Ep. 298: "Private Road"
John: Hello.
John: Hi, John.
John: Hi, Merlin.
John: How's it going?
John: Good.
John: I'm sorry I'm a little late.
John: Oh, no.
John: Never.
John: You know, I like to be on time.
John: Do you?
John: I kind of do.
John: Not really.
John: I have been.
John: Well, I don't think you like it.
Merlin: No, you're right.
Merlin: I think you like to leave things, much like myself.
Merlin: You do things on your own terms.
Merlin: You decide when it's time to jump on the plane or jump off of the train.
Merlin: You know, riding the rails.
Merlin: But, you know, I have an affliction.
Merlin: I have an albatross.
Merlin: what is it well i you me mr crystal crystal blue persuasion mr that's why they call me mr fahrenheit um they uh that my albatross is and i've said this before but i like to repeat this message for the young people for the teens and the youths yeah well you know that's who we're doing this show for is the youths this is the you know millennials love this show i know they do
Merlin: Oh, first to sidetrack, I only realized today that I'm one year away from being a baby boomer.
Merlin: Isn't that strange?
John: Oh, come on.
John: Do you think?
Merlin: Officially, the baby boom is like 45 to 65.
John: Has that...
Merlin: uh that that line in the sand has been shifting it's been shifting the whole time that wasn't true when you were 24 was it i was i thought i was generation x i don't know i think i am come on which one is obama obama which one is his birth he was born in kenya a lot of people leave out the uh is he a baby boomer
Merlin: He's boomed a lot of babies.
Merlin: He's a killer with the drones.
Merlin: Where's my little thing?
Merlin: Anyways.
Merlin: There it is.
Merlin: Anyways.
Merlin: I have an albatross.
Merlin: I have an albatross.
Merlin: Is that you're a baby boomer?
Merlin: No, I'm not a baby boomer.
Merlin: I'm a big boy.
Merlin: I'm a big boy.
Merlin: I'm smart.
Merlin: Not like everybody says.
Merlin: I got stepped over.
Merlin: Yeah, you can take care of things.
Merlin: And I am actually quivering in a chair as I say that.
Merlin: Quirming around.
Merlin: Oh, boy.
Merlin: Catch a fish.
Merlin: That's not how I wanted it.
Merlin: He was banging cocktails.
Merlin: This is two at a time.
Merlin: My albatross is that I was very late for everything through most of my... The years where I had a choice.
Merlin: I was always lazy.
Merlin: But then through the years where I had a choice to be better, I was still late for things.
Merlin: Into my 30s, I was late for things.
Merlin: And I didn't realize how sociopathic
Merlin: and disrespectful of my colleagues and friends that was, and I felt ashamed about it, and I don't know when it exactly happened, at some point probably in my late 30s, I just made a practice of saying I'm gonna be early for everything.
Merlin: I'm not saying everybody else has to do that, but that is like a value for me.
Merlin: It's like I'm very rarely late for things, and it's probably, actually Syracuse and I have talked about this, wondering if that's a form of privilege, is the ability to demand timeliness from people.
Merlin: But that's not an albatross.
Merlin: Well, my albatross is, it's like the time that I went to see Night Ranger instead of R.E.M.
Merlin: in 1984.
John: By accident?
Merlin: No, no.
Merlin: No, no.
Merlin: I had the choice.
Merlin: You know, you get limited dollars, and I could either see Starship and Night Ranger, or I could use that money to see R.E.M.
Merlin: with the DBs.
John: out of soccer stadium and you chose i chose poorly i got the wrong fucking grail starship yeah they built the city well the thing is you you you made it sound just a second ago like you went to see night ranger but you actually went to see starship no no no no as was often the case in the 80s i was there for the second band oh oh i see in that case that was and it was i believe the second time i saw night ranger i also saw them at grad night
John: But the ticket said Starship.
Merlin: BW, you know.
Merlin: Similarly, like the time I went to see ACDC just so I could see Yngwie Malmsteen.
Merlin: Wow, that's very unusual.
Merlin: Now my girlfriend was there for Billy Squire.
Merlin: I was there for the opening act.
Merlin: A little band from LA called Rat.
John: Really?
John: Lakeland Civic Center.
John: Look it up.
John: You know, our good friend and friend of the show, Mike Squires, just just played.
John: He's got it.
John: He's got a little Instagram series where he tries to learn the solos of 80s metal metal tunes.
John: Oh, I'm going to get on that.
John: And he plays this.
John: He tries to like learns it during breakfast and then he records himself first take.
John: And puts it on Instagram.
John: It's just playing along with the record.
John: No.
John: So he got this thing that takes the it gives him the backing track, but it takes the solo out.
John: Oh, my God.
John: And then he sits and just he's got his little guitar and his amp and he's doing all these different songs.
John: And he's driving me crazy because a lot of them, he's like, you know, he's like doing Zappa and stuff where I'm like, yeah, fine.
John: And everything.
John: Yeah.
John: Come on.
John: You know, why don't you do why don't you do some songs that people really like, man, like the Eagles.
John: Turn up the radio by Autograph.
John: Anyway, so he's on there.
John: It's very fun.
John: It's very funny.
John: Insert fart noise.
John: Oh, insert fart noise.
Merlin: Insert fart noise.
Merlin: That's way better because there's a lot of noise pollution around the Mike Squire's name.
Merlin: Insert fart noise.
John: Insert fart noise.
John: Anyway, he's a very good guitar player.
John: Yeah.
John: But what's nice about the series is that he's not such a good guitar player that you feel like, ah, what an idiot.
John: You know, like you're just watching some.
John: Oh, like one of those Japanese prodigy girls?
John: Yeah.
John: It's not like you're watching Peyton Manning.
John: Yeah.
John: Peyton Manning play guitar.
John: Yeah.
John: Yeah.
John: Do whatever he does.
John: Throw baseballs or whatever.
John: Yeah.
John: It's a he gets in the hockey net every time.
John: It's double.
John: He's somebody that it's obviously like hard and he's like trying real hard, but he's doing it out of love.
John: Yes.
John: And he's good.
John: So it's like he he pulls it off like eighty nine point nine percent of the time.
John: But, you know, it's the show he's showing up.
John: That's what I'm saying.
John: He's showing up.
John: He's showing up.
John: He's delivering some quality content.
John: Yeah, he's doing something.
John: You know, as a social media guy.
Merlin: It's not just photographing his coffee, you know?
John: Yeah, exactly.
John: It's not like, here's a picture of my dog lying in bed with me again.
John: Oh.
John: Come on.
John: No more.
John: I don't know.
Merlin: I like the dogs and the babies.
Merlin: I know you do, but this is your albatross.
Merlin: That's my albatross, but I'm there on time.
Merlin: I'm here for this.
Merlin: Yas, queen.
Merlin: So that's why I am like this, I think.
Merlin: And now I am compulsive about it.
Merlin: And now, of course...
Merlin: You know, it's hard because my youngster, she's pre-afflicted.
Merlin: She does not have the punctuality gene.
Merlin: It skipped her.
Merlin: And so that's a struggle for me.
Merlin: So now you guys are push and pull all the time.
Merlin: Push and pull, I get a little bit keyed up.
Merlin: I get a little bit keyed up.
Merlin: Because you can't, the thing is that you can't explain how important it is that, like, if we need to leave the house by 7.30, I mean, if we made it at 7.31, like, you know, like I like to say, you know, Apollo has crashed.
Merlin: Like, that's it.
Merlin: You don't get another chance at this.
Merlin: This is like an interstellar type situation.
Merlin: You've got to get inside the 5D bookcase and get this shit figured out.
Merlin: And you're not going to do that if you keep showing up at 7.39.
Merlin: Because, you know, every day you do that, you're building the late muscle.
John: Yeah, late muscle, where's the late crown?
Merlin: I'm not going to look it up.
John: Is it R. Kelly?
John: No.
John: So good, but no.
John: So not even close.
John: So that's why I'm like that.
John: I'm not privileged, though.
Merlin: I'm not privileged.
Merlin: I don't demand other people.
Merlin: I just make a noise like this.
John: I know you and Syracuse are very concerned about whether or not you're privileged.
John: People are doing it right.
John: Yeah.
John: You know, I've been through it a lot of times, a lot of different versions of the –
John: the feeling that being late is disrespectful and being late is You know all these things right like a like like as you just described it But it but you know and it and it really is and I've I've experienced it First second and third hand people have explained it to me people have lectured me about it I also have been made to feel the quiet shame of it I Because in this case I'm your mom and Eleanor is you
Merlin: Oh, yes.
Merlin: You're my mom and Eleanor is me.
Merlin: Yeah, it's like one of those SAT things with the colons, right?
Merlin: Because the situation is with your mom.
Merlin: Your mom just is not late for stuff, right?
John: No, she's not late.
John: She's up at five.
John: She's not late.
John: Well, it's just like she's just not late.
John: Somehow she is never late.
John: Does it seem like a magic power to you?
John: Well, getting up at 4.30 in the morning seems like a magic power.
John: Yeah.
Merlin: You've got to change.
Merlin: You've got to move some stuff around if you're going to get up at 4.30 every day.
John: Well, you have to just be made out of a different kind of material.
John: Helps to be from Ohio.
John: But...
John: But, like, it's interesting because getting up at 4.30 in the morning every day seems like a secret power, whereas my secret power, which is staying up till 3 in the morning every day, does not seem like a secret power.
John: Do you feel like you don't get credit for that, Sean?
John: Well, the thing is nobody's like, wow, I wish I could do that.
John: But don't they see that you're like the Cal Ripken of time?
John: Well, but I don't know if it is.
John: I do not accrue to myself.
John: Oh, you're like an early 60s Marvel character.
John: You're conflicted about your powers.
John: I am.
John: I am.
John: Last night, it was midnight, and I said...
John: Because Seattle prides itself on being a sophisticated, Pacific Rim, international city of business.
John: Business, business, business.
John: Business, business.
John: But Seattle is a cow town when it comes to food after 10 p.m.
John: It might as well be some Christian Nebraska town that rolls up the carpets.
Merlin: Yeah, but even then you get a Super America.
Merlin: San Francisco doesn't have anything like that.
Merlin: I mean, it's like, let's see, we used to get, it used to be, time was back in Florida, you had your Super Americas and your Little Generals, Little General.
Merlin: And that was a place where you could go.
Merlin: And I guess we kind of got that with 7-Eleven, but there aren't, we don't, it's not New York.
Merlin: Let's put it that way.
Merlin: This is not Manhattan.
Merlin: Jeez Louise.
Merlin: If you want some, if you want some pork shao mai at two in the morning, you're sitting there with your dick in your hand.
Merlin: Where are you going to go?
John: Well, here, right, on Fridays and Saturdays, you know, Jade Garden is open late.
John: Is that the Green Noodle place?
John: No, Shanghai Garden is never open.
John: You know, my wife and I still talk about that place.
John: We still talk about the Green Noodle place.
John: Shanghai Garden, when they're ready to close, they're one of those restaurants where they just come over and start running a vacuum cleaner right under your table.
John: And you're like...
Merlin: Okay, well, anyway, let's get going then.
Merlin: Chop, chop.
Merlin: This episode of Roderick on the Line is brought to you in part by Simple Contacts.
Merlin: You'll learn more about Simple Contacts right now by visiting simplecontacts.com slash supertrain20, just like it sounds, supertrain20.
Merlin: Simple Contacts is the most convenient way to renew your contact lens prescription and to reorder your brand of contacts from anywhere in minutes.
Merlin: It's vision care.
Merlin: for the 21st century.
Merlin: Here's how it works.
Merlin: Do you need to renew your prescription?
Merlin: That's not a problem.
Merlin: You take the five-minute simple contacts vision test online.
Merlin: It'll be reviewed by a licensed doctor.
Merlin: You receive a renewed prescription and reorder your contacts.
Merlin: All you need is your current contacts and an internet connection in 10 feet of space.
Merlin: I have that most of the time.
Merlin: Even if you're totally out of contacts, they've got an option for you too.
Merlin: And if you have an unexpired prescription, you just upload a photo or your doctor's information.
Merlin: And you order your lenses.
Merlin: It's that easy.
Merlin: So why is it that simple contacts is so awesome?
Merlin: Well, it's convenient.
Merlin: There are a million things demanding your time right now.
Merlin: Contact lenses shouldn't be one of them.
Merlin: So they let you renew your prescription, reorder from anywhere in minutes.
Merlin: Yep, that's all you need.
Merlin: It's fast.
Merlin: You just go take that vision test.
Merlin: It's self-guided.
Merlin: It takes less than five minutes.
Merlin: You think of how much time you're going to save compared to making an appointment, getting to the eye doctor, taking time off.
Merlin: That's no good.
Merlin: They're very reliable.
Merlin: It's designed by doctors and licensed ophthalmologists.
Merlin: Review every test carefully to make sure your eyes look healthy and that your vision hasn't changed.
Merlin: That's a good idea.
Merlin: They have choice.
Merlin: Choice is good.
Merlin: They have all the brands and types of lenses you're familiar with, so you never have to shop around to find your lenses at the best price.
Merlin: Five-star experience.
Merlin: That's right.
Merlin: They've been rated five stars over 4,500 times on the App Store.
Merlin: That's pretty good.
Merlin: And so right now it's summertime.
Merlin: There's no shortage of reasons to have contacts on hand.
Merlin: You've got beach days, vacations, outdoor activity, wedding things, the stuff where you've got to use your eyes.
Merlin: Well, you use simple contacts to stock up for the season.
Merlin: That's a good idea.
Merlin: The vision test is only $20.
Merlin: Now compare that with an appointment with one of these eye doctors in a building.
Merlin: You know, without insurance, that could cost up to $200.
Merlin: It's a lot of money.
Merlin: Contact lens prices are unbeatable.
Merlin: Standard shipping is free.
Merlin: And best of all, they're offering a promotion to our listeners, right?
Merlin: So, so what you do is you go, you got to go to soup, soup, simple context.com slash super train 20 and use the offer code super train 20 at checkout.
Merlin: That's going to get you $20 off your contacts.
Merlin: Now, we do need to remind you that this is not a replacement for your periodic full eye health exam.
Merlin: You still got to do that.
Merlin: But right now, you should go to simplecontacts.com slash supertrain20.
Merlin: Our thanks to Simple Contacts for supporting Roderick on the Line and all the great shows.
John: But the Ho Ho Seafood Restaurant in Chinatown, I don't know if it ever closes in the middle of the night.
John: They lost the key.
John: They just had to keep it open.
John: That's the place where the guy, late at night, 3 o'clock in the morning, you can go in there.
John: I mean, I don't want to give it away.
John: I don't want to bust these guys.
John: But no law enforcement is probably listening to this show.
John: They will definitely serve you a teapot of beer.
Merlin: I thought you were going to say Mahjong, but a teapot of beer is pretty nice, too.
John: Yeah, you're just like, can we get three pots of tea?
John: Wink.
Merlin: Oh, sure.
Merlin: You want beer.
Merlin: It's after hours.
Merlin: Yeah, nobody's drinking tea at that time.
Merlin: That's crazy.
Merlin: You would.
Merlin: You would drink tea that late.
Merlin: I do.
John: I drink tea all night.
John: I drink it all day.
Merlin: My wife does this.
Merlin: She, I don't, she, she knows this is weird, but I shouldn't say this, but like she, she has trouble with sleep sometimes.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: And she gets up and she looks at her phone and makes coffee.
Merlin: Cause as soon as she's out of bed, she wants a coffee.
Merlin: You're talking about if she's three o'clock in the morning.
Merlin: It could be two in the morning.
Merlin: Oh, she's a badass.
Merlin: It's, I know the feeling though.
Merlin: I know the feeling of like, I'm not even, you know, cause like coffee's the new bacon.
Merlin: It's like, shut up.
Merlin: But like at the same time, it's like, yeah, I really like coffee.
Merlin: And like when I get up, coffee's the new bacon.
Merlin: What does that even mean?
Merlin: Well, you know how the internet kind of ruined bacon.
Merlin: I guess.
Merlin: I mean, as a topic.
John: Oh, because they put bacon on everything.
Merlin: Well, there's certain kinds of things you can't even discuss anymore because it's been so meme-ified.
Merlin: It's lost its pride of place as a physical item and has now just become in the realm of Urban Dictionary.
John: Yeah.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: You can't even talk about a donkey punch anymore without somebody making a joke.
Merlin: What is a donkey punch?
Merlin: I'm not going to say.
Merlin: I'm going to cut that out.
Merlin: The thing is, I like coffee.
Merlin: I like coffee.
Merlin: I like coffee.
John: I like tea.
John: I like the java java and it loves me.
Merlin: Coffee and tea and the Java Emmy.
Merlin: Now I learn my coffee and tea.
Merlin: It's early.
Merlin: It's early.
Merlin: So that's the lateness.
Merlin: That's your mom.
Merlin: Ohio.
John: I want to be, you know, like I like to be superpowers.
John: Superpowers also.
John: Well, one of my superpowers is that I actually don't mind being managed.
John: If you are managed, if you're clever about it, here's how you clever manage me.
John: Don't tell me the truth.
John: Oh, oh, okay.
John: Right?
John: So if I have to be somewhere at 9, tell me I have to be there at 8.
John: Oh, that kind of management.
John: Okay.
John: I don't mind it.
John: I honestly don't.
John: You don't want to be Hector that the clock's ticking TikTok.
John: I would much prefer to show up to a thing 20 minutes late and find that I was 40 minutes early.
John: I love that stuff.
John: I walk around.
John: You've been to my house.
John: Every single clock in my house is set to a different time.
Merlin: Oh, my God.
Merlin: That would be very upsetting to me.
Merlin: I don't like it when the microwave and the radio don't agree.
John: I just keep shooting back and forth saying which one is closer to truth.
John: Oh, don't you just sit there and wait for the second to come around?
John: I think there might be drift.
Merlin: I think there might be Tokyo Drift on my devices because I try really hard.
Merlin: I'm listening.
Merlin: I got morning edition on.
Merlin: I'm waiting for the top of the hour.
Merlin: I'm looking at my watch, and I try.
Merlin: I hit it at just the right time so it'll match up.
Merlin: But then somebody unplugs the microwave, and guess who has to go fix the clock?
John: You have to stand there for an entire 59 seconds to wait for it to come back around.
John: It's wall-to-wall demon dogs until I fix it.
John: Well, so the closest clock to actual time in my house is still 10 minutes fast.
John: But if I look at my phone, everything goes out the window because I can't set the time on my phone.
John: You can't fudge a phone.
John: It's set by the nuculars.
John: Mm-hmm.
John: Mm-hmm.
John: So...
John: But I walk around, I'm always trying to fool myself, like, oh, shit, it's almost five.
John: And then I throw everything together.
Merlin: How do you not lose your mind?
Merlin: How do you not lose your mind knowing what time it actually is?
Merlin: That to me, that is like a superpower or a supervillain thing.
Merlin: I would completely lose it if I didn't know what time it was.
Merlin: Time is a flat circle.
Merlin: It's a flat.
Merlin: We just watched Interstellar the other night.
Merlin: Oh, it's such a great movie.
John: It's such a great movie.
John: My daughter liked it.
Merlin: She actually liked it.
John: Well, of course, because it's for children.
John: It is a children's movie.
John: It could be the last crop for okra.
John: You know, he does have a Filson bag.
John: He's got a really nice Carhartt jacket, too.
John: Well, yeah, the two things go together.
John: That's a Filson bag, huh?
John: If you're a Hollywood person who's putting a character together, you put a Carhartt jacket and a Filson bag on them.
John: Instant characterization, just Adam McConaughey.
Merlin: There he is.
John: You love him.
Merlin: I don't.
Merlin: You do not prefer him.
John: Because I think time is imaginary, just like money is imaginary.
John: It sure doesn't feel that way sometimes.
John: Well, I know it doesn't.
John: But that's like just, I don't know what it is.
John: Maybe that's my evil villain superpower.
John: But like, for instance, I just wrote an article for a magazine here called City Arts Magazine.
John: Okay.
John: It's called Punk Rock is Bullshit.
John: You're going to love it.
John: No, it's not.
John: Is that where that particular piece was originally published?
John: No, it was published in the Seattle Weekly Magazine.
John: The City Arts Magazine is a new, it's not new, it's been around for a long time, but it's an arts magazine for Seattle and it's very good.
John: It's not Time Magazine.
John: It's not Time, it's art.
John: So I ran into the editor.
John: We were on a radio program together and she said, why don't you write an article for the for the back page?
John: Oh, that's that's a nice spot.
John: It's a nice spot.
John: It's a modest word count and it gets good attention.
John: And she said and I said, OK, sure.
John: And so she wrote me and she said, I'd like you to have your draft to me.
John: No, no, no.
John: She said she didn't say I like you to.
John: She said your draft is due on Wednesday.
John: Now, here's what she didn't say when it goes to print.
John: She did not say when it's like the last minute that it's due.
John: She said your draft is due on Wednesday.
John: Okay.
John: Which feels arbitrary, not in a bad way.
John: Well, I have no idea.
Merlin: You have no idea.
Merlin: But that sounds like she picked a date because you need a date.
John: Who knows?
John: She gave me no additional information and she gave me no sense that she was open to any conversation about it.
John: And so I was like, oh shit, my draft is due on Wednesday.
John: Pretty one-sided deal so far.
John: So far.
John: So Tuesday night in the middle of the night, three o'clock in the morning or whatever, I was like, oh shit, my draft is due on Wednesday.
John: Fuck.
John: And so I wrote it at the last minute and I sent it in to her.
John: And then I didn't hear from her on Thursday.
John: That's kind of strange.
John: Where's the fire?
John: I was like, what the hell?
John: Yeah.
John: And then it was Friday and she wrote back and she was like, I really liked it.
John: Here's some notes that I have.
John: uh you know like do this more and do this less uh your draft is due on monday and i was like oh shit monday right it's like monday is when it goes so it was like sunday night oh man she's throwing like caltrops at you like she she's she's giving you lots of dates and then more dates yeah and i so i was like oh that's no way to live and then uh and then i sent it to her and there were a couple of days went by and she was like this is great you know let's just uh let's just tighten it up and and you know have it to me by thursday
John: I was like, geez, if I'd known I could have it to you all this way by Thursday, I wouldn't have done any of this work.
John: I would have waited until Wednesday night at 3 a.m., which is what I used to do on my Seattle Weekly column.
John: I knew when they went to press.
John: And so Sunday night at 3 o'clock.
Merlin: You're the one running the crucible.
John: Right.
John: But what she got out of me was a better article.
John: Were her notes good?
John: Oh, yeah.
John: She's a good editor, and I liked working for her.
John: That makes such a difference.
Merlin: What a difference.
John: Yeah, it was nice.
John: But also, she worked me so that I gave her a draft, a second draft, and a third draft.
John: I never do that.
John: Mm-mm.
John: I always just write the thing and send it in and then that's the thing.
John: So anyway, I just, I walked away from that going, yeah, this is what I, I always wanted to have an assistant that lied to me all the time.
John: and told me that we needed to be somewhere, you know, like an hour before we needed to go there.
Merlin: You need a disloyal but well-meaning helper.
John: Yeah.
John: Not disloyal, but dishonest.
John: A dishonest helper.
John: An Alfred.
John: Someone who knows whom they're dealing with, with whom they're dealing, who says... You need an Alfred.
Merlin: I would love for you to get an Alfred.
Merlin: Could you get Michael Caine?
Merlin: That would be really cool.
John: Wouldn't that be nice?
Merlin: He's an interstellar.
Merlin: It's a... Oh, God.
John: it's one of the great things about being super rich is that you have a loyal like think about think about Dudley Moore I do I do I could use a Gielgud right I mean think how dry his humor would be in your life
John: I'll alert the media.
John: I'll alert the media.
John: One of the greatest lines of all time.
John: I want him to say that to me every day.
John: I want him to sarcastically not alert the media against me every single day.
Merlin: And it's the same line, the same preceding line.
Merlin: Do you remember the preceding line?
Merlin: What's the guy's name?
Merlin: I forget the name of the butler.
Merlin: But then he says, I think I'll take a bath.
John: Yes.
Merlin: Isn't that what he says?
Merlin: That's what he says.
Merlin: I love the media.
Merlin: I love the media.
Merlin: Oh, you need an Alfred.
Merlin: You need a Gilgood.
Merlin: You should see.
Merlin: Maybe there's a gig economy service.
Merlin: Maybe there's an old English man, an old slightly kind of fake English man who could come and run your life for you.
Merlin: And give it kind of useful dishonesty.
Merlin: The problem with the gig economy, though, is it's like tasks, right?
Merlin: Oh, you have to give them stars every day.
John: Yeah, and just be like, here's a task.
Merlin: No, I want you to pick the task.
Merlin: That's the whole nature of the job.
John: Right.
John: I have a friend who is using TaskRabbit now, and I have encountered a couple of rabbits.
John: Mm-hmm.
John: And, you know, they're young.
John: They have wonderful names.
John: They're real good at building Ikea stuff.
John: They're good at building Ikea.
John: They're good at moving boxes around, opening stuff.
John: You can say, empty all these boxes and redo the kitchen.
John: And they'll just be like, sure.
John: You know, and their name is like, the kid's name is like Glacier.
John: Oh, I've got several Brandons.
John: Oh, Brandons?
John: You get a Brandon.
John: I mean, you're never, ever going to get a bill.
John: Do yours have a beard?
John: Uh, one kid had a beard.
John: One kid was a female kid.
John: Okay.
John: Female kid, no beard.
John: And, uh, I think her name seriously was something like mountaintop.
John: Oh, that's nice.
John: Um, but yeah, it's fascinating.
John: And, and when I think about it, like, I'd be great at that.
John: I'd be great at coming into somebody's place and doing tasks.
John: You know, I'd be like 20 minutes late.
John: Hmm.
John: But I'd say, like, hey, what's up?
John: And they'd say, will you rearrange my silverware drawer?
John: And I'd be like, will I ever?
John: You're born into this.
Merlin: This is my dream job.
Merlin: Yep.
Merlin: Yeah, that's actually a super interesting note to me.
Merlin: It's something I have actually thought about legit a lot.
Merlin: Because, you know, I used to be in something like the advice-giving racket.
Merlin: And I realized... Wait a minute, when?
Merlin: Did I know you then?
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: You know, talking about productivity and stuff.
Merlin: And a lot of what I felt is funny, because a lot of what I had to say, I would say this, and I know this sounded like something that you just expect somebody like me to say, but it was really true that a lot of what I was saying was a thing that I needed to hear.
Merlin: And so I would frequently find myself saying to people, look, I know you know this, but do you really know, no, no, no, no, no, you know this?
Merlin: Like, are you thinking about this?
Merlin: Are you doing this thing?
Merlin: Like, you know you should do this thing, but are you doing this thing?
Merlin: Sometimes it takes a ding-a-ling in San Francisco with a website saying it to you,
Merlin: in a kind of funny way to make you realize this is a thing you need to think about more.
Merlin: You need to, as they say, remember to remember, right?
Merlin: And I think that's the funny thing is like, and the reason I'm saying that's true for your client's silverware is I think like I could give all kinds of advice that I could use 10 times more than the other person.
Merlin: And I think I could deal with other people's shit so much better than my own, whether that's their silverware or their productivity problems.
Merlin: If it's somebody else, I have such a different outlook about it
Merlin: You could be so... I'm saying, if you went into business as a silverware organizer at all, you could bring something to that that you might even find difficult to do for yourself.
Merlin: The cobbler's children have no shoes.
John: Yes.
John: The cobbler's children have no shoes.
John: I'm noticing about my children.
John: She does not share any of this with me.
John: She is a...
John: She's punctual and really she follows the signs.
John: Oh, I know which branch of the tree she fell off of.
John: Yes.
John: And if I don't follow, like if we're driving on a thing, cause sometimes I take her for a drive and you know, I like to go down the road that says a road is a serving suggestion.
John: That's right.
John: When, and sometimes a road will say dead end or private road.
John: And I have always felt that private road signs were in the front.
John: That's a rule that's made to be broken.
John: Because, come on.
John: Come on, it's a road.
John: If it's a road, how can it be private?
John: Yeah, I ain't hurting nobody.
John: You're just driving.
John: But she is so offended that I not even not only private road, which I kind of understand.
John: She is offended that I go down dead end.
John: She's like, it says dead end.
Merlin: Mine is like that and is a real letter of the law kid.
Merlin: She reminds other people when they're breaking the rules.
Merlin: She has a lot of leadership skills, let's say, in a lean-in way.
Merlin: Let's call it leadership skills.
Merlin: She has a lot of leadership skills about telling people that they're not supposed to be doing that.
Merlin: Is this really where you're supposed to be right now is something I've heard her say.
Merlin: Are you sure you're supposed to be on the playground right now?
Merlin: She'll say these things, but she's very much a letter-of-the-law person where I'm like, oh, you know...
Merlin: that's, it's, it's okay.
Merlin: Well, it says here you have to be 13 to do this.
Merlin: I was like, it's, it's okay.
Merlin: Like I have the override ability for deciding when you don't have to be 13 to do something.
Merlin: Right.
Merlin: But I'm trying to give other examples of this, but like all signs, like she reads every bullet on the sign about what's allowed in the park and when it closes.
Merlin: Oh yeah.
Merlin: You know, the park with the Confederate soldier ghosts.
Right.
Merlin: You want to go cut through the park to go to Walgreens after sunset?
Merlin: Nope.
Merlin: Dad, the park is closed at sunset.
Merlin: I was like, it's not closed.
Merlin: There's no fence around the park.
Merlin: It's lit.
Merlin: It's lit.
Merlin: You can walk through the park.
Merlin: She says, no, you can't.
Merlin: There's no skateboards, no smoking, no swearing, and it closes at sunset.
Merlin: You cannot walk through the park after sunset.
John: Letter of the law.
John: Does she then not allow you to do it?
Merlin: She gets very anxious if I...
Merlin: How can I, I want to get the words right on this.
Merlin: She gets very anxious and flustered.
Merlin: If I am kind of moving her toward doing something that she regards as even a bending of any rule as stated or as she perceives it.
Merlin: Yep.
Merlin: She's always been very caught.
Merlin: I didn't mean to take you off this.
Merlin: I just wanted to say, I feel you because that then you find yourself.
Merlin: So now I'm in a weird position because now I'm saying like, is it okay to break the rules?
Merlin: Well, yeah, it is.
Merlin: Sometimes it's okay to break the rules sometimes, but you know,
Merlin: We just let her ride in the front seat for the first time.
Merlin: She was very, very excited.
Merlin: Well, that is exciting.
Merlin: Just in the neighborhood.
Merlin: Just in the neighborhood.
Merlin: She's 5 foot and 110 right now.
Merlin: So I think she's good to be in the front seat.
Merlin: Just in the driveway.
Merlin: Just rolling.
Merlin: So you want to take your privately owned automobile that you pay for with your money, and you want to just go a little bit, just a tip, just get a little bit into a private road.
Merlin: She's got an issue with that.
John: Well, sure, because the thing the thing about a private road is that you don't encounter it's not like you're just driving through a neighborhood and you come into a private road.
John: Yes.
John: Yes.
Merlin: Where you're getting into the rough a little bit more.
Merlin: And that might be, that could be in California off US 1.
Merlin: It could be somebody with a fancy house on a cliff.
Merlin: They might have a private road.
John: Oftentimes, you'll go down a private road and it turns out that, oh, this is just someone's driveway.
John: It's just a long driveway.
John: And then you have that kind of sheepish like put it in reverse and just slowly creep out of here where she's, I'm sure, mortified that the squirrels in the trees are watching us or that somebody up in the house heard crunching on the gravel and is peeking at us through their peephole.
John: On their private road?
John: On their private road.
John: But a lot of times what you find down a private road is a community of 20 houses that are on the beach.
John: Oh, it could be an enclave.
John: It's an enclave.
John: And what they don't want is somebody coming down their road to use their beach.
Merlin: I think it's a very innocuous version of this.
Merlin: And you really see this.
Merlin: Have you ever used the application Waze?
Merlin: Yes.
Merlin: You're aware of Waze.
Merlin: I've seen it.
Merlin: Waze can be very useful if you are on a highway.
Merlin: I imagine you hate Waze and 60 Waze.
Merlin: 60 Waze.
Merlin: You are on a highway that you've never been on and there's stuff you need to do.
Merlin: Before you even get into speed traps and stuff, it can be very useful to say, oh, by the way, if you take this little zip-a-zab over here, you could cut 15 minutes off your trip.
Merlin: That can be very handy.
Merlin: If you use it in an urban environment with which you are familiar, it's monkey balls.
Merlin: Because it'll be like, oh, you know what?
Merlin: Take it right here.
Merlin: Pull into Sid's driveway for six minutes.
Merlin: Back out slowly.
Merlin: Change the radio station.
Merlin: Do a U-turn.
Merlin: Go home and try this one.
Merlin: And it sends you down the most crazy ways through people's neighborhoods.
Merlin: That, I think, drives people crazy.
Merlin: I think that's part of what makes people want to say, hey, look, just because I live near the mall doesn't mean that this is a highway.
John: Yeah, well, and I mean, I've used Waze.
John: I've been in, let's say, a rideshare service where the driver was using Waze.
John: Oh, God.
John: And we went from LAX to whatever, the Chateau Marmont.
John: without ever going two blocks without making a turn.
John: I know.
John: Like, just going through people's neighborhoods.
Merlin: They're flying blind.
Merlin: They're basically flying on instruments.
Merlin: They do not know those roads, or there's no way that they would make that many turns.
John: Well, and I would say to the guy, like, you know, La Brea is right over there, like one block over, and traffic's moving.
John: It's not like it's...
John: It's not like there's a car wreck or something.
Merlin: Because in this day and age, you also have your own damn phone.
Merlin: You can do your own road due diligence.
John: Well, and also, like, I know where it is.
John: It's like right there.
John: I can see the big street.
John: You're like a hawk.
John: And the people in this neighborhood and the ones in the traffic circles and the stop signs, like the ride, the quality of this ride is low quality because of the stopping and the turning.
John: I'd almost be willing – because I'm paying you, you know, like if I was –
Merlin: all jacked up and and needed to keep moving because i was jacked up sure i might go zipping through oh you say you've been out clubbing you've been vaping and doing dj stuff and then you hop in your fucking car and figure i'll pick up some fast cash over two hours that's what i don't want i've had that guy i had that guy drive us to the airport over the summer i had a vaping dj
Merlin: I don't want a vaping DJ.
Merlin: You don't want a vaping.
Merlin: His vape rig right there.
John: That and a very, very, very large coffee.
John: What I like when I get a ride in from the airport is to sit in the back of a vehicle that's being driven by someone from Russia or Ukraine.
John: Yes.
John: Yes.
John: Who is in his 50s or 60s.
John: He's been through the shit.
John: You can tell he has.
John: 100%.
John: And now all... And he's got a little headset phone.
John: And if he is making a phone call to someone...
John: Oh, I know.
John: He's running his eBay business over the Bluetooth.
John: Yeah.
John: But otherwise, he's just in traffic and he's just driving you to the place.
John: And if you were to be assaulted by someone, like a terrorist group, he would be able to handle it.
John: Yes.
John: For sure.
John: But he's not zipping up and down.
Merlin: And if you were going to talk with him, you would be genuinely interested in what he had to say.
John: Oh, for sure.
John: I've learned a lot from those guys.
Merlin: Can I ask you to look at your phone and look at the photo I just sent you in text messages?
Merlin: No.
Merlin: My family arrived back from a trip earlier this summer, and we got into a ride-sharing service.
Merlin: What John is about to read to you, please, is a sign that someone printed and laminated and hole-punched and put a ribbon through and hung in three different locations inside the automobile.
Merlin: Wow, this is a car you rode in.
Merlin: This is a sign that was in a Lyft.
Merlin: Would you be good enough to read this to me?
John: Thank you for riding with me, period.
John: My goal is to get you to your destination quickly and safely, period.
John: If you feel uncomfortable with how I drive, comma, bold underline, please politely ask me to adjust, period.
John: Period.
John: If you notice the cameras in my car, they are, wow, they are for both of our safety and protection.
John: Is that the end of it?
John: No.
John: Are there, were there, let me just ask.
John: There was three cameras, three cameras in the car.
John: Okay.
John: Bold, bold type.
John: Please, capital, do not, colon, bullet point one, navigate me.
John: Tell me which route to take or where to pull over to let you out.
John: Bold capital letters underscored.
John: I do not allow passengers to navigate me.
John: I stick to the GPS.
John: Last bullet.
John: Please do not eat in my car.
John: Thank you.
Merlin: We've just gotten off a flight.
Merlin: And you know how you are when you're off a flight.
Merlin: I was feeling a little bit punchy.
Merlin: We've been traveling with a kid.
Merlin: We came all the way back from Rhode Island.
Merlin: I'm a little punchy.
Merlin: And this guy, I mean, is this a guy you want to hang with?
Merlin: I don't want to hang with this guy.
Merlin: I don't want to hang with this guy.
Merlin: You like the way he kind of, not scalloped, but the way he kind of did a little Battlestar Galacta octagon thing with the edges.
Merlin: He kind of edged into an octagon a little bit.
John: He clipped it so you didn't cut yourself on the corner.
Merlin: Please do not touch my side.
Merlin: This episode of Roderick on the Line is brought to you in part by Casper.
Merlin: You can learn more about Casper right now by visiting casper.com slash super train.
Merlin: Casper is the company that's focused on sleep and they are dedicated to making you exceptionally comfortable one night at a time.
Merlin: You spend one third of your life sleeping.
Merlin: If you spend a third of your life doing anything, you'd want to make sure it's the best it can possibly be.
Merlin: And that, my friends, is why you need Casper.
Merlin: Because Casper mattresses are perfectly designed for humans with engineering to soothe and support your natural geometry.
Merlin: It's got all the right support in all the right places.
Merlin: See, what Casper does is they combine multiple supportive memory foams for a quality mattress with just the right sink and bounce.
Merlin: Casper mattresses are designed and developed in the United States of America.
Merlin: And their breathable design helps to regulate your body temperature throughout the night.
Merlin: And with over 20,000 reviews and an average rating of 4.8 stars, Casper is very quickly becoming the Internet's favorite mattress.
Merlin: Now, this is what you need to hear.
Merlin: You can be sure of your purchase with Casper's 100-night risk-free sleep-on-it trial.
Merlin: They deliver your mattress directly to your door, and if for any reason you don't love it, Casper has a hassle-free return policy.
Merlin: Now, I mean, it's summertime here in San Francisco.
Merlin: I don't know what it's like where you are, but summer's the time of year when I have to travel and go to places.
Merlin: And sadly, most of the places I have to go that are not my home do not have a Casper mattress, which means when I get home, I am so happy to have my Casper mattress back.
Merlin: It is the key component of my sleep workflow, which is a very complex workflow.
Merlin: I couldn't do any of it without the Casper.
Merlin: It is just the best.
Merlin: Right now, you can get $50 towards select mattresses by visiting casper.com slash supertrain and using the offer code supertrain at checkout.
Merlin: Terms and conditions apply.
Merlin: You go to casper.com slash supertrain, offer code supertrain,
Merlin: Our thanks to Casper for supporting Roderick on the line and all the great shows.
Merlin: I was a little punchy.
Merlin: I was punchy.
Merlin: I've been on a flight.
Merlin: And, you know, I think you know that I can be insufferable.
John: Well, what's crazy to me is that the lace, the ribbon that's holding this sign is not meticulously flattened.
John: It's got a bend in it.
Merlin: It's like he probably people molest it.
Merlin: And then he has to move it back hastily.
Right.
Right.
Merlin: But, you know, here's the thing.
Merlin: He does not allow passengers to navigate him.
Merlin: First of all, I've never heard that used transitively in quite that way.
Merlin: Don't navigate me.
Merlin: Don't navigate me.
Merlin: I kind of want to be navigated.
John: I kind of want to navigate.
Merlin: That's why.
Merlin: And I kept saying, not quite a stage whisper.
Merlin: I'm going to say a semi-soda voce.
Merlin: I would say to Eleanor, do you think it's okay if I navigate him?
Merlin: She goes, stop.
Merlin: Please stop.
Merlin: Don't do that.
Merlin: It says right on the sign, don't do that.
Merlin: She was very, very, very.
Merlin: Of course, she's a little keyed up.
Merlin: She's been on the same flight for eight hours.
Merlin: Right.
Merlin: Please, please, please, please.
Merlin: You know, I know I just I do kind of live.
Merlin: You should never, as any friend of John Roderick knows, never show your vulnerabilities because they will be capitalized upon.
Merlin: Yes, this is the problem.
Merlin: So I'm not allowed to do anything embarrassing in public.
Merlin: And it's nothing.
Merlin: I must never be heard.
Merlin: I must never make a noise.
Merlin: I must never make a joke.
Merlin: I must never wear that particular pair of pants again.
Merlin: So I'm especially not allowed to do things like sing her name to the tune of One Day More from Les Mis.
Merlin: Another day, another destiny.
John: Stop it.
John: Please, please stop it.
John: Please stop it.
John: Well, so I have noticed this now about my little girl, the exact same thing.
John: And and at first it was that she was, you know, that she was like embarrassed by things I was doing to be intentionally embarrassing.
John: But yesterday... Oh, okay.
Merlin: I'm sorry.
Merlin: I'm just catching up.
Merlin: You're saying when you did dad stuff.
John: Yeah, when I did dad stuff, she was embarrassed.
Merlin: They very quickly bring the plates out from the kitchen.
Merlin: You go, what took you so long?
John: Stop.
John: Well, I'm not quite that bad.
John: Oh, come on.
Merlin: That's classic dad material.
John: Please stop.
John: Please stop.
John: I literally wear plaid pants everywhere I go.
John: And people recognize me and go, are you John Roderick?
John: And I go, yeah, I am.
John: There's a little special needs John.
John: Hey, how's it going, Commodore?
John: Am I coming over to your house or what?
John: And she's just like, stop it.
John: Can I bring anything?
John: But yesterday, we took a trail because there are a lot of trails here in Washington.
John: And we took a trail, a long, steep trail that was at one point there was a sign.
John: And she said, what does that mean?
John: And I said, well, read it to me.
John: And she said, primitive trails.
John: And I said, well, that's the nature version of a private road.
John: And I said, these trails are primitive, which means that they have not been improved upon in any way.
John: And she said, hmm, hmm.
John: I would prefer trails that had been improved.
John: And I said, a lot of people do.
John: But let's go down these, which are dangerous and kind of cliffside and eroded.
John: Safety is not guaranteed.
John: Lots of trees kind of falling over with their roots exposed.
John: Oh, God.
John: And so we were doing some of that.
John: We were going down some steep hills down into the cliffs.
John: And then when we got down to the beach, we had a good time.
John: We found some beach glass.
John: We turned over some crabs, dead crabs.
John: Mm-hmm.
John: And then on our way back, we came to a trail intersection because she likes to come to the Y in a road and make a decision.
John: Oh, cool.
John: And so we came to the Y, but here's the wrinkle.
John: On the one side were the primitive trails that we came down.
John: And on the other side was basically just a completely groomed access road, which is like graded.
John: And she looked at me with this look of betrayal and was like, are you kidding me?
John: There was a road?
John: And I was like, well, yeah, but sure, there was a road, but we took the Primitive Trails.
John: She's like, oh.
John: So we head back up the road.
John: That has made all the difference.
John: And that has made all the difference.
John: Don't you think a little bit?
John: Well, I said, look, here, we've done a loop.
John: All the people that come down the road and go back up the road, they don't know anything.
John: But now we've done the loop.
John: We've done the whole system.
John: Oh, you ran the circuit.
John: So we're all alone out there.
John: And she says, why don't we walk up this hill backwards?
John: Right.
John: And I said, yes, I think that's an excellent plan.
John: Literally backwards with your back toward the top of the hill.
John: Right.
John: So we turn around, and it's much harder to walk up a steep hill backwards.
John: It works out a whole different set of your body parts.
John: That's right.
John: And we're experiencing that, and we're talking about our feelings like, oh, it hurts.
John: Yes, it does.
John: We're walking up backwards.
John: And then she perceives the voices of others.
John: And she looks over her shoulder and somewhere way up the road, here come a couple walking down the road.
John: Uh-huh.
John: And she says to me, so we're still walking backwards, but she looks over and she says, let's turn around and walk forward.
John: Oh, right, right, of course.
John: And I said, do you want to turn around?
John: But we're still walking backwards.
John: She hasn't turned around because she understands that, like, we're on a mission.
John: Uh-huh.
John: So in order to change the mission, we've got to arrive at a Quora.
John: But to state the obvious, she doesn't want to look weird.
John: Well, this is what I'm trying to figure out.
John: So I said, do you want to turn around right now and walk normally because you're tired or because you don't want these people up here to see us walking backwards like weirdos?
John: And she said, I don't want them to see us.
John: And I said, OK, ready?
John: Turn around.
John: So we turned around and we walked past them like normal people.
John: Oh, hello.
John: Hello.
John: Nice day.
John: Yes.
John: And then once they were out of sight, she was like, okay, now we can walk backwards again.
John: And it was a real like – I learned a lot about her in that moment and I've been thinking about it ever since.
John: Like my instinct is to absolutely dad –
John: dad embarrassed in all these situations, right?
John: Like to turn to, you know, to be like, no, we're the backwards family.
John: And, you know, there's a song and a fancy dance, right?
John: The worst, but like, but no one has, or at least I definitely have not taught her this, right?
John: This, she either, she either was always like this, which I think she was,
John: Or she, you know, or she's learned it from my mom or from her mom or somewhere, you know.
John: Shame is very easy to pick up.
John: Right.
John: And she did not.
John: There was.
John: She this this was this was very simple, very basic desire.
John: She saw other people.
John: And all of a sudden, the thing that we were doing that had been fun and interesting was now no longer cool.
John: And we needed to flip it or flip it around.
John: But then she was she was quick to go back to that's the part I love.
Merlin: It's disappointing.
Merlin: You know, when you're a kid and especially when you're a girl kid of our daughters' ages, like that's not unusual at all to not want to be seen.
Merlin: Like that's I don't think that's unusual at all.
Merlin: But I'm super pumped that she went back into it.
John: Well, so she didn't continue to carry that feeling of like, I don't want to look weird.
John: No, it was it was it almost felt like it almost felt like that the shame went with those people, you know.
John: Like they, it was their problem, not hers.
John: Right.
John: But, but I'm trying to figure out like, what do I, how am I gonna, cause I, I, I just all of a sudden picture, it was like one of those, um, it was some Peggy Sue got married outtake or something where all of a sudden I'm sitting in the car dropping her off at some dance and she's like, drop me off around the block or whatever.
John: Oh yeah, that's real.
John: Yeah.
John: Get ready for that one.
John: So I, uh, but, but,
John: That's so not – but I can remember a time when I didn't want to look like a dork.
John: Somewhere along the line, I lost that.
John: I think I strove to lose it.
Merlin: I think it is totally normal.
Merlin: And I think, I mean, boy, you're going to hate me for saying this.
Merlin: It is a certain kind of privilege.
Merlin: The ability to be a weirdo is something we get to do.
Merlin: I treasure that.
Merlin: I love being a weirdo.
Merlin: Not everybody gets to be a weirdo because if you're a weirdo, you might run into trouble.
Merlin: And that really sucks.
Merlin: And I think it's a message a lot of people get.
Merlin: Again, I think especially young women get this message of like, don't be a weirdo or there's going to be consequences.
Merlin: But then there's this other thing.
Merlin: I sent you a screenshot from that book I was reading, I think, last night.
Merlin: This book I've been reading about anxiety.
Merlin: I'm not sure it's the smartest advice in the world, but it's definitely very intriguing and reminds me of you.
Merlin: You know how you talk about when you're feeling bad or you're feeling uncomfortable, like how important it is to sit with it?
Merlin: Yep.
Merlin: Is that fair to say?
Merlin: Is that a fair characterization?
Merlin: Yes.
Merlin: That's kind of a lot of what this guy says, is that one feeds their anxiety when they try to escape it.
Merlin: And that anxiety, in the true sense of like, well, you're not literally feeding it, but...
Merlin: But anxiety does not care what it is that you are anxious about.
Merlin: It exists only to cause bad wiring between the front of your brain and your amygdala and to keep that bad wiring going for as long as it can.
Merlin: So to cut a long story short, this guy's advice is to do something seemingly silly.
Merlin: It's a little bit serenity now.
Merlin: But the idea is as soon as you have these feelings of anxiety because of an event or the thought of an event, he says you need to find a phrase that you can say to yourself,
Merlin: that is the exact opposite of how you feel you need to start rewiring that connection you he encourages you to say something to sub vocalize something to yourself like this is exactly what i wanted right now and to like embrace it and to walk toward that thing that you're anxious about knowing that you will continue to feel anxious the example he gives a lot is people who have have terrible fear of flying on planes worry about having a panic attack
Merlin: And as soon as they feel their heartbeat going up, it just gets worse, right?
Merlin: Because now the feedback signal is that you are going to have a panic attack and you will die probably of a heart attack or you will suffocate because you're on a fart tube full of long pigs.
Merlin: And his, again, I don't know if this is super great science, but I think it's a very intriguing idea is that instead of the more you try to run away from the thing that you're anxious about, the more anxious that you will become about it.
Merlin: It's almost like a form of procrastination where you get rewarded for not getting caught.
Merlin: And I don't know, I just think that's such an interesting idea.
Merlin: And it does make me think a lot about how we got to where we are.
Merlin: You know, however we end up being terrified of the fart tube full of long pigs.
Merlin: Like, how do we get there?
Merlin: How do we get to where some combination of fear and shame goes?
Merlin: And all those kinds of terrible feelings you get in your youth, like end up sticking with you your whole life where you're like revisiting.
Merlin: I feel like it's very, I'm not trying to be all like Freudian.
Merlin: I feel like you do revisit some trauma or traumas over and over and over.
Merlin: And the only thing in this world that matters in a clutch moment is love like this.
Merlin: I cannot, I cannot handle having to have that feeling again.
Merlin: And just that thought alone is enough to have you running the other way, sometimes backwards up a hill.
John: Yeah, I,
John: You know, I was a skinny kid until I went to live with my dad.
John: I'm sure I've told you this.
John: He didn't make the eggs right.
John: Yeah, he screwed it all up.
John: But from the time I was in fifth grade to the present, I have had a voice in my head that was telling me I was fat.
John: And I've never not thought I was fat from the time I was...
John: in fifth grade to the present.
John: And sometimes I'll look at pictures of myself at some point along the way and go, you were so freaked out that you were fat.
John: And you just were normal.
Merlin: It becomes like your default thought.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: I mean, it's fair to say, like, it's not something that just occurs to you a couple times a week.
Merlin: It becomes something where there would have to be some other message that's more important to push out the I am fat message.
John: Well, and what the I am fat message was, was it came into play every time there was a girl I was interested in.
John: Every time there was a sport that was about to get played.
John: Anytime there was someone there who was good at sports, anytime there was the suggestion that we would go swimming or that we would put – You got to take a shower down to get an A. Yeah, or that we would change clothes or that – I know.
John: That's shame.
John: Anytime – I mean it just was – it was a constant – not was.
John: It has been and is still a constant friend.
John: the um the just the little niggling voice that that i'm fat and i've tried a thousand times to to eradicate that voice by saying something else and and all of the you know at any time you pick pick up a picture of me from
John: 2000 or from 1995 when I was basically living on a can of chili a day and 14 beers, but you know, I was, that's why they call them empty calories.
John: Yeah.
John: And I'm like, you're not fat here.
John: But, but I remember then thinking like, well, it's going to be really hard for me to be a successful musician because of, because of how fat I am.
John: And nobody wants to watch a rock show.
John: Nobody wants to watch a fat man rock.
John: Yeah, about a big fatty.
John: Right.
John: And, you know, and still, like, I imagine it as a component of when other people are like, is he attractive?
John: Well, I mean, yeah, for a heavy guy.
John: Yeah.
Yeah.
John: How to switch those, because that is a voice I do not want in my daughter's head.
John: I know.
John: I know.
John: And like, if she doesn't want to wear like, uh, like plaid pants and if here she does, she so far has not figured out that there's a normal style and then a, and then crazy style.
John: She has crazy style.
John: Um, but like for the love of God, the idea that you would get into your head, some version of
John: I am hideous.
John: It's just like, oh, such a boner.
John: I've got something wrong with me.
John: Such a boner.
Merlin: Got something wrong with me, B, that everybody can see or detect.
Merlin: Right.
Merlin: C, that it's going to cause me pain throughout my life that, D, I will never be able to get rid of.
Merlin: Right.
Merlin: I am perma-broken.
John: I put on a pair of pants this morning that I bought on the internet.
John: You bought internet pants?
John: I bought internet pants.
John: The person that sold the pants did not tell the truth about them.
John: They came and were a different size than they were meant to be.
John: And they don't fit.
John: And rather than A, send them back, B, throw them away, I...
John: put them over a chair and thought, well, I might be able to wear these pants after I lose 25 pounds.
John: Unfortunately, with this pair of pants, I will only be able to wear them after I lose 25 pounds and four inches of height.
John: And I'm unlikely to do either of those things.
John: Do you look like the Incredible Hulk in them?
John: I do.
John: I do.
John: But they're not purple.
John: They're beautiful pants.
John: They are purple, in fact.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: Doc Bruce Banner.
Merlin: Okay.
Merlin: But you're not going to send him back.
John: I've never sent anything back.
John: I never send anything back.
John: Things come, and if it doesn't work, they just keep going.
John: They go into the pipeline.
John: They go to the Goodwill.
Merlin: The other thing he says, part of what made me think of this is you're talking about the private road.
Merlin: And he's, he's talking about this sounds, it sounds cheesy.
Merlin: And like, I don't know, he could be like all these books that could be more economically written, but you know, the guy wants to, you know, kind of jam his point and bang it into your head.
Merlin: But he talks in particular, I think this is probably bullshit, but he says, you know, people who live on cobblestone streets tend to be happier.
Merlin: You know, you slow down, you pay attention to what you're doing.
Merlin: I don't know if that's really true, but that his point is, I think very much yours, which is like, it's not only fun to take the hard walk.
Merlin: Sometimes it's important to take the long walk or the hard walk.
Merlin: It's important to go like find the private road.
Merlin: And the other thing is, he's suggesting you find your own version of this mantra or sub-vocalization, this version of, this is exactly what I want right now, or this is exactly what I need right now, with the idea being, you know what, this anxiety is helping me practice.
Merlin: Whatever I'm feeling right now that I'm going to sit with, every time I have an opportunity to be exposed to that, I should be happy about it, because it gives me a chance to work on this.
Merlin: It gives me a chance to practice what I'm doing.
Merlin: But he says the other thing that you can, on a more intellectual level, I think, that you can think to yourself is...
Merlin: This is hard, but I can handle it, which I thought was that's that's a really I don't know how I would ever get that into my kid's head.
Merlin: If there's, you know, all this fucking New York Times shit about grit.
Merlin: I don't know.
Merlin: Fine.
Merlin: Whatever.
Merlin: Seems like kind of a tiger mom thing.
Merlin: But like, I do love that idea of this is hard, but I can handle it.
Merlin: Or, you know, this no one's going to eat me.
Merlin: I'm not going to die.
Merlin: Like, I will get through this.
Merlin: This will suck.
Merlin: But that sucking does not have to be a part of me.
Merlin: In my life all the time.
Merlin: It's a situation that I'm in.
Merlin: It's not a condition of existence.
John: Well, this is at the core, I think, of something really key to me trying to unlock my future.
John: Which is that up until this point in my life, I have never...
John: Um, that there is in, in my cosmology, there is a point to life and I don't, and I haven't figured out what it is and I am definitely not succeeding at it.
John: Now there are lots of other versions of life that I have seen both in traveling and in knowing other people.
John: Where it does not appear that the other people think that there is a point to life beyond making it and having fun.
John: Or getting it done or, you know, I don't know what is motivating people.
John: Like, I had a friend I was talking to the other day and they said, I tried living in Colorado for a while.
John: And it was great.
John: It was like we were skiing, we were going out, we were living...
John: But after a while, I just felt like we weren't doing anything.
John: Like every day we were doing, doing, doing.
John: We were going, going, going.
John: But it was all just in the category of play.
John: And this was their lives.
John: It wasn't play.
John: This was how they were living.
John: And, you know, when you go to...
John: When you go to, uh, the tropics or you go to, you go on vacation.
John: Vacation.
John: Yeah, exactly.
John: And you're in it, but you're in a town where the people there are living.
John: Um, they are the people who are live there a year round and their job is to accommodate people who are there on vacation.
John: Yeah.
John: And you see them working to provide vacation experiences for other people and really the working and what the, what their, excuse me.
John: Yeah.
John: their job and the vacation experience of the other people it's it's the the only difference is that they are like bringing the drinks right but it's like difference that is it's a huge difference it looks yeah but somebody oh my gosh you must be really living your best life you're in the sun all day but but the but the key being like that what is the what is the point right i mean if you're if you're
John: If you are like if my job here in Seattle was to serve people who were coming here because Seattle was their vacation, which happens a lot.
John: After a while, I would be like, this is not this is not the point for me.
John: Right.
John: Or I mean, I don't know.
John: I don't.
John: And so when I was at my psychiatrist's.
John: earlier this year, because I go to see him if I have to.
Merlin: Yeah, I mean, don't do stuff at the very least, like, you know, take your blood pressure and stuff, make sure everything is on an even keel.
John: Yeah, I mean, every once in a while, he'll send me an email like, you haven't been here in six months, and I'll go, all right, here I come.
John: But, you know, he was trying to, again, say, like so many people have said, like, mindfulness, like, get into now, and you're not, you don't have to be
John: There's nothing to solve or you don't have to Validate your existence, you know, you there's no you're not doing it wrong.
John: Mm-hmm And I just have a such a hard time accepting that at a like a core level and so they feel like a cop-out Yeah, well not just a cop-out but it like a like a failure, right?
John: I mean if if I don't think that I'm failing at life and
John: I'm surely not succeeding at it, so then all I'm doing is ignoring it.
John: All you're advocating is just that I ignore that I'm failing at life rather than I don't know what.
John: I don't know another option, right?
John: To tell yourself that you're succeeding at life is just to tell yourself that you're pretty, which is fine, right?
John: I mean, it's fine if that works.
John: But so much of my anxiety is tied to
John: All the things that I feel like I should be doing in order to be succeeding.
John: Yeah, that seems like an ongoing theme for you.
John: It's well, it's life.
John: It's lifelong.
John: And so I've been talking about like trying to sell my house and buy a house in a different part of town.
John: And the last and it's been causing me tremendous anxiety because it just feels like, oh, God, you know, to sell this house, I have to finish all the projects that I've been living in and amongst.
John: for the last 10 years.
John: Like, oh, maybe I should finally put in a walkway out front.
Merlin: I mean, it's an overused analogy, like the thing about pulling a thread and having the whole sweater unravel.
Merlin: But there's so many interconnected moving parts to even pondering what you want to do.
Merlin: I think that's a very natural way to feel about that.
John: Yeah, yeah.
John: But it plagues me, right?
John: I mean, I do not have happiness.
John: And I'm thinking about this house that I want to buy and how I'm going to sell this house.
John: And then last night I'm sitting around and I thought, why do you feel like you deserve another house?
John: Like, why do you feel like you deserve to sell this house and buy a new house?
John: Like, what is this?
John: This is just... You haven't earned a new house.
John: Well, yeah.
John: And it's just like treadmill stuff.
John: You're just on the treadmill.
John: You're just running.
John: Now you're going to get a new house and now you're going to like have to replace the light bulbs in that house.
John: And...
John: And that's the kind of like – that's that Welsh troll that just like tiptoes in on kitten feet and then everything just turns to – it's not – because I called my mom and I was like, I feel like –
John: Maybe buying another house is like a betrayal of all the suffering that I have yet to endure here.
John: You know, like there's all these things that... You're not done suffering in the one you've got?
John: Yeah, there's all these things here that I should still be... I should still be punished by this house rather than move on to some new punishment in the new house.
John: Wow.
John: And she was...
John: And she was like, you know, I think that I think that you can move to a new house.
John: I think it's not it's not a it doesn't have to have all that weight attached to it.
John: I was like, well, I don't know, maybe for you.
John: But how to unburden myself – or not unburdened, but just like – it just feels like a – well, yeah, unburdened.
John: It does.
John: It feels like a huge old-fashioned wood-framed backpack full of – with like a goat on it and some buckets and like I'm one of those knife sharpeners.
John: Yeah, you're like a wandering tinker of pain.
Merlin: Yeah, I'm a tinker.
Merlin: Yeah, I mean, I think that actually, I'm not saying this is easy or simple, but it's kind of related, I think, to what I was saying before, which is that, you know, a lot of this stuff, when you talk about it in terms, sometimes...
Merlin: When one talks about this, sometimes it sounds so hippy-dippy and so up in the air.
Merlin: But sometimes that helps you understand how potentially not that complicated this shit really is.
Merlin: It's just because it's not that complicated.
Merlin: How can I put this?
Merlin: So for example, that thing I said about you're not your feelings unless you have become your feelings.
Merlin: I very much believe that one can become one's feelings to where they are inextricable.
Merlin: And now you're the tinker of pain.
Merlin: You're just wandering down some death.
Merlin: Well, you're just wandering down some Hungarian road for the rest of your life, carrying all your pots and pans.
Merlin: But like, that's, boy, if there's anything, again, with my kid and other giving other people advice, so hard to do is just that idea of like, you do not have to be how you feel right now.
Merlin: You do not, how you feel right now, even if you felt that way for 20 years, doesn't have to be how you feel forever.
Yeah.
John: Well, I know, but that's predicated on a belief that you should have the option of feeling another way.
John: Does that come back to you haven't earned it?
John: Yeah.
John: I mean, to feel like I don't have to feel this way is to feel, it's the depression question again.
John: I don't feel like those feelings are alien to me.
John: So feeling like they're upon me and I can shrug them off requires that I not feel like I deserve them, which I do feel.
John: And a big part of my thing, a big part of my worldview is that people let themselves off the hook too easily.
John: And that there are a lot of people who are in voluntary la-la land because you see the bad versions of it all the time.
John: Of people that are just like, well, I'm not hurting anyone or creating a path of destruction where I go.
John: I'm great, you know, and I don't want to be one of those.
John: So I hold myself accountable, but I'm holding myself accountable to things that I can't possibly do.
John: I'm just holding myself accountable for earthquakes and stuff.
Merlin: Stuff I have nothing to do with.
Merlin: Well, and I imagine you've interrogated this at length, but is there a sense in your mind of what you would need to do differently or accomplish in order to feel that you've earned a change?
Merlin: I cannot think of a thing that I would... That's the problem in your, if I may say, as a friend.
Merlin: That's the problem in your logic and your reasoning, is that I don't think you've got that point in your life.
Merlin: I don't.
Merlin: And that's a tough...
Merlin: That is a tough parcel of pots to carry for the rest of your life.
John: Well, sure.
John: I mean, what is the success?
John: Like, what is success?
John: For somebody like you or me.
Merlin: Well, I mean, I don't know.
Merlin: And I'm very much the kind of person whose Velton Chong would cause me to, like, I'm totally fine lowering the bar for myself.
Merlin: I'm great at that.
Merlin: It doesn't trouble me as much as that troubles you.
Merlin: I don't know.
Merlin: I don't know.
Merlin: But I mean, you know, it's...
Merlin: I don't know.
Merlin: I mean, I guess I would say, like, you don't have to say this to me in public, but, like, if your kid came to you feeling the way you feel now, what would you tell her?
Merlin: You know what I mean?
Merlin: Oh, well, yeah.
Merlin: Because it would break your heart.
Merlin: It would break your heart if you knew that she walked around every day feeling that way.
Merlin: I would definitely... So why can't you give yourself that break?
John: I would try not to tell her... Well, I wouldn't put it in her in the first place.
John: Mm-hmm.
John: And...
John: And I see how ridiculous it is.
John: You know, I see from the outside, if somebody were to talk to me about it, I would go, I feel you.
John: And also, like, you just, it's just not that big.
John: You're just a small, small, small little dot in the universe.
John: It's not all hinging on you.
John: And not even the things around you are hinging on you.
John: Like, nothing is really hinging on you.
John: If you could afford to, you could just sit and do PlayStation all day and night and the world would keep on spinning, right?
John: And in fact, all the things that we get exercised about, all the politics, all the everything, the things that fill our worlds, the things that we lay in bed at night tossing and turning, none of it is anything.
John: It's all zero.
John: Money is fake, time is fake.
Merlin: Yeah, well, it's all things that are as valuable as what we choose to invest it with.
John: Right.
Merlin: Kind of.
Merlin: I mean, honestly, I mean, you have these kinds of moments of clarity at certain times in life where you go, oh, man, I was so wound up about this one thing, and then this other thing happened, and I realized how much of that was the emotional valence that I had invested in all of these various ghosts and demons and empty closets in my life.
John: Well, and not just...
John: Not just that you did, but like I think about this all the time.
John: We spent our whole childhoods fully expecting a nuclear catastrophe and trying to plan for it somehow in our minds.
John: Like, what do I do when my skin is falling off?
John: Like, do I kill myself?
John: Yeah, the ones in Manhattan are going to be the lucky ones.
John: Yeah, right, because they're gone.
John: They're gone.
John: They're ashes, yeah.
John: But here we are out here just far enough away from the blast zone that we'll be living in radioactive fallout and scarce resources until we... It'll clear up in 10,000 years.
John: Until we die eventually of like...
John: You know, of cancer eventually, like after three years of living, listen to Whitney Houston, you know, and and and yet now that's all just such a weird distant memory of like, oh, yeah, isn't that funny that we used to think.
John: Every single minute was pregnant with the possibility that this could be the end.
John: Every time a car honked or a siren went off, this could be it.
Merlin: Throughout the month of September in 2001, anytime I heard a plane, I got real antsy.
Merlin: Oh, remember the I remember the talks about the bridge being, you know, the big bridge here being something that was going to be attacked.
Merlin: And I would hear and I'd be like, wait, should a plane be there?
Merlin: A plane shouldn't be there.
Merlin: I got all next door about my entire city.
John: Well, that that first week after 9-11 when no planes were in the sky.
John: Yeah.
John: And you were just like, oh, there's no planes.
John: But I was I was very surprised.
John: You know, if I were planning 9-11.
John: I wouldn't have just done all that in New York.
John: I definitely would have done a Pan America.
Merlin: I think with the time behind us, I think we all probably would have done 9-11 differently, knowing what we know now.
Merlin: You could have caused a lot more confusing disinformation that people would still be figuring out.
Merlin: Oh my God, you absolutely could.
Merlin: There's so much stuff where you can scoff at the jet fuel still being people who are ding-a-lings.
Merlin: But knowing what we know about what people can be, what even average intelligence people could be convinced of,
Merlin: nowadays yeah yeah we we got off lucky no i shouldn't have said that but but i would say okay listen i'm not saying that wasn't bad okay all right let me do a walk back