The one with Eric Sciotto

This week, David updates us on his magical "no crying" Dad hack, Gavin lets us in on his most recent fatherhood fail, we do another round of "What would you do?," and this week we are lucky to be joined by Broadway sensation and recent Utah transplant Eric Sciotto, as he takes us through what it's like to be a life-long New Yorker and move across the country with two teenage kids. 

Questions? Comments? Rants? Raves? Send them to GaytriarchsPodcast@gmail.com, or you can DM us anywhere @GaytriarchsPodcast

Transcript

David: 0:00

Well speaking of interesting uh downward smile well speaking of terrible things and uh kind of like transition.

Gavin: 0:08

That was a terrible transition, and this is Gatriarch's.

David: 0:24

So remember last week when I was telling you about my really cool dad hack about just telling your two-year-old not to cry, and they magically don't cry. Oh boy, that took a long time. So I have an update. I'm a delusional asshole. And my daughter who cries nonstop about everything is continuing to do so. Um, yeah, that that whole like don't cry thing worked for literally two nights in a row, and then we recorded our episode. And ever since she cries dinner, after dinner, before bed, during bed, as she goes to sleep. She cries all the time. But you know what else is going on.

Gavin: 1:04

To your credit, I'm gonna try to give you the credit. You knew that this has played out exactly the way you expected.

David: 1:09

Well, really, real what I really wanted to happen was for her just to never cry again and me to be like, nanny nanny boo-boo, I'm a better dad than you. Um, but it didn't happen. But part of it is because my daughter got, of course, like they all do at daycare, she got conjunctivitis slash an eye infection. So the cure for that is eye drops. Um have you ever tried to put eye drops in a feral monkey?

Gavin: 1:33

Um, I don't think I ever have. But also, my kids both have glasses, which has nothing to do with like eye drops, except there's they have more stuff around their eyes. God, I cannot remember ever actually putting eye drops in them. Although we've done it, but I will tell you, I remember having pink eye when I was in kindergarten or something like that, and my mother straddling my chest with her knees on each of my arms as I'm flailing back and forth to say no, screaming and her, you know, then leaning, you know, so anyway.

David: 2:08

If you'd like to hear that sort of screaming, come to my house about three times a day because we have to give it to her three times a day for a week. And when I tell you, see, my son had had it many times, and he was just always like, okay, it's kind of annoying, but I'll do it. When I tell you that just what you said, my husband and I have to pin her down and peel her eyeballs open like we're like we're attacking her, it is awful. So the update is I'm a delusional asshole, and my kid still cries all the time.

Gavin: 2:38

None of that is a none of that is a surprise. Well, I think that that is um that is good parenting on your side that you acknowledge failures and you are keeping them conjunctivitis-free, or at least trying to get there. Yeah. Um, I had a pretty, I would consider major fathering failure this week, which was yesterday I had to go into New York City for a meeting. Um, and my partner uh was also in the city. So I had to do a whole massive like, uh, gotta figure out what to do with the kids after school, which is not that big a deal. They can stay home alone, that's fine. But one of them had a practice to go to, yada yada, yada. So um one, so my son was gonna go to a friend's house, and halfway through the day, or towards the end of school time, I was in a meeting and I look at my phone, and another mom says, Hey, the kids did so great in their presentation today. And I was like, What presentation? She they did something called Invention Convention. Really big. They've been working on it for months. They had to put together a whole poster for it. And all of this took place at the other kids' house, actually. So all the more reason that I was a little disjointed or um disconnected from it. They had this huge presentation that they had to put on for judges yesterday. This feels like a massive event that I gave in lodge, wouldn't would have moved you know, heaven and earth to attend, yet I had no idea that it was taking place. And luckily the mom said they did a great job. Hey, do you want me to hold on to your son for a little while? And I was like, he's not I have no idea where he is. Thank God this other mom, thank God this other mom happened to be there, which she then told me not a lot of parents were actually there. So it's not I apparently I wasn't the only delinquent parent. But furthermore, I just had no idea where he. I knew where he was, but I was like, I have completely lost control of my family situation today. Please don't call child protective services on me. But but then, you know, um, thank goodness other people picked up the slack for me.

David: 4:41

I mean, the only kid you really pay a lot of attention to is your daughter Pinot Grigio. That's true. She she demands a lot. And so you didn't hear what I said. You just talked over me because it was a joke. I said, your daughter Pinot Grigio. And you talked right over me, and that's why this podcast is failing. Anyway, and this is Gatriarchs.

Gavin: 5:03

Um But I do I do want to say I apologized it profusely to my son, and he was like, Whatever, Dad, not a lot of parents were there. I don't care. Like, uh, but but you had a presentation. Yeah, whatever. It wasn't that big a deal, Dad. Okay. So anyway, I had to take six seats and uh I don't know, dad fail contemplate my life.

David: 5:23

Yeah, it was maybe, maybe, maybe instead of like dad hack of the week, we do dad fail of the week. Like, how did you fail as a parent today?

Gavin: 5:30

Well, there you go. The starting a new series to be forgotten about by next week.

David: 5:34

Um, can we talk about also that my daycare um had a late start because it snowed two flakes, of course. So they decided to open daycare late. So when you go to daycare every day at the same time, you see the same parents in and out of the building, right? They become like your crew or whatever. Totally. But when you go at a different time, even we're talking like 10 minutes different, it's a totally different crowd. You're like, I don't know any of these people. I didn't know any of these people to the city. Who are these people? Yeah, who are these people? So I went and it was like nine, uh 9 a.m., which is not when we go. And we're getting there, and I realized that my daughter's classroom hasn't opened yet. The teacher's still like down the hall. So me and then some of the other dads are there, and this one dad walks in. And he was like 6'4. He looked like a Disney prince. He was wearing this like white sweater and these tight chinos. He was like clearly gonna go to work in Manhattan after this. When I tell you that I stuttered like a drunk teenager talking to him for those 30 seconds before the teacher came in, I was like, uh, hi. So your daughter is the I was like, David, you're 44. Get it together. You've seen hot guys before. But like this hot dad, whose whose daughter I know because my daughter and his daughter like they say each other's names a lot. I didn't know who the dad was. Now I gotta start dressing up before I drop off my kid at daycare.

Gavin: 6:53

You gotta up those standards. I can't believe you let so much go, David. Oh my god, I've let everything go.

David: 6:59

Um, speaking of letting go, why don't we do our top three lists, shall we? Gate three arcs. Top three list, three, two, one. This is your wait, this is your list, but also maybe a list we've done already. You know what?

Gavin: 7:10

It doesn't matter because um when when on the topic of lying, basically, I guess I have no, there's no end to it, right? So, yes, this week was the top three lies you tell your children. Number three for me, Reese's peanut butter cups are poison.

David: 7:28

Now, obviously, we don't do that anymore. We have 100% done this list before because that was one of yours. No, we're gonna do it. Our listener, our listener is gonna have to hear this again. No, but Reese's peanut butter cups has poison. Yes. Your mom, I know. There's a whole thing.

Gavin: 7:42

Yeah. All right, all right, all right, all right, all right. Um, number two, um, obviously, there there will be no driving because we're all gonna have um self-driving cars by the time my kids are 16. It is a lie that we keep fostering right now because basically I don't want my children to ever drive. So um they do it, though they don't believe me, it's a lie that I continue to foster. And number one, Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy. I mean, yeah, we do lie to our kids.

David: 8:09

That's a big lie. I I uh I feel guilty every time I talk about it, but like, oh, yeah.

Gavin: 8:15

But it's a wonderful lie, isn't it? It's a good lie. I know we what let that's a topic we should revisit sometime. How do you distinguish between white lies and big lies with your kids? Anyway, you're on. Let's cut that out and talk about it. Okay, go. What about you? What are how are you a big old liar?

David: 8:31

Well, yeah, how how do I lie to my kid that we've already done before? Um, so my my three are. Uh, and number three, we don't have tickets. I know we've done that one before. We don't have tickets. We don't have tickets. Yeah. Um, and and we're talking about things that don't require tickets. Like, can we go to the park? We don't have tickets. Um, number two, it's broken. You know that toy you really like that's really loud that we threw away last week? Yeah, it's broken. It doesn't work anymore. Um, and number one reason I say they're closed. Yeah. We want to go to the ice cream store. Yeah, they're closed. Sorry, they're closed. And they fucking believe me every time. Stupid kids. Idiots. Oh my god. Right. Um, okay, well, what about next week? So next week, hopefully, this is a new one. I'm not sure anymore. Um, I'm too old, and this is this is episode 50, Gavin. Yeah, I mean 50. Happy 50th because we are half a century. Half a century. We are half a century. I can't believe that. Congratulations to us.

Gavin: 9:30

Congratulations. Look at us. Yeah, thank you. We still look fair. We don't look a day over 49. No, not a day over 90.

David: 9:36

So myself. So next week, our top three list will be Top Three Things That Your Kid Is Gonna Tell His Therapist About You.

Gavin: 9:42

Hey, David, I know that you think I um think of things and never fall through, follow through with them, but not always. I want to revisit What would you do?

David: 9:54

From Cabaret.

Gavin: 9:55

From Cabaret.

David: 9:56

In fact, hold on. I We had a listener reach out to me actually via DM. I don't know if you saw it. And she was like, in case you don't know, it's from Cabaret. I was like, Yep, Gavin, just figured that out.

Gavin: 10:05

Uh just figured out. I saw your response too. Um, hold on just a minute. Ready?

David: 10:09

Your advice. What would you do?

unknown: 10:16

Nice.

Gavin: 10:18

There you go.

David: 10:18

What would you do?

Gavin: 10:19

Yeah, this is very dramatic. Very dramatic. I mean, come on, it's like all Holocausty, so of course it's very dramatic. Uh, okay, so what would you do? So, your toddler is in public with you and makes an overt comment about a visibly disabled person. Like, why does that lady have one arm? Or why does that man's face look like that? What would you do?

David: 10:47

It's that you don't know the intervals that makes me the happiest. You're welcome. I will say that this has happened to me a couple times, but notably one time there was a uh uh like a morbidly obese person on like a little scooter in a store we were in, and my son looked over to him and I saw him thinking, and I was like, please don't say anything, please don't say anything. And he was like, Daddy, why is he so fat? And I went, Oh my god, I want to die. So I died.

Gavin: 11:12

That's a different scenario, frankly. Like I was thinking, I guess. There are there are uh productive ways of having the conversation. The scenario that I gave for what would you do?

David: 11:22

Well, I think it's the same. So I'll tell you what I did and instead of what would I do. What I did was I tried to loudly so that person could hear me, say, hey, just so you know, we don't comment on other people's bodies, everybody's different, and um, we're all different. You know, I I did that thing, and I and I do mean that, but I I did it slightly performatively in volume so they could hear that. Because, you know, I feel like shit too that he just said that. Like, and also listen, the truth, we're all thinking things that we don't say that are maybe not kind. Like, yeah, why why is that person so whatever? But but to teach him that, like, hey, we don't comment on other people's bodies um is probably what I would do again. But yeah, as far as like a a person who's differently abled or something, yeah, it'd probably be the same. It'd be like, hey, everybody's different, you know. So like so, like my mom sometimes needs help getting up the stairs or something. So we he's asked about that. We're like, yeah, everybody's bodies are different. Grandma needs some help getting upstairs, and so that's what I would do.

Gavin: 12:23

I definitely think it's it is very important though to um not hide from differences, especially people who might have disabilities. I think it's important to not pretend they don't exist because it's part of the person's um identity and and presentation. And and helping kids learn is important, and being able to say, well, in some cases, I think it's appropriate to say, let's ask the person. I mean, in very specific situations, you can say, excuse me. I mean, you know, why are you so fat? Jesus. Um what would you do? You're trying to expose your kid to new foods, trying to expand their palate, explore the foods, etc., but you're on day six of the kid refusing to eat dinner you've made. What would you do?

David: 13:09

I'm I'm hardcore about food. I'm so glad to keep going. I keep going. Good because I know it's so annoying, but I am now reaping the benefits of what I've been sewing for two, three, even four years with my kids. Yeah. Is that they know the rules, which is what is on your plate is dinner, and also you don't have to eat it. But you are not ordering on a menu. There's nothing more than this. Because often they'll go, ew, I don't like watermelon. I'm like, great, don't eat it. And they are now getting to the point where they will verbalize what they don't like, which is basically everything. But they also know that like they can't just order mac and cheese. So it sucked for years. But like food is one of those things that like I feel like was one of the things I wanted to kind of like make better from when I was a kid. Like when I was a kid, kind of like you could have anything you wanted if you cried loud enough. I wanted to make, yeah, and I wanted to make sure that like that they saw food as not this like reward system and whatever that this is this is fuel for our bodies and it can taste good and there could be treats, but like this is the food. So it sucks out there, everyone dealing with that, with the kids throwing the broccoli on the ground for the 30th day in a row, but keep going.

Gavin: 14:19

Yeah, well, that's and that's the lesson for parenting in always, I think. It is we are in a culture that I think often gives up too easily or wants to find the easy way out, and there is very little easy way out with parenting. You really do have to be stronger and more persistent and more uh stubborn than your kids. And they're fucking stubborn and persistent, that's for sure. Okay, I've got one more for you. You're at Costco. Of course I am. What would you do? Like, as a newbie with Costco, I want to run screaming out of that place. It is so overwhelming. Everything's too big. Also, we have no closet space in our house, so I don't have I don't live in an 8,000 square foot face um house with a bunch of closets to buy to buy, you know, goldfish in the by the ton. I it is everything feels everything or nothing there. So seriously, my question is Costco. What would you do?

David: 15:16

So there's there's two questions you're asking. I'm gonna answer them both. The first one is like, how do you survive a trip to Costco? Yes. From somebody who is a Costco professional, a Kirkland pro, if you will, uh executive member, no big deal. I it took me six months to a year to really be able to get in and out of there without feeling like I was going to explode. Because if you go when it's busy, which is always, the carts are super wide. The narrow, the art the the aisles are not very wide. And so you're dodging a lot of traffic while also trying to grab the shit that you want to grab. So, my only two pieces of advice is one, go the second they open, because that's the only time that it's not crazy at the registers. Yeah. Um, and then the other thing is go the opposite way. So when you walk in, you kind of walk in through the thing, and then you can kind of go to the back with the natural scroll. And then you kind of come back down by the pharmaceuticals and then you can go to checkout. When you walk in, cross the store, go to the pharmaceuticals first. You're gonna be swimming upstream, but you're not gonna be competing at all. And then when you come back around to the front side, those registers are a little lighter than the ones everyone's trying to get to. People need to pay me for this kind of shit. This is important. They really do.

Gavin: 16:32

It's time, it's time to get beyond the you just made 10 cents off your pocket.

David: 16:36

I know. Um, we made 16 cents last week, guys. We got another ad and we got 16 fucking cents. Um, and then the other thing is like you don't have room for Costco, so what are you gonna do? Um, you can't go to Costco anymore. Like, I don't know. Look, I legitimately don't want to have to tell you because like we have this basement which we store a lot of stuff in, and I also used to have a freezer in the garage. But like, if you can't fit 16 boxes of chicken breasts in your freezer, you can't buy them. That's trying to waste money. And then if you just went to the grocery store and bought it for a little bit more expensive, you wouldn't have wasted the one. So I hate to say this as a as a Kirkland fan myself, you can't go to Costco as much as I do. I go twice a week, even.

Gavin: 17:18

Twice a week. I'm very jealous. All right, thank you. So we are so lucky to have today a very dear friend of mine who is not old, but we have been we have grown old together.

SPEAKER_01: 17:33

I'm not old, I'm legendary.

Gavin: 17:35

The legendary Eric Scotto, who has been in about 117 Broadway shows. But also, more importantly, the reason that he is here is he, I'm gonna call him my gay dad mom. And by that, I mean like my drag mom, but not anyway. Uh, the guy who introduced me to the possibility that I, as a gay guy, could have a kid. Eric Scotto. Welcome. Oh, hi, Eric. Eric Scotto. Hi, everyone. To Gatryarch. Tell us how have your kids driven you crazy today?

SPEAKER_01: 18:07

Woof. Well, today, okay, so teenagers, right? I have a 15-year-old and his friends like to make very last-minute plans really fast by text, right when you're running out the door. So we were, I was ready to take my kid to school. And he's like, Dad, just so you know, there's a whole lot of things that happen really fast, but I'm gonna grab all my hockey gear, I'm gonna spend the night at Leo's, we're gonna go up and play, blah, blah. I was like, whatever, just get your crap and get in the car. And then he did. Just don't get murdered. Thank you. Bye. That's right. Stay in the hockey, don't break your leg, and that's it.

Gavin: 18:33

Okay. And how did your daughter cre already drive you crazy today? Or has she? She didn't. Okay.

SPEAKER_01: 18:41

She woke up with her alarm. She was ready for school. She couldn't find her house key. And then she, oh, this is my favorite. She's like, it's right there on the counter. I left it there yesterday. I'm like, well, it's not there. And she's like, well, that's where I put it. I'm like, right. So all the magical creatures came and took your key and threw it somewhere. Sure enough, it was, I don't know, in some pocket or some crap, but that's it. She's very insistent on how she did something, but then apparently I I must have lost her key for her.

David: 19:06

Yeah, you're sabotaging her life.

SPEAKER_01: 19:07

You're constant gaslighting.

David: 19:09

Yeah, yeah.

Gavin: 19:09

That is what your that is what your point is, uh, to absolutely uh yeah, be in the way of all of her growth and maturity. And anyway, so how did you become a dad?

SPEAKER_01: 19:20

Tell us that. Um, we went through a a semi-open adoption process through a small tri-state agency uh when we lived over there. And it's a the kind of place where the birth parents choose you prior to the birth. So there's an amount of information sharing, and we understand medical information, and there's like a swap of info, and then it's a very subjective thing. So each case is slightly different, but you can get to know each other or meet each other depending on what everyone's comfortable with. And we had two really excellent experiences where there is an amount of openness and the kids know who their birth parents are, and they um can even my son texts his birth mom sometimes, or they'll just Go on FaceTime and talk for a while. It's super cool. Oh, that's great. So that really seems to psychologically eliminate a lot of questions and wondering like, why this and why do I have this, you know, and uh it's been a really, really, really positive experience.

David: 20:14

Is so I hear there's a lot of obviously variants to people's experiences with adoption and private adoption, and like who are my birth parents? It I've noticed that people who don't have that sort of connection from the beginning tend to have more questions and a little bit more of not baggage, but like a little bit more of like a God, why who is this person? What is this other part of my life that I'm missing? It's interesting to hear you say that like they'll text, but there's no like that's my parent. It's more like that's my birth mom or that's whoever. I don't know. Do they call her by her first name?

SPEAKER_01: 20:45

Yes, they would they know each other by their first names. It always has felt like like a favorite aunt that you see like once or twice a year. There's love and we care, but there's no real like daily influence. Um and with Sam, we know her birth hit his birth mom. She's great. And with Oh, we knew both birth parents, who are then still um together since got married, and now they just had a baby. So she now has a full-blooded sibling, which she refers to as my baby brother. And I'm like, okay, someday we'll have to meet him, you know. And she knit she crocheted a little hat and sent it to him, and you know. So there's just it's just more people to love and more people to care about you. And it's there's not been anything yucky about great.

Gavin: 21:32

Yeah, that's fantastic. And then when you say you were in a pool, kind of like you're not on a list, but in a pool, that also means that you were you ever in a situation or had the worry that you were gonna get a call and that the next day you had a baby, or absolutely oh, by the way, your baby was born last night. Oh, it is the same situation there. It can be that the pool means there's no waiting order.

SPEAKER_01: 21:53

You know, it wasn't like the next person on the list is the one that gets placed. It's a pool because they they get to look and choose, and you get matched up on criteria of what they hope for their child and what you hope. You know what I'm saying? So certainly, and we had multiple friends through the same agency who literally got a call, like your baby was born last night. Or your baby, you know, we were very fortunate to be chosen. I don't know if it's fortunate, it's just what it was for us, like three months out from the births. There's a there's a both times. Uh yes, that's pretty wild. There's kind of a window, they don't let the people normally choose too far out because there's a lot of emotions and a lot of up and downs, and they don't want to drag us along for all of that turmoil. It was a really wonderful agent uh agency. I think they mitigated um the psychological aspect of it for both parties really well. Um but we were both chosen kind of at the as soon as you could be chosen. It just took the first one took a year and a half, and then the second one was much faster.

David: 22:55

I was gonna say, like the the the joy, I think, of the three months or whatever is that you get a little bit of the like excitement part of it, right? You get to like be excited about what could be, what's coming. Um, you know, some of it's too long. Like when we did gestational surrogacy, so we had 10 plus months of waiting and getting excited. And then there was that point right in the middle where I was like, can this be fucking done yet? I'm tired of talking about the baby that's coming. Can we get the baby here? And now I want them back. So I guess.

SPEAKER_01: 23:22

Yes, I also think like, you know, but then you go through those lows of well, they are allowed to reconsider their choice. And I mean, it just it's a big roller coaster. But I think kind of that's how parenting and pre-parenting is there's a new term, pre-parenting for everyone, right? Like you, you you go through the highest, this is gonna be amazing, and they're like, oh God, every you know. So totally that still happened, even though we had fairly certain by the time the choosing happens, the agency is fairly certain that there's no red flags and there's no issues. You know, that's part of what I think their their great work was is to really go through the process of psychologically supporting both parties to make sure before we match that we're fairly solid. They had a great track record, very, very low incidence of um uh disruptions.

Gavin: 24:11

So uh so one of the of the many different reasons and ways that you would be able to contribute to Gay Triarchs, I think it's so interesting to talk about your journey over the last couple of years, where you had your kids living in New Jersey, basically right outside of New York City, you and your husband were both regulars on Broadway. You had your community, you had you had your tribe. It was very wonderfully insular and and uh and uh cushy. And then suddenly you picked up and moved. And there are so many things to in to pick apart there, but really, what was it like to move with your children? How did you prepare them for that? And then, of course, how have they adapted? So, first of all, tell us where you moved and why.

David: 24:57

Gavin asked six questions. I know there were some row. Should I honestly just choose the one you want?

Gavin: 25:01

Should I wait? Honestly, should I go back and restate? Let me go back and do that again.

David: 25:05

Gavin, this this entire podcast is built on the foundation of you ruining things. So we're keeping it. Eric, Eric, please go.

SPEAKER_01: 25:12

It's true. I can handle it. So uh, yes, we everything you said is true. New Jersey, hanging out, done. We were both older. We were both kind of like we had used up New York. We felt like that's a horrible thing to say, but like we had done everything we said, you set your dreams, you achieve them by 23. All of a sudden you're like 40 something, and you're like, ooh, I didn't think past that.

David: 25:32

And we're like, You're like, I've had sex in every bathroom at Port Authority. Like, what else do I have to do here?

SPEAKER_01: 25:37

You have used up New York. Truly. You used it up. Um, yeah, so we kind of took a giant leap, and uh David applied for a job at the University of Utah, which immediately happened. And we were like, Yeah, let's go, let's pick up and go. We didn't know how to get out of the rut of living in New Jersey, commuting to New York, and doing Broadway shows forever, which I loved that. That's not an there's no negative there. It just became weird. And I was still commuting in every day, missing bedtime with my kids every day except two, you know. And then when we first moved there, I was commuting in in about a half hour. By the time we left, it was taking like four hours. I would have to leave four and five hours early to make sure I could achieve no power cards. Not kidding. So it just became unsustainable. Anyway, we took the leap, he got a job, we were like, let's do it. I said, Do they have an airport? I'll fly around for work. That's what I always wanted to do was like fly around, direct a choreograph, teach, whatever. And I'll in the mean I'll stay home and be a house father when I'm not working. So, yes, we picked up and moved to Salt Lake City, Utah, which is quite, quite different. And um it's interesting. This I've been thinking a lot about this, like, how did we prepare the children? And the truth is, is we made it pretty simple and matter of fact. Like we said, yeah, yeah, it is gonna be scary, and you're gonna have to adapt and learn stuff, but you'll be fine, kind of thing. I mean, I moved like nine times or something before college, was in like seven or eight schools before college. And so I would just say, like, listen, I moved nine times and it's scary, but I turned out awesome, and we would walk away from it. I didn't like poop on their feelings. I just, I just was like, Yeah, that it's kind of gonna suck a little bit, but you'll figure it out, you know.

Gavin: 27:19

Does does that tend to be a parenting hack of yours is actually not uh sitting in the mire or like really taking the weight off of it?

SPEAKER_01: 27:27

Sounds like you're like, yeah. I think so. I I mean, maybe I oversimplify and maybe I'm too matter-of-fact about stuff, but I'm like, yeah, that is gonna suck. Like, I'm honest. Uh, but also listen, y'all, in this day and age, everyone's connected. The world feels very small, you know. Uh we moved, and like a week later, some of our best friends were taking a cross-country road trip. So they extended it by two days, and they were in our house in Salt Lake City. Like, their same friends from the East Coast were just at our house. Then my brother was randomly here. It just was like, I was like, see, it's not hard, you'll still see people. And then, you know, Fortnite, there they're all he's playing with all his friends back in New Jersey anyway. Like they're and and I just am kind of like a you don't have to miss them, just call them, you know, get on a video call.

Gavin: 28:12

Like, not to dwell on the getting ready for the move, but were they upset originally and then expressed they're upset?

SPEAKER_01: 28:19

Okay, of course. A hundred percent. They were, you know, born and three days later they were in our house in New Jersey and they never lived anywhere else. You know, of course, any nest, any normal is gonna get scary to leave. But I think I just kept drawing from the amount of times I left and did work other places or spent a month in different places or toured or um and just how adaptable and how easy it can be if you choose. And yes, they were scared to leave their friends and they were sad and they cried, and that's all real. And I'm like, yes, it is scary, and it is sad, but you're gonna be okay. And then now they're like, Yeah, I just call someone. So nice.

David: 28:59

Let's talk, let's talk a little bit about Salt Lake City. So I've worked there quite a bit. I worked at Pioneer many times. And um, I love Salt Lake City. I it's killer. I I I tell people all the time, I'm like, you you think it's one thing. It's like LA. You think it's one thing, and then you go there and you're like, oh, this is actually not bad. Um, but tell tell me about the kind of the culture part of this, right? Like New York City, your whole life, moving to Salt Lake City while I also love Salt Lake City, culture fucking shock. Tell us a little bit about that.

SPEAKER_01: 29:23

Uh I think I'm a small town person at heart. I'm really from Ohio and Dave is from Indiana, so we're very like Midwestern-y. So New York was like busy and different, and we knew how to navigate it, but that wasn't like my soul. Um, I thought it would be my soul, and I was happy to be there, but I once heard like live there at least once, but leave before you get hardened or something like that, right? Yeah. And that's really it. At some point, I was like, nope, this is just where I work. Like, I'm cool. So um I love the outdoorsiness and the air and the mountains and all of that. And the kids do too. Um, they can run around the neighborhood, and uh, my daughter has multiple friends in the neighborhood that she can just run around from house to house with. We didn't have that, you know. In New Jersey, it was like a 50s grandma neighborhood. So sure we had like sidewalks and stuff, but all the houses were really close. And I don't know, there's just something about it. Culturally, we got here and we thought we'd meet everybody and embed in the community, and then the pandemic happened like three uh, let's say August, September, October, five months later. So we kind of had this stilted experience. We got here and then immediately shut ourselves in a house for two years. Um, so that was a little weird. Um, culture shock. I'd love to say it was huge, but honestly, because we were like neighborhood sidewalk kind of kids growing up, it just was like, ah, there. This feels right. So it really felt more like a returning to something, I think. Yeah. Yeah. Um, but I I absolutely love it here. And it's I a lot of people were really worried that you know, we would be shunned or we would be treated poorly, but we have not had that experience absolutely at all. Our first neighborhood where we rented, I think was steered beautifully by a woman that was helping us relocate our who ended up being our realtor, was um very eclectic, very progressive, lots of pride flags and trans flags and lots of hair colors and tattoos. And we were like, okay, cool, you know. Nice. Not that we're that out there. We are so like apple pie Midwestern that I mean, I'm not I have I do have black nails.

Gavin: 31:26

But anyway, I was gonna say you do have your black nails, exactly.

David: 31:28

I mean But like Salt Lake City is pretty, I I mean that was the surprise when I was there. It was like Salt Lake City is pretty, pretty liberal and progressive. It's like once you start kind of going out of the bubble and you start getting in those little mountain towns where it gets a little like cliche. But tell me, do you miss being stuck in Midtown and having to poop and not having a bathroom? No, but I also used to have a list on my phone of where all the bathrooms were.

SPEAKER_01: 31:48

Thank you.

David: 31:48

Actress equity, Marriott Marquee, like Starbucks, Starbucks.

Gavin: 31:53

New York Sports Club, New York Sports Club, New York Sports Club.

SPEAKER_01: 31:56

And which ones had a changing table? Thank you very much. Because you know I have I can do a wall squat and change a baby on my lap, no problem. In Midtown, no problem. Because that they are not ready.

Gavin: 32:07

That's an excellent uh dad hack. Literally, like squatting with your back up against the wall and making a table with your knees. Uh you have never done that one. No, I haven't done that one, but I put my kid, I put my baby down on some pretty disgusting surfaces to uh change them.

David: 32:21

But Gavin, your knees couldn't handle that. You know what I mean? Like those knees, those are the knees of the Romans. You know what I mean? Like they're it's an aged knee.

Gavin: 32:28

I'm always no matter how no matter how old I am here on Gatriarch, I do want David to know that Eric will always be older than I am. I will always be older. Wow.

SPEAKER_01: 32:37

Yeah, I just look cute. Um, anyway, uh yeah, the oh my god, the changing table thing. Can we just talk about that for a minute? What the fuck?

Gavin: 32:44

Get it together because And I wonder, everybody, every generation of gay dads goes through this and we get irate and then we just adapt and keep moving forward, and then we forget about diaper uh changing tables, but it's still a thing, isn't it?

David: 32:58

It still is a thing. I was literally just doing a pre-interview before we got on this call for a guest coming up, and he was talking about the same thing. He was like, Why in airport men's bathrooms do I have to like lay down on this wet, disgusting floor? Why is there not just a little fucking koala gray plastic thing from the wall? It's like 90 bucks. In an airport, that's awful.

SPEAKER_01: 33:18

It's stupid. I used to, there were some restaurants in New York that I knew were not equipped, and I just would go in the girls' bathroom and then I would come out and they'd be like, What? And I'm like, there's no changing table, get over it. And I would go and sit down and continue eating.

David: 33:29

Because I don't do you want to change my kid? Because you are more than welcome. This is a fine alarm diarrhea. Now, so go ahead. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 33:36

Listen, I heard you liked poop stuff, but you know what? My kids are now much, much older. So I haven't had dealt with a diaper in nine years.

David: 33:44

We're also it's so interesting because like I'm on the bottom, I'm on the I have a two and four-year-old. Yes, even yes, tweens, you have teens. Like, we're we're we're covering the gamut here. We sure are. Yeah, we sure are, and things have still not changed. There's still we're we're we're about to start potty training for my two-year-old, and I keep thinking, like, when that's over, I because we're not having any more kids. I was like, no more diapers. It is a weird, weird sad feeling I'm having of like diapers going away and like diapers and cream, like just the culture of diapers. I'm excited for them to go away, but there's also like a weird sadness to it. Is that weird? That's weird. I think it's weird. Everything's a stage, everything's a weird. Well, it's been great having you, Eric. Thank you so much. Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_01: 34:27

Yeah, no, that whole thing, like you're right, because you're like, oh, I don't want you to not be a baby, but then they like become something new, and you're like, oh, that's cool too. So I think the whole thing is always like like a sad, but uh, oh my god, what's next? kind of thing. It's so it's so cool to watch them become whatever the hell they were hardwired to be because you know they are it they'll tell you.

Gavin: 34:49

Speaking of that hard wiring, yeah, what would be, I mean, now having a 15-year-old, have you gone through did you always I mean, obviously, you always let Sam be who Sam was gonna be. For sure. But has he taken diversions that you never saw coming?

SPEAKER_01: 35:04

Uh I don't know if I would say never, but I, you know, when he was little, he thought it was cool to like be in little shows or dance a little bit. And now he's like, fuck no, give me sports, and he's only but then but listen, his first word was ball. So I mean, like, a ball was all he said as a child. No, no, and uh all he said was so I'm like, how did I not know we were heading for the sports experience? So that it's not, but it's what I think that is exciting is how invested he will get and how much he will take on to like, I want to be better at this. Can you take me up to the rink so I can? And I was like, Oh, I see, we're gonna drive that boat. Okay, absolutely. So I think what's shocking is not what he's interested in, but like how hard he'll go. I think that's pretty kick-ass.

David: 35:47

What I love also about that is like it's so true of like getting to share in the joy of whatever the fuck they're into. Like, I hope my son is straight, only because like I I have no sports experience at all. I have women's figure skating and gymnastics. That's all the sports on my radar. So, like, if he's like into lacrosse or football or whatever, I'm excited because I don't know anything about that. But if he's excited, that sounds that would be really fun.

SPEAKER_01: 36:11

No, yeah, it's super cool. And that's exactly what happened. He's into lacrosse, he went through soccer, into lacrosse, into ice hockey. All things we knew nothing about. I mean, soccer a little bit, but uh has has he made you guys more of jocks yourselves?

Gavin: 36:24

Do you play with him at all? Or at least when he was learning the sports, or have you put on ice skates and gotten out there to knock it around?

David: 36:33

Learning the sports.

SPEAKER_01: 36:34

Learning the sports. Um, we certainly will go like throw the ball around or something, or like he's like, Will you throw the ball so I can practice shooting? And I'm like, Yeah, sure. And then, you know, that all happened and we drag the all the gear up to the playground or whatever. Um, I certainly am not playing them. David always could ice skate better than me, so I know he's been on the ice a little bit, but not recently. Sam just handled it himself. He literally, this past summer was like, I want to join a hockey league. And we're like, You've never skated. And he's like, I'll figure it out. And now he's like pretty effing great at it in just a couple months. He sure did. His trajectory of learning stuff is great. And Olympia is similar as well. She's like, I want to learn how to crochet. And like 10 minutes later, she's like, Can you buy me some yarn? And then like the next day there's a hat. I'm like, okay. And you're like, oh yeah, well, show me rolling shuffles on your left foot. Go. That's right. Like, you tried dancing for Wainsolento for eight hours. No. Um, yeah, it it's wild what they just decide is important and go in. And I'm like, I guess I was the same way. I taught myself also.

Gavin: 37:31

Undoubtedly. And your parents just went along with it, luckily, and um, just like David and I can relate to. I mean, my parents certainly had no background or understanding of what I got into, and yet, you know, it's what we do. It's what we do.

SPEAKER_01: 37:42

It's what we do.

Gavin: 37:44

Um, I do want to. We've been talking about culture a little bit, yeah, and that Utah's been no big deal, whatever, but come on. Gay Mormon dads? Have you met lots of gay Mormon dads? Because I gotta say, Instagram, I feel like is full of gay Mormon dads, which is it's also a search term on my Pornhub search.

David: 38:02

So my God.

SPEAKER_01: 38:03

Listen, yeah. Well, you know, listen, culturally, it's been cool. Everyone's really like polite and nice at the very least, you know, whatever they're judging inside. Have I met gay Mormon dads? Not that I know of, but do I assume some things? Sure. But I don't really, I don't know. I I don't I how to say this? We're busy people. I'm not out in the world, I'm not going to bars, I'm not like meeting people. I'm either working or slepping my kids around. Taxi dad is in full force, I'm just running kids everywhere all the time, and then I'm crashing and going to bed at 9 45 because I'm a thousand. So um I know the neighborhood people, which is a lot of like older folks, and it's a very diverse and interesting place, actually, strangely enough, my neighborhood. But um, I there is an aesthetic, there is a lot of self-care, there is a lot of money around. So there's some pretty things to look at. But I, you know, I think they just give me like a weird look and try to smile and nod and leave. I don't know. But on the sports ball court fields, I, you know, I have to interact with people and they've I'm shy. That sounds so weird. Like I'm a very like introverted extrovert. I can hold a room and be crazy, but I get really shy around people and about meeting new people. So I generally, the like gateway drug is like women. So I say hi to the moms and they start to be like, oh, I like your nails. I'm like, okay. And that's how that happens. But then there's a few dads, and certainly the parents of Sam's friends. They're just super cool. Nobody has ever seemed to care or treated me any different. I just feel awkward because that's just who I am.

SPEAKER_03: 39:42

Showed to you by anxiety.

David: 39:45

Um, it's so I work I work there and I I I will not say who, but I met a couple who had six kids, Mormon couple, obviously. Sure. And they were open about he was living as a gay man before they met, and then they decided to embark on this new journey. And that was a lot of feelings I have about that. Anyway, we're we're running out of time, but I want to ask you a couple questions before you leave. You have been in, I think, 875 Broadway shows. That's what I said. One of our favorite things in the world to do is like, just give us one. I know you have a million. Give me one horror story. One Broadway horror story where everything fell apart. Oh God.

SPEAKER_01: 40:19

A Broadway horror story where everything fell apart.

David: 40:22

And not when Gavin would go on and sing underpinch. That's so me.

Gavin: 40:27

Why do I laugh at that? Why do I why do I laugh every single time?

David: 40:30

Because if I wasn't saying it, I it I had me saying it is my love language. Of course, of course.

SPEAKER_01: 40:37

Oh God, I don't know if I have anything that amazing. I certainly was like dead center of 36 people all dressed alike in 42nd Street and completely wiped out for sure because we were dancing in taps on a metal turntable and it was fucking slick all the time. And instead of fixing the floor, all 36 of us had to grip for death and have like residual injury for the rest of our life. Definitely wiped out. And then when I played it back in my head, I'm like, it was really like two counts, and I was right back up. Because there's like a magical levitation claw that just picks you right back up and puts you to dancing. Um, in Priscilla once there's this magical quick change at the beginning, and you're in a dress with these puppets, and some kid grabbed some kid. Some kid like grabbed the pull away jacket too hard and ripped a puppet off of my dress, so I had to do the whole double puppet number with one puppet. Um, so I think I just used my other hand. I don't know. So I'm like doing that. You know the way I remember that. I remember that. I remember that. Yeah, who was that? I don't know. Some bitch. Jeff Metzler. Probably. Sorry, Jeff. Just name Jack. No, those are the best legs on Broadway right there. They really are. They certainly are. They certainly are. Lovely lines.

Gavin: 41:37

What about um what about horror stories from uh childhood? Like when you are in diapers, yeah, your own diapers someday in the nursing home, and you'll remember this story of I'll never forget when Sam did this when he was one and a half. Yeah, parenting.

SPEAKER_01: 41:49

I have a I have a really yucky horrible story, but it involves a lot of blood. Is that all right? Yeah. We usually don't get blood. Yeah. Well, I know. Uh so when Sam was three, is when my daughter was born. So I had a baby new little infant and like an a like tireless three, three and a half year old. So we used to go to those like indoor mall playgrounds with the like the big climby things, but they're kind of soft, but they're kind of plastic. You know the ones. And I would sit there with the baby who, for the record, God love her, she's the coolest. But for 15 months, she was like the literal nightmare of nightmares. So basically, she was calm. I was like, I'm not moving. Because she was, she even knows. She's like, I know I was a nightmare. Anyway, so Sam's running around like crazy, and I have this little, little bundle, and there's another little kid on the playground who's exactly mouth height on Sam. That's cute. So they're running like crazy, they're running like crazy, we're sitting, it's almost time to go, and all of a sudden I hear slam behind one of those. There's like a sliding board one. The kids were running in alternate directions. Yep. And Sam's mouth slammed full into the child's head. The child fell down, stood up, laughed, and went, and everything's fine. And Sam looked at me and just started gushing blood. His two front teeth completely punched in.

SPEAKER_03: 43:05

Oh gushing.

SPEAKER_01: 43:06

So he's three and a half. So I guess he had front teeth. Is that how science works? Yeah. Anyway, um, gushing, and I'm like, uh, newborn. I'm like, uh, okay. So we go into like some store, and I'm like, do you have a bathroom? And I'm like holding like a shirt on his face, just catching all this blood. And they're like, no, you have, you know. So sure enough, I slep him down, we get him cleaned up. His teeth are wiggly and gushy. And then, so, you know, it was a blunt force trauma to the mouth and a lot of blood. But you know, that was really fun. You just what you want. You have a double stroller, a newborn, and a three-year-old at a mall, and more bodily fluid than you can contain.

Gavin: 43:43

You will never forget that, and frankly, neither will we. No. To wrap up, yes, what would you say is the best part and the worst part of parenting?

SPEAKER_01: 43:52

Whew. The best part of parenting, honestly, is watching them figure out who and what they are. That is so freaking, it's like a wonder. Even the simple things, like what they chose to wear that day. You know, and I think letting them figure it out for themselves has allowed it to go on, but then they keep surprising me. So just like watching them become different every couple days. They're just different people as they as they stack their pieces together. That's really cool. The worst part uh was that 15 months?

unknown: 44:28

Yeah.

Gavin: 44:29

Thank you.

SPEAKER_01: 44:29

Yes.

Gavin: 44:30

Maybe I mean it was I can't.

SPEAKER_01: 44:33

I have never seen an uglier side of myself than I did in those 15 months. And someday I'll write a book and then I'll be taken to jail.

Gavin: 44:40

We yes, I do have to say, um, we definitely bonded over the struggles at the beginning. For that is for sure.

SPEAKER_01: 44:46

And nobody in our house 15 months.

Gavin: 44:48

No, for a couple for a couple of years, Eric and I would text each other. Uh uh, we hadn't even seen each other in many, many months. And I remember sending a text to be like, Did you just hear me scream at my child? You know, no context four months after having seen each other. And he would send it back, you know, and it it's tough. It is tough, it is totally rewarding, but it's tough. You're not alone out there. And it's just how they show up. Eric, yeah, thank you so much.

David: 45:13

So that was so fast. It was great to see you. I know, so fast. But it's so nice meeting you.

SPEAKER_01: 45:18

Nice to meet you. See you. Thanks for having me.

Gavin: 45:21

Thanks. So related to my serious parenting fail, my something great is that I do have a village, and I am grateful for it. And another parent fully picked up my slack, picked up my child, kept them from being abandoned on literally on the side of a road, admittedly a small town road, but nevertheless, uh, somebody fully stepped up and uh it reminds me when I am feeling like a selfish little shit that uh I need to look out for other kids too and pay it forward because you are lucky to have a village and hold on to that.

David: 45:55

It's so true, man. That like the village thing is like it's it sounds so cliche and very Gabe and Lodgy, but it's so it's it's so true. It's such a real thing.

Gavin: 46:06

Um, so I am so grateful for my village. That's what it is. My something great is great gratitude. Jesus Christ.

David: 46:14

Um so my something great this week is the baby center, which is an app I've talked about before, which is if prior when your kid is born, you you tell them when your due date is, and they say, you know, this week your size kid is the size of a lime a bean and they're growing their lungs. Um and then afterwards, which I love now, um, they will send you kind of like developmental things that will be happening. So, like, hey, this month you should notice your kids start to notice more colors or whatever. So they sent an email last week talking my son, it was for my son who's four, they were saying it was about gender roles. And they were saying, Really? You will notice your child now more than ever talking about gender, uh, identifying with one of the genders. And it was very specific about mentioning the difference between sex and gender. And it was very well said and a very casual, like, you know, boys can play with barbies, girls can whatever. But I just so appreciated the nonchalantness of the facts, which just frustrates me when we have all these fake conversations about bathrooms and transness and everything. Sure. Um, that like babysitter's like, no, no, no, I'm not debating this. We're gonna talk about it's real. They were like, yeah, so your biological male or female kids maybe displaying you know, likes or dislikes or identity with the other ones. And it was just such a nice thing to see from these things that go out to millions of parents. It goes out to millions of parents. So thanks, baby center. I loved that email. And that's our show. If you have any comments, suggestions, or general compliments, you can email us at gatriarchspodcast at gmail.com.

Gavin: 47:46

Or you can DM us on Instagram. We are at Gatriarchspodcast. On the internet, David is at David FMVonEverywhere, and Gavin is at GavinLodge on Star Trek.

David: 47:58

Please leave us a glowing five-star review, except for that part, wherever you get your podcasts. Thanks.

Gavin: 48:04

And we'll confuse you next time on another episode of Gatriarchs.