The heart behind the hustle - Mothers Day Special

[0:00]  well Mom what is that over there so this is the this is the audio recorder yeah that's cool thank you it's Auto recorder yeah so this is the recorder it records all the audio for us which is nice fancy right wow well Mom welcome to the heart and hustle podcast thank you so much for joining me today at the time of recording yeah exactly this is Mother's Day so 2023 always a day that we can celebrate moms you know me and Alexa always joke around about um what an amazing like motherly figure you were for us and we always laugh about kind of the relationships that everybody's got and their perceptions [Laughter] okay but I mean we always just appreciate you so much you know you're always just so

[0:47]  nice to us and so uplifting and so supportive yeah I mean it's true never yelled I mean we were joking because we were talking about something there they were like yeah could you imagine if Mom was ever like mean to us you're like oh my God not even couldn't even imagine you like raising your voice or threatening us or being angry about anything well I did call you back to threaten you to clean our room yeah exactly so that's the one downfall my mom always used to call me back to my house when I was like 14 15 16 17 years old to come clean my room oh my God I know but that was the kind of stuff that we stressed about when we were you know a little bit younger no because it was like I didn't want I was like I think it's just because I didn't want to have to do it yeah you know I was like geez Louise you guys are old

[1:36]  enough to do it yourself yeah so what was it like kind of racing you know two kids who yeah were as busy as we were um I don't know well we were so busy like with uh with sports and stuff you know I mean so because Alexa was in sports um and you were in sports so she kind of crawled you know came along thank God she wasn't a um what do you call it hey like soccer player or something no like maybe like a ballerina that would have been terrible um no it was easy raising you guys because you guys were so motivated to do stuff you know so yeah I mean playing all the sports like what was it like when we first started like signing up for sports let's talk about baseball and then we've

[2:23]  got to travel for all the Summers was it something that you expected to be on the road doing as much stuff as we were doing your kids um I think that's when you guys first started your first sport was soccer do you remember that yeah and um you were my coach no go ahead yeah so I mean so you're I do I do remember you being my coach so I played soccer one time as a kid I was I think it was in fifth grade no no I'm sorry I was five years old yeah I was a little tiny five years old um played for the six shooters my mom was my coach Alexa also played she played for a team called the little Little Critters yeah and I remember they said like they said oh you know where I'm a sign you guys were taking uh you sign ups or whatever

[3:11]  and then they said well we don't have a coach so if if you if we're gonna have a team you're gonna have to coach I'm like the classic dude we're gonna be I'm like what are you talking about I'm like I said well I've never even I've never played soccer so yeah and they're like well you could you know yeah there was no training no nothing it was just like get out there and that is funny yeah I think about that because it's always a parent who coaches right they never have experience but all the other parents are watching their kid on the field run back and forth aimlessly after a little soccer ball and stuff like that that was a lot of fun yeah it was like I don't want to run so she was a goalie she was a goalie yeah she just stood there what do they say that that kind of like was the whatever of her life yeah it was like the framework that she established so let's talk about this this is one of

[3:58]  the things that I always joke about my mom had a philosophy with Alexa my younger sister when we were growing up doing chores doing hard labor outside having to plow the driveway for snow or go mow the lawn we used to split those responsibilities as a kid and Alex used to have to do them until one day Alexis started doing such a terrible job at cutting Milan or shoveling or anything like that that she never had to do it again and what was the piece of advice that you gave to her if you do a really bad job like your crooked or whatever they're gonna say oh forget it just go inside and they'll never ask you to do it again and it worked that was that was one of those framing moments where it's like someone when you're real young says something to you like you can be an astronaut or you can manipulate people by doing a really bad job of never having to do the work

[4:45]  and remember she too we'd be outside and remember in the yard like doing the yard and you'd be like where's Alexa at yeah like where is Alexa inside hanging out on Twitter or something back in the day she was no Myspace Myspace that was her Alexa man just crazy insane oh look and then you were playing baseball so then um we spent so many you know having like what was it we had to go like on Friday Friday 6:30 and then we'd come home on Sunday every weekend yeah Drive in different places spending time in those really dumpy hotels that we used to stay in but actually for parents oh it's actually not that I mean getting the kids there and then you guys once you are there because then you're with all the guys playing you guys would go to the in the hotel she would go to the

[5:33]  rooms and you would um play video games or whatever um and then for the parents really it's kind of relaxing actually because your kids are just like patrolling themselves pretty much yes you really are just like sitting in the lawn chairs Sun Tanning and watching I mean it's not any work for the parents I actually think about that because it's like when you get to the tournament it's report to coach and be with the team yeah oh and then you never see your kid be like I said because you guys would be like we're gonna be in Bobby's room playing you know video games back in the day you guys had to put you guys played uh Xbox Xbox yeah yeah and um yeah so it was it wasn't you know it was just it was just that you were away every weekend that was the thing so yeah so a question for you what was it like having a student like me who was really never motivated by school it

[6:23]  didn't want to be what was that like well um it was just really it was frustrating because you because you wanted you to be able just to get it done and you would be like I don't I don't want to do it I don't know it was just really because I just remember like at a super early age just being like this isn't for me yeah like I just don't want to be here well great morning time second grade oh I remember it earlier in that it was oh I remember coming home at second grade and being like Mom I don't want to do this please so miss dasham was my first grade teacher that was when we went to Saint Paul's Lutheran yeah yeah no I remember you saying that actually in when we were at wilderness and um you were they would do those books and then you would say that was

[7:11]  kindergarten kindergarten that's kindergarten and you would say well you know so and so she's you know on book number two and I'm never gonna get to book number two so you just basically quit yeah I don't know what it was but I remember being on like the last day of school you picking me up from Wilderness from kindergarten and me working on one of those books on the last day and it was the first book yeah they were like um SRA books were they yeah or something yeah or I don't know it was just like school was just never it for me yeah I just didn't I was never in I was never engaged I was never interested in the topics I didn't like the way that we learned in the group setting I don't know what it was well yeah and the thing is is that's why schools need to be you know like now they have different schools that are for you know

[7:58]  people that are into like computers or robots and things like that that's what it is it not all kids are going to fit into that yeah boring yeah you know school you know scholar type atmosphere you know where they want to go home and like they don't want to play sports they just want to read yeah you know which is great because it just doesn't work for all kids yeah I was always just interested in being outside and playing with stuff one of the things I remember from being a little kid was used to buy me these little Lego packs they would come with like 30 pieces it was a little box you'd give them to me and then I just build them right that was my favorite oh yeah because I could like use my brain and like figure out how these things went together when you were like three and we bought a new vacuum like I said like Keenan can you help me pick this put this together yeah and it was I remember

[8:46]  there was like a um gosh I can't remember the brand now but it was and we had to assemble it and you put the whole thing together you were like little like before we moved out of our house in Renton oh wow it was downstairs and I was and you were like let me just figure it out and you like put the whole thing together it was wow isn't that weird I always love that stuff it was just like so much more engaging me just like figuring out all the pieces and then like building something all like complete was just so awesome not reading the directions not reading the directions yeah man so then so now so I'm older I'm five years old I'm three years old and building stuff five years old I'm not liking School seven years old we moved to Michigan what was that a whole experience like for you like as a mom being like gotta pack up the house we're

[9:32]  gonna move to a new place in the other side of the country yeah you guys kind of like really adapted to that really well though um I think Alexa turned four Wing out there right when remember I think her birthday was at after we arrived or something um and yeah it was well this is a new experience for all of us and um yeah that's when I we decided to put you into guys into um uh what was it Saint Paul's Lutheran Lutheran yeah and um because we found out that the house that we moved into or the development that we moved into or whatever that that school district hadn't any to hadn't had any children of any color yet hold on wait where was this South Lyon oh yeah so that's why you guys put us in yes I did not know

[10:20]  that because um yeah and I called a woman had kind of warned me she said do you guys know where you're moving to and I was like well yeah oh wow I didn't know this yeah and then she said um and she said you should probably call the school district so I called the school district and I said you know so are there any children of color and she said well not yet wow so there's never been never no Asians no children Hispanic children no children of color of anything it was just wow my children and so I was like okay we're not going to be the first sorry and um so we put you guys into Northville and then um when you guys eventually went back to the South Line area fourth

[11:10]  grade yeah um you guys were one of the first children of color to be in South Lyon isn't that crazy to think about that like the whole school district that is wild this is 1990 this is like 2 000 because this is fourth grade or third grade we moved in 1997 97. so would it yeah it would have been you guys were there for two years so yeah you're right two thousand yeah yeah isn't that crazy oh my goodness um because I do remember a big jump from being at St Lutheran which was a class of like 28 kids but like here's the thing about St Lutheran it was 106 kids kindergarten through 12th grade was it 12th grade yes oh wow so there was like the I remember like the 10th grade class or like the eighth grade class was on

[11:57]  the same level as us at that school because it was a split level and there was like four of them in there or five of them tops yeah very interesting yeah so you guys went out to South Lyon and um which you know that District grew so much then but of course you wanted to play football so I remember you and like Mom sign me up for football sign me for a football and I was like oh my gosh so the district we were in you couldn't play football until like you were seven maybe and so you wanted to play so early that um so I looked into Novi and Novi would allow you to start the year before so I signed you up for football in Novi that's how we started doing all the sports in a different city in which then then where we live oh wow because like

[12:46]  it was interesting for everybody who's listening and watching we lived in a town that was split by like grid systems right because like north of Seven Mile Eight Mile Nine Mile Ten Mile you know chub all the other roads that were up and down Napier all that kind of stuff and we were what two miles away from the cutoff between one city and the other one and so we went over the border of the city limit and started playing in Novi and Northville yeah wow yeah and then um and then just kind of kept that's when they were uh you met some kids or whatever and they said well let's play you know baseball so then you guys started playing baseball and then you play travel baseball so it just kind of grew and um do you remember the first baseball team that I played for the first baseball team ever yeah and was it in Seattle though it was in Seattle

[13:34]  um I think I saw the Jersey yes what color is the Jersey not the green one it was I can't remember I think I play for a team called the Cubs and I was like five years old oh you did and we traveled around yes or I'm not sure if that was traveling yeah no it was considered a um they called it team like team baseball or something back then yeah that was a blast yeah and your coach was um the family that man from out in South um out in Maple Valley yeah I remember those days because I remember being in the Outfield I have like an image of me being in right field left field and standing there and like wanting to wait for a pitch or something like that that's like one of my earliest memories of baseball I do remember first when you played baseball you were like looking around yeah

[14:21]  like pay attention not realizing at all no kids paid yeah at that age you know so yeah yeah it's crazy to think about how like long ago that was but it doesn't really feel that long ago but then you moved to well then you when you moved to Novi and you played baseball yep remember it was Machine Pitch or is it coach pitch first because it was coach pitch because we played in that rec league and then because I had that small little tiny Novi Jersey remember I still think I have that or Alexa has it somebody has it yeah and then it went to Machine Pitch and then I always remember each year a huge highlight of my life was being selected for the All-Star team for Machine Pitch and just like how much fun that was to play back in the day because we had your old back had your own bat used a wood

[15:09]  bat used a wood bat which we still have yeah um yeah I used a wood bat and that wood bat and then they said later on oh you can't use a wood bat you have to go to aluminum yeah and you were like what yeah you know that's funny yeah and I think that you were like so mad about that that you had to you couldn't use your wood bat I love that you did use it though like for some reason I want to say you used it for like a year and then you finally got into the aluminum bats but those aluminum bats were a big deal you could hit those things so far I hit like two home runs a game in Machine Pitch right that was a blast yeah come right down the middle every time just crush it aluminum bats did you go through that was the thing back in the day I think about that I was like you had to have a different bat each year yeah and the bat was a big deal yeah you know the bats came out and they were all new yeah yeah

[15:56]  they were right and then like some kid would get a really good bat then you could use his back yeah exactly that's how it was it really was you try and keep them all shined up yeah yeah because I was born in 1990 so this is night this is early 2000s 2000 2001 that was when the big barrel bats first started coming out because the Big Barrel because once you went from like machine pitch and you started doing like coach or kid pitch right you could get big barrel bats and there was this one bat it was called the TPX gold that I had I got him when I was 10 years old from uh Rick green when we were on the Nova heat back in the day because he like had the hook up because he was a coach or something like that yeah remember that yeah he was a really good coach really good coach yeah he was very very uh he expected a lot of you he was like that

[16:43]  first like hard-nosed coach that I ever had who was like serious serious yeah and I was like oh this is great because everybody else was serious and we dominated everybody yeah well he wanted he wanted you guys be good because you know he didn't want to teach yeah he didn't want to teach him it was losing yeah I remember that we're gonna be gone yeah you know well you're all the dads were kind of intense too you know they were unfortunately yeah that's good everybody's dad's was everybody's dad was a coach because the only time Dad Dad never coached me in baseball he only coached me in football and that was about how old was dad back then I was 10 years old so he was 40. 41 42 years old oh wow yeah right yeah and we'd be so football yeah Dad is a coach this other kid named Bobby Thomas his dad Dan Thomas was a coach oh yes and

[17:32]  they were so funny because they'd actually like scream at us and yell and now I think about like we were like nine ten years old we were tiny we were running around like bobble heads you know they'd be grabbing Us by the face mask and Dan will be smoking cigarettes and stuff on the field oh my God I remember that oh my gosh yeah and then afterwards and stuff they'd all get together in the parking lot and you guys would throw the football remember that yeah yeah and the dads would all have beers afterwards they would all drink after practice it's a hard job coaching I know it was so intense and we were terrible we got washed every single year and for the Novi Cults we would go like one and nine that's true every year we just get smoked yeah that was tough was it coaching it could have been a coaching honestly but that was back in the day when like football wasn't that

[18:18]  competitive you know like we always just weren't very competitive because we had a mix of kids who just weren't very good yeah there was like four or five kids who were solid you played both ways you play offense and defense the entire game yeah and then all the other 46 kids would get subbed in and then there was Southfield and then there was Southfield all the black kids who would come across and they'd just be like so much more athletic and oh my God not that like I think about the kind of culture that we grew up in like being the first colored people in a school district was pretty much prominent for that entire area of Michigan right there's not a lot of culture a lot of Hispanic kids no not a lot of anything no and so when you play against kids in Detroit southfield's a great example it's like oh my God such a culture shock of like who are these kids they're bigger than us they're faster than us it's like guys like we can win this game it was just so psychological

[19:05]  back in the day yeah that was crazy and then so I play baseball for a couple years play football for a couple years and then do you remember making the jump from playing for Novi to Detroit yeah and playing for the Eagles so I go from playing on this all-white team yeah to playing on an all-black team right what was the adjustment like for you as a parent oh it was a long drive yeah it was a long drive yeah it was a long drive it wasn't like you could drive and not and drop you off it was like when I dropped when I got there with me and I had to take Alexa with me oh yeah you guys had to stay there and we had to stay and wait oh wow yeah every single night that they had and then they had a game it was always in Detroit and yeah so Drive wow yeah but great experience though great experience we had so much fun with those guys yeah oh my gosh oh my gosh I always wonder where all those

[19:53]  kids are at today all the parents are at today yeah I'm wondering if they're still doing the same stuff all right we thought about that too we're thinking about you know so you should look our way up on social media yeah because I don't know where everybody's at I know little Mark Brown ended up getting drafted by the Cleveland Indians and stuff right yeah a bunch of little kids yeah some awesome stuff oh that's great yeah so yeah what do you think has been the biggest adjustment the recent years kind of as being a mom that now that your son is 32 Alexis 29 going to be engaged this year oh yeah so what is the adjustment going through Alex is going to be engaged with you yeah she thinks she's engaged she's gonna get married this year get married yeah um the biggest adjustment um I don't know I don't really have an

[20:42]  adjustment I don't think yeah I mean I was gonna one of the things I always really appreciate about you as my mom is like so when high school was ending yeah everybody was like talking about going to schools inside the state everybody was sticking talking about sticking around because everybody's kids were going to be you know what was it like patent attorneys yeah patent attorneys and they're gonna be going to Yale and you know oh my gosh I put the pressure yeah yeah and you always told us like get out of here go and so you can experience because I think you just grow more from experiencing um different cultures you know I mean leaving leaving Michigan and all those people and stuff and going like you went to South Carolina that was an adjustment very big adjustment that was crazy yeah so

[21:30]  um yeah it's like just get out of there you have to leave you have to leave and and travel or you know move away from that home City so that you just meet new people you know but you also have to be able to experience like different cultures in how people behave you know different ideas yes different ways to you know approach different subjects in society and stuff like that well I said when we lived in Seattle for years and then we moved to Michigan um it was a rude awakening as to the separation of of cultures people were saying you know well you know you know you can't live in that area people wouldn't like a realtor wouldn't show our fan it wouldn't show us a house in a certain area they were I didn't realize it was like that yeah well I don't know if it was legal but it was they she said

[22:17]  um oh I can't I can't really take you out there to show you that and I was like and that because Dad's black uh-huh wow yeah so like um or you're white I know yeah exactly like Livonia is a great example yeah yep she said yeah um and I didn't know that the United States of America was still like that or that that existed so that was a culture shock and unfortunately when we had already um had already been decided that we were moving so it was kind of something where we just had to scramble on the background yeah yeah we had to like yeah so we already knew kind of where we wanted to live so which uh which was South Lyon um your dad had played golf out there or something and so we knew we wanted to live there um so we just had to figure it out and

[23:05]  figured make it work you know so yeah so then when it came time for you guys to get out of high school I thought it was so important for you guys to feel that you could move you could leave you know and I know a lot of people want their kids to live like um you know next to them or you know around the block or whatever yeah and I was our way at the college yeah it's like no yeah I think the kids need to go and experience new people you know yeah I think it's it's vital because when you don't get out of the same area that you live in you don't realize that people do things differently you know because like zero to 18 years old when you leave to college like your world is formed around a microcosm of how the culture is in that area yeah and then going to South Carolina was a huge adjustment um I bet as soon as I got down there

[23:52]  people were calling me Yankee I was like what does that mean they're like you're a Yankee you're from the north and I was like uh-huh are we talking about the Civil War here like the 1800s is that what we're really talking about here they're like yeah and I was like okay well I've heard that too is that um is that um that like if you move down to the South or something they do yeah because you're from the north they're like no we're yeah I had no idea that that was even a real thing did I have to pay attention to history class more um yeah so

[24:39]  um but that was just like a shock to me though that our family was basically told that you I mean our realtor literally would not take us out there yeah it was like yeah we had to ditch her at the line and we went to the to the um housing area to because we were going to build a house um on our own because she was so she pulled you guys up to the neighborhood and it was like I can't go in there with you though I can't I can't no she wouldn't even come out there with us she wouldn't she said I can't I can't unfortunately I'm not able to was this a white lady or something well yeah it's very interesting but when the commission of the house was paid she was there yeah exactly yeah I'm sure she was like hey she literally was there like they're like oh my God I know who that is um but yeah it's it was like I said it was just so important for you for me for you guys and I think that's because

[25:26]  after I lived in Yakima Washington and After High School um I left you know I went off to college and then I moved to Seattle before anybody else pretty much um wanting just a change you know and like I said when you moved to Seattle then I would like I was like wow like people you experience different cultures and different people and yeah yeah you got to get outside that fish bowl you do I mean one of the things I remember about being in South Carolina was someone once said to me that they had never been outside the county before in South Carolina they're like I've never been yeah I've never done it outside the county the county that we were in yeah yeah that's an example of why people are stuck in their own ways

[26:14]  sometimes and how important it is too yeah because you have to get out there you have to get out there yeah you know and that's why I think like living in so many places Seattle Detroit or South Lyon South Carolina Vegas Hawaii it's given me so many different experiences to see like the different cultures of how people are the things they prioritize yeah just completely different yeah it makes you appreciate other people instead of being judgmental uh about people or whatever you know yeah so because yeah it's crazy yeah it's very interesting so what are you thinking about um is going to be happening in the next like a couple years what are you looking forward to oh gosh um Alexis getting married um having um two new grandchildren yeah how's this going to go are we gonna treat these

[27:01]  kids are we gonna be nice to them they are so cool yeah they're so cool so excited um yeah and having Jason as part of our family now and yeah it's gonna be exciting yeah yeah just to see them grow you know and yeah so hopefully Keenan and Malia will still be here and not be moving or yeah never know what's gonna happen with us yeah right I think that's something that it's a blessing and a curse one thing I've realized is I get a little bit older is it's important to spend time around your family you know I was at Trader Joe's today and there was a guy as I was checking out what do you call the person who's at the front desk the clerk the attendant cashier I was at a cashier and he was like what's going on today and I was like oh you know just gonna go grab

[27:47]  um breakfast with my mom and you know do the whole Mother's Day thing he was like oh that's awesome he's like make sure you enjoy it because you don't know how long you're gonna be able to do that for him and I was like you know that's just like so impactful because there's so many people who don't get to spend time with their mom you know so I thought it'd be really cool if we were able to hop on the podcast and just be able to kind of document it you know what I mean because it's like it's a cool tradition you know being able to kind of talk about this stuff you don't ever know like how long your parents will be there yeah you know or your grandparents or you know everybody you take it for granted you do there was I was listening to a podcast the other guy and this guy was talking about an argument he was in with his wife and he was like a venting and he was like oh yeah and he was like yeah we just got in a really bad argument today and he's like have you talked to her since he's like no he's like well I mean you should give her a call he's like I will when I get home at the end of the our conversation I was like well who who

[28:34]  told you that he was like what who told me about it he was like who told you you're guaranteed to get home tonight you know it's like you don't have an expectation to pass away in an accident yeah so every day that we wake up is so vital I'm so glad that we were able to spend today together yeah I love you Mom I love you love you too yeah