024: Challenges and Blessings: Our Utah Experience. With Alec Duzan

      This episode gets real about the gritty challenges of balancing ministry work with a complicated pregnancy and the medical hurdles we faced with our newborn son, Hugo. From severe hyperemesis gravidarum to the isolation of raising a baby far from our usual support network, we paint an honest picture of the emotional and physical toll it took on our family. We also explore the mixed feelings of navigating a new community, cultural barriers, and the strain of starting anew while managing personal and professional responsibilities.

      Finally, we discuss the deeper themes of faith, community, and the pursuit of a more intentional life. From the cultural dynamics of living in Utah and interacting with the LDS community to the joys and trials of early parenthood, our story is one of growth, resilience, and reflection. You'll hear about our dreams of sustainable living, our musings on the end times, and our aspirations for raising children in a connected, mindful environment. Whether you're here for the parenting tips, the church-planting insights, or the heartfelt anecdotes, this episode promises something for everyone.

Chapters

• 0:00 Basement Living and Church Planting
• 12:32 Pregnancy Challenges and Church Planting
• 25:44 Building a Young Adult Community
• 38:07 Parenting Challenges and Juggling Responsibilities
• 44:08 Naming and Parenting Journeys
• 48:55 Parenting, Dreams, Travel, and LDS Temples
• 1:00:49 LDS Church Culture and Belief Integration
• 1:06:19 Authentic Christianity and Genuine Relationships
• 1:12:54 Clothing, Minimalism, and Parenting
• 1:21:06 Casual Clothing and Sustainable Living
• 1:27:10 Dreaming of Country Living and Independence

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

sit here and hope that something happens. You weren't recording this whole time no, I am it's been recording.

Speaker 2: 0:08

Oh, so this is part of the show now.

Speaker 1: 0:09

Yeah, nice I might leave some of it out, but you know, nah, anyway. So what have you been up to the past couple months? You were renovating your kitchen, oh my gosh, the past couple months.

Speaker 2: 0:29

Well, I found out I was getting laid off, so I quit my job just to stick it to him. And then we yeah, we, we had plans to, so right now we're living in her in my in-law's basement, which is a fairly large basement.

Speaker 1: 0:48

It's not like an unfinished. Which I know who that is, but it's your wife's parents Right.

Speaker 2: 0:52

Yes, that's what in-laws means. Yeah.

Speaker 1: 0:55

Not always you could be at like somebody's like your.

Speaker 2: 0:58

That's true, could be like a brother-in-law. It's definitely not that.

Speaker 2: 1:02

Yeah, yeah yeah, her parents. So they have a pretty large basement. So we have our own bedroom, my son has his own bedroom, and then we have like a master bath and then, um, there's a big living space and then across there is the. It just was an extra room. That was originally our room when we were in there, because we were in there and then we switched. Well, technically, we moved to utah and then we came back and switched rooms, but, yeah, so we got a kitchenette in there, did the whole thing ourselves countertops, cabinets, sink, ordered all the appliances and now we just get to be out of the kitchen upstairs. Now.

Speaker 1: 1:41

Nice, excuse me yes, uh, when did you come back from utah again?

Speaker 2: 1:48

we came back um may of 2023 and you left october 2022 yep, yep. So we actually got there on halloween. We drove, we left a couple days it was like the 26th of october, I think and then, yeah, first day was halloween and november 1st we got our trailer parked and, yeah, we were there for about six and a half months. Six and a half months what all did you do down there? Um key, turn my headset down a little bit when we were.

Speaker 2: 2:21

So how's that? I can't hear. That's good, you can turn up a little bit more. Check, check, check check, check check, check, a little bit more Check, check. That's good, right there.

Speaker 1: 2:30

About where it was.

Speaker 2: 2:33

So we had gone down there with kind of intentions to help start the young adults portion of the church and I was mainly well, not mainly mainly I was doing that and I was also helping play drums. So they had acquired like a drum kit and we're doing full setup tear down every, every weekend, for the church plant. So I forgot we haven't really talked about this. No, yeah, so we, um, when we got down there, shoot it was hot.

Speaker 1: 3:08

It got hot fast because I mean down there summers are like, but you were there in the fall and winter, weren't you? Yeah, it was.

Speaker 2: 3:15

It was nice for like november, december, january. So it was like we got out before before I got like crazy, but it was, it was super nice. It was way different than what we're used to here in michigan.

Speaker 2: 3:25

It was like 80s, like 80s, 70s, 80s most but it's drier yeah, I mean they say it's a dry heat, but when you sweat it doesn't feel any different. So but yeah, it was still, it was. It was nice, but anyway the um. So we were doing that, I was helping with drums. So we were doing that, I was helping with drums. So we were in a, for the first part where I was there, a movie theater. So they rented out just one theater space and then I think it held, I want to say about, let's see, 120 people-ish. And actually we rented two, because one was for the adults, one was for the kids and so they worked it out where we actually got to store the stuff underneath.

Speaker 2: 4:09

There's like that random space between the wall and the screen where the curtain hangs down, excuse me. And so, luckily, I think the first when we we got there, the church launched. I think it was january 8th, and so we had a night of worship on the like it's a new year's eve, night of worship for new year's eve and then we had a couple like dry runs where we'd bring everything set up, tear down and but at that point we couldn't leave the stuff in the space, so we had to. Actually, we had like a 20 foot, 30 foot trailer, something like that. We pack everything. It was all in there, and then we set up, did some songs and we tore it down and packed it all up in the trailer, wheeled it out. It was a lot of work. And then, I think, the third, second, third week.

Speaker 1: 4:56

How long did it take to set everything up each time?

Speaker 2: 5:00

I mean, as with anything, the first times were like a little bit rough. Yeah, because you're figuring it out. Yeah. Well, we kind of got a system going and, honestly, I could get the drum set up faster by myself than when I had people help me, Because I'm like I'm trying to explain to people what to do.

Speaker 2: 5:16

And I'm just like if you would have let me do it, I'd be done already. But you want to let people feel helpful, so it would take. I think the first couple times it maybe, you know, took an hour, maybe an hour and a half, then we got it to where we could get done in like 30 minutes pretty much but you had to do that, even if you were just rehearsing.

Speaker 2: 5:34

So we actually rehearsed in one of the family's garages. So they had um, they had a pretty big setup. He had almost like a little concert venue in his garage. He had a little stage. He had those big what do you call those silver trusses I think trusses that they had lights and stuff on. So he had a lot of stuff. He had a soundboard.

Speaker 2: 6:00

Was his garage big? Yeah, it was fairly. It was like a little bit bigger than I think it was a three-car garage, so there was a decent amount of space. He would still park the two cars in there. And then on the left side was the space for rehearsing. And it wasn't bad because we'd usually rehearse, I think, monday nights and the weather was when the sun went down, it was pretty cool, so it was like around 60, so it wasn't ever terribly cold or hot. It was nice in there, which is surprising. So, yeah, we would rehearse. We did a lot of very similar songs or a lot of repetitive songs, just to kind of get right, because you're trying to start a culture, a culture of worship there, so you've got to get people familiar with the songs and you got to get the band where they could be solid but also still have some variety.

Speaker 2: 6:48

So I think we we probably had six or eight songs that we did for probably the first month or two that we didn't really change from like we did. I thank god a lot. Um man, I played that song so many times. I thank god, um, we started doing. We used to play that song a lot too.

Speaker 1: 7:05

Yeah, Everybody did.

Speaker 2: 7:10

What was that song by Elevation? It was like I see lightning, I hear thunder. Do you remember that song? Did you ever play that one? No, we didn't. Oh, do you See what I See I think is what it's called? We played that one a lot.

Speaker 1: 7:25

Do you See what I See? I think is what it's called. We played that one a lot. Do you see what I see?

Speaker 2: 7:29

Not the Christmas special, I know.

Speaker 1: 7:33

Oh man.

Speaker 2: 7:34

But yeah, that's what we were doing. So that was like Sundays and then, with me trying to get young adults off the ground, my biggest challenge was trying to find a place to meet, because everything is. I have a very heavy mormon influencer. Lds church of jesus christ of latter-day saints. Most people call themselves lds or I'm a part of the lds church so, and most of the people even the um, the movie theater that we were in is called the larry h H Miller Megaplex and Larry H Miller was actually like a billionaire or something, somebody with crazy amounts of money, and he actually passed away. Never really knew who he was, but his family owned the movie theater and they were very.

Speaker 2: 8:18

It's kind of like the more money you have, the higher up you are in the LDS church, sometimes Throw your weight around a little bit more. I guess that's how it works in every circle, but especially in the LDS church, and so we had like signs and awning and stuff in the movie theater parking lot and they saw that like there were actually people like scouting us out and they said you have to take that. The movie theater came to us and said you have to take that down. Like we've been told you can't have that up. So we were reduced to one bifold sign in front of the door and we had one I think thing by the sidewalk in the grass, a little stick sign with metal wires or whatever, and so they made their way around it. They actually got a bigger building after we left, but all we were there was all in the movie theater.

Speaker 1: 9:13

Is that the end of your sentence? Yeah, oh, okay, forgot what the original question was. Uh, what you guys were doing down and oh yeah, but you're kind of yeah, yeah the um, the young adult stuff, like I was attempting to, and yeah, we were on the young adults, the pastor and I we weren't exactly like.

Speaker 2: 9:28

He pretty much gave me free range to kind of figure it out, and I was also having a baby at that time. My wife and I, we, when we moved down there we were. She was 27 weeks pregnant, so it wasn't very long before we had our son. He was born february 9th. So we got there, was what? November, december, and then he was born like basically first, second week of february. So she was very pregnant, very sick, so she wasn't able to participate in a lot of this stuff um, which is a bummer for her, and we're living in a camper.

Speaker 1: 10:02

I don't know if you ever saw it, it was massive, but yeah, you were living on the, you were living down by the river, that's right. That's right, that's right. Before you left, we were in jenison.

Speaker 2: 10:15

Yeah, yeah at the steamboat park.

Speaker 1: 10:18

That was fun um, it was a nice place honestly like we would do it again.

Speaker 2: 10:23

We could live in a camper, we could travel, live on the road, but with a baby and another one on the way, it'll be out of our future, yeah it makes things more difficult, but you were trying to find a place for the youth to meet and nobody liked kids coming over to your trailer so I will.

Speaker 2: 10:43

There was a and we say it like that, no, we never, we never hosted anybody at our, at our camp. I mean tiny, our living room space was about the size of your table. But um, we, like I was looking at there was one coffee shop that was owned by a christian family and they were. I reached out to them and I couldn't quite figure it out with the staff. Like they're like, yeah, we could do something, but then it never worked out to have like a staff member there.

Speaker 2: 11:14

Um, you know, I tried a few other places and I was like I'm almost just ready to meet in a park, but I really wanted to have a nice place and there was actually another church owned this spot. It was called the harbor. It was basically. It was kind of like almost like a studio apartment, like you just walk in and it's just like a space with couches and a tv, and they had, um, like it was a self-serve coffee bar almost, and it was all run on donations and they just put it up as like a safe space for people to come and meet and I think it was probably, maybe underutilized is it open to everybody or do you have to get a key to go in?

Speaker 2: 11:47

no, the doors are open like it was like 10 to 7 or something, every day, pretty much so but there's no staff, there's nobody working there and you know they had like a little wooden table along the wall with like self-serve tea and they had a coffee pot go you could make coffee and like creamers and stuff and they actually so that church was like a calvary chapel.

Speaker 2: 12:11

They would meet there every, I think, friday night, and so I was trying to get something set up on like a tuesday or a thursday and we were trying to figure it out because I'm still trying to make rehearsals for worship team, yeah, and I'm trying to get together young adults and just trying to figure out a way to bring together the young adults from like hill, because there wasn't. There was a lot of people. Basically, how it worked is my job was to reach out to, because we have the forms right. If you're like a new person, you can fill out your name. You give me your phone number, your email, what your age is and depending on the age range or what ministry you're interested in.

Speaker 2: 12:48

They would get filtered to me, so they get sent to me and I have to, like, text them, reach out to them. You know, guys, girls alike and sometimes it was like parents that were filling out that form for their kids and I'm like this is awkward. This is like a young adult ministry. Why are you Like your kid's 23. I think he can text me. I don't think he needs your help, but my thing is I'm not going to force anybody to come. Like I'll reach out. Sure, that's great, but I also need some interest on your end to come and find some community.

Speaker 2: 13:23

I can't especially not knowing you I can't drag you out of your mom's basement to come and join our young adult group. But yeah, I didn't really see too much come from it because we were there. We were there a pretty short time.

Speaker 2: 13:29

I mean it felt like a long time with Beth being pregnant and being sick, you know, because six and a half months is not enough time to get a young adult ministry off the ground, and our pastor wanted to get the young adults going like a month after the church launched. So we were there in november. Church didn't launch till january, and then I had my son. We had our son in february.

Speaker 2: 13:51

So it was kind of like trying to make these things happen, but I'm pretty stretched thin, like it's just me and my wife and she's she's incapacitated, basically a whole pregnancy, and then we have a newborn who has a lot of complications. So hugo had um torticollis when he was born, which I don't know if you know what that means, but basically he was laying on one side in the womb the whole time, so like his neck muscles were not fully stretched out, so he was it's almost like having a pinched nerve, it's kind of what the. We took him to a chiropractor actually to help a lot with that, and so he was just in a lot of pain all the time, which we didn't know, and so he was crying all the time, all day.

Speaker 1: 14:31

Yeah, when something's up.

Speaker 2: 14:32

Like he wouldn't sleep well and we didn't know. But he actually had a tongue and a lip tie which, if you don't know what that is, it makes it really hard for him to nurse because he could barely lift his tongue off the bottom of his mouth like I can stick my tongue out. He could. He couldn't even stick his tongue out of his mouth so it makes it really hard to like latch on and, you know, get the milk that he needs. So that part was really hard and really frustrating.

Speaker 2: 14:59

And not having you know, not having your community around you that you're used to, like we had some friends, but it's just not the same as having mom and dad around on both sides of the family, having the people that you've been friends with for a long time and like the people they were pretty great. But you know, I just don't think anybody really understood exactly what was going on and we don't have the medical expertise to diagnose like hey, he's just a really fussy kid, he's like we don't know what's wrong, but he would cry and scream and you'd be hung like, be hungry and in pain and we're just like this is ridiculously hard yeah, especially because you weren't working down there, right, you were just trying to help the church build yeah, so were they gonna plan on helping you with medical costs, or what was like no I mean, we were out there solely on our own and, like the people, we had a couple people who supported us and that was pretty much it.

Speaker 2: 15:57

Um, I wasn't. I was willing to get a job and work down there. But uh, for us, like I, we only had the one car. That means Beth would be home all day by herself with the baby in a place that she knows nobody. And I wasn't really willing to work full time and subject her to that? And then try to do the church full time.

Speaker 2: 16:19

Yeah, because I mean, having a kid is a full time job. Starting a church is a full-time job. Starting a church is a full-time job. And you know we had only been married, for we got married in February, so Hugo was born before our one-year anniversary. So we were still trying to figure out how we worked together. She got pregnant, I think two or three months in so somebody else can do the math on that and she was sick the whole time. So a lot of other people. What a lot of people don't know is that with she had what's called hg hyperemesis gravidarum, which basically means she is nauseated and sick 24 7. It's not. It's like way more extreme morning sickness like, yeah, pregnant women will get up and, um, you know, feel queasy, nauseated, like you know, throw up like I'm sure we've all seen our moms if you know an older sibling kind of go through some of that.

Speaker 2: 17:11

But for her she could barely stomach any food. She couldn't stomach any food, not barely. She could not stomach food, she couldn't stomach water, she couldn't keep down anything. So I I helped her a lot. Like before we left I was working, uh, at amazon as a delivery driver and basically all she did while I was gone was lay in bed. She wouldn't eat. You know, we basically figured out that sparkling water worked the best.

Speaker 2: 17:33

It would kind of I don't know if it was carbonation, but that would sort of ease not ease, but it would stay down that was the only thing she wouldn't throw up, and so she lost like 30 pounds her pregnancy with hugo and, like, right when she gave birth she was like right back to her pre-pregnancy weight because all the weight that she gained was just baby placenta and everything that was growing fluids. So she gained no weight, which you're. You're supposed to gain a lot of weight because you have. You're, you have 50 more blood in your body. You're trying to build another human inside of you, like. So it's pretty dangerous. I mean this.

Speaker 2: 18:04

The amount of women that have it is pretty low. I think it's like 50. It's either two percent of women or 15 percent of women. I always get the stats wrong, but there was a pretty significant percentage of women that terminate their pregnancies with hg, like have an abortion, just because it's so bad. I think it. I think it was two percent of women have hg and% of those women abort their babies because it's just so bad. I could be wrong, somebody has to check on that, but it's astounding and I never heard of it.

Speaker 2: 18:30

There's a few people that we talked to at Res, like Pastor Carson, his wife. His wife had it, so she understood a lot of different ways people deal with it is they get like a PICC line in their collarbone for IVs if they do them like weekly or daily and like every other day, just to stay hydrated. So she was getting infusions for that. We probably did that three times a week with her first pregnancy and we did it with this one as well for our second son, who's coming here in a couple weeks, but it wasn't having quite the same effect. So but before we left, like she, she would, you know she'd be incontinent, so she'd like throw up and pee herself over the floor.

Speaker 2: 19:10

She could barely walk Like she was. There was times where I'm holding her as her legs and whole body is shaking just because she has no, she has nothing in the tank, she's just toast. So that's. She took all that with her to Utah. None of that changed until she delivered. When the placenta detached and she gave birth, it was gone, which was crazy. She still had some lingering nausea, but as far as the absolute food aversion and the throwing up and not being able to keep anything down for days, that was gone. So it was just purely a pregnancy thing yeah, which she has with with this one as well, which makes is it something that comes with every child?

Speaker 2: 19:51

or is it?

Speaker 2: 19:52

just like there's a good chance a lot of people, hg is not very well like researched and so there's not a bunch of information on it. Um, doctors know what it is but they don't know necessarily what causes it and they don't know anything to help it. And they don't know. Some women will have one pregnancy with HG and the next one they won't have it. Some women will have their HG be less with the second pregnancy or it will be worse. It's different with different trimesters, like uh, with this pregnancy.

Speaker 2: 20:30

Uh, her second trimester was actually fairly easy, so she was able to kind of stomach some food and you know she still didn't want to eat, but she wasn't having the constant urge to throw everything up. Yeah, so she felt a little bit more normal. But on like on a day-to-day right now she operates. If, like, a one is a good, one is good and ten is bad, she operates at, like uh, seven to eight every day, nausea wise. So it's like it's not good. She fakes it a lot when we go places, but, um, yeah, there's nothing that they've. The doctors have figured out how to make it better. They just like drink water, eat whatever you can and get through it, or they, you know, some doctors will bring up abortion, but none of ours did and that wasn't an option for us. But that's probably why this will probably this will probably be our last one biologically, unless unless the lord has something else to say but might be a vasectomy and condom time for a long time that young, huh, only 26, and hey, no, I get it.

Speaker 2: 21:35

it's like for her, like we would both love to have more kids and if we do decide we'll adopt. Yeah, like biologically for her, like our whole. Basically right, because you're pregnant, for it's 40 weeks, which is actually like 10 months. It's not nine months, as most people think. Those months are weird with a 30, what 30 days, whatever. It's like technically 10 months. So, out of the, let's see, we had two years in February. So what is it? March, april, may, june, july, two and a half years. She's been sick for like 18 months of those Jeez, yeah, like just deathly. So it's like I'm not going to say it's not worth it, but it's so hard on her body, like before when we first got married. I won't tell you what her weight was when we got married, but she was jacked, like her legs were straw. She was probably stronger than I was and at that time I was working out a ton like she was go. She was doing hikes with 60 pound vests on like she was strong she was one of those people.

Speaker 2: 22:35

It was one of those people I didn't know that yeah, but she was very into fitness. You know, not necessarily like competitions and like wearing bikinis and getting you know rated and sculpted and wearing all the oil, but she wanted to be fit for the functionality of it and she wanted to feel good, and so she was very in shape and you know, pregnancy took all of that away and not that it's a vanity reason, but I mean who would want to be sick for 10 months straight, you know, throwing up and not wanting to eat any food and not being able to go anywhere and having to worry about?

Speaker 2: 23:08

I felt so bad for her when we were. We took like a little baby moon to Tennessee for a couple days and for our first flight she got not like a nausea spell, but she couldn't keep it anymore so she had to go throw up. So she went to the bathroom and she took off all her clothes because she knew she was going to pee all over the floor and she might not want me to share that, but there it is. That's just what she has to do at that point, because she's just so.

Speaker 2: 23:35

She throws up so violently that she can't even control it so that's just kind of what you have to prepare yourself for and that's what nobody sees. You know, they're like even the nurses and stuff. When we go sometimes to er, like whatever we're checking up on, like they're like oh, it's just morning sickness, it'll get better. But you obviously don't know. You don't know what's going on here yeah, so how?

Speaker 1: 23:58

I mean? It's obviously it's hard to, but she would have had to eat something or somehow get nutrients in those 10 months to feed herself and the child.

Speaker 2: 24:10

Yeah, and so that's where, like forcing herself to eat came into play. Like she would literally I don't even know how to explain it, she's so tough. I gave her so much credit. I mean I would just make kind of whatever and she, you know, might have to go into the other room while making food, or like while we were in the trailer. She would eat a lot of eggs then, like plain toast with butter sometimes, and like a lot of noodles, just plain noodles, if she could. Um, we tried to do like salmon bowls with lettuce sometimes. That'd be too much for her rice.

Speaker 1: 24:43

Like really plain, really simple you don't like salmon? No, oh, salmon's amazing it could be because recently I've been eating canned salmon and that's just yes, gotta go to costco get the salmon burgers.

Speaker 2: 24:55

They're so worth it really. Oh yeah, we bought like three bags it's like 18 patties of wild caught salmon. I don't know, it's a great way to go, but anyway. So yeah, it was basically like anything and whatever. Just very plain, very simple, lots of carbonated water and she now, with this pregnancy, she kind of knows Like she just has to Like. This morning she was like sitting at the table and like just I could see her trying to gear herself up for it. Like she pushed her food away. She was like closing her eyes and like gagging at the table and just she's miserable. But that's why I say it'll probably be our last one biologically love to adopt. Maybe we will. But so all that is happening while we're in Utah.

Speaker 2: 25:44

Right so so we have our son and the only adults is supposed to launch like a month later, and so we do like we start and we have, like I think the first day, two people came one girl I never saw again the other guy, he would still come. And then the second time was, I think, a couple people more. It was like one family of, uh, like apollon asian family really cool guys uh and they would pretty much come intermittently. And then it was like some of the volunteers that were on that were like working like one family was um clayton on a list they were doing like youth, and um josh and jasmine, that's pretty much it.

Speaker 1: 26:25

So were josh and jasmine down at the same time you were, or did they come a little bit later? They moved later.

Speaker 2: 26:31

So we moved in. Like I said, we got there like november 1st, basically halloween, and then they came down for the night of worship on new year's eve and then, I think two or three weeks later, they called us and told us that they were moving down, which was super exciting. So I think they came and visited one more time, maybe before they moved, and then they moved. Calvin McKenzie came out and visited.

Speaker 2: 26:59

And they were actually Josh and Jasmine and Calvin McKenzie were over at the trailer five days after Hugo was born I think he was five days old. Beth was like, yeah, I probably should have stayed in bed that whole time, so it was fun to see them. And then they moved. They just moved back like two months ago, I think.

Speaker 2: 27:20

Back to Michigan, yeah, because he was telling me their last day in Michigan, at Rez, I think it was Easter. Easter was their last day and then Easter was their last day at Hilltop in Utah, so it was like a full year and so, yeah, so young adults, I mean it never really went anywhere. But it was interesting to have the realization that the people that were there really didn't know anything about the Bible. Like the family that I was talking to. They came from kind of an LDS background, because they're actually from a lot of like the Polynesian community there will move from Hawaii because it's so expensive and go to St George because the climate is very similar. So there's a very big Polynesian community down there.

Speaker 2: 28:08

But I would, I think the first or second time that I the first time was more like a get together I did plan a whole sermon and I had cross references and all these different verses and it was just like right over their head. I was like, okay, I really got to dumb this down. And then I did that again for the next, the next sermon. I did like a passage and I dumbed it down and still like right, I was like, okay, I'm real, I need to do like one verse, and we'll just talk about that, because that's just where we're at this was for the main service.

Speaker 2: 28:39

This is for like our young are like five people that came to Young Adults. Okay, like the couple people that were there and so I was like, wow, we're just, we're like nowhere, you know, and I was really struggling to figure out where to start. Well, where to start, really? Because you know, the pastor was he's trying to start the whole church and make sure that was Jared right, yeah, gregory the pastor was he's trying to start the whole church and make sure that was jared, right?

Speaker 2: 29:08

yeah, gregory, yeah, so he's trying to, you know, start the church, make sure the buildings get the rents getting paid, the space, you know, make sure all the volunteers doing their thing. So I'm like, all right, I gotta figure this out. So it just, it never really came together. It was a great learning experience, but it was tough.

Speaker 1: 29:24

It was tough what does the future of the hilltop look like now? Is it still there?

Speaker 2: 29:29

yeah, it's still there. Um, I really have no idea. I haven't talked to them since we left. Is jared still running that?

Speaker 1: 29:35

or is it somebody?

Speaker 2: 29:36

else. Okay, alicia.

Speaker 1: 29:38

Um, yeah, I haven't talked to him and what made you want to move down to utah in the first place, like who gave you the idea it was um.

Speaker 2: 29:49

so it's such an interesting story that I'm still working through, however long it has been later, a year and a half later, still working through yeah, just like a lot of healing because, like we, when we went down there, we spent like all the money that we had. We pretty much saw nothing come from it and we came back with our head between our tails. Basically One of the things that Beth said. She's like the one thing I do not want to do is come home with no money and nothing to show for it and basically, with our head between our tails and that's exactly what we did.

Speaker 2: 30:24

I'm not saying that we should have never gone, but I question, and I just still have a lot of questions about it. We were tested a lot and our faith in each other and in God is still there and strong, but it's just like, okay, did we miss the timing? Did we just hear you wrong? Because initially the reason I wanted to go out there was I met with Jared at a coffee shop before a shift at Amazon for delivery driving. So I met him at a coffee shop out by our house on Broadmoor and he asked me to seriously consider and pray about going down and helping Unpaid. And not exactly what it would look, didn't say what it would look like, he just said, hey, pray about coming.

Speaker 2: 31:12

And I had already been praying because at that time my internship had just ended with Rez and I was really hoping to get on staff at Rez, specifically in young adults. I had a whole proposal that I gave to Daniel Cavazos at the time, who was a next-gen pastor that Jake is now he's now the executive what Pastor Al was. So I presented it to him and he looked it over and then we had another meeting said, you know, just not the just not going to happen. You know, I don't didn't really say why, if it wasn't in the budget or they didn't see if it was necessary and just wasn't a thing. I think it was two meetings two meetings it might've been one and um, I was like, okay, no problem, Like still going to finish out my internship strong, and so like that ended and I just was like, okay, my internship strong, and so like that ended and I just was like, okay, cause that was two years of young adults with res that I interned with. I mean, res was my very much, my life, I was there.

Speaker 1: 32:13

Sunday, tuesday.

Speaker 2: 32:15

Thursday, sometimes Wednesdays Like I was there a ton and I was like, okay, this is over, we're going to figure out what's next. And so I was just praying and fasting one day and I got this word from the Lord. I was like this is going to be a season of building and I was like, okay, I have no idea what that means, but I know that I heard you and you said something, so I'm good for now, and so I was just hanging on to that. And then that's one of the things that Jared said is like we're going down there and we have to build everything. You have to build the community, the church, the you know, um, the relationships, all of it. And then I felt like the Lord quickened that word in my spirit and I knew we just had to go, like that day. And so we made plans, um, and we prayed about it some more and I was like I knew we had to go, but I was going to make sure that Beth was on the same page.

Speaker 2: 33:07

So I asked her to pray about it and we were kind of praying about what the timing was and you know, I kind of thought we were supposed to go more towards like December, like end of the year, and she was like I think we're supposed to be there like in October. I was like okay, so we that time I think it was, let's see, I think it was may, may, june-ish around that time when I met up with him. So we, uh, I quit my job in september. I think it's like the first week, september. We got everything ready, we moved into the trailer, um all of october basically. So we had like three and a half-ish weeks to kind of figure out what that would look like, because we were living with her parents before we left. So that was the first time we actually lived on our own, was within the trailer, and so we figured out how it would be to cook meals and shower, because it had everything in there, just a very small space.

Speaker 1: 34:03

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 34:04

And then just make sure I knew how to do the like, check the gas tanks, and had to do a lot of repairs on the trailer actually, because it's 1800 mile drive and it went through like iowa, I think, uh, kentucky, colorado, I think, was the biggest one. So the first, you see, my dad stayed with us for like three or four days because he drove the trailer down for us.

Speaker 1: 34:30

Okay, so he was down in Utah with you.

Speaker 2: 34:32

Yep, at our campsite and he's the handyman. He can fix anything. I don't think I'm that technically handy, but I was able to fix some stuff like our water pipe started leaking, our furnace went out and, surprisingly enough, up in the mountains, because we were like 3,800 feet elevation and just to give you the elevation change, the drive to the church was only 20 minutes, the movie theater and it went from 3,200 to like 2,300 elevation.

Speaker 2: 35:01

So the elevation out there is crazy. Where jared alicia lived, which was like 15 minutes from us, was actually like 5000 feet elevation. So wow, it was. So I mean you're in the mountains and the red rock and it got cold up there at night like into the 30s. So I was literally in this two and a half foot crawl space underneath our trailer trying to get the furnace out, try to replace like a blower fan part and put it back in there, and it was crazy. I didn't think I was gonna be able to do it and I was so mad that I had to. But I got it done. I got new like connections on all the water pipes and because I'm like now it was very maturing for me because I'm like, well, I can't just leave it, I have to fix it because otherwise nobody else is gonna do it. Yeah, and you have no other choice. There's no other choice. So I just I did. I went to the hardware store, I facetimed my dad and I was like, okay, what do we got to do?

Speaker 2: 35:54

and so he sent me some videos on some parts to replace and he helped me a lot because he's like it's probably this for the it was this little tiny like winged piece that would detect the airflow and that had busted with all the jostling and the oops sorry, all the jostling in the 1800 miles. So that was fun. Um, yeah, it was so much that we didn't expect to happen and, like, when we came back, we just had to work through it all. I met up with Pastor Al when we came back. We just had to work through it all.

Speaker 2: 36:25

I met up with pastor al when we came back and he kind of helped me put a lot of the words to my feelings. It's like your circumstances really just caught up to you. You know being 1800 miles away from all your support, you know not having a bunch of money. There's more, just like having a kid trying to start a church, just like it's more than any one, any one young married couple, can handle. So it makes sense that you guys would come back. So that was really encouraging to me because it was a lot.

Speaker 1: 36:56

I felt like we went there and failed, you just felt embarrassed.

Speaker 2: 36:58

Yeah, it's like okay, now what? We sent out letters, we started social media pages. It's just like. This is awkward. Came back, just deleted all of our social media.

Speaker 1: 37:10

Now.

Speaker 2: 37:11

I'm back in my in-law's basement and have a kid. I have no idea what the future is going to look like. I have no money.

Speaker 1: 37:21

So, yeah, that was a good time and now, what's it like being a dad, since you've had more experience?

Speaker 2: 37:31

oh my gosh dude, it's the most tiring thing I've ever had to do but it's not like the opposite of ricky.

Speaker 1: 37:39

And what did he say? He made it sound like it was the greatest thing on earth. Uh, which I mean it is. I know, I know it's rewarding, but it's just funny to hear it a little more.

Speaker 2: 37:50

I'll be real man. I don't know, ricky's a very real person no, he was, it was just.

Speaker 2: 37:55

It's funny, it's I you definitely can tell where you are, like, maturity wise, when you're thrown into parenthood, like if you're not. Like I would say we were unprepared, like I thought we were prepared, but oh my gosh, I was not prepared, she, she knew what was going on. She's the one who's tethered to reality. I'm the dreamer. I'm in the clouds. Somebody's got to be, somebody's got to be. One of us has got to be the realist and one of us has got to be the dreamer, and I'm the dreamer. But it's so hard. I mean, don't get me wrong, it is a blast and his little laugh and his giggles and his smile are worth all of it, but it is definitely the hardest thing I've had to do and I only have one. I think ricky's got four, but I mean I think it just it brought the challenges that came with it.

Speaker 2: 38:44

Um, like in the beginning, a big part of us leaving too was Beth was super, super depressed, and rightfully so. I mean the complications that she had with Hugo first of all, him being super fussy and me trying to start the ministry, so I'm away not supporting her, and there'd be times where I go for rehearsal and she'd come back just holding him. He's crying, she said he cried the whole time. We were gone just like two hours and he has a high-pitched scream. It is infuriating and so irritating which Beth hates when I say that, but it's just how I feel. It's so aggravating, but I love him.

Speaker 2: 39:24

I have to say that part I do. I really do love him. So I mean, she's doing that and you know I'm gone and she has nobody to reach out to. Um, the one couple that we did really connect with, chasing bailey, that we just went to disney with, I told you about, yeah, they moved away while we were there. So they moved to indiana, um, which worked out good for us because now we can see them, now we're back in michigan, but they moved, I'm trying to remember.

Speaker 2: 39:51

So we left in may. I think they moved in maybe march, march, april, because chase here, uh of, while we were down there, it's 2023. Okay, um, so, because chase was like, chase was planning on taking a new job within his company and moving up, and so they're like, yeah, our, our timeline may be like nine months, but if Bailey was going to get this other job at the church she has now, it was going to move their timeline up from like nine months to like three weeks which she did get the job, so they were gone really fast.

Speaker 2: 40:22

I think they were gone in March, so I could be wrong on that, but it was like that was really the only people that we really connected with, because we would go over there, we'd hang out at their house, um, and just be parents, because they their son is about six months older than ours so they still have a very young, young kiddo and we're just shooting a breeze just being parents together and and then they left and yeah, we had there was a.

Speaker 2: 40:48

There was one other family that we connected with a little bit, but they were super busy with their jobs and and it just we just didn't quite make the connection. So she's super depressed, you know, by herself. Um Hugo was not breastfeeding well, so she, she had to. That was another part of her journey. She couldn't breastfeed so she had to pump for almost like nine months, which obviously you and I will never experience that. But being hooked to a mechanical machine for 20, 30 minutes every two hours does not sound like a good time.

Speaker 1: 41:27

No.

Speaker 2: 41:28

For all the people listening, listening, this is just real. So I mean your nipples get chafed, like it's painful, like you don't wanna, like you want to go places but you have to bring this bag with the pump and all these parts and like you're attached, this mechanical thing and it limits what you can do socially and so it's like it's hard to to do anything because you're you're right, she's making the sacrifice to to feed our child because we didn't want to do formula, but nothing against people who do formula, but it was just it's really hard for her yeah so that's a whole another aspect where, like, we're back and that's still a thing, but it was even more down there and and they just didn't have like medical experts down there.

Speaker 2: 42:09

So of all, like Hugo, we had to have actual lip and tongue tie surgery, which I was telling you about earlier, when he was about six months old, which was horrible. We had to do it. We had to stretch his tongue every four hours, even in the middle of the night. So and he's usually they do it, they can identify it right when he's born. But we did like a natural birth, with a midwife in a birthing suite which was amazing, but that's not her medical practice to diagnose that sort of stuff and I had somebody helping us out with that. This just didn't work out and if she hears this she'll probably reach out to me, but I blacked her numbers, yeah, so it was just like it was a mess, so like that should have been noticed and fixed within the first like three days of his life and it's I'm assuming it's easier when it's yeah, yes, right, because I tell you he couldn't you know, move his tongue at all so he can't, because you're literally supposed to, like you know to

Speaker 2: 43:07

get the, and he just couldn't do that. So it made breastfeeding because, basically, right, he's a baby, he doesn't know how to communicate, so he can't latch, he can't get any milk, he's hungry, he's frustrated, he's tired, so he just this cycle of crying and fit and there's just nothing we can do. So we went to bottles and lot, but yeah, so we're just dealing with all of that coming back. And then, once we got back and settled, it was just like, okay, how do we figure out how to be like parents now? Because we barely figured out how to be husband and wife. Luckily, we communicate very well.

Speaker 2: 43:39

But yeah, it was just a whole jambalaya of mess and we finally, I feel like, gotten to a sort of stable spot until I got laid off from my job. So we're kind of starting all over again. But yeah, it's been a heck of a year and a half, that's for sure. And now you've got number two on the way. Now we got number two due in, like it's the minimum three weeks, max, five weeks do you know if it's a boy or girl?

Speaker 1: 44:08

A boy, what's the name going to be?

Speaker 2: 44:10

Can't tell you. It's a surprise. What I know Is it going to be? I haven't even told my parents.

Speaker 1: 44:17

I can't tell you.

Speaker 2: 44:19

Your name? No, it's not. I don't think anybody. I don't have any family members with that name. Where's?

Speaker 1: 44:29

I don't have any family members with that name.

Speaker 2: 44:30

Last name will be Duzan, though you can count on that.

Speaker 1: 44:34

Well, I know that. What made you think of the name Hugo?

Speaker 2: 44:41

Was it the clock movie? It was a name that Beth had always liked. That was the only reference.

Speaker 1: 44:51

I had to. That name was the book in the movie.

Speaker 2: 44:52

Yeah, because there is a book it's about as big as your books here called hugo. Same story, the boy and the clock or whatever, I haven't even read it, or it's really that big of a book.

Speaker 2: 45:02

It's massive but it's got a lot of pictures. From what I've heard, it's a lot of pictures, so you would like it. But, um, I have to look it up again, but his middle name is lewis, which I believe um, hugo, it's one or the other. His name means intelligent and like bright spirited, so that is what. That is what kind of illuminated me to falling in love with the name, and it really felt like God just kind of solidified it, cause Beth was like what do you think of Hugo? And I was like I like him.

Speaker 2: 45:38

And then I got the middle name Lewis, kind of like that. It's kind of like another quickened in my spirit sort of thing, and I was just like, so we had that name from the time she was like seven weeks pregnant-ish until he was born. We just knew, and before we found out the gender we were just like that's his name. So we knew it was a boy. So Hugo Lewis it was.

Speaker 1: 45:59

Hugo Lewis Duzan.

Speaker 2: 46:01

And then it was not like that at all for this one. We had no idea what to name this one and didn't really feel like got any impression. And then you came up with the name exactly I thought I could trick you gotta be quicker than that next time, next time yeah, there's no, next time we're not getting pregnant again.

Speaker 1: 46:24

Well, not to bring it up again, but ricky said that sometimes vasectomy doesn't work.

Speaker 2: 46:29

Gosh, that's what I.

Speaker 1: 46:30

I thought he had a vasectomy and it backfired, or not backfired well, I don't know if it's necessarily him that it didn't work on, but he's just heard that it doesn't he had a vasectomy, didn't he?

Speaker 2: 46:41

yes, did you ask him? Yes?

Speaker 1: 46:42

he said publicly, so we can say that?

Speaker 2: 46:44

yes, I talked to him about it too, but I just couldn't remember.

Speaker 1: 46:47

Yeah, pretty sure um, but he said that there's cases of where the guy gets it and the woman and they still have a kid the only way is to have a hysterectomy take the organs out.

Speaker 2: 47:00

I'm not recommending that it's. I'm not.

Speaker 1: 47:03

I'm not saying but it is a shirt. It sounds like you kind of.

Speaker 2: 47:08

I mean we've, I don't. There are ways. Uh, yeah, there are ways, but we will be taking all precautions, which is kind of what got us into the first and well, not in trouble. But Hugo, surprise Hugo was a condom baby, so it doesn't always work, folks.

Speaker 1: 47:25

I thought you guys were doing like the natural. We were yeah, I thought you guys were doing like the natural, we were yeah, um, and then it's those people are always the first ones to have a kid. We're doing natural birth control where we just know the cycle and it might have been.

Speaker 2: 47:40

It might have been one of those yellow days maybe, but we were protected, you assured. But here we are so thankful, I really am. I mean, hugo is so special. So we just went to Disney World for like four or five days and he came back a whole different kid and Jake Blaukamp told me he's like you're just going to hang in there for nine months. They're kind of like a dud for about a year and then you start to see some personalities.

Speaker 2: 48:11

It's true, I've had a lot of nieces and nephews and they go through it just lots of different phases but he after this trip, like he's blossomed and he's kind of a nutcase, like we were at costco, I think yesterday, and he's a very coy, very shy, doesn't like new people at all kind of person, and we're in costco and he's in the car and he's like hi, hi and strangers are like hi. He probably had four people say hi to him while we were in costco and everybody else ignored him.

Speaker 2: 48:48

Everybody else ignored him. Yeah, oh. So it was so cute and he's just a bundle of joy. And it's interesting now because Beth just told me something this morning, like when mothers are pregnant and in like the last few weeks or so pregnancy I don't know if it's like four or six or whatever it is, but they say the hormones change because baby's getting ready to come in and the kids can sense it and it causes them to be a little bit fussier. So this morning he was a pistol. He woke up just like asking for a fight.

Speaker 1: 49:21

Hugo, mm-hmm, they can sense when the mom is going to.

Speaker 2: 49:25

Well, they can sense, like the hormonal changes in mom affect hugo, they affect me too, like pregnancy brain that's been rubbing off on me. I'd be forgetting stuff all the time you were already doing that yeah, yeah, thank you for that you're welcome.

Speaker 1: 49:41

But anyway I think that even through all the hard times of raising kids, at the end it's always rewarding.

Speaker 2: 49:48

I mean, I've always wanted to be a dad um, I guess being the dreamer and, uh, I idealized what it would be like in my head.

Speaker 2: 49:56

So I have these visions of, like playing catch with the kid and, you know, working with him through hard things, but then you forget about all the other details, the everyday, everyday part of life. So it really is a pleasure and it's just hard. You realize how selfish you are when you have a kid, because most of the time when I'm mad at him, it's not that he's doing something wrong, he's just doing something that I don't want him to do. So I have to get over myself, not the other way around. So it's like letting go of a lot of those things and just letting him explore and letting him do what he wants to do besides stuff that's going to get him killed, like sticking his finger in the electrical outlet If he wants to play with that backpack and get in all my stuff and take my cards out of my wallet. Well, whatever, dude, just let him do it, keep him happy, let him explore, yeah.

Speaker 1: 50:45

I don't know. It's the first I've heard that.

Speaker 2: 50:50

Everybody's parenting style is different. I mean, I don't want to ever stifle his adventuring or his creativity or his curiosity.

Speaker 2: 50:59

Yeah, that's true and there are things right. I think who said it? I think it was maybe Jordan Peterson. It was like you got to let kids do dangerous things safely. Jordan Peterson who was like you got to let kids do dangerous things safely. So it's just, it's letting your kids, you know, climb the stairs, or letting them, you know, figure out what color that pencil is, or marker, or whatever, but you know climb a mountain, but you just, you're there to protect them and make sure that you right, you set the boundaries whatever you want to set them as a parent. You know, maybe the boundaries that you set define whether you're a good parent or not, you always have to draw the line somewhere.

Speaker 2: 51:35

But it's also that balance of keeping the kid happy and not crying while also instilling a little bit of discipline and force. He won't understand discipline until he's like two and a half three. I think. But it's just a parenting game and we get to start it all over here in four weeks it seems so excited I'm so excited, can you tell I really am.

Speaker 2: 51:58

I mean, I'm not mentally prepared at all for the newborn sleep and you know, just taking half hour increments of sleep at a time, but I'm I'm very excited because we're looking at the future Like we're going to be. So her parents, beth's parents, were I think her dad was 40, somewhere between 40 and 43 when, um, her younger brother, caleb, was born. So, and I'm 26. So when our second son is born, by the time they're, you know, like 20, we'll be 40. So we'll be kicking kids out of the house at like 40 instead of 60.

Speaker 1: 52:36

Yeah, that's got to be feeling nice.

Speaker 2: 52:38

So I'm very excited for that. Then we can take all the money we've saved and travel or do whatever the heck we want. Move to Florida, move to Disney World.

Speaker 1: 52:48

I would never move to Floridaida move to disney world? I would never move to florida, maybe montana that would be a place to live, or wyoming wyoming state. I wouldn't mind utah either. It is weird that there's all the mormons there.

Speaker 2: 52:59

But I was eating northern utah. I mean it depends on where you go, like, uh, what's the city in northern utah? I can't remember salt lake city, yeah but that's like mormon central I thought all of it's mormon central like saint george is. A lot of people are a lot of people are leaving the lds church, so like saint george is kind of becoming the last like mormon stronghold, but I mean they're still everywhere.

Speaker 1: 53:25

Like there's mormon temples here in michigan there is one just popped up on, or it may have been there for a while, but I just noticed it on Gazan or 54th and Byron Center, whatever it is.

Speaker 2: 53:37

It turns into Gazan and then back into 54th street is it like a ward or is it like an actual temple? If you would know, if it was a temple it would be a pretty majestic looking building. Then it must just be a ward, probably just a ward, but there are, like temple temples here.

Speaker 1: 53:51

Have.

Speaker 2: 53:51

I shown you any pictures of the temples? No, I'll show you when we're done.

Speaker 1: 53:55

I heard.

Speaker 2: 53:56

They're actually really cool. They are beautiful buildings. They're incredibly creepy once you figure out what goes on inside of there, but like whitewashed walls, like there's a thing. It's like the baptism of the dead or whatever, or for the dead, I don't remember but basically it's like you can get baptized for your ancestors. Like we have to be able to trace your lineage, though as far back as you could trace, you can get baptized for them. So there's like people.

Speaker 2: 54:23

Then you could probably find some videos on it, but they have this base and it's like five or seven find some videos on it, but they have this base and it's like five or seven, like big golden bulls and there's a like bull with horns and there's a pool for, like the baptismal and they'll like dunk you for, like, if you have seven baptisms, uh, seven ancestors, and you get baptized for all of them so that they can move up to a higher heaven, uh, like you can repent for their sins or whatever and get them into, yeah, so they're like dunking you, like if you have seven ancestors, like one two, three, four, five.

Speaker 2: 54:55

They just slam you down.

Speaker 1: 54:56

Imagine if you had 100.

Speaker 2: 54:58

If you could trace that many I don't think you'd want to, but I don't know. We actually got to tour the visitor center of the new temple, because St George is actually one of the visitor center of the new temple, because St George is actually one of, so St George has the very first temple that was built for the LDS church in.

Speaker 2: 55:17

America, so I think it was in the 1800s, maybe it's way longer than that, but it's the first one and they built another one, probably open by now. But you could visit the visitor center for for the first, for the original one and, um, they have this like tour and it's kind of. It's kind of creepy like they have this I'm trying to remember what it was it's like a bench seat and they have like these, uh, these scenes set up and they kind of take you through like a movie of like what. It's almost like a testimonial if. It's like if you took somebody's testimony and made it an advertisement but took out all the gritty details of their testimony, like that's what this was. It's obviously like written by somebody and these people weren't real. But they're like this family went on a vacation and they went like hiking and their, their kid fell and almost died and they saved him and they're going through money problems and it's like they find a ward or something and they come to the Mormon faith. It's like a weird thing, but at each bench they have like a spotlight on, like a scene, like you're watching the TV and like it's happening. It's like this is like their living room or this is like the park that they went and hiked in or whatever. It was really weird.

Speaker 2: 56:33

But the tour, the visiting center, has just all these different things and they had a big picture of like all the different. I don't think they call them. I think they call them presidents. Now there's prophets, yeah, whatever. All these dudes in white robes and they're like in Tuscany or something. It was just weird. Man, you got weird vibes, but you can Google what inside of these temples look like. But they have a ceremony where they'll build it and they'll let anybody tour it for like three weeks and then they'll rip out all the carpet and put new carpet in because it's been defiled by all the unholy gentiles, yeah, no, no, I don't think I'm gentiles, but the sinners yeah imperfect and yeah, it's just.

Speaker 2: 57:23

They're disgusting. Like I saw pictures and it was just like literally whitewashed everything Like you almost can't even see the features of the room or the chairs or anything Like it's just creepy, it's just creepy.

Speaker 1: 57:35

That is because they always come off as so nice, at least on YouTube, where, like, people are talking to them.

Speaker 2: 57:41

They're nice to your face. They can be very, very like condescending and like behind your, behind your back, like cut your throat, kind of thing like they're.

Speaker 2: 57:55

This gives me an uneasy feeling yeah, but everybody has to be perfect in that culture, or like you don't make it into the highest heaven, or like there's literally it's. It's like almost it's kind of like with christianity, like saved by faith through works, like it's not grace, it's all works and what you can't say and you can't do anything wrong. You gotta follow all the rules and it's an impossible standard. But so you just have all the lying and the gossiping and yeah, it's a it's a weird culture to be a part of, but they're um like people there will and it's totally different from here right in our little. That was one thing nice about going retrospectively, like looking back.

Speaker 2: 58:37

It's like it definitely popped our, our west michigan kind of granville res bubble you know, because I I ran into a kid that, um, his family were polygamists. So like he was, yeah, you know, and he was maybe 14 and his dad kicked him out because he saw him as competition for his wives, or something.

Speaker 2: 59:01

So he was like on the street the 15, just in the middle of the city, and there's a lot of people that are like that. But there are towns, like where Jared and Alicia live. They actually live across the street from like a more fundamentalist of the LDS, because there's I always wanted to call them federalists for some reason, but they're fundamentalists of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, fundamentalist, fundamentalist, yes, of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which is that's where they had their split. I think Could be wrong, but it's like they believe in polygamy. Lds doesn't really believe in polygamy, yeah, but there is still a remnant of that Like, if you look into Warren Jeffs and if you watch the documentary Keep Sweet, pray and Obey on Netflix I think it's still on there A remnant of that community is in the St George area where they had more of the I don't want to call it the commune, but the compound.

Speaker 2: 1:00:02

They literally bought an entire city. I think it's called Short Creek. This is the FLDS and everybody worked and gave all their money to the church, entire city. I think it's called Short Creek Like. This is the FLDS and everybody you know like worked and gave all their money to the church and it's more like the manipulative sexual abuse kind of cult. Yeah, a remnant of that is in St George, and so it's. It's crazy because you have the FLDS and you have uh, which is just kind of how do I call it Spread out like a little bit dispersed out here and there, and then you have the LDS, which is everywhere. Like you drive around here, you'll see a church in every corner. You'll literally see there's one road that has two wards on both sides.

Speaker 1: 1:00:42

Is a ward, just a small temple.

Speaker 2: 1:00:45

A ward is like a church. Like what? You would consider that's where people go on.

Speaker 2: 1:00:49

Sunday for their message and we never actually went to one which you're able to and I wanted to, but just with our circumstances we weren't able to with Hugo and all the stuff we had going on. It wasn't really at the top of our list Because anybody can go, but depending on where you live, you're actually assigned, like, I think, within your zip code or street or whatever it is. You actually have to go to a certain one, then you can visit other ones. But chase was telling me like it's, it's like an 8 am to noon kind of thing and there's all kinds of different stuff. There's a dress code, there's nothing wrong with dress code, but it's very, it's very cultish and don't they also check your paychecks to see how much that you should be?

Speaker 2: 1:01:32

yeah they. You have to give them your I think tax returns to see if the amount that you tithe was actually like up to the 10 that it's supposed to be and then, if it's not, then you lose status or whatever. Like there are many stories of people literally getting disowned. Like if you're, let's say, you're in a cul-de-sac, right, there's 10 houses on it and everybody's LDS and you turn Christian. Like nobody will talk to you. Like everybody that you were friends with. Like you're not getting invited over to any barbecues. Like they won't talk to you. They'll probably talk bad about you to everybody. Like it's just so bad that people have to leave neighborhoods. Or just like they're cut off entirely from their families because of their faith. Like some people will just do that. I don't know if it's like that for every family, because Chase and Bailey they're Christians now and his parents are still very much.

Speaker 2: 1:02:23

LDS but they still want to be grandparents to their grandchild. So there's some definitely awkwardness there.

Speaker 1: 1:02:32

Do they recognize the differences between their children's faith? Because I know some Mormons think that they're Christian and so are other Christians. But then yeah.

Speaker 2: 1:02:43

I don't know necessarily, because I think one thing that I realized there is that it's so just like here. I think people are just kind of indoctrinated into the religion of the culture, like growing up in the bible belt, like if your family grew up christian, like you're probably christian. You may not know what it means, you may not follow any of it, but you're christian right, and so it's very similar that way with LDS.

Speaker 2: 1:03:09

I don't know how much of the people are literally very endowed in their beliefs and follow whatever the Book of Mormon and all their other books and all their rules, or if they're just like, yeah, my family's LDS, we go to this ward and it doesn't affect me.

Speaker 2: 1:03:31

I try not to sin. I don't drink coffee because I can't have caffeine and stuff like that. So it was interesting to go to another place and see that what's the word? See that kind of idea play out, where it's like we bible belt, they're lds. You go somewhere. You go to india, everybody's hindu. Maybe they're hindu because they believe it, or they're just hindu because everybody else around them is hindu. So, right, it was interesting to see that because you could definitely tell like some people wouldn't like it, care less. But but it's how it plays out, because I wasn't really super heavily involved in that community. It's hard to see the ramifications of saying I'm no longer LDS or I'm a Christian, but there are stories of people being totally disowned and families cutting them off because of their faith change.

Speaker 2: 1:04:24

So I think there are some true believers in lds and some people who are more casually and culturally.

Speaker 1: 1:04:31

I'll call it seems like there's a lot of religions like that, where you just get disowned once you start believing, but christianity is the only one where it's like we'll still keep you around, we'll be friends with you. But I mean, obviously there's like the disagreement and belief, but there's still not like I'm going to disown somebody or cut them completely out of my life?

Speaker 2: 1:04:55

Yeah, I think this is one of the things that I think about a lot and it's like how do we, where is the line between casually and culturally a Christian and like actually being a follower of Jesus? And I think it's only inside the context of a relationship that you really see the people who are casually and culturally a Christian and who are actually in their Bible and doing what they are talking about.

Speaker 1: 1:05:27

You know, as with anything you know, talk to talk, walk the walk. But yeah, I mean it's hard to draw a definite line, but like I've got friends, I won't use names, but I've got friends that they'll be anti LGBTQ, which is why they recognize as a sin in the Christian community, rightfully so.

Speaker 2: 1:05:44

Right.

Speaker 1: 1:05:45

But then he'll swear all the time and like I don't you know, it's just like they'll swear or they'll go and hook up with women, but like there's certain christian aspects that they'll be against but they're not following. I would say that's one of the lines like yeah they recognize what is right and wrong, especially from a Christian perspective, but then they're just not living it out entirely. But they'll choose the sins that they want to be against.

Speaker 2: 1:06:16

Right, yeah, and that's the thing. Right. Christianity is not supposed to be about sides. Right, there's two sides there's the world and there's Jesus you know yeah exactly.

Speaker 2: 1:06:28

But we want to play this card where we're a christian, but we also judge you based on what you do like whatever, whatever bent you have towards, whatever you're gonna hate like if you're gonna hate drinking, or if you're gonna hate lgbtq, if you're gonna hate youation it's like okay, you have no justification to judge anybody, I mean right Outside of relationship, cause I think that's the biggest thing. Social media has really driven us all apart, I think, cause there is supposed to be judging that happens.

Speaker 2: 1:07:00

But it's supposed to be. It's like among your close friends, like they're supposed to call you out, like you're if no and you don't. I don't know how you feel about this word. I think you've heard relational equity and you don't like the way it sounds, but like if I don't know you and I'm just like calling you out on social media or I'm calling you out in person too, it's a little bit different, but I don't know the people who have the bravery to do that nowadays call somebody out in person that they don't. I don't's just weird. Like why are we throwing around so much hate and so much judgment? People are not, I think, introspective enough to look at their own dysfunction and their own sin, but they always want to play the card of like I'm better than you or I do this, but I'm not doing that, and it's just so backwards.

Speaker 2: 1:07:43

It's like everything is it's all sin.

Speaker 1: 1:07:46

I think, yeah, I think we should be preaching our gospel and you can do that on social media. But then, like Jesus says, judge them not, for they know not what they do. He's talking about the world and obviously if we see sin, it's okay to call it out. If somebody's coming up to us like, hey, you want to go to the bar this weekend and get smashed, it's like no, I'm not going to do that. And if they ask why, then tell them.

Speaker 2: 1:08:12

Right.

Speaker 1: 1:08:13

But then, yeah, it's. It doesn't help for you to go up to some random person and just tell them everything they're doing wrong, because we don't have that.

Speaker 2: 1:08:22

You're just going to drive them farther away, yeah, backwards.

Speaker 1: 1:08:26

And there should be strengthening ourselves. Iron sharpens iron and then with that, I think that's how it spreads more, because people are going to form relationships with nonbelievers and slowly make that change within them. I think it's that one-on-one that really changes people, instead of just posting a message on social media about how you need to dress more modestly. Oh my gosh, which is a hot topic for another day.

Speaker 2: 1:08:54

Yeah, I haven't had social media in like a year and a half, like I told you, and it's just like we always find our outlets right. If I need right the dopamine hit, I might go play a game or like if I'm feeling anxious, like, I'll find something else to do where I can just click and click. But, like I don't have Instagram, I don't have Facebook. I still have YouTube, but I'm barely ever on it and, honestly, that has helped cut a huge part of like anxiety and just comparison and competition out. But I think it also forces you to be more personal, because we like to think that we're more connected with everybody when we constantly know what's going on.

Speaker 2: 1:09:31

But you really don't have that. There's no relationship. You've just taken all the. You've taken all the nitty gritty out of it. You've just got this clean cut, shortened, condensed version. It was like okay, I see you did this, you did that. Oh, you're engaged, cool. It was like I don't actually know you, I don't know what you use it for, but I think so many people have forgotten how to be personable, how to have friends and how to talk to people that could keep them accountable and how to be right. They want to be real online, but they can't be real with themselves about the struggles that they're going through and they can't find help and they don't have anybody to go to because they haven't cultivated any relationships that go beyond surface level.

Speaker 1: 1:10:13

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 1:10:14

So I think that's, I think that's one of the biggest downfalls of culture today is we just don't. We've forgotten how to do like small community, and I have struggled to find it it's, it's hard, it's a hard thing to come by. You know it doesn't come easy, it takes a lot of work?

Speaker 1: 1:10:30

Yeah, because not everybody's thinking the way that you are getting rid of social media.

Speaker 2: 1:10:34

And it's not that you necessarily have to Right. Yeah, it's not just social media but trying to find people, because it takes intentionality, you to decide that you want to do it, and then you also have to find the right people. It's not like you just pick somebody and it's like, okay, this person is going to be my accountability partner.

Speaker 2: 1:10:53

You know you got to go through some nitty gritty together, you know and build some trust before any of that can happen, which is why I heard I've been listening. Do you know who Tim Ross is? I've been listening to him a lot on like Spotify. Tim Ross, Tim Ross, yeah, he's the basement.

Speaker 1: 1:11:12

I know who he is.

Speaker 2: 1:11:14

I don't know what your opinion is on that.

Speaker 1: 1:11:17

Right now. I'm not the biggest fan, because he did have that sermon where he compared Jesus to a stripper and it's like, dude, come on.

Speaker 2: 1:11:26

You had better words. Everybody always brings up the stripper one. But yeah, he talks a lot about a lot about, um, judging people and and having that like that long distance hate. It's like you don't know what's going on. You're not there, you have no context, so like why are you, why are you talking? And he just talks about the vulnerability and kind of forgot where I was going. But he's been very inspiring to me to like just be more, more be more authentic and be more real and and try to pursue those relationships that are. They're gonna like bring something forth and kind of dig in a little bit more than just because I mean there's nothing wrong with hanging out with the guys too, just going out and longboarding like we did so much of that in the past, going out camping oh my gosh, hauling a our crap through the woods and up hills.

Speaker 2: 1:12:19

That was a good time I'll never forget making my two stick tent oh my gosh sleeping in a bag chair and then on the ground, uh, yeah, dude, what was I thinking I? Don't know what you were thinking, and you were younger then too.

Speaker 1: 1:12:34

You can't do that now I couldn't do it, then I barely fell asleep and then it's like we wake up and nathaniel's just like yeah, I've been awake all night. I think I'm freezing. It was cool, though, because we're out in the middle of the woods with a little fire I mean it was and there's nothing wrong with that.

Speaker 2: 1:12:52

We never I don't think we ever really. I think we talked about some stuff, maybe me and you, but like collectively, as a group. Nothing has to be a group thing, but it's just like there's so much more opportunity, I think, for like better conversations than just you can't hang out and play Smash Bros all the time.

Speaker 1: 1:13:09

Yeah, you should be bringing. I mean it's good to have a group or another friend and do a Bible study or do communion together, right?

Speaker 2: 1:13:18

which we tried. Yeah, and you got to keep trying and it's probably never going to look the same. How many different times you try it?

Speaker 1: 1:13:25

Yeah, it's hard to find a group that stays consistent with that, like the last group we were doing. It's doing people started drinking and it's like this is a Bible study guys.

Speaker 2: 1:13:35

Which group was that?

Speaker 1: 1:13:36

Was that with us?

Speaker 2: 1:13:37

No, I wasn't a part of that one.

Speaker 1: 1:13:39

No, you were not a part of that one With us, it was who you don't have to drop any names.

Speaker 2: 1:13:45

I probably won't. This is funny.

Speaker 1: 1:13:48

Well, it's like I don't think that having a drink or something is a sin, but we're a bible study it just didn't feel right for me that was all but yours is what us?

Speaker 2: 1:14:01

it was you, luigi ethan ethan yeah, yep, that's four, I think a whole month I think luigi made it twice, and then we, we did it a couple more times, like we would be out at ethan's, where we were at the house, weren't we, ethan's?

Speaker 1: 1:14:16

house. It was ethan's house, and then it was also the house that we lived in, I think it was?

Speaker 2: 1:14:21

yeah, was that? Was it ethan's house before or after the house in uh kentwood?

Speaker 1: 1:14:27

I don't remember, because I remember we had to leave that house so soon.

Speaker 2: 1:14:31

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 1:14:32

It was like Ethan texted me. He's like here we got a problem. And I was like why don't you just tell me what it is, instead of saying he's like, all right, well, we got to be out today, today, yeah, oh my gosh. And then I was like hey, you got to see if we can like prorate it for a week did the lease end like nobody was aware of it, or did he just correct?

Speaker 1: 1:14:53

well, that's the last time I've let somebody else read the contract, and it was luigi who read it. And then, of course and he missed over something important what did you guys do? I don't remember. I was like I have to go back to my parents because I don't have anywhere planned to go right now.

Speaker 2: 1:15:13

And.

Speaker 1: 1:15:13

I can't just be hauling this stuff around. So I right, food ton dumped it, couch dumped it, just drove it to the dump and got rid of it. Really, you didn't even take it to your parents house?

Speaker 2: 1:15:25

No, I'm trying to remember what couch you had. Was that your couch in the living room? Yeah, you had. Was that your couch in the living?

Speaker 1: 1:15:38

room. Yeah well, there was luigi's couch was a little nice looking. And then I had that old floral one. It seemed like, oh no, you took that one from me. Was that from your parents?

Speaker 2: 1:15:42

I think that was from my grandma's oh, my gosh dude dude was that in the basement. It's like a two person trying to remember.

Speaker 1: 1:15:48

I think it looked like it was a three it seems like it was a three person couch and it was brown, uh brownish, and it had like a floral pattern on it, just like an old style, like it looked like it came from my grandma's house to take it to the dump yes, and then the futon was just old. That's probably where my back problems have come from now because it's just sleeping on and the floor bed.

Speaker 2: 1:16:16

Is that a full mattress in there?

Speaker 1: 1:16:18

Yeah, I think it's a queen. No, that's not a queen, it might be full. It's definitely not twin. But, dude, my room in that house was so messy I don't remember, if you ever saw it.

Speaker 2: 1:16:31

I do remember you didn't like to let people in. It was on the top floor, but every once in a while I'd peek in there and you couldn't even see the carpet.

Speaker 1: 1:16:40

It's weird how much things have changed. I'm still a little messy sometimes, but it's a lot better.

Speaker 2: 1:16:46

Do you still have all your denim jackets? Yeah, but I don't wear them as much anymore, ah dude, it's like the denim vest with the fleece sleeve always get me. I have that one still. I know you. You should stop still uh, shopping at pacsun, no hollister not really.

Speaker 1: 1:17:07

This shirt is hollister, but it's so old I was gonna say I recognize that shirt and it doesn't say Hollister on it, so I wear it.

Speaker 2: 1:17:15

I don't know if you're allowed to say, hollister on the podcast, you don't have that trademarked well, I'm not sponsoring them, oh my gosh.

Speaker 1: 1:17:26

But yeah, I mean, you get older and you just stop wearing certain things.

Speaker 2: 1:17:31

I didn't stop caring, I just stopped trying as much because, like, I have a bunch of skinny jeans but my kid, he gets my clothes so dirty all the time. It's like I just remember the first time that we met with Chase and Bailey it was at the coffee shop that I told you about the one that was owned by the Christians, and we had never met them, but we knew that they were kind of similar age, because Bailey is the same age as Beth and Jace is a little bit older, he's like 31, 32.

Speaker 2: 1:18:00

Yeah, so he's like seven years older, but anyway, we were meeting them and they come in with Jackson, I think Hugo, maybe maybe Hugo wasn't born, I don't remember, he might not have been born yet, but they come in. We're sitting at the table and I think 15 minutes in Jackson has a blowout all over his shorts. So he goes to the bathroom and Jackson's their son and he goes to the bathroom, changes Jackson's whole outfit but he has nothing. So he just tries to wash the poop off his shorts and he just owns it. You just kind of have to. Nothing that I wear is going to stay clean for a day. It's not worth changing my shirt to go somewhere as high as today, because I knew I was going to be here. I had to be presentable, but it's just like the little things. I don't want to wear stuff that's too nice. I also want to be comfortable yeah I've got these shorts at costco.

Speaker 2: 1:18:54

They're eddie bauer. They're like fleece stretchy. They don't look like they're like, maybe they do, I don't know, but I think they're super comfortable don't look like what they don't look like it's not like I've resulted to the classic white New Balance sneakers and tube socks. Dude, I got it. I've been doing it.

Speaker 1: 1:19:20

I work to the gym sometimes the tube socks, the white tube socks with the white New Balances oh my gosh, dude, I have to like.

Speaker 2: 1:19:30

You got to take care of yourself, man.

Speaker 1: 1:19:31

No, I have to like push the women away when I walk into the gym, Like bro, like I know the shoes and the socks, but I can't right now they're just pouncing on you. Yeah.

Speaker 2: 1:19:45

Can't resist a new balance.

Speaker 1: 1:19:51

But yeah, as far as clothing, I don't necessarily go with expensive, but I just like to look a little more put together these days there you go A little more mature and I feel like a lot of times the jean jacket just doesn't portray, which is sad, but I have.

Speaker 2: 1:20:06

I have like nine jackets and I love all of them, but I can't wear them in the summer. But I also don't know if I can wear them with kids, can't you?

Speaker 1: 1:20:17

put them in the wash, or is it like I?

Speaker 2: 1:20:20

can wash them, but it's just like I have so many and I'm really trying to like get rid of stuff and not have so much stuff since since Beth and I got together, like when we started dating she probably she didn't make me, but she's like you have so much stuff Because she was pure minimalist. Like she had everything that she owned in one point, in a box that was like 18 by 18 inches. Like it was everything that she owned Clothes, everything, Everything More than just clothes, like books, notebooks, laptop, all her personal belonging, hair ties, shoes it all fit in one little box. That was it, and I'm like I have 32 shirts so I started getting rid of a lot. I don't know what's your opinion on having hobo clothes you wear around the house when you don't wear anywhere else. I think that's fine. Actually, I don't have too many of those outfits. I used to have a lot of them. Now I'm down to like three of those shirts.

Speaker 1: 1:21:24

Yeah, I think, wow, voice crack. Yeah, I think that it's fine, I think that it's not that it's necessarily a sin, but when we go out into the world as Christians, like look presentable, you know, like don't be the.

Speaker 2: 1:21:40

Don't be the person wearing sweatpants and Crocs and long socks.

Speaker 1: 1:21:43

Yeah, even if you're grocery shopping, like, go out into the world and look decent.

Speaker 2: 1:21:49

That's my thing, I feel that, like you can be comfortable, but I don want to see your, your toes and you and your plaid pajama pants yeah baggy sweatshirt yeah, like put on a bra, please. Just kidding women, don't hate me, you can do what you want. There are some people that just want to wear a sweatshirt. That's fine. I, I'm not looking, I'm married, that's right. You heard it from him. Yeah, I get it, though. Just look presentable, like, put some pants on, wear some jeans. There's nothing wrong with some jeans.

Speaker 1: 1:22:21

Right.

Speaker 2: 1:22:22

There are some people I do. I have to not judge, but I'm just like man, you must be comfortable.

Speaker 1: 1:22:33

Yeah, and if it's all they can afford, it's one thing, but I don't think that's always the case. One thing I get irritated, but I don't like the airpods.

Speaker 2: 1:22:40

I think the airpods crack me up more than anything.

Speaker 1: 1:22:42

Like everybody's just got airpods in nowadays well, that's what I was going to bring up with. The whole connection thing earlier is that's no wonder everybody's mad at each other.

Speaker 1: 1:22:51

You can't even say hi to anybody seriously because if I want to go up to somebody and say hi or like hey, what's up, because I try to be more social and I have to take the airpod out and be like what, then it's just awkward because I have to repeat it, and it's not as confident as the first time, right, and it's definitely not as organic right it's like excuse just like, excuse me, hi, how are you?

Speaker 2: 1:23:13

Yeah, it's just cringy. Yeah, you're not doing that anymore. You're not having conversations with strangers in the grocery stores.

Speaker 1: 1:23:19

Nope. Well people, when they walk by me too, they look away or they're looking down. They don't even make eye contact.

Speaker 2: 1:23:25

Eye contact is big. I don't like making eye contact with strangers.

Speaker 1: 1:23:32

I do, and I try to hold it longer. I try to be the one that looks away last that was a challenge.

Speaker 2: 1:23:38

You're also the person that if someone's driving too slow in the left lane, you'll get in front of them and slow down and put your blinker on to tell them to get over yep, I've done that before and it works sometimes.

Speaker 1: 1:23:50

I think about that every time somebody makes me mad on the road I told beth about it and she's like that does sound like him and I have the, the back wiper, so I can wave, wave goodbye to them too. It's fun. Oh my gosh, it's so ridiculous. Well, there's only 50 billion signs on the highway that say keep right except to pass.

Speaker 2: 1:24:14

That's true, that's true. Oh, I hate driving. People are the worst Can.

Speaker 1: 1:24:21

I say that no, technically no, you have to say that they're the best.

Speaker 2: 1:24:25

People can be the worst.

Speaker 1: 1:24:27

Yeah, driving Dude, that's not a thing. I think there's too many people on this planet, or at least living in one in one place. I think a lot of the stress that comes from, at least in my life, is just being in traffic.

Speaker 2: 1:24:43

There's so many people and so many red lights, I mean you think about right in politics aside, like when you look at cities and how much congestion there is and then you look at people who live more rural and you look at, like the way they vote it's kind of funny, like, but people I feel like we've been really focused on I don't want to say like country living, but like almost homesteading, like we literally get our eggs from our neighbors because they have ducks. So we just do duck eggs and we try to do, we try to buy locally from farms. Like there's a place called Deep Roots right on the corner of 84th and Whitneyville.

Speaker 1: 1:25:24

Yep Ethan and I did the scary corn maze.

Speaker 2: 1:25:29

Yeah, so they have like a bunch of like farmers who bring stuff in there. They have their own produce, but like we just try to buy locally and I think people take for granted how much it takes to put like food at a supermarket or like how, how far we've come because, like at one point everybody was just getting food from farmers. There's just farm stands, like yeah, then we had the first supermarket, which I don't know when that was. Then we started stacking people on top of each other in skyscrapers. Oh my gosh, I just think it's a terrible way to live. Nothing against people who live in the city. Some people love it, but there's just a lifestyle that I appreciate. That's much slower. That wants me to be. This may sound a little hippie, but like connected to, like the earth or like to nature you know, I'm not talking about sniffing crystals and praying to stones and all that.

Speaker 1: 1:26:18

No, I know what you mean.

Speaker 2: 1:26:21

It's like spending time out in God's creation, basically, yeah, putting my feet in the grass, like living off of the land, like having your own, like it's funny because I'm like Joe Rogan talks about it a lot Like he's like I love my Tesla, but if there's ever an apocalypse, I have a Toyota that has a 70-gallon gas tank, right. He's like, if all of this falls apart and let's say we lose electricity and we lose everything, who are going to be the first people to die? It's the people in the cities, because they don't know how to get food for themselves. It's all just brought to them and they buy it and all the resources are going to go like that. In a city that you have eight million people in like stacked on top of each other, like new york city, they're all dying first.

Speaker 2: 1:27:02

Like they're going to kill each other. But the people out in the country right, they have their own cattle or like people, like communities can rely on each other when you have too many people and resources are too limited. Not to sound apocalyptic and end of the world, but you did say we are in the end times, yep.

Speaker 2: 1:27:15

I could say that I kind of think about that sometimes. What if? If it happened Not that there's going to be a nuclear fallout or World War IV I did hear an interesting quote that I don't remember who it was I think it was tom, like albert einstein, or somebody was like I don't know what world war it was mark twain was it will be fought with.

Speaker 1: 1:27:34

Yeah, yeah, world war four will be fought with sticks and stones.

Speaker 2: 1:27:36

Yeah, I just heard that um like today or something, or yes maybe it was albert einstein, but I've I just heard that too no, it was some real. I think beth was on youtube and I'm like that is so real, like it's just if it all falls apart and they were oh dude I don't talk about ai later, but like we we've just the way we want to raise our kids is like we want them.

Speaker 2: 1:28:01

We really noticed it when we went on a trip to disney and you see it a lot with just parents in general, and I understand like a parent need if the parent needs a break, like give the kid a tablet, let them watch bluey or something. But there's something about letting your kids watch a screen all day that I think just just knocks them back socially and developmentally. And we want to raise our kids where we can be out in the country, like if we could have, you know, five, 10 acres, like have a homestead, like have chickens, have pigs, have goats, you know, get our own milk, like supply our own meat and just be outside and eliminate screens from you know. Obviously I don't know if they'll ever be totally gone, but there was an age where nobody had screens, like the iPhone only came out, I think in our generation. Yep, so and.

Speaker 2: 1:28:46

But nowadays people can't live without them. But it's like there was 2000 years or more. I don't know how old the earth is. I want to go there. But oh yeah, the like people, just they don't know that there's any other way and they think that this it's the only way. You know, in their, in their screen, no eye contact. Yep, like what? What did we come to? And I find myself much more satisfied being outside and working hard and, you know, kind of building something, than just getting a paycheck. And, you know, going back to the routine of whatever debt I have to pay off, you know.

Speaker 1: 1:29:23

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 1:29:24

So I don't know what your thoughts on that. You maybe like the castle living in the apartment you maybe like the castle living in the apartment.

Speaker 1: 1:29:34

No, I would love to live out in the country with my own crops and homestead and all that yeah, it takes a lot of work, though not everybody can do all of it.

Speaker 2: 1:29:41

so I think, right like we've we've talked a lot about like community living, um with different people, like buying a bunch of if we could afford, you didn't say you buy 10 acres and you put 10 people with houses on it and then everybody does something different, like somebody raises chickens, somebody raises cattle, somebody.

Speaker 1: 1:29:59

That's basically. It's funny, that's basically the idea of socialism, I know, but it's not run by the government. That's the difference. You're not giving power to the government. So I think when it's community-led, I think it's different. Yeah, it's when you give the power to the government to say, hey, this is how you're gonna live and everybody's gonna share everything, but living in a community like that, the only problem is somebody's getting lazy I know somebody's getting lazy and then people are getting angry at the somebody getting lazy and then that's the only downside is like people just ruin everything they really do

Speaker 2: 1:30:37

because community living is a great idea right you live with people are the worst yeah, you live with 10 people and then you share the food and.

Speaker 1: 1:30:46

But then someone's like, well, they're gonna be doing this? I don't have to do as much, and then the guy doing more is like, well, he doesn't do anything. That's true.

Speaker 2: 1:30:56

Yeah, there's so many different ideas we've thrown out and just trying to figure out what it looks like to have our own home in this day and age, because we don't make a ton of money and stuff is just stupid expensive. And inflation has caused the prices of everything to go up. Not that we're gonna rant about groceries and gas, but gosh man, I can't save any money and I, like we don't even spend money a ton, you know it is hard.

Speaker 1: 1:31:21

I don't really spend money either.

Speaker 2: 1:31:23

I only have two jobs and it's hard for me to save money yeah, so it just we, we dream, we dream, and we are where we are right now, and it's not a surprise to God, not that God's going to give me 10 acres and a mansion, because he just wants me to have it. Yeah, sometimes Some of that's prosperity gospel.

Speaker 1: 1:31:45

Yeah, sometimes you got to put in the work.

Speaker 2: 1:31:47

Yeah it's a little bit of both.

Speaker 1: 1:31:54

But yeah, it's a little bit of both, but yeah it's nuts Would you want your farm or homestead to be in Michigan.

Speaker 2: 1:31:59

That is a good question. That is a good question. There's something to be said about living like far away from family, like it's actually super fun, like you don't necessarily have to deal with all the drama and all the stuff, like when we were in Utah we were just that was just removed for us. You know, we came back and not that family's bad, but like no it's terrible, just kidding.

Speaker 2: 1:32:29

There's so much like maturing. That happens right, because when you get married or even just when you move out on your own, like you, you have to become something different than when you were living with your parents. Otherwise, like it just won't work like you'll.

Speaker 1: 1:32:41

Like there's, you have to grow, you have to do your own laundry.

Speaker 2: 1:32:44

You you have to wash your own dishes and something about being in a different state is just so freeing and like there's no family pressure, there's nobody telling you like what to do, because I feel like even when we move out, like some parents are just a little overbearing and so, but it's just, it's just crazy. I don't know, have you ever lived out of state like away from your family?

Speaker 1: 1:33:09

I mean, you've lived on your own plenty of times, but no, I've always wanted to move either to Arizona, which would be very hard to have a farm because it barely ever rains Right, or I want to move almost to the opposite side, which is Maine. Okay, I would love to live in Maine.

Speaker 2: 1:33:26

We really want to go visit Maine or like Connecticut or something over there East Coast yeah, but it's just like it's so freeing and there's so much less pressure and I think you're forced to come into your own a lot more.

Speaker 1: 1:33:45

Yeah, because it's like you have to figure out life. There's no one here to save you.

Speaker 2: 1:33:49

Yeah, I think that's the really big thing, right, that it's just a natural causation of the current circumstances of our nation and our culture, like stuff is just so expensive so you don't have people moving out on their own, like they're living in their parents' basement or something. There's always like a fallback and sometimes, when I think most of the time when there is no fallback and you do fail or you're forced to succeed, like there's just so much growth and that's one thing that I've talked to Beth about a lot like living at her parents' I know that there's so much more maturity potential with moving out, like living in an apartment or doing something else than living there.

Speaker 1: 1:34:30

That.

Speaker 2: 1:34:31

I know like I'm just at a glass ceiling you know that I can't shatter until I'm away from there and we kind of reached some of that when we were on our own in the trailer in Utah. We came back and I recognize it even more now. Excuse me, but yeah, there's just a lot to be said about living on your own and especially out of state. It's just like you have so much more opportunity to adventure, explore, like, grow as a person and figure out, because there's really so much. I heard something the other day, like some clip from whatever beth was watching. This is like some british guy, somebody from the uk, about americans. He's like people say americans are not well traveled, it's like, but they don't have to travel to go.

Speaker 2: 1:35:15

Like every different city in america is a different culture because, we have 50 states and every single one of them is different, so you have so many different places you can go to be cultured within. You know our own and different landscapes.

Speaker 1: 1:35:27

Yeah, it's like alaska has tundra and then you can go to the tropics. Hawaii alligators live in florida the gators. It's also funny too, because I was watching, I got into like really big international parks and hiking, yeah, and so I was watching this guy from florida talk about the national parks that he's visited and he's just blown away by seeing deer.

Speaker 2: 1:35:51

Yeah, it's like to us, it's like right. Every day deer with our car.

Speaker 1: 1:35:58

But it's just funny to see that he's just he and then he's used to alligators right so when he's talking about the everglades he's like, yeah, there's some alligators here, and then he just it just goes over. But then he's like freaking out about deer.

Speaker 2: 1:36:10

And I think that's one thing people need to do is travel more. Right, I get everybody's money situation, but there's just something to be said about getting out of your bubble and forcing yourself to experience a different culture, because you will find things that you don't recognize wherever you go, as long as you get out of the radius that you're comfortable in.

Speaker 2: 1:36:30

You know, yeah, so we did that in utah. Um, you know, vacations help a little bit, but living somewhere where you really are not relying on anybody else, you know, and you grow a lot when you, when you're close to family, when you're living on your own, like there's something huge to be said about that. But yeah, living living away from family out of state is super. I don't want like if my family heard that. I don't want it to sound bad because I love them dearly and they're great. But like just being away, you're just forced to.

Speaker 2: 1:36:59

Like I said come into your own and figure out how much more of yourself that there is to discover yet. So I mean, we're very blessed in this nation to be able to have the Grand Canyon and all the different mountains and you got all the different, like you said, the tropics. You can go all the way up to Alaska if you want to.

Speaker 1: 1:37:19

I wouldn't, but maybe you can go to Nebraska. There's nothing. We have nothing here. You can go live where there's nothing If you want to hide in the corn, go for it.

Speaker 2: 1:37:33

Kearney, Nebraska that's where I left my favorite pillow in a hotel on our trip back.

Speaker 1: 1:37:38

Really.

Speaker 2: 1:37:38

So mad. There's nothing there but a Japanese steakhouse and three hotels. It was hilarious, it was one stoplight off the highway, but yeah.

Speaker 1: 1:37:51

Yes, sir.

Speaker 2: 1:37:58

All right way, but yeah, yes, sir, all right.

Speaker 1: 1:37:59

well, I think we're at there we're at about an hour 40, so really snap diggity. I don't think if you've got anything else to talk about.

Speaker 2: 1:38:02

If not, otherwise we can just talk about a lot of different things. I can talk about alien visitations. We could talk about elon musk alien visitations I'm just kidding.

Speaker 1: 1:38:12

Okay, I was gonna say maybe save that for next time because it's a long one, but yeah, we'll just end this one here. I think that's a great time to to call it quits. It's three o'clock, getting late it is.

Speaker 2: 1:38:25

I gotta go to bed in like 45 minutes. Yeah, me too. Dinner's at dinner's in a 15 minutes. So I got to get going.

Speaker 1: 1:38:32

Dude, you're going to take a half hour to get home.

Speaker 2: 1:38:34

I know I'm going to be late. Bye.

Speaker 1: 1:38:40

All right, everybody. Thanks for listening. Bye, and don't forget to have a blast week.