Derek Beaton - The Wisdom of My Father

Foreign.

Welcome to the Man Talk Show. I'm Connor Beaton, and joining me today is my dad. So as I step into fatherhood at the end of this month, I thought it would be really interesting to interview my father and talk to him about everything, dad life, what it was like for him to become a father, what that transition looked like for him in his life, what his relationship was like with his dad and how he would describe that relationship and how the dynamic with his father changed when he became a father, when that role shifted for him as well. And so this is just a really good look into one man's experience transitioning into dad life. We have some good stories that come along with this from his childhood. So, yeah, so this is Mr. Derek Beaton, my dad, joining me to talk all about fatherhood. There's some fun stories from his life, from my life, and we just talk a little bit about not only those pieces, but how the transition can go, what it looks like, some of the challenges. He shares some good perspective of the struggles that he had moving into fatherhood. So whether you are a dad, whether you are becoming a dad, whether you're thinking about it, whether you. Whether you're a mom, this is just a great episode to dive in to what it's like for a man to become a father. All right, dad, welcome to my podcast.

All right, how's it going? E.

Just busting out the Canadian. Just, just so. Just.

You have to. That's how it is, man.

Just so my listeners in the UK and Australia and. And Europe all know where I'm from. Yeah, good, good. How are you doing today?

Hey, great. Excellent.

Good, good. Wonderful. Well, since I always start the show off in the same way, we're probably going to do that today, but for. For everyone that's. That's listening, you know, obviously, as I prefaced on this conversation, I'm becoming a father. And so I thought it'd be kind of cool to have you on dad and to. To have some of your wisdom be imparted on the show and to have, like, a generational conversation about becoming a dad. Unfortunately, Grandpa isn't with us anymore, so we couldn't include him in the conversation, although I feel like he'd have some interesting things to say as well.

Well, and if you had Grandpa on here, if you had my dad on here, you need a lot more time, right?

Yeah. Which. Which we might talk. Which we might talk about. We'll get. We'll get to that.

So, I mean, this is going to be just a conversation, just like you and I were sitting down and having a beer or having a scotch and talking about becoming a dad, so. All right, before we get into all that jazz, I have to ask you the question. I can't let you off the hook just because you're my dad. So I have to ask you the question that I ask all my guests, which is tell us a story about a defining moment in your life that made you who you are.

Wow. Well, I guess that as you know, I just turned 67, so I guess there's been quite a few of them along the way. But I think one of the earliest defining moments in my life was when I lost a job. I worked in the 80s, I worked for a big stereo company and we sold stereos and records and all kinds of stuff. And I worked for them for four and a half years all over Western Canada. And I worked in Saskatoon and Winnipeg and Edmonton and Grand Prairie and worked really hard for four and a half years. And four and a half years I had in continuous days off. Once I had one week and that was the one week I took off to get married. And other than that I worked every week. And you got two days off a week. And I got, I got Sundays and Wednesdays and I worked at that for four and a half years. And finally the company closed and I was without work. And having worked so much, so many hours for so long, I was kind of an odds and ends. And I did a number of other jobs. I was a mortgage broker for a while and I tried to sell life insurance, which really didn't work. And I did a number of things. And then I got a permanent job with the federal government and I really began to realize what I had missed by working so much. And we didn't. You weren't born at that time. We didn't, you know, we didn't have any kids. But you know, between the two of us, all we did was work. And I really, once I got a nine to five, five day a week job and that was, you know, in my late 20s, I think I was 27 or 28 at that point. It really, really did define for me that when I was doing so much work, I was having a lot of fun. It's true. I love the stereo business, I love the record business, I love the audio business. It was just fantastic. But I realized that it's not as much fun as it was. I couldn't really see what I was missing out on or what life could be like otherwise because I was so busy working and I kind of promised myself at that point in time that I would not do that again. And I did have other opportunities to leave the civil service and go do other things that would have taken, you know, put me sort of back into that role again. But, you know, I guess, you know, today's conversation is with young people is frequently about work, life, balance. And you hear about this in the workplace all the time. And I guess I kind of figured that out in the 80s that, you know, if you just work all the time, yeah, you can be successful and you can make a lot of money. You know, in 1981 I made 43 and a half thousand dollars. I don't know what would that would be in today's money, but it would be, it would be quite a bit. I mean, I had more money than I knew what to do with in 1981, so. But you know, there's a price to be paid for that. And I simply decided that it wasn't worth it. And you know, when Joanne and I got married, we simply made the decision at that point in time that whichever one of us careers took off, the other one would be in the supporting role.

Because I saw that working like that all the time.

Simply wouldn't for me anyway.

Be, you know, somewhere where I could operate and still raise a family. And so when Joanne's career took off, as you know, she's probably one of the premier IT integration specialists and strategists in the country. And you know, and it's, I think she would say.

Thankfully, I think she, you know, she would recognize that because one of us just decided not to take on that much work, but rather to be there to support the family, which has been my role for 30 something years. I think that allowed us to see through the forest from the trees from a family perspective. And you're kind of going towards being a dad today. And I think that allowed me to be a dad. Now, I don't know whether I was a good one or not, but I mean, I think it allowed me the time to think about being a dad at least, and what I was doing. And if I had continued to work 60 or 70, 80 hours a week, I never would have been able to do that. So that was a defining moment in my life and it's really set a tone for the, for the rest of my life as well.

Long answer to a short question. Sorry about that.

No, no, no, it's, it's good, it's good. I mean, I think there's a lot of interesting parts in there that we could dive into. Actually, I just wanted to say $42,000 in 1980 equates to about $133,000 today. $132,000 today.

Yeah, exactly.

That's insane to me. I was born in 80. That's. I was born in 83. So to think that when I was born that, I mean, that's. Inflation is one, one heck of a.

No, no kidding. I mean, even in those days, I mean, I was driving, I was driving a 15 year old car. We lived in a, we lived in a small one bedroom apartment in Saskatoon with your mom there for a year and a half and I mean, she was working at the bank and between the two of us, holy mackerel, like, we just had more money. We thought we did anyway, you know, like we, we just thought we had the world by the tail. But of course, the price for that, you know, the price for that is that you're just working, you're in the store seven days a week and you're there at 9:00 clock in the morning and you're there at 9:30 clock at night, and that's just what your life is.

Yeah.

You know, so there's a. Grandpa used to say there's a price to be paid for everything.

Yep, very true, very true. Yeah. I mean, it's interesting. I think a lot of people talk about work, life balance today, and as we enter into this conversation about becoming a dad, you know, I'm interested to get more of your, your idea on that because I think that's one of the things that, you know, I've really started to look at becoming a father. You know, we're less than 60 days away from having a child. I'm fortunate enough I'm going to be taking a sabbatical to, to be with Vienna and, and our child when it arrives for, you know, for four to six weeks. And, but at the same time, you know, I look at our lifestyle and we, we both work quite a bit and yeah, I'm sort of looking at when Vienna goes back to work and, you know, all those looming questions are there. And so I'm sure we'll get to that towards the end of the podcast because I know the listeners will want to hear about that. But I wanted this conversation to be wisdom about fatherhood from my father. And so let's, let's just dive in. So let's, let's talk about, let's start easy. All right. What was your favorite part of being a dad? For you, what was the favorite part of of becoming a father.

Oh, my gosh. That's. That's really hard to say.

My gosh. I guess my favorite part of being a dad is when my kids were really little, when my kids were really small. And I. And I have to. This. This is a bit oxymoronic for me because I don't feature myself as really being particularly adept with small children. I don't know that I really relate to small children necessarily all that well. I think Joanne's much better at that than I am. But, you know, I really loved when my kids were little, and I loved that magic of discovery that, you know, the little. Little, you know, from sort of really from their first days on into four or five, six or seven. And, you know, as they grow up, they really have this wonderment of the world around them, and every day is a discovery. And then there's a new color and there's a new sensation and there's a new word and there's. And just that opening up of that, you know, that little personality in mind is just pretty special, pretty fascinating and pretty wonderful.

Yeah. Awesome. I think that's part of. Part of what I'm looking forward to as well.

Yeah. And I think this, if I have a. Can have a second part of that. I think the second part, Favorite part of being a dad is now that my kids are grown up and are really wonderful people in this world.

It'S really great for me as a dad now to have a completely different relationship with my children where.

We can actually move from the dad, daughter, dad, son relationship more into. More into a friend, mentor, like we're doing today. Conversational. What can I learn? What can I know? What can you tell me? And that's also a really, really great part of being a dad.

Awesome. Awesome. Well.

I think those are all pieces I'm looking forward to. But what I hear you saying is that the parts in the middle where the kids are loud and freaking obnoxious and fighting constantly are challenging.

Yeah. Teenage years just suck, man. I.

Of course. Of course I'm being. Of course I'm being facetious, but I, you know, there are. There are aspects of parenting through time that are particularly challenging. And half the time, for me, anyway, you have no idea what the hell to do. So, you know, we used to talk at work about one of the special characteristics of senior managers, you know, senior leaders was managing an ambiguity. And you kind of feel like I did anyway. Feel like you're doing that as a parent half the time because. Okay, what do we do now? Oh, Okay. I have no idea. Well, okay, let's do this. See what happens. If it doesn't work, we'll try something else.

All right, well, tell me a little bit about where, where you were at in life when you became a father and what it was like for you to enter into fatherhood. Because I think it's such a. It's. I think it's such a huge transition and for, for a lot of men, I mean, for women as well. But this, this is the man talk show. We're talking about what it's like to become a dad. So where were you in life when you became a father?

How old were you?

What was happening? And. And then what was it like?

Yeah, I was. I was 28. 28 29. We had just moved back to Edmonton from Winnipeg. I had just started a job with the civil service. Your mom, of course, was working for the bank. I really wanted to wait. Like, I really felt at 28, 29, I was really not ready to have children because I just had not grow up. And if you talk to my wife, she'll say that's most of the time probably still true. But I really didn't think I was ready to be a dad. I was too busy again working and partying and riding dirt bikes and hanging out with my pals and you know, doing all that kind of stuff. But, you know, life just doesn't work that way, does it? You know, so you, so you know, at 28, 29, you become a dad and, you know, you instantly get this realization in just a very brief moment of time that. And you'll encounter this, I think quite quickly that for me anyway, it became very quickly obvious that I was no longer the most important person in my own life. And that.

Really changes how you look at everything. But I guess in the early days I didn't feel like I was really ready to be a father. We were just too busy doing other stuff. And did that color my behavior as a younger dad? Geez, I don't know. I mean, maybe in some ways, I guess, but you know, I think we did pretty well in the first year or two. And then of course, to complicate all that, my relationship with your mom was falling apart at the same time. Not due to the fact that we had a baby, but simply due to our own, Our own issues. I don't think having a child caused any. Any repair or any damage to our relationship. I think we were. We were kind of headed south.

So I can. Anyway, I can stop blaming myself for the divorce. Is what you're saying?

Yeah, yeah, well, I, you know, I think children always do. And, and the fact of the matter really is that the reverse is absolutely the case. I mean, I don't, in my lifelong experience, I don't ever see a case in my mind where children are ever the motivating factor for a divorce. I think if you go down the list, it's probably pretty low on the totem pole. You know, lack of communication, fighting about money, of jobs, you know, who's got the power. All, I mean, all those things are way up the, way up that list. Before you ever get to arguments over.

Children, I think.

Yeah, I would agree with that based on the people that I've worked with over the years. So, okay, so you're 30 years old, you come sort of kicking and screaming into parenthood.

And, and along, along comes me, I'm the firstborn. Along comes me, also kicking and screaming a little bit here and there. What, what was it like the first few weeks and few months? Like what was, I know I'm taking you back 37 years, but what was it like that the first little while? What, what was surprising to you? What changed? What could you not have prepared for?

Well, holy mackerel, that's a big question, isn't it?

What was I not prepared for? Well, I don't think I was prepared to be a parent. I mean, we had no idea what really functionally what to do with a child. So I mean, like changing diapers and setting up cribs and you know, all that kind of stuff. I mean, we had no knowledge or experience on really what to do. You know, your child's crying, so is he sick? Do you go to the hospital? What is it really? How do you take temperatures? How do you know when they're sick and when they're not? How do you know when they're crying? Just because they're tired, you know, so you're. So you're faced with all these conundrums that you're really, you know, really don't have much of a, much of a solution for. So, you know, like I said, managing an ambiguity. You're kind of running around looking for answers to questions that you've never encountered before. And of course in 1983 there wasn't really an Internet. So you, so you phoned your mom and if you didn't phone your mom, you phoned your sister in law who was a nurse and.

You got expert outside help, right? So everybody talks about being tired all the time and being tired. Well, you know, you are tired all, you know, for the first little while. But we all adapt and adjust our schedules around those things so that, you know, we can all work and everybody's comfortable and, you know, we have time together to, to, to enjoy our newborns. And so we all adapt to that. But the initial process of adapting to that is, is kind of tiring. But I think the biggest thing is just having this, having this completely new focus of just what's love in your life and you finally have a new and precious understanding of what love in your life really means, and one that you've never had before. You know, you, you can fight with your wife, you can fight with your parents, you can fight with your siblings, you can fight with your employees and argument and argue and do whatever you want to do and have conflict, but you can't have conflict with a baby. You can, you can, you know, you can only be there in a calm, you know, present yourself in a calm environment and, and, and just, you just have this big ball of love around. It's just really, just really pretty amazing. And so that would certainly be one of the things that changed my life.

So, yeah, that was gonna be my follow up is like, what changed for you as you entered into fatherhood? Like, what about your identity shifted? What in what changed in your external life besides the like losing sleep part? So it sounds like, it sounds like your, your relationship to how you viewed love and connection and intimacy was, was certainly changed. Thanks. Me.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. Because you have, you know, I think you realize that you have such power because the, you know, this little being is completely depending on you and every decision that you make. And, and you, you know, we can either embrace that as a, as a loving, wonderful responsibility or we can kind of go, holy crap, I'm not really comfortable with that. It's making me, you know, it's making me feel, making me feel pretty uncomfortable. And I think there's both of those things and we have to accept that, you know, it's, that's kind of how it is. There's no special roadmap for this. There is no, I mean, there's lots of books and you can go read them all, but, you know, nothing really.

Prepares you for 3 o' clock in the morning when the baby's crying. And you know, it's kind of how we as parents present ourselves to babies really, is how they react to us. So if we present ourselves as being worried and upset and agitated and maybe even angry because I don't have an answer, like, what the hell do we do now? If you present yourself in that way, the baby's, your little one responds immediately to that. So we kind of have to learn to govern ourselves in a different way, which is to try and present ourselves as much as we can in a, in a calm state. And once we do that, we find our children really react the same. And you know, and you might think back to days when, you know, maybe I lost my temper a little bit or maybe I wasn't happy about things, but you know, the one thing I always tried to do was to not really, not really turn that, turn that on, but rather to keep, you know, try and keep myself on a level keel and not really blow up or explode too much, but rather just stay, try and stay the same. Even if I wasn't happy inside, I would just try and try and stay the same because that's it, you know, that's the other thing that kids have to have. You know, they have to have consistency. If you're one way about something today and another way about something tomorrow, it just doesn't work. And it's the same with employees in the workplace. It's the same with managing your superiors, managing laterally and horizontally in an organization, you have to be the same all the time. And when you're not, that's very, very confusing. So yeah, tonight you can stay up till 9:30 and watch television, but tomorrow night you have to go to bed at 7 and then the night after, because it's Friday, you can stay up till 11 and then the night after. Well, we don't care what you do because we're going out. So you can stay up till two and then next night, oh no, sorry, you have to go to bed at 7:30. That kind of inconsistency is really something that kids have a very, very hard time dealing with because they just don't know what's going to happen next. And so I always tried to, I mean that I, before you were born, I had a really, really bad temper. And I have tried all my life to manage it. Hopefully I've gotten a little better at it at almost 70. But you know, when I was a younger man, I had a terrible temper and I was, I was mad at the whole world and, and you know, mad at everybody in it. And so that it really told me that I, you know, having children really told me I couldn't behave that way anymore anymore. I could stop that. And so I really did try and maintain an even keel. I wasn't successful at it all the time. Certainly. But, you know, yeah, that was certainly a big change in my life. The man who was angry at the world kind of had to stop doing that.

Yeah, I mean, I would say you did a pretty damn good job of it, you know, for the majority of the time, but I think mission successful on that front. But I think one of the things that I really hear you saying that I feel is important is, is the idea of like, self regulation and the, the merit behind that, you know, being able to tend to ourselves as fathers in some capacity so that we can be consistent like you're talking about, so that we can show up and provide some order and some structure sometimes. And I think, you know, I, I do think I, I do feel and know that that is one of the things that I've, you know, I very much appreciated and respected about you as a parent is that I always felt safe in that, in that endeavor. I knew that, you know, if I had, if I had up and done something bad, like. I remember when I, When I wrecked your bicycle, remember when we were camping in Banff.

Oh, yeah, yeah. You came to the outside of the camper with blood dripping off your heads.

Yeah, I would. So just, just, just for the listeners. The listeners context. I had, uh, my brother and my sister and I, they're, They're younger than me. Uh, we had taken the bikes, the bicycles, and we were in BAM for Jasper and we were like biking around the camping lot and I had decided. Bright idea that I would jump stairs. And so I was, I was taking my bicycle and showing off for my younger siblings. What was I dad, like 12, 11 or 12?

Yeah, I think about 12. 12 or 13, maybe.

Yeah. Somewhere in there, I was just transitioning, actually between grade nine and 10. That's what it was. Because I had to walk into a new high school and it looked like I had the shit kicked out of me.

So. So anyway, so I'm. I'm running around with my siblings and I'm jumping stairs and I end up jumping one that had a dip. This long staircase. I had a dip before it and just face planted and wrecked the bike. And I just remember, I just remember just in that moment, I walked into the bathroom at this campsite and somebody saw me and asked what happened. And I joked around. I got mauled by a bear. And I'm, I'm cut up everywhere. And I just remember thinking, dad's gonna, Dad's gonna take this, okay? You know, and I, and, and I, you know, I think that's one of the things that I always appreciated was that there was. Yes, there was structure. Yes. There's an order. Yes. Like, I didn't get away with too much shit. Like, there was always boundaries. But there was room for me to take risks. There was room for me to fail. There was room for me to get it wrong. And I think as I enter into parenthood, that's certainly one of the pieces that I hope to take with me, because there was that safety that I knew that I could mess up and I wasn't going to come back. And, you know, you weren't going to. You know, you weren't going to, like, lay into me in a sort of detrimental way. But, you know, you still had. You still were like, what the hell happened?

Yeah. Yeah. I may shake my head in wonderment. Everyone in a while.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

True enough. That was quite the sight with the blood dripping off your fingers and off your mouth. You looked like this teenage vampire standing outside the door of the camper. And actually, you were hurt quite badly.

I was.

And I don't think we realized at the time how badly you'd actually injured yourself, because you remember, you had a puncture wound on your shin that we didn't even find out, didn't even see till a couple of days later.

Yeah.

But we were actually quite concerned about you because you might recall that you came in and we got you all cleaned up and gave you some bandage. We gave you a couple of Tylenol. And then you might also recall we went for a big walk. And we went for a big walk because we were concerned that.

You might have a concussion or.

Something might set in, trauma might set in or whatever, and you would want to fall asleep, and we wanted to keep you awake just to make sure you were okay till you went to bed. So that's why we went for that big walk, just to make sure that, you know, you were. You were going to be okay because we didn't want you to fall asleep because we weren't sure how. We all. We weren't sure how hard you might have hit your head or how badly you actually were injured.

So there's. There's a. There's a few of those.

Yeah.

Along the way.

Yeah. Do you remember the time mom and I were having a house party and you were out riding on your motorcycle? You fell off your motorcycle and you on your ass, and you got big road rash on one butt cheek, and you came in the house to the party and you had the ass ripped out of your jeans. Underwear. Your underwear was gone. And we could see the road rash on your butt. And you thought that was, what are you, about 16, 17, 18.

I was, I was a little bit old. I was like 19 or 20, maybe.

19 or 20, you thought that was the funniest thing that ever happened. And Joanna and I are going, what the hell is going.

Yeah, unfortunately I was, I was older. I was legal, I was of age.

Yeah. Yeah.

Thanks for telling that story on my.

Show, by the way. Yeah, hey, no worries because I wasn't too worried about your butt because obviously you thought was pretty funny. But I did tell you I went down. I wasn't paying to fix your motorcycle.

Yeah, right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I was, I was out. I was out stunting my motorcycle at that point. I was trying to learn how to, how to change gears, wheeling between first gear and second gear and, and ended up. I couldn't do it because I wasn't using the clutch. And every time that I try and shift from second. First gear to second gear, the bike would fall as I was wheelieing. And so I tried to power it through because at a thousand CC motorcycle and ended up as I shifted gears between first and second, giving it too much power and going straight over backwards and landing, landing on my ass at like I must have been, I must have been doing like 80 or 90 kilometers an hour and rolling down the highway watching my bike slide into the ditch. So.

Oh my God.

Yeah. All right, so let's get back on topic. Now that we've regaled of time embarrassed.

You one more time.

Right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Now that we've regaled times that climb Connor has destroyed property. So funny. Funny or fond memory? I feel like we're going down the question I was, I was going to ask you what are some of your fond memories from your first experiences as a dad? First experiences as a dad. So, so I come into the world and you, you, you bring me home and you have this little entity. What are some of the fond memories from those. From those first days? Because I think, I think about, you know, I took these four weeks off to become a father intentionally. And I, you know, I've worked hard since finding out that I'm going to be a dad to, to make that possible. And you know, I just think about how new that newness, that sort of like cocoon of, of like love and, and new experiences that you talked about. And I just want to be present for all of it, but I just have no idea what to expect. So fun memories from those times or funny memories because I think I Recall some, some funniness.

Yeah, it's. Well, I, you know, I think that, you know, right at the, right of the very, very beginning when your baby's born. I mean, I think every dad should be in the room every time. I don't think, you know, I don't think a dad should ever stand in the hallway when his kids are being born. That, that to me just does not make any sense at all. And not only because, you know, you want to greet your children as they come into the world, but you should also be there to support your wife. And you know, that's my logic. Anyway, so for me those memories really start from the very, very beginning. You know, when you're, when your child comes into the world and, and you're in that room and you know, they weigh the baby up and they make sure he's okay and do all the little, the little 10 point tests they do to make sure everything's good and you bring them back to mom and do all that kind of stuff like that for me is just one of the most, best, most magical things that could ever happen to any of us. It doesn't matter what your gender is. I mean, it's just crazy. It's something that you never forget. You just put lock it in a little box in your mind and it just stays there with great clarity for the rest of your life. For me anyway, that moment just is with all three of my children is absolutely just crystal clear, locked away.

In my mind. And I can bring those three occasions to my mind at any point in time, even 30 something years later. So that for me is absolutely striking memories of, you know, of the early days of being a dad. And we took you home. Of course it was, of course it was fall, it was Edmonton, it was very cold, it was the middle of November when you were born. Uncle Blaine was there, remember?

Yeah. Speaking of motorcycle accidents.

Yeah, speaking of motorcycle accidents. Yeah, and Uncle Blaine was there and he came home and man, he had flown flowers ready and everything and they cleaned the house and was like, holy mackerel. But what happened here? And yeah, and then we tried to figure out what to do and then grandma and grandpa, my mom and dad showed up and they came for 10 days and as, as usual with grandpa, we had some interesting, interesting moments. But yeah, I just remember those early days being one of very, a very close knit family and just really being surrounded by, by family and supportive family in those first few days because mom was, my mom was. She really didn't like toddlers, but she was Good with babies. She liked babies. But Once kids were 2 or 3 years old and running around, my mom wasn't that keen on them anymore. So. I know, I know she had three kids, but that's just the way she was. So when she was there with the baby, you know, my mom was. And she really demonstrated for us that, you know, if you approach the little one just calmly and quietly and just relax and just, it'll just be okay. And she really was able to demonstrate that for us. And I certainly remember, remember that in the early days as well. And I was just talking about that. And now that, you know, bringing back that memory makes me think. Or that's probably where I learned that from. In that first week or two when you came home from the hospital.

Yeah. I mean, interesting. I feel like we've sometimes like, lose out on the, the basics of. Not ancient wisdom, but just sort of like knowledge from the, from our ancestors in some ways, you know, that they, that they know just some basic things of how to caretake young ones. So. Yeah, yeah, I appreciate that story. And I'm curious what, you know, you mentioned, you mentioned grandpa, and I'm curious what expectations.

If any, that you had on your father as you entered into fatherhood. What, what role maybe you expected him to play in your children's life or, or not, and what that dynamic looked like. Because I think as men, when we enter into fatherhood, there's, you know, I, I, at least I'll speak for myself. I hope that you're very active in my child's life because your, your dad, my grandfather was, was sort of instrumental in many parts of mine. And so, yeah, so I'm curious about that. Did you have expectations of him and how he would support you or, or how he would be involved in my life? Like, what did that look like?

Well, I guess, yeah, again, that's another big question. He was a very, he was a very complicated guy in a lot of ways. He had come through the Second World War I. We now think he, he suffered from what we recognize now as was ptsd. And he was, he was a very complicated guy who was always under a lot of stress in his own mind. You know, did I have expectations of him? Yeah, I expected him to be exactly who he was every second. He could be fun to be around. He liked to do physical things. And you probably remember racing back and forth, you know, in the backyard with him and, you know, if you wanted to have a foot race, he'd race you. If you wanted to have a race, chopping Logs he. He'd get. He'd be right in there. If you wanted to learn how to do something physical, if you want to learn how to throw a discus, he would be right there doing it. So he was a very physical guy. And if there was physical things going on, he would always be right there. He always thought of himself as a very.

A teacher. He always wanted to show people how to do things. He always felt he had an enormous knowledge to pass on. And in a lot of ways he did. Of course, because he was an aero engine mechanic, he was a navigator. He could fix anything that had wheels on it or wings on it, basically. So he was very, very talented guy in a lot of ways, and he did have a lot to pass on, and he felt he had an obligation to pass things on. He wanted to teach me how to weld. He wanted to teach me how to do woodworking, because he knew how to do all that stuff, right? And he had basically a grade 10 education, but he had a really big world education, you know what I mean? He didn't have a university education, but he had a wealth of practical education and of course, the experience that he got in the Air Force in World War II. So my expectation was that he would simply carry on doing that. So when we would go to mom and Dad's, if you wanted to have a foot race in the backyard, dad would be the first one there. And it was great because I could sit down and have a beer.

You know what I mean? If you wanted to go fix the car, if you want to go help Grandpa fix the car, he'd lift the hood, you'd tinker around underneath the hood and probably do. Actually do nothing at all. But he was really instructing, instructing all the time. And he was also instructing all the time on how we should live our lives, what it means to have honor, what it means to be honest, what it means to have integrity, what it means to. To how to deal with other people, how to listen to other people. And. And he always had these great moral stories and tales he was telling all the time. That went on.

Sometimes for hours.

You know, literally. I learned about the birds and the bees in a 1963 grain truck between Peyton and Lloydminster. And I swear it took an hour and a half, but.

But he was determined I was going to know what there was to know. And I think I was about 10 at the time, so maybe a little early, but that's the kind of guy he was. He wanted to pass on to his kids and his grandkids things that he knew that he thought were important. And he did not necessarily care if he was your friend. And that's the same for myself and my brothers, and the same for the grandkids. He did not necessarily want to be your friend. He wanted to get along with you.

He didn't want to be mad at you. I don't think he ever got particularly angry with me anyway. But he didn't necessarily, as his children, want you to be his. He didn't want you to be his buddy. And even later in my life, you know, in my 40s and 50s, when I got to spend more time with my dad, he didn't. He didn't really care to be your big pal. He wanted to talk to you about stuff. He wanted to give you his opinion that he thought might help you with a problem that you had or help you with your view of the world. If you didn't take it, that was your problem. He couldn't have cared less. But that idea of passing on knowledge and learning.

Really carried through his whole life and his view. And it's a mistake I think I probably made as a parent, that I would.

Look back at me if I was going to do things differently. You know, he looked at it as guiding children to where they could go. He never looked at having children as turning them into somebody he wanted them to be. And I think that's an enormous mistake that too many parents make today. They put so much pressure on children to be who the parent thinks they should be. And I got news for every parent out there. It just doesn't work that way. Yeah, you can take your kid to hockey every night. You can get them the best coaches and buy them the best skates, and you can take them to every power skating school, and you can yell at them and berate them and train them, do everything you want to do. You still cannot turn a kid who has a bent to be a saxophone player into a hockey player, at least not for very damn long. So the one thing that dad really did that I wish I had done a better job of, and my older brother describes it as parenting by benign neglect.

We always have a good laugh about this. You know, my older brother Chris says, yeah, we were brought up in a system of benign neglect, but, you know, we were, as you say, allowed to do all kinds of crazy things that you would never allow, certainly never allow children to do today. But you did have the latitude to make mistakes. And if you did make a steak, you got a big lecture about it, and you knew Damn well that you'd better not, you know, do it again. But he never told us what we should be, you know, he never told us you'd be really good at that and you should go do it. You know, that never happened. He would say, hey, you know, did you ever think about what it would be like to be a banker? Did you ever think about what it'd be like to be a truck driver? You know, and he would always say to us, I don't give a damn what you do. I don't care what you do for a living. I don't care. I don't care if you drive a truck. I don't care if you fly airplanes. I don't care if you're a doctor. It does not matter to me what you do for. For a living. Just make sure whatever it is that you do choose to do, you are the very best that you can possibly be at it. That's all you. That's all you need to do. So he never said to, you know, Chris, who was a very talented football player, you know, he never said to Chris, oh, you should go be a professional football player, even though he. Even though he probably could have been, you know, he never said to Colin, oh, you should go be an architect. Supported him to do it, but never told him he should do it, you know, you're going to be an architect. Just be the best damn architect you can be. And unfortunately, I never went to university, so I got to be the best stereo salesman I could do.

Well, no, I think. I think there's merit in what you're saying, because it sounds like there was, you know, a. Again, a sort of freedom there that, that he exuded and provided. And I love that the, the corporal punishment that you received was long lectures, like avoiding the long lectures.

Yeah, it was an interesting environment, of course, and it was much different than all my friends grew up with at school because we lived on a farm in, In Saskatchewan. And the. In the freer listeners who aren't Canadian in the. In the. The grain belt, the plains of Saskatchewan, and with a real melting pot in the community. There were people from Ukraine, there were people from France, There were Polish people down the road. There were English people. There were people from all over the world whose parents or maybe they had come to Saskatchewan to get land to farm. And those. All those kids grew up in schools in households that did have corporal punishment. And if I would go to another friend's place for a sleepover or whatever, you know, in grade four or five or six, it Was very evident to me that those kids lived in a much different world than I lived in because my parents never spanked or hit any of us. And in our environment, in a farming community in those days, that was extremely unusual. I think he. And maybe the English folks down the road, I think maybe they were the only parents who didn't ever hit their children because everybody else, same thing at school. I mean, school was ruled by corporal punishment. If you did something bad, you put your hand out, you got the strap, right, so.

Because I think. I think that's where like a lot of. I think that's a common experience for a lot of people is that the. The father is sort of like the authority of, you know, structure or punishment or, you know, like, however you want to, whatever label you want to put on that. And, you know, I think it sounds like grandpa still did that, and I think you still did that, but did look different. You know, I think it was. I think it was sort of like lessons learned and how to learn the lessons, teaching how to learn those lessons. And so I think all of those. All those things were embedded into. Into the parenting style.

Sure. Yeah, absolutely.

You know, which I think is incredibly important. And I think, you know, I do think that he was. I mean, did you ever have a conversation with your dad about. About becoming a father or about what your expectations were with him being in. In my life? Because I think this is where a lot of. I think a lot of the dads that I talk to, a lot of the parents that I talk to, they don't know if they should have that conversation or how to have those conversations or how to say, you know, I'd like you to be involved in this way or not in this way, or did you just allow that to unfold organically?

Yeah, I think the idea that, you know, we would have a conscious conversation, you know, as you and I would. Would do now, that we would have a conscious conversation about what role as a grandparent I would. I would play in my grand child's life. I think that's a pretty recent construct, you know, the idea in 1980, you know, and I was born in 1954. I was never brought up with the idea that I would ever sit down with my father and have a conversation about how he was going to interact with my kids in their life. He was my father. He was who he was. He did what he wanted to do. And it was certainly never up to me to tell him how to behave or how to act. And, you know, I might say to him if he was roughhousing with the kids on the floor. You know how you guys always wrestled all the time, and, you know, he was. As I say, he's a very physical guy. And, you know, he'd throw you around and throw you on the couch and you wrestle on the floor. And every once in a while I go, hey, dad. Dad. You know, like, that's pretty rough. You know, you're being pretty rough there. They'd go, we're just playing. I'm not being too rough. What are you talking about? We're just having some fun. And then, of course, he would listen and he would calm down. But, you know, that's a whole different social construction, the relationship between parents and fathers, sons and fathers. When I was born in the 50s, compared to what we're talking about in this current day and age, I would never, ever even dream about telling my father how to behave. I might make a suggestion, I might point something out, but I would never go to him and say, hey, you know what, dad? You can't do that anymore. All right? That conversation would simply never, ever happen.

Yeah, I mean, it's. It's an interesting balance because I think one of the things that I really appreciated about Grandpa was that he truly was just like. He was wild in some ways and unbridled and just unruly, but he was unapologetically who he was.

Oh, yeah.

And he didn't give a shit. He didn't give a shit what you thought about. About who he was. And I think that was one of the qualities. As I got older and sort of, you know, ventured out into the world and went to, you know, university and. And started work and started my own company. It's something that I've actually. I look back on and, you know, I kind of chuckle because sometimes it was, you know, sometimes it was obnoxious, like his. His shitty wine that he would. I mean, he would make this. Oh, my God, terrible peach wine and horrible. It was just. It was terrible. But he was so excited about it, right? And he. He was just like, you got to try my wine. And. But I. I really appreciated that about him because I think that in some ways, I. I don't know about women necessarily, but in some ways, for men, I feel like we have lost some qualities of being that unapologetic father or being that unapologetic, you know, individual that's venturing out and saying, this is what I love. This is what I'm going to do. This is who I am. And. And I'm not sorry about it and.

Yeah, and you could take it or leave it. Yeah, he was. And he was very much like that. And I think in this, I think being in the second World War, like a lot of men of his generation, really one of the things for better and frequently for worse, that it gave him instilled in him was that he was not afraid of anything. Like literally he would drive a car as fast as he could drive it. He would. When we would go to the dance at the Peyton Legion hall in the 50s, there would be a fight outside and he was a boxer in the Second World War. So they go, norman, there's a fight outside. And dad would go outside and pretty soon there'd be three or four guys laying on the ground.

He was a tough guy. He was absolutely fearless. He was not afraid of anything and he was not afraid of anybody. Even in his later years, in his 70s and 80s, he was not afraid of anybody.

He was sprightly, he was very, he.

Was very, very feisty guy. But I think one of the hallmarks that he had that I think he has passed on some way or other to Chris and Colin and myself, and I think to you too is just a really unbridled sense of curiosity. And I think if he had one trait that is imbued in all the guys in our family is just this. Hey, I want to know how that works. Hey, why did that happen? Hey, I want to go read about that. Hey, what's happening with that thing over there? Well, how did they do that? You know what I mean? Because that's exactly what he was like.

Yeah.

Then he was kind of add with it, you know, I mean, my God, he'd go out to the garage to do something and 30 seconds later he'd be going into town to do something else. And while he was there he'd do five other things and the thing he started out with would still be sitting in pieces in the garage. But he was just immensely curious and I think particularly Chris is that way. My older brother Colin certainly is that way. I mean, Colin's curiosity is just as boundless and I'm that way, I think too as I get older. So maybe I don't know how that gets all passed down or how that works, but I think if he did leave us a number, he left us a number of things. But I think certainly that wide eyed wonderment and curiosity for the world is certainly something that he left us all.

Yeah, I would agree with that wholeheartedly. I mean, I remember going to see them as A kid. And, and I mean, just the, the stories of him and his shenanigans and what he would get up to. I mean, we could have a, we could have a whole, you know, two hour conversation about, you know, Grandpa Norman's stories and his life. But I think one of the things that I appreciated was that he was a, you know, he did have this balance of sort of teaching and mentorship. Whether I, you know, whether I wanted to learn or not, he was just going to show me. And there was, there was something endearing about that. Like, I remember he one day he was convinced he was going to teach me how to train, change the oil in his car. And so I think it was like, you know, 11 or, or 12. I wasn't very old, but he wanted me to learn early. And he, he brought out like a doctor's stethoscope and was teaching me how to listen to the pistons in the.

Car, learn how to listen to the engine. Oh, that's very important.

Yeah, yeah, 100%. And I mean, but it was those types of things where, you know, it was, for me, it was sort of wondrous and whimsical and, you know, because as a kid, I didn't have a clue what was going on, but it was all new information. And so he just had this very sort of curious and enduring and outgoing personality. But I really appreciated that unapologetic quality to him. And I think I've, you know, I've tried to take that into some of, you know, some of my own life and in, in the way that I show up. But let's, let's get back to, let's just get back to you just for a few more minutes. I think we're going to have to wrap up here. Not too, not too far away, but okay. So, you know, that's a little bit about Grandpa and, you know, his expectations and your, your expectations of him. And I think you're right. I think that that construct of, you know, being able to sort of ask your father, tell your father, like, this is how I want you to be involved in my children's life is maybe a more modern concept than it was back then. But what would you say. What would you say were some of the, like, the values and. Yeah, some of the values that you really wanted to instill in, in me and Mark and Sarah and your kids and, and how did you try and embody those values? Because I think this is one of the things again, that as, you know, as fathers, as we step into this role, I Think oftentimes, you know, we. At least for myself, I'm stepping into this role I'm looking at now, this responsibility, and that there's this little entity, you know, this little child that is going to rely on me for certain things. And so I think for me, I've really started to question, like, what values do I want to stand for? You know, what values do I want my child to see in me, and how do I embody those values? And so I'm curious for you, like, what did you want to stand for? I know that we've talked about the idea of fairness before, but I wanted to use just like, Just allude to a few of those things.

Yeah, I think. Yeah. And one of the things that parenthood really does, I think, is really cause us to think very try and be clear in our own minds about what we want those values to be and how we want to pass them on. And I had a few of them. I always wanted my kids to be honest. Don't BS me about stuff. If you've. If you've made a mistake, tell me you made a mistake, and let's figure out the next step. But don't lie to me. That's just never on the table. And, you know, we've had experiences in our family with quite a bit of that and some addiction and those kinds of things. And one of those leads to the other thing. But one of the values that I really wanted to have in my children is just be honest. Just tell me the truth. If you screwed it up, tell me you screwed it up, and let's figure out a way to fix it. Because we have always said to our kids, if you make a mistake and you screw something up, the punishment will be a lot less than if you lie to me. You'll always be in more trouble for lying to me than you will if you tell me the truth. Because when you do that, then you're forcing the person to be honest with themselves. They have to realize honestly what they have done and not hide it. So the person. The kids are not only honest with you, then they're also having the opportunity to be honest with themselves. And that's very important. The second thing I always wanted my kids to be. I always wanted my kids to be kind. I never wanted my kids to be bullies. I hate bullies. It's just abhorrent. Bullying is just abhorrent behavior. And we're seeing more and more frequently in our society now and in our. Particularly in our schools and also increasingly in our politics of what bullying looks like and what its results are, and it's not good for individuals, and it's not highly detrimental to society as a whole. So I always wanted my kids to learn to be kind. It's extremely important to be generous. It's extremely important to be thoughtful of other people and to demonstrate kindness. Now, that doesn't mean you're weak. That doesn't mean you don't stand up for yourself when you need to. It doesn't mean that if somebody is endangering you and your family, you don't put a stop to. Just means that in your general demeanor, in your life, you demonstrate kindness to other people. And I think it's really, really important that we do that. And a lot of people see that as being weakness or, you know, you're not strong enough or whatever. None of that is true. Being kind and being weak are not connected. Yeah. In fact, I think the opposite is true. I think being kind. I think being kind and being strong and connected and I always wanted my kids to work hard. I think in the old, you know, Scottish Presbyterian way, there. There is value in an honest day's work. And regardless of what it is, we should never rely on anyone else for what we get. We should always have the courage to go out and work hard. Even if it's at a menial job, if you have to at some point in time, you know, you've worked in gravel pits, right. It doesn't matter what the job is. You have to go out and work hard because there's personal value. There's personal value in working hard. And I. You know, you see the way Joanne works and you see the way I worked, I see the way you work. I mean, there just is an intrinsic value in whatever the task is, putting your shoulder to the grindstone and just working hard. And I still do. Like, I've been putzing around the house, doing stuff here all day. I'm every day. So I always want my kids to work hard. I want my kids to sit in their ass.

I like the distinction between. You know, I think it's interesting because we were just talking about being unapologetic, and I think there. I think that's where the line is. You know, I think there is a huge line and distinction between being unapologetic and bullying someone, and that there is strength and clarity and order and structure that comes in being unapologetic about who we are and the direction that we're taking our lives in and. And our belief systems and what we value and what our Opinion is and all those pieces. But I think a big part of, you know, being a father in, in my perspective and what I hear you saying is that there, there is no equivalency. There's no, there's no line to be drawn between being unapologetic and being a bully. And then.

No, absolutely. Absolutely not. There. I, there's no, there's no connection in, in, in those two things at all in my mind. Yeah, absolutely. Good point.

I think that's where the con, that's where the misconception has come today is that because, you know, I think father's option represent the archetype for that quality of. At least for, for a lot of young boys especially that, that archetype of leading ourselves through life and having direction and, you know, maybe catching some heat for it. Like, I remember when I started man talks, I mean, I got so. I had so many people attacking me.

Yeah.

And, you know, saying all kinds of shit to me. And I was just like, no, this. I know that this is what I am meant to do, what I need to do, what I want to do, and I'm not sorry for it. And I'm glad, I'm glad that I stuck it out and I didn't have to bully anybody or shit talk anybody in the process, so.

Exactly.

I think that it's a, you know, it's a solid, a solid lesson. What you're, what you're outlining there.

Yeah, there's a, there's a big difference. There's a big difference between, between standing up for what you believe in and making it clear and following the path that takes you along the way to follow the things that you believe in. That's. To me, that's being, and I'll use a gender this time, that's being a man. To me, you stand up for the belief. Things you believe in, you go forward and do them. That has absolutely nothing to do with bullying, which is simply taking advantage of other people. Those two things are, are in, are in no way connected.

So final, final question. Because one thing that I've, you know, been exploring is managing your, your career, your passions with being a parent. And, you know, I, I remember a former mentor of mine, Philip McKernan, said it, you know, I would live, I would die for my kids. I would take a bullet for them, but I'll never live my life for them. And I think that idea I really appreciated because it was, you know, he was sort of saying, in that I'm still going to pursue my career and my passions and what's important to me and be an embodiment of that. And I think that you, you did as well. And so I'm curious for you, like, what did managing your career and your passions with. With three kids all of very different ages, because, you know, Mark and I are. Are 10 years apart. And so you, you. You had a wide gap, right? You had a. Yep. You had a. You had a son coming into adulthood as you have a son coming into puberty, basically.

Yeah, that's true. Yeah.

And so. So how did you manage your own career and your own passion through. Through all that?

Yeah, well, two things there. I mean, I was fortunate to have a 9 to 5 job in the civil service, which allowed me holidays and sick days, which a lot of people in the workplace today don't have access to. So I had a job that allowed me some latitude, take time off or to leave an hour early during the day, take an hour's vacation or whatever the case may be. So I was in a job where my time could to some extent be flexible. And I used that, you know, I could work a compressed schedule, work an extra hour a day. So I got every second Friday off those kinds of things in union schedules. So I was able to take advantage of some of those things to be able to manage my own time through the week so I could be home. And of course, when. When Mark and Sarah were little, we had a daycare in the building we worked in. So that was pretty slick. Right. The kids just went to. Went to school with you and came home with you. You don't want to work with you. Came home with you. So that was. That really was very easy. But in terms of managing work, yeah, you just have to, honestly, you just have to get busy and get up earlier and get ready sooner and make sure you've got time to do things and you have to plan ahead without over planning. I know a lot of people now like to over plan and plan everything as far as if I possibly can and have every second on the calendar filled up and, God, I can't stand that. So, yeah, plenty important things. But you have to have a little bit of flexibility because things don't always go the way you want. Right. So, you know, but in terms of managing my passion, as you know, I sang opera with Edmonton Opera for 25 seasons, and when I first started doing that, you were quite small and that was probably 120, 100 nights a year out of the house. And then we went to three shows. Three shows a year. So that was probably 90 nights or more a year out of the house. And that was a passion that I never gave up, ever. And I probably never would. I'm still singing now, so. And that's because I think for me anyway, there has to be some.

90 degree, I'll put it 90 degree diversion sometimes from the rest of your life. And for me, going to the rehearsal hall, learning music, learning staging, being on the stage was a complete 90 degree.

Separation from working for the income tax department, which I did, you know, the other 40 hours of the week. And yeah, it's, yeah, it's work and yeah, it's time consuming, but it's, it's such a diversion that it puts your mind in a different place than where it usually is. You're not thinking about all that other stuff. You're learning something completely different. Has no, nothing to do with the rest of your life. And, and that diversion of, of doing opera and doing music largely, I think kept me, kept me sane. And one of the things that I found was a very great thing to do was on Fridays at noon, my voice lesson was that's when it was Fridays at noon. And Friday I quarter to 12, I'd jump in my car, drive across the river, I'd sing for an hour. I drive back to my office and have a McDonald's hamburger or something in my car on the way. And that set my weekend up for success because my mind had an hour to just get away from everything that was going on, take a 90 degree turn somewhere else. And it just lets your mind be in a restful place. For me, anyway, lets my mind be in a restful place where I can say, hey, you know what, we got to go to soccer tonight, we got to go to hockey tonight, Sarah's got a horseback riding lessons tomorrow morning, Mark's got lacrosse in the afternoon. And now you can take all that on with the extra burden that you've had from your week of work, lift it off your shoulders because you've had that mental break, even if it's an hour. So if a person has that passion, regardless of what it is, whether it's working on your car or doing bonsai trees or whatever it is, it doesn't matter. I think it's really important to be able to find that 90 degree turn to get the mental break and the mental rest.

That really we all need. We can't all just live in a pressure cooker all the time. And that's what it was for me. I mean, I don't know how I would have managed. I Think I would have been a much grumpier and much horrible person than I already was without opera and without music for sure. Wonderful.

So I think if I could condense that, it would sound something like.

Know that life is going to be stressful, being a parent is going to be stressful. So prioritize. You prioritize your passions and make sure that you're, you're setting them up in a way where you're recharging your own battery. Because I think that's, again, it's one of the things that I learned growing up. You know, obviously.

I didn't grow up living with you all the time, but I did grow up seeing you prioritize what was important to you. And that, that certainly taught me a very valuable lesson about, about prioritizing my own passions. And so I think I enter into fatherhood making sure that that's, that's still there, that I don't, I don't lose touch with that. Any, any final thoughts for, for the dads that are out there, whether they've been dads for a while or they're just becoming dads or thinking about being dads?

Yeah, I, well, I, you know, I hear a lot of people say, well, we're not going to wait for the right time to have children. And you know what, that, that's just, you know, if you do that, you're going to be 60, you know. Yeah. You have to do a bit of planning and you have to make some changes and allowances are necessary and whatever. But you know, if you're, if you'd like to be a dad and you have the right partner and I know we're talking about dads here, but, you know, it doesn't really matter what your gender persuasion is or how you see the life from a gender perspective. It's not really relevant in a way. Although we're talking about dads specifically today. You know, if you feel that you want to be a parent and that's an important thing for you to do, then it's something that you need to find a way to do. Because I see so many people in my life, many of whom I worked with, who don't have children and I don't know, they just seem to me to have a much narrower view of the world and it usually doesn't go beyond their own self interest. And so they're not really very interesting, well rounded people, I don't think think. So in my mind. If you want to be a dad and you want to have children and you believe you have the right partner and you feel you both want to go ahead and do that, then you should do that. Because stuff happens in life. None of us are guaranteed tomorrow. None of us are guaranteed anything. So if you really want to be a dad, your partner agrees and you have a plan, some kind of plan for what you want to do, go do it. Don't worry if you don't have enough money, you can live in a smaller place. Don't worry if you want to buy a new car. You'll have lots of time to buy a new car. Drive the car you got and figure it out. Put a car seat in the back, what's the problem? Because that's actually more important than planning and waiting in my mind anyway.

And I think you just have to approach fatherhood with just an open mind and being open to every concept and every idea and every change that you may have to make. And when we do these things as parents.

We can't be angry about the fact that we can't buy a new car because we have another baby on the way. The things just aren't. Those two things just aren't equated. I'd like to buy a new car, but we got more kids and oh, I wanted to do that, but now we're having another kid. You know what, that's just not the right approach. You know, we should just be saying, yeah, look, I know I'm driving a 10 year old car, but you know what? I got two of the greatest kids in the world sitting in the backseat. So I don't really give a shit if I'm driving a 1985 Mazda. This is all good. And.

We have to get ourselves out of the way and some of the things that we want out of the way and for focus on what's really important and that's our family, isn't it?

Yep. Well said. Well said. All right, well, this is a good conversation, dad.

You might. Yeah, thanks, son.

You might have to come back on the show at some point. I think the listeners might enjoy you. I don't know, we'll see.

Okay, well, let me know. I'm always here for you, buddy, anytime you want me.

Thanks. Thank you. I have, I actually have three. Three rapid fire questions. Okay. They're just, they're just fun fact questions.

Geez, you're going to expect me to give you a short answer? Okay. This is going to be really hard.

For Norman. He'll lays alive and well in you.

I know, right? I know.

Okay. Favorite car that you've owned.

Favorite car that I've owned. 2014 Porsche Boxster.

Uh huh. Okay. Place that you would love to travel the most when, when and if life ever goes back to normal.

I love sky. Oh, no, I take that back. Venice.

Okay. Venice. And what quote, if you had to have a quote on your. On your gravestone or your tombstone, what quote would be on the tombstone?

Wow.

Off the top of your head. I know it's a random one.

Here lies a good guy.

Awesome. Love it. All right, dad, Love you. Thank you so much for being on the show. Such a pleasure, such an honor. And for anyone that's out there listening, if you enjoyed this conversation and you know a dad to be and you feel like he would benefit from it, send it off to him. Or if you know a dad that exists already and you feel like he would enjoy this conversation, send it off to him anyway. So again, thanks for joining me. This is Connor Beaton signing off.

Sam.