00:03:07.560And I have a visual, like a visual and I, and I, this is weird too, because when you smell things
00:03:13.680like this, you have that memory, right? And I go back to that time and I was very much surrounded
00:03:19.220by gifts and I felt surrounded by love and whatever issues my mom and my dad had, whatever
00:03:27.560it was they were working through and they had to go through as hard as it was, I didn't go through
00:03:34.320it necessarily with them. I know there's elements, and I've told stories before about how I would say
00:03:39.780things, but for the most part, a lot of my very cognizant memories are just of family, of love,
00:03:49.140of no disdain, of no animosity, no anger, and in those Christmas mornings, very, very early on,
00:03:55.920my dad was present, my mom was present, surrounded by all of the gifts, Sesame Street abounds,
00:04:01.140and I felt and I still feel to this day, I feel love. I look back at those pictures and I feel
00:04:08.980love. I feel support. I feel all of those things. And it's not very tangible, right? I don't have
00:04:15.060like incredibly significant memories where I remember very particular things, but it's a
00:04:19.980feeling. It's a feeling you get. And when I think about that why, going to who I am today,
00:04:26.480oh guys it seems little right it does it seems little it seems like well sure you could do that
00:04:36.340or you could spend Christmases separate and you could have gone from your mom's to your dad's or
00:04:40.400alternated but my dad never made my mom do that my dad never thought for a single second that I
00:04:49.080should spend Christmas without my mom but here's the better part they did he didn't think I should
00:04:53.460spend it without him either. So whatever it was that they had to put aside, they did.
00:05:00.440And they did it for me and for what I needed more in that moment.
00:05:07.760They're going to go on to co-parent with each other. Now, again, you guys have heard my podcast
00:05:12.860before. It's not like I didn't have, you know, flaws with my relation with my dad and struggles
00:05:18.240and struggling to understand him and get at a deeper sense of who he was, but I never thought
00:05:23.920for a minute, I never thought for a minute I wasn't loved. I never thought for a minute
00:05:31.160that he wouldn't have moved whatever he had to move, shift whatever he needed to, to prioritize
00:05:37.320what I needed. And same with my mom. And so as I go through my younger years into my teen life,
00:05:45.020all of the most important moments of my life, guess who's there? Both of them. Both of them,
00:05:52.320not begrudgingly, not with anger, not with animosity, but both of them with love focused
00:05:58.100on me and what was best for me. And then they made space to love each other, which I find
00:06:04.880astounding at some points because I know how hard being an adult now, we've all been through it. I
00:06:10.300know how hard being in a relationship and ending a relationship and how painful that is. And I don't
00:06:16.940think I could have done it as well as they did it. And even though my dad had left, I still think it
00:06:23.820was painful for him. You know, this was a guy who showed up at every baseball game he drove. Now that
00:06:29.820I know where he lived compared to where I lived, he would drive two hours through traffic to be at
00:06:33.640the baseball game starting at 530 every single game. My mom would score keep. We'd all go out
00:06:39.500for dinner after. They were able to establish this incredibly healthy balance for me. Was it
00:06:47.200perfect? Of course not. Of course not. Did he get up at 4.30, 4 o'clock in the morning to ensure
00:06:55.140when I opened my eyes and I went down those stairs, that both of my parents were ready to
00:07:00.900open up presents and spoil me and do all of those things with me? Yeah. Guys, that's significant.
00:07:06.920And that says so much about him. That says so much about her. And it's that kind of stability and that kind of, I guess, making sure you're prioritizing the kid in your life better than you prioritize you.
00:07:26.940And again, I don't know if I could do it.
00:07:29.640I think about what they did and I don't know if I could, but I thank them for it.
00:07:34.160And when I speak about this, I speak about a lot of different instances when I was a kid.
00:07:39.220It was the fact that they could still parent together, not when I was at his house or her house, separately, together.
00:07:46.520And my dad would put everything else aside to ensure that I was always with my mom and I was always with my dad for those important events.
00:07:55.960To the extreme, are you ready for this? I'm going to go one step further. My dad would come to my
00:08:03.040grandma's house on Christmas Eve. Guys, my grandma wasn't a big fan, especially in those early
00:08:09.040divorced years of my dad, but my dad would show up. And when I had to go to my dad's family's house,
00:08:15.620my mom would come with me. She would go into the same house that she was married into.1.00
00:08:21.520she went with me to my dad's family's Christmas every year of my entire life until those
00:08:30.160grandparents had passed. Every single year. Do I think it was comfortable for her? No.
00:08:35.660Enjoyable? Probably not. But was my happiness and my comfort more important than all of those
00:08:43.460things? Yeah, that's how she prioritized and that's how he prioritized. I think the value of
00:08:50.100that in who I've become is so incredibly foundational. And I look at those old pictures
00:08:58.340and the toys that I got and, you know, those kinds of memories that you have, Grover being just one
00:09:03.020of them. And I have nothing but joy and nothing but fond, happy, loving memories, guys. That's
00:09:10.820all kids need. Truly, that's all kids need. And I'm very, very, very thankful that those two people
00:09:17.760in my life were able to put aside everything else and give that to me. Was I spoiled? Yes,
00:09:22.580absolutely. I was for my listeners. Of course I was. But when you say, were you spoiled? I don't
00:09:29.360love the word because spoiled in title, it sort of gives a level of like, let's say entitlement
00:09:35.020or animal, you know, yeah, an entitlement. Like I was owed it and now I was this jerk of a kid.0.99
00:09:41.600I never was. I think there's quite a bit of a difference between a child who gets a lot0.98
00:09:47.760because their parents, you know, and their extended family or whatever loves that. Let's
00:09:53.500be honest, my family's love language is gifts. And from a kid who doesn't respect it and isn't
00:10:00.260thankful for it, I think as an adult, that kind of gift giving and love and show of affection and
00:10:07.320just wanting to see joy of somebody else open up something that you know they're going to love.
00:10:13.000Well, I have that. I have that. You know, I love, I love to be able to find something and spend
00:10:20.380money on something that especially, for example, Anna would never buy for herself. I love it.
00:10:26.500I love it. I love the fact that I can do that for her and it brings me joy. I don't think
00:10:32.280material things are all that matter. That's not the point. The point is to put yourself out,
00:10:39.300put that person ahead of you and see that joy and find that perfect gift, right? And I think
00:10:46.520that probably comes from then as well. And I got that from both my parents. I got that from the
00:10:52.260love they both expressed and they both loved buying gifts and all of that kind of stuff.
00:10:56.400but I think it's pretty important aspect of who I am, how I show love, how I feel confident in
00:11:03.020myself. I think that all matters. All right. My second why, are you ready? All right. Buckle in
00:11:10.420for those. You know what? This isn't going to be for the faint of heart. Cause like,
00:11:13.740let's be honest in the eighties, I don't even know if these, I guess it was the early eighties.
00:11:19.020I'm trying to remember. Um, this might've been a little later. I could get these gifts mixed up.
00:11:24.220I can't remember exactly what years they came out in. I'm sure you guys will correct me in my
00:11:27.820comments. But nonetheless, early 80s. Are you with me? Solid rock ballads, you know,
00:11:34.820Total Eclipse of the Heart, Pat Benatar, that kind of thing. Was that Pat Benatar?
00:11:38.460You're going to correct me in the comments as well. Nonetheless, one of my best memories of
00:11:42.940Christmas was this. I used to live in a general, well, above and to the side in a century-old home,
00:11:51.380giant house above the only general store in Mansfield, Ontario. And in this home was my mom,
00:11:59.420me. We had like an area of the house. We both had bedrooms. We both had our own living room.
00:12:03.440My grandma, my grandpa, they had this huge room that had their dining room table, living room set,
00:12:08.740their bedroom in with these huge vaulted ceilings. And my two uncles, Ray and John,
00:12:12.680who lived at the other end with their bedroom and another living room. And then downstairs,
00:12:16.860we had a living room and a kitchen and then the door out to the store.
00:12:21.380So I grew up with those guys. I grew up with, once my parents got divorced, I grew up with Ray and John. They were brothers to me. They were 13, 14 years older than me. They tormented me. You know, I had a black eye for a long time. I had a, it almost broke my orbital bone in the, in the, you know, games of circus we would play where I would ball up and they would shoot me with their feet down the hallway.
00:12:43.920Anyway, again, I digress. But Ray, Ray is my uncle. And you guys have heard me talk about him. He's, well, he's more, he's more of a father than a brother. And I don't mean that to replace mine. I mean that to add to mine.
00:12:58.960And I think a lot of the times we think that we need to swap one out for the other. We've been conditioned to think of what family is supposed to be. When what family truly is, or should be, is the ability to surround yourself by all these people who love you and that you love and that you want to share in triumphs and victories and handle them or take care of them through the hard times. That's what family is.
00:13:25.860So I was lucky enough to have a lot. All right. I had a lot of family. And Ray was one of the best. He was amazing at buying presents. He still is to this day. But he was great at clues and treasure maps to get to the present. Okay. Like just amazing. The things seemed to last for hours. Okay.
00:13:51.820And as we were living up there, he'd done it a few times.
00:13:54.500So come Christmas time, I hadn't got a big, like you always kind of get one big present.
00:13:59.780And I was looking around, looking around, looking around.
00:14:01.760And finally, Ray goes, hey, there's an envelope on the tree.
00:14:05.440So I pull out this envelope and it's a scavenger hunt.
00:14:08.620Guys, if I could remember, you know, you just wish your parents would have kept things like that because it has such a lovely memory for me.
00:14:15.440You would have thought they would have kept, just keep those things.
00:19:58.480It drove me. And that kind of competition coming from a source of family and love,
00:20:09.180like there's limits to that, right? I'm not talking about tormenting kids.
00:20:13.160I'm talking about understanding. I was able to learn and understand that at seven, eight,
00:20:21.720nine years old. I was intelligent. I was capable. I could do so many things that adults could do.
00:20:30.100I could have adult conversations and arguments and debates. I could sit down and play video games.
00:20:37.660I could go outside and throw the ball. My uncles also taught me that. I could do all of these
00:20:43.260things. And I didn't have to do them as though I was the little kid trailing behind. I could do them
00:20:49.840as a, as a fully functional, you know, yes, young person, but incredible little being.
00:20:59.440And, and I think that I think about that quite a lot, actually. And I think the confidence when
00:21:05.400people ask, you know, where do I get my seeming confidence from? And I say, well, I don't always
00:21:10.040have that confidence, but I say my mom and I have to say, I have to say my uncles, right? I have to
00:21:16.860say, Ray, and it doesn't stop there because Ray pushed me in school. Ray, you know, pushed me to
00:21:25.700excel. Ray never let, when I thought I'd reached my pinnacle, he was always there to say, are you
00:21:34.560sure? I know you can do a bit better than that. I know you got that in you. And I think, and I
00:21:43.100might not be right. But I think part of that can be traced back to those days when I was so young,
00:21:50.460yet they never gave in, but they would sit with me and they would watch and they would help and
00:21:56.280they would push so that I could actually win. And that was powerful. That was powerful.
00:22:06.140Raise a teacher, which is, I think, a big reason why I became a teacher.
00:22:09.880but but even more so than that what he gave me was this incredible sense of
00:22:17.080goal and aspiration to be better than yesterday you know he's a he's a physicist he's a incredibly
00:22:26.440smart guy a great artist we have very different like paths in what moves us what we're passionate
00:22:32.900about and what we teach but i when i was young and i watched him teach physics i was just like
00:22:38.480blown away i was blown away at his wit and his humor and his intelligence and the kids
00:22:44.880in physics will be on the edge of their seats wanting him to tell the next joke or explain the
00:22:50.480next theory or whatever it was he was doing and i looked i remember thinking i just want that
00:22:56.480i want kids and i want people to be able to to be able to connect like that and inspire like that
00:23:02.480And yes, push them like he pushed me, right? Like he was able to push me and bolster more confidence, more competition, a work ethic. Ray has a 10 times better work ethic than I, but a work ethic rivaled by very, very few people to be amazing at what we do and to do what we're passionate at.
00:23:32.480You know, Ray could have done a lot of things in science. He chose to teach. That's admirable. I think that's where I first felt that. I think that's why I went in it.
00:23:42.840Um, and, and again, it's in those moments, scavenger hunt to find out they've been cheating
00:23:51.800on me the entire week. It's in those moments that you get a sense of who you are and who you can be
00:24:00.080with that kind of support and that kind of push. It's very much, it's like support, support,
00:24:06.180support, give it a shove, support, support, support, give it a smack on the nose. They know
00:24:10.080they're still not there yet. I kind of like that. I feel like I teach like that a little bit,
00:24:13.780a little bit. All right. You ready for my last one? My last one's a big one for those who are
00:24:19.300around in the eighties. So I think in 84, a very special product came out. And again,
00:24:27.440kids today will never know what this felt like. I don't think, because everything's online. You
00:24:31.540don't have to, right? But I think in 1984, the epic wave, the cultural onslaught, it changed
00:24:44.900everything. These are back in consumer days, consumer distributing catalogs. But in Christmas
00:24:53.660in 1984, what came out? Cabbage Patch Kids. Now, whoever's listening that wasn't alive during that
00:25:01.500time, or has no idea what I'm talking about. I can't describe, the frenzy of like a One Direction,
00:25:07.920I guess a Harry Styles concert, coupled with a, maybe a Justin concert, coupled with, like,
00:25:17.140interruption, interrupt, but they weren't listening to music, guys. They were battling each other to
00:25:24.820get into the Toys R Us, to get to the stack of Cabbage Patch Kids that have just been brought,
00:25:30.100and within minutes gone bought sold now this came out my mom said to me joanna do you want a cabbage0.87
00:25:38.260patch kid i said no i'm too old for that i'm such a moron she goes you sure no so she asked me like
00:25:48.580maybe a month or two before christmas a few weeks go by joanna are you sure because if you want a0.93
00:25:53.600cabbage patch kid you need to tell me because i can't they're they're going they're selling
00:25:57.500everywhere. I have to go figure out how to get one. Mom, I'm too old for Cabbage Patch Kids. Stop
00:26:02.300it right now. Push me a little bit again. Another week, another two weeks. No, no, no. Until,
00:26:09.820heaven help me, folks. Two weeks before Christmas, I say to my mom,
00:26:15.240I should have brought her on this podcast. I say to my mom, Mom,
00:26:19.720i i i want a cabbage patch kit she's like joanna you can't how how am i gonna get you one i'm like
00:26:27.800well i don't know but you've all my mom's always got me everything i've ever wanted for christmas
00:26:32.720i have a big big big list it goes i go you'll figure you'll you're good like that you're
00:26:37.280magical like that you know and my mom's like in she's told me before like she's just freaking
00:26:45.380out, freaking out, freaking out. She couldn't find one anywhere. So what did she do? Guys,
00:26:51.940I wish I still had this or at least a picture of it. There was a lady who lived in Mansfield
00:26:58.620who made, I can't even describe it. Think of it like a homemade doll and the head would have been0.92
00:27:07.840like a pantyhose and the body was soft, but it was bigger than a cabbage patch kit.
00:27:14.000it in i i it's burned into my memory because i still you know i i got this um because this was1.00
00:27:22.280the only thing my mom could figure out to get me and this lady had like ripped off cabbage like
00:27:27.460cabbage patch sewn into the homemade sweater that the thing was wearing guys i can still sometimes
00:27:35.400have nightmares about what this thing looked like and it was and it was big and it was terrifying
00:27:39.440absolutely terrifying um and and christmas rolls around and i'm just like opening presents opening
00:27:48.060presents i get this present my mom said joe i couldn't i couldn't get one for you you you told
00:27:53.880me too late i couldn't get one you see what all these people all these people are crazy right all
00:27:58.920these you guys if you can watch a youtube video on the onslaught in a toys r us i i hazard you
00:28:06.060watch it. Um, and I'm upset. Like, I'm upset guys. Is it all my fault? Yes. Yes, it is. Am I
00:28:13.800devastated? Absolutely. I am. And I'm looking around and I'm at that point. I, you know,
00:28:19.240I thought I'd opened everything and I'm looking around, I'm looking around at my aunt, Paula,
00:28:23.980my mom's sister says, Oh, there's one right back there for you. And I look around and it's in the
00:28:32.060perfect shape i don't know if you know that the sort of weird kind of shape of a of a cabbage
00:28:38.460patch kid box back in the day and i saw it and i tears puddled in my eye and i went over i grabbed
00:28:47.900it i opened it up and guys for those not watching again you're missing out because i'm holding my
00:28:54.940very first Cabbage Patch Kid. His name is Armando. You can see him. It's very lovely orange hair.
00:29:02.520Smells exactly the way he has for the last, well, how long is this? He's 40 years old, at least.
00:29:09.54040 years old. And I open Armando and I'm elated. Like I am so, so happy. And I just think the
00:29:20.800heavens have opened, magic's ensued and I've got this. And, and I didn't even really question any
00:29:27.280of it, to be honest. Um, and then later I heard the story and here's how the story goes.
00:29:33.520So my aunt worked at, uh, and this was Christmas Eve, worked at the Royal Bank and on Christmas
00:29:40.740Eve, um, she was working and getting ready to come to my girl, like early shift. And the bank
00:29:47.260manager had bought a whole bunch and had them delivered to the Royal bank and said, anybody
00:29:51.260who wants to take them, take one for their kids. I got them for you. It's like a gift. And guys,
00:29:57.280I mean, some people want a bonus, but trust me, this Cabbage Patch thing, insanely valuable.
00:30:04.320And everybody's going, do you want one? Do you want one? Paula, do you want one? Yeah, Paula,
00:30:07.700pick which one you want. Go get the perfect one. And she said, you know what?1.00
00:30:11.420Joanna's going to love, as long as just leave me, get me one, she's going to love anything she gets.
00:30:17.260and I'm going to hold this up again, guys, because I'm telling you right now,
00:30:20.940this Armando, he has blue eyes, orange hair. What a weird combination.
00:30:26.580It was the best. It was like the perfect, till this day, I feel like he represents a lot of
00:30:33.060who I am. And it started this trend. Now, the funny part is, did it, I don't know if it made
00:30:42.580me think, oh, I can have whatever I want. I don't, there was this, um, newfound sense of a, like,
00:30:50.600like, I don't know of magic. I thought it was magic. I really did. I thought the whole thing
00:30:56.320was magic. And that lasts me a very long time. That feeling, that feeling of, you know, of that
00:31:03.820kind of crazy Christmas and that kind of thing that I, I just thought it wasn't gonna, it wasn't
00:31:09.860going to come to pass. And then to know that like, again, that's how a family works, right?
00:31:16.140Everybody talks about, well, a family is just this or just that. My mom, her sister, brothers,
00:31:23.020my grandma, my grandpa, that whole side of my family, guys, it just like moved heaven and hell
00:31:29.020to get whatever it is everybody needed or wanted and supported. And just, it was an incredible
00:31:36.020thing. And I started this, this trend of my family buying Cabbage Patch Kids. I should do a whole
00:31:42.080other podcast of showing you because my total for Cabbage Patch Kids is 19. Why we stopped at 19,
00:31:48.460I'll never know. I should probably just even that out right about now, but they make them1.00
00:31:51.300differently as we all know, and nobody wants that, but here's why. So Armando, when I got him,
00:31:58.500because it was in this big, huge pile of Cabbage Patch Kids and everybody decided they didn't want
00:32:05.220him, I guess. Might have been the orange hair. I don't know. Paula told us that story and I
00:32:13.800immediately loved him more. But then my whole family loved that story. So every time anybody
00:32:21.100in my family was in a Toys R Us or a toy store and they saw Cabbage Patch Kids with a broken box,
00:32:27.760we would assume that Cabbage Patch, nobody was ever going to buy them. They'd want a perfect box.
00:34:02.900I believe it's our imperfections. I believe it's the scar under your eye. I believe it's the bad haircut you got when you were eight. I believe it's the weird way you throw a ball but still manage to strike them out.
00:34:16.300I think all of the cool things that make people authentically, and I know I use that word 800 times, authentically themselves, and maybe makes people overlook them or look away from them or look around them because of that, those are the things that I want.
00:34:36.340you know so it made me believe in magic but i think more importantly it sort of set me on this
00:34:42.720path to understand that i don't need a perfection in a thing but loving it and taking care of it
00:34:51.320oh that we need oh that we absolutely need how dare you toss that aside there's a whole i guarantee