dad had the foresight to like, give me a computer and give me internet in the late nineties.
And of course, you know, I found IRC and called the dead cow and like, all the beautiful, like, late nineties, early 2000s, agriculture. That is the reason I work in tech, but it's not like I dreamed of it. You know, I just had access. I didn't have anything else, but I had access to this. So, like, you know, thank God.
So, you know, I, I hope that Bo and. And, you know, other kids as we have them grow up in a world, in our family, where they just feel supported enough to like, have a dream. I don't have any specifics to that. You know, if, if Bo wants to be a filmmaker, I hope that I am financially solvent enough to make that happen.
Because, frankly speaking, as someone in the arts and creative world as well, like, if you don't have family, money, if you [00:42:00] don't have generational wealth, like, You're not gonna be successful. It's just that's just the odds are just stacking your favor. There's edge cases. Cool. There's edge cases everywhere, whatever. I didn't even know you could get student loans, you know, like I grew up in such a backwoods world that I thought that you had to be rich to actually go to college and thank God because I would have gotten, I would have definitely like figured out how to finish high school. I was living in my car my senior year of high school.
So I didn't even, you know, I didn't have a chance at, like, actually going to college actually like doing that. I almost went in the Navy, but whatever. just to say, like, I didn't have a dream. I didn't have, I didn't think I could have a dream, I didn't think I could deserve a dream. And, and all I want is for my kids to just feel the complete opposite of that.
Mike: other side of that coin, as you look, not necessarily that far ahead, but, but as you look ahead, you know, for your, this stage, the next stage of your son's life, what are the things that you grapple with? Or like, what do you [00:43:00] worry about? Or what are the things you, you are focused on addressing for, for the next. You know, this stage in the next stage.
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: I'm gonna reach for stoicism here, and I'm gonna put those into two categories. There's a lot of things that I worry about, that I'm, I'm concerned about, that I'm thinking about, that I have absolutely no control over. And those suck. That's the biggest category. The smallest category is the things that I do have control over.
So, you know, lately we're, we don't own a home. We're renting you know, talk about not being whole before you have a kid, you know, technically I'm a surf. So, you know, so we're thinking about like, where, where do we want to be? Like, where are we going to buy a house? Where do we want our family to, to be?
Do we, do we stay in the Midwest? Do we go to the South? Like we go to the West coast, like whatever. I have control over that, and that gives me a little bit of a sense of control over the things that I don't have control over, that I worry about, like climate change, crime, and, you know, the economy, and all that sort of stuff.
So, like, [00:44:00] I'm, I'm trying to, like, come up with a, an algorithm. And and I, you know, I was a software engineer for a long time. So I guess I just think algorithmically and trying to think of like, here's the thing that I'm concerned about. Right? That's my value. And I'm going to pass that value into two functions.
I'm going to pass it into 1 function that says can I control it? Do I have control over this? Do I have any control to mitigate this concern? And, you know, You know, if, if so, let's put that in, you know, column a key value pair. Let's bring redness into the equation. Come on, let's get full tech row here.
If, if not, let's put that in, you know, column B. And then it's just about building those algorithms. You know, that's my first algorithm. we're going to keep the big O on this fairly consistent. So, but then you got to build the algorithm for, okay, how do I deal with the things that I can control?
That those are actually scarier than the things that you can't control. So yeah, you know, I'm, I'm, it's a work in progress, man. Like, but I worry about a [00:45:00] lot of stuff and you know, you know, I think that I go back to a nice little Southern co localism of that my dad used to say, and he said, you know, hold out both your hands, shit in one of them and hope in the other one and see which one fills up first. So I'm really trying to fill up that hope hand right now.
Luke (2): That's good. We always like to keep you got a question, Mike.
Mike: I have struggled a lot it has been unexpected. I have struggled a lot with the managing the things I can't control. You know, you mentioned climate change and that. That is one that I worry about a lot. And other, other things that I, I just, I won't be able to control.
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: Yeah.
Mike: it is unresolved for me.
And maybe that's just part of being a parent, but I have been, it [00:46:00] was, it was one of the many surprises at how how much that affected me. I used to not, I just wouldn't worry about stuff. And maybe that's being a dude in your twenties. You know, middle class white man, whatever. And I had a, had a child get a little older and I worry a ton now, total waste of energy in most cases, you know, I think let's call it 98 percent waste of energy. But I can't avoid it. I've, I've struggled to avoid it. I've struggled to let that go. And I don't have a, a question for you or anything, but it's been a major part of my life as well.
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: Do you, do you ever wonder, and you know, I'm just speaking about myself cause I did the same, you know, I really like I've gone down rabbit holes of, you know, all these different things that are terrible in the world right now. And there's a lot of them, man. [00:47:00] Like my social media feed is just so dark and disturbing, but I wonder if you were able to just kind of like be vulnerable and say like, What do I really get out of worrying about these things?
Like am I just distracting myself worrying about the things that I can't control because I'm afraid to take responsibility and actually change the things that I can. For me, that is 100% true. I was about to say 1000% true. I'm tired. Hyperbole. It is 100% true. It's a lot easier for me to worry about climate change than it is to think like.
How am I going to get my W 2s for the past four or five years together and figure out how to get my taxes sorted out so that I can get approved for a mortgage? That's easy, man. That's, that's two hours of concentrated work and, you know, calling my, my father in law's friend and, you know, trying to get a payment plan sorted [00:48:00] and all that sort of stuff.
But I've been putting it off for two years, but I will watch four hours of YouTube videos about the minutiae of like why the rise of the right wing in Europe is going to change, you know, the economic outlook in Georgia next week, right? It's really, really easy to ruminate and put time and, you know, effort into things that you can't control because it doesn't matter.
Like, there's no, you don't have a dog in the fight. And so yeah, it's not helpful, but it, it I can't tell you how to stop doing it because I can't stop doing it. But at least the awareness of it makes you feel like you're, you know, on a path.
Mike: Yeah. Yeah. And I, I do think there's, there's paths for me out of it. Staying as far away from social media as I can getting out into just nature, putting my phone on the mantle and you know, some stuff like [00:49:00] that. I've, I've spent periods of my life consistently consistent with meditation. And I think that has some positive effect in, in myself. But you let your, let, let your grip loosen on that a little bit and it doesn't take long for it to come back and to come back a lot harder. And then you gotta start all over again on inching your way back to, you know, equanimity for, for the lack of a, of a more mass parlance of our times.
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: Yeah. You know, I think that for a long time, I thought that dealing with my problems, dealing with my trauma, dealing with my past, all that sort of stuff implied that there would be some sort of like release or relief or like it would go away or like whatever. And it does not, none of this is going to go away.
None of it, but. You can stop letting it affect you. You can stop being [00:50:00] powerless over it. You can stop like, letting it cause you to enjoy your life less. Like why should I let the fact that I had a bad childhood make not only my adulthood shittier, but my wife's adulthood and my son's childhood and my coworkers and you know, everyone else, like it's really, really selfish to let your problems and the things that you're worrying about hurt other people.
And I don't know, I just, I find more and more that like, the less that you think about yourself, the less that you worry about everything else. Like, are you truly worrying about climate change because of your, your kid? Or are you worrying about climate change because you're scared shitless of the fact that you have a kid? Maybe a little bit of both.
Mike: Yeah, yeah, it's a great, that's a great question.
Luke (2): Yeah.
Way. We typically like to end our wrap up our podcast is by asking the last question, which is if you had one piece of advice [00:51:00] to give to somebody who's about to become a dad. What would that piece of advice be?
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: We've talked a lot about control and the things that you can control and you can't. And I think that being a parent is an incredible exercise in cognitive dissonance because you can control the environment that your child grows up in, the way that they're parented, do you sleep train, are you doing, you know, child fed weaning like, you know, There's so many things.
The way that you potty train a kid has so much to do with, you know, their, their personality as an adult, so you have some control over that, but you got to start preparing for that moment where, like, all of a sudden, their individuality becomes more of a factor than your influence. And I think that.
Wrapping your head around that sooner than later is, is going to pay dividends in the future. And I don't think that I don't think parents think about that enough. You know, like [00:52:00] earlier you asked me what my dream for Bo was and, you know, I said it was for him to have a dream. And I think that so much of being a good parent. Is, is just setting the stage for the child to kind of choose their own adventure and and build their own life and giving them the resources that need to do it. A technology that I can think of, you know, I'm a sales engineer. I was a software engineer and DevOps engineer for a long time. And I wasn't very good at it.
I'm just going to be completely honest. I was okay at it. I, I, I like learning the stuff. I like building things and prototyping them big ideas. But when it comes down to, like, just sitting and staring at gibberish for a day, fixing 1 problem and then being like, cool, let's do that again. Tomorrow. I just couldn't do it anymore.
And and so now in my job, like, so much of. Of what I do is showing people value and showing how the software that I sell can make their life easier. And I believe that it can, and I know that it can, but without [00:53:00] trying to influence them, because the more I influence them and try to convince them that they need this and they like it and all that sort of stuff, they're going to go in the other direction.
So I just got to show them value. I got to show them what a successful engagement with our software and, you know, adaptation and implementation looks like so that, so that they want it. And I think that that's being a parent, I want to show my son what a good marriage looks like. I want to show him what a successful career looks like.
I want to show him what, you know, a successful creative life looks like. I want, I want to lead by example and create an environment where he's constantly inspired by, you know, me and my wife, our friends, our family. And I think that, you know, the more that you try to cultivate that and just try to like work on yourself.
What you're doing, the space that you're taking up in the world the better influence you'll be and the better your, your chances of success are. And also like define what success is like, what is success as a parent? Technically speaking, you're [00:54:00] a pretty successful parent. The second you, you know, make a child and it's an embryo, you're an even more successful parent when you're, you know, the mother completes.
The, the pregnancy process and gives birth every day that your kid wakes up in the morning and, and, you know, didn't starve to death. You're a pretty successful parent. And I try to really like give myself a lot of grace and think of those quick wins. You know, my, my kid smiles a lot. I'm a good dad.
If your kid smiles a lot, you're probably a good, a good parent. Like, yeah, I don't know. Be kind to yourself, your expectations and understand that you don't really have that much control. Like just, just do you and be the best version of yourself. You can be, and you'll probably be a pretty good parent.
Luke (2): Awesome. David, thank you so much. So much ground we covered. Appreciate you so much for going those places, being open, sharing, and good luck, dude. You're doing great work.
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: Thank you, man. Yeah, it's an, an honor to, to talk to you guys and, and to, you know, talk about my story. I [00:55:00] I'm tired of hiding it, you know, I'm proud of who I am. I'm proud of where I've come from and where I've got, and you know, I hope that this inspires people to, to be a parent. 'cause it is the best fucking thing I've ever done.
Like, man,
Mike: Thank you.
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: I love being a
Luke (2): Alright, everybody. That's it.
db-2024-7-19__13-8-22: Yep.
Luke (2): David, thank you so much.
mike-2024-7-19__14-20-6: Something I've marinated on is like thinking about someone who's preparing to become a dad. So let's say, you know, there's your, your wife is pregnant or whatever, and you, you know, that there's, you expect to have a baby in the future. Do you [00:56:00] like, there is so much that I, like, if I was going to explain to my past self, so much of it would not land even, even as like, like it just, and I've, I've grappled with this, , this idea of like, you could say all this stuff to a. And it might not mean anything like I and I that's comes from my experience of like, I just wouldn't have understood interested. I want to know, but there's this like Delta between. Like there is no way I could have understood how I feel in certain situations today. Like you've talked about with, , your partner, like you, you know, there's, I have a really difficult time with drop off because, or pick, uh, particularly drop off when I take my, my daughter to school, because for [00:57:00] me, it brings up this moment where I was supposed to pick up my brother.
When he was in second grade or something, he's eight years younger than me. It must've been, let's say third or fourth grade. And I procrastinated and I was late and I, and I, and I raced over to his school and he was out on the sidewalk by himself, standing there waiting for me. And I was super worried that he was going to get lost and he just went out and he waited and he was standing there alone and I can barely get through this. about or explaining this concept without like crying myself. Like this is, it's one of the most shameful things that I carry with me. And I, I think that that bubbles up when I drop off. My daughter and like that and I would never have thought about that connection, you know and everything and I'm just curious What you think about that like like if if you could go back in time and talk to yourselves Do you think the old the pre dad [00:58:00] you would have?
Is there anything useful that you would have like heard?
db-2024-7-19__14-20-6: Well, first off, man, like you were a kid, you know, that's, , even if you were a teenager, that's still a lot of responsibility for a kid that's, you know, like you had your own life. You had your adolescent hormone surging through your body. Like no one's like, man, my time is
luke-2024-7-19__14-20-6: what were you, what were you doing while you were procrastinating, Mike? That's
mike-2024-7-19__14-20-6: I'm pretty sure I was watching MTV. Like the, like there was the four o'clock, like Carson daily show where they did the top 10 music videos. I'm pretty sure. I just wanted to see what was number one
db-2024-7-19__14-20-6: TRL, bro.
luke-2024-7-19__14-20-6: Christina Aguilera genie ing a bottle? I'm pretty sure.
db-2024-7-19__14-20-6: My favorite TRL my favorite TRL moment is, you remember that weird like month in the summer of 1998 when all of a sudden like Stein was normal. Like, Duhast was the number one video on TRL. It was like, Corn Freak on a Leash, Duhast by Rammstein, [00:59:00] Spacelord by Monster Magnet, and then like, Christina Aguilera.
That was a weird time. You think we're in like, end times right now? You think like, Trump is a problem? Rammstein was number one on TRL.
mike-2024-7-19__14-20-6: and eighth graders were watching it. Seventh graders were watching
db-2024-7-19__14-20-6: I loved it. I, you know, I, I still, I could still fuck with Rammstein if I was, you know, in my club in Berlin on the right night. But uh, but no man. Yeah, so first off like You can't go back in time and say that because he's still there man. Your inner child's still there. This might actually be your inner teen But like
you don't need to You don't need to feel ashamed. You don't need to feel pain for that Like you should think that inner teen You should thank him. You should think Carson daily. You should think, you know, whatever video you're watching, whatever you were doing, you know, eating toast for strudels and drinking Dr.
Pepper, like we did in the nineties. And now we all wonder why we're all sick. You should thank him because you're probably never [01:00:00] going to be late to pick your kid up from school ever. Like I bet you are, you know, drop off. You're you're there. You're present. You're enjoying every moment. You miss her while she's gone and you can't wait to pick her up in the evening.
And. You know, you probably feel the same way had you not experienced that as a kid, but you're just that much more conscious of it. Like, you know, like it's a gift. It's a, everything, everything that you're talking about right now is just a gift. So like, just, just tell, you know, 13, 14 year old you that it's okay.
You made a mistake, but you still love him. And, uh, and, and that mistake is helping you be a better dad today.
luke-2024-7-19__14-20-6: I generally agree with kind of the direction you're going with it, David. I, When I think about this kind of this question of like, if I went back in time and told the past version of myself, knowing myself, I'd probably tell that guy to shut the fuck up and fuck off. You know, like, like, I don't, that's just kind of who I am [01:01:00] and how I operate. And I think, you know, you were kind of asking that question, what, where I went immediately was parenting, I think is powerful in so many ways, but one of the ways it's really powerful for me is it's.
It's really helped me understand that we can't intellectualize everything. Like not everything is a logic puzzle that we can figure out with like, what do we do in serial? What do we do in parallel? How do I break this into its components? Like being a parent is a lived embodied experience that is not possible to describe.
It is not possible to tell somebody what it's like. It is literally only possible to experience. So I don't know how much value, Luke would get other than telling future Luke to, you know, shut the fuck up. But I think that's part of the joy of it too, you know, is like in the moment when I project into the future, I want to do everything I can to, to get ready, but we don't know, like I, David, I loved how you, one of your big themes for today was, you know, what can we control?
What can we not control? And I think that's one of the [01:02:00] most existential parts of parenting. is how little we fundamentally control. And at the same time, how much control our kids have over us. It is an asymmetric equation.
db-2024-7-19__14-20-6: Yeah. I mean, you know, if I could go back in time right now, there's a lot of things that I would do. I would, I'd buy a property in Brooklyn in, you
luke-2024-7-19__14-20-6: Bitcoin, baby!
db-2024-7-19__14-20-6: 2008. Yeah. I'd buy all. I, I, I had, I remember buying a Papa John's pizza with one Bitcoin in 20. Like I did that. I ordered a
luke-2024-7-19__14-20-6: You could open a Papa Jai's franchise with that same Bitcoin!
db-2024-7-19__14-20-6: Yep. Yep. , I'd definitely buy Nvidia stock.
You know, I do that. but there's not a lot else that changed, man, because you got to think, you know, if you, if you had gone and picked your brother up on time from school that day and a drunk driver, it cruise down the street at the right moment and taking you both out, then where would you be now? You know, like no regrets, no changes.
We're [01:03:00] here.