Confident, Not Cocky
Real talk. Real discussions. You'll love this show because I know you can relate and I know this will be interesting as hell to you. This is just me being confident, not cocky.
Confident, Not Cocky
Embracing Life's Complex Journey
Facing life's trials can often feel like navigating a storm, but as Benny and I share, it's those storms that teach us the most. Benny opens up about his ongoing health challenges and how they've shaped his perspective on kindness and setting boundaries, especially within the family. We also explore the delicate balance of supporting adult children living at home while maintaining personal space, drawing parallels to my wife's experiences with people-pleasing. Our conversation is a testament to the complexity of family dynamics and the need for open dialogue and understanding.
Relationships thrive on appreciation and communication, yet often, we let gratitude slip through the cracks. Through our stories, we highlight the importance of expressing thanks and the role it plays in a healthy relationship. With the rapid changes in parenting today. We share an enlightening experiment that underscores the need to educate children on the potential dangers of the digital world while fostering their sense of independence responsibly. The episode also touches on bullying and sharing personal reflections that aim to empower and build resilience.
Life's unpredictability is a recurring theme, and our honest discussion sheds light on personal responsibility and the courage required to face life's challenges. We talk about the power of resilience and the importance of self-care in overcoming obstacles. From dealing with bullying to battling cancer, the takeaway is clear: life is a complex tapestry of experiences that shape who we are, and it's our responsibility to navigate it with integrity and perseverance. Join us as we reflect on these life lessons and the wisdom gained along the way.
As the saying goes, it ain't cocky if you back it up. This is Confident, not Cocky the show where bold conversations meet relatable real-life experiences. Hosted by Charles Campos Jr, this podcast brings you everything from the latest trends in news to personal stories that make you laugh, reflect and maybe even get a little emotional. Whether it's Charles flying solo or chopping it up with special guests, nothing's off the table and it's always straight talk, real and raw, no filter. So get ready for a ride that's as fun as it is real. This is Confident, not Cocky, and this is your host, charles Campos Jr.
Speaker 2:How you doing, Benny.
Speaker 3:Alright, alright, charles, you feeling better? Yeah, just hanging in there every day is a struggle with me. Just hanging in there every day is a struggle with me.
Speaker 2:So I know this past week and I know people that don't know us. We work together. I know you've missed this past week because you were feeling sick. Is it anything new?
Speaker 3:Just I had a touch of pneumonia again. I have lung problems from the COVID from last year, so it just caught up with me. I think that the week before I was outside doing all those arms and it just got me sick and jacked me up where I had to stay home, didn't want to come back outside and get even worse.
Speaker 2:So you're saying it's my fault for making you do it? No, the work's got to be done brother.
Speaker 3:I don't mind being outside, it's just I knew it was going to catch up with me and it got me. I got you. Well, I'm glad you're doing better.
Speaker 2:I mean, I know you've got serious problems which we'll get into that later in the podcast, but I'm glad you're doing better.
Speaker 3:I'm glad you're able to come out here and join me. Yeah, me too, man.
Speaker 2:It feels good to get out of the house, not just be cooped up looking at everybody, same people every day so I actually want to start something as like, I kind of want to do this for, like I guess, the first part of my every podcast. I'm just going to ask you a question and just feel free to answer how you want to, but what is something that people seem to misunderstand about you?
Speaker 3:My kindness. How so? I just think I'm too nice and I hold too much in where I should be able to just explode. But I don't want to be that way.
Speaker 2:So are you one of those peoples, like my wife, who can't say no or tend to say no? Right, like a people, pleaser. Pretty much I try to Can you give me a couple examples, examples that would be like an issue.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I can't throw my kids out and they're all above 25.
Speaker 2:Okay. So, speaking of that, how many kids do you have living with you? I have two. You have two kids, Well three.
Speaker 3:Well, actually four Okay okay, the number keeps going. I'm sorry, let me. I have two adults, uh, eight year old and a five-year-old grandson okay, so the eight.
Speaker 2:Well, it's one of those, that five-year-old that's one of the adults living with you. Yeah, that's my daughter's son, okay, and so you also mentioned you have a stepchild, yes, and which? How is?
Speaker 3:that the adult, he's, he's, uh gonna be 25 next month.
Speaker 2:Okay, so you have your biological son and you have a step son son, yes, they're living with you. Currently right, they're both over 20, yes, and why are they living with you?
Speaker 3:man? My daughter and her boyfriend got into some you know the back and forth thing, the whole domestic type of, Exactly. So he kicked her out because she wasn't on the lease. So me and my wife too, oh, just come on in. We got room, which you know we do, but she helps, she does help out. You know, my stepson just, I love him to death, but he's going to learn the hard way. You know, got to get out and do something. If I can get out there and go, he should be able to, and there's nothing wrong with him Now, are they?
Speaker 2:both in school, were in school, never went to school like college was.
Speaker 3:No, no, college college, nothing like that. Just barely graduated. Just I don't know what their plans are, but they figured out quick how long they've been there. For my stepson going on probably four months off and on my daughter about a month now. But my grandson lives with me because we put in in school out there by my house because it's a better school.
Speaker 2:So then the eight-year-old is your, my daughter yeah, your biological daughter no but that's a whole nother story well, do you want to go into that while we're here?
Speaker 3:No, it's a touchy situation. I just don't want to get on her nerves already.
Speaker 2:I see what you're saying. That's no problem. I can see that my wife has this. It could be an issue or it could be just like I said kindness, my wife does the same thing with family. They ask favors, even if it inconveniences her. She'll be like yep, I'll do it. Yeah, I'll be right there. Yeah, I can really no problem. And it frustrates me because it's like damn, you got to do so-and-so and now you got to do this, just to come back. It definitely gets under my nerves, but I know that's the type of person she is and so I can relate to that in a way. Me.
Speaker 3:I want to say no, but then sometimes I'll have my wife Trish on the side Go do it, he'll do it, he'll look at it. Like last night, for instance, I had to do my daughter's brakes on her car at like 7 o'clock at night, so it was already dark. Got a flashlight, the calipers wouldn't collapse. I'm like motherfucker.
Speaker 2:And I'm sure she knew about this.
Speaker 3:Yeah, the brakes been grinding. So I'm like I get home, or we went to the grocery store and came back and my wife's like, oh, he'll do your brakes. I'm just looking at her like no, I don't want to do them, but I did them.
Speaker 2:See and I think that's a little different because we're talking about your kids- we're talking about the safety. Yeah, it's one of those things like damn I don't want to do it.
Speaker 3:And the thing is too, charles, she is appreciative, like she will help you.
Speaker 2:That's good, and go out of her way to help you, it's more frustrating when the person or people aren't appreciative Exactly or they don't even like a simple thank you man.
Speaker 3:That's when they could get it, and that goes a long way with people. To me it does Like appreciation to show you your gratitude that you do care. You ain't got to be an asshole. Like you said, don't say nothing. Absolutely, that just don't make sense to me.
Speaker 2:And I think, at least for me, I think I have that issue, it's been a big issue for me, I think I have that issue or I've I've. It's been a big issue for me, especially like in like other my marriage, where I have a tendency to not show appreciation or express appreciation and that's got me in trouble that's between me and her quite a few times yeah and she does do a lot at home, like I I did last week.
Speaker 3:I've been home, I should you know, keeping up with the laundry, the kids, feeding them, school, and then she goes to work and then come home, does it all over again. I'm just like, damn, sit down, you don't. I don't want to do it, but I want just sit down.
Speaker 2:It's hard to communicate in a relationship. It is Even more so in a marriage, especially if you've been with someone for five, ten plus years, I think it's overall it's hard to communicate in general in a relationship.
Speaker 3:This year it just pass me 23 years together. I mean it's a long time, yeah, but like you said I, I have a hard time telling her hey, good job, you know, or, and, and and I try to make a recently have a date night, even if it's sitting at home watching a movie together, but there's always somebody at our house.
Speaker 2:That's rough and what I learned is that as far as like a relationship, especially if you have kids, you almost have to go to the point where you have to prioritize you and your significant other over your kids. I agree, and I think before I learned that it was all about the kids. Make sure that the kids are taken care of or make sure that we have stuff for them or we're doing this for them. Sometimes you got to say fuck those damn kids, we need some time alone.
Speaker 3:We have to prioritize us and for some reason when that happens it brings you a little closer together, Like almost at ease, because you took that time apart for each other. And I don't know if your kids are little or I see them come into work that day, but they look like they're little kids.
Speaker 2:They're all under 10.
Speaker 3:It's almost like more attention to them, because this is what they need. You can't be like hey, go in your room, they don't know what to do.
Speaker 2:And then it's now. We're in the iPad era, where it's like you don't want them to have too much screen time, but nowadays, when both parents are working and we're exhausted or if we want us time, it's like man it's all you could do is give them the ipad and get like 15 minutes, because uh quiet time like us growing up we didn't have that stuff.
Speaker 3:I mean, and and the little ones at home, my house there, that's all they are about. Yeah, ipads switches, this, that, but um, about getting to, uh, preoccupying them.
Speaker 3:It's almost like I I'm I don't want them on that all the time because just too much bad stuff they can get in to see oh yeah and like I've seen the stuff my kids look at like, so I had my wife put the blocker on there, for only a certain age can go in between certain things to look at. But yeah, there's some crazy people out there trying to. You know you got people trying to contact kids off. Oh, I'm a 12 year old little kid, or you know, 10 year old, and I don't trust that stuff.
Speaker 2:I saw a. It was a tiktok or short video, um, and it was a a person doing like an experiment and it was with the consent and the parents were involved. It was it was a guy who would like create a new Facebook account, put a picture on and just randomly message a girl and say hey, I'm new in town and, like dude, I think one of the girls after two days I seen that one, charles, after two days this girl 12, 14.
Speaker 3:And they had their parents in the house. Yeah, dude.
Speaker 2:You see the one where they're in the car. And and meet her by the park or something well there was that, and then there was a third one where the guy's in a no window van, he's in the front seat, the parents are in the back and they're just like waiting. Like this. He texts her and be like hey, I'm here, this 12 13 year old just oh, parents are gone. Let me go hook up with it or meet with this guy just met a week ago.
Speaker 2:Yes, she gets in the van and then the parents are in ski masks and they like hang on to her and she's scared for her life. If it wasn't her parents, she would have been gone.
Speaker 3:Gone and I tried to tell my daughter that, with an 8-year-old at home, our gas station is right around the corner from our house. I said get in the car, abby, you're going with me. No, I can protect myself, daddy-o. So I grabbed her up real fast. I said what are you going to do now when someone my size grabs you. She just looked at me. I'll go with you Like you can't. Just because you watch these videos, you can protect yourself. Don't mean you can't.
Speaker 2:Nope, it just blew my mind how willing these little girls were For real, just willing to go down the street or into a person's car that they just met.
Speaker 3:It's almost sad and sickening because there really is people out there like that, and it's sad for the parents' wives, like you said, always somebody working. Or, like me, when my wife gets home from work, we got maybe a 10-minute window and I'm leaving for work because it's you know, I work nights with you. So it it's good and bad because we ain't got time to argue either. You know I'm cutting out if she's coming in.
Speaker 3:So it's like it is scary out there for the kids and I don't know what. I don't let my daughter in the front yard unless I'm out there. I can see her, she her chain playing in the backyard.
Speaker 2:You see, that's a shame nowadays because I mean, I know you're older than me but like even in my days when we were, I was little like you could go outside and be out till eight o'clock at night parents didn't worry about you.
Speaker 3:no, bullshit, bullshit, dude. Early 90s, like I grew up over in North Hamlet behind Gaza and Roller Dome.
Speaker 1:Uh-huh.
Speaker 3:Be on our bikes at 9 in the morning, ride all the way out to Wolf Lake, lake Michigan I mean at least before the boats was even there and out there snagging fish, just doing whatever we wanted. Like you said, there was no hesitant. Parents ain't looking for you until, like you said, you need to come home by 9, 10 o'clock at night.
Speaker 2:Before the streetlights came on.
Speaker 3:You knew it was time to be home.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it's crazy because I grew up in the harbor in East Chicago.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, I know that area and it was like the same thing.
Speaker 2:You just ride your bikes around town and don't even worry about it. Now we're scared to let our kid go down just a street. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Because you're just scared of what's going to happen. It takes one second to snatch you up, throw you in a van or a car gone. You know just.
Speaker 2:Yeah, man. I wouldn't know how that happened, but it's messed up too, because it's like we want our kids off the screen, yes, but then we're so concerned about what they're doing out there, I agree, but then when they're on the screens, then we're worried about sexual predators trying to take them out there.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's insane sexual predators trying to take them out there. It's insane. My, uh, my wife was telling me about that. Somebody on roblox she, my daughter plays and like there's older people. I didn't know I didn't know they could talk to people oh yeah, they got mics headphones. Yeah, dude, my daughter I heard in the bedroom talking. She's there by herself like when? Who are you talking to, abby? Oh, somebody on Roblox. You don't know how old that person is. Do not give her address.
Speaker 2:I just had the same conversation with my nine-year-old because he plays Fortnite and he's made friends, which is fine if you play a game long enough and you kind of get in the same lobby with the person.
Speaker 2:It's like, yeah, you want to team up, I did it I had friends in different states that we just team up because we're always on at the same time. Okay, but I told him too. I'm like look, you don't know who these people are. Like, don't don't give them your address, don't give them your telephone number, don't, like. I think he was, I think one guy was asking for I think it's called a gift on fortnight, where I guess you could give them some kind of coins or whatever currency that fortnight uses I guess you could give other people gifts.
Speaker 2:I'm like no, because you don't know if it's a scam, you don't know if these guys are right. It's like I'd be damn, you give this guy a gift and now I get an alert from my bank that I got five thousand dollar charge on my credit card. Hey, I'm broke, man you know, it is scary and it's it kind of sucks because, like I said, you could set blockers on and you could. You could do all that and as parents, you're supposed to watch your kids and what they're doing.
Speaker 3:But it's hard, you can't be there every second, every, you know, like it's just that quick too for her to get on there, and always. Daniel, can I have this for this game or this? And, like you said, we're always putting our debit card on there or something?
Speaker 2:and everything. All our credit and debit cards are like on all in our electronics. It's so easy, don't?
Speaker 3:share this, you know, because I don't want to overdraft charge like that either. Crazy. But yeah, I, I wish I could. I bought our guitar and uh, we're trying to get lessons for her, but we've got to find a place and all this, and then again it comes to time. I'm working nights, her mom gets home, she's tired, so it almost has to be like a weekend thing where one of us could be there, because I'm not going to take her and drop her off so wacko, yeah, you can't do that anymore.
Speaker 2:People used to get piano lessons drop off at someone's house for an hour. Can't do that shit anymore, unless it's a friend. But even then you see these stories of babysitters people you know abusing your kid or beating your kid.
Speaker 3:Man, charles, I wouldn't even know how to act. I would fucking go ballistic. I already told my daughter if someone ever touches you the wrong way, I'm going to go kill them and kill myself.
Speaker 2:And it's so messed up that? Because if that's the case, like if something happens and you let's say the extreme and you murder that person, do you think that the justice system takes it easy on you, or do they just charge you as murder Exactly?
Speaker 3:And that's all they're looking at. That's all they're looking at. Oh, he touched his daughter or molested her. I watch a lot of Steve wilkos with the old lady and there's something like you said they don't care. Man like the kid is now messed up in the head for life and and this guy gets to sit behind jail and probably get out in four or five years or whatever it's just yeah, the whole system is messed up. Just I don't understand that.
Speaker 2:Yeah it's crazy. I I don't know, but, um, definitely rough. Let's see, I was gonna bring up here. So then, speaking of children, do you want to kind of just go, I guess, give a brief description, or however? You're descriptive, you want to be as far as like what, what was your childhood bringing?
Speaker 3:like me, yeah I was started young. Like always, I was always had a messed up life hard my mom, always made sure we had food.
Speaker 3:You know something to eat? Obviously you could tell, but like a struggle man, we used to eat like cocoa wheats for dinner. The guy she was dating wasn't my real dad and like he abused me, my mom would go play bingo with her sisters and my aunts and stuff. I remember taking lighters and like holding it upside down to get that chrome part red and just touched the bottom of my feet.
Speaker 3:No lie bro really, and then uh, put vaseline on them and baby powder, put my socks back on and I couldn't walk right. I was probably two, two, three years old, so I was walking. But my mom, finally why ain't you walking right? And took my socks off and seen these blisters on there. So I told her. I said hey, he burns me, he pinches me and pulls my hair away and I broke my collarbone when I was two and a half.
Speaker 1:Just what was he handling you?
Speaker 3:wrong From yanking me up and every bone I've ever broken. Charles is on my left-hand side.
Speaker 2:Really yeah. And how many bones have you broken altogether?
Speaker 3:The wrist, my thumb, the collarbone, my hip, my femur bone and my ankle, in eight places.
Speaker 2:And it's all been your left side, all my left side.
Speaker 3:That's insane and it's all been your left side, my left side, when it was insane later on in life. I I fell off a mountain, kentucky, and uh I landed on my right side. I tried to get up off the road and uh, this hip just popped and I heard it like motherfucker and man, it hurt and they uh took me to the first little hospital, couldn't do nothing for me. It's a real small town called Hyden, kentucky, so I always say it's bad.
Speaker 3:I shouldn't have been down there anyways, but that's where my mom's sister lives and I stayed in Lexington Trauma Center for a month doing rehabilitation walk-in, and this was early 90s.
Speaker 2:So how old were you when that happened?
Speaker 3:I was in ninth grade.
Speaker 2:Oh wow, you were young yeah maybe 13, 14. Yeah.
Speaker 3:And it just went downhill from there. This leg has always been messed up and a year later I got mauled by a German shepherd Took the big plugs out of my arm.
Speaker 1:On your left side arms.
Speaker 3:Oh okay, I was like yeah, this arm the worst, though, for real. The dog took a big plug out of my, out of my arm because, uh, my buddy's dad came out of the house and picked the dog up like this and fell back with it and that's what took the big plug out of this arm. Now, how, how old were you when that?
Speaker 2:happened A year later. So you were about, let's say, 15, correct 15, about yeah. Tell me how that experience was? Is it one of those things where just your adrenaline my heart's pounding.
Speaker 3:I'm thinking about it right now, troy, I swear to God.
Speaker 2:Okay, I will slow down. I'm just curious.
Speaker 3:I was actually kneeling down trying to put a hole in this piece of aluminum. So he's putting a radio in my buddy's car. He didn't have a license yet, but we're kids, you know, yeah.
Speaker 3:So here comes his dog, up to me, and I was already afraid of dogs. He bit our friend two weeks before this, and in the hand, and uh, I was kneeling down pounding a hole in the stand, a piece of metal, whatever, and that dog coming to him like hey, james, put star away. It's a full white, all white german shepherd. He just and lunged at me and I I kind of fell back and it got me right here in the chest. So then I'm, you know I'm struggling getting up because this leg is still kind of healing.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, because it was just a year prior you fell off the mountain.
Speaker 3:Damn, I can't run you know because it just never healed right. So I start to stand up after the dog bit me. The dog got this arm start, you know, thinking it's a fucking toy.
Speaker 1:Where's your?
Speaker 3:friend at. He's standing right there, yelling like star star trying to grab the dog. Okay, well, I got this arm loose turning. I was trying to get in his car. It was just sitting in the backyard dog got this fucking arm, so I'm grabbed the dog's throat here and they got this now yeah and I could feel it swallowing and my buddy James hit it over the head with one of those mag lights. The old school.
Speaker 3:The 4D batteries in it. Fucking batteries came out of it. Me and him yelling. People was coming down the block looking over the fence. I was just hearing this German Shepherd fucking blood all over it. And then his dad finally came out of the house, like I said, and grabbed it and like suplexed it backwards and that's what took the big plug on his arm. Dude, from not even six, seven miles away, they put two white beach towels around my arms. They was just dripping with blood by the time we got to the hospital. Yeah, emergency surgery. I really didn't look at it because I was scared, but when I was laying in the bed they was gushing it with that.
Speaker 3:Uh, saline cleaner oh yeah, you know that white hair and dirt and and uh, I remember looking at it, didn't just do you see the muscle and the white just hanging out? Just, we have an emergency surgery. I think like 57 stitches because of all that, and so I got the tattoos to cover it up. Yeah, and it's still.
Speaker 2:Sometimes I regret getting these motherfuckers look stupid so my question is so, when that was happening, was your adrenaline so high that you didn't really feel the bite down to the pain? Or did you feel all that pain and you're? Reacting the pressure just the pressure of it okay especially when he had this arm.
Speaker 3:You ever seen those dogs and you, yeah, a piece of rope and yeah that's what he thought my arm was and like he's pulling me through the fucking yard and you know, because, like I said, my hip is shit still trying to heal. I mean, it's been a year but I really never got the exercise to yeah get to the heel right then. Yeah, I just couldn't get away from that dog fast enough when I finally did get loose.
Speaker 3:I got in my buddy james's car and locked the fucking doors. I'm like man, I was scared, you know, like shit. Finally went to the hospital going to emergency surgery, and it jacked me up. I was a friend of dogs for a while. Of course, you know I don't hold nothing against it, but I just knew the dog was bad news because, like I said, I bit our friend before. His name is Travis Drew. Blood on him. He got his hand good and you know everybody. Oh, you should have sued, you should have sued.
Speaker 2:You should have sued who am I, you know they're poor.
Speaker 3:What you're? Gonna get right you know, and then, like that, I found out now that I'm older like they was renting that house. Whoever owned that house had homeowner's insurance. I could have got them, but yeah you know I don't think you're 15 16 years old right right, so I'm not, and I and we're still friends to this day, oh really my buddy James.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I call him. He'll come over, you know I'll help you out in a minute. Yeah, it was just rough growing up, but I don't know. My mom met that guy, like I said, child abuse. She wasn't a bad mom, she was just, uh, the guy. Well, she ended up leaving him after probably about a year so okay.
Speaker 2:So let's fast forward a little bit. So she finds out, you know, and then leaves them about a year later. So at this point you're about four or five years old so where you was.
Speaker 3:She just like a single mother for a while, for a while, and then, um, you got with this other guy named rich okay that's why I called dad okay because my my real dad got deported in 1978 back to mexico, or? Yes, okay, his name was Angel Jose Rodriguez. Well, my mom knew him as Jose.
Speaker 3:So, she was only 16 and already pregnant with me. I was born in 76, and I guess he got to see me once or twice, but back in that day, you know, white folks didn't like that, but back in that day white folks didn't like that. So supposedly the story was my aunt called immigration on my dad and they took him to Chicago. So my mom was trying to call up there looking for Jose. They're telling her we don't have a Jose.
Speaker 2:And your mom didn't know.
Speaker 3:No his real name. So he was real low keykey. Oh wow, so she's gonna marry him. You know that just to keep him here right and uh she didn't know him as uh, she knew him as jose, not angel, and they got his real name up there. We'll come to find out years later. She sees one of his sisters over in north ham and like she's like, oh, how's jose?
Speaker 2:she's like his real name is angel so she didn't even know until years later, right?
Speaker 3:wow, so she could have found him.
Speaker 2:Kept him here yeah, I don't know how that would have worked out, you know, but he got deported and so even so, even when she found out his real name, what was there any reason why they didn't like keep in contact or like phone calls with you or anything like that, or I think he was probably scared because, like I said, she told me, um, my aunt seen him at one time, uh, over on this front porch in some house in Hammond, so she goes back to where they all lived.
Speaker 3:Told my mom, hey, jose's over here, took me over there to see him. I guess he held me and then vanished after that again, like I don't know if he was scared for maybe getting caught again, or I really don't know, charles. I mean, sometimes I wonder, like you know, how's his health? I would hope he's a cartel or something. You owe me some back chops for it, jack, but I'm not that lucky, but I'm not that lucky shit.
Speaker 2:So you, so you can't remember like what he looks like, because you haven't met him or seen him since never.
Speaker 3:I don't remember. Like I said, I was only two years old, maybe two exactly it was in 78 she seen. She seen me for the last time and then last we heard he lives in California somewhere. But I don't know how true that is. I never tried to look them up, I never tried to bother them or nothing.
Speaker 2:Is that because you don't care or you're not interested in getting to know them?
Speaker 3:It's probably more not interesting because the guy who raised me passed away, so I knew him as dad.
Speaker 2:You knew him as dad, yeah, so.
Speaker 3:So you just never had an interest or curiosity of Right to go pursue looking for him, pursue looking for him, and I thought about getting on that Ancestrycom, but then again, I don't know his exact, true? You know, as far as I know, like I said, it's jose or angel jose rodriguez. There's so many jose rodriguez out there, you know, it's just gonna run more and more money that I don't have.
Speaker 2:It's like that's true, that's true too, because at that point you gotta like, probably hire a private investigator to find them.
Speaker 3:Yeah, especially back from 78 I mean I was born in 76 but, yeah, he was already gone and so the guy who raised me that's how I got the last name, blankenship. Okay, you know a lot of people, yeah, I did the Mexican, I did the same thing.
Speaker 3:I did the same thing at work and I get a lot of people. You know the work we do shops I worked at before Mexicans come in there and I wish I knew how to speak Spanish. I just don't, man. What do you need? Oh, come here, my friend, let me show you something. You know English now? Huh.
Speaker 2:Yeah, exactly All right. So your mother met Rich, Correct Around what like, when you were about four or five.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:And then from there, it was just you three. Yes.
Speaker 3:And then, well, no, because she already had three other kids by the other guy in this span. Wait with your original father or with rich?
Speaker 2:no, with a dude oh, the one that was abusing. Oh so he.
Speaker 3:She had three kids with him right in that short time period right so like I'm the oldest, underneath me is my sister and my other sister and my brother. Well, she was a baby and she was born in 81, I think. So from 76 to 81, she done three more kids.
Speaker 2:So there's three kids plus you, right, same mother.
Speaker 3:Right, we're all got the same mom, just different dad. Wow, my brother passed away, so now it's just me, my mom and and my two sisters and you're the oldest, right. So, uh, she's, you know, was with that guy for a while and I believe in him. We got with rich and I I've seen some shit where, like that, the Roger would lean out the kitchen window and was shooting at my mom and Rich, wow, and then he would, you know, like, uh, one time we was watching tv in the living room and my sister spilled kool-aid. Dude, I got my ass beat for for something my sister, dusty, did, and I think he took it out and beat me because my mom was out fucking around, not being home and you know she, she was having fun, she's young, whatever but I feel like I got the grunt of it because she wasn't there and now running around with another guy which she ended up being with until he passed away.
Speaker 3:So they lived their whole life together. She's single now to this day because she don't want to be with nobody else, I guess. Yeah, I get that, damn yeah it was rough man.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I get that Damn so.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it was rough man. We lived in real small apartments.
Speaker 2:Where'd you grow up? Did you grow up your whole life in North Hammond? Yep, okay.
Speaker 3:Never been, nowhere else.
Speaker 3:Never been nowhere else Right, went to almost every fucking school in Whiting All the way out to. I've been to school in Whiting all the way out to. I've been to school in Whiting. We lived in Whiting for probably a couple years and just it's been rough like with her, with this guy, and not want to work, not, you know, take care of the other kids a little better than me, because I'm not his and which I understand, but I could never be that way. It's just you know. But I'm glad she well, I'm glad she got away from him, because I'm pretty sure he would have tried to kill her.
Speaker 2:Was he like a gangbanger or he was just an idiot?
Speaker 3:He ran with the Hells Angels for a while and then he was in the military for a little bit and he got out, started running with the gangs. And he's just a crazy dude Like he would try to set my aunt's car on fire one time, put a sock in a gas tank and at this time shed a brand-new Ford Maverick.
Speaker 3:It's like like man why are you gonna burn my aunt's car down. You know just, he was just that crazy and and uh, sleep anywhere. Just didn't, really didn't want to work. He wasn't in with society kind of like, kind of on his, lived on his own, did his own thing and so when I think about it then. So when she left that guy, you were about four or five, yeah so I'm doing the math here, so maybe I I can't I know for sure.
Speaker 3:I was um six, maybe going on seven okay because I remember I asked for a bike for my birthday and I ended up getting it and, uh, that kind of right.
Speaker 3:Then I knew or not knew, but that's when I knew she was talking to another guy, because that's how I got the bike so so you know that's right, so yeah and this guy stepped to the plate yeah, and we're talking about rich right, okay, it took care of, uh, you know, four kids, I think his and you know that's all I was gonna bring up that you, that's a you got to be the one, the right one right to take on that responsibility and especially back in that era, you know, it's like people are already struggling nobody.
Speaker 2:Yeah, minimum wage probably three dollars, you know, and he already had three kids too on his previous see, and in my opinion, I think it's a lot harder for a single mom with like two or three kids today to find a man a good man at that than it was maybe 20 years ago, you're right. Even though it might have been hard living. But nowadays men, a lot of men, are entrepreneurs. A lot of men are hustlers.
Speaker 2:They ain't got time to take on a single mom, no matter how bad she is. To take on a single mom, especially with little kids I was gonna say especially little kids.
Speaker 3:It's already hard enough whenever they're their own kids. Oh yeah, like yeah I, I could, I could relate, so I could definitely see that well, he sounds like.
Speaker 2:He sounds like a, a good man a good person, dude, he's dynamite.
Speaker 3:We really didn't go on vacations as a family. Sometimes you can afford it, sometimes you can't Right, and that's the reason why I went to Kentucky quite a few times because my aunt lived down there. That's the farthest I really got to go out of Indiana growing up, right.
Speaker 2:So how would you define a good person then? Like in general, like, what are your criteria for a person to be considered a good person?
Speaker 3:I would say definitely your values of getting up and making honest money. I mean, there's enough trouble out in this world just to hurt yourself or get hurt, be in prison, get up, go to work, take care of your family. Me, that's what I try to do and just over the years I'm getting weaker, my legs hurting, just bad health. And it brings me back to jose. I would like to meet him just to know. You know what runs in your family health-wise. I had cancer twice. Never smoked a day in my life. You know a little bit of weed back in the day, but nothing crazy. And you know, you know. But I'm getting off the subject here, charlotte.
Speaker 2:No, you're fine.
Speaker 3:There's no structure, we have here You're fine, I respect somebody that gets up and tries. You know, like my stepson at home, I want to bitch about this. I got bad luck. No, man, you bring that upon yourself. Nobody will tell you to sit up there and play video games all night long and then can you go to work. You know, that's what I'm trying to tell him. You know, he just thinks somebody's gonna come knock on that door and and give you a job. And he's got, and he's got a baby too. So it's like I try to tell him you got to get it together. Man, like they're gonna, she's always gonna disrespect you because you're you're not even trying right now as a young man like they're gonna.
Speaker 2:She's always gonna disrespect you because you're you're not even trying right now as a young man like because I mean, at some point, if you're not gonna do it for yourself, do it for your kid.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes and I think those are just like it's. It's a lot easier to say that it's. You know. Stuff like, oh well, if. Well, if you're not going to do it for yourself, do it for your kid. Or, you know, if you're going to, I'm trying to think, if you're going to be out here doing this, then just make sure that you're doing it for the right. Like those type of things where it's like hindsight 2020 thing, where it's like if you were just in this you'd be in a better position, right.
Speaker 2:But I just think in general it's a lot harder to say it than to do it, because and you know, I fell into that where I've I could have made a lot of better decisions in my life. That probably would have got me into a better situation now. But even at 20, 25 even shit, even at 30, you know, you still make decisions that still affect you or hinder you, even if in the slightest way.
Speaker 3:I do it now, charles. I'll be 47 this year it's.
Speaker 3:If you don't do it right, then it can definitely backfire on you absolutely and, like you said, especially nowadays, I think it's a lot harder to not make a living because there's definitely jobs out there. I think it's harder to live you know where, like when my parents was growing up. You know 50s, 60s, dude, the error was just so easy. Yeah, you don't mean it, and you could have been the first one to think of, you know, maybe a cell phone or or, or something. The next big adventure.
Speaker 2:We we consume too much information. Now, true information is available everywhere. That's what, right I mean, I could get the same information as to somebody in freaking ghana that lives in a hut but has access to a cell phone and that gets google every. Me and them have the same access to information, you're right, it's crazy. Yeah, you're right and I'm one of those people that need tv going to fall asleep. Are you like that, or I am now?
Speaker 2:isn't that weird yes, yes, and I wish I'm sure there's a poll somewhere, but I I wonder what the percentage of people sleep with the TV going, because, if I had to guess, I think it's high.
Speaker 3:Oh, it's got to be Charles, because it ain't got to be loud. No, Just that little voice, and I got to have my fan on. I don't know why Me too?
Speaker 2:Me too, I sleep with a fan on I always have well till. I got old, I start paying my own bill.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it was my own man shut that shit up, you know and I don't know what it is and I don't know.
Speaker 2:I don't know if it's because tvs have just become more accessible to have now, because, like back in the day, you just had the one television in the living room. Right, I'm right, you just had the one square television, or you had that one big motherfucker that was 2,000 pounds.
Speaker 3:Don't stub your toe on that bitch.
Speaker 2:But it was always in the living room and if you were lucky enough, you had a small portable TV in the kitchen. Man, I remember that dude. But nowadays flat screen TVs are like $200.
Speaker 3:And you can put them everywhere. Yeah, and about that Nintendo, my dad used to take the cord out of the back of it and take it to work with him, because he worked nights so none of his kids would be arguing who's next, I'm next.
Speaker 1:My mom didn't want to hear all that shit. That's smart.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and I'm thinking, man, why did he buy it for us?
Speaker 2:And, like you said, that old ass TV with the two Yep or that yep and and where you gotta fix the antenna and get it just right.
Speaker 3:I've seen my parents have aluminum foil on their potatoes did you ever have a cheetah box? Yes, my old man did. Yup, I ain't gonna lie. When I was younger, I watched porn all the time. Yup, it was awesome like yes, we get a cheetah box hell yeah, yes, we get a cheetah box. Hell yeah, we get all the channels. Yeah, dude, like late 80s they started hitting the scene. Man dude, it was some good times back then. Yeah, nowadays, fuck, these kids don't even know how hard we had it growing up.
Speaker 2:Well, that's the thing too, no matter what the decade is high school and middle school, and you could probably go all the way down to elementary school it's all the same, it's kids will pick on you. Kids will talk shit about you. Kids will make fun of you for the most stupidest thing. But as a kid you're just you're, you know you take it so personally.
Speaker 1:That sticks with you and it sticks with you.
Speaker 2:Yes and you go home thinking you're no good or that, just because one person says something and got a laugh out of it. We're poor yeah yeah, I just it sucks and it but and you think back at it it's like why the hell did I care that that guy you know made fun of me, or why did I let it get to me? It's, that's true. It's stupid because in the end that guy, that guy could be a damn um working at walmart right, right now.
Speaker 3:Right, you know, and I've seen people like that. Yeah, I remember you talked shit about me in high school and now you know I make more than you.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:But I would never say that and throw it in nobody's face. But you're right, you know just, the times have definitely changed and I hope my daughter the best, I mean, because you know what I mean Like hey, man, I hope you the best. I hope you survive high school man, I hope you're the best, I hope you survive, right, you know, because we're not gonna be around forever. And and like I try to tell her always, pay attention, don't, don't, let nobody get in your head.
Speaker 3:I say the same thing, you got, you know, you just just pay attention, pay attention.
Speaker 2:It's just, it's scary because you just gotta tell them, like, don't let stuff get to you, right, don't let it roll off, walk away, because if you, if you don't acknowledge it, or if you, if you don't interact with them, that that takes the power away it does, and it almost like as soon as they see your weakness, they're gonna keep on, keep on.
Speaker 3:as soon as they see your weakness, they're going to keep on, keep on as soon as they see you whimper as soon as they see you crack a tear as soon as they see a frown from you then they attack.
Speaker 2:I agree right there. Kids could be so hateful and so judgmental and so harsh. Yeah, it's horrible. And then you hear about the stuff about you know, know, kids committing suicide because they're made fun of. And even the more fucked up part is that you you get made fun of at school and then you come home and they get made fun of on your social media or while you're playing your game or via text messages on Facebook.
Speaker 3:It's sad you can't get away from it and, like you said, for kids to be committing suicide. Or I'm going to go shoot the whole school up and take people out that didn't even have nothing to do with it and just so they think they got some kind of peace of mind out of it. And it does hurt, I think. I don't know. I was bullied quite a few. I was too. You know what I mean, just.
Speaker 2:I mean, and if you're just a slightly hiverset person, yep, they will make fun of you, man.
Speaker 3:Charles every day. Why?
Speaker 2:Why do you care? This person is bigger than you, yeah, and most of the time you never interact with that person, no, but they, just as soon as they see you, they want to try to make a joke, to get laughs.
Speaker 1:It makes no sense yeah.
Speaker 2:I don't understand the kid logic of it, that's all it is, but I've been through it. I mean I was always a heavier, heavier set person, you know. But eventually you just you have to just roll with it to the point where, by the time I got to high school, I mean I got once, I got more in sports.
Speaker 3:I got a little bit fitter.
Speaker 2:Right, I was always, I guess, technically obese from my, from my height, you know.
Speaker 3:I'm saying I was never a tall person and that word sucks to even say obese, I know but they, they have that whole height to weight ratio so I was not gonna lie to you. I just did it the other day because when I went to the doctor I weighed 311 pounds. I'm like fuck. So I get home and I already have a hard time sleeping. So I'm on YouTube from fat to fit at 50.
Speaker 1:And.
Speaker 3:I did that weight to rate chart show At the bottom obese.
Speaker 1:God dang.
Speaker 2:It sucks. I remember the first time the doctor said yeah, you're obese. I'm like damn.
Speaker 1:What does that mean?
Speaker 2:I think I was in high school like really, I'm like I don't even because you think of obese, you think 400 pound man, you know, that's what you think of me.
Speaker 3:I'm thinking.
Speaker 2:At least I'm still able to wipe my own ass but as soon as you go over a certain weight at your height, you're classified as obese.
Speaker 3:I'm like damn that sucks. You're right, it could don't think it can't happen to you oh yeah, it's like that dude, your world could be flipped upside down. And you know, like I said, the cancer at 24.
Speaker 2:Both thyroids had to be removed explain that a little bit more, like how did they explain that to you? I went no bullshit.
Speaker 3:I worked for uh ogden, lincoln, mercury, mercury, as a used car mechanic. I did a lot of transmissions over the head, stuff. Okay, the shoulder was hurting. My lady got me an appointment. I had a knot right here on my neck kind of neck area shoulder Like a muscle knot a blood clot Almost like a muscle knot.
Speaker 3:Okay, yeah exactly Charles, and I go there to the doctor. Knot, yeah, exactly Charles. I go to the doctor. I'm like man, my shoulder is All right, all right. And my lady's like look at that knot on his neck. I'm like I ain't worried about that damn knot. Well, he starts poking at it, sends me right to a community hospital to do a biopsy. They lay me on a table, stick my neck all the way back and do a biopsy. They lay me on a table, stick my neck all the way back and they's 10 different size needles. I remember one was like a like 13 or 14 gauge, sticking it in this fucking knot and trying to suck stuff out of there. Oh, come to find out two, three days later cancer.
Speaker 3:so so they said you had lung cancer no, no uh thyroid oh yeah, thyroid cancer yeah because you got two thyroids like like this on the side here, you know, your, your glands here.
Speaker 3:okay, one was the size of a dime and some was spotting on the other one. They got in there and looked, so I took both thyroid out, did radiation treatments and stuff. And then over the years I noticed something else growing on this side. It ended up being they called it, a mass. It was eight centimeters big, dude. It was pushing against my esophagus so I would have a really hard time breathing that night. And then growing underneath my collarbone. So when they did the the bobsy on that found out cancer again and so nobody in indiana wanted to touch it. I had to go to university of chicago to have it removed and, uh, stayed up there overnight and stuff and got it taken care of. Had to come back to Indiana, did radiation two days at a community again. Okay, now at this time they're doing more with cancer treatments there, but I had to stay there another two days.
Speaker 2:Now this is all before you got lung cancer or after you got lung cancer? I never I thought you before you got lung cancer or after you got lung cancer.
Speaker 3:I never I thought you said you had lung cancer. No, I had cancer in the neck.
Speaker 2:Okay, so then, because you said you never smoked.
Speaker 3:No, well, because the doctors just smoking in general. Oh, so you could get thyroid cancer from smoking Right.
Speaker 2:Sorry guys, I'm not a doctor, oh me neither. Cancer right from smoking right.
Speaker 3:All right, sorry guys, I'm not a doctor, I don't know, and uh, I I probably saying it wrong or whatever. Okay, the the correct terminology, but the thyroid. And then from that just a mass grew off. That okay, I get it so that's what they removed. On this on my right side and because thyroid cancer is actually is.
Speaker 2:I guess I don't want to say it's common, but there's other ways, right than smoking. They have to get right they.
Speaker 3:They technically call it a ben, a benign, but not answer. But not yeah and uh.
Speaker 2:Luckily it didn't get my limp notes, because then it would have been full-blown throat cancer oh, okay okay, so like I don't have no thyroid, no adenoids, no tonsils, but then that thyroid shit was up with your weight too, then wasn't yes, cuz I know.
Speaker 3:I take synthroid. Highest I could take is 300 milligram a day and I told you before I could. I can go a day, two days without eating.
Speaker 2:I'll gain weight so do you have like a, a toolbox, like of pills, of medication you have to take every day? I do not a toolbox I can show you well, I was just trying to be fun, but you, you, you got those like one of those. Monday, tuesday wednesday there's.
Speaker 3:It's rough because sometimes I forget the you know philum or chicken, and like I'll get it tomorrow, I'll get it and then if I don't like do I start? I'll swell up just from the thyroid fucking really just yeah, jacks you up, man.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I got a picture in there somewhere, but it's definitely a lot of medicine I gotta be on now because of that. The high blood pressure runs in our family. Diabetes runs in our families. I was like man, I'm getting the shit in of every every which way, you know. So all I get to do is keep on going forward and try to do the best I can. Yeah that's.
Speaker 2:That's all any of us could do right oh yeah, you got you. You know you take the cards you're dealt with and try to make the best of it. Man, I feel bad for your medicine cabinet 17 different pills Charles in one day. Are you serious, 17?
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:That's tough man.
Speaker 3:It sucks, dude. I don't wish this on nobody. It is what it is. I mean, I don't want to say that, because it could be a lot worse.
Speaker 2:You could be in the ground Right.
Speaker 3:I'm glad I'm still here. I'll see my kids. I don't take shit for granted. I moved out. I think I was 17 or 18. Oh did you no. I was actually 19. And I had a one-bedroom apartment, no car, no, you know, cell phones.
Speaker 2:How did you get to work?
Speaker 3:Cell phones was just barely. I'm going to tell you right now. I was working at my uncle's shop. Sometimes, dude, I had to walk down 165th to client avenue. Are you serious?
Speaker 2:he would pick me up on the sometimes you, you have to do what you gotta do, and I did that sucks, you know.
Speaker 3:And then, uh, saved up enough money. Well, I got evicted out of the apartment, you know, because rowdy ass friends broke the front window and of course and here I come home with a little toolbox do a side job that night the people running apartment buildings out there like we gotta evict you. So you know I'm thinking.
Speaker 3:Mother fucker didn't want to move back to my parents, so I moved in my uncle's house okay he lived in highland and uh, nice, nice house, nice basement, didn't charge me no rent, but I could never call off yeah, you know I'm in this base.
Speaker 2:You had no reason get up here, no excuse man just if if people don't know we're. We're talking about places in um indiana. Uh, I guess the easiest town you would probably know would be Gary, gary, indiana. We're talking about East Chicago, whiting Highland, which I guess you know, and I didn't learn until I went to college in Bloomington that they call this area the region did you know that yeah, I didn't know that I would go out there.
Speaker 2:But hey, where you from. East Chicago, oh, you're from the region. I never knew why either and I didn't know that I would go out there. But hey, where you from, I eat chicago. Oh, you're from the region.
Speaker 3:The hell of the region either. Yeah, and I don't know why so yeah, we're.
Speaker 2:We're from what I guess a lot of people call the region. Yeah, in that area. So if you hear us talking about towns, and we're talking about that area yeah, we're like what, what?
Speaker 3:15 minutes from Chicago? Yeah, about a half hour from downtown.
Speaker 2:So that's where we're, the area that we stay in. So you moved out with your mom I was about 19. Stayed in this apartment for what? Maybe about a year, yeah. And then you moved in with your uncle yeah, but then I'm assuming once his business went out, you weren't living with him anymore.
Speaker 3:I was still there because I was still driving to Chicago. I got that job at the indoor auto mall, okay and fucking $10 an hour, which was good because it was 701 Union, and that's when I got sick the first time with the cancer and I was out of work for a month I mean, they backed me up good on that and stayed in my uncle's basement for quite a while.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know like I said, it was cheap.
Speaker 3:To what you were 25, 26, 30?. I was 23-ish Okay. Kind of around there.
Speaker 2:You say, for a while, that's like four years, A while To me is like Eight ten years.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it wasn't that long. Okay, you would have threw me out, for sure.
Speaker 2:So you're about 24 when you yeah what was. What was your first car that you bought Then?
Speaker 3:I bought Was a.
Speaker 2:Because you said you were driving to chicago. So what were you that? Was that a car that you bought?
Speaker 3:my very first car was a damn uh 78 impala I bought off my dad.
Speaker 3:Okay, for uh 650 working at that little construction. Okay, and no bullshit, charles, he would not let me take it. I was down to 50 dollars. It was a friday night, like hey, can I take the car? Nope, really man. So but that taught me a a value to take care of your shit. You paid for. And I was turning wrenches in my parents garage, you know here and there. But and then when I moved with my uncle, I had my dad co-sign for me and I got a real nice thunderbird at the time.
Speaker 2:Nice so it was like everyone had a thunderbird almost right, and it was a nice step up from a rusted ass out 78 impala with a broken exhaust and you know, to this thunderbird, got the windows tinted, put sounds in it.
Speaker 3:You know, when you're young and you're all into that.
Speaker 1:That's all you want is, uh, decals and stereo for real dude, no matter what generation.
Speaker 2:You want decals and stereo that's true.
Speaker 3:That's very true. I got sounds in my escalate. Still my ladies, I hit you. Ever gonna take them out? Hell?
Speaker 2:no, I love my music so you moved out of your uncles at about 24 yeah to say and then that's when you got your own place yeah, because at this point have you met your?
Speaker 3:old lady by this point. We just started talking.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 3:And this was the year like towards the year of 99.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 3:I've known her since she was 14. I was 16. And my buddy's dog that bit me. We met those girls underneath a tree over in North Hammond Underneath a tree.
Speaker 1:Yeah, for real, true story. And he had a van at the time, me. We met those girls underneath the tree.
Speaker 3:Okay, over in north hammond underneath the tree yeah, true story and, uh, he had a van at the time and we pull up over there and he had sounds in there and, yeah, and I was always big my whole life and she, she's skinny little, you know, hot girl, and she didn't talk to me so I was always mean to her like fuck, fuck you know, show me your titties this and that.
Speaker 3:He was talking stupid to her and then, when I found out she was going through some things with her ex, I'm like man. That's when you took your opportunity.
Speaker 3:Hey, try to be nice you know, and then, soon as she would see, I was in the backseat of my buddy's car because her and his girlfriend her name was Carol and Trisha were like good friends. So, yeah, we kind of started talking and I was still going to the clubs, I was 23, and she was 20, so she couldn't get in and she had her own place, her own car.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, yeah, she was doing her own thing. What was she doing at that?
Speaker 3:age, a manager at Burger King.
Speaker 3:Oh, okay, she's always been in and out of the Burger King scene. So I started talking to her and hit it off. Good, New Year's Eve 99, in the 2000s, we just hit it off real good. I actually let her shoot a gun. Yeah, and teach you know, show her which way to shoot it and this and that. And teach you know, showing her which way to shoot it and this, and that. We got together and I kind of moved in with her and her little two-bedroom house and I was halfway there and halfway staying at my mom's, Okay, and then we got our own place together. That's around the time when I got sick the first time and I was in that one-bedroom apartment and you know, this is a whole another four or five years later I moved back to those apartments where I got evicted from. How funny is that?
Speaker 3:Now my aunt and uncle are running the show over there, so they let me back in. Wow it just circles back.
Speaker 2:It was fucking slam. It do Fucking slamming ham.
Speaker 3:It was definitely a different experience at that time. Cell phones wasn't real big. So I remember I had the old ass Nikia.
Speaker 2:With the snake game.
Speaker 3:Yeah, dude, Just man.
Speaker 2:The thing that never ran out of battery.
Speaker 3:For real.
Speaker 2:I don't ever remember charging that thing man.
Speaker 3:I stomped on that thing, yeah, ran it over, still turned right back on like a cat that won't go away. Just yeah, but we got together and hit it off and just took off. Ever since, we had our bad times. Everybody had their bad times. If you're going to be with someone, for 20 plus years.
Speaker 2:You're going to have good and bad times, absolutely we stuck it on.
Speaker 3:Here we are.
Speaker 2:I think when someone says we've been happily married for 30 plus years, it hasn't been happy the whole time.
Speaker 1:You guys are lying, you guys are lying.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you guys are lying, I guarantee. Maybe not guarantee, but there's a high probability. Sometime in that 30 years you guys either separated, almost got a divorce.
Speaker 3:Right, like come on now. It's true, and even you know people going back our parents ages or whatever, and times was different, like we said before, you know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1:It's a lot easier, smoother.
Speaker 3:You ain't got all this. How can I be better than you? Yeah, or I drive a better car, nicer clothes, like just you know. Times has changed and she stuck by my side like through all the sickness and getting hurt that's hard to find I don't know how many fucking jobs I lost that's hard to find man.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, it is because nowadays so many people are ready to jump ship. Oh yeah, because they don't want to put the work in exactly it and and I'll be honest, there's been. That was kind of my mentality too and just like kind of in general like, and if something got too hard I was ready to jump shit and move on to something else because it's easy.
Speaker 3:It's easy, exactly. It's easy.
Speaker 2:You know like, yeah, I could definitely see that and it could be something to the smallest thing where it's just playing a video game, and not be something to the smallest thing where it's just playing a video game and not be able to beat it and just going on to the next one, to relationships in my marriage where I'm like ready to jump ship because things were not going well or not easy for me.
Speaker 3:I could relate to that definitely yeah and it's.
Speaker 2:I'm just mad. It took me almost 30 years to learn, to learn that lesson to like hey, just don't you know it's to understand that it's a lot easier to quit something right than to just work at it work at it.
Speaker 3:Make it work? Yeah, because definitely people just fuck it. I'm gone, you know, I I go buy all this again. This ain't nothing, you know, and but in the back of your mind you're like man, I fucked up. Yeah, I'm just, I should have stayed, or should I make it work?
Speaker 2:you know that's what and that's why hindsight is 2020 and you I just that's why I think parenting is so freaking hard, because it's like whatever example you set sits in a kid's mind and then, at the same time, it's so easy to blame other people for your mistakes, for your decisions, for your outcome of life. So easy to blame other people for your mistakes, for your decisions, from your, your outcome of life. So easy to blame other people. You know it's you got. You always see it all the time. Somebody's life's in shambles and then they say, well, my father didn't love me, this is the way I am. Chances are that's not true. No, it's the decisions you made. Now.
Speaker 2:Is there maybe, perhaps psychological things that happen in your life that maybe prevents you from making certain choices or makes you make certain choices? Yeah, I could see that, but I it has to be like traumatic and, in my opinion, right. I mean a lot of times you hear oh, my parents divorced when I was five and it fucked me up. That's why I'm no good. Or my my dad left me when I was, you know, eight. That's why I'm not good. But if, if your mother was a, was genuinely good to you and did whatever she did to take care of you, then your father not being there should not put you like. If you're a meth head without a job, right, you can't blame that on your father not being there.
Speaker 3:No, you know what I'm saying? Yeah, saying you definitely didn't learn it from him, right?
Speaker 2:so and I understand, don't get me wrong. Everybody's situation is different everybody's upbringings are different. There's probably thousands of variables throughout your life that happen, but at the end of the day, I think it's important that you have to take responsibilities for your own actions, for your own decisions, and if you fuck up then it's your responsibility. I agree to take care of it or to make it right or to fix it, and I just think it, especially nowadays, it's so much easier to blame other people the blame game yeah, and I believe it, I've done it, I've I've experienced it, you know if you didn't, you're lying
Speaker 3:yeah, absolutely and for someone to say oh, it ain't hard life's, life's hard man, I don't care who you are you sure you got something going on? I know I got something always fucking going on fucking me up. Somebody's always got something going on in their lives, like that's why I don't fuck people, I don't pick on nobody.
Speaker 2:Just for that reason, like you said, because this would be that one point that this motherfucker's gonna snap and and I think many people have different ways of handling situations, just like how I won't name specifics, but like, um, you know, if somebody makes a joke of everything, that's their way of handling certain things. But is it the right way, the wrong way? I don't think there's a set.
Speaker 3:I think like you said, because I know some people like that and it's just that that's their mind frame of not blowing it off but not showing.
Speaker 2:But at the same time time they're not handling it heads on head on right, right, miss, shit, dude, I, if you just took 10 random people off the street, lined them up, I I probably bet a whole bunch of money that eight out of those 10 people probably need therapy. Oh, I'm sure I'm sure there's plenty of people out there that could benefit and or need therapy, because, at least for me it's. It's very hard for me to share how I'm feeling. I'm the same like I don't know. I don't know where you are, but, like me, low-key, I don't have many friends like I'm not one of those guys that could call up a group of 12 guys and we go to vegas and have a great time like I'm I hang out with my lady and the kids dude yeah, other than that honestly, I felt strange coming over here, because I get it not nothing bad, no, I know I don.
Speaker 3:I just always at home or my mom's house or the in-laws and other than that, and my wife is the total opposite.
Speaker 2:My wife total opposite. Like I said, she loves to socialize, she loves to be with family, she loves to tell about her day stuff at work. Man, I barely tell her about anything that's going on at work or with myself, like she has to check in with me. She has to sit down and be like let's check in how you feeling, you know, like is there anything you need to talk about? Like low-key man, I don't.
Speaker 2:I just don't express myself like that and honestly, I don't, and I think about it. I don't know where it came from. Is it because? Could it be because my dad left when I was you know eight? Is it? Is it because I don't have a relationship with him now? Is it because I never, you know, at a young age I never accepted my stepdad as a dad and all this shit? But that's me trying to go back and blame somebody or just trying to figure out why the way I am and at least you're owning up to it.
Speaker 3:It ain't like you're hiding it no, I don't try to and like you said it could, because you keep everything so bottled up and just don't snap off one day and I don't, and that's another thing too.
Speaker 2:It takes a lot for me to like, snap and like in like an anger rage, like I could take a lot of uh, I could take a lot of criticism. I could take a lot of criticism. I could take a lot of sarcasm. I could take a lot of like bullying before like I get so enraged that I snap. I think I've only snapped off in two times in my life that I can remember that anger has got the best of me. It doesn't happen very long, like I learned at a young age in school, like the whole bullying thing let it slide off, I like, to the point where you learn to just make fun of yourself with them, yeah, and then they eventually it stops being funny for them and that's kind of my same thing too, like for joking or something you said I'll I'll cut myself hell yeah, you know we're all laughing around.
Speaker 3:You know, I'm not. I'm not better than you, I'm not above you, hell yeah I'm here right by your side if anything. But you know, and you got some people like that, just I'm better than you. I'm, I, I could do this man it don't matter it not matter. We're still in this motherfucker all together on this earth, fucked up or not.
Speaker 2:Some people just want to get a rise out of people because I think it makes them feel better about themselves. It's true. And statistically it's probably true. The people that are bullies most likely have something fucked up with them at home.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it probably does most likely have something fucked up with them at home.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they probably have an abusive dad or a drunken mom or something. Their parents just probably went through a divorce. They may have siblings that are more praised than them and they take that shit out on people they can. The more less vulnerable you know, or the more the weaker people.
Speaker 3:Let's say that right and that's what happened up my I got the shit in of my sister and brothers and maybe maybe he thought that way and or or mistreat this one, but not, you know. Let me baby my kids and me. To this day I've never hit my kids.
Speaker 2:I want to fuck, just blood, but like I've never hit never, see never I get and and see, and that could be a bringing thing, because you were abused, right, and maybe now you psych out. I you know you think right, that's not what an adult should do to you. Another kid but as my upbringing, my mom was a single mom. For a long time there was no man influence, so she had to get a belt and whoop the shit out of me.
Speaker 3:Yeah, there's been times my mom would bust loose on us, and let me one time she uh straightened out a steel co-hanger and dude fucking she lit us up and I I had the covers like this and I remember got my fingers, that's why I remember it. And then she went in her room. She started crying. Yeah, because. So the next morning we're like mom. Why was you crying? Oh, because I had to hit you guys.
Speaker 2:Well, don't hit us, she's probably thinking quit pissing me off. Yeah, exactly, before I let you go, what's? What's one thing either you want to let whoever's listening to know, or what's like your biggest thing that you've learned in your lifetime. That may benefit somebody, it could somebody else. It could be young, old around our age.
Speaker 3:However well, like I said, don't never think it won't happen to you. Oh, I won't get in this car accident or this can't happen to me, because it could happen to you and I'm walking shit I've been through. I don't wish on nobody and just do the best you can, because life is not promised. You know, like I said, I have a hard time falling asleep because I'm afraid I'm not gonna wake up and that just sticks in your head. You're not gonna wake up, you're not gonna see your family tomorrow. So then I'm like all fucking night and just never give up. Man, like I don't want to sound like after after-school special, but it's the truth. Like I wish I could do more for people, just in the good, and show other people like, hey, give a little bit of respect, you get a lot of respect.
Speaker 2:I think that's a good advice for the younger.
Speaker 3:I don't fuck with people because you don't know what that person's going through. I agree with you and I don't want to be the one to get shot for making fun of somebody or calling them names, just and you, we see it all the time you know, or get get shot over a road.
Speaker 2:Rage fight because exactly that person had a bad week of work.
Speaker 3:Yes, you were the first person to tip them over. You just got in an argument with your wife. Yep, your kids are pissing you off, man. I try to let that just breathe, man.
Speaker 2:Let it roll off the back.
Speaker 3:You got you, bro, you got you, I get it it just, life is already rough. I don't care who you are. I'll say it again just anything can happen to anybody. It's just, it's sad to say it that way. But man, I I'm glad I'm still alive. I love god, just glad I got my family, a couple little friends.
Speaker 3:I do got like you, and I don't talk to a lot of people because I keep just like this you know I gotta keep inside and I just I don't know, I I don't want nothing bad to come to anybody, because they're the backfire on you my luck it will well, I appreciate you uh coming on man hey I appreciate.
Speaker 2:Definitely learned a lot about you. Definitely have a different perspective about you. I respect you dude, I do Before we cut it off. Is there anything you want to talk about? Is there anything you want to bring up that maybe I didn't mention, or maybe there was something you really wanted to talk about and hope that I brought it up, if you don't feel like you have to say something because we've talked a lot today.
Speaker 2:But just in case, if you wanted to talk about anything specific and then we didn't hit, we could definitely. I don't care, I'll spend another hour talking.
Speaker 3:No, actually I want to get time to think about things and what I really like I said my first time, your first time, yeah, I appreciate you letting me get things off my head and my chest and uh, hope I come back on there and talk to you again and just just some things I want to think about and that's cool with me a better way of telling you not just killing air time, you know that sounds good with me.
Speaker 2:All right, for sure, man thanks.
Speaker 3:All right brother, thank you.