W. Kamau Bell on How To Parent In Uncertain Times

Lemonada. You can hear every episode of Don't Listen to Us ad-free with Lemonada Premium. Just tap that subscribe button on Apple Podcasts or head to Lemonada Premium to subscribe on any other app. That's LemonadaPremium.com. Would you guys say there's a taboo in our family? Taboo? Yeah. Of what? Yeah. Taboo means something you shouldn't do. Yeah, like something that's, you know, it's taboo. Don't tease mom. That's a taboo. I don't like being teased. Trust me. I do not like being teased. Do you feel like we tease you? No, it's mostly dad. I just can't stand being teased by dad. By dad. Yeah. She used to love it. It was the way I made her laugh. No. As she's gotten older, she's lost her sense of humor. No, it's not true. How are you doing on teasing less? Not that well. Yeah, really. Bothering me very much that I can't remember what I would do. I don't mind being teased. Mom, would you like to tease Dad for a little bit? Give me a good tease. No, I don't even know how to tease. Sure. You've never teased? I don't think I do know how to tease. Hey, your beard is so long, you can't see your neck. Yeah. Yeah, it is hurtful. God, I really, I think I am losing my sense of humor. Do you want to try teasing me? Try and tease. See if it makes you feel better. Yeah, you might enjoy doing it but not accepting it. Honey, look at that. I can't even see your upper lip. It's all covered with this funny fuzz. Oh, you're such a tease. Oh, what is that? College boys, your courage muster. Shave off that fuzzy cookie duster. You know what that's from? What? Burma shave. Are you kidding me? Remember the Burma shave ads? How do you remember that? How'd you find that? I had a book of the Burma shave ads, and that was my favorite one. College boys, your courage muster shave off that fuzzy cookie duster. Do you remember that book I gave you about Victorian expressions, Gid? That was a pretty good gift with all the vocabulary from Victorian period. Oh, it actually wasn't Victorian. It was words that were once popular. I remember that book. Since 1200. Yeah, since, yeah. Through the 1900s. I remember that book. Yeah, and then they. Yeah, there were some good ones. I remember snollygoster, calipigian. What do those words mean? Snollygoster is like a disreputable wretch, a terrible- Oh, my God. I love that. ...line piece of shit. And then calipigian is, it might be calipigian. I'm not sure. It means perfectly proportioned buttocks. Calipigian? So that's mom. Thank you for sharing that. A calipigian woman. That's not a tease, mom. That's a common one. I don't know. Do you feel dad is calipigian? I love your kelepiggy in this. I'm retiring from this podcast today. Okay. Welcome to... Don't listen to us, really. I don't know why. Our take it or leave it advice show will be featuring advice from cows today. If you want to know where the best grass is. Ask me. Have you ever played a cow? in anything uh i almost was the back end of a cow in something that i can't remember what it was but i didn't get the part wow that must have been devastating it was devastating but you know don't go on this business unless you're willing to be knocked i i drew cows that were with square bodies when i was in the third grade and my mom rounded my corners and i have them framed in my office that is that is something i hope you've shared with your therapists over the years you drew square cows, your mother needed to round the edges. That is truly insane. I think that was not encouraging my own creative vision, but showing me the reality of how she perceived cows. On the other hand, you could think of we were drawing together and having a nice time. No, it's just insane. Go on up here. Becky, get up there. For the next 20 minutes. Oh my god. Mom, Dad, I wanted to start the show off today. Can you please explain, to the best of your ability, how you think, first off, microwaves work? How does a microwave work? You want me to talk? Becky, you are knocking into equipment. What are you doing here? Looking for love. You're in trouble. Becky, get out from underneath. Come here, Becky. Come here. Come on, Becky. This is really... You are cruising in. Honey, put her up on the couch with a treat again. She doesn't want to do that. Sit down. Leave her alone, will you please? How do microwaves work? Well, I'm terrified of microwaves. I don't have them if I have an option. How do they work? I think the protons and neurons are... Neurons? Yeah, the protons and neurons in the air are stimulated to create friction, And that also stimulates the protons and neurons You mean neutrons? Maybe I'm not sure whether they're neurons or neutrons Neurons are what you have in your head Yeah, but neutrons I don't know I have no idea how they work If you haven't paid attention, I sing show tunes Okay? So I don't know whether they're neutrons or neurons Whatever the atomic particles are in our body You know, that everything's made of They get them to friction You know, to kind of get moving Makes heat And it makes heat in all the meat and everything you put in it, soup, whatever, water, and heats it up. And that's how it works. How they get them to move is, I think, they're sort of invisible, but there's a lot of invisible little people in every microwave. And they start moving quickly to get them heated up. The protons and the neurons. Yeah, yeah. Great. If you look, if you have like a filter, then you can see them. Great. mom how does the liver work in your body how does that work it's a detoxifier the liver processes poisons and gets them to go out of your body through the kidney i believe i mean the liver i know the liver is a detoxifier i know if you take a lot of tylenol or advil you should eat a lot of pineapple because pineapple is a detoxifier liver is like a coffee filter you know it lets the liquid go through uh absorbs the nutrients but doesn't let the coffee grinds go through often if you look up liver and functionality you'll see pictures of coffee filters that's really interesting i do how does things get into the liver they get in through the ceramic coffee filter holder and you put it on your mouth you pour the liquid into the ceramic folder expose our ignorance on every subject to the whole I think it's exposing our collective ignorance I think that's what what's your best guess of how things get into the liver well you have intestines and you have all these arteries and all your organs are connected to each other I mean mom I don't know either Well, it's just pathetic I mean, this is like We're more ignorant We're more ignorant about our daily Things than we were 100 years ago 100 years ago, we drilled the well We knew how it worked Let's just be adults, they get in through the liver door What brought these up? Desperate for content No, just, I mean, we gotta start talking about something I think how do things So desperate for content I think how do things work that are around us that feel obvious But are hard to articulate is sort of interesting. But you know, it is interesting to me because 150 years ago, everybody understood how things work. They chopped the wood that made the fire. They built the well that they used to pump water from. And we have gotten further and further away from understanding how, you know, we just turn on a light and we don't know how anything works. We certainly, I can't tell you how all the internet and the hi-fi wire. The head bone's connected to the neck bone. The neck bone's connected to the back bone. Yeah, that's about it. Is it on the list? Is that on your list? I'm stopping someone. I don't want to pay for that. Take it away. Every year I tell myself I get better about meal planning. And it's just like a New Year's resolution that never happens. 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Now shut up and eat it. And it's incredible. This new year, fast track your way to eating well with Marley Spoon. Head to MarleySpoon.com forward slash offer forward slash don't listen for 45% off your first order and free delivery. That's right. 45% off your first order and free delivery. That's MarleySpoon.com forward slash offer forward slash don't listen. Now, you probably didn't hear that because you're not listening, but I bet you're eating your Marley spoon. Have fun. Eat that Marley spoon and enjoy it. Mom, Dad, we're going to mix things up and have our live guest joining us a little earlier in the program today. He's a pal from the Internet. We haven't met him in person until this moment right now, but we've all been appreciating each other's work and speaking out on important issues for a long time together. And he's here to help us answer a listener question. Please welcome stand-up comedian, director, producer, dad, and celebrity Jeopardy! champion, W. Kamau Bell. Hey, Kamau, how are you? Oh, my God. Kamau, I'm going to try not to be too much of a fangirl. I'm honored to be here. Thank you for having me. Well, I'm honored to talk to you. Don't do that. Don't do that. We need joy in the world. We do need joy. Joy as a way of, you know, combating all the other shit that's going on, right? Don't let him take away our joy. What does your t-shirt say? Love is still the most powerful force on the planet. Couldn't agree with you more. There you go. Bell hooks, right? James Baldwin, all of, I mean, anybody. It was a free T-shirt that was sent to me. I'm not sure. Camille, can I ask a question? How are you doing today and with all this right now in this crazy moment? I laugh because in my stand-up act, I say that's the hardest question to answer right now in America is how are you doing? So I've been thinking of myself as I have a certain level of privilege that many people around me don't have. So I have to understand that I'm doing great. compared to many of those around me. Doesn't mean I don't struggle with things. Doesn't mean I'm not frustrated. You can talk to my wife about that. But I often understand, like I understand that even in doing the work that I do and that you all do, we're sort of get to do like the most privileged end of it, which is sharing words online. We're not, and I'm not, I'll say that. I'm not generally out in the world doing the heavy lifting. So even when I think about like, if I'm having a hard day, I'm very quick to be like, but it could be hard. Oh yeah. My joke in my act is that whenever I start to feel bad for myself, is that the ghost of Harriet Tubman shows up and says, Oh, you're having a hard day. You're having a hard day. Yeah. I went to San Francisco state Oh and in a great period come out I arrived there in 1964 And I often think if I gone to that acting school, that fancy one in Pittsburgh that my parents couldn't afford, instead of landing right in the heart of it all, it terrifies me. My narcissism would have just been grown there as opposed to a whole, you know, other political education that was so thrilling because I was lucky enough to be part of that generation that thought we did change things. You know, we stopped a bad war. We had the first Earth Day. We had the Civil Rights Movement. We thought, hey, these four years in college, man, we've- You did it. We did it. All done. We're done. All done. You know? Well, you know, we thought we did it, or a lot of young people thought they They did it in 2020 with the Black Lives Matter marches around the world. We thought we did it. We finally have beaten back institutional and structural racism. And all they did was give us Juneteenth as a holiday. That's right. I'm curious, how is it making comedy during this time? And I mean, Dad, for you too, I know that you're continuing to sing and going on tour and singing. how how does continuing to make your craft and your art feel supportive or meaningful or challenging while all this is going on yeah uh so for me it feels like people use my comedy shows as a way to get like a vitamin b shot of hope in the middle of all this so they definitely want me to talk about what's going on but they also want me to just tell jokes about my kids and the silly things they do. And then afterwards I will hang out and there will just be a line of people who just want to say hello, get a picture, get a hug. They just need, it's, I find right now, it's a great time to be a performer who's worth a damn. Now that's the key part. Are you a performer who's worth a damn? I can, I can vet that the Patinkin family are worth a damn, but a lot of performers out here are not worth a damn. You know, it's interesting. I have, I have this thing about practice being human. I wanted to make t-shirts that said fully human, not a neural link in me. Do you know? I think between- You don't think your phone is a neural link? Wait a minute, yes. My phone is a neural link, but so far it's not in my chip, you know, in my head. But, you know, it's interesting between COVID and the heinous aspects of technology and social media, I think we really have forgotten. We've gotten so frightened of each other. We're on these squares, you know, and I find just like I realized in New York City, I was listening to too many things while I walked around and I wasn't where I was. And I took out my ear things and I just made eye contact with strangers in my community. And people looked at you and said, what the fuck are you doing? Somebody was singing and I went, oh, my God, did I need to hear that? And they're like, want and they take their things out, go, oh, thank you, you know, or thanks to the postal person. Man, I love you people. Thanks for doing that. This practice and reminder of any kind of connection isn't too small if we can just make each other feel seen, you know, and practice kindness and that we're in the same space. And that idea, too, of despair, man, you know, that is what the fascist forces want us to feel. Despair and powerless. And inaction. And there's nothing we can do. And I just feel at every opportunity in every way, if it's being kind to a stranger, if it's buying locally. Doing comedy. Doing comedy. Yeah. You know, I just think, I go out and do concerts, so I sing, I call myself a mailman. And I sing things that, you know, genius is right. I'm not the genius. I'm the mailman. But they wrote, men and women wrote these words, these lyrics, some with music, all with music, but, you know, that become timeless in many ways because they hit the nerve of existence. And so I try very hard during these times. And, you know, when are these times? I guess I would say all times. I try during these all times to not make my concerts a political event. Now, I'm slapped in the face the minute I say that with our dear friend Martin Sheen said to us once, because Catherine used to take care of her kids when they were little. But I said to him, you know, early on in our relationship, I said, Martin, I don't know if I'm political. I mean, Catherine, you know, has certainly plugged a lot of political juices into me. And he said, do you breathe? Do you breathe, Mandy? I said, yes, I breathe. He said, well, the air you breathe is political. And I got it right. I got it in one. And so what's so interesting to me is I like to go out on the stage and sing these songs. But I like to go out there and be with the audience most of all, because I need a break from this world and everything that we're bombarded with. And I go to that theater to have a break. But what is the unexpected joy is I never know what's going to come out of my mouth. I just know what the song is from the minute I start the song to the song's over. and the song has all kinds of possibilities in it always but but i never know what i might say in between it's whatever comes to me and sometimes it's a fucking disaster but but uh and or gideon will come after after he's heard me tell something you know x amount of times he went and it started off being like a nice you know 10 second thing and then it becomes like a three hour event yes and uh and and gideon will say you can you know you can you can drop that one do you really need to tell that story? You can, you can drop, yeah. Do you really need to tell that story, dad? You don't need, you don't have to tell that story. But my point is every now and then I hear the audience have a reaction, a laugh or a kind of deep silence or a laugh or a gasp. And, and I just, I'm just filled with their support for the condition of our lives right now and our humanity, because what they're saying to me is we are with you. We are with you. We are with these people who wrote these ideas and these thoughts that people were trying to realize in their own lives. Sometimes they never realize them, but they left those wishes behind. And it's such a gift that I never expected. And the minute I accidentally say something because I can't help but be who I am, and the political shit just comes out because I've been living with this woman for 47 years. So, you know, so but but when it comes out and they react, I try I try pretty quick to dial it back because I don't want to go down that road. You know, we're here to we're here to have a break. But but they say you can go down that road, little boy. You go down that road all you want. And that is a pretty thrilling gift to receive on that stage. You know, it's pretty amazing. It's also wild that my dad's audiences are always calling him little boy. Yeah. But something I think is incredible about live performance right now is that it feels powerful, even radical, with all these corporations pushing us into boxes to have everything at our fingertips at home. Just being with a bunch of people in a room is amazing. It's powerful. If you sing a song just about love and kindness, that is inescapably political in this moment. It is, you know, if you're singing about humanity, if you're just singing about having a difficult moment and communicating and surpassing that. I mean, yeah, the air you breathe is political. The songs you sing are political. The jokes you tell. And I think it's an amazing thing just for us to gather together. 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Little Saints products are non-alcoholic. Functional ingredients are not intended to diagnose, treat, or cure any condition. We got a lot to talk about from looking around and knowing that it's all on us and parenting in this time. You know, somebody wrote in and I just sort of wept because this mom said, I have an 11 year old and how do I nourish her in these times? And I thought that was such a great word. How do you nourish your kids to be hopeful, decent, connected human beings and appreciate joy and beauty and nature and possibility? Well, the shit is going on around them and this ugliness and inhumanity. I think that's a big challenge on a daily basis for parents. I don't know how old your kids are. So I have three daughters. I have a 14-year-old who's a freshman in high school, an 11-year-old who's in sixth grade, and a seven-year-old who is in second grade. And then there's my wife, and my 88-year-old mom lives with us, too. So I'm experiencing all the different realms of womanhood that a woman can experience, I believe. Lucky you. Yes, very lucky. So for me, I think it's important to do two things. One, meet kids where they're at, so don't talk to them about adult things like they're an adult. Right. But two, don't be negligent and not telling your kids about the state of the world in a way that they can understand. Yeah. What parts of the state of the world do you share with your kids and what parts do you avoid? So that's a great question. With my seven year old, she knows that Trump is the president. She knows that he's doing things like taking away people from the streets that he shouldn't do that for. She knows he's a bully because little kids can recognize a bully when they see one. And she knows that he wants to hurt many of our friends and family in our community. So that's where we're at. He's a bully. He's the evil guy in the movie. He's a monster. With my 11-year-old, it's a more nuanced conversation. But it's also about with her, because she's different. She's like me. She gets anxiety about, are we safe? I see all these things. are we safe? So then with her, the conversation is about, I will, believe me, if it gets to the point where we're not safe, me and mama will know that and we will, we will get us out of here, you know, so you don't need to worry about that. We are safe right now. And I often joke about, that's why we moved to the Bay area, the brightest, bluest, safest place on, on, in America, I believe. And so, and we're surrounded by friends and we're surrounded by people who love us and who we love. So if it gets to a point where we're not safe, we will, me and mama will know that before you ever know, we'll take it from there. And with my 14 year old, it's about how to be out in the world now that you're out in the world by yourself. And that means how to deal with the forces of America that I'm not going to be able to protect you from. And some of that is even the online forces of America. The number one thing I do for my 14 year old now is just send her videos about how to spot AI. That's phenomenal. Can you send me those videos, please? Yes. I want to get to a listener question that we got that we want to share with you Kamau and hear everybody thoughts on it This is an email from Julie and we started talking a bit about kids and having kids This is a question along that vein. I'll read it. She wrote, Dear Catherine, Mandy, Gideon, and Kamau. She didn't write that part, but she meant it at the time. I started listening to Don't Listen to Us in October. I really appreciate that all three of you make me laugh a lot throughout your episodes. Thank you for your authenticity. It's fun to hear about your family's stories, experiences, and religious traditions. You're inspiring to me as my husband and I raise our 12-year-old son. What are some of the ways you gave your boys space and opportunities to authentically be and become the unique individuals they are today? Thanks again for making a great podcast. Keep up the good work. Blessings, Julie. And I'd love to go to you, Kamau. Like, first, you know, you've got three kids. You share their ages. And curious, yeah, how you guys in this world fight to enable them to be themselves. So I'm an only child. My wife says only children are weird. And I said, but I'm an only child. And she said, that's how I know they're weird. I believe the kids need free time and space to sort of figure out who they are and what they're thinking about. And I think a lot of times parents at this point especially want to like plug in all their kids hours with something to do or say, why are you in your room by yourself or whatever? and I'm a big believer in allowing kids to have some free time to just be by themselves doing their own thing because that's when they get to know themselves. And that's when they get to have thoughts they weren't going to have if they were always in a room with the big amoeba of the family. So and then I'm a big believer of like once you find out that your kid is interested in something even a little bit, if there's a way to figure out how to explore that with them, explore it with them. And it may only last a day or two or maybe a thing that opens up a whole new world to them. so one of the great things about youtube is that my seven and a half year old it will it loves animals and she'll start talking about animals and she'll start having and she knows a lot about animals but then she'll have questions about animals that i can't answer and i'm like to youtube batman and we will go then find videos that will do for kids that will do deep dives on these animals that i'll learn and she'll learn and it's a way that i can then share this with her just by following her interests. And so that's one of the great things about technology in this era is that it's much easier to sort of feed your kids' interests. I think there was a great educator that wrote a book called All Kinds of Minds who said, parents, it's great if your kid has a passion, but you don't get to choose what it is for them. You know, and I think just seeing who your kid is, not who you wish them to be, or who you wished you were to live over, you know, your childhood differently, but to really see who they are and encourage that. And also just by example, you know, if they see you treat everybody with a certain level of dignity and respect, they'll get the idea that's what you do with people. There's not a different level, you know. But I remember taking Isaac. He was eight years old. I took him on the march against going into Iraq. You know, it was freezing in New York. And he said, Mom, why are we doing this? It's not going to stop the war. And I said, yeah, but they're going to know the people are pissed off. Do you know? And that is your obligation. You know, I mean, my dad was a son of a Jewish immigrant that landed on Normandy on D-Day. He had a 30-year correspondence with Senator Al Cranston, and he had no money. That is a big difference in where we are right now. Like he had ideas and his senator wrote him two pages back, you know. So I think. Let me ask. Let me ask you a question. What comes up for you, Kamal, with this topic of either what you've learned or how, you know, different kids' personalities inform how you parent them? So, yes. As an only child, it is weird to me that three kids from the same two people can be so totally different. yeah so I'm always blown away by like how do how are these three so different even though they're made up of the same stuff yeah so I've learned the I have to parent each of them differently which may be no revelation to you all but for me it's a big deal uh so the thing that I'm aware of because my kids are mixed their mom is white I'm black as I believe I've stated publicly right um that the thing that I'm aware of is that there is a black education that they need to have that I have to be attuned to because it's not going to happen through osmosis the way it happened with me because they're not constantly around blackness the way that I was I have to be sort of aware of the fact that like oh I need to teach you this thing so that you know this thing so you know how to be connected to other black people in the world. Not that you can't, not that you have to, you can judge it, you can have thoughts about it, but I want you to know the thing. And so I have often, and we joke about it. So we talk about it. Like, I'm like, this is the thing I'm teaching you because it's a black thing. And the kids are aware that this is the thing we joke about. And then there's things that we do that are black things that I love that are just a part of what, how I grew up. So we do Kwanzaa in my house, which is still, despite what the media would tell you, it's not a thing that most black families do. So there's this part of me that is like, I want to teach you the black things. And then at some point, my wife who grew up Catholic and I grew up, you know, black Christian, whatever that means, but we didn't go to church in our family, but we both, me and my wife both grew up going to church. And I realized at some point, like, I think we accidentally skipped God. Like, I think we, I didn't mean to, like, I don't need them to be like religious zealots, but I would like them to have an understanding and you can decide if you believe in that or not, but I would like you to have understanding of that. And so God started coming up around my kids and they would hear about it. My 11 year old said to my wife, I don't, I don't believe in God. And my wife was a little bit like, Whoa. And she, my seven year old goes, do you buy my 11 year old? Ask my wife, do you believe in God? She goes, yes, of course I believe in God. And a little bit confused that she didn't know that my wife believed in God. And then I came up and, and, and my wife goes, do you think data believes in God? And she said, yeah, of course. He's always saying, help me black Jesus, which is the thing I say around the house. Anytime I need help with something, I say, Oh, help me black Jesus. And so it was funny to me to find out that I had sort of introduced the idea of religion of spirituality to them through just my own life in the world. But now my 14 year old is actually going to high school at a Catholic school. And weirdly, I'm happy about it, even though I'm not Catholic, because I feel like you do need to know what this God religion thing is, because that's a lot of how the world works. I think I'm going to start saying, help me black Jesus, too. Yeah, I've always said, help me Jewish Jesus. You can do that. And I'm going to say, just to add to that, there's two things I want to say. Just I want to make sure I say, not that I have to go, but I just want to make sure I get these two things out. As we talk about parenting and how parents show up and how parents should act, literally today I have to go to my 11-year-old school to have a meeting with the school about a thing that my 11-year-old does not like that me and her mom agree with. And I asked my 11-year-old, I go, look, you can handle this if you want to, But if you need to tap me in, tap me in. But you have to tap me in. And I put my hand out like this. And because she's my kid, she's funny. She put her head down on my hand. It was like, tap, tap. And so I was like, all right, I'm in. And even in the process of doing this, I sent an email to the school and I let my 11-year-old read it to be like, is this okay? Am I saying it right? She had a couple edits. And then I sent it off to the school. So as we sit here talking about how to be a parent, I'm literally like getting ready to go to the school today to express to them that this is the line and we have to stop crossing this line. Good for you. I just want to like active. I'm thinking about it. I was curious if Kamau, was there something in your experience, even though your kids are still young? Is there something that you feel like, oh, wow, that was something that I felt confident about or seemed obvious early on. But now after having three, I've learned how to do that so much better with that much more practice. Yeah. So my oldest kid is very confident in the world just by nature of who she is. She takes after her mom. and I think I often sort of assumed she's got this and then I would look up sometimes be like oh no she doesn't got this even though she is confident in the world that doesn't mean that I shouldn't always be like very attentive and paying attention and to make sure that she's not navigating herself into bad spots so I think not that I'm I'm not a helicopter parent but I am a parent now who like will check in and be like, everything okay in here? Everything going all right? Just a little more actively to let them know that I'm here if you need me, which is what I did with my 11-year-old. I am here if you need me, and I want you to hear me say that. I think the number one thing I learned from my mom's parenting is it is important that your kids know that you always have their back. And you can't sort of say that out loud enough. I got you if you need me. It's not a thing I want you to, I don't want you to hear me say this a year ago. I want you to regularly hear me say, I'm here if you need me. I love that. I love that. I love that. I just want to ask one thing. I know we have to go. Gideon's doing the signal. Mom sees me do the, we have to end now, we're wrapping up signal. And she interprets that as, oh, just five more things. I don't even know if you can see this. These are my notes to you about all topics, you know. I might end up sending them to you. Kamau, do you know Jessica Craven, Chopwood, Carrie Water? Okay, I just want to let you know. Oh, yes. I know that expression. Well, she has a sub stack of video. She's an activist. What I love about her thing, I mean, you know, she's sometimes so enraged that she can't speak. But with the recent elections, she was so excited she couldn't speak. She said, I know we had to lose somewhere, but I can't find one, you know. But what she does with every video or letter, she tells you, here's the 20 great things that happened today. And we're not hearing it on the news or in the frigging New York Times. She tells you every lawsuit we're winning, every overturning of abortion bans, all the climate change. I mean, I read it when I'm in great despair and think, quote, they're winning. And I realize, no, they're not. We are, you know, even though it seems like we're not. So thank you for doing what you do. I'm thrilled to talk to you. I could talk to you. Thank you. Pretty much for the day. I want to send you something, Gideon. I'll show you me how to do that. Thank you for your brilliant Shades of America, which I was a devoted fan of, and you shot the shit out of me often, and I loved it. Thank you. Before I go, I said two things. Oh, yes, absolutely. You can't wrap me up, Gideon. No, I don't want to. You can't, yeah. I can't see you. That's all right. I can't see you giving me the wrapping up, so I get to keep going. I can give him a kick up to the table in the right place. You go right ahead. so uh and i told gideon this a long time ago but i just want to bring it up so i was my two my three best friends in high school apropos of nothing other than the entire conversation were all jewish kids uh sort of in chicago uh jason smith whose dad was the head of religions at the university of chicago jonathan z smith uh jonathan norton who uh whose dad worked in cable and Rob Nassar, whose parents were both doctors. And so in my teen years, I would go to satyrs and passovers occasionally. But one of them, Rob, regularly said that he was your cousin, Mr. Patinkin. And so I spent a lot of time with Rob What was Rob last name Nassar I don know if it through the Nassiter family but whenever you came on TV or in a movie which was a lot he was like yeah I'm related to Mandy Batinkin. I don't know if that's true, but it's just funny to me to sit here and talk to you because for my teen years, I knew you were my friend's company. It's a very big family. It's a big family, but I would be curious. And if you're connected with Gideon to tell him, ask Rob, It has to be through his mother's side, not the Nassiter, because I don't if it's a Patinkin or a Pinkert, it's a cousin. But if it's it must be on the marriage side of the mother. So I'd love to know how she was related, how he's related to us. OK, I just couldn't I couldn't leave without without saying that. So, yeah. So I have a cousin, too, now because Rob was my best friend. So now I'm a cousin. Where are you? Absolutely. Where'd you grow up in Chicago? Hyde Park. That's the last place I lived was 54th and Hyde Park Boulevard. Then we walked past each other. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Where'd you go to high school? Kenwood? I went to lab, of course. Of course. You're talking to the only Patinkin in the whole family of a lot of Patinkins. I'm the only one who couldn't get into the lab school. I couldn't get in. And I was in the first graduating class. I was in the first graduating class at Kenwood Wow I went to lab Putting my nose in the air Yeah, yeah, yeah We have a lot of friends that went to the lab I hear that word, I go into a little PTSD Yeah, right, of insecurity Thank you Thank you so much for making time with us, man Such a pleasure and privilege Thank you so much for what you do in every imaginable way. Yeah. Thank you. And keep banging that drum, baby. Keep banging that drum. Yeah. I got no choice. Got no choice. Thank you. Love you both. Love all of you. It's up to us. Thank you. Not just you two. We're all in this together. All of you. Thank you. Put your hand out there. There he is. There he is. There's the guest man. So since a lot of our conversations today were about family, I want to wrap up by revisiting a segment we've done before on the show. I call it Gideon's Secrets, where I share a story about me or my childhood that you don't know about. Oh, my God. Have we done this before? So I don't— We did the fire one in the bathroom. Yeah. I don't think you know this, but when I was a kid, growing up on 200 West 90th Street, we had quite a large apartment for the in the city and we had a long hallway so there was one half of the apartment where me and my brother's room was and there was a long hallway that led to your guys offices in your bedroom and when there was conflict or some sort of issue you guys would go like okay we're gonna go talk about this you would very obviously separate yourself from the group and you would go to dad's office usually to have these adult conversations where the kids couldn't hear i would walk very slowly because it was an old creaky floor in the hallway and i would sometimes even bring a cup because i saw that in a show or a movie and i would get right up to your door your office door and i would listen in or put the cup there and i would listen and if i heard you coming towards the door and a few times you'd open the door and leave the office, I'd leave the door to the bedroom open and I'd dash into the bedroom and roll across the bed. But I listened to countless secret adult conversations that I wasn't allowed to. What's the most memorable one? Well, that's really very... None of them. I mean, I just found them fascinating. And it was so delicious that you didn't know I was there. I mean, I wasn't into stealing stuff, but I was into stealing moments kids weren't supposed to have. I think you're still into that. And it was. And it was. I mean, it's not entirely disconnected from here we are. Yeah. Still fascinated somehow by my parents. Yeah. But it was very fascinating education to hear adults talking about adult things, work, parenting, arguments, friends, family, in ways that you would never let me hear as a kid. Did you feel there were things that harmed you that you shouldn't have heard that would be better for you not to have heard? No, I thought it was all super interesting. It was kind of the equivalent. He told me a couple of them, but they mainly had to do with things that you did wrong. Yeah, that's right. No, it was the equivalent of like kids who aren't allowed to watch rated R movies, like stealing them and watching all the movies. And it was most delicious to just kind of be getting away with it and feeling like, oh, wow, I have a whole new world into adult land. Well, you still are, you could call it very inquisitive or curious or nosy when you said to me a number of years ago, Mom, are there any secrets that you have that you've told nobody? And if there are, you can tell me. You can tell me. Don't tell Isaac. He couldn't handle it. But I can handle it. I'll be your reservoir of truth. One of the reasons I want to purge all my shit before I die is my biggest... How's that going? Not good. One of my biggest terrors is you will just spend decades going through every scrap trying to find things. Don't worry, Mom. And Isaac will just throw it out. I've gotten quite a bit of you over the last few years. I don't think I'm going to be mining. Okay, good. I think I've squozed you for all your wisdom and experiences. But I think what you're referring... I think whenever mom goes to do her place somewhere, I'm going to empty out all the storage places. That's when I'll get rid of all that she hasn't even looked at for a good 30, 40, 50 years. But you know what's interesting? You're so curious about my secrets, but you won't share. You're very private with me. That's because you cannot handle it. You want to know everything about me. You can't handle negative things about me. It's true. If you hear anything about my life that is negative or that I'm sad, you take it on your burden as your own. You tell 15 friends about it, and you'll talk and think about it until you hear that it's good for me. So that's part of the challenge in our relationship is for you to be able to know that some bad things sometimes have sad feelings. Yes, I know you have sad feelings. There's nothing he's mentioning about me. Everything about us is perfect. I know, that's right. Dad can handle that a little bit more. Okay, I would like to be given the opportunity to practice saying, I'm sorry you're sad, but that's being human or whatever I'm supposed to say. Or just dealing with your sadness. You should just say, oh, that sounds hard. That sounds hard. Good luck with that. That sounds hard. Good luck with that. I can't do anything about it. But I'm sure you will be able to deal with it, handle it any way you want to. The one thing that you're referencing about me asking you about secrets, you're conflating things a little bit. But there is something in the family or something in the past that you were debating whether to tell me and my brother. And I really wanted to know. But I can tell whatever it is. It's that your concern is that this possibly negative thing about someone connected in our history, that that will sully my perception of them or damage my perception of them. What I've always told you is like, I find it really meaningful and interesting to know all the flavors and the shades of people and the family and the stories. And that, you know, knowing something bad about me doesn't make me a piece of shit. No. You know, like it's just another chapter in our lives. But can you imagine anything for any family, including ours, that is something that is absolutely not helpful to know about, that you don't need to know about? I can, and I think it's important to preserve the mystery of each individual in your life so that you keep leaning in to try to see it, learn it, find out what you don't know. I would never share every little thing about my life with hopefully anyone, including a therapist. But it's not about your life. It's about somebody else. No, my life's connection to someone else, something that is filtered through my existence. Not everything is worth or important. And I think it's important to keep... I agree. I know you do. And I think it's important to keep a wellspring of privacy because I think I just I don't know why I think it. But I but I I deeply believe it's an important private treasure chest of your existence. I agree that that's a healthy thing to keep a lot of things private. Yeah. I just want to know whatever this one secret is that mom has been debating. I'll tell you later. I don't know if you know. I know it. I know what it is. Does dad know it? He doesn't know it. She just shook her head. You don't know it. You know the truth? I have no idea what you're talking about. I know. None. Zero. I know. So if she tells me, I'll then decide whether or not you can know. Oh, me? Yes. Oh, my God. Okay. I'll buy you something. What do you think the chances are that you'll tell me, Mom? Do you know what he's talking about? Yeah, I do. Do I know? No. Will you tell me? I'm not discussing it. Will you tell me? Sure. You will? No. What? How do you like that? No, she was just... You lose, pal. She's mouthing no. You lose dad, son. She's mouthing no. Father, son. She was just trying to get you off her back for a minute. Oh, my God. When you draw that picture of a family, next time you draw the picture of the family, they have little kids draw, and usually the kid's bigger, the mom's real bigger, and I'm real little. Okay, we've said this. You put me in there. You make me big. You're very special. I'm the one who's going to hear the secret. I wish I lived in San Francisco and I could get to know Kamau Bell and his family. You know, I've got a song about all this. If you want to know... Everything you want to know, everything you want to do, everything you want to say, come to us, knock on my door. Say you can tell me from the ceiling to the floor. Yes, everything you want to know, everything you want to do, everything you want to do, everything you want to be, everything you want to go, everything you want to go, know. I remember these words I love to say. Have a wonder, wonder, wonder, wonderful day. Thanks for tuning in, everybody. We want to hear from you. More questions, stories, advice, recipes, jokes, strange things you find underneath your house. You can send an email to askmandiandkatherine at gmail.com. dot com or check out our socials for an easy way to send us a voice note please leave a review if you're enjoying the show and if you aid the show just it's optional stop listening thank you so much for being here and remember don't listen to us don't listen to us Don't Listen to Us is a Lemonada Media original hosted by Mandy Patinkin, Catherine Grody, and Gideon Grody Patinkin created by Katrina Onstad, Debbie Pacheco, and Gideon Grody Patinkin Executive producers are Catherine Grody, Gideon Grody Patinkin, Mandy Patinkin, Katrina Onstad, Debbie Pacheco, Jessica Cordova-Kramer, and Stephanie Whittles-Wax. Our engineer is Ryan Derringer of Welterweight Sound, a video and audio production by Mark Whiteway of Bellows Media. 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