July 24, 2025 • 29 mins
Rich Easton explores why Scotty Scheffler's dominant performances leave him emotionless while other athletes' victories bring tears, questioning what truly creates emotional connections in sports.
• Scotty Scheffler matched Tiger Woods' timeline of 1,197 days between first and fourth major
• Professional golfers face constant pressure of "what's next" even immediately after victories
• The Coldplay concert kiss cam caught Astronomer CEO Andy Byrom with his HR manager in a compromising moment
• Social media amplifies private mistakes and modern technology makes privacy increasingly difficult
• Billy Joel documentary reveals the personal stories behind his music, including relationships that inspired his songs
• Chris Hayes' book "The Siren's Call" examines how technology companies compete for our attention
• Procrastination might indicate our true priorities rather than simply being a character flaw
• Visual reminders help combat age-related memory challenges
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
you're tuned into another episode of tales from
the first tee.
I'm rich easton telling talesfrom beautiful charleston, south
carolina, the Open Championship.
(00:29):
Is it me or is the number onegolfer in the world, scotty
Scheffler, on the path to chasedown Tiger and Jack's records
and I find myself emotionlesswhen he dominates myself
emotionless when he dominatesBoth.
He and Tiger took around threeand a quarter years before their
(00:51):
first and fourth major.
Okay, 1,197 days exactly.
For all of you retentive sportsfans, not to go down a rabbit
hole, but if you're a whiz withsports stats like they matter to
you, have you ever looked intothe eyes of non-stats people?
When you wax eloquently onsports facts and then add more
(01:14):
sports facts just to makeyourself self-satisfied, you
know what you see Dead eyes.
I personally check out whenpeople make arguments with
sports facts like who was thebest 30 years ago and how would
they have done in the modern era?
I think some people just liketo talk.
(01:36):
I mean, some of this stuff istotally irrelevant, like the
question about could 100 mendominate a 600-pound silverback
gorilla?
Of course not.
Well, maybe if they werezombies or a few of them were
Marvel superheroes.
I mean, you see why I getsemi-comatose when numbers and
(01:57):
selective facts are thrownaround with the weight of
manhole covers.
My brain can't hold space foreverything I hear, particularly
when someone like CarolynLeavitt, our chippy White House
press secretary, justifieseverything the
commander-in-chief says andbelittles the press corps for
(02:19):
asking such a stupid gotchaproposition.
All right back to the open.
You know, even though I'mtearless when Scotty dominates,
he is a winning machine whovalues non-golf related
relationships more than winningtrophies.
Very few people areone-dimensional Now.
(02:43):
Tiger gave us the initialimpression that he was, but
after a few PR chinks in hisarmor we certainly saw he had
multiple dimensions.
Some of them might have beenlike 36, 24, 36.
And, by the way, they werenever my favorite dimensions.
(03:04):
But the standard va-va-voommeasurement still stays strong
in our modern lexicon.
Who knew Scotty's confidencearound his distance, accuracy
and putting excellence is justcrazy stupid and his, his caddy,
(03:25):
ted Scott, has the experienceand such a level personality to
guide Scotty through his winningjourney.
Now I've listened to a bunch ofScotty interviews with the media
on how winning golf tournamentsis ephemeral, on how minutes
(03:48):
after he wins and celebrates.
The question is, how are yougoing to do next week?
How are you going to handle thenext major?
What do you think about thetour championship?
And hey, what about the RyderCup?
What if you and Rory play againAll of this?
So I think Scotty gives us someinsights into his perception of
(04:12):
how everybody else is thinkingabout him and how they're
peppering him with questionsabout what about the next?
What about the next, what aboutthe next?
And I get it, he makes somereally good points, but still
that doesn't get me tearful whenhe wins.
(04:33):
When Michael Jordan wonchampionships, he would clutch
the trophy and cry like a baby.
It meant so much to him andit's great to see athletes when
they finally overcome somethingthat they've been challenging
themselves about their wholelives and how they feel about it
(04:57):
emotionally.
I, like millions of others,wanted to witness a Rory
comeback on Sunday for the ages.
I mean, after watching hisreaction to winning the Masters,
you just want to see how was hegoing to feel about winning, an
hour from his hometown and thepatrons did all they could do to
(05:22):
help him battle the golf gods.
And the patrons did all theycould do to help him battle the
golf gods, but the number twogolfer in the world in Rory,
competing with the advantage ofhome field advantage couldn't
catch the number one rankedgolfer in the world.
And how about Chris Goddard, upagain making a charge at the
(05:44):
end?
I mean, how long is it going tobe until he wins his first
major?
You see, here we go again withfacts and expectations.
Whatever a professional golferdoes to win tournaments, the
question is always going to behow does he compare to Tiger or
Jack?
Or how is he going to do in thenext big outing?
(06:09):
Scotty's right, it never ends.
So you better find somethingthat motivates you to compete in
golf other than just holding upa trophy and celebrating.
Even Scotty would say hedoesn't know why he got so amped
up to play in golf tournaments.
He just wants to win.
(06:30):
That's pretty cool, but stillno tears.
And I guess if I want tearsI'll watch my favorite sports
movie, with the hopes and dreamsof victory being thwarted with
personal setbacks, only to beovershadowed by the ultimate
victory at the end.
That's what Rory showed us atthe Masters, or DeChambeau at
(06:54):
last year's US Open, or theEagles in the Super Bowl having
to overcome the Mahomes comebackmagic.
That's what brings me tears.
It's either that or all the newtariffs that are going to cost
my life 20 to 25% more.
Yeah, that'll give me tears,god.
(07:28):
I'm just thinking back.
Remember the time when you wentto a Coldplay concert with your
gumad, thinking that you couldjust blend in with the crowd of
90,000 ticket holders at WembleyStadium and then get caught in
an intimate embrace on the kisscam.
You know, they say it'svirtually impossible to create
(07:54):
something with the intention ofit going viral.
Viral things just happen wheneverybody sees something and it
holds everybody's interest.
Well, chris Martin learned thatfrom Coldplay when he executed
his new viral fame, not as asinger, but as his best
(08:18):
impression of host Chris Hansenfrom Datelines to catch a
predator but in this case itwasn't pedophilia, it was just a
CEO and his chief peopleofficer enjoying a moment away
from their respective spouses.
You know what I'm talking about.
I mean, who hasn't seen AndyByron, ceo of the company,
(08:40):
astronomer hugging, kristenCabot, his chief people manager
which is a fancy way of sayinghead of HR and then being caught
on the kiss cam?
And when they saw themselves onthe jumbotron they couldn't
move out of the camera viewquick enough and lead singer
(09:00):
Chris Martin commented that thecouple was either having an
affair or just very shy Onemoment doing something secret in
public can alter the momentumof so many lives.
Hey, at least when Bobby Axelroddeveloped an intimate
relationship with Wendy Rhodes,his chief people officer, they
(09:24):
kept it private.
If you binged billions, you getthe reference.
And that was all made up.
This thing at Wembley wasn't.
And what do you think thereason is for people posting,
commenting and talking about theKiss Cam incident?
I think because it was a steamytopic, not about them.
(09:50):
Look, we're human.
We all make mistakes.
My peeps, who range in agesfrom 15 years younger than me to
10 years older, all say thesame thing and it's basically,
boy, we're glad social media andsmartphones weren't around when
our brains were stilldeveloping.
(10:12):
We would have been in a lotmore trouble then.
And now, when it continues tofind us in later years, hey, I
don't know what type ofrelationship Andy and Kristen
had with each other, with theirworkmates or with their families
.
They chose to take a privatematter into a public arena and,
(10:34):
by chance, get caught bytechnology, the field that they
were both in.
It might not have beensurveillance technology, but I
mean, imagine if he wasn't theCEO of Astronomer and he was the
CEO of Astrologer.
Do you think he might have beenable to predict what was going
(10:56):
to happen to him at the concert?
Probably not and, quite frankly, if he wasn't the CEO of a
company worth over $20 millionhis own personal assets and
wasn't having an affair with hisHR manager, then I'm not sure
that the fallout from that kisscam would have been as viral as
(11:22):
it was.
But you know, everybody likesto see the King fall.
The Piano man recomposes hislife and it's on HBO Max.
The new Billy Joel documentaryon Max explains the pressure
(12:01):
that formed the performer thatwe know and the person that he
became.
I spent my early education yearsin New York State, mostly in
Dix Hills, long Island, before Iexplored upstate New York and a
year in the Big Apple.
I was a New Yorker.
Billy Joel was raised inHicksville, long Island, 15
(12:24):
minutes from my hometown.
He was an emerging big thing inLong Island when I was a kid
and, as I learned later in life,he came from a similar historic
cultural migration from EasternEurope as my family did.
In other words, we hadsomething in common.
(12:45):
I didn't know it, but that hadnothing to do with my
appreciation for his piano styleand voice.
He bangs the piano like it wasa supermodel.
I mean, he views the piano as apercussion instrument more than
just a string instrument.
You know it's actuallyclassified as a struck
(13:09):
chordophone.
That's for all you factoidal,anal retentive people.
You know, at that time I wasboth an Elton John fan as I was
Billy Joel.
They were both competing forour ears and a percentage of our
wallets at the same time and ifyou have a limited budget as a
(13:31):
kid during the early listeningyears, you had to stretch that
dollar, particularly your musicdollars, your record dollars.
If you're collecting the Stones, beatles, beach Boys, zeppelin
and the Doors, you might havejust enough money for one album
(13:51):
for a piano-driven pop singer.
And which is it going to be Now?
I can't imagine that either ofthose two artists thought about
each other as competitors, butI'm certain their management
teams did.
It wasn't until later in theiryears that they combined forces
and played together, and Ihappened to see them in LA
(14:13):
playing together and what wasreally cool about it is they
played each other's songs andthere's nothing like listening
to Billy Joel playing Elton Johnsong and vice versa.
I mean, it was pure genius.
So I've watched the first of twoparts and it was over two hours
(14:33):
long and I was 100% focusedwatching it, no devices other
than the TV.
That's rare for me.
I usually have two devices up.
I'm usually looking somethingup that I thought about while
I'm watching something, orlooking at sports scores, or
maybe I'm bored during a sceneand I'll start watching TikToks.
(14:55):
So, going back to Billy Joel, Iknew nothing about his first
wife, elizabeth, and hiseventual manager for the band.
I mean, when you listen to thearc of his love with Elizabeth,
it's songs like she's always awoman, just the Way you Are,
she's Got a Way.
These were love songsintroducing his complex feelings
(15:21):
for her and then, as the yearsgo on and she's manager of the
band, their relationship takes aleft-hand turn, particularly
when she flexed her managerialmuscles and he wrote Big Shot
about a pompous, arrogant person.
Speaker 2 (15:52):
All your friends were so knocked out, you had to have
the last word.
Speaker 1 (15:54):
An interview in 2010, .
Billy inferred that the songwas about Bianca Jagger, but I
think he wasn't ready to open uphis life for all to see it.
It's almost like listening toTaylor Swift bash her
ex-boyfriends or Kendrick Lamardissing Drake.
It just goes to show whenyou're in a relationship with an
(16:16):
artist, beware what you say andhow you behave, because it
could end up in just about anysong or even podcast.
So while I'm watching thisdocumentary, I start thinking
how can I grow up 15 minutesfrom legend Billy Joel and know
(16:39):
nothing about his life's trialsand tribulations that influenced
his music?
I'll tell you why.
Nobody cares about the whys.
I've said this before.
Well, perhaps it's a dominantmale gender trait, because I
know many females that hoverover the why, maybe even more
(17:02):
than the what.
Hey, you know what I think I'mstarting to get it.
We appreciate each other,despite differences in wiring.
Holy shit, what an epiphany.
And if you were moved by BillyJoel's songs and have put them
away for a while, thedocu-series might spark you to
(17:23):
throw a few of them back in yourplaylist.
Step back in time just for aminute and enjoy them.
I know I did.
Speaker 3 (17:55):
I know how many of you just love book reviews.
Well, my summer book is theSiren's Call by Chris Hayes.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
So I'm a binge reader .
I used to read the Wall StreetJournal daily until recently.
My distribution dried up andI'm too cheap to pay for another
subscription or streamingservice.
So let me give you the cliffnotes on this book.
Chris Hayes has a handle on howwe all are being distracted, on
(18:35):
how we all are being distracted, how most companies are in the
hunt to get a high share of ourattention, while your Facebook
friends, insta contacts, snapcontacts, tiktok performers and
YouTube videos are bombardingyou with content and the
advertisers are just sitting andwait to track the moments when
your eyes and ears are focused.
(18:56):
Even as a boomer, I have to makea concerted effort to
disconnect so I could smell theroses.
Gen X and Gen Zers were bornwith devices in their lives from
the earliest years, sosomething powerful has to come
into their lives to dislodgethem from the grid, because it's
(19:17):
always consumed them.
Even with mindful parents whotry to prevent or delay the
inevitable over time.
Most everybody is connected allthe time, like a drug.
All the time like a drug.
(19:37):
When I write down my thoughtsin each episode, I try to
disconnect from AI as long as Ican, with intermittent inquiries
and perplexity to get my factsclose to right.
The barrier island beaches withthe sound of wind waves and
families are my muse.
Sound of wind waves andfamilies are my muse.
Okay, susan, you're my othermuse.
(19:58):
Okay, I have two muses.
I tend to find stories at thewater's edge.
The book Sirens caught myattention when I was walking
down one of the library aislesthat said large print edition
Don't laugh, my eyesight's notgetting any better and large
print gives me the ability to goto the beach, wear sunglasses
(20:20):
and not have to wear readerswhen I'm reading it.
So I picked up the book.
There was something about itthat caught my attention and I
just read a few paragraphs and Ithought you know this will be
enlightening.
If you have any interest inself-awareness of your device,
facetime, and want to understandwhat everybody else is doing
(20:40):
and how it's affecting mankind,I recommend it.
And if you don't, don't careabout it, I'm okay with that, as
long as you continue to listento this podcast.
Procrastination just anotherword for manana.
(21:27):
The last topic of this episodewanted to be the leading entry
story.
I thought it would piquesomeone's attention,
particularly if someone thatlives with somebody or knows
somebody or just recognizesthemselves as chronic
procrastinators.
But, I just couldn't get aroundto it until the end.
(21:49):
And what does procrastinationsay about us?
Maybe we take life lessseriously, we're indecisive and
need more time to weigh in onthe facts.
Something else always pops up,more important.
Maybe that thing that wedelayed didn't need to be done
(22:11):
at that time, or, probably morelikely, we just didn't want to
do it.
That's right, isn't it?
You just don't want to do it.
The weight of I don't wanna faroutweighs the fuck.
I've got to get this done.
I don't wanna is a freightership sized anchor.
(22:34):
I mean.
Some people, as an example, areclean freaks.
It takes constant active cleanas you go.
Now, I love clean environments,new homes staged for sale,
hotel rooms when you first enter.
Nothing I like better thaneverything in its place.
(22:57):
Well, there might be one thingand not doing the work to get it
there.
I said earlier I am a bingereader.
I'm also a binge cleaner.
I procrastinate until I seethings out of place for just too
long.
That's what fuels me toorganize and deep clean.
(23:19):
Or maybe it happens to do withhaving company.
Maybe I like to be organizedwhen Susan visits.
Okay, I do most of my deepcleaning before Susan comes to
visit.
I don't want her to think of meas a slob, because I'm not a
slob, I am just a binge cleaner.
(23:40):
Hey, what can I say?
I don't enjoy bending,scrubbing when my body is
contorted or lifting bucketswith mops and cleaning fluids.
My back is always one bad twistaway from three nights sleeping
on a hardwood floor.
Hey, that's my story and I'msticking to it.
(24:00):
Yeah, so maybe I'm anintermittent procrastinator.
What needs to get done gets done.
Everything else gets done whenthe mood hits me that it's about
time for that thing to get doneand this might be a senior
thing, but things sometimes stayout in the open to visually
(24:21):
remind me that I have to dosomething with that thing.
I've gotten to a point in thejourney of my life, in my brain
development or maybe seniordecline, when I think of
something that I'd like to getdone.
If I don't do that thingimmediately, there's a really
good chance that I'm going towalk into the next room.
(24:42):
Something's going to come up,I'm going to do that thing,
maybe even leave and go travelsomeplace and forget to get that
thing done.
And I'll remember that when I'mdriving and say shit, I knew I
should have brought that thing,did that thing, mail that thing,
whatever that thing was.
When I think of something andit's got to get done, I've got
(25:08):
to do it right then and there,or there's a really good chance
it doesn't get done.
So just about everybody I speakto says hey look, you just got
to write it down, which I do forshopping but not for stuff
around the house.
And it kind of reminds me ofthat joke.
There's an elderly couplesitting in the living room.
(25:28):
When the wife says I'm going tothe kitchen, do you want
anything?
And then the husband says yeah,I'd like a bowl of ice cream.
The wife says I'm going to thekitchen, do you want anything?
And then the husband says yeah,I'd like a bowl of ice cream.
The wife says okay, and he addswith strawberries on top.
She says got it.
He says maybe you should writeit down and she replies I don't
need to write it down, I'llremember.
A while later she comes backwith a plate of bacon and eggs
(25:53):
and he looks at her in dismayand says I knew you should have
written it down.
You forgot the toast, you know.
So for me I leave things out, soI'll I'll leave out the vacuum
cleaner the mop and bucket.
I'll leave out some bills.
I'll get to all of them if Icould see it, so that I could
(26:14):
create that pristine environmentthat I so much like living in.
Look, I know what most of youall right, some of you well, at
least one of you are thinking.
Should you and Susan make themove to cohabitate, all of your
thoughts of when the mood hitswill have to change, and I know
(26:36):
that.
But today is not that day.
So the golf stuff that'ssitting on the kitchen island is
going to stay there until I getthe urge to move it, and I
think I feel that urge right nowback to sleep.
Speaker 2 (26:52):
Wait, the deadline was today, oh no.
Well, puppy, go back to sleep.
Wait, the deadline was today,oh no.
Speaker 1 (27:26):
Thanks for staying to the end.
You've been listening toanother episode of Tales from
the First Tee.
I'm your host, Rich Easton,telling tales from beautiful
Charleston, South Carolina.
Talk to you soon.
Speaker 3 (27:41):
Now, that's no lie.
You always say good morning,hello and bye.
I know where you go, how youfeel and why.
Google Plus, flickr, spotify somany out there for you to try.
(28:12):
Put your life on the web andyou will find Like-minded people
.
All have a good time and eversince you entered my life, I
don't feel alone anymore.
So go on and YouTube, twitter,facebook me.
That's the way to get closer.
(28:33):
You see, we used to bestrangers, but now that won't be
.
No-transcript.
(32:14):
No-transcript.
you're tuned into another episode of tales from
the first tee.
I'm rich easton telling talesfrom beautiful charleston, south
carolina, the Open Championship.
(00:29):
Is it me or is the number onegolfer in the world, scotty
Scheffler, on the path to chasedown Tiger and Jack's records
and I find myself emotionlesswhen he dominates myself
emotionless when he dominatesBoth.
He and Tiger took around threeand a quarter years before their
(00:51):
first and fourth major.
Okay, 1,197 days exactly.
For all of you retentive sportsfans, not to go down a rabbit
hole, but if you're a whiz withsports stats like they matter to
you, have you ever looked intothe eyes of non-stats people?
When you wax eloquently onsports facts and then add more
(01:14):
sports facts just to makeyourself self-satisfied, you
know what you see Dead eyes.
I personally check out whenpeople make arguments with
sports facts like who was thebest 30 years ago and how would
they have done in the modern era?
I think some people just liketo talk.
(01:36):
I mean, some of this stuff istotally irrelevant, like the
question about could 100 mendominate a 600-pound silverback
gorilla?
Of course not.
Well, maybe if they werezombies or a few of them were
Marvel superheroes.
I mean, you see why I getsemi-comatose when numbers and
(01:57):
selective facts are thrownaround with the weight of
manhole covers.
My brain can't hold space foreverything I hear, particularly
when someone like CarolynLeavitt, our chippy White House
press secretary, justifieseverything the
commander-in-chief says andbelittles the press corps for
(02:19):
asking such a stupid gotchaproposition.
All right back to the open.
You know, even though I'mtearless when Scotty dominates,
he is a winning machine whovalues non-golf related
relationships more than winningtrophies.
Very few people areone-dimensional Now.
(02:43):
Tiger gave us the initialimpression that he was, but
after a few PR chinks in hisarmor we certainly saw he had
multiple dimensions.
Some of them might have beenlike 36, 24, 36.
And, by the way, they werenever my favorite dimensions.
(03:04):
But the standard va-va-voommeasurement still stays strong
in our modern lexicon.
Who knew Scotty's confidencearound his distance, accuracy
and putting excellence is justcrazy stupid and his, his caddy,
(03:25):
ted Scott, has the experienceand such a level personality to
guide Scotty through his winningjourney.
Now I've listened to a bunch ofScotty interviews with the media
on how winning golf tournamentsis ephemeral, on how minutes
(03:48):
after he wins and celebrates.
The question is, how are yougoing to do next week?
How are you going to handle thenext major?
What do you think about thetour championship?
And hey, what about the RyderCup?
What if you and Rory play againAll of this?
So I think Scotty gives us someinsights into his perception of
(04:12):
how everybody else is thinkingabout him and how they're
peppering him with questionsabout what about the next?
What about the next, what aboutthe next?
And I get it, he makes somereally good points, but still
that doesn't get me tearful whenhe wins.
(04:33):
When Michael Jordan wonchampionships, he would clutch
the trophy and cry like a baby.
It meant so much to him andit's great to see athletes when
they finally overcome somethingthat they've been challenging
themselves about their wholelives and how they feel about it
(04:57):
emotionally.
I, like millions of others,wanted to witness a Rory
comeback on Sunday for the ages.
I mean, after watching hisreaction to winning the Masters,
you just want to see how was hegoing to feel about winning, an
hour from his hometown and thepatrons did all they could do to
(05:22):
help him battle the golf gods.
And the patrons did all theycould do to help him battle the
golf gods, but the number twogolfer in the world in Rory,
competing with the advantage ofhome field advantage couldn't
catch the number one rankedgolfer in the world.
And how about Chris Goddard, upagain making a charge at the
(05:44):
end?
I mean, how long is it going tobe until he wins his first
major?
You see, here we go again withfacts and expectations.
Whatever a professional golferdoes to win tournaments, the
question is always going to behow does he compare to Tiger or
Jack?
Or how is he going to do in thenext big outing?
(06:09):
Scotty's right, it never ends.
So you better find somethingthat motivates you to compete in
golf other than just holding upa trophy and celebrating.
Even Scotty would say hedoesn't know why he got so amped
up to play in golf tournaments.
He just wants to win.
(06:30):
That's pretty cool, but stillno tears.
And I guess if I want tearsI'll watch my favorite sports
movie, with the hopes and dreamsof victory being thwarted with
personal setbacks, only to beovershadowed by the ultimate
victory at the end.
That's what Rory showed us atthe Masters, or DeChambeau at
(06:54):
last year's US Open, or theEagles in the Super Bowl having
to overcome the Mahomes comebackmagic.
That's what brings me tears.
It's either that or all the newtariffs that are going to cost
my life 20 to 25% more.
Yeah, that'll give me tears,god.
(07:28):
I'm just thinking back.
Remember the time when you wentto a Coldplay concert with your
gumad, thinking that you couldjust blend in with the crowd of
90,000 ticket holders at WembleyStadium and then get caught in
an intimate embrace on the kisscam.
You know, they say it'svirtually impossible to create
(07:54):
something with the intention ofit going viral.
Viral things just happen wheneverybody sees something and it
holds everybody's interest.
Well, chris Martin learned thatfrom Coldplay when he executed
his new viral fame, not as asinger, but as his best
(08:18):
impression of host Chris Hansenfrom Datelines to catch a
predator but in this case itwasn't pedophilia, it was just a
CEO and his chief peopleofficer enjoying a moment away
from their respective spouses.
You know what I'm talking about.
I mean, who hasn't seen AndyByron, ceo of the company,
(08:40):
astronomer hugging, kristenCabot, his chief people manager
which is a fancy way of sayinghead of HR and then being caught
on the kiss cam?
And when they saw themselves onthe jumbotron they couldn't
move out of the camera viewquick enough and lead singer
(09:00):
Chris Martin commented that thecouple was either having an
affair or just very shy Onemoment doing something secret in
public can alter the momentumof so many lives.
Hey, at least when Bobby Axelroddeveloped an intimate
relationship with Wendy Rhodes,his chief people officer, they
(09:24):
kept it private.
If you binged billions, you getthe reference.
And that was all made up.
This thing at Wembley wasn't.
And what do you think thereason is for people posting,
commenting and talking about theKiss Cam incident?
I think because it was a steamytopic, not about them.
(09:50):
Look, we're human.
We all make mistakes.
My peeps, who range in agesfrom 15 years younger than me to
10 years older, all say thesame thing and it's basically,
boy, we're glad social media andsmartphones weren't around when
our brains were stilldeveloping.
(10:12):
We would have been in a lotmore trouble then.
And now, when it continues tofind us in later years, hey, I
don't know what type ofrelationship Andy and Kristen
had with each other, with theirworkmates or with their families
.
They chose to take a privatematter into a public arena and,
(10:34):
by chance, get caught bytechnology, the field that they
were both in.
It might not have beensurveillance technology, but I
mean, imagine if he wasn't theCEO of Astronomer and he was the
CEO of Astrologer.
Do you think he might have beenable to predict what was going
(10:56):
to happen to him at the concert?
Probably not and, quite frankly, if he wasn't the CEO of a
company worth over $20 millionhis own personal assets and
wasn't having an affair with hisHR manager, then I'm not sure
that the fallout from that kisscam would have been as viral as
(11:22):
it was.
But you know, everybody likesto see the King fall.
The Piano man recomposes hislife and it's on HBO Max.
The new Billy Joel documentaryon Max explains the pressure
(12:01):
that formed the performer thatwe know and the person that he
became.
I spent my early education yearsin New York State, mostly in
Dix Hills, long Island, before Iexplored upstate New York and a
year in the Big Apple.
I was a New Yorker.
Billy Joel was raised inHicksville, long Island, 15
(12:24):
minutes from my hometown.
He was an emerging big thing inLong Island when I was a kid
and, as I learned later in life,he came from a similar historic
cultural migration from EasternEurope as my family did.
In other words, we hadsomething in common.
(12:45):
I didn't know it, but that hadnothing to do with my
appreciation for his piano styleand voice.
He bangs the piano like it wasa supermodel.
I mean, he views the piano as apercussion instrument more than
just a string instrument.
You know it's actuallyclassified as a struck
(13:09):
chordophone.
That's for all you factoidal,anal retentive people.
You know, at that time I wasboth an Elton John fan as I was
Billy Joel.
They were both competing forour ears and a percentage of our
wallets at the same time and ifyou have a limited budget as a
(13:31):
kid during the early listeningyears, you had to stretch that
dollar, particularly your musicdollars, your record dollars.
If you're collecting the Stones, beatles, beach Boys, zeppelin
and the Doors, you might havejust enough money for one album
(13:51):
for a piano-driven pop singer.
And which is it going to be Now?
I can't imagine that either ofthose two artists thought about
each other as competitors, butI'm certain their management
teams did.
It wasn't until later in theiryears that they combined forces
and played together, and Ihappened to see them in LA
(14:13):
playing together and what wasreally cool about it is they
played each other's songs andthere's nothing like listening
to Billy Joel playing Elton Johnsong and vice versa.
I mean, it was pure genius.
So I've watched the first of twoparts and it was over two hours
(14:33):
long and I was 100% focusedwatching it, no devices other
than the TV.
That's rare for me.
I usually have two devices up.
I'm usually looking somethingup that I thought about while
I'm watching something, orlooking at sports scores, or
maybe I'm bored during a sceneand I'll start watching TikToks.
(14:55):
So, going back to Billy Joel, Iknew nothing about his first
wife, elizabeth, and hiseventual manager for the band.
I mean, when you listen to thearc of his love with Elizabeth,
it's songs like she's always awoman, just the Way you Are,
she's Got a Way.
These were love songsintroducing his complex feelings
(15:21):
for her and then, as the yearsgo on and she's manager of the
band, their relationship takes aleft-hand turn, particularly
when she flexed her managerialmuscles and he wrote Big Shot
about a pompous, arrogant person.
Speaker 2 (15:52):
All your friends were so knocked out, you had to have
the last word.
Speaker 1 (15:54):
An interview in 2010, .
Billy inferred that the songwas about Bianca Jagger, but I
think he wasn't ready to open uphis life for all to see it.
It's almost like listening toTaylor Swift bash her
ex-boyfriends or Kendrick Lamardissing Drake.
It just goes to show whenyou're in a relationship with an
(16:16):
artist, beware what you say andhow you behave, because it
could end up in just about anysong or even podcast.
So while I'm watching thisdocumentary, I start thinking
how can I grow up 15 minutesfrom legend Billy Joel and know
(16:39):
nothing about his life's trialsand tribulations that influenced
his music?
I'll tell you why.
Nobody cares about the whys.
I've said this before.
Well, perhaps it's a dominantmale gender trait, because I
know many females that hoverover the why, maybe even more
(17:02):
than the what.
Hey, you know what I think I'mstarting to get it.
We appreciate each other,despite differences in wiring.
Holy shit, what an epiphany.
And if you were moved by BillyJoel's songs and have put them
away for a while, thedocu-series might spark you to
(17:23):
throw a few of them back in yourplaylist.
Step back in time just for aminute and enjoy them.
I know I did.
Speaker 3 (17:55):
I know how many of you just love book reviews.
Well, my summer book is theSiren's Call by Chris Hayes.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
So I'm a binge reader .
I used to read the Wall StreetJournal daily until recently.
My distribution dried up andI'm too cheap to pay for another
subscription or streamingservice.
So let me give you the cliffnotes on this book.
Chris Hayes has a handle on howwe all are being distracted, on
(18:35):
how we all are being distracted, how most companies are in the
hunt to get a high share of ourattention, while your Facebook
friends, insta contacts, snapcontacts, tiktok performers and
YouTube videos are bombardingyou with content and the
advertisers are just sitting andwait to track the moments when
your eyes and ears are focused.
(18:56):
Even as a boomer, I have to makea concerted effort to
disconnect so I could smell theroses.
Gen X and Gen Zers were bornwith devices in their lives from
the earliest years, sosomething powerful has to come
into their lives to dislodgethem from the grid, because it's
(19:17):
always consumed them.
Even with mindful parents whotry to prevent or delay the
inevitable over time.
Most everybody is connected allthe time, like a drug.
All the time like a drug.
(19:37):
When I write down my thoughtsin each episode, I try to
disconnect from AI as long as Ican, with intermittent inquiries
and perplexity to get my factsclose to right.
The barrier island beaches withthe sound of wind waves and
families are my muse.
Sound of wind waves andfamilies are my muse.
Okay, susan, you're my othermuse.
(19:58):
Okay, I have two muses.
I tend to find stories at thewater's edge.
The book Sirens caught myattention when I was walking
down one of the library aislesthat said large print edition
Don't laugh, my eyesight's notgetting any better and large
print gives me the ability to goto the beach, wear sunglasses
(20:20):
and not have to wear readerswhen I'm reading it.
So I picked up the book.
There was something about itthat caught my attention and I
just read a few paragraphs and Ithought you know this will be
enlightening.
If you have any interest inself-awareness of your device,
facetime, and want to understandwhat everybody else is doing
(20:40):
and how it's affecting mankind,I recommend it.
And if you don't, don't careabout it, I'm okay with that, as
long as you continue to listento this podcast.
Procrastination just anotherword for manana.
(21:27):
The last topic of this episodewanted to be the leading entry
story.
I thought it would piquesomeone's attention,
particularly if someone thatlives with somebody or knows
somebody or just recognizesthemselves as chronic
procrastinators.
But, I just couldn't get aroundto it until the end.
(21:49):
And what does procrastinationsay about us?
Maybe we take life lessseriously, we're indecisive and
need more time to weigh in onthe facts.
Something else always pops up,more important.
Maybe that thing that wedelayed didn't need to be done
(22:11):
at that time, or, probably morelikely, we just didn't want to
do it.
That's right, isn't it?
You just don't want to do it.
The weight of I don't wanna faroutweighs the fuck.
I've got to get this done.
I don't wanna is a freightership sized anchor.
(22:34):
I mean.
Some people, as an example, areclean freaks.
It takes constant active cleanas you go.
Now, I love clean environments,new homes staged for sale,
hotel rooms when you first enter.
Nothing I like better thaneverything in its place.
(22:57):
Well, there might be one thingand not doing the work to get it
there.
I said earlier I am a bingereader.
I'm also a binge cleaner.
I procrastinate until I seethings out of place for just too
long.
That's what fuels me toorganize and deep clean.
(23:19):
Or maybe it happens to do withhaving company.
Maybe I like to be organizedwhen Susan visits.
Okay, I do most of my deepcleaning before Susan comes to
visit.
I don't want her to think of meas a slob, because I'm not a
slob, I am just a binge cleaner.
(23:40):
Hey, what can I say?
I don't enjoy bending,scrubbing when my body is
contorted or lifting bucketswith mops and cleaning fluids.
My back is always one bad twistaway from three nights sleeping
on a hardwood floor.
Hey, that's my story and I'msticking to it.
(24:00):
Yeah, so maybe I'm anintermittent procrastinator.
What needs to get done gets done.
Everything else gets done whenthe mood hits me that it's about
time for that thing to get doneand this might be a senior
thing, but things sometimes stayout in the open to visually
(24:21):
remind me that I have to dosomething with that thing.
I've gotten to a point in thejourney of my life, in my brain
development or maybe seniordecline, when I think of
something that I'd like to getdone.
If I don't do that thingimmediately, there's a really
good chance that I'm going towalk into the next room.
(24:42):
Something's going to come up,I'm going to do that thing,
maybe even leave and go travelsomeplace and forget to get that
thing done.
And I'll remember that when I'mdriving and say shit, I knew I
should have brought that thing,did that thing, mail that thing,
whatever that thing was.
When I think of something andit's got to get done, I've got
(25:08):
to do it right then and there,or there's a really good chance
it doesn't get done.
So just about everybody I speakto says hey look, you just got
to write it down, which I do forshopping but not for stuff
around the house.
And it kind of reminds me ofthat joke.
There's an elderly couplesitting in the living room.
(25:28):
When the wife says I'm going tothe kitchen, do you want
anything?
And then the husband says yeah,I'd like a bowl of ice cream.
The wife says I'm going to thekitchen, do you want anything?
And then the husband says yeah,I'd like a bowl of ice cream.
The wife says okay, and he addswith strawberries on top.
She says got it.
He says maybe you should writeit down and she replies I don't
need to write it down, I'llremember.
A while later she comes backwith a plate of bacon and eggs
(25:53):
and he looks at her in dismayand says I knew you should have
written it down.
You forgot the toast, you know.
So for me I leave things out, soI'll I'll leave out the vacuum
cleaner the mop and bucket.
I'll leave out some bills.
I'll get to all of them if Icould see it, so that I could
(26:14):
create that pristine environmentthat I so much like living in.
Look, I know what most of youall right, some of you well, at
least one of you are thinking.
Should you and Susan make themove to cohabitate, all of your
thoughts of when the mood hitswill have to change, and I know
(26:36):
that.
But today is not that day.
So the golf stuff that'ssitting on the kitchen island is
going to stay there until I getthe urge to move it, and I
think I feel that urge right nowback to sleep.
Speaker 2 (26:52):
Wait, the deadline was today, oh no.
Well, puppy, go back to sleep.
Wait, the deadline was today,oh no.
Speaker 1 (27:26):
Thanks for staying to the end.
You've been listening toanother episode of Tales from
the First Tee.
I'm your host, Rich Easton,telling tales from beautiful
Charleston, South Carolina.
Talk to you soon.
Speaker 3 (27:41):
Now, that's no lie.
You always say good morning,hello and bye.
I know where you go, how youfeel and why.
Google Plus, flickr, spotify somany out there for you to try.
(28:12):
Put your life on the web andyou will find Like-minded people
.
All have a good time and eversince you entered my life, I
don't feel alone anymore.
So go on and YouTube, twitter,facebook me.
That's the way to get closer.
(28:33):
You see, we used to bestrangers, but now that won't be
.
No-transcript.
(32:14):
No-transcript.
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