Full Transcript
We’re very kind people, you and I. Well, in gen uh profoundly, yes. But in the grand scheme, on a day-to-day basis, God, it’s so much work to be kind, right? And it’s so much more fun to be naughty and mean and catty.
David:
And this is Gatriarchs. So, real quick rant. We are now in with my three-year-old, the fuck around and find out phase. Do you know what I’m talking about when I say the fuck around and find out phase, Gavin? For those of you out there who are like, what does he mean? This means that like my three and a half year old is now old enough to want to know what the real consequences are to things. So when I’m like, put on your shoes, and he’s like, no, and I’m like, if you don’t, I’m going to blank, he’s like, do it.
unknown:
Do it.
David:
Fucking come at me, bro. And so now I’ve either got to back up my threats with the thing I threatened, or I’ve got to really turn. So we’re in the fuck around and find out phase. Yeah. Which for somebody like my husband is okay because he’s like, maybe let’s calm down, let’s find a new way to do this. Maybe let’s let’s let me get on your level. And when it comes to me, the immature asshole, I’m like, I will let you die in this bathroom floor if you don’t brush your teeth. You live here now until you brush those fucking teeth. So um, anyway, with just a new phase, which is super not fun, which is where my my three-year-old is like, I want to find out. I’m gonna fuck around and I want to find out.
Gavin:
So that’s that immediately makes me think of a cat who’s like walking along a counter and just kind of passively knocks something off the counter to see, like, hmm, what’s the thing?
David:
Yeah, but the cat makes sure to look at you in the eyes, and then you say, Don’t knock it off the counter, and without breaking eye contact, pushes that thing off the counter.
Gavin:
Well, I would say that my kids probably did that at some point. Although I we’re still in a fuck around and find out mode. Well, are we in a fuck around and find out mode, or is it more like a don’t fuck with me mode, which is my um wonderful tween who definitely has more um pizzazz in looking me straight in the eye and being like, I’m not doing that. And there, I can hear in her tone of voice, there is no amount of cajoling I can do aside from taking away her phone.
David:
That is worth offering her Duncan on the way to school, I hear, is a powerful tool.
Gavin:
I know I’m still gonna win because I pay the bills, but I there’s a defiance in her voice that’s like, no, I’m not doing that. And um, oof, guess what, David? It’s it’s not a phase. It’s not a phase. He’s he’s he will just be developing his fuck around and find out for the five.
David:
But now at three and a half, I can still physically overpower him to force him to put his shoes on. You really I mean, at this point with your daughter, you can’t really do that because she’s uh yeah, totally.
Gavin:
No, no, no, it’s uh no, it’s the real deal now. So um, so tonight, big day in our household because my daughter is going to her very first middle school dance. Oh, fuck. That is a big deal. It’s a really big deal. And the thing is, um, for the past week I’ve been like, so are you gonna do something beforehand? Are you gonna go get ready with somebody? Are you gonna do anything afterwards? These things were never proposed to me when I was in seventh grade going to my first dance. I remember being dropped off by my mom and being like, go, go, mom, go, go, go. Like, drive away as fast as you possibly can. Even though everybody was being dropped off by their parents. Yeah. But there, it was terrifying to walk in alone. I get the power of safety in numbers thing. You don’t want to walk in to your middle school alone because you’re like, I just need some safety in numbers. This is super scary and super exciting at the same time. Anyway, she’s been totally chill about it. Also, she’s like, Dad, you know we’re not gonna dance. We’re just gonna like run around the hallways together. Meanwhile, she has an outfit, she has a necklace for the very first time, she has just all the things. And I mean, I’ve been in high gay dad orbit. Um, just uh trying to wanting it to be such a fun, lighthearted experience, also knowing that it can be so fraught with so much drama.
David:
Totally. But that’s like the dra she’s she’s getting into that part of her life where this is this is what’s gonna be happening, is all this drama. I got middle school dance where like boys on one side, girls on the other. And it was like, but it but it’s so the beginning of that like the social dynamic starting to come into play, which is And she’s gotta live out, she’s gotta go through the awkwardness without me trying to, you know, I don’t know.
Gavin:
I mean, I d I’m not trying to protect her from drama, but I am I know that it’s after a dance, you like want to go get milkshakes at Denny’s and talk about it. And so I’ve been like, if we only had a Denny’s near us, but I wanna say, you know, let’s I think you’ll want to socialize afterwards. Oh, dad, stop. No, I don’t care. Well, you’re gonna care, and I think it’ll be more fun if you have something planned. Okay, fine, just do it. Oh, oh, I have to do it. Oh, like I mean, you’re on Snapchat all goddamn day. Can’t you organize something? Yes, I will be the bus to drive you, but like I’m not gonna go text eight parents saying that this needs to happen. Come on. So anyway, it’s a it’s a big deal. I will report. Um, but I can’t wait to do that. It feels like a big deal.
David:
Yeah, it will be, and and she’ll have all these like secret experiences, these like hush conversations in the corner of the you know gym or whatever. So it yeah, exactly. Um, but um, that’s that’s very exciting. So she is your first kid. Yeah. Right? So you have two kids, I have two kids. Yeah, and I thought really quickly before um we do our top three list, I thought for those of you who are parents of one kid who are considering two, since you and I both have two kids, we could maybe talk about like why we did it. Um, I ask myself that every day. Why the fuck do I do this to myself? Um, but also like what to think about. Like for people who are like, I have one kid, I’m thinking about having a second one, because I feel like that’s the question you get all the time. When I had one kid, it’s like, when are you gonna have another? When I have two, when are you gonna have a third? Um, and I find myself asking, we have friends down the street who, gay parents who have a one and a half year old, and I’m always like, when are you gonna have a second? And I hear myself, I’m like, David, shut the fuck up. Who cares?
Gavin:
Also, as an only child, I am an only child, and I know plenty of people out there who are like, you know what, one kid is good for us, and we love our kid, and we don’t feel like we need to a muddy the waters, or maybe we haven’t been able to have a second kid, or for all the things. So it is a consideration, and also there is a baked-in assumption that you always are gonna have more than one kid, and uh you you don’t always need to have more than one kid, for sure.
David:
No, not at all. And my my only really piece of advice is the same piece of advice I give for people who are like, should I have a kid, a kid at all, is that have a kid if you want one. And I know that sounds oversimplistic, but like so many people feel the pressure. I should have a kid, I should have a second kid. Don’t don’t don’t succumb to that before. Don’t don’t shit all over yourself. Don’t shit all over yourself. Yes. Um, so um for the obvious first thing that gay parents have to think about is money, right? Like having a second kid doesn’t mean like a second mouth to feed and a second daycare bill, it does, but it means an extra 30, 50, 100,000, 200,000 of cost to have that second kid. Now, a lot of times what people do, and I think you did this as well as we did, was where the kind of embryo creation process, which is a kind of a big expense, once you’ve done that once, it’s kind of done. If you have, you know, multiple embryos. I think we have 12 embryos, so it’s like we have those, we don’t have to make those again. So that part of the process is already paid for. But yeah, surrogacy is expensive if even if it goes perfectly right, adoption can be really expensive, even foster adopt can be expensive, depending. So um, money is obviously uh a fucking consideration. Yeah, um, timing between kids, like we very purposefully had a kid almost exactly two years apart from our other kid because we wanted kids that were close enough in age but not in the same grade. Um, I grew up, I have two brothers and two sisters, but they’re all like 13 plus older uh years older than me. Um so I kind of live life as an only child. I never really lived with my siblings. Um and I always wanted to have a sibling in the house that I could complain about my parents to. So that was part of my inspire with, yeah. Oh, yeah, totally, yeah.
Gavin:
Yeah, we definitely uh we jumped right on it. We were before our first was even born, we were talking about when are we gonna do the second, and uh my partner was like, uh, I’m not getting any younger, so let’s just do it. And uh we ours are what is the term, Irish twins. They’re 19 months apart, but that has put them two grade levels apart, and they’re close enough that they’re still friends, and that has been, frankly, really helpful. But at the same time, there is no wrong way to do it, and there is no right way to do it. And as my best advice um came from, and if she’s listening, uh thank you, Mo. She said there’s just never the right time to have kids. Never mind.
David:
There’s never the right time to have kids, there’s never the right time to buy a house or to leave your partner or to whatever. You just have to fucking do it. And that’s I have a lot of friends in that category who were like, Well, I’m thinking about them kids, but all right, my job is a little weird right now, and blah, blah, blah. I’m like, I’m telling you, yeah, there’s there’s never gonna work out. There’s never gonna be a time to have kids. Nope. Um, so just don’t fucking have them. Um, and then the last kind of big thing I would think about the decision that goes into the decision is like your support system. So we don’t live around family. So our support system is minimal, it’s babysitters, or if we want to fly family. And so it was real we realized after having two, because I’ve always wanted to have a big family. As soon as we had two, we immediately go, Oh, without a built-in support system here where we can just drop a kid off at a house or have people on call. It is real, real hard. Because one, when you have when you’re married or have a partner, you’re like, Okay, can you just take the kid? Because I need to blank whatever it is, poop, go to work, have a little bit of crying time by myself in the park, whatever you need. You can kind of give your kid the when you have two, you always got a kid. Yeah, there’s always one around. So the support system I think is an important thing to consider before you have a second kid.
Gavin:
And when you’re talking about having an infant when you already have a toddler in the house or any kind of young kid, or a 13-year-old in the house, it it the infinite expansion of your fatigue is beyond what you could have imagined. When you have that first kid, you are walking into walls for sure. But at the same time, I have to feel like we also we step up to the plate. I think most people really uh human beings are capable of having multiple babies. They really we’ve been doing it for many millennia. Uh, but it you will find strength in yourself, hopefully, to push through in ways that you never imagined. And I just remember having like a toddler and a baby, and and it was never a matter of um, can we do this? You just you just do it. Yeah, and boy, you find the strength within yourself that you never realized you had. And then 10 years later, like I am right now, you think, I don’t know how I did that, but I did it.
David:
Yeah, and I will say, uh, just to end it on a little bit of a positive note, the the the things that I I didn’t expect to just absolutely love about having a second kid were you know, second kid syndrome, which you’ve heard parents say, which is we’re like the first kid you’re very protective of. Oh yeah, we have all these plans and we’re gonna be very focused. And kid number two, you’re just like if she’s off the floor, God speak. Um so there’s that part of it which I think is is really fun as a parent because you get to kind of enjoy parenting in a way. Like I got to enjoy parenting, I feel like the second time around that I didn’t allow myself to enjoy the first time. You’re less stressed. Yeah, I’m less stressed, uh differently stressed, but also I just there were just times I remember holding Hannah, my my my youngest, and thinking, and just looking at her and just listening to her eat and just like really enjoying the moment I was having, instead of in my head going, when is she gonna go to bed? Okay, if she goes to bed now, I get like I could turn off those voices a little bit because I wasn’t as paranoid about like all the things I was so paranoid with. Number one, both because I had experience in doing it, and two, I was just too fucking tired. Yeah, I think there is a benefit in you being, I think some people worry about having a second kid. They’re like, Well, what if I won’t give as much focus to that first kid? I’m like, Yeah, that is great because you now they get to experience something different, and you get to experience something different, you get to uh enjoy the love between these two kids. And then the last thing that I that was a surprise to me was watching them interact with each other that didn’t involve me, right? She does something funny, he laughs, they look at each other, they throw food at each other. There’s something so beautiful in watching this relationship between these two people exist without me that I was very surprised. That was like really cool.
Gavin:
Giving back going back to exactly right, you give up the control freakiness because you don’t have the energy, time, or or interest in being a total control freak, and that is liberating. And we’re all better parents when we give up trying to absolutely control um every element. And you’re right, their little world behind your back, or when they don’t know that you are fully filming it from around the corner, um is that’s magical. And um, that relationship, that bond is um hope that will be with them forever. And you’ve given them a gift, I think, also of camaraderie for one day when you might not be here. So it’s uh it’s a pretty fun thing to watch.
David:
I’ll always be here to haunt them.
Gavin:
Yeah, it’s true.
David:
All right, so let’s move to our top three list. Our top three list this week is my list, and it is the top it’s Gavin was really excited about it, if you remember from last week. Um, it’s the top three kids’ books. So the top three books to read to your kid before bed. So this is my list, so I’m gonna go ahead and start. So my first one and number three, and uh, is Little Blue Truck. Now, if you have a kid, you have read this book a million times. Yes. It is a it is just so beautifully written. My kids are obsessed with the book. I don’t know what it is. It’s a cute book, I would say. Little Blue Truck, number three. So good. Number two, Grumpy Monkey. Now, this is not a very popular book, and it just came into our existence a couple months ago, but it’s just about this monkey who’s grumpy and everyone’s trying to cheer him up or whatever. And it’s a cute book, but there’s something so gorgeous about the message, which at the end he basically says, I guess I just need to be grumpy. And his friend who’s been trying to make him happy was like, Well, I’m just gonna be here next to you and and we’ll just hang out. And he’s like, Yeah, I feel better already. And there was this just sweetness to like the fact that yeah, sometimes we just need to be grumpy, and to have it in a kids’ book form, I think is really lovely. So, in number two, Grumpy Monkey. Uh, number one, my favorite, favorite kids’ book is a book called Love is You and Me. And in the way that Little Blue Truck has this like really great rhythm of rhyming, Love is You and Me is just like it’s these two little characters, and it’s just a sweet book about love, and it is one of those books that, like, for whatever reason, every time I read it, I get a little choked up. This is the sappiest I’ve ever heard you.
Gavin:
In this cutries, like, Jesus, where’s the where’s the joke about Spooch?
David:
Oh, it’s coming, literally.
Gavin:
But this is beautiful. I I applaud your sentimentality, David.
David:
I refuse to ever be sentimental again. Just wait. I’m in our interview, I’m gonna really gross it up. All right, Stephen, what are your top three kids’ books?
Gavin:
Number three is a book that was given to me by some friends. I have never seen it in a bookstore, but it’s fantastic. It’s just country roads, and it is an illustrated version of John Denver’s song, Country Roads. And it’s done in a quilt pattern, like as if you’re looking at a massive quilt, and shows a family coming together for a family reunion as they travel the country roads, take me home, etc. And at the end, it’s everybody’s come together, and it is a thoroughly multiculty, super bipoch, queer friendly book about coming home. And it’s just beautifully illustrated. And now my kids know all of the words to country roads, which I think is a pretty cool skill. Nice. Number two, a book that we definitely wore out the spine of and have, I believe, got three copies of to replace because it was so aggressively loved, is called Press Here.
David:
I love that book.
Gavin:
Yeah, it’s it’s it speaks for itself. It’s just a really, really wonderful activity, active book. Number one, another book given to me by friends is called The Tuba Lesson. And it’s a story about a little boy who um like literally his mom says, Don’t be late for your tuba lesson, and he takes his tuba through the woods and he ends up like climbing a tree, falling asleep, taking a nap, da-da-da-da-da. And then animals come out and he’s playing the tuba for them, and there’s a parade, and then a bear comes and he yells at them, blah blah blah. What’s special about the book is there’s no writing whatsoever, it’s just pictures. And it I have read it to my kids’ classrooms frequently where I have them narrate the book, and then, or we narrate it just with noises, and it’s just really wonderful.
SPEAKER_04:
Cool.
Gavin:
But I’m gonna have a special um uh edition today. Um, I we we release our recordings a couple of weeks sometimes after we’ve done them, but we’re gonna be a little more timely. And I do want to say that today is the International Day of Um Transvisibility, and because of that, I do want to give a very special mention to another book that I absolutely love, which is called Red. And it is about a crayon that has been mislabeled, and it’s a blue, I believe it’s a blue crayon that’s labeled red or vice versa. And all of the other crayons are like, you should be blue, you’re you’re you’re labeled blue, or you should be red, you’re labeled red, whatever. And the crayon’s just like, but this is my color, and I’m just like, I’m just doing my thing. And it’s seen as a book that is very much like a trans-friendly advocacy book about not necessarily being inside what you’re labeled on the outside, and it’s uh it’s a really good one that we should all um embrace and read our kids. Not uh So what are we doing next week? So next week, let’s think about your top three worries for your kids. Now, no sincerity or sentimentality, please. Literally, one of my biggest worries when I was a kid. I’m gonna give you an example. One of my biggest worries as a parent was that he would be a basketball player.
David:
I hate You mean tall and rich?
Gavin:
Yes. I hate basketball. Why? Because I’m tall, and everybody told me when I was a kid that I was supposed to be good at basketball, and so I definitely harbor uh ill feelings about basketball. Sorry for all of you March Madness folks out there. Uh and anyway, so top three worries that, oh God, please don’t let my kid do X, Y, and Z. There you go. Today’s guests are husbands who’ve delighted the internet world for years with their near daily dances full of vim and vigor and delight and frivolity. Between them, they’ve been in 10, count them 10 Broadway shows. I know. I mean, talk about achieving so many dreams. Um, and they are social media coaches, but definitely social media influencers on top of all that. During the pandemic, they took their online creativity from New York across the country to various locations, filming dances all over the all over the world. I want it, well, all over the country, I want to know how many weird looks you’ve gotten all over the place. I’m s I’m that’s what I’m constantly thinking about. But anyway, they eventually settled in Houston, where they’ve become leaders in the Houston dance world and even, I’m sure, the parenting scene. And they became fathers just one year ago when their son Maverick was born. Welcome, Brett Schufer and Stephen Hanna. And tell us how has Maverick disrupted your day today. Good time.
SPEAKER_01:
Um, I guess the biggest disruption for me would be just the fact that I had to. Wake up at 6 30 to make sure I was awake and ready for him to get up at 7. Um, because I went to bed at like I I mean I went to bed at midnight, but I it’s like a it’s like an overkill of not sleeping for a long time, and this new schedule is kind of wearing me out.
Gavin:
Yeah, there’s for a little context there, Steven is right now starring in a brand new Broadway show called New York New York. And um, but this is the first time you’ve been on a show schedule with a baby waking up.
David:
Are you guys in previews right now? Are you open? Yeah, we’re in previews. So you’re rehearsing and you’re doing the show, and you’re raising a one-year-old.
SPEAKER_01:
That is correct. So wow. Needless to say, I think I was very emotional yesterday. No, I don’t think I was emotional. I cried, I laughed, I was frustrated, I was angry. Um, but I feel better today. But it was it’s definitely hard to wake up in the morning. It’s a roller coaster, you know.
SPEAKER_00:
Maverick was a real, I will say he was being an asshole during his diaper change today. Oh, yeah. Actually, he had to do that part.
David:
Did he get a nice like heel in his shit? And then now you’re dealing with that.
SPEAKER_00:
He purposefully reached behind him and put his hand in this shit. Nice. Yeah, and that was probably on purpose to piss you off. That was and then just to see if I can give him a reaction, and then he grabbed the wipes, so then you got shit all over the wipes. That’s clever because now you can’t clean because the cleaning product is now soiled. So it was a it was a workout.
Gavin:
And that was fun. And he’s not yet walking, right?
SPEAKER_00:
No, he’s so close. He’s very close. It’s gonna happen in the next week or two. Yeah, he’s like standing, he’ll take a step, and then he’ll sit down. We’re approaching things in a very like uh, and we’re doing the rye method. I don’t know if you know this method, but we’re approaching this in like in his own time, in his own way. We don’t push it. We’re not trying to like force him, like, come on, buddy, you can do it. You know, we’re just like, whenever you’re ready, dude, you’ll do it. So when he takes a step, I’m like, you just took a step.
David:
You just you just kicked your own shit off the table. That’s so exciting. Has he I have a so I have a one-year-old and a three-year-old, and my one-year-old has now done the gator rolls. Have you had has Maverick started doing the gator rolls on the changing table where he like can flip his body upside down?
SPEAKER_00:
Well, we stopped doing changes on the changing table every time we go. We do them on the floor.
David:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah. It’s it’s especially fun when they’re twisting around in their own shit. So, you know, parenting is glorious.
Gavin:
You can get your deep plies in there as well rather than having to keep him from rolling off the table.
SPEAKER_01:
Yeah. Yeah. He he almost we fell off a couple times, like a long time ago. And I was like, okay, we can’t do this anymore. This is unsafe. Very unsafe.
Gavin:
I remember um I was very, very fortunate to be employed um in shows when both my kids were born. And there was, it was an interesting and tough balance for my partner and I, where he was not in on the schedule that I was, but he was doing his other stuff. And that it was really hard, hopefully I’m not digging too deep here, in being like, like waking up and thinking, I have to do five shows this weekend. Can’t you be the one to get up? And him being like, I’ve got my own stuff to do too. And like everybody is so tired, and it is so hard to not be at each other’s throats when in reality we’re all just barely keeping our heads above water, and um, with a show schedule that makes it doubly so.
SPEAKER_01:
Yeah, that is very true. Everything you just said.
David:
Yeah, because you can’t go to bed, like like you can’t go to bed at 9 30, which is when you should be going to bed, right? Like that’s we’re talking act two. Like you should be in bed at 9 30. So when six six o’clock happens, you’re like bing, shower, coffee, relax, wake the kid up. It’s also romantic. But you’re you’re like eating dinner at like 11:45 p.m.
SPEAKER_01:
Well, the good news is that I do very little in the second act, which is not usual. Like it’s very unusual. Any show I’ve ever been in, that is not what’s what’s happening. But I have a lot of downtime in the second act. So I’ve actually been eating uh my my dinner then, and then coming home. And then sometimes I do eat a little bit more, but I’ve been able like last night we went to bed at I was in bed by 11:50. Um, and now that they’re making cuts to the show where I’m getting done a little bit earlier. So it’s all last week he was like getting done at 11 15. 1120. Nice.
David:
It’s funny because Gavin actually does very little on the shows he’s in, but for different reasons.
Gavin:
Very true, very true. I have always just been window dressing um for the ogres in the window. Um, but Brett, also though, you’re you’re the one there also being being stuck home. I’ve been there too. You’re the one stuck home and being like, well, you know, I you got to go out and be with adults tonight, and now I’m stuck here, and I could go to bed at nine. But guess what? I don’t want to go to bed at nine. I want to be able to stay up too, and and yes, on a sweet side, I want to be able to greet you when you come home.
David:
But also, I want to watch The Last of Us. So, like, let’s let’s go. I need some daddy time.
SPEAKER_01:
The new secession season just. Yeah, the new secession. We haven’t had a chance to watch it.
SPEAKER_00:
Yeah, it it’s been it’s been an interesting um evolution in the last we’ve only been back in New York for two months, and and Steven’s been in rehearsals the whole time. It’s just like, oh, I it’s just like sort of realizing, oh, I can’t actually do all these things I wanted to do or I thought I could do, and we actually can’t afford to hire a babysitter to watch, so I can do those things. Like it’s just like we had to sort of like start chipping away at like what’s possible, what’s not possible. And um, I think it was easier in Texas because when we’ll talk about it, it was just cheaper. Um New York is so expensive. So we’re just realizing, okay, in this moment, in this season, while he’s getting the show open, I just need to be full full-time dad, and uh and that way we know that things are going the way we want them to, and that Maverick has a sense of security, knowing that it’s one of us. And so it’s been an interesting negotiation in my own head because then my identity shifting, like, am I who am I? What do I do? Like it’s been a such a weird thing.
David:
And you guys are both artists, so it it at any point these dynamics can change and will change. Like, my husband is a total muggle, he’s like a nine-to-fiver, so like I’m the the the chaos and he’s the steady. So we can kind of plan around that a little bit. I mean both that emotionally and schedule-wise. Um but for you guys, like, you know, Steven, you’re in a show right now. Um, uh, Brett, you’re not, but that easily could flip-flop and probably will a hundred more times before Maverick starts.
SPEAKER_00:
Like, we were telling Gavin the other day, like, I put an audition on tape. I’ve I I mean literally three months ago, I was like, I think I’m done acting, I think this is it. And then we got to New York and I had a meeting with my agents, and they were like, What do you want to do? And I was like, Ah, do you like do you want to do Broadway? I was like, no, because the baby, like, and and just the schedule, and there’s not a lot of things I really want to do. Like, some of this stuff is so shitty, and there’s people in charge, as we were talking about, like, who are really shitty too, and I don’t want to work with them. Um, and I it’s just like, I just don’t if like my my level of tolerance is so much lower than it ever has been now that I’m a parent. I’m like, I don’t want to waste my time with people who don’t give a shit. But isn’t this so amazing and powerful feeling?
David:
That feeling that you get where you’re just like, I can officially say fuck you to things that I was nervous about saying fuck you to, and now I’m like full fuck you.
SPEAKER_00:
No, no, my kid deserves better. Um, and then and then I booked a TV thing on like I put it on.
SPEAKER_01:
His first self-tape. We did it so quickly during Maverick’s second.
SPEAKER_00:
I’ve booked two TV things this month.
SPEAKER_01:
I don’t even think I don’t even think he did two takes. We just did it once, and he was like, I was like, Do you want to do it again? He was like, No, it’s a good thing.
SPEAKER_00:
But this week I something on tape thinking it’s nothing, whatever. And then a Wednesday morning, my agent texts me, You booked it. This go into studio, you’re gonna have a fitting today, and you’re shooting tomorrow, meaning yesterday. So I had to figure out sitters Stevens in rehearsal. So I had to figure out who could watch Maverick while he naps so I could go to my costume fittings so I could get back in time from Long Island City to like oh my god, it was chaos, and I was like, that’s this is what it is. But I was like, but I can actually handle things if it’s just this. Like if I’m trying to do like three other things, it’s yeah, yeah, yeah.
David:
I I was directing uh uh uh I’ll just say an unnamed production one time, and this woman walked in for her audition with her two children, one of them being a one-year-old and the other one being like a five-year-old. And at the time I remember thinking, Come on, lady, get it together. Get a fucking sitter, like take this seriously. And now I’m like, oh no, this bitch is like, no, I’m gonna be in this show. But also, it was amazing because she put the two kids, she goes, Oh no, they’ll stay in the corner, it’ll be fine, they’ll just like sit by themselves. And I was like, Okay. So she’s about to start singing, and the one-year-old starts crying. So she was like, Do you mind if I hold him? And I was like, Yeah, sure, I guess. So she goes and she gets the one-year-old, she holds him, she’s standing center, the music starts, and she starts singing Life of the Party from Wild Party. She was like, Don’t you wanna be the life of the party? Like, like getting sexy and disgusting while holding this door in her hand. And it was one of those like Christopher Guest moments where like my hands went over my face, and I was like, I want to remember this for the rest of my life. Like, now I get it. She was like, bitch, I am gonna sting my 16 bars. I’m getting there. These kids are not gonna hold me back. Did she get it? Yeah, did she book it? No. No. She did not book it. Um I love you if you’re listening out there. Her kids are okay.
Gavin:
So tell us about And it’s all David’s fault. David has David has ruined lives. I mean, the the amount of just detritus on the side of David’s highway um is extensive, and uh this poor person is there too. Um so so in terms of the parenting factor though, um are have there have there been any nice elements of parenting in New York?
SPEAKER_01:
Or what have you what have been the biggest differences between Houston and New York? Just that, I mean, number one is that we can actually see a lot of friends that we’ve not seen in years, and so many people have met Maverick, and it is hard to find a sitter last minute, but it’s super easy to spend an hour with somebody who you’ve known for decades.
SPEAKER_00:
Um the social aspect has been the best part, I think. Because in the suburbs of Texas, like there I would go days without seeing a human being, besides maybe Zoom or whatever. Yeah. And I’m not even kidding. Like I would go days without seeing somebody, and and here it’s been like I’m gonna get on the subway and I’m gonna go down to you know the East Village and meet somebody for coffee for an hour and then come, you know, I’ll wear a maverick on a and an Ergo baby and come back, you know. Where you know, the car seat and the the and tax, yeah. It’s just a very different, it’s it’s so much easier to just be mobile and go do stuff. And it’s so isolating to be a parent, period.
David:
Um, and then to be a parent of an infant. There’s just so many things you’re like, I just don’t have it in me to do all the things I need to do to go have fun tonight. So I’m just gonna say no. And it’s such a fucking slippery slope to becoming this like shut-in. So that is something that New York City, like, there is something about New York City where you’re like, fuck it, I’m gonna throw the baby in the the Ergo baby, and we’re gonna just gonna head out. And and like you said, being in a rural area, that can really fuck with you as a new parent, especially a first-time new parent.
SPEAKER_01:
Yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, yes, but I will say the nice thing about it is that because we’re talking about New York though. I okay, we’re gonna talk about New York. I want to say, but like I want to say, we’ll talk about Technical. Okay, so forget about it.
David:
Forget about what’s what are the good things? You guys listen, feel free to fight on camera during this recording. We would love to listen.
SPEAKER_01:
The nice things about New York, you know, it’s sometimes it’s hard for me to find nice things about New York. Um I it’s a very overwhelming place, and I think that I have a hard time. It’s interesting too, taking him out on the Ergo Baby. We would take him out, and we were starting to face him out front before we got here. So we were doing that, and you just forget how overstimulating the city is, and then you have it’s winter, a nine-month, a ten-month-old, you know. Yeah, and he’s just you know, you’re in Times Square.
David:
But at the same time, you know, like shielding his eyes from the homeless people masturbating in front of you. You just look for no Elmo, no Elmo, stay away from me, Elmo.
SPEAKER_00:
That Elmo is smoking, ignore her. He’s a very focused baby, and he sees everything. So, what would happen? You get on the subway and we’re facing him out, and he would stare at every person on the subway because he just wants to see, like, okay, who’s that? What’s that? And so he’s making eye contact with people. I’m like, don’t make eye contact.
David:
Because they’re gonna think that baby has beef with them, and then all chaos. You know, there’ll be chaos.
SPEAKER_00:
I don’t want that person talking to us, you know. They do.
Gavin:
Yeah, but I don’t want I don’t want your advice, your unsolicited advice on the subway. Come on, number one rule of Maverick is no eye contact on the subway.
SPEAKER_01:
Yeah, yeah. But I mean, the good news is that I mean, he has grown in leaps and bounds because of all the things that are around him, the sounds and everything. We’ve started facing him in again because I’ve we felt that it was a little too overstimulating, and also the wind was like way too much. I was like, this is too windy, you know.
SPEAKER_00:
So, and then um in the moving process, yeah, how is that literally moving your lives with a baby? We’ve moved so much in the last like five years, you know, South Carolina, and then back to New York, and then we’d like to stay in Pittsburgh, and then we moved to Texas, and now we’re back here. Um, so it’s been it’s just exhausting, but honestly, he’s so great. He’s doing amazing. Like we’ve flown with him, we’ve flown with him, we flew him back from Orlando when he was born. Seven days. He was seven days old. That was stressful.
SPEAKER_01:
That was like, I thought my heart may have popped out onto the ground a couple times.
SPEAKER_00:
We flew to California with him. He was three months. He was great. Great at three months, three to four months with the baby. Five months is easy.
David:
It’s the easiest. When dads are like, when you see on the gay dad sites when they’re like, so my dad, my baby’s gonna be born soon, and I don’t know, should we do like a 20-hour road trip or fly? I’m a little nervous. And everybody in unison says, fly with that kid, because it is the easiest time you can ever fly with a kid. Also, you’re a superstar on that plane. I’m sure you thought that where everybody was like, Oh, how old is he? And you’re like seven days, and they’re like, Oh, and they see you’re like gay dads, and it’s just like perfect. And then you have a one and a half year old who’s throwing spaghetti at the store, you know what I mean? And then you call your baby an asshole for sure.
SPEAKER_01:
Well, yeah. Well, then we flew at Christmas time to see my family to Pittsburgh, and it was harder. It was much harder because now that he’s more physical, yeah.
David:
He wants to stand so much, and like so you know, but and he’s eyeing everybody on the plane, I hear, just making direct aggressive eye contact.
SPEAKER_00:
But he does, like he literally does. And but getting here, honestly, because we’ve been doing that, like I said, that rye method, it’s like everything is very um, you know, we build like a safe space for him to play, and that he’s always had that. So, like being able to just set up the same toys, the same space for him. It was like it took him no time to adjust. He’s like, Oh, yeah, I know this, this is familiar, I feel safe here. And so he slept well the first night and the new the new room. Yeah, it’s not been an issue really for him. I think it’s just more stressful for us.
Gavin:
For us, oh, there’s so much that’s just like the the pressures that we put on ourselves, the expectations, the the fabricated nightmare scenarios, we all stress ourselves out about it. But since you’re so fresh off literally the airplane, do you have any little tidbits of advice of taking a toddler on an airplane that you either did and it nailed it or wish you had done?
SPEAKER_00:
Bring lots of toys that and don’t let him see them. Don’t let him see that. That was really fun. Because then when he starts to get bored, you can bring out a new toy, and then he’ll be occupied with that until he gets bored. That was one thing that I found really helpful.
SPEAKER_01:
Um and then when we’re flying together, I mean it’s it’s great to have a partner, I mean, have another person with you, whether it’s your partner or um somebody helping you, because then you can just pass them back and forth. Um, don’t be afraid to stand up and walk up and down the aisles with your baby. I think that it took us a minute to kind of get comfortable with that because he was fussing so much, and we were like, I was like, we gotta stand up. Like he can’t, you know.
David:
That’s always but that’s always a fun little experiment because when you walk up and down the aisles with a baby, you get to see the the halves of the plane. You get to see the people who were like, Oh, hi, baby. And then you get to see the people who look at your baby and you’re like, if you fucking d disrupt my Shrek 2 viewing, I’m gonna be really fucking yeah.
SPEAKER_00:
I will say he did um flying. I so I flew back to New York with him because Steven was already here. But we our babysitter came and he cried more than usual. The f the because flights the flights got delayed, the worst, right? Because it was a direct flight, but then we set I think somebody got redirected at one point to Dallas, and then it was like a whole thing. Um so he got really done. He was done, he was crying and screaming, and people, you know, certainly kept looking like they were annoyed listening to him cry.
David:
And I’m like, you know, who the fuck cares? Get fucking over it. We’re on a public bus in the sky. Get over it.
SPEAKER_00:
Like, you know, he’s upset, and he should be upset because look where we are. Like, yeah, totally it is just public transport in the sky.
Gavin:
So I mean yeah, just stuck with it. Um, and so uh what then what can you tell us a little bit about your experience as gay parents in Houston? Was it um yeah, tell us about it.
David:
By the way, Houston for me equals my 600-pound life doctor now. Like, I’m obsessed with that show, and he makes all of his pa he’s he’s based in Houston and he makes all of his patients move to Houston. So I feel like I kind of understand Houston by just watching the show. Continue.
SPEAKER_00:
I don’t know that show, but I don’t know quality TV. Steven might get really into that now, and thank you, David. It is, Stephen, it is everything. David’s gonna get into it. Um honestly, you know, it was fine because when you live in the suburbs, we were in the suburbs of Houston, like you don’t have to see people if you don’t want to. So like I’m not affected. Like everyone in New York that we see, all of our friends are like so happy to be out of Texas. Oh, are you guys okay? I mean, it’s that voice, that voice you guys are using. I love it. Oh my god. You know, and they’re like, well, you’re not a well, you’re not a woman, and or you’re not you’re you’re you know, like it’s like they think that there’s people like outside our house like going, don’t get an abortion, don’t be gay, play off the CNN for a minute. Just no one’s live your life. There’s plenty of space there, it’s very affordable. It’s like so it was kind of nice. I I will say it was hard to find our people. Like, I never really we have a few handful of friends that have kids, so we never see them. Right. Yeah, of course. Yeah, they’re your best friends you never see, I guess. You never see them, and um, and then there’s like you know, the more progressive areas of Houston are downtown, which was about 45 minutes away. And uh, you know, so I that that was the only thing that I like when we were talking about like New York versus Houston, and I will say we did go when Maverick was a few months old. We went to like we were like, let’s just go look at stuff at um world market. Let’s go look at this for Oh god, you guys are so gay.
David:
Oh my god, the gayest. Like getting married to each other, having sex, having children, but like that’s pretty much choosing as like a fun event to go to world market. We were looking for changes.
SPEAKER_01:
When he was like, Yeah, we were looking for a new dining chair. Oh Lord. So we’re going, you know, we were searching and searching, searching. We went to World Market and Maverick at the time, I don’t know, it was like more than six months. What was I don’t know? Six months. He was still like very tiny in a car seat. I remember I was holding it the car seat to bring him in. Like we didn’t take him out of the car seat. And this woman, as we walked in, she looked like she did like um a Linda Blair exorcist move.
SPEAKER_00:
I mean, she like short-circuited. She saw two men and she was like, trying to add it all up, and yeah. It just like perplexed. I was like, and there was another lady, I swear to God, who was like peering around furniture, like looking at us. And I was like, so that was, I mean, that’s the and the other thing I was saying to somebody that oh at Maverick’s birthday party the other day was like in Texas, I felt like I had to explain ourselves all the time. People would be like, people be like, You worked on Broadway? What was that like? Da-da-da-da-da. What wait, you did what? Why are you here? What are you doing here? Da-da-da. You have a baby? How did that how did you do that? What did that we’re in New York?
David:
I do not have like a fake story ready to go. I do that on planes when somebody’s like sees me writing and they’re like, What are you doing? And I’m like, I’m an accountant. Like I just like I’m flat, because you there are no further questions if I say I’m an accountant. But if I say like, oh, I’m a director, I’m a TV writer, they’re like, Oh, oh, I need to talk to you. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:
That’s good, David. Yeah, you got you gotta have a really boring job. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because um, because I’ve I in New York, no one gives a shit. So you don’t have to explain anything. People are like, oh, you’re a big thing. No one gives a shit about you. No fucking cares. And then, like, also they give a baby. Cool.
David:
Like, there’s no there’s so does everybody. Good luck. Yep. Unless you’re trying to sell it in Midtown, like, get the fuck away from it.
Gavin:
And you’re gay, please. Who cares? Moving on. Is there can you tell us something in actually interesting about your lives? That’s great.
SPEAKER_01:
Yeah. It was just way easier, like in Texas in the beginning. I think if I think about that, like, I think that it was really nice for us to be there because I didn’t have to work a job that requires so many hours, and we could just be home with the baby. Like, there was something so great about um, you know, us being able to be together as much as we were without the stress of what it takes to be here.
David:
Yeah, but that’s the that’s the power, that’s the power of finding your tribe, which you guys were kind of talking about. What was missing when you were in Houston was that like you needed that like tribe. That was like the last missing piece because you had you liked the area, you liked your your time together, and that’s what it’s partly why this podcast exists. It’s why it’s so important, I think, to find your community of like-minded people, because just spiritually, like you know, uh like you’re saying, seeing people in New York fills your spirit meter up. It does.
SPEAKER_00:
And one of the things I was gonna say is like we I started feeling kind of lonely. So I started going through Instagram and finding other gay dads in the Houston area, and we started doing these monthly meetups, and uh it was it grew to like over a hundred different uh you know, people that would show up with their kids. And some of these kids are you know, maybe a little bit older, it’s the first time they’d ever seen other two dad families because they live out in these rural parts of Texas, and so it was really cool to like be able to build that community and start to see that. I hated leaving it because we were meeting like once a month. Um, but you know, if it’s you know, I I want to build something like that here too, because it was just such a relief to to know like we had that touch point of these other gay dads, and we didn’t have to feel so isolated.
Gavin:
And building your tribe or finding your tribe can be very difficult no matter where you are, no matter who you are, no matter what your identity is. I mean, I don’t live in the city anymore, I live in Connecticut, and it’s taken a few years even here to find my my people, and whatever that means by my people. But also in parenting, everything is so cyclical, you know. We’ve talked to some dads who have started their communities, but their kids are already 10 years old and 20 years old. And so there’s a constant rotation of uh communities that need to be built. And uh luckily there’s more gay dads in the area, um all over the country, and so but the gay dads from 15 years ago aren’t your tribe either, kind of. I mean, they could be on an in another circumstance, but you you’re just like I need to bond with somebody whose kid grabbed a shitty handful of wipes this morning, and we can all just conspire about it.
David:
Well, like like our previous guest was Mike Lubin, who created a gay dads uh group in New York City, but in the early 2000s, right? Like that, what a different time, what a different world, what a different set of needs. He was like, it was literally word of mouth. There was no Facebook, there was none of that stuff. Um and now, you like you said, you can just kind of look on Instagram or Facebook and immediately find gay parenting groups, yeah, which is so important. And it’s weird, there’s a weird hypocrisy in my mind when I think about like because I have been both the like oh, he’s a gay dad, what does that mean-ness of it? And then also like the like, who cares, there’s a million gay dads. And there’s something kind of cool about both. Like, there’s something cool about like being the one who kind of introduces people into gay parenting and like they think it’s cool and you’re kind of the star, but then there’s also something nice about not constantly being asked all the stupid fucking questions that we get asked, and that’s sometimes kind of nice, just be like, Yeah, we’re all just gay dads, we don’t have to ask each other stupid questions.
SPEAKER_01:
Yeah, but you know, it’s all I feel like we’ve also shared some like experiences with the gay dads in the in Houston, like they would talk about their journey, and because everyone’s journey is so different, like you would I would hear things and I’d be like, huh, that’s not at all what we did when we picked our eggs or how we got the eggs retrieved, you know. So it’s just interesting to hear the differences and the methods and what different doctors do and what they, you know, so I think it changes.
David:
Yeah, it changes and you guys did what, gestational surrogacy?
SPEAKER_01:
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah.
Gavin:
In your um social media feeds, not only do you bring lots of really fun dancing all the time, which God bless you. That’s how I found you, that’s how uh most of the world has found you, undoubtedly, is just because we all need to dance more. Everybody needs to dance more. We all need to be able to like just do what Lizzo tells us to do, and it’s about damn time.
David:
Always listen to Lizzo.
SPEAKER_00:
Always. Magic loves that song.
Gavin:
Yes, she is. Yes, she is, just like Queen B too. And Dr. Nalzardin. So much talent coming out of Houston, including Bretton Stephen. Um, and you have not shied away from making political statements and um and being full fronted in um advocacy on your feed. Has that been uh has what have you thought about that process?
SPEAKER_00:
It’s funny, we were just talking about it the other day, because I I I think if we didn’t post about like some of those things, we probably would have a ton more followers. I think we lose followers almost every time I post something that is like not even political. It’s like it’s it’s it’s not political, it’s human rights, you know. Um but I I don’t feel like using this platform to just promote fluff and make people feel like a gay well, you know, like somebody said to us in Houston actually was like, you know, I I really think things have improved for y’all. I watched Creek. Yeah, yeah. You know, you’re like that that’s a that’s like a misleading, like I don’t want to mislead people into thinking that like our community is not suffering by these laws and that young people who young people who follow us should know, like, hey, like this is actually like affecting our us in our community. And I I just you know, and I I know there’s people there’s accounts that we follow, I was saying to Stephen’s like, how do they have more followers? Oh right, they don’t post anything about what’s happening in the real world. And and and I think that that and it’s great and it’s a real it’s a relief and it’s fluff and it like helps people escape from their reality, which is why like if we just danced, we’d probably have 200,000, 300,000 followers at this point. But but that’s but also we’re tired sometimes too.
David:
So you know your new parents are but also you don’t want to mislead people into thinking that this is gay life, right? And I think that’s what you’re saying is that like gay life is just fluff and joy and and uh you know oversaturated photo shoots, and it’s not like there are literally laws out there trying to hurt and kill us. So I I I think it’s great that you don’t have that many followers because your followers are more authentic.
SPEAKER_00:
Yeah. What’s the point of building a platform if you’re not gonna use it to like help our community? And all I think about is like my people, like I think about who our ideal audience is, and I think about like me at 13, 14 years old, living in Southeast Texas, and thinking, could I be on Broadway and be married to a man and have a kid and be happy and healthy? And like, oh, there’s an example of it, right? Um, but also like I want to be able to tell my parents, like, yo, you what you think is wrong, like what you’re voting for is wrong, what you’re the things you’re doing.
David:
It hurts me at 13 years old, me at 14 years old, whatever like you’re hurting my future connected to a real person because often they just kind of go, Oh, well, you know, not you, it’s just those. And like, no, no, no, we are those. That is us. That’s what my our family, my family does, at least.
SPEAKER_01:
So it also I think just like speaking up and like being honest about what’s really going on also gives us a purpose on social media because like the fluff and the dances are trust me, tons of fun. But um, at the end of the day, if you don’t really have like a real mission or a statement to put out, then yeah, then what’s the point of doing it after a while?
Gavin:
All right, did you guys go to Disneyland, Disney World while Maverick was like one, two, three, four, five, six days old by chance?
SPEAKER_01:
No. No, we thought we planned a phone.
SPEAKER_00:
He wouldn’t let me.
SPEAKER_01:
He was like, he wanted to get so we were joking, he wanted to get a photo of him in front of the castle as like a newborn, and I was like, You just wanted to be on dills of Disney.
David:
I know because I follow that Instagram account and I want to be on that fucking thing. That’s the only reason I worked out. I want to be on that Instagram account.
SPEAKER_01:
Yeah, my goals, life goals. Oh my god. Um at one point we joked with my mom because she’s like super religious, like Catholic, and was like really worried about him being baptized. And we were like, Well, we’re gonna take him to Disney World and get him baptized in front of the castle by Flora Fauna and Merriweather. And my mom, you would have thought she believed us, she was like, You better not.
David:
We’re just gonna we’re just gonna dip him in the in the small world water, you know. That smell can just live through his force forever. Yeah, there’s that there’s there’s that scent. Yeah, absolutely. Okay, I have a hard question to ask you, and I want your honest answers. It’s hard.
SPEAKER_01:
Okay.
David:
If Maverick turns out tone deaf, no rhythm. What’s are you yeah, I’m sorry, bruh. I know I know I shouldn’t have said it, but I do we need to take a break.
SPEAKER_01:
How could you say that?
Gavin:
Well, go ahead. What if he ends up being an accountant? For real. Oh god.
David:
And his and his his plain story is actually that he’s like a Broadway actor. You’re like, wait, this is confusing.
SPEAKER_01:
Well, wait, what if he well, first of all, it’s a joke. It’s a joke question.
David:
Don’t ever listen to anything I say. Gabe. It’s just all bullshit coming from David. I think it’s a great question.
SPEAKER_01:
I think it’s a great question. But from the moment he started pulling himself up, he’s had a really nice turned-out supported leg and a beautiful tondue back. He does have a beautiful tongue back. He has a beautiful tongue. No, he has a beautiful tondue back and it’s a nice Krista actually said, ooh, look at that tongue, and I was like, Steven’s kid.
Gavin:
I uh not to turn it back to me, but we are all right. My uh my daughter starred in her fifth grade musical last year. And as Todd and I got out of the car walking into the- Was it the life?
David:
Did you play the lead in the life? Oh my god, please, please. The oldest profession. Such a weird show to have that kind of tone, right? When it’s just uproetic soprano, you’re like, wait, how anyway, we’ll have another show.
Gavin:
So we get out of the car, and Todd turns to me and goes, She better not embarrass us. She did not. But there was that feeling of she better not suck. Because, you know, and we hadn’t rehearsed her, she wouldn’t run lines with us at all. And she did it entirely herself in the world.
David:
Was she reviewed as strikingly adequate? Like I was one time. Striking.
Gavin:
I mean, that’s just wouldn’t we all be better off if we if we could just set a bar of just being strikingly adequate? I think it’s all right. We are all David and I are definitely the world’s okayest dads, and maybe just the most world’s most strikingly adequate dads. And you know what? That’s better than most of the fucking world. So the fact they’re even talking about being in talking about it, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:
I mean, my dad didn’t talk about it. Um, but I was gonna answer your question. So yes, I was gonna say this. When when we had Maverick, my brother, well, my twin brother actually said to me, in this very similar question, what are you gonna do if he doesn’t what it what are you gonna do if he wants to play sports? I watch women’s gymnastics, I’m totally there for him. I don’t know what you’re talking about. I was like, what? Figures gymnastics, yeah. We’re gonna be in the crowd wearing team colors. Yep.
Gavin:
Yep and the best cheers for sure.
SPEAKER_00:
That what did you yeah, what how did you react to it? I said to him, why would you I I remember I said to him, Well, we’re gonna why would you why did it matter? We’re gonna do whatever he wants to do. Yeah, what are you gonna do if your kid likes musical theater? Yeah. I was like, it’s just such a weird question, you know. It’s like and and it’s so laced in homophobia. It’s like, yes, it’s so amazing how people say things and don’t even realize that it’s homophobic.
David:
Yeah we’ve done we’ve kind of discovered this as we’ve been interviewing people, is like most of these things are either laced in homophobia or misogyny, honestly. Which one of you is the girl, and you know, which one of you is the weaker one? You know, you’re like you kind of follow the trail and you’re like, wait a fucking minute. I know what you’re saying. Yeah.
Gavin:
I’m I’m infuriated for you. I know that it wasn’t um it it wasn’t meant to be uh hate um, you know, I don’t know. It it it wasn’t meant to be a homophobic question, but it was a homophobic question, and that’s really frustrating. Sorry to hear that.
SPEAKER_00:
Well, it’s inevitable for people who don’t have, you know, they’re like, Well, what? I’m not homophobic. Okay, how many gay friends do you have? Right? How many of you have been on the five? I’ve watched Will and Grace once. Yeah. Shits Creek is like, you know. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:
Yeah.
Gavin:
Um well, you are making the world a better place, and thank you for doing it. And I love that you’re closer in New York. We gotta have it during some time. But also, I love it when you’re in when you’re gonna be in Houston or South Carolina or Pittsburgh or wherever you are, and spreading the love and joy of dancing and advocacy and parenting um wherever you may be, because you are making the world a better place. Thank you, guys.
SPEAKER_00:
Thank you.
Gavin:
Thanks for having us. Thanks for joining us. Thanks. So, something great on my mind right now is always people who are making the world a better place. And Ugh, you’re so earnest and nice. It’s extremely. I know, I know, but don’t worry, I love sex and coming too, all right? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Um Ashby Beasley is the amazing woman who happened to be visiting Nashville here in terms of um timely news events, who was uh showed up at the um tragic shooting that took place at the school, and she just stepped in front of the microphones as you know the statements were being um were finished, and she stepped up just as a citizen who happened to be in Nashville visiting her sister-in-law and said, Aren’t you sick of having to report on these murders of children?
David:
It’s such a great video if you haven’t seen it.
Gavin:
It’s oh it’s and so Ashby Beasley is um I mean she ha she took her moment and um that was something great. And I there’s so much surrounding obviously this bullshit of um fear and paranoia that are fueling our sick society. But Ashby Beasley was something great in my world this week.
David:
Fuck yeah. Um so my something great is fucking the internet, which is sounds stupid, but let me explain. So I think about parents before they had the internet. So my son is just being a total fucking asshole at night now. Um he’s getting up, he’s he’s he’s doing all the things. So I’m going to Google, like we all do as parents, and we’re like, why is my kid blank or whatever? And it just feels so good when you Google something like why won’t my kid blank. And there’s hundreds of articles like your kid won’t blank. Well, here’s five. You realize you’re just not alone. And I just think about like being a parent and just being like, oh, my kid isn’t my kid is an asshole, but he’s like not some unique asshole that’s going through something that’s never happened. We’re all in the same boat, yeah, we’re all dealing with it. And to to I so so my something great is when you Google something that you think is wrong with your kid and it’s wrong with everyone’s kid, you’re like, ah, safe space. We are not alone. We are not alone.
Gavin:
It’s all a phase, we’re not alone. Yeah.
David:
And that is our show. If you have any questions, comments, or general compliments, you can email us at gatriarchspodcast at gmail.com.
Gavin:
Or you can DM us on Instagram. We are at Gatriarchspodcast on the internet. David is at DavidFm Vaughn everywhere, and Gavin is at Gavin Lodge on Thursdays.
David:
Please leave us a glowing five star review wherever you get your podcasts. Thank you, as always.
Gavin:
And we’ll see you next time on another episode of Gatriarchs.