(upbeat music)
So we jumped in with both feet.
And love the kids more
than anything in the world.
Do not, do not pass
code, do not collect $100.
But I asked you, I said, "Hey, would you
put your foot down?"
We don't really know
what's going on in your house.
This isn't completely unplanned.
Game of Thrones, succession.
Everybody watching this is busy.
Because we get run down, we get tired.
Everybody is their own person, obviously.
You're a robot.
And I don't want to
wish away time at all.
Which isn't the best of relationships.
It's a give and take.
There was a lot more,
I think, trial by error
when we were kids.
Technology has brought
this world to a faster pace.
I don't know how, I
mean, I feel like, "No!"
We talked on phones on the walls.
It's a great visual.
I love the fact that we're Gen Xers.
It's just kind of, it's a
(indistinct)
Sitting on a cactus.
Our children are more
plugged into technology.
We are more plugged into technology.
That's a great dad joke.
I feel like I'm
constantly on maternity leave.
I can't be focusing on a promotion.
But it's amplified.
Think you all get the point.
Eating chips and dip
watching Netflix today.
I know, they're kind of then
my eyes and ears out there.
Everybody knew, let's go to her house
and we'll go to their basement.
It was beyond PJ time.
Game off.
It is ridiculous how scared Texans are
of stuff falling from the sky.
They laid us against each
other in a very real way.
It was you, I thought I wanted to win.
I never gave the thumbs up.
They were the ones
who gave me a thumbs up.
We were so happy because the kids
were going back to school.
I'm staring at a...
I literally just learned about everything
that's happening two minutes ago.
Raising children, marriage and career.
If I can just get to that horizon,
they get there's another horizon.
That cheesy.
Oh my God, that's not
cheesy, that's something else.
I do love a good high five.
More annoyed cop.
I think six months from
now it's still an issue
and six years from now
it's probably still an issue.
We actually had a competition,
a hand clapping competition.
We don't talk about work in bed.
Sometimes it's good to
hear that you're normal.
You're normal, we took a nail on that.
We took a loss on that one for sure.
That's a thing, skeet ball.
Disclaimer, I'm a half expert on myself
and that's really where it stops.
Because I know we're coming to the close
of the first quarter here.
I'll let everybody take a bathroom break
and we've got about an
hour and a half left.
We'll have a lot more to talk about.
So will you.
We'll cut that.
Welcome to the Mr. and
Mrs. English Podcast.
I'm Megan.
And I'm Sean.
We're here to talk about
the wild ride of raising kids,
growing careers, keeping life together
in the middle of all the chaos.
So buckle up because we're all
in this crazy journey together.
Start.
When I say the word test,
it starts us over every time
and we can't actually start this.
Exactly, so let's start.
Okay, right now.
Yes.
Go.
All right, well.
(laughing)
You're not supposed to
laugh at me when I'm starting.
I'm sorry, you did a great job though.
Welcome back, we'll start there.
All right.
You go ahead.
You go, I hear you're better.
Okay, here we go.
Welcome back everybody.
We are here, Mr. and Mrs.
English, episode number two.
And it's exciting, we're actually filming
on the day that we
dropped episode number one.
And it's actually been pretty exciting,
even though we've been
working full day to day
and you've been on
calls back to back to back.
We've been getting some feedback
and it's been positive, which is great.
So thank you for those
of you that reached out
and took the time.
I think, and one thing I
know I'm doing too much
is talking too much, so.
I don't think so, this is a podcast
where we're both supposed to be talking.
So as long as it's, you know, balanced.
General mathematics would
assume you should talk 50%
of the time that we are talking.
I think you're hitting the right number.
I just felt like I was
more like 80% of the time
than the last one.
I felt like I was 80%.
So maybe it was 50-50 and
we're gonna go with that.
Okay, perfect, perfect.
Well, it's great to have everybody back.
Thanks again.
We're gonna jump into this week
and we don't have as
much maybe to talk about.
We don't have a whole
month and a half to talk about.
Right, which is nice.
We can probably make this
a little more digestible
and we can probably double
click on a couple things.
But, you know, speaking about jumping
right into the podcast,
we jumped in feet first to this week
because this was the
first week back to school
and our first full work
week after the holidays.
So we jumped in with both feet.
And it's been a bit of a wild ride.
A little bit, yeah.
I mean, I kind of think about,
and it's terrible to
say it to some degree,
but I think about this week,
what's the Christmas
song that talks about
parents are excited for the
kids to go back to school?
Oh yeah, it is
definitely a Bing Crosby song.
Yeah.
Mom and dad can hardly wait
for school to start again.
There it is, Mom,
that's exactly what it is.
And love the kids more
than anything in the world.
But it is nice for us
to have our spaces again.
You guys go there.
Yes.
And we'll stay here.
Exactly.
And because both of us work from home,
when our children are home,
that does create
challenges during the work day.
I don't know about all of you,
but the children will
come into our offices
while we're working
and carry on conversations
with each other, not with us.
And so I'm always
like, well, what the heck?
We have a whole house you guys can talk.
I don't know why
you're doing that in here.
You and I actually
talked about that this week
to some degree, that I
asked you if you wouldn't mind,
because they do that in your office.
Yes, they do.
They don't do that in my
office for whatever reason.
I think probably because,
these are again things that we can get to
as we get further
down this, but you know,
good cop, bad cop,
I'm generally the bad cop
parent a lot of the time.
But you let them come in there
and just talk, talk, talk, talk, talk.
And they just sit in there
while you're on a call sometimes.
And we've got all the,
it's a yellow meeting
or it's a red meeting.
You know, if it's a red meeting,
you gotta get out of
mom's office or dad's office.
But I asked you, I said,
"Hey, would you put
your foot down for once?"
Not for once, but put
your foot down and just say,
"Hey, if we're working,
our offices are kind
of off limits, right?"
You can come in and say, "Hi, what's up?"
But don't sit in there because
when they come into my office,
I'm like, guys, I'm working.
Like I can't have you in here talking.
Yeah.
And I'm on call so often that I think
if they hear me being silent,
that means, well then,
mom must be available.
I don't know where they got that needed.
A red meeting is do not pass go,
do not collect $100 or $200.
It's leave me alone
unless somebody is dying.
Yeah.
And it works.
Yeah.
I actually had to institute that
and pull that back this week
and say red meeting, leave.
But they still think
they can just come in there.
And they're like, you know,
mom's the good cop because
they can just sit in mom's office
and talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk.
And then I'm the bad guy
because I'm like, guys,
because I can listen to music.
In fact, I listen to music while I work.
I like, my brain needs
that portion taken up.
But for whatever reason,
that doesn't work with kids talking to me
and telling me things and
asking about this or that.
Yeah.
I can't do it for some reason or other.
We bring up a good thing though,
or a good point of
something to talk about here.
And we talk about it and it's off script.
Not that we have any script.
We have literally eight talking points
that we may or may not get to.
So this isn't completely unplanned.
But one of the things that's not on there
and you brought it up is we're blessed
because we both work from home.
Yes.
And the only time that that
doesn't work out well for us
is when I'm traveling or
the few times that you travel,
also for work.
I just don't know how people do it in
today's day and age.
And I know a lot more people work from
home than they used to,
but still a lot of people
are going back to the office.
Yeah.
How do they do it?
Practice starts at six for us.
And we leave at 440, sometimes 450,
just to start from our
house to get there in time.
Yes.
And sit in traffic.
And I don't know how we did it.
I know for sure we woke up earlier.
Yeah.
And we do now.
But from a coming
home standpoint, I mean.
Think about when we lived in Chicago.
For a while there, I
would get maybe like,
there's several trains,
the hard tracks to get out
from downtown
Chicago, out to the suburbs.
And I don't remember the train I took,
or you were down there too for a while,
but at some point, I worked
my way from like the 615 train
that got me home at seven o'clock.
Of course, this is
pre-kids, so totally different.
That's why we moved out to the suburbs.
But my point here is
there's people that live,
or that work down in
Dallas, or in Irving,
or wherever it may be.
But they're in an
office, they gotta come home.
You used to go to the office here.
I've had an office down
in Dallas multiple times.
And that's an hour drive home.
So if I worked till
five, I gotta come home.
I get home by six.
Oh, guess what?
You're gonna be an hour
and a half late for practice,
and practice is over.
Yeah, yeah.
And you may have, if
your kids are staying home,
or you have after school care,
you have to sometimes pick
them up from after school care.
Or, I think the term from our
generation was latchkey kids.
And they're just hanging out,
and you expect them to
be doing their homework.
Hopefully they are.
You don't really know
what's going on in your house,
and how they're running around.
So it's, I don't know, honestly.
And my, just all of the kudos in the
world to those people
who still have to do
that and balance it all,
because we are truly
blessed to both work from home.
And those people in our
teams that can't do that,
and we talked about it
last week, it takes a village,
which I now know, but I'll forget that
within another month or two.
It takes a village.
It's just incredible
that the day and age,
the expectations, even last week,
they moved up track practice to 4.30.
Right, and I--
And even for us that we're
from home, I said it to you.
I said, "How do they
expect us to do this?
"I'm actually working."
That was my other point.
The only way you can
get people or your kids
to practice at six o'clock,
if you work in downtown Dallas,
is you gotta leave at 4.15.
Correct.
If you get home by five.
And I don't know about you,
but I worry about my
job at that point, right?
What is my boss thinking?
Right, and that
perception of you in the workplace.
And I like to think
that schedules are getting
a little more flexible, and okay,
if someone needs to leave at four o'clock
to go pick up a kid or to
go take a child somewhere,
they probably then need
to log on later that night.
And that gets really hard,
and it can wear a person down
when they really have no downtime
because they've had to blend and flex
their schedules so much
that it has eliminated
any free time or downtime
or space that people
need to rest and recharge.
We don't have any of that.
And I feel like I talk about that a lot,
even in our highlights, I
was like, "There's no time,
"and there's just no time,
and by the way, we're busy."
Like I know, everybody's busy.
Everybody watching this is busy,
and I know it's hard to
even carve out 10 minutes
to do something on your
own just to rest and relax,
let alone 30 minutes or
40 minutes for a podcast.
So thanks for doing that.
We won't extend this
to two hours, I promise,
because we don't have
that kind of time either.
But I feel like we're hampering,
or I'm hampering on that a little bit,
really focusing on that,
but I know nobody else
has that time either.
And you talk about the free time,
and there's none of it.
We used to watch
television shows at night, right?
All of our favorites,
Chicago PD, Chicago Fire,
that was five years
ago, eight years ago maybe,
but I remember actually
sitting and watching TV.
And the times when we were
able to binge watch a show,
Game of Thrones,
Succession, some of those,
like we haven't done that in years now.
No.
So, I mean, you talk about it, yeah,
the listeners here don't have time,
but that's one of the
reasons why we wanted
to create this podcast
was to let people know
you're not alone, we're all struggling,
and we clearly don't
have the right solution
because we get run down, we get tired,
which is why we really, at least for me,
I don't mean to speak for you,
all year I look forward
to that holiday break.
I try to take a lot of time off,
and it's amazing how tired I get,
and I was like, gosh,
how can I be sleeping
till eight, 8.30 in the morning?
This is crazy, this is not adulting,
but you're so tired from doing that
for such a sustained period of time
that at least for me,
my body just shuts down
and it's like, you need to see.
And that's even further compounded
by everybody's kind of their own person.
I mean, everybody is
their own person, obviously,
but everybody's got their
own way of doing things,
their own internal time clock,
or whatever you want to call it, right?
Their own need for rest and relaxation,
and you and I know that.
I mean, I'm sure everybody else out here
knows how your spouse is, or your
significant other is,
or how your children are,
but I am one, as sad
as it is, we know it,
I have to get that rest in at some point.
I mean, there are times
that maybe I can push through,
and we're gonna talk a
little bit about that
maybe this week of
work-life balance even.
We've been pushing pretty hard on this,
but generally speaking,
whatever it is for my brain,
or physicality, or
whatever I'm doing during the day,
I have to be able to have some time to
come down with that.
And sometimes I just gotta get away.
That's why I go run at night
sometimes, or whatever it is.
I need 30 minutes to decompress
if I'm gonna be worth anything,
and I need to get enough sleep at night
to feel that way too,
but you're not like that.
You're a robot.
Yes, I can go, and that's one way
that we've kind of split up the timeline.
Now again, my knee, if you
watched the previous episode,
you know all about it,
has thrown a wrench in it,
because driving's a challenge.
That's why I try to take,
if we have a 6 a.m. practice,
I try to do that one, because I know
that I can manage through that,
and it'll bother you if you do it.
So I think that's just one of the things
that it's the balance
that we have to find,
and kind of what works for everybody.
Yeah, yeah.
Well, and we've been
that way our whole marriage,
and I think, in my opinion,
I think the best marriages
and the best of
relationships, it's a give and take.
Absolutely. Right.
If it's all take, it's not gonna be good.
So, I can't take advantage
of you by, you're a robot,
and I'm like, you just
keep going with it, honey,
you've got it.
(laughs)
Because it does
eventually catch up to me.
I can just probably sustain it
maybe a little longer than you can.
Yeah.
But everybody needs that.
And so hopefully people
got that around the holidays,
but know that that's, I
think, a very real struggle,
and a very real struggle,
particularly at these years.
I think forward, and I don't
want to wish away time at all.
I kind of love the
chaos that this time brings,
and I know that I
won't-- Speak for yourself.
Probably. I love the times.
I don't know if I love the chaos.
I keep reminding myself
that this doesn't last forever.
Yeah.
The retirement will come,
the children will be gone,
you know, and married
with their own families,
and we're gonna be
staring at each other going,
wow, what, how did we do it all?
And maybe we'll feel rested then.
Maybe.
And I think we will, and
I think everybody will.
I mean, that's just the way, I mean,
that's the way of the world.
You know when you talk
to my mom or other people
that have been through
this process already,
they know it's just this
time of life, you know?
I don't always wanna
make it sound as though
the time that we're
living in is always busier
than the other people,
but there is no doubt
that 1980s when we all grew up,
or the 90s when we grew up,
technology has brought this
world to a faster pace, right?
We are accomplishing how
many multiple times more
than we used to.
I mean, we talked on phones on the walls,
and if I wasn't at home
next to that phone on the wall,
in fact, I'm not even answer that.
If nobody got to it in time,
you didn't get a hold of me,
and we were just gone.
You talked about latchkey kids, I mean,
again, I'm aware that
I'm talking so much here,
but I love the fact that we're Gen Xers.
Gen Xers are really taking a lot of pride
in how we grew up, you know?
Coming home with the street lamps.
Parents had no idea where we were.
We just got on our bike somewhere.
But we kinda came up
hard because, not hard,
but we learned the way of the world.
Right, there was a lot
more, I think, trial by error
when we were kids.
We actually talked about this quite a bit
when we're camping, and outside,
you growing up in
Colorado, were climbing mountains
and stuff from a very young age,
doing things that, and I don't
necessarily consider myself
a helicopter parent, but if I heard,
if I knew my kids were
doing some of the, you know,
risky things that you were doing by
climbing a mountain,
I would freak out.
I don't know how, I mean, I was like, no!
Well, we've talked about that,
and my mom's here right now,
so when we get done with this,
we can go ask her, but I
would never have let my kids do
some of the things I did,
especially climb that mountain
at that age.
Yeah, there's rattlesnakes everywhere.
Yeah, I mean, there's
a reason why, you know,
there's stories of me
climbing rocks, you know,
lifting myself up onto a
rock and sitting on a cactus,
and, you know, rolling
down the side of the mountain,
crying because I had, you know,
a thousand cactuses in my butt.
Great visual.
We'll cut that.
You're welcome, everyone at home.
My behind, my rear side.
You can say butt, it's okay.
Yeah, okay.
It's all right, yeah, but, you know--
Oh, you said it again.
I know, I've just said it twice.
That's a great dad joke.
All right, that one will get cut.
All right, let's keep going.
Love actually is going
through my head right now.
I could've just gone
ahead and said the F word,
and then we'd all be in real trouble.
Yeah, I think those
years when we were kids
and we were out playing and, you know,
doing all kinds of
crazy things on a mountain
and getting, sitting on cactuses,
it's different than today's generation
and our children are more
plugged into technology.
We are more plugged into technology
and I think that
makes a lot of challenges
from that work-life balance perspective.
I mean, you'll hold your
phone at nine o'clock at night
and still get an email or a, you know,
team's message from a colleague
and you think you have to answer it.
Yeah, and that's where I was going,
exactly what you were saying there,
this is a busy time in
life historically, right?
Yeah, I mean, I think about the generations,
childbearing, child
raising years are busy years,
but what we do now with all our
plugged-in capabilities
and to your point, I
mean, you're constantly
getting pinged by people you work with
and if they're not emailing
you, they know after hours
they're gonna team
you or they'll text you.
I mean, next thing you know,
they're gonna be
showing you at the front door
because they're just
constantly expect to get a hold of you.
And so I think, I feel like it is busy,
but it's amplified even
more so than maybe it was
when we grew up and that
creates even more of a work-life
issue. Yep.
And it's true and I
think one of the things
that I always talk to
people about, you know,
if they ask me, how do you balance it?
And I always start with everyone's
balance looks different
and you know, as if you're
climbing the corporate ladder
or you know, and there's
been times in my career
where I said, you know
what, I'm gonna hit pause
on any type of
vertical movement, you know,
it was because I was balancing
and I needed that
balance to look different.
I needed to lean in to family.
I mean, we had three
kids in under four years
and so there was a time
at work where I was like,
I just feel like I'm
constantly on maternity leave.
I can't be focusing on a promotion
because that's not where I'm needed.
Yeah.
And I think that's
also then conversations
with your spouse or
significant other is, you know,
when to lean in because there's times
when your spouse needs
to lean in more to work
and so it's, you're
balancing not only just work-life
but then even balancing within the family
to make sure you have adequate coverage.
And even that, I
mean, you hit on a thing.
Obviously we both work, right?
So we're a dual income family.
We both work at fairly high levels.
We both have employees that report to us.
So there's a lot going on
and maybe even that's
changed a little bit more
since the 80s and 90s
when it wasn't as normal
for there to be two
working parents, right?
So you had a parent that
was able to, and even now,
we have a lot of
friends that are, you know,
stay-at-home moms and I don't use that
in a negative connotation.
I don't know what else to call them,
but I will say, and
they will tell you too,
they are crazy busy.
They are.
Right, they've got a
million things to do.
So they're keeping
themselves busy one way or the other.
Right, and it goes back
to what you said last time.
It takes a village
because I work outside the home.
I guess that's a weird
phrase since I work at home
but I think you all get the point.
I can't donate as much
of my time to the schools
and be involved in some
of the things at the school
that my stay-at-home mom friends do
and I rely heavily on them
to help keep me plugged in
and to make sure that
they're kind of then my eyes
and ears out there to make
sure that there's no trouble.
There's nothing that
I'm not aware of going on
at the school because
I'm not there as much.
So it is hard to be a stay-at-home parent
and it's hard to be a working parent.
And so I'm just glad
that we actually have both
because we need both.
Our son, we mentioned on the last episode
that he just has his girlfriend,
first high school girlfriend,
and Monday the kids didn't have school.
And so he asked if he
could have his girlfriend over
and they were just gonna
hang out, watch a movie.
I could let you tell the
first part of the story
and how her mom dropped her off.
It was pretty funny.
It all kind of came together quickly.
And I watched her pull up,
the girlfriend's mom
pulled up in our driveway
and she let her out
and she came to the door.
I stood up in my office
because my office is at
the front of the house,
yours is at the back.
I was just waving at her
through the window saying,
I got her, we're here,
adult her at the house.
I don't think she saw me
because I was watching her.
She pulled back out to leave the driveway
and she stopped.
I'm like, oh, what's going on here?
She got out of her car and came to the
front door basically.
And to your point, I
was still on my sweats
and I hadn't taken a shower yet that day.
I don't know what time she
came over, but like one--
It was like one or two in the afternoon.
It was late.
It was beyond PJ time.
I've been burning the
candle a little bit,
doing all these extra things for the
podcasts and whatnot,
which I love doing,
but there's a big learning curve here
and a lot to kind of get in place
to hopefully make it be
done right and whatnot.
But anyways, I was
embarrassed to some degree
that, yeah, I'm not even ready
and it's 1.30 in the afternoon.
And she actually made the comment to me.
She's like, oh, did you
guys both work from home
or are you just eating chips and dip
on the, watching Netflix today?
I know, yeah.
No, I'm just turning into
Fat Thor, thank you very much.
Yeah, that's exactly right.
Fat Thor is a great one.
So yeah, so that was interesting,
but she dropped the girlfriend off
and then that's where
you're going with your story.
Yeah, so then I think go
into where they're watching
a movie and they are on
a beanbag chair together.
It's a big beanbag chair,
but still on a beanbag chair.
And I think I was gone.
I was at soccer
practice later in the evening,
but what we don't wanna be though,
is those parents'
house where anything goes.
Right, right.
Because I know growing
up, the person's house,
when I was in high school in junior high,
where anything went.
Everybody knew, let's go to her house
and we'll go to their basement.
They had very loose rules.
Right, and we don't have
loose rules at this house.
Yeah, so more to come on that one.
We're kind of learning.
I mean, we've been
through that in our lifetimes,
but it's just an awkward,
it's awkward conversations in situations
to be in with your child.
And I'm glad, because our
kids are pretty open with us
about some of these things.
Way more open than I
ever was with my parents.
And I don't know what
your household was like.
I know what mine was like at that age.
And we did not have those
open lines of communication,
period, let alone to talk about things
that were more sensitive subjects
like that would have been.
Well, you have to remember,
I was a bit of an ugly duckling
and I didn't really come into my own
or anything like that
until much, much later.
So I'm in unchartered
territory and I don't really know.
Because at 14, I didn't have a boyfriend.
Right, right.
Rightly so, if you've
ever seen my freshman year
of high school picture.
Gosh, I hope it doesn't
ever make it to the internet.
Anyway. Yeah, it's right here.
We'll put it up. There we go.
So anyway, but the kids
finally went back to school then
on Tuesday. Yeah.
And I don't know about you,
but I feel a little bit
like the scene in Wayne's World
when they're like, game on.
Because just as we got
two days under our belt.
Game off.
Game off, yeah.
And they pull everything off, right?
It was totally that scene
because we've now had a snow day
for the last two days.
Yeah, two snow days, two
snow days now in Texas.
Which it was valid.
We got two, three inches of snow.
Valid for Texas.
Minnesota, Colorado.
There. Ridiculous.
Right. Ridiculous.
Now granted, I will note
the caveats that I get it.
Don't send me things saying,
Texas doesn't have the
equipment to clear the roads
and all that kind of stuff.
I get it, there's not a
bunch of snow clouds around,
but they do ice, they do pre
spray for ice and all that.
And I also get, if it's icy,
no matter how good of
a driver are you can.
But that being said,
those two caveats being said,
it is ridiculous how scared Texans are
of stuff falling from the sky.
Let it be frozen like snow
in the last two days or water.
It's true. They freak out.
It's true. Worst drivers ever.
We knew that when I lived in Colorado,
before I ever lived in Texas.
It's like, oh, this car, oh, flying by.
Hey, actually. You know they're bad?
You know the horrible driver?
You knew they're from Texas.
Sure enough, license plate from Texas.
Yeah, that's funny.
I don't think we got
many Texans up in Minnesota,
so I wasn't aware of the stereotype.
They probably can't even stay on the road
to get up there long enough.
It's too icy or snowy.
Yeah, they ran out the road
or got in a car wreck
or something like that.
Terrible drivers is the point.
So, I mean, gosh, maybe I just squashed
my own theory there,
but Texas is protecting their people
because they're such bad drivers.
You put them on the road with an inch.
I mean, the year we moved here,
they canceled school for two years.
This was eight years ago,
for literally a
quarter of an inch of snow.
Quarter of an inch.
You remember that?
We were still in
corporate housing at that point.
Yeah, I really remember
it because I cut that.
(laughing)
We will cut that, but I'm
gonna leave in the discussion
that we're cutting it
because that was like the first,
who said something that maybe be
sensitive to viewers?
And it was you, just for the record,
because it's usually me
screaming something out.
Some of these indoor soccer
game comments come to my mind,
which I can't obviously
repeat here, but everybody goes,
like, "What did Shawn say?"
I'm like, "That was
totally acceptable 20 years ago."
So it was you, that's
all I wanna point out.
Yeah, yeah.
So the snow days, we had the
kids at home another two days.
So we had the problem
with children in the office
and all of that, which-
So straight back to the
beginning of this conversation,
right? Right.
We were so happy because
the kids were going back
to school. Yep.
And then they came back home.
Right.
And then, I think, I
think this is the first time
our children have ever
played us against each other
in a very real way.
Oh, yeah.
And so both of us had busy days
and they were passing me post-it note.
They were trying to tell
me that they were invited
to their friend's house.
Well, then they go into your office
and indicate that mom was okay
if we go over to our friend's house.
Are you okay?
Long story short, they had
this whole thing planned out
and ended up getting picked
up by their friend's parents.
And we never even agreed to
the fact that they could go.
Yeah, we had no idea.
So, I mean, let's just
first back up and just say,
love these friends.
Love them. Love these parents.
Nothing wrong with that.
Love that they can spend
time with them and thank you.
They very- Yes, they're fantastic.
They had a great time.
But, and I said it to
the mom when I went outside
because they're like, we're going
straight to sledding
and Liam doesn't have socks on.
And I was like, well, I'm sorry.
I literally just learned
about everything that's happening
two minutes ago, right?
So we had to go back inside
and we were inside for five more minutes
packing the right stuff
because our kids were like,
like you said, they were
negotiating and arranging all this
via text with their
friends behind the scenes
while they're like,
mom gave the thumbs up.
And then, oh, it
didn't even stop at that.
All of a sudden they're like,
oh, and we're gonna
spend the night there.
And for the record, I
never gave the thumbs up.
They were the ones
who gave me a thumbs up.
I'm staring at my screen, right?
And I can just see out of my peripheral
them standing behind me or in
front of me going like this.
I don't know what this means.
Like, and so I ignored
them as a great mom should do.
Cause clearly this ended up in a,
in a situation where my
kids invited themselves
to someone's house.
And clearly this is a
situation where ignorance
or ignoring them, you
know, means agreeance.
So we have since had the conversation
that that is not to happen again.
And so I will, how do you
think I handled that conversation
with the kids today?
Is that okay?
It was good.
And this, yeah, it was great.
And you know, this is part
of that good cop, bad cop
that we talk about to some
degree, because you and I,
there's, there's a few
things like I would say
over our 20 year relationship,
there's a handful of things.
There's four or five things that,
that we will squabble about
and we get along really well.
And probably in an,
to an annoying degree,
maybe to some other people,
like we just don't fight that much.
We're okay.
I remember somebody once asked, you know,
do you have any, what's
your, what's your success?
What's your, what's your suggestion
for success in marriage?
And I looked at you and I
came up with it pretty quickly.
And I said, it's okay to tie.
You know what I mean?
Like you don't have to
have a winner of every fight.
I think that's something that I've kind
of tried to live by,
you know, through the years.
So it's okay to tie.
And that's something
that I've kind of lived by,
you know, for our whole relationship.
And I think we both do.
It's okay.
Like there's times when we'll
just walk away and, you know,
I'm sure if there is
videos on each of our faces,
we're both, both
rolling our eyes or, you know,
it's a good thing.
Internal, not a lot.
I'd better roll my eyes.
Yeah, neither have I.
But the point there was, you know,
there's a handful of things that we know
that we squabble about.
And one of them for
me, and you know this,
is the good cop, bad cop.
Like I am the bad cop parent.
I lay down the law.
And sometimes I feel like I got to lay
down the law too much.
And I'm like, can you jump in here?
Just let them know you feel the same way.
You know, even though
you're standing back there,
I don't know that they
understand that it's not just dad.
Dad's the one that's always mad.
You know what I mean?
So I did appreciate today,
because it was one, I don't want to say
one of the few times,
but it is not the norm
to get the talk from mom.
So I mean, they both
sat there, were like,
we're in trouble.
Yeah, in fact, our
daughter was nearly crying.
So I thought it landed maybe.
Not that I like to make them cry,
but you know what?
When they mess up, they need to know,
and they need to know
what the consequences are.
So hopefully I did all right on that.
Yeah, I'm just curious how
that works in households.
If there's just
always a good cop, bad cop,
or if it's like, or if
that changes, you know,
you really need to have rules at times.
You know, you're
gonna be a bad cop today.
Because I've actually
literally asked you at times,
"Can you just please go be the bad cop?"
Take that and run with it for the moment.
Right.
I knew how it was in my house growing up.
We always had the same
good cop and bad cop.
It was always pretty.
We did too.
So maybe, for the
listeners, I don't know.
Maybe it changes.
But maybe that bad cop sometimes wants
the good cop just to be, you know, a
little bit more annoyed cop.
Rather than just so positive because bad
cop is like the worst.
Bad cop's not a fun place to be.
As we unpack
topics, I mean, I think
work-life balance, we've spent some quite
a bit of time on that this time and
because I think it's really
important and something that a
lot of people struggle with.
And
you can tell it's top of mind for us and
how that feeds into the
family and the family life and
how you can balance it all. Well, it'll
always be a topic, right? Because I think
the way life works, at least for me, is
you're struggling,
you're hiking to get to that
horizon, right? You're like, just if I
can just get over, if I can just get done
with this or I can just do that,
if I can just get to
that horizon, then I'm
sailing free, you know, then I've made it
at that point in time. And every time I
get to that horizon, I look up,
and then I get there's another horizon.
Hey, thank you for saying that. That's
probably the saying. I just
didn't use the correct saying.
But there's false summits
and I think because of that,
you're always gonna be struggling with
the work-life because there's something
new. That next summit
puts something in, like our soccer
practices, for instance. Right now,
all three, two soccer and
track are at the same place.
But at some point, eventually, that's
gonna change and that's gonna completely
reshuffle our work-life
balance. Because right now, again,
thank you to the carpool people and thank
you for the gentleman who drove this week
because I know he asked if somebody else
could and we couldn't.
So, you know, again, it takes a village
on that kind of stuff.
And my point is we hamper on it now, but
I think six months from now, it's still
an issue and six years from now,
it's probably still an issue. Yes. Yep.
Every phase, I think, with
raising children, marriage, and career is
different. Yeah. And
it's how do you be agile
and work through it and
yet still maintain the important
relationships? I mean,
we talk about it. We know that this is a
very busy, very busy time.
Have we ever mentioned that? I think so.
Okay. Once or twice. Okay.
But coming into
retirement, you get some time back,
but you also can't only invest in your
kids and their lives
because once they move on,
and this is something that
we try to keep top of mind,
we, as a husband and wife, need to keep
our relationship strong because that
lasts longer than the craziness of having
our kids in our house.
Yeah. Oh, for sure. And so
continuing to find
time to invest in that and
grow together through all of
the chaos and the times that
this
timeframe and life bring is really
important. And we can go down that
tangent probably on another
episode to some degree here,
but I mean, we were really good, really
up maybe to the last year or so,
but we've almost always carved out time
to have date night. Yes.
If nothing else, date night.
And I think another
thing that's big for us,
not to give away all of our secrets here,
but I think another thing
that's big for us, which honestly,
I've heard from quite a few people that I
don't think it's the norm.
We go to bed at the same time every
single night together.
Yes. Yes. And that is, I,
that's just something
that works for us, right?
I think everyone has their thing, but
that is huge for us because we get that
time of whether it's
getting ready for bed.
We're brushing our teeth together. We
read together in bed. Right. Well, we
read separate books, but we
still read at the same time.
I read aloud to you until you get sleepy.
Not that cheesy. Oh my God. That's not
cheesy. That's something else.
But it is good time together to reset.
And there's a song from Ed
Sheeran called Tides, and he says,
but time stands to
still when I'm with you.
And that is how I think about that time
that we have that 30 minutes or whatever
it is of just getting ready for bed,
reading in bed, or it's just us.
Yeah. And we get back to us. Yeah.
And maybe that works for us because
throughout our relationship and other
people's relationship are different.
Like you said, like they may have that 20
minutes together somewhere else in the
day that they don't need to have that at
nighttime or again,
like we talked earlier.
Some people, I know your mom, she's a
night owl. Oh, very much so.
You know, so she likes to stay up late
and, you know, your dad goes
to bed a little bit earlier.
And I don't know what they did their
whole life, but I know in this in this
chapter of their life, that's how it is.
And it works fine for them. They are a
lovely couple that
loves each other. Right.
So there's nothing. I mean, each
everybody has their own way.
But I think what we're trying to say is
find your spot. Yes.
Find that moment. Right.
Find those date nights.
Find that moment in every day.
I mean, that's that's
an everyday thing for us.
We go to bed every day together and
that's 20 minutes that we get to just
kind of unwind and, you know, and we do
have rules in that, too.
It's like we don't bring we don't talk
about work in bed because we talk about
work everywhere else.
Everywhere else. It's dinging on us.
They're texting us. I
mean, everywhere else.
I mean, you know, you have to have some
rules around things like that.
Not that we're that strict, but I mean,
that is one that I think is a good one.
That's a good hard stop.
Yeah. Like, OK, is this really a work?
We're not doing a work conversation.
It's so we will we'll pivot and stop and
we can pick that one up then
the next day if we need to.
So yeah, I think that's it's really
important to have that time
because we need to ensure that we are
fulfilling the most important
relationships in our life.
Yeah. Yeah. That's right.
Well, we're on the same page for that,
too. So that's good.
It's good to know. High five.
Number one on the podcast.
I do love a good high five.
It's just that clapping thing
that we do with all the kids.
Like, it makes that like hand clap noise.
Yes. Yeah, that's like a thing.
I mean, there's a lot of stupid things
that kids do these days.
And that's one of that's a thing.
Yeah. Yeah. We actually had a
competition, a hand clapping competition.
Little insight into our family.
We are quite competitive.
Game night usually ends in tears and
fights in our house.
We've almost outlawed it to this point.
There's too many fights.
Too many fights.
So, you know, I mean, in
those circles that we run in,
most of the families we
know are the same way, too.
Yeah. So I don't
think we're unique there.
It does help give me some comfort that
people are like that.
And it reminded me of our kids who they
went sledding with their
friend, their best friends.
Yes. They're great people.
The the they have like a
family texting string, right?
Ours is like with everybody in our
family, like our immediate family.
It's the English. It's
all it says is English.
So it's our kids and us.
But theirs is.
Let's just we use our
name for the example.
But what was it like?
The English is always win or what is it?
Yes. It's what it is. Yeah.
That's what it is. The name of the group
is English is always win.
But with their last name, right?
Which is hilarious.
So I don't understand.
Everybody's competitive. Yes.
But I still need to send them some of
those pics that I took of our kids
beating them at
bowling, bowling, skeet ball.
What else was there?
There's a couple of other things to you,
but I can't remember what.
Yeah. The one where you
knock the clowns down.
I think they beat us
in that one for sure.
But that's true. We did take a loss.
We took an L on that. We took
a loss on that one for sure.
That's funny. It's good to know.
And again, that's one reason why we like
to do this podcast is because
hopefully people are
finding that to be relatable.
I know I felt fantastic when I finally
heard that other
people can't do game night.
I was feeling like a failure
of a mother because I'm like,
my kids always start fighting and crying
and they hate this and it should be fun.
But after talking to people and they're
like, well, that's how it always ends
in our house, too. And I
was like, oh, thank goodness.
I thought it was just us.
That's a really good point. Not to not
not to gloss over that by any means.
That's a really good point, because there
are times like literally I'm like,
are we just crazy? Like, are we just
raising the most hellion of kids?
Like they're so misbehaved, you know,
they're spoiled brats.
And I think they behave really well,
actually, when they're
out in the real world.
It's at home. They kind
of let their guard down.
But when other people say that, you know,
they can't have game night either, too,
that actually gave me
a little bit of relief.
So to your point, I think that's just
some of the things
that just come out of this
that, you know, maybe we're all a little
bit more like and normal
than we all think we are.
Right. Right.
And sometimes it's good
to hear that you're normal.
Sometimes, you know, you're normal.
Are you? I thought you
said you wanted to hear that.
Yes. It's good to hear it.
I hope I'm. I'm above normal.
I'm above average. Are
you above normal then?
Well, you are, too. I mean,
I wouldn't have married you.
Is that the gushing on you counter?
There it is. I had to
get one. I had one. OK.
So all that to say, I think the more
content that we try to put out,
it's it's really to help
people know that you're not alone.
And what you're going through is people.
People are feeling the same way.
Sometimes that's enough.
Yeah. You feel like you have the strength
to make it through another day.
Yeah. Yeah. Because we are
just making it up as we go.
And the only plug I would put there,
because I know we're coming to the close
of the first quarter here, let everybody
take a bathroom break.
We've got about an hour and a
half left. But no, we don't.
But, you know, as if
people want to hear things,
I hope they reach out like we're happy to
discuss certain things,
you know, on this podcast.
So if there's people that we know, you
know, text us, that's fine.
We're happy to talk about some of this
stuff. It's kind of fun.
I mean, we've like I said, we've got a
lot of positive feedback back,
which has been interesting and I don't
want to say surprising,
but it's just been really
nice. It's been a relief.
But also, you know, on the website, I
mean, you can go to the website
and, you know, contact
us that way via the email.
So feel free, you know, to send us some
some of those questions and whatnot.
And we'll be more than happy to discuss
some of those things as best as we can.
Again, disclaimer.
I'm not a professional mom and I haven't
studied being, you know,
all I have is my own experience, and I
think that's what we're going for.
I'm a half expert on myself. That's
really where it stops.
A half expert? I'd say
you're 100 percent expert.
I don't know. There's times I'm like, I
don't know what I'm doing.
I feel like that all the time. Yeah. OK.
So, hey, you're not alone. Yeah.
You're normal. Oh,
well, you're above normal.
That's the rudest thing
anybody's ever said to me.
You're above normal.
Just slightly, though.
But we would love to hear from the
audience and the listeners
about what things
that are on their minds.
All right. So we give
everybody a bathroom break.
Let them come back. Well,
let's just come back next week.
Let's just come back next week. Yeah.
We'll have a lot more to talk about.
We have a birthday coming up next week.
You sounded like Mr. Rogers there almost.
We'll have a lot more to talk about.
And so will you. I'm not
going to say on the podcast.
I promise. Not yet.
I don't think anyone wants to hear that.
But I mean, we're going to have
another teenager in her
house, so her daughter turns 13.
That's right. We cannot sign off without
saying we got another birthday this
weekend, another teenager in the house.
She's been a teenager
for two years, though.
Wow. The girls just always
grow up faster than boys.
I feel like she has been
worldly since she was about four.
Yeah. Socially. Yes. Mentally.
Her attitude, Ali.
Yeah, she she can
definitely have the attitude.
Yeah. Dramaly. Yep.
Yeah, we definitely get
some drama. Yeah. Yeah.
But so we have that.
But happy birthday to you,
baby girl. Happy birthday.
But then also you're headed to Las Vegas
with our youngest son.
Oh, yeah. Let's figure out we may have to
do this via Skype next week.
I don't know. I'll be in Vegas to the
next three. Yeah. Weekends.
Yeah, we actually joke that you may as
well just stay there
and fly the kids home
since you only have about what, a 72 hour
reprieve from Vegas.
Yeah, we considered it. But yeah.
So lots to talk about, lots to unpack.
So everyone will hear about the
shenanigans of Sean traveling
with the kids and the
soccer parents, soccer parents.
Indicate all the soccer team to Vegas.
Yeah. Where it'll be 32 in the morning.
So it'll be it'll be warmer here in
Dallas than it will be in Las Vegas.
So yeah, after all the snow
melts. Yeah. So you'll be fine.
You will find out more
with your MRI next week.
So we're to come on that more than likely
a surgery coming the next.
X X amount of weeks.
I'm on a week's exactly.
So lots more to come.
Yeah. We'll talk about the headaches of
our medical system on next episode.
Because I know you've
been having fun doing that.
And you're you're kind
of in that industry. So.
Yeah. No one needs to hear me go off on
how frustrating it is,
because really, most people have talked
to me one on one, have
already heard it from me, for sure.
Yeah. Yeah. All right.
Well, let's sign off.
All right. Until next week,
everyone. Take care. See ya.