DOD262: Rent's Due, Kiddo

Transcript

This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors — the audio is the record.

0:00:02 Clip: I'm the cool dad, that's my thing I know now what I can offer you that no one else can Complete and under-dependent I'm a man, I'm sensitive I need to feel loved, I need part of being a father that I enjoy

0:00:28 Tom: Welcome to Dear Old Dads, the podcast that wants its check on the first. I'm Tom Curry. I'm joined as always by Thomas Smith and Eli Bosnick. Hello, gentlemen.

0:00:46 Eli: That's crazy. No, I just realized that there must be times in your life when people are late and rude and you just have to be like, well, here we are 445. I guess we'll go to a different movie. Let's get it together. Have you ever seen that meme online? Oh my God, you people can't do anything. It's that it's, oh my God. Us people can do anything, but this brings up a very interesting question and don't take this as an attack. Open your heart, Thomas. When someone is late to you. You, as an ADD person who, like all ADD people, has the most batshit explanation for lateness that isn't, I don't care about you. What do you think? Like, when someone shows up at 445 for the 3 o 'clock movie, are you just like, man, fucking traffic, am I right? Or do you have a separate thing that you project onto another mind?

0:01:53 Eli: You're late, too. You're there at 450, so it doesn't...

0:01:55 Tom: I was just saying, I feel like reject the premise. Thomas, yeah, Thomas Smith has never, he would have to notice that somebody else was late.

0:01:56 Thomas: I'm not sure I understand the question. Yeah.

0:02:02 Eli: That's true. He's already in the 3 O 'clock Movie.

0:02:04 Thomas: Oh, no, I've had issues. Well, here's the thing about ADHD people. There are times when it's like, okay, what I have to do is remind this person that this is important because every ADHD person will find the ways that the things like, like, they prioritize, especially when they're overwhelmed, like every overwhelmed ADHD person, the things will find a way to cut like the what's the the thing I'm trying to say anything yeah anything that can be delayed will be delayed and sometimes you got to be like hey this is one of those things that can't be delayed okay essentially so I've had to remind certain folks like we got to just not be late to this like but all that really changes is my definition of late I don't care if someone's like two five minutes late like that doesn't matter to me two two to five ten

0:02:30 Eli: I donno, you're overwhelmed.

0:02:51 Tom: So it's two, five minutes late, 10 minutes late and it's like two fives?

0:02:55 Thomas: Is where it's like yeah

0:02:55 Eli: Overwhelmed or is that you trying to say the word 25 but not allowing yourself

0:02:58 Thomas: No it was like two five seven you know just like right around there that's not really anything

0:02:59 Tom: Or is that between two and five? Okay.

0:03:04 Eli: Two to five minutes late thomas let me explain everybody on earth is two to five minutes late except for me all the time yeah

0:03:12 Tom: No, you and my dad. You and my dad and Cecil, actually. Cecil has never, 30 years, he's never been late that

0:03:18 Thomas: Yeah jesus christ just makes me sad

0:03:19 Tom: I'm aware of. Anywhere. Well, never.

0:03:21 Eli: I can't even comment on two to five minutes late at this point are you kidding I think covid did something I don't know what it was but I think there was something where we were We're all just five minutes late from now on. And I also, I have had to adjust my behavior because I show up three minutes late and I'm like, Hey, I'm sorry. I had a meeting today that I was two minutes late for. And I was like, I am so sorry. And she was like our meeting was at one. And I Was like, yes, one Oh two. And she Was like oh, no big deal. And I I was, it is though it is, it didn't

0:03:27 Thomas: Oh yeah that is part of

0:03:53 Tom: You're like, you should be mad at me. You should be a little put out. I at least don't get croissants, right?

0:03:59 Eli: Have to be big. I just needed to acknowledge that this is not the time we agreed on to meet important

0:04:04 Tom: Okay, but for ADHD people people in your life I mean because I just lie about what time stuff is that's the easiest way to do it

0:04:09 Thomas: It no that's the dumbest

0:04:10 Eli: Important stuff, I lie to them because here's the thing. If you try lying to them, right, they will make up their own times. They'll be like, well, he said three,

0:04:11 Tom: Yeah I just

0:04:11 Thomas: Thing I've ever heard in my life the minute you lose credibility they'll never be on time again for anything yeah yeah yeah can't do

0:04:22 Eli: So four. So I will only do lies for really important stuff. For my buddy Jason, who I adore, who is chronically late because of his ADHD, we told him to get to my friend's wedding two hours early. It was at three, and we were like, yep, we're getting there at one. He got there at 1258. and texted us and was like, hey fellas. And I was like ah, bad news man.

0:04:49 Eli: They got married along the West Side Highway in New York City and there's this hockey rink activity center that also has this gorgeous little nook that is a beautiful wedding venue where my friend got married. He was there so early, youth hockey practice was still happening and he just watched it and they were like which kid do you know? And he was like I'm just Just wearing a tux and watching children play hockey.

0:05:10 Thomas: Nice yeah in a really nice suit yeah

0:05:13 Tom: Just late a lot and they just tell me shit like hayley lies to herself about what type stuff is so she'll put stuff in her phone into her calendar and she'll purposely just put it in at like an earlier amount of time and she doesn't choose the same amount of time every time so she can't like automatically like auto correct herself 15 minutes or what have you yeah

0:05:25 Thomas: Man that's so interesting because that would not work on me at all like I always would remember exactly what I did I don't yeah that's yeah man interesting

0:05:38 Tom: See that's the difference yeah she doesn't remember it at all so like she's just like well it's somewhere around that time and I'll just tell her like oh yeah we got to leave what I do for the kids in the house and hailey too is I don't tell them this has actually worked really really well for adhd people because everybody in my house has it but me is I never tell people what time we have to be somewhere ever that'sthe worst that's just nonsense it's what I've discovered is that's that's noise that you made with your face that doesn't actually have any impact on their lives

0:06:07 Eli: Right, right. They check their phone at 9 p .m. on a Monday night and go, all right, well, it takes eight minutes to get there. I'm going to drive a little fast, so three minutes. Yeah. Ooh.

0:06:17 Tom: I tell everybody what time we have to walk out the door that is actually meaningful and then I just lie about it a little bit and I by lie I mean like I hedge for traffic or hedge for like you know we're gonna have to get there and like because what a lot of people ADHD will do is they'll leave it exactly the right amount of time if everything goes perfect Yeah, that's

0:06:18 Thomas: Thing yeah

0:06:37 Eli: Yep, that's exactly what they do. It's the shortest amount of time anything ever took.

0:06:35 Thomas: Yep that's exactly right yep that becomes the new amount of time so

0:06:43 Tom: It. And so like we've had to go to like a lot of doctor's appointments for Haley and a lot of the appointments we go to are like in the city. So it's not like we just drive and then we arrive and we're at the doctor's office. It's if it's in Chicago, you got to get to the parking garage, which might be a block or two away. You got to wind around eight or 10 floors of the parking garage to find parking that can easily take 20 minutes. Then you got a walk down the concourse and get to this special magic elevator that connects to the other elevator. You've got got to build in time to get from I arrived with my car to I arrived with my body people with adhd can't do that

0:07:18 Thomas: Weird yeah no I I picture I'm gonna drive in with my car through the front door of something and then that counts that's it I will say that's what really gets me like the the things like I all right, man, I'm doing my best to stay within, you know, a few minutes as much as I can to everything except when something takes too, like longer than expected to get from like the parking or the arrived at the place physically with your car to the inside the place. That's where I'm fucked. That's where the whole system breaks down. There's no, there's no way.

0:07:24 Tom: Yes yes well

0:07:36 Eli: Insane.

0:07:51 Tom: One other thing I noticed with people with ADHD which makes me laugh is that they like seem like opposed at a visceral principle level to the idea of getting ready early and then doing the waiting what they'll do is wait to get ready

0:08:07 Thomas: I don't know what it is I wish it could be fixed I really do

0:08:09 Tom: I've never met anybody that won't do that like it's like if you've got to like shower and get dressed and like look nice to get out the door it's okay well I got to start that process at two o 'clock to leave at three o'clock and you'll be like well it's noon you could just do all that now and then just do your waiting and it's no that is an that is a crazy thing to say a crazy things to say yeah

0:08:25 Thomas: Dear god no it it first off it is yes secondly I totally agree with that observation and if someone could fix that I would gladly go under the knife for that if somebody could just like take that out of my brain I don't know what is

0:08:43 Eli: Do you actually know what works? Can I tell you guys a little secret? If you're a pretty calm person, Have you ever screamed at someone with ADHD?

0:08:52 Eli: It fucking works, man, because their emotional attention is incredibly acute. It's why they overreact when they're late to stuff, which you'd think would be the opposite, right? You'd think they'd show up and be like, what up, skibbity Ohio? Guess I'm 15 minutes late again. But they show up like panting and covered in their own blood because they're super upset. If you scream at them 10 minutes before it's time to leave with your full voice sussy, they'll get right out the door. It's interesting because they really, they are making a solid argument. And, again, you're like, oh, my God, Elias, it's terrible. I would never. Try it once.

0:09:24 Eli: Try yelling at the ADHD person with your whole voice sussy once in your life. Watch how well it works and realize that all the gentle parenting, all the stuff you've taught about, like, make ableism and making space for people with different neurodiversity, it was all bullshit. All you needed to go was, hey, get your fucking shit on. That was it.

0:09:44 Thomas: It's true yeah it sucks yeah no that's true

0:09:46 Eli: That's all you had to do for a thousand years.

0:09:46 Tom: Well, you do have to create like emergency. Yeah. Like if you can create like some. Yeah. It does gather the attention differently.

0:09:55 Thomas: It is about the stakes like that's why we that's why ADHD people are good in an emergency actually because that's when we're like oh thank god I can focus dude when something when a bomb lands on when my dad was like dying and had to go to the hospital. I was just like, all right, let's fucking do it. I'll carry him there.

0:10:02 Tom: Yeah. Right. Locks you in. Locks You In.

0:10:02 Eli: Oh, thank God. Everyone's behaving the way I am.

0:10:10 Thomas: In the rural place we were, we had to like load his body ourselves. It was like, I was like yeah, I'm fine. We're good. Yeah.

0:10:10 Eli: Yeah, that's good. Oh, this is great. Yeah. I'll get the legs. You get the head. It's over there by the couch.

0:10:22 Thomas: I remember for some reason, my brother who also has ADHD, but for some reasons he was always really impressed. I didn't even, he said something later. He's like, yeah, it was weird. You just like did everything and we're fine. And I still was like yeah, I don't understand. I don't like, I dont understand what would be different about it's really weird I yeah yeah when you're always screaming at yourself it doesn't matter if someone

0:10:37 Eli: Yeah I've been in a constant state of trauma since birth. It just it's been screaming all the time. Yeah

0:10:46 Thomas: Else is screaming at you too dear

0:10:48 Eli: All right gentlemen do you know the only thing worse than not being able to scream at the ADHD people in your life even though you You know it's tantalizingly waiting on the other side of victory. Why? It's the auto ads. The auto ads, they're bad. You want them away. We want them away. So give us a dollar over at patreon .com forward slash dear old dads. You'll get a commercial free extended version of every single show plus bonus episodes, monthly bonus episodes on the stroke of midnight every single month. I mean, some stroke of Midnight. Look, they are eventually, eventually someone strokes Midnight and we have bonus episodes, and that's all you need to know.

0:10:48 Thomas: Old debt no I'm just gonna end the show a couple minutes after the month it's a conversion factor a couple of minutes is to an hour what the time the day that we get the bonus out is to the month something like

0:11:34 Eli: Yeah, it's that old apologetic how time stretches and so the universe actually did take seven days. That's how our bonus episodes work, and you can get all of that over at patreon .com forward slash dear old dads. Like your voice, through an ADHD delay of getting into the car, rip into it.

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0:12:01 Tom: All right so we're gonna grab this topic ripped from the headlines about headlines we mean uh the facebook dads group so there was some conversation rather spirited back and forth that I saw that I wanted to chit chat with you guys about about whether or not it's okay to charge your kids your adult kids 18 in this case rent and very specifically whether it's Okay to charge them in this case market prices for rent and I I think there's like kind of a bunch of questions that are sort of interesting in there I'm curious first if you guys ever I know you didn't eli is a stupid question did you ever get charged rent thomas when you were living with your folks did you live with your folks as an adult person as a technically adult person

0:12:44 Thomas: No remember my uh my dad always made it clear that the minute I wasn't in college then I couldn't live there like or if I had a job I think I could have lived there for like a second but it was it was always like yeah well it was like it was summer after I graduate college it was clear like actively you have to be getting the fuck out of here and getting a job now kind of thing and I I fortunately got a job pretty quickly so I never had to figure that out but uh no yeah it was never charged rent just

0:12:57 Tom: For yeah while your resume was was being updated or whatever. They just weren't able to stay.

0:13:18 Thomas: Wasn't couldn't stay there so it was like any other building really just

0:13:24 Tom: I'm sorry, there's no units for lease. There's nothing available. Like, I know this is available.

0:13:24 Thomas: That yeah I tried to stay in like a safe way

0:13:27 Eli: I just got a ticket from my dad for Malink. No,

0:13:30 Tom: I live here now. Yeah, the other tenants have already seen it.

0:13:30 Thomas: And the safe way was like you can't stay here and you can't pay rent. Like neither.

0:13:37 Tom: Eli, I assume you've never paid any money to anybody for anything, ever.

0:13:40 Eli: My parents have paid my rent multiple times. Multiple times throughout my life I have turned to my family and said hey you know that thing about being an adult where you need to pay to live and they've gone yes and I've gone I don't spend it all on treats and they went okay will you stop and I was like maybe after a few more times and they paid my rent for a little while okay

0:13:45 Thomas: Oh my God. Oh wow. Oh boy.

0:14:08 Tom: Oh, my God. So I think for me, just start off with the basic question. Is it okay to charge your adult kids rent at market prices? I would say it depends for me very strongly on the age. If we're looking at a technically legal adult, where somebody is 18, 19, 20, in that range, my answer is the hardest possible no imaginable, unless the family needs the money to survive. Right. So let's set that off to the side. If the family is an all hands on deck financial distress, then I think that that changes the entire equation. Right. If a family is in all hands -on -deck financial distress. Then I think it's like, all right, everybody's got to pitch in. Everybody's got a throw into the kitty. We'll figure it out together as a team. I think, that that's fine.

0:14:55 Eli: But here's my problem right if there's a scenario where the family's in dire need we don't need to phrase that as rent we can come to our families and say hey our family is in dire needs will you please kick in as much as possible so that we can get through this together and your child who loves you says yes because you've done a good job fucking going round about it being like uh hey yeah you know what I realized I loaned you that That pencil is a second grader and the juice has been running. Please help me out of my financial desperation. Now, let me say this. Sell a couple of holes before you charge your kids rent.

0:15:05 Thomas: Good point.

0:15:27 Tom: Jesus Christ.

0:15:33 Eli: Like, truly, I would rather call most of my casual acquaintances, who I don't care about my continual relationship with, and be like, you ever wanted to fuck me real hard? Like, real hard so hard it hurt me? Oh, I got good news. 80 bucks.

0:15:44 Thomas: I keep waiting for the call. I keep waiting for this call.

0:15:48 Tom: 80 bucks. Whoa.

0:15:49 Thomas: Jeez. I can't afford not to.

0:15:48 Eli: Bucks all all the boss but you can pound well to be fair I'm calling everybody literally everybody time I'm I'm going wide not narrow I'm sure

0:16:00 Thomas: That's what he said about his hole

0:16:00 Eli: I'm Sure a handsome fellow like you could just charge out the wazoo but I'm here to make a lot of money very quickly you know what I'm saying I come from toy stores Tom not real estate I would genuinely I mean this maybe if you're a monago it's different but if I if I'm also you because you can't care about monogamy if you're in financial desperation right you can'T be like put magic right you have to press time out on whatever thing you believe until you're safe is the

0:16:02 Thomas: Too yeah that's true that's the law but magic I fully co -sign and agree with all of

0:16:31 Eli: Rule and I would sell my holes before I charged my kid rent I might let them know like hey I know you live here still and that's you know you're getting on your feet just so you know, a series of men are going to get off that bus stop and you're going to think your mother and I are having a party. And in a way we are, but it's, it's more of a party of one situation. Now, do you know about Bonnie blue? Okay. You do. Okay, good. Then this is going to be a lot easier to explain for daddy. You don't know about Bonnie blue is Tom doing a sarcastic description of porn, right?

0:16:45 Thomas: This what

0:16:55 Tom: No

0:17:01 Thomas: I don't know what that is what what is it what I miss

0:17:14 Eli: So for those of you who don't know, Tom's a porn crazy person and he's like, it's coming for your blood cells. Yeah. And so, and Bonnie blue is a person proving Tom, right. Right. She's just constantly endangering her body and the body of others and everything about it is sketchy. And the consent is obviously not there for anything and everything that she does she's famous for doing these like hundreds of people sometimes a thousand person gang

0:17:18 Thomas: He's still on that Oh,

0:17:20 Tom: I've never had an issue with porn in general it's an issue with tube sites specifically tube sites

0:17:46 Thomas: I think I saw a headline of this.

0:17:46 Eli: Bangs yeah yeah and it's just it's horrible and terrible and that's what I would do rather than charge my kid rent

0:17:53 Thomas: I think for me, we could three bears it. For me, it would depend on like what their job situation was. If my kid was like loaded, I'd be like, well, yeah.

0:18:00 Eli: Jeff bezos well can I say if your kid's loaded and you're in financial straits you've done something terribly wrong

0:18:08 Thomas: Yeah. Or I haven't told them yet. Maybe I haven't told them yet, you know,

0:18:09 Tom: Or something terribly right maybe if yeah I don't know man but like you know you've sacrificed a lot of your own personal happiness and financial well -being to make your kids successful and you know I can see that being a thing no

0:18:23 Thomas: But they're still living with you.

0:18:26 Tom: I mean look I would not be even remotely surprised if Aislinn doesn't ever want to be fully independent and happily lives with us forever. I don't think she really, that's not a drive that she has as a person yet. She's 15. I would not be surprised if that's a drive. That just doesn't develop for her. She is very happy, just, you know, comfortably relying on and being with other people and not having or needing like full independence or full autonomy.

0:18:34 Thomas: Man how would you deal with that tom

0:18:56 Tom: I wouldn't mind at all. If, yeah, if Aislinn wanted If she wanted to live here forever, I wouldn't mind at all as long as she doesn't live here as a 15-year-old forever.

0:19:05 Thomas: Really you're required to grow okay yeah yeah

0:19:09 Eli: Yeah good news based on the time dimension

0:19:10 Tom: Well, I think she's done growing, but I think she would need to start behaving when she became an adult as an adult that was an adult partner in the house, right? That had similar responsibilities if she's going to live live here yeah I mean if she's 30 that's what I was trying to distinguish in the beginning I think there's a huge difference between somebody who's 18 or 19 and doesn't have fuck all in the world and doesn'T really have any like real earning power yet etc and somebody who'S like living at home because that's just what they would like to do and everybody'S okay with it and like one of the things that I've seized on I've seen this I'm sure you guys have too is this I think completely insane idea that because people become legal adults at 18 that we treat them in our families like actual adults yeah

0:19:21 Thomas: Yeah paid rent yeah yeah yeah you'll see those idiotic like insane posts that are like 18th birthday morning of I threw all their stuff to the sidewalk and then I sat here and you're like okay this fucking yeah yeah

0:20:08 Eli: Then they're like why don't my kids visit me

0:20:11 Tom: Really like any consideration at all in my opinion that like somebody has reached the age of 18 and now they are an adult that's insane there's actually no reason to think that like there's not a reason that anybody would have to think that except for that the law needs to have a time where somebody is allowed to join the military and die like that's what that's based on it literally moved from 21 to 18 and during world war ii in order to create more conscripts that's a false idea yeah

0:20:41 Eli: Need more dead people too few dead people the other thing is like there's a difference between what you hope for from your family and what you enforce I hope my son isn't 40 and living in my basement but if he wants to live in my basement at 40 is he going to absolutely now tom can I offer you some hope on the Aislinn front, though. Now, I have a sample size of exactly one, but that feeling of, like, I don't think she's ever going to want to leave, was exactly how me and my parents felt about my sister

0:21:04 Tom: Sure well I I kind of hope she stays but

0:21:15 Eli: Up until she was like 16. And then Mother Nature descended from heaven, and one night while we were all asleep, she leaned down and whispered in my sister's ears, these motherfuckers don't know shit. And indeed we did not. For the next three and a half years. And she could not wait. This cute little kid who just wanted to hang out and redecorate her room. And oh my God, she can't wait to go to the ice cream parlor with her friends. All she could talk about was getting out, getting on the road, getting away from us.

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0:21:56 Tom: I actually kind of hoped that aislinn sticks around I think she would be a perfectly pleasant person to have just in our house.

0:22:04 Eli: Aim high, aim high, Tom.

0:22:04 Tom: Like, I'm not like, you gotta go. I don't feel that way. Like you gotta fucking go. But my rule for me, my rule has always been one. I mean, I have to be able to financially support you. Right. So that is a real thing that may not exist forever. So that's, that's true. But as long as I can financially support the kids, like my rule has always been like, You've got to be working on yourself. So, that means you've got to be going to school or you've gotta be working. Like I won't let the kids work here if they just want to like hang out and play fucking minecraft right that's not a thing as long as they're actively looking sure man come on by come on bye I don't buy into this idea of charging kids like especially like young adults I'm putting that in fucking hard air quotes rent as a way of teaching them that this is how the world works

0:22:08 Thomas: Chill yeah can I hang out and play minecraft at your house yes I'll pay rent yeah

0:22:53 Tom: I've seen that like oh yeah I gotta learn some way like the world will give them lots of opportunities to learn where you you don't enrich yourself.

0:23:00 Eli: You just wander into your kid's room with a knife and a ski mask. There's a lot of robbers out in the real world. Gotta make sure he's ready. He's 10 now. Yeah.

0:23:09 Tom: I've seen people say like, I would not otherwise be in this house. I wouldn't have a house this size. Like if I didn't have these kids and I read that and I'm like, yeah, but again, like it's a false idea that 18 is a magic number that like you were happy to support them in a house, this size when they were 17. And then 366 days later, you're like, I really can't afford to live here anymore. Like I don't buy it. Like I'm not going to live in here. I don't buy it.

0:23:33 Eli: Sell your hole. Well, again, if it's, I can't afford to live here, sell your holes. If it's I'd prefer not to your priorities are so screwed. Like I can, we're not going to have a conversation if I'm like, Hey, it seems like your young adult child is not yet ready to venture out into the world and putting a financial burden on them. We'll begin the poverty cycle that could suck them in for the rest of their lives. And you're like, I'm more of a, a one bedroom guy.

0:24:00 Eli: I mean, like we have nothing in common. We don't share any values. I'm going to start like naming things from TV shows and be like, you remember when Homer Simpson stopped choking Bart? Just nod if you have any emotional connection.

0:24:11 Thomas: I wonder how I'd feel because on one hand, I had the thought that you were saying, Tom, where I'm like, man, I would actually love to have the kids at home. I'm sure I'm going to miss them if they ever leave. And then I realized like, I do wonder, and this is what I'm curious about with you, Tom. I do wonder if I would be able to take it in terms of just like, like I can't sit around and see someone being, I don't want to, I don't know how else to put it, but like being lazy in a certain way. I don't mean like minute to minute. I have no problem with like my parents use, if we were just sitting at any time, they'd just be mad at us for or not, I don't know, doing something. Yeah, exactly. It's not that, but like just life -wise, I don'T mean like on a micro level, but if they were like not getting a job, not trying to find a job and they were just lazing around, it would

0:24:51 Tom: You got time to lean you got time to clean move it Smith oh yeah

0:25:04 Thomas: Fundamentally bother me to my core to an unhealthy degree. And I'd have to be like, God, I'm really turning into a dad from the fifties for some reason that I still have internally. Like when I, like, I still get that when I they're too young now so it's not it's not like a huge deal but when I need to have them do any sort of chore at all like hey you just made a giant mess can you clean up one one hundredth of it while I do the rest and then they're like I like I lose my mind for a second because I'm like I should be killing you right now like nature wants me to be so upset I haven't figured that out because I'm just pausing it till they're older

0:25:07 Tom: 100 % oh same yeah

0:25:42 Thomas: You know I'm just kind of like all right this is my young kids gotta be chill but I don't know how, hopefully they get better. I don't know.

0:25:49 Tom: When my kids were younger they were not and they're still not and they're not all the same either like interested in helping out around the house Donovan incredibly helpful but we've set up a sort of expectation that if he's helping out round the house in anything substantive, I usually pay him a little extra allowance for it. Hey, if you're going to give me a hand for an hour with this thing, I'm going to pay you 20 bucks or whatever. So there's kind of a give and take there. That said, if I asked him to do something without paying him, he would do it. Same thing with Finn. Finn has to be reminded more often than Donovan to do like his household chores, but he happily does them. He just fucking forgets all the time. So all the kids are a little bit different, but like I am very hard if the kids are working, looking for work, or going to school, they're all welcome to stay here. They're all absolutely welcome to say here. If they're not doing those things, they are welcome to leave. I am right there with you, Thomas. I am not interested in supporting people who are not trying to move their lives forward. That's not going to happen. I wouldn't do that for a second. Go to college. That is great. Awesome. Go to a trade school. Awesome, terrific. Go go to grad school. Hey, that's probably not a good idea

0:27:00 Tom: In today's economy, but like work on yourself and you can stay here.

0:27:05 Thomas: I agree with that. Yeah.

0:27:05 Tom: But yeah, if you're just like sitting around on your ass, like you can sit around your ass somewhere else. Like you're not doing that here. Cause then I do think there's a life lesson involved. Then I do think there's something that's worth pushing.

0:27:00 Eli: Think if someone's in sit on their ass mode, they are in all likelihood, not necessarily a hundred percent of the time in likelihood in pretty deep mental health crisis and the work that they need to do. I don't think there's a gumption button.

0:27:27 Tom: No, I don't think so.

0:27:27 Thomas: I don't know about that. Well, I don't think it's gumption, but I do think that people just adapt to their environments. And if a kid is raised thinking they can always just do whatever and never have to pay for anything, they will just do that.

0:27:46 Eli: But no, I was raised that way.

0:27:46 Thomas: And it's not about teaching them a lesson in a tough parenting way. It's literally just changing the circumstances so that like, okay, now you do have to like figure something out for yourself and then they will.

0:27:58 Eli: Or else, are they starve or they're on the street? Like, because the problem is you can't set those boundaries unless you're willing to enforce them. And if your kid's like, okay, well, I'm not getting a job. I don't have any apartment things. So you said I have to be out next week. Next week, I'll be unhoused. Do you stick with that?

0:28:12 Thomas: Oh yeah. If I had a kid who did that, then yes, they're already kicked out. If I had a kid, who was holding me hostage emotionally by being like, well, I'm not getting a job. What are you going to do? Kick me out. I'd be like, yeah, absolutely. I will kick you out. If someone literally said, if a kid literally said that to me, if they were like trying and like, ah, I haven't found anything. I'd be like, oh yeah, that's fine. But if they literally said what you just said, I would have kicked him out a long time ago.

0:28:34 Eli: I just think that's a person in mental health crisis.

0:28:36 Tom: Oh, I don't think necessarily.

0:28:37 Thomas: I don't know.

0:28:38 Tom: So I, I mean, genuinely, I think I have met and encountered people who do not exhibit any outward signs of a mental health crisis and are just fucking not real motivated people and if somebody is willing to meet their needs for them they are perfectly happy to let somebody else meet their need and if you want to be the person that meets their needs then like fine no no shade no judgment I'm saying this is prescriptive but here in my house like I'll meet your needs as long as you're working toward a goal that's great awesome I'll do that as long I'm able to do that and I'll give you an example like I had my first job out of college. I worked for a company called Market Star and I was a sales rep. I was an outside sales rep. And that company was based out of Ogden, Utah. And I was in the Chicago area. And it was a work from home job in the year 2000, 2001. That was very early to have a work-from-home.

0:29:28 Eli: He just called people to tell them that the plane hit the second tower.

0:29:34 Tom: So I was supposed to drive around and meet with people and sell them shit and do this thing. But what I mostly did was sit on my ass as a 22-year-old kid in my apartment, apartment, sit on my ass and play Civilization V or some shit. Then I would look up and it'd be three o 'clock and I would not have showered. And I'd be like, oh shit, I fucking wasted my day and didn't do any work. And I did that for like six or seven weeks. Yeah, I did it for six or seven weeks and I realized like I'm not cut out to be a work from home guy. I don't have the discipline necessary to do this. And I found a job that I had to attend because I just recognized that I didn't have the discipline to do it. And I was going to be I was ultimately going to fail at the job. And I was a very motivated person, but I think under the right circumstances, if somebody else is meeting all your needs, in this case, I was getting a check because

0:29:34 Thomas: Wait, this is you we're talking about? Huh. Wow.

0:30:21 Tom: I had a subsidy check. So like I was getting a check, it met my bills, nobody was standing over my shoulder. And it was real tempting to just kind of do nothing for a while. And as a young person, I think a lot of people can be real tempted to just kind of do nothing. And we have to create some kind of external pressures to get people to sort of like move forward. When I think about like teenagers, almost all the pressures in their lives to be driven to the next thing are all external pressures. And I think it's a weird thing that like all of a sudden we pull all those externalities away from kids when they graduate. And then we ask them to suddenly develop internal motivating pressures. Right. And there's a lot of people that really, really, really struggle with that. So I think it's entirely fair as a parent to say like, hey, I will create, I will be the person who provides that externality and provide some of that like motivating force. Cause it seems weird to just be like, yeah, well, you know, one day it's just different and we, there's no transitional period at all.

0:31:27 Ad: [Ad break 3 — ad music]

0:31:29 Thomas: I'm trying to figure, I wish I had a good idea for why. I think we've talked about this before, but it's been a while. Like there are aspects of me, believe it or not, that I do think are good. Like a couple. And I think that like one of them is that there's never been a question. I was just going to get done what needed to be done in terms of a living of whatever like that was all I've never had this problem and I don't know if that comes from a good place or a bad place you know like I don'T know if THAT'S like the toxic independence of my upbringing or that kind of thing or or if there's some healthy way to do that you know what I mean like I DON'T KNOW I genuinely DON'T know I do know that like the feelings I have of not relying on my parents for anything do also mean that I'm not relying on them for anything. I am not, not even like talking to them, not, you know, like it does mean I don't feel any need to really interact with them like

0:32:25 Thomas: Past a certain age. And that, that's probably not something I want for my kids, you know? But I don't know if that's definitely tied together or if part of that is also like they turn, we're Trumpers and stuff and I just don't give a shit about it. You know what I mean?

0:32:25 Eli: Well, I was completely spoiled, right? Like I said, and I also have that driving motivation.

0:32:40 Thomas: Like, that's true.

0:32:43 Tom: Do you think that the desire to be independent is a natural desire of all people then

0:32:51 Eli: I think once you live without fear, motivation sort of naturally comes. And I don't want to act like this is a scientific opinion because it's truly just my take. But I think about like what they've found through UBI experiments, right. Right. When they do UBI experiments, for the most part, virtually nobody just sits around and takes their check. Everybody goes back to school, does a thing, starts a business, starts volunteering, does a thing like fear tends to not motivate people. I think comfort and safety motivate people to make those decisions. So my suspicion is that most of the people who we think are lazy, who are just like happy to sit and veg, are in fact paralyzed by fear.

0:33:44 Eli: Fear of failure, fear of success a lot of the time.

0:33:42 Tom: Fear of what oh no

0:33:42 Thomas: I could see some amount of that. I could say some amount of that, OK?

0:33:49 Eli: I have several people on my let me say this I have had truly a dozen people in my life who have from all external circumstance seemed like monumentally lazy underperforming pieces of shit who really took

0:34:05 Thomas: No, I'm just kidding. Yeah.

0:34:06 Tom: That feels a little rude right

0:34:06 Eli: Advantage of everybody in their lives and then when their wife got a surgery they were like we have to work out the schedule and it was like you miss the show all the time, man. Just go. No, I'm kidding.

0:34:20 Thomas: I was so genuinely far from my mind that Tom would be depicted as lazy that I was like trying to figure out how this was someone else. Like I was, like, what? Mr. Show. Is he talking about a magic show?

0:34:26 Eli: Yeah. Let's do it for fun. Yeah. Magic.

0:34:34 Thomas: And they did the voice and then it kicked in.

0:34:34 Tom: Here that was it yeah that was

0:34:36 Thomas: You know right

0:34:37 Eli: But there have been people like that. And then things have come along in their life that have made that fear better. Where they have found a thing they care about. A really good example of this is I had a buddy who had like a just barely stay alive job. Have you ever known someone who has this? They're always like two days behind on rent, but only two. Right? And they cannot afford anything. And then he met his now wife and instantly just like like a man was there she was like alright I'll see you Friday at 7 and he was like I gotta get a 401k like I think everyone has a different cue as opposed to fear I've never seen fear be a good

0:35:09 Thomas: Yeah that's part of it for

0:35:17 Eli: Motivator like no one's ever had the like the awesome kicked into them sure

0:35:19 Tom: It yeah the awesome yeah I don't know like I you it would be entirely reasonable I think it would Be entirely reasonable to argue like that perhaps in the case that you just described he was afraid he was going to lose this girl if he didn't show that he wasn't a lazy piece of shit right so to back away from the lazy thing like to like I think of like Aislinn again like as an example like she's the furthest this thing from Lazy. I strongly suspect she'll go on to school, like a very, very good four -year school. She wants to be a physician's assistant. She's an all. I think she's going to stay more local, but not nursing. She is going to be physician's assistants.

0:35:24 Thomas: Yeah how hard have you kidnaped interesting interesting

0:35:36 Eli: Possible maybe Montclair State University one of the nicest nurses nursing programs in the country it was the same thing I mean

0:35:59 Tom: It's entirely different. It's not even close. Anyway, she will very likely be very successful financially and in her career. She's very successful in school, but I don't think she has any desire to be independent. And I think those are two different things. And I think it's okay. Like I genuinely, like, I think it's Okay, if she decides to stay with us, and work, and she's a physician's assistant, and she's successful, and she's putting away money, and She's do it like and she wants to live with us. That's great. I would expect her to live with us as an adult. But only once she reaches like a real and actual adult age with adult finances and adult maturity and adult, you know, like not just some randomly decided legal age so we can ship kids off to the fucking war you know and it's fucking weird to me when

0:36:14 Thomas: You bigot interesting yeah yeah

0:36:48 Tom: People do that because what I think is actually happening is they just want to kick their fucking kid out or they just Want another economic engine in the boat or they have weird ideas that have been instilled in them about what adulthood means and how it can start like overnight and I just like it it all sort of like is this cloudy fucking mess that none of it feels like it's any good for the kid you know what I mean like at all I think about like the other kids that are maybe less motivated in my house like azan is very much the most motivated by far donovan a close second finn is happy to do whatever we tell him to do like if we tell them to go do something he's happy to go to it he doesn't have like a strong internal motivation but he'll go do whatever he's pointed at I can see a world where if all of finn's needs were met and there were no no external pushes that he would just be like, yeah, I fucking played Terraria today and I talked to my buddies and I worked out a little bit and ate some food and it was a great day and that's it. Like it was great day. Awesome. Yeah.

0:37:52 Eli: That does sound like a pretty sweet day okay

0:37:54 Thomas: Can I do that

0:37:54 Tom: Right. That's what I'm saying though. It's like, and that I think is the problem, right? Is that like for some people that drive for independence, that drive to sort of like build something that is entirely separate and entirely their own. I do has not always existed and we sort of have normalized this idea of perfect personal independence in a way that like the rest of the world doesn't even have and then we're like well why aren't they like getting out of the house and getting a good job and doing all these things you know like well it's because like you know historically that's not been how the world has worked and it still isn't in many cultures so like I wonder like which is the aberration too

0:38:36 Thomas: Or yeah yeah I also think it's funny that since I'm in my line of work I don't know if you lie if you would have this probably not because you're hashtag fig life but part of me would be like well you at least got to start a fucking podcast like then you can at least say you're doing something that could lead to it's exactly like no genuinely I'd be like do a stream do something that's like could be something thing. Whoa, we're

0:38:51 Eli: Play terraria on twitch I don't fucking come on you're the you're if the fininator I look I got you fininator 9000 on twitch and just say some racist shit just say

0:39:07 Thomas: So rich. Holy shit. We're loaded now. Yeah. What the hell? I heard this like chime sound, you know, like that little sign and everything. Yeah, at least

0:39:08 Eli: It oh my god I live in a mansion how many five millions of followers on tiktok

0:39:10 Tom: And like, I want to be clear, too, like, like just so he doesn't because I know Finn listens to the show. Like, I know that Finn wants his own place someday. So he actually wants a certain level of independence as like a long term goal. I just understand that, like there's a big difference between wanting something as a longterm goal and understanding how to like do all the steps it takes to get there, you know, and like just sort of no, that is not true. I'm just saying, like, that's that's that transitional thing that I think we're responsible for, that I think just being like, yeah, you got to pay me market rates like I don't know. That's how it works out here. Let's see. A room for rent is twelve hundred bucks. You owe me twelve hundred bucks, figure it out.

0:39:41 Eli: And that's what your dad doesn't think you could do finn in case you're wondering that's what he's saying okay so that was the other thing that I wanted to point out is that I think the capitalist system of how to live is so broken that we also have to acknowledge that right so like Like, right, the concept of living in your own house after you leave is 70

0:40:08 Thomas: Give your kids some subsidized housing. Like doesn't have to.

0:40:16 Eli: Years old? 80 years old, right? And impossible in today's economy, right. It used to be that like everyone just lived in like, and I'm not talking like ancient times.

0:40:17 Tom: You know, that's impossible.

0:40:28 Eli: I'm talking like 150 years ago. You lived in the town with your family in the family house on the family land, right. The notion that you were going to go out and buy an entirely separate piece of property from strangers miles and miles, hours and hours away from your family. It's just a very, very new concept. And so it's a very weird standard to be like, well, that's the way of the world. And especially where it's like market. What do you mean market? Market rate where we've been resisting a housing crash since fucking 2012. I don't know what that means when the market itself is the fantasy, the Monopoly man. Like if you zoom into the dream, the monopoly man is having on a giant pile of gold. That's our housing market. So, right. Yeah.

0:41:18 Thomas: Also, they wouldn't rent something like your house you know market rate like it better at least be adjusted for like well you would get like a studio apartment so maybe that amount or something yeah

0:41:28 Tom: Or like if you were subletting a room in your house, that would actually be the market rate. Right. Not like an apartment, but it'd be like, if I was subletting a room where I live, what would that subletted room run but it's like why I like the question I ask is like why do I need to do that like what is it is it because I need it because like I have to secure that money myself or is it yeah like in my case definitely not right or is het like am I trying to teach some life lesson or is it in some ways this weird punitively capitalistic kind of like reaction to the world I think it's the third one to a large degree right where you're just like yeah I mean 18 is is is the age and we can fuck them we can kick them out we can send them to the military it's like it's a magic moment where like all of a sudden you've become an adult well we can't yeah all right that's true but

0:41:32 Thomas: Definitely

0:41:53 Eli: Sell your holes.

0:42:17 Thomas: I don't think you can fuck your own kids tom I'm pretty sure they have some files about that no I'm just

0:42:25 Eli: Oh, that's a great question. No, because look, that is an important part of life is that sometimes you are a little short on rent And the landlord comes around. And you make it worth his while to give you a free...

0:42:31 Thomas: Kidding what

0:42:39 Tom: Oh my god I don't

0:42:39 Eli: Aren't you doing it... Wait, let me be very clear. Everyone's male in this scenario, so it's still funny.

0:42:39 Thomas: Is happening

0:42:45 Tom: Know oh my God no no no I hope you're not okay

0:42:46 Eli: Um, A. B, now it's Tom and his son, which is even funnier. So everyone relax. Finn, I hope you're listening. All right, gentlemen. Before we go, what do you call a bra that you can't take off? A booby trap.

0:42:57 Clip: Dear old dad

0:43:11 Thomas: I keep

0:43:13 Tom: I like that one that was pretty good

0:43:59 Eli: Rep you ever wanted to fuck me real hard like real hard so hard it hurt me oh I got good news I done spent it all on treats

0:44:03 Thomas: Waiting for the call I keep waiting for this call I don't think you can fuck your own kids tom I I'm pretty sure

0:44:14 Eli: Sell a couple of holes before you charge your kids right