Season 3 Episode 27 | Loss, Love, & Legacy: Father’s Day Reflections - The Mariah Effect

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:27):
Hey, everybody, welcome to the Mariah Effect.

Speaker 2 (00:30):
I'm Mariah and I'm Darsana. Let's dive in.

Speaker 1 (00:33):
So if you can tell, I have a guest with
me today, Darsana. This is my mom, the one who
gave birth to me painfully and who I'm here to
visit for a little bit in Colorado, and I thought
it would be a perfect.

Speaker 2 (00:49):
Time to talk about her dead dad. Yay, she has
a way of making me cry. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:57):
I just thought that since this year has been a
year where I've lost a father figure and I'm currently
trying to like find my father also, something I've been
doing passively for many years, and I'm getting a little
bit more active in this year, and my mom has
lost her father. It was a couple of years ago,

(01:18):
now what was that, twenty twenty one, But it's something
that we have that we can relate to each other
now that I've lost Roland and I'm still trying to
process through my grief and you know, finding ways to
navigate that. But I thought it would be a good
conversation to have since it's Father's Day this week, and
it's a day that has always been kind of mixed feelings,

(01:39):
mixed emotions for me, and now with Roland gone, it's
even worse.

Speaker 2 (01:43):
And so, I don't know.

Speaker 1 (01:44):
I thought it would be a good conversation to talk
about and something that I thought my mom could sit
on on and share her experiences as well.

Speaker 2 (01:52):
So are you excited? I'm nervous.

Speaker 1 (01:54):
Well, I mean, I meant like not to talk about
dead dads, But are you like excited to be on
the podcas?

Speaker 2 (02:00):
Yeah, something that you advidly listen to. I am excited.
I've been listening since you came out with it. I'm
already gonna cry. I am so incredibly proud of you
doing this. And I do listen to every episode and
as soon as I know that it's come out, I
listen to it. Your brother and I listen to them together,

(02:20):
and it's kind of like it's sometimes a little bit
of a therapy for me and helps me kind of
think about some things in a new perspective, which is
totally the point of it. Yeah, but it is very
helpful a lot of times for me to particularly if
I find myself struggling with something like oh yeah, there
was some thoughts that were brought up on this particular

(02:42):
episode about this particular whatever the topic or the idea,
and I can go back and kind of revisit those
that podcast and listen and just kind of think my
way through some things. So it's been helpful to me
and I just I love that you're doing this. I'm
so probably you, dang, she already needs the tissues that
are sitting right here. I'm a I'm a huggerer, I'm

(03:05):
a crier. Kiss me Starsana. I noticed you said cryer twice.
I am. That's something that we have in common. I'm
so happy and thrilled that you gave me that. But yeah,
I do think that it's really interesting because I started
the podcast with the intention of telling stories from my
life and trying to find compassion for the other people

(03:26):
that are involved in my life and for myself in
certain situations.

Speaker 1 (03:30):
And it also kind of became my own therapy of
being able to work through all sorts of different things
and talk about things. And as I talked about it,
it was helping me like kind of figure things out
for myself. And some of those topics are definitely related
to you, because I mean, like you're the person I
grew up with and I have a lot of struggles
with some of the things from when I was growing up,

(03:50):
and so I at first was kind of nervous to
know that you were listening to everything, because I don't
want it to be something that I'm like, I guess
filtering what I'm saying necessarily, But knowing that you're listening
and that you haven't like called me to be mad
at me means that you've definitely grown a lot in

(04:12):
how you're able to take criticisms, and I've definitely grown
in being able to like voice those without being.

Speaker 2 (04:18):
Angry about it. Yeah, excuse me, I'm going to do
that a lot too. There have been times a lot
of times that I've had, you know, some some feelings
or been felt away about some things that you've said.
But I have to remember, I have to remind myself
that it's not my story, it's not my version. It

(04:39):
is from you. It's your story from how you remember things,
how you felt about things, And just because I feel
away or just because I said or did something that
was intended in a way doesn't mean that it's the
way that it was received. And so I do oftentimes
have to remember and be aware of that fact and

(05:02):
be like, Okay, I'm gonna let her tell her story.
I mean, unless you are just wrong about something, then
I you know, I would correct that. But when you're
talking about opinions and feelings, there's no wrong because it's
it's truth. It's how you feel, and that's where you're

(05:24):
at and that's how that's how it comes across. And
it's also interesting to see your side of things and
your perspective and a lot of times like wow, I
had no idea, absolutely no idea, because it's very easy
to get wrapped up in your side of things exactly,
and so it's it's nice to hear and see things
from another perspective sometimes and sometimes maybe it's not nice,

(05:47):
but it's necessary. Yeah, So yeah, I think.

Speaker 1 (05:50):
And one of the things that I love about, at
least the way that things are in general for everyone
in the world right now, is that it's a lot
more how do I say this, It's a lot easier
for people to be able to directly talk to their
families about things that they experienced growing up or ways

(06:12):
that they view the world now, to be able to
relate to them because we're living in a time where
being open and honest about your feelings and your emotions
is acceptable rather than something to shun. I think that
that's a really good thing about today, is that maybe
I was scared to talk about those things to you
ten years ago, fifteen years ago, but.

Speaker 2 (06:32):
Now I feel a lot more.

Speaker 1 (06:34):
I feel better about being able to say it, because,
regardless of how you react to it, I'm telling my
truth and I'm telling you my feelings. And I think
that even if you at first have a negative feeling
about it, that you'll think about it later and come
back and be willing to talk about it again.

Speaker 2 (06:50):
Right.

Speaker 3 (06:50):
There's one thing, excuse me, one thing that I have
learned over the years, probably the past thirteen years in particular,
is you take what you like and you leave the rest.

Speaker 2 (07:04):
And I don't have to love it. I don't have
to like it, but I do have to recognize it.
So I have tried very hard to put that specific
practice of take what you like and leave the rest
into play in my daily life because the world, as
you said, the world is full of unpleasant truth and
unpleasant feelings. I don't have to like it, but I

(07:24):
do have to live with it. So you know, you
change what you can change, and you maybe don't have
to accept what you can't change and don't like, but
you have to find a way to be at peace
with it within yourself or you're just gonna drive yourself crazy.

Speaker 1 (07:40):
This is so interesting because we are both daughters, but
for most of my life I've been pretty much just
your daughter, like I didn't have another parent, I didn't
have the other part of that. You were my parent,
and that's pretty much it for you. You had both
of your parents your entire growing up.

Speaker 2 (07:58):
Right your whole childhood.

Speaker 1 (08:00):
And it's interesting to come and talk about this because
the way that I saw Grandpa was not really your dad,
was more my grandpa, And so when he passed away,
I was really shocked when I was really emotional about it,
But I was even more shocked when you were very

(08:20):
emotional about it, because for a few different reasons. The
main reason was when I was growing up. I remember
at some point I talked to you about the fact
that I didn't have a dad and trying to express
to you how upset I was about that, and you
very bluntly told me that you grew up with a

(08:40):
dad and that it didn't do you any good, that
it didn't make any difference. I'm gonna let you have
your feelings about that, and so when he passed away
and you were really upset, a very small, very.

Speaker 2 (08:52):
Rude, mean part of me was like, didn't make any difference, huh.

Speaker 1 (08:56):
And that was a very small part. Most of the
part was being supportive and loving, but that was that
little small part. And I realized thinking more about it,
like I even had emotions about Grandpa passing that I
didn't like realize I was going to feel. And so
thinking back on it and having compassion for myself and
for you, I was like, that was not the appropriate.

Speaker 2 (09:16):
Response to that. Right. It's interesting that you say that
about how you viewed my response to it, because I
when it was happening, you remember that conversation. I do
remember that that conversation, Yes, when we were in the
middle of you know, as he was he was passing,
and it just directly after he passed, and that whole

(09:38):
time was very surreal for me, and it was very
much about how I lost my father, and it was
it was hard for me to talk about. I didn't
want to I didn't want to cry in front of everybody,
and I didn't want to like break down, and I
just wanted to get through my day, and I wanted
to get onto the next piece of what was going

(09:59):
on and then and then have my time in private, right,
so I would I would just shut it down. I
just stop and shut it down. But when but I
remember realizing at some point that I had made most
of that time about me losing a father. And when

(10:19):
I'm upset, like I turned to my mom and or
people you know close to me, but most of the time,
it's to my mom, and I turned to her and
look for comfort, and I think I did that during
that time, and I didn't I was so kind of
wound around the idea of the fact that I just

(10:39):
lost my dad that I didn't even realize that this
woman that I was talking to had just lost her husband,
her partner forty seven years. And I when I had that,
when I realized that for her, then I was able

(11:00):
to grieve for her, and I stopped grieving for myself
for a little bit. And then I felt like, you know,
a big ass if I'm being honest and pretty selfish
about it. And then you know, part of part of
grieving is guilt. And so that's one of those one
of those things that came about for me in terms

(11:22):
of the guilt. There were some others that we can
get into a little bit later as this conversation goes forth,
but that that was an interesting realization for me and
wrapping my head around that, And yeah, it was. I
remember that conversation with you, And I don't know why
that I said that at that particular time in that
in that way, you know, I don't, And like.

Speaker 1 (11:46):
I definitely I remember because that conversation happened when I
was a teenager, and I'm sure that it like in
my memory, I remember being really calm and rational like
I am now. Probably wasn't when I was having it.
From my perspective of things, that would probably really upset
with you because I was trying to express that you
didn't understand my position because you didn't grow up the

(12:09):
way that I was growing up. And in that time,
I probably wasn't being very like like I said, I
wasn't being calm and like trying to actually express the feelings.

Speaker 2 (12:20):
It was just the feelings that were happening. So instead
of being like, mom, this is how I feel, it
probably was more like you don't know anything about how
my life is, like you don't get me, like it
was probably the anger part of it, because in my
teenager eye is the reason I didn't have Dad was
because of you, And I think I felt that from that,

(12:44):
I'm like, I'm doing the best I can do. Okay, look,
circumstances are what they were between your father and I.
Was was the way it turned out. There wasn't like
I don't think that there could have been any other
direction before that to go. And so I feel like
I felt like I did the best that I could.
I was doing the best that I could with raising you.

(13:05):
And I should say that I am a huge believer
in the phrase it takes a village, and I was
very lucky. I have a wonderful village and everybody, your grandfather,
your grandmother, I had a lot of support. Nanny, you're

(13:26):
my best friend, your your godmother, your nanny, and my siblings,
you know, were wonderful that your uncle Tony stepped in.
And you know, he was a kid when he became
a dad, and he didn't really know. He didn't know
what he was doing. None of us know what we're doing,
you know, as parents, like it's it is ninety nine

(13:46):
percent instinct and one percent just winging it. And he
stepped in and he did the best he could, you know,
to be a role model for you, a father figure
for you. Yeah, we're all pretty daughter, excuse me, his
own daughter at the same time. Yeah, the first children
get the best of everything, right. I can say that

(14:08):
because I'm a first child too. The first children get
the best of everything. They are the experimental projects, if
you will. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (14:16):
But on that frame of thinking, I was talking with
some other people.

Speaker 2 (14:21):
I was talking with Jason, and I think I.

Speaker 1 (14:23):
Talked to maybe Mallory about it too, And I was
thinking about how kind of like because my relationship with
Jason has been so distant for so long until the
last three or four years really outside of like a
trip or two that I've taken to see him. But
when we were talking about the reasons behind it, I
always grew up thinking and feeling like the Cavnars were

(14:47):
the side of the family that were uppity and snooty
and didn't care about our side of the family or anything.
And from Jason's perspective, it was that Grandma got with
Grandpa and Grandpa was somebody that was not a good guy,
not a nice guy, not somebody that they wanted to
that they thought was a good decision for her to

(15:07):
be with him, and so it came up of them
of like when I was talking with Chad Jason about it,
that like that's kind of how they felt about it,
and so they made sure to keep their distance, not
because of like them being snooty or whatever and thinking
that we were nothing, but because they didn't want to
be around Grandpa. And so when I was having that conversation,

(15:27):
it reminded me also of my conversation with Aunt Joanne
where she was talking about how Grandpa was radically a
different person before the war and then after. Yeah, so
that it just made me wonder. I mean, I've heard
stories of things when you were growing up, but like,
I don't think we've ever sat down and actually talked
about your perception of Grandpa.

Speaker 2 (15:50):
When you were young. So obviously I didn't know my
father before before because I wasn't alive, But I do
know as as I grew up, my perception of my
father did change, and and he was going through his own,

(16:16):
you know, his own things, his own changes at the
same time. So he in my later years before he passed,
lot a lot of what he had going on was
PTSD and related. And although he was never to my knowledge,
he was never formally diagnosed with anything. He didn't go
to doctors, he didn't, you know, go to counseling. He

(16:38):
didn't do any of that. He just kind of found
a way to deal with his demons or his ghosts,
or whatever his troubles were. He just kind of found
a way to deal with those on his own. Maybe
the best decision for him, maybe not the best decision.
I don't know. I think that's subjective. But when I
was young, when I was you know, he was he

(17:02):
was younger, he was involved. He we got out, we
went to family gatherings, we went to places, we did things.
As I grew and got older, like he didn't go
to school events, he didn't he didn't go to the store,
he didn't go outside, he didn't do things. He became

(17:22):
very much sheltered from outside life and angry. He watched
the news all the time, and he just became angry.
He was angry with everything. He had a complaint about everything,
He had an opinion about everything. But at the same time,
he really enjoyed, you know, watching like Nova. I don't

(17:47):
know how many people today are familiar with Nova, but
on public TV, Public Education TV. It was a series
that was you know, they would delve into like science things,
and he also liked watching like Animal Kingdom, and he
just he really liked learning. He was I remember him

(18:09):
just watching a lot of things about space. Nova. Talked
a lot about space and you know, the planets and
astrology and just so many different topics. That was to me.
I perceive that as him kind of you know, expanding
his mind and learning, continuing his learning, and that he
loved those things. And he loved music and he loved

(18:31):
He used to listen to the music so loud, and
I'd be like, holy cow, like I know, he ruined
my hearing. I know he did. I can't hear very well.
I have a hard time distinguishing noise. If there is
any background noise and you're trying to talk to me,
I cannot hear you very well. I know it's because
he used to listen to music so stink and loud.

(18:52):
But it is what it is. He was. You know,
he evolved, he grew, and he just became more and
more and more sheltered. And he'd stay in and he'd
watch TV. He always watched the news, but he he
chose not to go to family gatherings. He you know,
didn't come and do it was a very very rare.
I was very involved in school activities back when you

(19:15):
didn't have to pay for every stink and thing, and
I was able to do a lot more in all
my school years that I can remember. I think he
came to one swim meet. He came to three performances
that I was in acting, like plays, productions, and he
may have come to one, maybe two concerts. I played

(19:37):
the flute from third grade all the way through twelfth grade,
so he may have come to one or two concerts.
But I don't think he ever went to a parent
teacher conference. He just was not an involved parent in
terms of school. And he also did not work. He
had a job when I was young, very young, and
then he chose to stay home and raise his ch

(20:00):
and my mom went to work, and so that in
itself kind of colored I guess you could say my
view my opinion of him. And for a lot a
lot of years, I didn't have a lot of respect
for my father because I viewed my mom as the breadwinner.
The breadwinner, she worked hard, she was gone a lot

(20:22):
of hours away from home, but I knew that she
was the one that was working and supporting her family.
And although my dad was home, maybe because I was
the oldest and just my own responsible nature, a lot
of times things fell to me, and you know, taking
care of my siblings, doing the laundry, making sure dinner
was ready.

Speaker 1 (20:42):
You were like the little like not in a weird way,
but like the little wife, like the one that.

Speaker 2 (20:48):
Was taking care of everything at home, even though he
was the one that was home. I always kind of
felt like Cinderella. Yeah, like I, you know, like all
these chores needed to be done, and I felt like
I had to do them all, and you know, I
was the one getting yelled at if they didn't get done.
And you know, I just always kind of felt like
there was an animosity almost there, like, you know, you

(21:10):
can make dinner too, You can do these things too.
Why are we waiting to eat so late at night
for either my mom to come home and make dinner
or for me to make dinner. Why can't you get
up and make dinner? And so there was that frustration,
and it's all like it's a snowballs, right, And there
was a lot of different aspects of it that just

(21:33):
kind of led me to not have that respect for
not the same respect that I had for my dad
versus my mom, and I always felt like my middle
sister definitely Daddy's girl, even though I was the first.
That's Kurren at the Bighter. We've talked about her Daddy's girl,
and even when my dad passed away and even still

(21:56):
through today, she I think has taken his passing the
hardest of all of us. Outwardly. I don't know that
she has actually taken his passing the hardest, but in
terms of outward display of emotion and grieving and loss,
she has definitely been the most prominent.

Speaker 1 (22:18):
When Grandpa passed, it was me and Angie coming up
on the like from California to Colorado to be here
for his passing, to be here right before he passed.
When we were told what six months or something, three months,
three to six months and then he died three weeks later. Yeah, no,
that's he was given approximately six months, five to six

(22:40):
months and he had passed within five weeks.

Speaker 2 (22:43):
Yeah. Yeah, it was like a month of time, I know.

Speaker 1 (22:45):
Because it was kind of hard to get the work
off to come because initially it was like, well, my
grandpa is dying and I'd like to see him before
he passes, and that this is my opportunity. And then
a few weeks later I was like, Okay, so he's dead,
so I need to go. But anyway, I think Angie,
who probably had the most bitter feelings, I feel like

(23:06):
towards Grandpa in terms of, like, well, once he's gone,
then that means that my mom can live her life
the way she wants to, because, as Angie views it,
as Grandpa was like holding Grandma back in a lot
of ways, and so she had a lot of animosity
towards him and for things when she was younger that
I don't really know all the information about, so I'm

(23:27):
not going to speak on that, but I just know
she had like a lot of animosity and like bitterness
towards him, and when he died, she was very emotional
about it and it kind of changed her viewpoints on
a lot of like a lot of things. It was like,
now I'm looking at things, or now I have to
make decisions as somebody who doesn't have a dad rather
than somebody who is like dislikes her dad is different.

Speaker 2 (23:51):
And if you shift, I can feel that, like what
you're saying, I guess I never saw that from her
or realize that that was just talk about it. Yeah,
she doesn't, she doesn't talk about it, but I can
totally see that and understand that it's very surreal. It's
a very surreal feeling to just suddenly have no one
in that space in your life. It's you know, it's

(24:13):
a placeholder all this time, Oh, this is my mom,
this is my dad, this is you know, this is
my grandma, this is my grandpa, this is my daughter,
this is my son, and then all of a sudden,
you don't have that that placeholder, and it's just a
very surreal feeling. One of my one of my coworkers,
has very recently lost her son, and this is the

(24:33):
first mother's day, a first birthday, a lot of first
that she's trying to get through. And you know, I
just told her the other day, I said, she said,
this is a hard one, and I said, well, the
first one's going to be hard, but you're going to
get through it, and you know, you're going to learn
how to live without it and to move on from it.

(24:55):
And yet the first one is going to be hard.

Speaker 1 (24:57):
Yeah, And that I mean that circles back back around
to just grief in general, having to confront firsts without
that person, without that thing, because people grieve more than
just people passing. But it's interesting that you say that
because for Patty having lost her husband, she recently when

(25:18):
it was Mother's Day, she talked about how this Mother's Day,
even though it was the first without Dad, that it
was actually so much easier for her because she could
experience the day without any guilt that was coming from Dad.
Of the things that he couldn't do for her, the
things that he couldn't like put together for her, all
the things he wanted to do for her and was

(25:40):
not able to is stuff that he would tell her
and it would be like, Okay, I'm sorry that you
feel so guilty, but you telling me that is like
putting pressure onto me or putting it onto me to
have to be like I don't need that, like it's okay,
like comforting him when it's supposed to be a day
that was about her.

Speaker 2 (25:58):
Right, you know.

Speaker 1 (25:58):
And so she was like, this is the first Mother's
Day and since I became a mom that I haven't
had to do that, And it was actually she was
actually able to enjoy the day, which is hard to
confront because it sounds like, you know, to some people
maybe that she's like thank God that he's not here,
and that's not what it is. It's just realizing, recognizing

(26:21):
the things that have changed and shifted. I know that
she is in this grieving process where she like, it's
it's weird, and she talks about it on the scale
of like one being I'm survived, like I'm okay, and
ten being I'm catatonic with where she's at with the
grief scale, and she sometime like she basically said that

(26:42):
she's centered around like three to seven.

Speaker 2 (26:44):
Yeah. Yeah, And I saw that post and I remember, yeah,
she mentioned you posted. I remember feeling that exactly what
she was saying, I have not lost my husband. I
see a lot of similarities in some of the things
that she has posted in the past in terms of
dealing with, you know, being a caretaker and somebody that

(27:05):
has a you know, a terminal illness or any illness
of any nature. And so it could feel that on
a deeper level, I could feel that, and I was
so happy for her that she was able to experience
that day and to have that just be about her
and about her day. And I did post. I did

(27:27):
comment on that, and I did write that because that,
you know, what she said really touched me. But she
also made me. It made me feel a great joy
for her and know that if and when that time
might come for me, that it's going to be okay. Yeah, So, yeah,
it is. You know, you always talk about living vicariously

(27:48):
through someone else, and there's two sides of that, right,
you get to live the good things as well as
the bad things, And so watching somebody else on her
own journey kind of lays the foundation, if you will,
for what is to come for me. Yea at some point.

Speaker 4 (28:05):
Yeah, And like kind of switching gears a little bit
in my meetings with my coworker Jay Lift, when she
wants to like segue into something else because we've gotten
off topic, she'll be.

Speaker 2 (28:17):
Like, Okay, let's get into the next thing.

Speaker 1 (28:20):
But to get into that, it's still on the same vein.
But talking about Roland, thirteen years since I met him,
that he's been in my life, and probably about ten
or eleven of those have I been calling him dad
and has he been dad to me? And I think

(28:41):
that for a lot of that time, it was in
the thickest of him being sick, so I have a
different perspective obviously than his natural born children. But for me,
he showed me something that I felt like I had
been lacking because of the way that he loves his children.
Once Roland was in my life and I saw how

(29:01):
he was with his kids, it just was like, that's
a dad, and so being around him and being loved
by him, I.

Speaker 5 (29:11):
You need the tissue now, don't you got to experience
him being a good dad to his kids. That he
was kind of like a good fill in the blank
here to everyone. He tried his best to be a
good husband. Sometimes he failed at that because of his illness,

(29:33):
but he tried his best to be a good husband,
to be the best dad. He tried to be the
best uncle, the best cousin, and like people when he
was passing, when he was on his deathbed and people
were coming to visit, they were like, Roland is my
favorite uncle or he's my favorite cousin, and it's like

(29:53):
everybody was saying that, and it's and there's a reason
for that. Because he was just so loving and so
kind and so caring. And he had the flip side
where he was sick and he was maybe a little
bit like would get his feelings hurt very quickly, or
kind of impart his wisdom and not really willing to
hear anybody else's side of it. But he tried really

(30:15):
hard to be the best at being the best, and
he was loving and kind. And I think that when
me and Mallory first met, she was Daddy's.

Speaker 2 (30:24):
Girl all the way.

Speaker 1 (30:25):
She loved him so much, and because of how much
she loved him, I then kind of took on that too,
and I was like, I love.

Speaker 2 (30:33):
Him so much.

Speaker 1 (30:33):
He became Papa maryl like to me, and that turned
into dad eventually. If I was going to go see
Mallory and I wanted to surprise her, he's the one
I would tell about it because I knew he would
pick me up from the airport and he'd love the
fact that we were doing a surprise and want to
videotape it. And it's just like, it's so interesting to
have this place in my life that was empty because

(30:56):
I have a difference, I have a different perspective. It
was empty for so long. He filled that and haven't.

Speaker 2 (31:01):
Be empty again.

Speaker 1 (31:02):
It's really hard, and it's weird because I had grown
accustomed to having it be empty or like partially filled,
however you want to view it. And I thought, knowing
he was going to die at some point because of
how sick he was, I thought that I would be okay,
Like I would be the rock for everybody else because
they're his real children. And he passed, and I have

(31:24):
really been struggling with it, and the fact that its
Father's Day is not easy. It's a first for Father's
Day for me, you know, and everybody is handling it
in their own ways. But I can see how it's
affecting everybody, and that is also added on to me
because of my empathetic feelings. But it's so crazy to

(31:46):
have similar feelings for totally different situations. But we both
have that place missing now, you know. And it's difficult
and it's hard, and it's like day by day different experience. Yeah,
what how did I put this? What how did it
feel for you? Because not even just talking about Dad,
but like mom, like I call her mom and I

(32:08):
call her mom to you, like what does that? How
does that feel to you? Like is that difficult for you?
Or was it difficult for you at any point? I
think sometimes it is like when you first moved there,
and especially when you were sick and going through all
of the things that you were going through.

Speaker 2 (32:24):
And we live apart. We live a whole state, you know, apart,
And it doesn't really matter that it's a whole state.
It could have been you know, across the country or
even another country. It doesn't matter. The fact is I
couldn't be there for the tough stuff, and I couldn't
be there to help you while you were sick and
while you were you know, going to your doctor's appointments

(32:45):
and doing all these things. And I I that bothered me.
It bothered me that when you were saying that, oh,
Mom's taking me to the doctor, or Mom's going to
be there, you know, when I get out of my surgery,
and I I wanted to be there, but I, you know,
circumstances being what they were, and I couldn't be there.

(33:05):
And I know that you understood that. That's not what
bothered me. Is it just I put that guilt upon myself.
But then when you would say, you know that mom
was there or you know, it wasn't just mom or Dad,
it was anybody in the family, I'm like, she lives
with a family that is not me, And I can't

(33:26):
be there to take care of her, and it hurt me.
It dug at me. But not because not because you
call them that or not because you had that relationship
with them, just because it wasn't me. Yeah, And so
I took that on for myself. I when I was
growing up, I had my group of friends, my friend group.

(33:51):
We all would call, you know, my my nanny's mom.
I called her mom, and she called my mom mom.
And my friend want thought the same thing. We I
just posted something recently about how we you know, you
knew you were in trouble when your friend's mom was,

(34:11):
you know, giving you the business and yelling at you.
And we I remember very specifically in a you know,
a time when we went to Elich's and we were
in trouble. We'll just leave it at that. We were
in trouble and we came out of elich Is expecting
one of the moms to be there to pick us up,
and both the moms and the little brother were there

(34:32):
to pick us up, and we were getting She was
yelling at me, and my mom was yelling at her,
and back and forth. But I'm getting off topic. I remember,
you know, we just we all had that comfortable that community.
So we refer to each other's parents as mom and dad,
and I see, you know, I had. It wasn't strange.
It's not strange for me to hear you call somebody

(34:55):
else mom or dad in that sense, coming from that
pin background, and I'm you know, there again, it takes
a village. And I'm very, very very thankful that they
were there for you during those times. Even though it
hurt me. That was that was all in here that
I have to deal with that that was my guilt,

(35:15):
I guess, if you will. But at the same time,
I was very thankful that they did for you and
took care of you. And you know, and I remember
one of the first times that I met Roland, and
I have always viewed him as kind of like the
fun guy and the best guy and the you know,
just like you were saying, and he he kind of

(35:39):
fueled your passion, I guess you could say for cooking.
You know, you and I I always used to watch
cooking shows and you used to watch them with me,
and you know.

Speaker 1 (35:49):
And yet the Mom and Mariyah cooking shows pretend that
there were cameras while we cooked together.

Speaker 2 (35:56):
Right, I remember you coming home and you're like, oh, yeah,
Dad or Papa Marril. This is when you were still
cling in Papa Marril. Papa Marril showed me how to
cook jumble EyeT and so you made it for the
household and it was fantastic, and it just you were
so excited about it. Like just watching you be so
excited and sharing something that he had shared with you

(36:18):
was really heartwarming for me. So I knew, I think
pretty early on, that that was going to be a
special relationship. And I was right. It did grow, you know,
I could see it growing, and that's exactly what happened.
And I'm glad that you had that. I really am.
I you know, I wasn't able to give you that

(36:39):
growing up with your father, and so I'm glad that
you were able to find that and to have that
and be able to cherish it and remember it. It's
something that you'll have always. So yeah, now it's it's
not weird for me to hear you call other people
mom and dad. I think that there is like you
when you went to California and you went out there

(37:02):
with the intention of helping Angie take care of Jason,
and Jason was young, and you know, and you left
your brother, who was the same age as Jason, just
you know, five weeks older than Jason. You left your
brother and our household, and you went to California, and
you were primary caregiver outside of Angie. You were the

(37:23):
primary caregiver for Jason, and he struggled in a sense
with he called you mom when you're his cousin, but he,
you know, he called you mom, and I thought that
that was that was heartwarming because he felt safe and
he felt secure. And so when to hear you refer
to other people as mom and dad, tells me that
you feel safe and you feel secure with them. Yeah,

(37:45):
and that's a good thing. And that's how you know.
I called my friend's parents mom and dad. And even
today I still in friends friends on Facebook with somebody
from my middle school years. I'm friends with her parents
on Facebook, and I still call them mom and dad.
And that's that's just how you know. I know their names,

(38:06):
but I don't call them by their names.

Speaker 1 (38:08):
Yeah, it always felt weird, and like the second that
I met them, it was weird to say. For some reason,
it felt weird to say mister and missus Merrill and
I think it's because they're Mormon, and so when other
people would come, they wouldn't call them mister and missus Merrill.
They would call them brother and sister Meryl, and I
was like, I'm not going to call them brother and sister.

(38:29):
That's also very weird. Was interesting because to call mom
mom was so much harder for me than to call
Dad dad. And I think it's because Dad was available,
if that makes any sense. The term dad was something
that I wasn't using for anybody, so it was available,
it was open, and so like the second I called

(38:51):
him Dad, I was like, yeah, like easy, And to
call mom.

Speaker 2 (38:54):
Mom was like I felt like I was betraying you.

Speaker 1 (38:57):
I felt like it was like a backstad to you.
Because any other friends that I had, I would either
call them by their first name, like when I was
friends with Dominique, I would call her mom sonya. I
think that for all the time that I spent with Roland,
specifically when we were both sick together, because he was
sick with his own stuff, I was sick with my

(39:17):
cancer and my loopus. We were both the two people
in the home that like if somebody was going out
or whatever, if Mom was going to not be home.
She would say to other people like make sure that mom,
or make sure that Mariah and Dad eat dinner, like
make sure to make them dinner, or make sure they
are okay, like, because we were both the ones that
needed to be checked up on consistently and everything, and

(39:40):
so sometimes it was hard to go to other people
in the house to say I'm really upset about this
or I'm feeling overwhelmed, because they also were feeling overwhelmed.
They were taking care of us, and they were also
had their own feelings about, Okay, what if Mariah dies,
what if Dad dies, like what are we going to
do then? And so I didn't want to burden them

(40:01):
with my own feelings about what if I die? Right,
And so the only person who could understand to an
extent how I was feeling was the other person who
was sick in the house. And so there were many
times when I would go into Dad and be like, Dad,
I'm really struggling today, and he'd go sweeker, Al, I'm
struggling today, Let's talk about it, and we'd talk about it,
and he would talk about how he was like everything

(40:24):
would be easier if I was dead, and I would
talk about how I felt unworthy of being taken care of,
and that was the thing. Those were the things that
we would talk to each other about, and I'd be like,
it wouldn't be easier if you were dead, it would
be a different kind of heart. He would tell me
you are worthy of being taken care of and being loved,
And I feel like that part of our lives is

(40:46):
what connected us the most, which is so sad, because
it was very clear that one of us was going
to go at some point, and to get so close
because of that, it just feels like cosmically cool. The
other thing that we would talk about, too is my
own journey and trying to find my dad, because I

(41:07):
remember expressing to him how difficult it was sometimes for
Father's Day because I'd be so happy to be able
to celebrate it with him, but also be disconnected because
they have all these memories with him that I wasn't
a part of that they would talk about or whatever,
and I'd be like, wow, I wish I had somebody
for that, you know, And so we would talk about

(41:28):
that quite a bit. And I feel like in my
journey and trying to find my dad, there's been a
lot of times where I feel like, gosh, like I
need to try and remember the story, and I keep
asking you the story over and over again.

Speaker 2 (41:42):
And maybe it's my loopus. Maybe it's all the freaking
drugs I've taken over the last few years for cancer.
But would you tell the story again?

Speaker 1 (41:52):
What specifically, like how you met him, when you found
out you were pregnant, you know.

Speaker 2 (42:00):
The whole shebang, the whole shebang. So I was I
was at school in Greeley. Well, no, I wasn't in
school at this time. I had gone to Greeley for school,
and at this particular time, I was taking a break
from school and was working just still in Greeley. I
had roommates and friends that I was living with and

(42:20):
just being a college age and you know, living life.
Had just recently turned twenty one. And one of the
things that we did, even before I turned twenty one,
they would have eighteen and up night at this one
particular club, and so we used to go, and it
was on Thursday nights, and we'd go and we would
just enjoy ourselves. And you know, that's the thing that

(42:42):
we were going to do, was go dance and hang
out and have a good time. And it was at
that particular club that a group of my friends and
I were there this particular night, and we had gone
with another group of friends that kind of co mingled together,

(43:03):
and it was a fraternity on campus, and I guess,
I'm not sure if your dad was trying to become
involved in the fraternity. He was not a student at
the at the campus because he was older, right he was,
he was a little bit older, and he had just
recently come into town. He had just recently come into town,
and he knew he was there with other members of

(43:27):
the fraternity, and we were friends with some of the
fraternity members, and so we were all just there having
a good time, and you know, he had asked me
to dance, and so we were dancing and that's how
we met. And then we had a fling, I suppose
you could call it, if you will, a fling, and
flank was flung. It was flung, and then we were

(43:49):
talking and kind of starting to build a little bit
of a relationship, and it was it was kind of
funny how this particular night transpire. But the I was
waiting for news about your cousin Brooklyn, because Lisa was
pregnant and pretty close to being due. And so I

(44:11):
was sitting there and we were talking on the phone.
Your dad and I were talking on the phone to
each other, and I said, I have to you know,
it was back in the days of call waiting, when
you had the second line and you could click over
to the other line if the other call came in.
And I said to him, I'm waiting for news, you know,
of this baby that's coming. And so if I if

(44:34):
I tell you like I need to go, I need
to answer the other line. I can't just ignore it.
And he's like, oh, sure, of course. We continue talking,
and then at some point he tells me he told
me that I was pregnant, and I'm like, what now, whatever,
And I just kind of brushed it off. And then
and then Brooklyn was born, and that weekend I came

(44:54):
down to see her and meet her, and then went
back up to school and with it. In a couple
of weeks, I found out that I was pregnant, and
so and I told him, and we were again still
in the early part of a relationship, and he was
I was not sick right away, but when I got sick,

(45:15):
I was sick every single day until she was born.
He called me at work one afternoon and he wanted
to take me out on a date. And I was like, okay, well, yeah,
that's fine, we can go to dinner. And I was
feeling nauseous and whatever, and he kept pushing and pushing
and pushing, and I really got irritated with him, but

(45:36):
he kept pushing me. He wanted to, you know, make
plans and make a reservation, and he wanted to know
what I wanted to eat. And I'm like, this is
hours away, first of all, and second of all, I
really don't even want to deal with food right now,
Like this is not my thing right now. And to me,
it felt like he wasn't being compassionate about that. He

(45:59):
wasn't understanding I being exactly what was going on with me,
which I don't know that anybody really can at that
particular point in a pregnancy. But this is the most
in depth you've ever gone about this story. I've never
heard this vision. I am almost positive he just kept
pushing and wanting to know what I wanted to eat.
And you know, I'm sure he was just trying to

(46:21):
make some plans and just be ready to go, and
I didn't know enough about him at that time to
really you know, if that's what he was trying to do,
or if that's the type of person he was or anything.
And so I just I got super irritated and I
was like, look, we need to back off from each other.
For we just seemed to back off from each other.

(46:43):
And I had been upfront with him in the beginning,
like I'm having this baby. You don't have to be involved.
You can be involved, that's up to you. I'm having
a baby, whether you're here or not here. I'm going
to be a mom. I knew in my heart that
I wanted to be a mom, and so I don't
know if he took something from that that maybe, you know,

(47:06):
was his ticket out the window. I should add at
this point that I am aware that he was already
a father to at least two children and they were
very young, and that he was in the state because
he was separated from his wife, so walking down the
path of divorce but not necessarily final. He was married.
He was married. Yeah, if we're going to be technical about.

Speaker 1 (47:29):
It, yes, and that's really just the story he told you. Yeah,
I know very very very little about him. At some
point during that whole like, hey, we need to back
off and take a break from each other. He left
the state and I just didn't hear from him again,

(47:49):
and I didn't hear from him for a long time.
And then when I was right about five, well about
twenty weeks along, I did get a phone call from him.
And I had told him that I was getting ready
to have the ultrasound and find out if you were
a boy or girl or you know. I didn't I
didn't find out at that time. But that was back
in the day when you got one ultrasound, and that

(48:09):
was that was it, as long as everything was going well,
and I was really excited about it, I was really
nervous about it.

Speaker 2 (48:14):
And he asked me to send him pictures, the ultrasound pictures,
and he gave me an address of somewhere in California,
and he told me that he had left the state
to take care of his grandmother who was ill, and
that that's where he was at that time. And and
then we got off the phone, and that was literally
the last time I ever heard from him. He never
called me again, he never tried to reach out to me.

(48:37):
That address. I did write to that address. I did
write to that address. I didn't have the best experience
with the ultrasound, and so I had intended to like
get a videotape of it, and then that it just
didn't work itself out that that ended up happening. So
literally all I had was was three kind of super

(48:59):
grainy ultrasound pictures, and I wasn't sending him any of them.
I tried to copy them to send him, but I
wasn't going to send one of the ones that I had.
And it wasn't that I didn't want to send the picture.
It was that I didn't want to send a picture
because that was all I had. So I did try
to send him something. I never got a response back

(49:21):
from him, So I don't know if that was even
a good address. I have no idea. And I had
that address for a lot of years in a notebook,
and then when I went to look for at one
time when you were a five or six years old,
I think I just could not find that notebook, could
not by We had moved a few different times, but
I don't know what happened to it, Honest to goodness,
I don't remember getting rid of it, but I don't

(49:44):
know what happened to it. So that was kind of
how that happened. And it was never my intention to
push him out of your life or to not have
him involved in your life. But I did want to
be very clear that I was not I was not
going to have an abortion. I was not going to
end that, you know, and that I didn't need him

(50:05):
to stand by me. I didn't need him to do that.
So when we had that, this kind of circles back
to when we were having that conversation and I was
pretty blunt about, you know, about the fact that you
didn't have a dad. I may have very well taken
that at that time that you were blaming me and
taken that action those things that I had said to him,
like maybe I shouldn't have said those things, Maybe this

(50:27):
would be different at that time. I don't know that
they would or that they wouldn't, but I think that's
where that kind of where that kind of came from.

Speaker 1 (50:35):
So, I mean, it's it's one of those things that
it's something that could have changed everything. I mean, it
could have made it to where we wouldn't have Patrick.
It could have made it to where we would have
been worse off. Maybe he was a terrible awful person,
and we didn't know because you didn't know him very
well and could have been turned out way way worse

(50:55):
than anything that has happened. Maybe it could have been
way way better. Who knows, because there's no way to know, really.
But the thing that's been the hardest for me is
that it's kind of a mix of different things where
it's like he was black, and so it made me
now have to be this very literal black sheep and

(51:17):
an all white family and having to experience life that
way was not hard in the moment, but it's hard
for me now, like looking back on certain things, because
it definitely made it hard for me to figure out
who I am through all of that, and it made
it really hard in school to be a part of

(51:39):
like friend groups and stuff because there's all sorts of
things that.

Speaker 2 (51:42):
They would call me or say to me or whatever.

Speaker 1 (51:46):
It was very clear that I wasn't like I didn't
have black family, so that part of it was hard.

Speaker 2 (51:52):
It was hard to not have a dad to just
be like without that missing piece, and maybe have been
harder to if I was if I was a boy too,
But it's just like this thing that has been missing
for so long, and I don't know why, but it's
just so ingrained in me that it's like gonna help me.

Speaker 1 (52:14):
Figure things out about myself even more, which is why
I did the twenty three and meters because the questions
that I have for him are very much centered around
who is this other family? Because if I think about it,
it's not like I was lacking family necessarily because our
family is freaking gigantic, But it just made me realize, like,

(52:37):
and I would always think like, Okay, so, who are
these other kids that he had that.

Speaker 2 (52:42):
Are siblings of mine somewhere? Ye?

Speaker 4 (52:44):
Who?

Speaker 2 (52:45):
Like, did he have siblings? Who's his parents? Like?

Speaker 1 (52:49):
What is all of that family supposed to look like?
Because I'm sure that they're not all Even if he
is like, oh, I don't really want anything to do
with this kid, what if all of them did?

Speaker 2 (53:01):
You know?

Speaker 1 (53:01):
And I could have had a whole other family that
I could have been a part of and learned about.
And so that was part of my intention with the
twenty three and me is like, maybe this could lead
me to my dad, but even better, what if this
could lead me to any of those other people?

Speaker 2 (53:16):
And what if I could.

Speaker 1 (53:18):
Learn more about my ancestry, which I kind of did
from the twenty three and me a little bit, But.

Speaker 2 (53:24):
I want to know stories. I want to know like.

Speaker 1 (53:27):
Little like habits and stuff, because there's a lot of
things that you learn from environment, but there's even more
things that you have that are just natural habits that
are passed through genes. So there's just so much that
I want to find out. There's so much I want
to know.

Speaker 2 (53:41):
And I'm just every year more and more in passioned
to find him.

Speaker 6 (53:45):
And every year it gets it changes from what am
I What am I going to say to him being
like hey, like I'm your daughter, to I'm your daughter
you piece, like you know, like it changes all the
time because like I flip flop back and forth. I'm like,
it's his fault that I've grown up the way I have,
or it's his fault that like I that he wasn't

(54:07):
in my life, or it's your fault, so then maybe
he's blameless, like you know, like it keeps going back
and forth and back and forth, and I've gotten to
a place where it's just kind of like I don't
really care what his intentions were, it's what happened, and
all I want is.

Speaker 2 (54:22):
To know why.

Speaker 1 (54:23):
Sure, I just want answers and I want to be
able to know more of that family. And so that's
kind of where I'm at with that. And it's not
I don't need another dad. Roland is my dad, but
I just want to know more family, Like there's no
cap to that, you know what I mean? More people
in your life is more love. Absolutely absolutely, it takes

(54:44):
a village.

Speaker 2 (54:45):
It takes a village.

Speaker 1 (54:47):
One of the things that's been really difficult for me
from growing up to now is being able to appreciate
the similarities that we have and be understanding of the
differences that we have. And I think that even though
it's a very sad thing to have similar this grief
that we have for losing fathers is something that you've

(55:09):
helped me a lot in in the last few months,
even if you don't realize it, in how to like
feel my feelings and take care of myself. And I
recognize that you must know that because of your own
journey with losing Grandpa.

Speaker 2 (55:25):
I think that I've grown a lot since my father's past.
I've come to realize as part of the journey, of course,
I've come to realize a lot of the resentment and
the lack of respect that I had for my dad
was based on not having all the facts. And I did,

(55:53):
as I said in my more adult years, I did
give myself the time to recognize where he was, where
his position, and instead of just being angry at him
for not coming to my things, or not you know,
supporting my mom or not doing you know whatever, I

(56:16):
was able to get some outside information and realized that
he was he was suffering and that was a big
reason for why he was the way he was, and
I was able to take that and give him the
grace to be himself and love him anyway. It's hard
for me to say because it was a big step.

(56:36):
It was a big step to take, and I realized
that I, you know, I'm not like you said you
in your teenage just blamed me. I can think of
a lot of times where there were outbursts and maybe
some bad behavior. And you know, he wasn't a perfect father,
but he was a father and he supported me. He
made sure that I was taken care of, He made

(56:57):
sure to help me as a single mom. He made
sure to help me. You said something about a funny
story I remember when we were growing up that man
loved his Rocky Road ice cream, and as children in
the house, we just got the you know, like the
metal gold, like the Neapolitan ice cream, which there's nothing
wrong with that, but when you see Rocky Road ice

(57:18):
cream in the freezer and you really want some and
you are told that you cannot have it because it's
your father's ice cream, and then you know, you always
grow up wanting it, and you wait, you grow up,
and then you have a child of your own, and
you go take her over to your parents' house, and
at two o'clock in the afternoon, this little girl goes

(57:41):
and just wraps her whole hand around Grandpa's little finger
and walks back to the kitchen and comes out with
a bowl bigger than her head full of Rocky Road
ice cream. And You're like, what the heck, I'm like, dad.
And then the next time we go over and here
here they go, sneaking off towards the kitchen. I said,
no ice cream. He says, you just leave us be

(58:03):
we know what we're doing. And I was like, oh
my god, I can't you know. You got to let
him be grandpa then, And one of my favorite pictures
is my dad was very like he you know, always
washing his hands and his face and everything. And because
he never went out, he cut his own hair and
you know, trimmed his own mustache and beard and stuff.
And he one of my favorite pictures is him sitting

(58:26):
in his chair on the front porch swing and he's
got his two granddaughters sitting with him, and he is
covered his face, his nose, his everything. He's covered in
stickers because his little granddaughters just decided that they were
gonna put stickers all over him. And he was very patient.
And it was a side of him that I didn't

(58:47):
necessarily see when I was growing up. To see him
get to be a grandfather was really different, and it
kind of, in a odd way, it loops back to
his dad to my grandfather. I remember my grandfather being
just very stern and very you know, loud and grouchy,
and you know, but he was he was very soft

(59:08):
and sweet when it came to the babies. And I
just recently did my I'm a member of my high
school alumni board and we just had our annual meeting
and we posted something about it on Facebook, and I
have my maiden name is posted as part of my
Facebook name. And one of the members from you know

(59:30):
whoever that that went to my high school commented and said, hey,
I remember there was a gym teacher at Greenley Elementary
when I was going there, and I said, yeah, that
was probably my grandfather, Jim and and she said, oh,
he was just the He was the nicest guy. He was.

(59:51):
He was just so silly and he always let us
kids be kids. And I thought, who, what are you
talking about. I was like, that is not the grand
well that I saw. He was great with the babies,
but as soon as you hit a certain age, he
was like he was pretty stern and expected behavior, you know,
good behavior out of you. And I always loved my
grandfather in a kind of a reserved way. Yeah, much

(01:00:14):
like I did my dad. Yeah, And watching my dad
get to be a grandfather with his you know, grandchildren,
was he was kind of the same way with babies,
whether they were his nieces or nephews, or whether they
were his grandchildren. He was playful with them, and you know,
he had a certain he didn't seek them out, but
they just seemed very captivated by him, and he would

(01:00:35):
play with them and it was it was nice, it
was heartwarming.

Speaker 1 (01:00:38):
I remember I have really hard like I'm really bad
at memories from certain time periods of growing up.

Speaker 2 (01:00:45):
And I don't know again if that's because.

Speaker 1 (01:00:47):
Of lucis, if it's because of the drugs from the
recent years, if it's because of that car accident I had,
But I do remember, when I want to say, pretty
much before ten that my grandpa would is loving and
kind and caring and interested in me and invested in

(01:01:09):
things that I was doing. And I could always go
and talk his ear off and he wouldn't care that I.

Speaker 2 (01:01:14):
Was talking so much.

Speaker 1 (01:01:15):
He would just listen to me, and he'd like interject
every now and again, sometimes like tell me things that
he thought I should do or whatever. But I remember
basically before ten that he was in his own way involved,
and then it was like after ten, after eleven or something,
maybe when I started to feel more like I was

(01:01:36):
an adult even though I wasn't, that he like really
like disconnected.

Speaker 2 (01:01:43):
And it could also be.

Speaker 1 (01:01:44):
From some other things that were going on, like with
Frankie at the time, or you know, having to take
care of like having Krean and Roy be living with that.
I don't know, but I think that at some point
there was a disconnect and we lost the connection, and
I started seeing him less as my grandpa as and
more as this angry, hateful, racist person.

Speaker 2 (01:02:07):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:02:08):
That and I couldn't go back, like I couldn't go
back to the other version. And it's hard because it's
like they are two different people in my brain. And
I think when he died, I was mourning the first person. Yeah,
and what it could have been like if he had
stayed that person, which I'm not saying he changed. I'm

(01:02:28):
saying it was like he changed how he acted with me,
because I'm sure he was that racist, you know, angry
person from when you were growing up even still, but
he didn't show that side to me until a certain age.

Speaker 2 (01:02:42):
Right, you know, and calling friends mom and dad. My
friends called mom mom, and they called him Bobby. They
called him Bobby because he was Bobby. Yeah, he was not.
He was not Dad. So and that I suppose that
speaks to you know, a lot about he Just he
wasn't necessarily welcoming, you know, as he wasn't welcoming in

(01:03:04):
the sense that he was just very gruff, you know,
much like I was describing my grandfather. He was very gruff,
and he was reserved, and he was. There were times.
I remember times where he would laugh and it was
it was so funny and weird at the same time
to see him laugh like that. I remember him laughing

(01:03:24):
so hard he couldn't even breathe. One time, you know,
my uncle Michael was telling a story and he just
he was hilarious. He was hilarious. He was just losing it,
and he laughed so hard he was bending over it
like holding his stomach in stitches. Because you know, just
the vision, like you tell stories and you can picture

(01:03:47):
it and you know the people that you know and
stuff growing up laughing like that. I'd never seen that.
It is just it's crazy. It was just crazy to
me and I you know, just those little things, those
moments that you just know you're never gonna forget ever.
So that's Dad. Yeah, well that's Bobby. Well.

Speaker 1 (01:04:06):
On that note, I have lots of pictures that I've
posted on the Mariah Effect website.

Speaker 2 (01:04:13):
Check it out, get Out, there's lots of pictures.

Speaker 1 (01:04:15):
That sticker picture is also one of my favorites because
it's a really cute picture of me and Grandpa and
I feel like, even though Brooke is in the picture,
they're like because he's kind of like looking at me
and I'm looking at him in the picture. Yeah, it's
like a connection picture between the two of us, and
I just love it. I feel like it's so cute.
So that's on the website. I post on the website

(01:04:38):
as often as possible, and I typically post all of
the show notes and everything for the episode, so you
can check out what was talked about, specific quotes that
were pulled from the episode. Those are all on the
website at the Dashmarah dash effect dot com. If you
want to check that out. For anybody that's listening and
is not a part of the Patreon, you should go

(01:04:59):
ahead and check that out. It's just one subscription, very easy,
very simple, and you get access to the uncut versions
of all the episodes. To go ahead and check out
the Patreon. It's under the Maria Effect. And I just
want to say thank you mom for being on the episode.
I feel like we talked about so much more than
what I had planned. But that's not a bad thing.

(01:05:20):
It's all good content. And I feel like we only
use like one or two tissues.

Speaker 2 (01:05:25):
The both of us. I still have my tissue. Yeah,
I'm surprised. I thought that bad. I thought that there
would be a lot more more crying, but you never know.
I will say this about grief. It will come and go.
It will catch you completely off guard, and you can
be overwhelmed at the smallest little thing, and it's okay

(01:05:45):
to just let it be. Just sit in that moment
and let it be and move forward. That's that's what
I will say about grief. And thank you for letting
me do this with you, and I appreciate you, I
love you, I'm very proud of you. And thank you
for listening to her. Yeah, thank you for listening.

Speaker 1 (01:06:02):
Bye.

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Season 3 Episode 27 | Loss, Love, & Legacy: Father’s Day Reflections

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Season 3 Episode 27 | Loss, Love, & Legacy: Father’s Day Reflections