Latest / The Steve Harvey Morning Show / Overcoming the Odds: A deeply personal exploration of fatherhood, addiction, and resiliency from Craig Melvin, news anchor of NBC’s Today show.

Transcript

Overcoming the Odds: A deeply personal exploration of fatherhood, addiction, and resiliency from Craig Melvin, news anchor of NBC’s Today show. · The Steve Harvey Morning Show

0:00
Speaker 1: If you're about to make a change in your life
0:03
Speaker 1: and you feel uncomfortable, that's the best feeling you can have.
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Speaker 2: Because for the first time in your life, you'll make
0:10
Speaker 2: a new decision that's going to be best for you
0:13
Speaker 2: and not what somebody told you to do. And that's
0:16
Speaker 2: when all bets are off.
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Speaker 1: Welcome to Money Making Conversation Masterclass. I'm your host, Rashwan MacDonald.
0:22
Speaker 2: Our theme is.
0:22
Speaker 1: There's no perfect time to start following your dreams. I
0:25
Speaker 1: recognize that we all have different definitions of success. For
0:28
Speaker 1: you and maybe the side of your HM, it's time
0:31
Speaker 1: to stop reading other people's success stories to start living
0:34
Speaker 1: your own keep winning. My next guest is Craig Melvin.
0:41
Speaker 1: He's the co host of The Today's Show and the
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Speaker 1: author of the book Pops Learning to Be a Son
0:46
Speaker 1: and a Father. You may know craigge and the ward
0:49
Speaker 1: winning news anchor. As I said earlier on The Today Show.
0:52
Speaker 1: You also have seen him on MSNBC Live and a
0:54
Speaker 1: host of Dayline. He's on the show discussed his book,
0:57
Speaker 1: Pops Learning to Be a Son and the Father.
0:59
Speaker 2: It's the story of all the father figures.
1:01
Speaker 1: In Crigg's life and that includes inspiring men from his
1:04
Speaker 1: program or his series called Dad's Got this series on.
1:09
Speaker 2: NBC News Today.
1:10
Speaker 1: These experiences and encounters of shapes Crig's understanding of his
1:13
Speaker 1: own role as a dad. And I'm sure I can
1:15
Speaker 1: be related. We have a nice conversation. He has two
1:18
Speaker 1: young children. Please welcome the money making conversation, my man,
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Speaker 1: Craig Milvin.
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Speaker 3: How you doing, Craig Sean, I'm well, I'm well. Thank
1:25
Speaker 3: you so much for having me. Always enjoy your conversation.
1:29
Speaker 3: So honored to be a part of what.
1:31
Speaker 2: Thank you. Memria A Southern boy South Carolina, Okay.
1:35
Speaker 1: You know you know when I see people on TV
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Speaker 1: and you're so articulate, There are no y'alls, there are
1:41
Speaker 1: no access.
1:42
Speaker 2: How does a man come straight out of club?
1:45
Speaker 3: You?
1:45
Speaker 1: And I know color because Steve Harvey and I used
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Speaker 1: to go down a lot performing at the Town Center,
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Speaker 1: selling that place out all the time. So I'm very
1:50
Speaker 1: familiar with South Carolina, Charleston, that whole low country. There's
1:54
Speaker 1: no low country in your tone? What's going on here?
1:58
Speaker 1: How you break that low country accent? Low cut your accent?
2:01
Speaker 4: It's funny because I never had it.
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Speaker 3: My mom, you'll appreciate this growing up in Houston the
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Speaker 3: way that you grew up. My mom grew up in
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Speaker 3: the projects and first in the family to go to
2:14
Speaker 3: college and first in the family to get a graduate degree.
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Speaker 4: So when we came along.
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Speaker 3: She wanted to expose us to things and places that
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Speaker 3: she had not been exposed to. And consequently, I think
2:30
Speaker 3: I was probably fourteen or fifteen, and she had us
2:33
Speaker 3: take part in these oratorical contests, right, and that was
2:39
Speaker 3: kind of how it started.
2:40
Speaker 4: So I took I took.
2:42
Speaker 3: Some public speaking classes, and then these oratorical contests, and
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Speaker 3: then the next thing you knew, I had what they
2:48
Speaker 3: what they liked to call in the business a nondescript dialect.
2:54
Speaker 3: You can't really tell based on listening to me where
2:57
Speaker 3: I'm from.
2:58
Speaker 4: It's a blessing. Now.
3:00
Speaker 3: When I was growing up, it was always he's talking white.
3:03
Speaker 4: Absolutely, he he talks like a white boy. So it's
3:08
Speaker 4: you know, it's it was the curse. Now it's a blessing.
3:11
Speaker 1: Well, you know, it's interesting because I knew in my
3:14
Speaker 1: middle school.
3:15
Speaker 4: I remember my.
3:15
Speaker 1: Teacher used to always ask me to read, used to
3:17
Speaker 1: always ask me to read, and you know, people talk
3:19
Speaker 1: about bullying, and you know, when you people are talking
3:22
Speaker 1: about they call you snowflake. That was formal bully and
3:25
Speaker 1: then so it's popularized now because people are willing to
3:28
Speaker 1: talk about it. But we all grew up in some
3:30
Speaker 1: form of physical or mental abuse from high school kids
3:33
Speaker 1: or people in the neighborhood. And my I remember this,
3:36
Speaker 1: this this girl. She made such a big deal that
3:38
Speaker 1: I was always asked to read that. It almost, I
3:42
Speaker 1: have to say, traumatized me because I went exactly the opposite.
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Speaker 1: I wanted to talk, I wanted to say, ain't I
3:48
Speaker 1: wanted to have I wanted to slur my words.
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Speaker 2: I wanted to fit in. And so with you.
3:52
Speaker 1: Now, I bring that story up because you talk about
3:55
Speaker 1: because you was hit with it. You was hit, you know,
3:57
Speaker 1: talking white, didn't want to act white. You're calling snowflake?
4:00
Speaker 1: What kept you focused? What kept you from from veering
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Speaker 1: off like I veered off? I veered off and I said, hey, man,
4:07
Speaker 1: I want to fit in and not be me.
4:09
Speaker 4: You know, I think it was And I wrote about
4:12
Speaker 4: in the book. My mother. My mother really racheant.
4:15
Speaker 3: I mean she she she kept us on the straight
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Speaker 3: and narrow.
4:18
Speaker 4: At the time, we resented the strictness.
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Speaker 3: I mean, my mom she knew all of our friends, right,
4:26
Speaker 3: and she knew all of the parents. We weren't allowed
4:29
Speaker 3: to stay out past you know, during the week maybe
4:32
Speaker 3: nine o'clock, maybe on the weekends when kids were going
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Speaker 3: to parties and having fun. I was doing oratorical contests
4:40
Speaker 3: and activities.
4:41
Speaker 4: And I went to in high school.
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Speaker 3: I think I probably went to maybe three high school
4:47
Speaker 3: football games on Friday night.
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Speaker 4: I just I didn't. I grew up on a very
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Speaker 4: tight leash.
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Speaker 3: Right, And and part of it was my mother over
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Speaker 3: compensating for my father not being the kind of dad.
4:57
Speaker 4: That he should have been.
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Speaker 3: But part of it was his mom knew. She knew
5:01
Speaker 3: back then, I think kind of what it took. She
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Speaker 3: was a school teacher, then she went into an administration.
5:07
Speaker 3: She knew what it took to shape and mold young
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Speaker 3: black boys, especially right, And.
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Speaker 4: That was it.
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Speaker 3: Had it not been for her, had I grown up
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Speaker 3: in another house, we wouldn't be.
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Speaker 4: Having this conversation right now.
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Speaker 1: Well, you know, in writing your book, you know the
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Speaker 1: book we're talking for talking to interviewing Craig Melvin, his
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Speaker 1: book Pops, Learning to Be a Son and a Father.
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Speaker 1: Is it because the fact that your father wasn't there
5:30
Speaker 1: that she maybe overcompensated and wanted to make sure you
5:34
Speaker 1: didn't you had a better life, or you pursued the
5:37
Speaker 1: options even though I knew she went to college and
5:39
Speaker 1: think of the age of twenty two is when she
5:41
Speaker 1: became pregnant with you. But talk about that in the
5:44
Speaker 1: middle is because as we talk about trying to shape
5:47
Speaker 1: you because of the fact that you've been shaped by
5:49
Speaker 1: a lot of people, especially the stories we gon't talk
5:52
Speaker 1: about the presidentcident when it was our camp grades. How
5:55
Speaker 1: that really kind of like started you in this direction
5:58
Speaker 1: of humanizing all men, actually men who are incocelreaty. Talk
6:02
Speaker 1: about your mom in her role versus your dad role
6:05
Speaker 1: because you mentioned it just a little bit, but that
6:07
Speaker 1: centers around us getting to the story and your father
6:10
Speaker 1: changed his life at the age of sixty seven.
6:13
Speaker 3: Mom, Yeah, Mom, Mom, Mom, Ha had to play the
6:15
Speaker 3: role of mom and dad for the better part of
6:19
Speaker 3: my childhood. It was it was it was a role
6:22
Speaker 3: that she was you know, she was unfortunately well prepared
6:25
Speaker 3: for it because she ended up she had to take
6:28
Speaker 3: care of her three younger siblings when she was in
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Speaker 3: college and her father skipped out of the family. Ended
6:35
Speaker 3: up essentially dying on the streets and squalor.
6:39
Speaker 4: But no a mom.
6:41
Speaker 3: Because my father was not physically present as often as
6:47
Speaker 3: I would have liked, and my younger brother would have
6:49
Speaker 3: liked my older brother as well.
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Speaker 4: Mom stepped in to fill the gap. She filled, She
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Speaker 4: filled the boy.
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Speaker 3: And not just not just being present in the sense
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Speaker 3: of searing a little aims or soccer games or concerts.
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Speaker 3: Not just physically present, but emotionally present, right, spiritually present.
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Speaker 3: I mean, the relationship that I have with God is
7:12
Speaker 3: because of my mother's relationship with God.
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Speaker 4: So it was it was divine intervention. You know.
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Speaker 3: Had I had any other mother, things would not have
7:23
Speaker 3: gone the way.
7:25
Speaker 4: That they did.
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Speaker 3: But you know, it's also and I write about in
7:29
Speaker 3: the book, as you know, and I do appreciate the
7:31
Speaker 3: fact that you read the book. You'd be surprised. And
7:33
Speaker 3: how often we talk to people about books and they
7:35
Speaker 3: haven't read word one, but I can tell you read
7:39
Speaker 3: the whole thing. And I write about in the book.
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Speaker 4: My father.
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Speaker 3: I asked him doing the course of my interviews with
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Speaker 3: him for the book, I said, Pops, what was the
7:48
Speaker 3: most money you ever wasted? Without missing a beat, he
7:51
Speaker 3: said it was about fifteen hundred dollars back in nineteen
7:54
Speaker 3: eighty six, said there was a lot of money back then,
7:56
Speaker 3: would you spend that money on?
7:58
Speaker 4: Right?
7:58
Speaker 3: He said, that's how much he has to put my
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Speaker 3: daddy in the ground.
8:02
Speaker 4: And in that moment.
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Speaker 3: I realized that while I had been frustrated by the
8:08
Speaker 3: lack of relationship I had with my dad, it was
8:11
Speaker 3: exponentially better than the relationship he had with his own father. Right,
8:14
Speaker 3: he knew who his dad was until he was almost
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Speaker 3: a teenager. So it was it was wholly unrealistic of
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Speaker 3: me to expect him to be the kind of dad
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Speaker 3: that I had come to idolize. He couldn't be it
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Speaker 3: because he hadn't seen it. And you can't be something
8:35
Speaker 3: stretch that. It's really hard to be something, yes, if
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Speaker 3: you if you haven't seen it, if you haven't been
8:40
Speaker 3: exposed to it.
8:41
Speaker 4: So that's what my dad was up against.
8:43
Speaker 1: Well, you know when I when I read the book,
8:45
Speaker 1: you know, you know I heard the shotgun house. Okay,
8:49
Speaker 1: I grew up in there. I was born in the
8:50
Speaker 1: shotgun house, two bedroom shotgun house. A lot of people
8:52
Speaker 1: if you listen to the shotgun house, open to the
8:54
Speaker 1: front door, shoot the gun out the shotgun out through
8:56
Speaker 1: the go out the front, back door. Don't hit anything
8:59
Speaker 1: that's a shotgun. Okay, you referenced big feet. Grew up
9:03
Speaker 1: with big feast. My man, Hey, I went touching, but
9:09
Speaker 1: big feasts part.
9:11
Speaker 2: Of my lifestyle.
9:12
Speaker 1: And so that's the Southern I'm from Houston, Texas, I'm
9:14
Speaker 1: from the South.
9:15
Speaker 2: It was it was a lifestyle that was normal to me.
9:17
Speaker 1: But it was also a community lifestyle of people taking
9:21
Speaker 1: care of each other.
9:22
Speaker 2: And that was really important.
9:23
Speaker 1: Not only your dad, even though there were some missteps,
9:26
Speaker 1: there were still people there to take care of him,
9:29
Speaker 1: you know, to make sure he was focused, to shout
9:31
Speaker 1: at him as he.
9:32
Speaker 2: Became an adult. There were people in the community.
9:35
Speaker 1: That's really important in this book that no matter what,
9:38
Speaker 1: there is some form of family tied to your story,
9:42
Speaker 1: and the people in your life talk about that.
9:45
Speaker 3: You know, it's it's it's funny because long before people
9:49
Speaker 3: started talking about it taking a village, uh to rear
9:53
Speaker 3: a child, I had a village. You know, it wasn't
9:56
Speaker 3: called that back back in the eighties in South Carolina,
9:59
Speaker 3: back in the eighties nineties when I grew up and
10:01
Speaker 3: I had a village, and and and yes, there were
10:05
Speaker 3: a number of men who played the role of dad
10:08
Speaker 3: alone the way my uncle James, my uncle Jake, my
10:10
Speaker 3: uncle Frank. But there were also a lot of women
10:15
Speaker 3: that that that played the part as well. I was disciplined,
10:19
Speaker 3: and I think that's the politically correct term.
10:23
Speaker 4: I was.
10:24
Speaker 3: I was disciplined by more women growing up than men,
10:27
Speaker 3: whether it's my mom or or one of my aunts
10:30
Speaker 3: and my grandma. I spent a lot of time with
10:32
Speaker 3: my two grandmothers growing up, and they really shaped me
10:37
Speaker 3: in myriad ways that I didn't fully appreciate until.
10:40
Speaker 4: I was older. But and then after that, I had
10:43
Speaker 4: coaches along the way.
10:44
Speaker 3: I always God always blessed me with with with people
10:48
Speaker 3: along the road, right Uh that that gave me a
10:53
Speaker 3: little part of something that I was. I was able
10:56
Speaker 3: to tape and build on. It's difficult for young black
11:00
Speaker 3: men especially, it's difficult to to learn how to carry
11:04
Speaker 3: yourself in this world.
11:08
Speaker 4: With without examples of it.
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Speaker 3: And I had lots of examples thankfully along the way.
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Speaker 3: But the reality is, you know, Sean, a lot of
11:17
Speaker 3: kids don't have that. A lot of kids don't they
11:19
Speaker 3: just you know, through no phone of their own mind.
11:22
Speaker 3: You they don't have a mother or a father, or
11:26
Speaker 3: an uncle or an aunt to take their hand on
11:30
Speaker 3: this journey of life. And so they end up finding
11:34
Speaker 3: role models that they should not be held out or
11:38
Speaker 3: that should not.
11:39
Speaker 4: Be on a pedele stale, and they begin to emulate them.
11:42
Speaker 1: You know, the thing I really like about your book
11:45
Speaker 1: is that sometimes because my father was a truck driver,
11:49
Speaker 1: you know, so you know when he wasn't driving trucks,
11:51
Speaker 1: you know he was he was, he wasn't really connected
11:55
Speaker 1: to me. I can I can tell you he was
11:58
Speaker 1: my father. I can tell you that my mom was
12:00
Speaker 1: there for me. My mom pushed me. My mom always
12:02
Speaker 1: felt that could be somebody special in life. When your
12:05
Speaker 1: father showed up for your ball game, that memory, you
12:09
Speaker 1: don't know if you got to hit a home runner,
12:11
Speaker 1: got struck out every time you went up the bat,
12:13
Speaker 1: but you remember that moment.
12:14
Speaker 2: And then when your mom rescued you when you thought
12:17
Speaker 2: you had an entered early fatherhood.
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Speaker 1: You know, those are two moments that really I bring
12:25
Speaker 1: up those two moments prayer, because despite of all the
12:28
Speaker 1: things we do in our life, there are always memories
12:31
Speaker 1: that really.
12:32
Speaker 2: Some haunt people, some inspire people.
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Speaker 1: Your father showing up for your game and your mom
12:38
Speaker 1: I basically come into the rescue because she did something
12:41
Speaker 1: that enabled you to relax. Talk about those two key
12:45
Speaker 1: moments of parenting. Even though your father wasn't there, that
12:48
Speaker 1: was a key parenting moment that he provided for you
12:51
Speaker 1: that stays.
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Speaker 2: With you today.
12:52
Speaker 1: It probably cares into your parenting you with your children today,
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Speaker 1: and then your mom being there for you at a
12:58
Speaker 1: moment of doubt for fear. But both of them were
13:01
Speaker 1: there at different times.
13:04
Speaker 3: I mean, you're talking about the part of my book
13:06
Speaker 3: where I am I almost became a teenage father. I
13:10
Speaker 3: was almost a statistic at the age of fourteen. No less,
13:15
Speaker 3: I made a.
13:18
Speaker 4: Bad choice. I made a bad choice.
13:20
Speaker 3: And you know what I write about it because I
13:23
Speaker 3: wrote about it because I wanted people to understand.
13:26
Speaker 4: There but for the grace of God go I.
13:30
Speaker 3: And I think a lot of folks can relate to
13:33
Speaker 3: this idea that you know, there's that night or sometimes
13:37
Speaker 3: that day, but usually it's that night where you went left,
13:41
Speaker 3: but you could have gone right, right right, and had
13:45
Speaker 3: you made a different decision, it would have altered the
13:48
Speaker 3: course of your life in a dramatic way.
13:52
Speaker 4: That almost happened to me.
13:53
Speaker 3: I got lucky and at that point in my life,
13:57
Speaker 3: I was, I didn't have much of a relationship with
13:59
Speaker 3: my father.
14:01
Speaker 4: I was I was afraid of my mother.
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Speaker 3: Uh, definitely afraid, so I couldn't talk to her about it.
14:08
Speaker 3: And it was a situation where you know, this young
14:10
Speaker 3: lady was convinced she was pregnant, and I, like, I
14:14
Speaker 3: had to, I had to do something.
14:16
Speaker 5: Please don't go anywhere. We'll be right back with more
14:20
Speaker 5: money Making Conversations Masterclass. Welcome back to the Money Making
14:27
Speaker 5: Conversations Masterclass hosted by Rashaan MacDonald. Money Making Conversations Masterclass
14:32
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14:41
Speaker 3: This was not one of those situations where in action
14:44
Speaker 3: was an option, right, And I write in the book
14:47
Speaker 3: about how I went to my aunt, and it was
14:50
Speaker 3: my aunt that finally convinced me that I had no
14:52
Speaker 3: choice but to talk to my mother.
14:54
Speaker 4: Right.
14:55
Speaker 3: But my mom has always been long before we started
14:58
Speaker 3: calling people fixers, my mom was a fixer, like it was.
15:02
Speaker 4: It was.
15:03
Speaker 3: That obviously was an extreme example, but there were so
15:06
Speaker 3: many other times in my life where I thought I
15:09
Speaker 3: was out of option. I didn't know what I was
15:11
Speaker 3: going to do, and I prayed to God and put
15:13
Speaker 3: trust in Betty Joe Melvin and and Betty Joe Melvin
15:16
Speaker 3: always came through and still does now.
15:18
Speaker 4: Mind you in a different way, my dad.
15:20
Speaker 3: You know, I wrote about that, that that part in
15:22
Speaker 3: the book with Shan where he showed up at my
15:25
Speaker 3: little league game, and the memory stayed with me because
15:29
Speaker 3: it was so rare to that point my dad. And
15:33
Speaker 3: again now looking back on it, knowing what we know
15:36
Speaker 3: about addiction, about it being a disease and not a weakness,
15:40
Speaker 3: I understand why he wasn't there. I understand why he
15:44
Speaker 3: had walled himself off from our family and society at large.
15:47
Speaker 4: But back then I was a kid, you know.
15:50
Speaker 3: I was a kid who wanted my dad to be
15:53
Speaker 3: proud of me and see me, uh and certainly watched
15:56
Speaker 3: watch my little league games.
15:57
Speaker 4: And so when he showed.
15:58
Speaker 3: Up that evening and I I saw him down the
16:01
Speaker 3: third baseline there on the fence, it's a memory that
16:04
Speaker 3: stayed with me because it was so rare. That being said,
16:07
Speaker 3: now he's everywhere, like you know, he was up two
16:11
Speaker 3: weeks ago my son had a soccer game.
16:13
Speaker 4: My dad was right there with.
16:14
Speaker 3: Me on the sideline, and thirty seconds in, my boy
16:18
Speaker 3: hadn't scored a goal all season, thirty seconds in, dribble, dribble, dribble, dribble, dribble,
16:24
Speaker 3: shoot score first goal of the game, and me and
16:28
Speaker 3: my pops are high fiven like he had just won
16:30
Speaker 3: a green jacket at Augusta.
16:31
Speaker 1: Yes, you know it was. The book is an emotional book.
16:36
Speaker 1: And I would say emotional because I told people when
16:39
Speaker 1: I get a book like this, after slow read it,
16:41
Speaker 1: because sometime it they hit points where I go, I'm
16:44
Speaker 1: about to about to go there, I'm not let me.
16:46
Speaker 2: Finish this moment.
16:48
Speaker 1: And because I remember a moment with my dad nineteen
16:51
Speaker 1: ninety two when I owned the comedy club and my
16:54
Speaker 1: dad had never ever been to anything I've been, and
16:58
Speaker 1: he just showed up at the comedy club and uh,
17:01
Speaker 1: it was sold out and I.
17:02
Speaker 2: Looked at the lobbaries.
17:03
Speaker 4: What you're doing here?
17:04
Speaker 3: Dad?
17:04
Speaker 2: He goes, I come to see my son.
17:06
Speaker 4: And he looked around.
17:07
Speaker 1: He looked, wow, this you this you this you? And
17:11
Speaker 1: I went, yes, sir, yes, sir, you know, because I
17:14
Speaker 1: always said certainly my dad, and uh and he said
17:17
Speaker 1: he said, he said, I'm proud of your son, and
17:21
Speaker 1: and and like I said, this is because that's what
17:23
Speaker 1: the book did to me as a dad. Because when
17:26
Speaker 1: you start talking about an incarceration, and you talked about
17:30
Speaker 1: you talk, you said earlier, right turn, left, turn those turns.
17:34
Speaker 1: I always say that. When I was in college, you
17:36
Speaker 1: know you you played the fraternity. I pledged to make
17:38
Speaker 1: us I fire, and you always do stupid things. I
17:40
Speaker 1: remember that the big brothers said, we want some plants. Well,
17:43
Speaker 1: we didn't have no money, and so I remember this
17:46
Speaker 1: was this giant open field where they had plants back
17:49
Speaker 1: in the day, and rem lying, brothers, we went and
17:52
Speaker 1: stole these plants.
17:53
Speaker 3: Man.
17:53
Speaker 2: I mean, if you.
17:54
Speaker 1: Look back on the Craig from the freeway, you would
17:57
Speaker 1: have seen us running across this field with these plants.
18:00
Speaker 2: It's okay.
18:00
Speaker 1: So anybody could have went, what are those black dudes
18:03
Speaker 1: boys doing.
18:04
Speaker 2: Running with all these giant plants.
18:06
Speaker 1: And I had a little Fiat X one nine, which
18:09
Speaker 1: is a two seater, and the truck was in the front,
18:12
Speaker 1: so I had to put the plants in the front,
18:15
Speaker 1: and it were blacking.
18:15
Speaker 4: My wis sealed.
18:16
Speaker 1: So along the way I could have stopped and stopped
18:20
Speaker 1: by the police and been incarcerated, and my life could
18:22
Speaker 1: have changed on that right turn left turn that you
18:25
Speaker 1: were talking about earlier.
18:26
Speaker 2: You are meeting men who've done.
18:28
Speaker 1: Something far worse than what I've talked about, but they
18:31
Speaker 1: have made a mistake. And sometimes because they made a mistake,
18:34
Speaker 1: we don't give them a second chance because we feel
18:36
Speaker 1: that they are unworthy of that second chance. And then
18:40
Speaker 1: in your book you talk about guess what they are
18:42
Speaker 1: fathers too. Let's talk about that journey of you doing
18:46
Speaker 1: a story I think basically changed your life.
18:49
Speaker 2: And it started with Camp Grace.
18:51
Speaker 4: Yeah, it was one of the most impactful stories I've
18:54
Speaker 4: ever done.
18:55
Speaker 3: There's a and I don't even remember how we found
18:57
Speaker 3: out about this camp, but I was I'll be reading
19:00
Speaker 3: some article in an obscure publication about this summer camp
19:05
Speaker 3: at a maximum security prison in California. Salinas State Valley
19:12
Speaker 3: Prison is the name of the facility, and for one
19:16
Speaker 3: week every summer they bring in about a dozen or
19:21
Speaker 3: so kids to basically have a camp experience with their dads.
19:26
Speaker 3: I mean, you know, arts and crafts, and they play games,
19:30
Speaker 3: and they sing songs and they.
19:31
Speaker 4: Do all this stuff that they would do at a camp.
19:34
Speaker 3: And these kids are between the ages of you know,
19:37
Speaker 3: seven or eight and fifteen or sixteen, and the guys
19:42
Speaker 3: who are part of the program have to exhibit good
19:46
Speaker 3: behavior for a full year.
19:48
Speaker 4: The camp is a it is a privilege.
19:50
Speaker 3: And I went out and spent some time talking to
19:55
Speaker 3: these guys and it ended up being just an emotional
19:58
Speaker 3: day because these these are man.
20:00
Speaker 4: First of all, most of them are not going to
20:03
Speaker 4: be getting out of prison.
20:04
Speaker 3: I mean they've some of them have been convicted of
20:07
Speaker 3: doing some pretty heinous things. But the two women that
20:12
Speaker 3: started the camp, both of their husbands were incarcerated and
20:16
Speaker 3: consequently weren't.
20:18
Speaker 4: Really a part of the child's lives.
20:22
Speaker 3: They would get the occasional visit, you know, on the
20:24
Speaker 3: weekend and you've got the glass, but they weren't able
20:28
Speaker 3: to really be a part of the child's lives. So
20:30
Speaker 3: they came out the side there for a camp and
20:31
Speaker 3: I talked to one of the guys out there, and
20:33
Speaker 3: I asked them the question I knew a lot of
20:34
Speaker 3: people were going to be asking when they watched or
20:36
Speaker 3: read the story.
20:38
Speaker 4: How can someone.
20:41
Speaker 3: Accused of some of the things these guys were accused of.
20:45
Speaker 3: How in what universe do they deserve the right to
20:50
Speaker 3: spend time with the child. Yes, and without missing a beat,
20:55
Speaker 3: he said to me, tears in his eyes.
20:59
Speaker 4: They be right.
21:01
Speaker 3: I may not deserve it, but you know what, crag
21:03
Speaker 3: my kids do. My kids deserve to know their father.
21:07
Speaker 3: They didn't do anything wrong, they didn't make any bad choices.
21:12
Speaker 4: And his larger point, and I think this was just
21:14
Speaker 4: as valid.
21:15
Speaker 3: If we're serious about stopping the prison pipeline that we
21:19
Speaker 3: always talk about, then we need to make sure that
21:23
Speaker 3: kids of incarcerated individuals have relationships with them. He spent
21:27
Speaker 3: a fair amount of his time talking to his daughter
21:30
Speaker 3: about choices, making good choices, not ending up where he
21:34
Speaker 3: ended up. It's a fantastic program, and it moved me.
21:38
Speaker 3: It also moved me Sean because my grandmother, and it's
21:42
Speaker 3: the first line in the book. Not to give away
21:43
Speaker 3: too much, but you know my grandmother. Now, when I
21:47
Speaker 3: knew her, she was going to church, at church, coming
21:52
Speaker 3: home from church like she she only loved the Lord.
21:56
Speaker 3: But apparently long before I came along.
22:00
Speaker 1: Just say she's a bootlegger. I won't give away no
22:02
Speaker 1: more than that. Just say she a boot leg. I
22:03
Speaker 1: don't want to give away the earther part Okay, she
22:05
Speaker 1: a bootlegger.
22:06
Speaker 4: She was a bootlegger. She was a bootlegger. And and
22:09
Speaker 4: and got a second chance, Yes he did. And had
22:13
Speaker 4: she not gotten.
22:14
Speaker 3: A second chance, uh, who's to say whether I would
22:17
Speaker 3: be here right now, you know.
22:19
Speaker 2: But here's the thing I want to point out about.
22:21
Speaker 1: That now his grandmother was in the same jail that
22:25
Speaker 1: Martha Stewart was in. So she got how many chances
22:28
Speaker 1: that she's got, Okay, but in the same facility now.
22:32
Speaker 1: And so so when I when I when I read
22:34
Speaker 1: the book and and and and I'm and it's like
22:37
Speaker 1: I say, it's an.
22:37
Speaker 2: Emotional journey because it's your story.
22:39
Speaker 1: But it's a relatable story because I remember when my
22:41
Speaker 1: younger brother was incarcerated in California and uh glass talking
22:47
Speaker 1: and uh and I was in tears and and and
22:49
Speaker 1: he told me.
22:50
Speaker 2: He couldn't cry. He's Irish. I can't cry. I can't.
22:53
Speaker 1: They can't, he said, I can't. And my nickname is Ricky. Ricky,
22:56
Speaker 1: I can't cry because they see me crying out here.
22:59
Speaker 1: I pay a price when I go back inside. And
23:02
Speaker 1: in that book, you know, gentlemen, you interview and he said, look,
23:06
Speaker 1: he said, thank god I have a seal by myself
23:10
Speaker 1: because now I can cry. And so I love the
23:13
Speaker 1: fact that you were humanizing people because we see these
23:16
Speaker 1: we see this, we see the violent size, and nobody's
23:19
Speaker 1: trying to downplay that.
23:20
Speaker 2: But we have made mistakes.
23:22
Speaker 1: There are people on the other side of this that
23:24
Speaker 1: have to deal with the emotion that these are kids,
23:26
Speaker 1: And like one of them said, look, it's all right
23:30
Speaker 1: early on when you plan cards and you plan catch,
23:33
Speaker 1: but when it becomes teens, the conversation becomes different.
23:37
Speaker 2: And that's what fatherhood.
23:38
Speaker 1: Is all about, which leads to your whole life of
23:40
Speaker 1: being a father, being connected to your dad, and now
23:43
Speaker 1: being a present day father.
23:44
Speaker 2: Let's talk about that, Greg.
23:46
Speaker 3: You know, I think that I think that you can
23:51
Speaker 3: be shaped by negative examples, Yes, just as much as
23:56
Speaker 3: you can be shaped by positive examples. In fact, I
23:58
Speaker 3: think in some instances, maybe even more so.
24:01
Speaker 4: So.
24:01
Speaker 3: You know, growing up, I didn't know the kind of
24:05
Speaker 3: man that I wanted to be. I didn't certainly know
24:08
Speaker 3: the kind of father that I wanted to be. But
24:10
Speaker 3: up until a few years ago, I knew I didn't
24:12
Speaker 3: want to be anything of anything like my dad.
24:14
Speaker 4: Yes, and and and.
24:17
Speaker 3: That was what what motivated me personally and professionally, probably
24:20
Speaker 3: to a certain extent now that that I'm talking about it.
24:23
Speaker 3: But no, it's it's it's funny because I have to
24:27
Speaker 3: remind my kids sometimes and I have a job and
24:31
Speaker 3: and and consequently I cannot be at their beck and
24:35
Speaker 3: call uh day and night, because you know, when my
24:38
Speaker 3: dad was there when we were younger, it was it
24:41
Speaker 3: was big, like it was a wedding or funeral or
24:44
Speaker 3: graduation or that that Little League game that I write
24:47
Speaker 3: about that I remember because it was so weird. Dad
24:50
Speaker 3: didn't show up for stuff, in part because he worked
24:53
Speaker 3: third shift at the post office, but in larger part
24:56
Speaker 3: because because of the addiction issues that he had.
25:00
Speaker 2: So as a.
25:00
Speaker 4: Result, I've gone to the other end of the spectrum.
25:03
Speaker 4: So if you know, I'm there for.
25:05
Speaker 3: Soccer games and my daughter had a gymnastics recital last
25:08
Speaker 3: Sunday morning, and some I'm physically present as often as
25:13
Speaker 3: in as much as I can to do you know,
25:15
Speaker 3: pick I do school pick up, and I try to
25:18
Speaker 3: do it all because you know, my dad didn't do
25:21
Speaker 3: any of it. Now, now, the problem that that that
25:24
Speaker 3: you create when you do that, and it took me
25:26
Speaker 3: a while to figure this out, I've created expectations. Yes,
25:30
Speaker 3: so if I'm not there to go, Daddy's got to
25:33
Speaker 3: travel for work. Well, Daddy, why can't you write can
25:37
Speaker 3: you take a later flight? And me can you go tomorrow?
25:39
Speaker 3: Enough had to say it a few times. You know
25:42
Speaker 3: that it's the job that pays for all of this.
25:47
Speaker 3: You don't get to go to dance or you don't
25:50
Speaker 3: get to go to soccer if daddy's not hopping on playing.
25:55
Speaker 3: So that that's the that's the that's the unfortunate part.
25:58
Speaker 3: But they're you know, they're starting to understand. But it's
26:00
Speaker 3: funny as you become a parent, how you at some
26:03
Speaker 3: point become you become the kind of for me at least,
26:07
Speaker 3: the kind of father that I used to mock. Yes,
26:10
Speaker 3: hate it with My dad would talk about, you know
26:12
Speaker 3: how much something costs.
26:13
Speaker 4: You don't have money for this.
26:15
Speaker 2: And.
26:16
Speaker 3: When we were younger, we didn't like he wasn't lying,
26:20
Speaker 3: Like we knew we didn't have a lot of money.
26:21
Speaker 4: We knew we had enough.
26:23
Speaker 3: With my kids, you know, I've said a few times
26:25
Speaker 3: and we can't afford this, And myself, I'm missing the
26:28
Speaker 3: beato say yes we can, you can, and I'm like
26:34
Speaker 3: and then you then you find yourself trying to come
26:35
Speaker 3: up with a new excuse like, ah, well maybe we
26:39
Speaker 3: can't afford it, but that we don't need it.
26:41
Speaker 4: You don't need.
26:42
Speaker 2: That, right right right?
26:44
Speaker 4: You know, So it's hard.
26:47
Speaker 2: I know we're about to wrap up.
26:48
Speaker 1: I want to bring up a very a fun moment
26:52
Speaker 1: as a parent, and I want to share with you
26:54
Speaker 1: because you wrote about it when your son climbed into bed,
26:57
Speaker 1: and you know, and then your kids when they sleep.
27:00
Speaker 1: If you don't have kids children of you got a
27:02
Speaker 1: very young child, when they climb in the bed, they
27:05
Speaker 1: forget you in bed. They kids are the worst sleepers
27:09
Speaker 1: in the world, especially when they get that six to
27:11
Speaker 1: ten years of age. They were sleep And so when
27:14
Speaker 1: you said that in the book, you said you may
27:17
Speaker 1: miss that. I remember I talked to my daughter when
27:21
Speaker 1: she was like seventeen. I said, hey, want your hop
27:23
Speaker 1: in bed, we watch the TV.
27:24
Speaker 2: Shit what you're talking about?
27:26
Speaker 4: I said, you.
27:26
Speaker 6: Know, can we not watch a TV? Can we not
27:29
Speaker 6: watch TV together? Remember we used to go I don't
27:31
Speaker 6: do that. No more, Dad, No, no, we're not doing that.
27:34
Speaker 6: So I would tell you this, Greg. That moment brought.
27:38
Speaker 2: Laughter to me. It brought back memories as your book.
27:41
Speaker 1: You know, they're amazingly good book, Pops, Learning to be
27:43
Speaker 1: a Son and a Father.
27:44
Speaker 2: Man, it's a great read.
27:47
Speaker 1: Like I said, it slowed me when I said the
27:49
Speaker 1: word slowed me because I was becoming emotional because, like
27:52
Speaker 1: I said, my father was a beer drinker.
27:54
Speaker 2: My father worked hard as a truck driver. My father,
27:58
Speaker 2: like I said, was he in my life? I don't know?
28:00
Speaker 2: But did he shape me to be the man I
28:02
Speaker 2: am today?
28:02
Speaker 1: Yes he did because he had a role in it
28:04
Speaker 1: and that that role has made me to be the
28:06
Speaker 1: man I am. I'd like to believe I'm a good
28:08
Speaker 1: parent to my daughter, a good husband to my wife.
28:12
Speaker 2: And uh, those are the things that the stories that you.
28:14
Speaker 1: Tell out of this book, from the incarcerated to individuals
28:18
Speaker 1: who raised you as a family, the community, and whether
28:22
Speaker 1: teachers who shaped you as third grade, teachers who shaped.
28:24
Speaker 2: You as you go through life and you went.
28:27
Speaker 1: To school and want they want to shame your uncle
28:30
Speaker 1: where you didn't pledge cap aside, But it was all
28:34
Speaker 1: good man.
28:35
Speaker 2: I love your book, Craig. I want to appreciate you
28:37
Speaker 2: for putting it out there.
28:38
Speaker 4: Man, thank you, thank you for your time. I've enjoyed
28:41
Speaker 4: this conversation. You're very good at what you do. Thank
28:43
Speaker 4: you for having me, Loko. We talked so many all right,
28:47
Speaker 4: bye bye.
28:48
Speaker 1: If you want to see or hear in my interviews
28:50
Speaker 1: a money Making Conversation, please go to money Making Conversation
28:53
Speaker 1: dot com.
28:53
Speaker 2: I'm Ushan McDonald. I am your host.
28:59
Speaker 5: Thank you, Thank you for joining us for this edition
29:01
Speaker 5: of money Making Conversations Masterclass. Money Making Conversations Masterclass with
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