The Jordan B. Peterson Podcast XX
[0] Welcome to episode 237 of the Jordan B. Peterson podcast.
[1] I'm Michaela Peterson.
[2] Episode 237, we are doing away with the seasons.
[3] I never liked seasons anyway.
[4] Episode number makes more sense.
[5] The Peterson's are in Rhode Island.
[6] I'm currently recording this intro from backstage before dad's show.
[7] It's been so fun.
[8] We're all doing really well.
[9] This is a compilation episode on my parents' relationship.
[10] After 30 years of marriage, my parents have built an incredible relationship.
[11] One based on love, of course, but also good communication and lots of self -work.
[12] I can't stress the value of negotiation enough, as long as it's done in good faith.
[13] And that goes for everyone navigating a relationship.
[14] If you want, you can listen to the episode that was just released right before this one.
[15] On my parents, understand myself, couples report.
[16] If you want to understand how their personalities played a role in building and maintaining a successful marriage.
[17] If you enjoy this episode, or at least learn something, please subscribe.
[18] And if you don't want to hear me read ads, please visit jordanb peterson .supercast .com if you want to sign up for an ad -free experience.
[19] It'll switch your regular podcast to the ad -free version automatically on whatever platform you use.
[20] It's easy in just $10 a month or $100 a year.
[21] I hope you enjoy this episode.
[22] That's actually why people get, married, you know, just so you know.
[23] Because this is built into marital boughs.
[24] I'm not leaving ever, no matter what.
[25] It's like, okay, well, that definitely puts a boundary around our arguments, right?
[26] Because I can't say every time you manifest one of your flaws, which you're likely to do just as often as me, well, enough of this.
[27] It's like, that's horrible, man. If your whole life is, well, every time you get out of line, I'm out of here.
[28] It's like, how the hell are you, first of all, you're not going to admit to ever doing anything wrong.
[29] Second, you're going to be on your, you're like a scared cat the entire relationship because, well, who knows, it could just come to an end at any moment.
[30] It's like, you know, people say, well, if the possibility of divorce is open, it makes you free.
[31] It's like, yeah, that's what you want.
[32] You want to be free, eh?
[33] Really?
[34] Really.
[35] So you can't predict anything.
[36] That's what you're after.
[37] It's a vow.
[38] And it says, look, I know that you're of trouble.
[39] Me too.
[40] So we won't leave.
[41] No matter what happens.
[42] Well, that's a hell of a vow, but that's why it's a vow, right?
[43] That's why you take it in front of a bunch of people.
[44] That's why it's supposed to be a sacred act.
[45] It's like, what's the alternative?
[46] What's the alternative?
[47] Everything is mutable and changeable at any moment.
[48] Well, go ahead.
[49] You live your life like that and see what you're like when you're 50.
[50] Jesus, it's dismal.
[51] Two or three divorces.
[52] your family's fragmented, you've got no continuity of narrative.
[53] And it's not good for the kids, not by any stretch of the imagination.
[54] And so it's a form of voluntary enslavement, I suppose, but it's also equivalent to the adoption of a responsibility.
[55] And there's more to it than that.
[56] If you can't run away, then you can solve your problems.
[57] Because it might be, okay, well, I'm stuck with you.
[58] So how about we fix things?
[59] Because the alternative is we're going to be in a boxing match for the next 40 years.
[60] That's the alternative.
[61] And you think you're going to fix problems without something like that hanging over your head?
[62] There isn't a chance.
[63] You'll just avoid them because that's what people do.
[64] It's really hard to solve problems, especially in a relationship.
[65] We're having a fight, and I find out that it's because you're, you were abused by your uncle when you were five or some goddamn thing.
[66] You know, it's like, it's very frequent that that sort of thing happens.
[67] There's the partner, your partner is, you know, manifesting some weird anomalous behavior.
[68] You just can't make heads or tails of it.
[69] that doesn't seem related to what you're doing at all.
[70] They don't want to talk about it.
[71] And so as soon as you bring it up, they get mad.
[72] And then you bring it up again, they even get madder, and they tell you that you're not going to talk about that, or they're going to leave.
[73] And so maybe you're really, really persistent because you're kind of a son of a bitch, and then they break down and cry, you know, and then they have this horrible memory that comes flooding forward that's completely, you don't know what to do with it, and then you have to sort it out.
[74] So you think you're going to do that unless there's a good reason?
[75] You have to know.
[76] better sort this out and we're going to be carrying it around for the next 40 years.
[77] That maybe is enough motivation so you'll actually try hard to solve a problem.
[78] It's a lot easier to say, well, sorry, we're not going there.
[79] But then good, you'll have it every day, every day, every goddamn day for the rest of your life.
[80] See, there's some additional problems with divorce that people don't really grasp when they're young.
[81] Like the idea that you can be divorced once you have children, that's kind of a stupid idea, because you can't.
[82] you can find a limited substitute for your initial freedom.
[83] But if you have kids and you try to get divorced, the probability that that's going to demolish your life is very, very high.
[84] First of all, it's incredibly expensive.
[85] So one or both of you is going to come out of that poor.
[86] And your market value has declined.
[87] Let's say you're the woman who takes the kids.
[88] your market value has declined radically.
[89] You're going to be poorer.
[90] The man, he's just as screwed because he is now an indentured servant and there's no escape from it.
[91] So it's not so bad if you can negotiate a peaceful separation and some people can, but lots of times if you have a terrible relationship, it's not like negotiating a peaceful separation is all that easy.
[92] But if you're at each other's throats, good luck to you.
[93] I think it's roughly equivalent to having non -eastern, fatal cancer.
[94] It is not pleasant.
[95] It's a 10 -year process, 15 -year process.
[96] It'll cost you $250 ,000 and it'll tear a big chunk out of your life.
[97] And also it will really disrupt your relationship with your kids.
[98] And, you know, you bring kids into a step -parent family.
[99] They do not do as well.
[100] Step -parents are not as good parents as biological parents.
[101] And the data on that is clear.
[102] Now, obviously, there are exceptions, because there are terrible biological parents and there are wonderful step parents.
[103] But if you look in aggregate, it's not that easy to care for children.
[104] You need everything you can binding you to them.
[105] And if there's someone else's children, mostly they get in the way of the person that you love.
[106] Right?
[107] Well, if I'm, let's say you have a child, I'll be right out.
[108] Let's say you have a child and I want to go out with you.
[109] every second you spend with that child is the second you don't spend with me and and there's going to be a price for that I'm not going to be happy about that and if I have a child you're going to feel exactly the same way you might say well no I love children it's like yeah yeah sure sure you do I doubt it you might love your child and you know it's pretty specific the way that people love children so and the rate of abuse for kids in step -parent families is way higher than it is in biological families.
[110] There's not even any comparison.
[111] When did you meet dad?
[112] I was eight years old.
[113] He moved on to the street when he was seven, I guess, because he's a year younger than me. He lived right across the street in an orange house.
[114] His dad was a teacher at the elementary school, and George was this very skinny little kid.
[115] He was a skinny little sandy -haired.
[116] he had straight sandy hair.
[117] He had straight hair when he was little?
[118] He had straight hair.
[119] It didn't curl until he was in puberty.
[120] Same with my son, right?
[121] Same with Julian.
[122] Julian has curly hair?
[123] Julian has hair.
[124] Well, it's a bit curly, but he never had any curl until he went through puberty.
[125] Same thing.
[126] Yeah, I met George when he was eight, seven, eight, when I was eight.
[127] And we did things that kids do.
[128] We played games on the street.
[129] We played baseball in the empty lots that were behind our house.
[130] We lived right on the edge of town.
[131] And he was in the same grade as me, so we hung out with some of the kids at school too.
[132] And I was very good friends with him, you know, until grade 7 when I matured and he didn't because boys don't mature as fast as girls.
[133] He was also younger, right?
[134] And he was a year younger.
[135] So I left him to his group of friends.
[136] I went on with my group of friends.
[137] And we didn't really hang out again until high school, until late in high school.
[138] And I was actually going out with another fellow, but I wanted Jordan to be my grad escort because he was my best friend.
[139] And so my boyfriend had to go away around graduation, so I asked George to be my escort, and he said yes.
[140] So that was our first date.
[141] And that was pretty cool.
[142] He didn't spend any time with me, though.
[143] He spent time with his friends.
[144] at graduation at graduation yeah yeah he was still well he was young he was a young guy he was probably nervous he was probably nervous too yeah he was probably nervous okay so what happened in university where'd you go uh first of all i went to edmonton and that was you know a good six hours away from home so it was away from home yeah where is fair view it's fair view is where you guys met yeah it's it's uh it's uh it's in northern albara Alberta, so it's, you know, six -hour drive north of Edmonton, near an hour from the BC border.
[145] So it's nearly into British Columbia.
[146] It's in, it's on the prairie, so it's a, you can see, we could see 40 miles from the hill in our town.
[147] Our town was called Fairview, and if you drove up on the hill west of town and looked, you could see communities, lights from communities at night that were, 45 or 50 miles away.
[148] You would just see a string of lights like a like a string of of pearls.
[149] It was a beautiful place and you know the you could see so far that the stars would come down and then you would see the lights of the towns.
[150] So you could see the sky and the and the ground meet in this little cascade of light.
[151] It was it was a beautiful place.
[152] That's nothing like Toronto.
[153] No, but you know when we moved to Boston, when George was at Harvard and when Julian was born in Boston you were two when we moved there we went to the ocean every weekend and that kind of reminded me of the prairie because I could see so far and so that really in a way although it was the ocean it reminded me of home and there's wind at the ocean and there's lots of wind in the prairies so in some ways the ocean and the prairies have a lot in common and at least the immense sky that you can get on the prairies is similar to when you go to the beach.
[154] Yeah, I remember the ocean in Boston.
[155] Yeah, it was wonderful.
[156] It was wonderful.
[157] Yeah, I was very calm.
[158] George used to build out of sand, he would drag his foot around and make a house with rooms.
[159] And you and Julian would play house.
[160] I loved playing those games.
[161] I can remember that.
[162] It would have been like four or five.
[163] That was a really good game.
[164] Drag your foot and draw a house and then you can play in like the bed.
[165] room or the kitchen of this sand house.
[166] That was a good idea.
[167] Yeah.
[168] So you went to, where did you go to university?
[169] I went to University of Alberta for a year, but I didn't want to live in Edmonton.
[170] Oh, no, let's see.
[171] When I first, yeah, I went to Edmonton.
[172] I just took one course.
[173] I took a psychology course and I worked full time because I didn't quite know what I wanted to study.
[174] I was very creative and it was difficult for me to decide on.
[175] one career.
[176] You're open.
[177] As really open.
[178] And so it was very difficult to hone in on exactly what I wanted to do because everything looked interesting.
[179] Driving a bus looked interesting, you know, as well as, you know, being a painter.
[180] So all these things looked interesting.
[181] So I took one course in Edenton.
[182] I worked full time and then I decided, actually I met someone who was going to McGill and we drove out to Montreal and I went to McGill for a year and I studied arts.
[183] So I studied, you know, a general arts with French and philosophy and English.
[184] And I really had a good time there.
[185] It was really fun to be in Montreal, although that was about 1980.
[186] And the separatist movement was very hot then.
[187] And when we arrived in town, we arrived in town, we'd driven across the country.
[188] I got food poisoning on the way, nearly died.
[189] It was a fun trip.
[190] Well, when you're when you're living out of a picnic box, you know, sometimes, well, we didn't have a, we didn't have a lot of ice or anything to keep things cold.
[191] You remember those things.
[192] I got salmonella.
[193] Yeah, you remember those things.
[194] I got salmonella two years ago in January.
[195] You, oh, and I had Scarlet and she was still in her crib, like young enough that when she wakes up in the morning, I have to go in there and pick her up.
[196] And I was so sick.
[197] I couldn't move.
[198] And I had to get you to come over.
[199] Oh, I remember.
[200] get scarlet up because i had like a fever and i couldn't yeah you were really sick yeah it was like three days of i thought i was going to die and then the fourth or fifth day i could eat again was like huh well that was nasty but i that sounds like what you got i wonder if it was samanella except for i was sitting in the bush that's so much worse sitting in the bush anyway it wasn't i think although to come back to that i think i had had my ankle replaced re -replaced then.
[201] So I think I was still hopping around.
[202] Oh, you might have been.
[203] I think I was still hopping around.
[204] So I wasn't in the bush, but I did have a surgery ankle.
[205] Okay.
[206] Well, I think you win.
[207] I think you win.
[208] I don't know, man. The bush doesn't sound good either.
[209] Anyway, after the food poisoning.
[210] We went, we got to Montreal and I recognized Sherbrook Street and I said, oh, let's get off here.
[211] So we go down Sherbrook Street and I'm like this little town girl, right?
[212] I'm a rural girl.
[213] I lived in for a year.
[214] But I'm a little, and we, down Sherbrook Street, and I see this guy walking down the street, and he's got on leather shorts and a leather vest, and that's about all, you know, and, and boots on, and I was just complete, my eyes were just, I was just glued to this guy.
[215] I couldn't believe what I saw, and I thought, wow, I've, you know, I've finally moved somewhere were something's happening.
[216] And then we stopped at a light.
[217] The light was red and the car in front of us turned right, right into the parked car beside him.
[218] And I was just like, what kind of place is this?
[219] You could go to a bar and you could carry your drinks around.
[220] You could stand up in a bar.
[221] In Alberta, you can't stand up in a bar because if you stand up in a bar with a drink, you're going to fight.
[222] So you get kicked out.
[223] Really?
[224] Yes.
[225] So when I came to Ontario, of course, I was only five.
[226] foot two so it didn't do me any good to stand up but you could stand up and walk around and talk yeah in montreal whatever you wanted people till three in the morning people socialize like crazy in those bars yes they wand on the streets i think you're on on the streets yeah yeah well in alberta no that was a like no goal you're gonna fight no go that's right so it was quite a so then i got to montreal and i just loved it and i loved mcgill too it was a wonderful it was a wonderful year it was strange to be in a place where I couldn't get a job because my French wasn't good enough.
[227] And if you spoke English, it was tense.
[228] The atmosphere was tense.
[229] So when I finished that year, I moved to Ottawa, and I finished my degree in Ottawa.
[230] And I went to University of Ottawa.
[231] It was a bilingual university.
[232] So I took half my courses in French.
[233] And I got a science degree, a kinesiology degree.
[234] And I studied with a massage therapist for a while.
[235] while because I wanted to do massage afterwards and I didn't go to the massage school but I took weekend courses and read a lot and started offering massage therapy to people and at that time there was there weren't that many massage therapists around because it was about 19 it was 1887 and I got people I got people coming out of hospitals who were dying coming to me for massage for some relief it was was really quite a time to be offering those services.
[236] I had one woman, she did pass away.
[237] She had lupus and passed away.
[238] I had another woman.
[239] She was in a cancer treatment.
[240] She came to see me. She, you know, she was okay, but hurting.
[241] And I had lot, and I taught yoga.
[242] I taught yoga out of my house, too.
[243] When I first went to university, I'd studied yoga since I was 13 years old.
[244] My aunt introduced me to yoga one summer when we were tearing down the pig barn and doing yoga lessons in the morning.
[245] It was quite a summer.
[246] I took the yoga and went home and I just did yoga every day.
[247] That is so cool.
[248] I thought, I don't know, it seemed like something to do.
[249] And I thought I might need this someday.
[250] Yeah, well, that's for sure.
[251] So I always had that in my mind that I would need to know how to take care of myself when I was older, that life would get, I didn't know life would get complicated, but I didn't know that, but I sensed that there would be a time where life would be too much for me and I would have to have skills to cope, right?
[252] Yeah, well, that certainly happened.
[253] Thank goodness I did those things because I think those things have, well, they took me through high school successfully and otherwise I don't think I don't know how successful I would have been you know I'd come home at night after drinking and do a yoga pose or two and realize I drank too much you know I mean it would bring me back to myself all the time about just where I was so it's it's like you know when you balance when you when you weigh something you get it to stop at zero zero first and then you weigh it that's what I was like when I'd do my yoga it would bring me back to myself and I could reflect, okay, I'm not, I'm doing okay today or I'm really not balanced today or I could, and then I did that all through high school so that I didn't ever really go too far one way or another.
[254] It kind of centered me. And I'm really grateful for that because high school can be a disaster for some people.
[255] High school is really hard.
[256] High school's really hard.
[257] I mean, And people, high schools are, even the teachers have seemed to be confused.
[258] I mean, it's not just the kids are confused.
[259] And I don't know, you know, I grew up in a very rural place, in a public school, but I don't think it's all that different anywhere you go.
[260] That kids are trying to find their way and there isn't a lot of guidance that they can listen to unless it's, I mean, this was old sage.
[261] You know, the yoga, this is centuries old.
[262] It was something that had some staying power, and it wasn't the church.
[263] And the church, you know, I went to the church, but I didn't get a lot from the minister that was there.
[264] And there wasn't, and they're just, although my grandmothers were religious, my mom didn't practice.
[265] so we went to church as little kids and then as teenagers not so much and then left the church.
[266] And when I went to Montreal, I went to church for a year there to a united church.
[267] And at Easter I went to a Catholic church and it was all in French.
[268] All they said was, you know, forgive me, Monseigneur, through the whole thing.
[269] They were all, all these Frenchmen were wearing pastel suits and walk.
[270] It was really, it was Easter, you know, they all looked like.
[271] the Easter eggs walking around the church.
[272] It was quite an experience, but I went all by myself, right?
[273] So, because George wasn't a church goal.
[274] Okay, okay.
[275] So let's go.
[276] So you were in Ottawa.
[277] You finished your degree.
[278] You're doing massage therapy.
[279] You're now fairly bilingual.
[280] Now I'm fairly bilingual.
[281] And Jordan gives me a call.
[282] When was the last time you talked to him?
[283] I used to see him at Christmas, you know.
[284] I'd come home at Christmas every year.
[285] and then I didn't for a couple of years.
[286] And then he said he was going to move to Ottawa.
[287] And I thought, oh, that'd be nice.
[288] And then he didn't.
[289] He got a job in Edenton, so he didn't come.
[290] So then I kind of thought, well, I'm just going to pick up my life and go forward.
[291] So I went out with a fellow and lived with him for a couple of years.
[292] And then I was finishing my degree, and I got a phone call from George that he was in Montreal, that he was doing his Ph .D. and he was going to McGill.
[293] and so I went there for Thanksgiving in 2000, no, in 1986, and he looked like he was doing all right.
[294] And he was a lot taller.
[295] Well, he was a lot taller a year after high school.
[296] I met him in Fairview.
[297] He got out of his car, and he got out of his car for like a second or two longer than usual because he was a foot taller.
[298] And he still wasn't marriable at that point, though he was pretty much a wild man at that point.
[299] But once I got to McGill, he looked like he wasn't quite as much of a wild man and that he was getting a life in that he had a plan.
[300] And I thought that there was a possibility that maybe we could make a go of it.
[301] Because he'd already asked me to marry him a couple of times by then.
[302] When?
[303] At Christmas?
[304] this?
[305] At New Year's?
[306] I think at New Year's I said yes, that was the last time.
[307] What?
[308] I don't remember hearing about this.
[309] I thought he wrote it to you in a letter.
[310] He did.
[311] He wrote me a letter and asked me to marry him there and I thought, is this guy for real?
[312] Yeah, kind of.
[313] That's not very romantic.
[314] Where's the knee and the ring?
[315] Yeah, it's like, well, we did live 3 ,000 miles apart.
[316] Yeah.
[317] And that, you know, back then, to call home was, uh, it wasn't, you didn't have a cell phone you didn't have a cell phone plan or anything it it's kind of money for a long distance and we didn't have it i didn't have any extra money neither did he yeah and it is kind of romantic yeah he wrote me i think that used to be the way it was really would write letters i imagine yeah oh a lot of letter writing you know love letters remember you've heard of yeah yeah yeah so he wrote me i think he was probably going to europe and wanted to know if i wanted to get go with him man also get married.
[318] But I thought maybe he was joking, because it was written in kind of a joking way.
[319] He's probably nervous.
[320] Yeah, he could pass it off as a joke if you said no, just in case.
[321] That's right.
[322] So I didn't quite know how to take it.
[323] So I just kind of left that there.
[324] And one time he asked me, and I said, maybe.
[325] I wasn't ready.
[326] I didn't want to say no, but I wasn't ready to say yes.
[327] I still had to see which way his life was.
[328] Well, when we got married, I was 27.
[329] So did he ask you the first time when you were like 25 or something?
[330] Oh, maybe 23.
[331] Oh, okay.
[332] That's pretty young.
[333] That's pretty young.
[334] Yeah.
[335] I didn't know that.
[336] Oh, yeah.
[337] Yeah.
[338] I didn't know it started like that early.
[339] The asking.
[340] The asking?
[341] Yeah, the asking started kind of early.
[342] You just tortured him for like four years?
[343] Yeah.
[344] When he started to, it looked like he was going to start to have some girlfriends.
[345] I married him.
[346] As soon as you saw other women moving in.
[347] That's funny.
[348] Yeah, and he was just starting to feel like confident and everything, and I married him.
[349] Desperately and definitely want to hear about your wife, Tammy.
[350] Yeah.
[351] And also, you're so well known for your views on men or how your ideas have been taken up so enthusiastically by young men, but we want to talk to you about women.
[352] Yep, that's good.
[353] So, but one of the things you and I share is that we both grew up in Canada.
[354] I promise Christine I would not do my Canadian accent while you were here.
[355] But you grew up in rural Alberta.
[356] I grew up in Toronto.
[357] And you are, what, the country's most famous guru now since Marshall McLuhan.
[358] But is the fact that you came from Canada have any effect on your views, do you think?
[359] Has it formed you in any way?
[360] I mean, would it be the same if you think?
[361] think you'd grown up in rural Texas?
[362] How has Canada contributed to your worldview?
[363] She's always looking to promote Canada.
[364] So go for it.
[365] Go for it.
[366] Well, I think the particular part of Canada I grew up in probably was formative to some degree.
[367] I mean, the town I grew up in was only 50 years old.
[368] And the particular part of the world that I grew up in was really the last settled part of the North American prairie.
[369] This was outside of Edmonton, correct?
[370] Yeah, about 400 miles north of Edmonton.
[371] Oh, 400 miles?
[372] Yeah, yeah.
[373] That's right at the tip of the...
[374] Short distance.
[375] Short distance.
[376] Yeah, so the prairie stretches up that far north.
[377] It stretches up farther north in Alberta than it does anywhere else in the North American continent.
[378] And so we were at the tip of viable farming, essentially.
[379] And so it was a new place, and it was a rather raw place, and it was a rather harsh place in many ways, especially because of the winter.
[380] and it was fundamentally a working -class place, although a prosperous working -class place, right, because most of the industry there was related to the oil and gas industry, and although it was cyclical when things were good, working -class people could make a very good living.
[381] This was during the 70s, so through the world.
[382] Was it fun to be a kid in 400 miles outside a small town?
[383] I liked it when I was a kid.
[384] I wouldn't say it was as fun when I was a teenager.
[385] But I'm not convinced that, you know, the majority of people who are teenagers necessarily have the most wonderful time of it.
[386] I think adults often look backwards at the past through rose -colored glasses.
[387] I think that's what the cartoonist Trudeau accused Reagan of doing continually.
[388] Gary Trudeau.
[389] I think the words you...
[390] I think the words you...
[391] No, no. And I'm kidding, I'm kidding.
[392] I think the words you used for it in your book was Teenage...
[393] wasteland, I think, is what you called it.
[394] But it's Canadian -ness.
[395] How does that form you or affected you, if at all?
[396] Maybe it didn't.
[397] It's hard to say.
[398] I mean, I've lived in lots of different parts of Canada now, and Canada's quite different.
[399] I lived in, well, Alberta for a while, and it had this particular flavor of existence.
[400] I mean, mostly in Fairview, I was striving to leave and to move ahead, let's say, or to move, I hesitate, say, up, but somewhere different, somewhere more urban.
[401] But that's the case with many people.
[402] I mean, the small towns all across the west in the U .S. and in Canada are dying.
[403] They're down to nothing because everyone's moved to the cities.
[404] I lived in Montreal for a good while, and that was interesting because it was a very, very different culture.
[405] It was a culture that was to some degree stratified by language and by class.
[406] None of that was true in Alberta because it was so new that there's no class structure.
[407] So that was quite interesting.
[408] Right.
[409] And you worked, what I loved, I pulled a passage because I think, as you say, people are born in small places everywhere and some want to leave and some don't.
[410] You said, I wanted to be elsewhere.
[411] I wasn't the only one.
[412] Everyone who eventually left the Fairview I grew up knew they were leaving by the age of 12.
[413] I knew, and my wife who grew up with me on the same street knew.
[414] What was that thing?
[415] What would you call that?
[416] What's the thing that makes you want to leave?
[417] And sets you off, because as you point out, there was no class system.
[418] Education was cheap in Canada compared to the United States.
[419] Oh, yeah, it wasn't cost that was stopping people.
[420] You were from a, what, middle class order?
[421] My father was a teacher, and my mother was a librarian, though she had trained as a nurse.
[422] So, you know, we had a comfortable, I would say, a suburban lifestyle.
[423] essentially, you know, a moderate, middle -class, suburban lifestyle.
[424] That's what Fairview looked like.
[425] It looked like a suburb that was built mostly in the, say, between the 1950s and the 1970s.
[426] The young Jordan and the then -young Tammy, and you have to tell us that story how you met, but wanted more.
[427] Well, you know, I think that's one thing that is different to some degree about class.
[428] my father and my mother had both left the towns they were from and they were forward future -looking people and most of my friends who quit school and who didn't attend university they didn't have that sense I would say that more developed sense of a world outside of what they knew and the other thing is that my father took us on long trips when I was a kid he was a teacher and so he had summer holidays And we drove all over Western Canada and down into the US, long driving trips, thousands of miles.
[429] And, you know, that also gave us the sense that the world was a bigger place.
[430] But I knew way before I was 12, I believe, that I was off at least to university.
[431] And I think generally, in your family, if you're liable to go to university, people don't even really talk about it.
[432] It's just a given that that's what's going to happen.
[433] It's something that you take in with every breath almost.
[434] It's often an unspoken expectation.
[435] And maybe people make casual reference like, well, when you go to college, but it's not like there's a question about it.
[436] Whereas if you're from a working class background, especially if your family hasn't pursued post -secondary education, that isn't in the realm of unspoken or spoken expectation.
[437] And it wasn't like lots of my friends, including many of them who dropped out before they hit high school.
[438] They weren't, they were by no means the dimest people in the class, like they were plenty smart, but they weren't oriented towards the idea of pursuing a career that involved intellectual, what intellectual engagement wasn't in their worldview.
[439] And, you know, when you hear people on the, let's say, more socialist end of the distribution talk about barriers to education, they often talk about cause.
[440] And sometimes cost is a barrier and it's more of a barrier.
[441] Yeah, and it's more of a barrier, although there's still plenty of community colleges or state colleges where you can get educated for a perfectly reasonable amount of money.
[442] But for my friends, it was never a reason that money was never a reason they didn't pursue post -secondary education.
[443] It was more like a truncated view of time, I would say.
[444] You know, there was more of an emphasis on the here and now.
[445] And there were jobs of plenty, I guess.
[446] Well, there was also that, yeah, yeah, and well -paying jobs.
[447] Like, it wasn't obvious that you were in better shape economically to go to university.
[448] Probably worse.
[449] Oh, yeah, well, especially if you were doing something like working on the oil rates.
[450] Right, right.
[451] But, you know, that was rough, cold, harsh work.
[452] And it wasn't, once you had an inn, you could stay employed, but it wasn't that easy to land an entry -level job either.
[453] And so, yeah, well, it was wise for lots of working -class people to work.
[454] in those jobs because they were unbelievably lucrative.
[455] And they should have been because they were very difficult and dangerous and frigid cold and rough.
[456] So, you know, it's not like the people didn't earn their money.
[457] Well, just tell us quickly, like, how you met your wife.
[458] You were, you met her when you were seven or eight or, you know.
[459] Yeah, in grade three.
[460] In grade three?
[461] Yeah.
[462] And you, did you fall in love with her?
[463] In grade three?
[464] In grade three?
[465] Yeah.
[466] And was it mutual?
[467] And not in the beginning.
[468] She wouldn't admit it if it was.
[469] There were lots of the boys in grade three were in love with her.
[470] She had a whole little crew of guys that were perfectly willing to follow her around, and she was perfectly willing to exploit that.
[471] She was very good at it.
[472] Yeah, she was very popular.
[473] It's just so wonderful that you met his children.
[474] We were friends for a long time.
[475] We used to play chess together and croquet, and she was a vicious croquet player.
[476] She would, I don't know if you've ever played croquet, but if your balls touch, then you can stand on yours and whack it, and then the other person's ball will vanish off into this stratosphere, and she liked to knock it all the way down the street.
[477] And then she'd laugh, and, you know, so she always had a good sense of, good vicious sense of humor.
[478] It's one of the things I actually admire about my wife when we've had our verbal disputes, which, you know, have certainly happened.
[479] She can string together a sequence of, of insults that's so hair -raising, that you have to laugh.
[480] Did she have brothers?
[481] She did.
[482] She has a brother, much older, eight years older, but he's quite a peaceful person, and she had two sisters.
[483] I guess my girls with brothers can get along with guys, because guys, they show love and affection by insults and jabs and jeers, and if you, and I had a brother, and I sort of learned, okay, but if you don't have brothers, girls are like, oh, that's so rude, That's so...
[484] Yeah.
[485] So she was...
[486] Yeah, well, she has a naturally...
[487] Or maybe she came by it naturally.
[488] A serbic twist.
[489] She did.
[490] Well, and her father is quite sharp -witted, and, well, he was a real town character.
[491] He's still alive.
[492] He was a real character in the town, a real hyper extrovert.
[493] Everybody knew him.
[494] And he had a pretty good wit on him, and she had some of that.
[495] Well, it still does have some of that.
[496] So she was a, you know...
[497] Aside from her, acerbic...
[498] humor and her ability to whack balls.
[499] And I just don't want to go further on that description.
[500] That could have many things that tells us about you.
[501] But what else brought, what else attracted?
[502] I mean, you've known her pretty much your whole life.
[503] So some of the other qualities that not just attracted you, but enable you to sustain.
[504] I mean, I think every young person in this room will want to know, and maybe there isn't one, but what's the secret?
[505] What's it like to be with someone that long?
[506] How do you sustain that?
[507] Well, I think if you're fortunate, some of it's good fortune, you know, and I would say this is true.
[508] I've watched people in their relationships, you know, personally for a long time, but also as a professional, because I've done a lot of clinical counseling.
[509] And, I mean, there's some things that need to be a given about the relationship, I would say.
[510] It doesn't hurt to find the other person very attractive.
[511] You know, and that's a mysterious thing.
[512] We're not exactly sure what it is that produces, let's say, chemistry between people, although, Chemistry is definitely part of what produces it.
[513] There's subtle things that attract people to one another that are way below the level of consciousness.
[514] So, for example, women don't like the odor of men who have R .H. blood factors who, if they had children with, would be likely to produce a stillborn infant.
[515] Well, that's definitely a category atmatch .com.
[516] Right, right, right.
[517] Well, it's so strange, though, because you...
[518] How do you even know?
[519] Well, that's a good question.
[520] And you know by odor, apparently.
[521] And so there's also...
[522] If you're wearing cologne, then it would depend on what type of cologne is.
[523] R .H., what was it?
[524] Right.
[525] Smell is a very strange sense, and it's very deeply tied to very profound emotions, including memory.
[526] And so you find people attractive for reasons that you can't always determine.
[527] And so that was part of it.
[528] I've always found her very attractive, and that continues.
[529] And I liked her combativeness, you know.
[530] Like, I think that you want someone, I think, in a relationship that you can spar with.
[531] And it's partly because you have hard problems to solve.
[532] And if the person that you're with isn't willing to put forward their opinion, then you only have half the cognitive power that you would otherwise have.
[533] You know, and hopefully you find someone who's interestingly different from you, like not so different that you can't communicate, and you have to be careful of that, but interestingly different, and then hopefully they have the ability and the will to express their opinion, and then it's, you know, then your interest stays heightened and there has to be that tension in a relationship.
[534] You know, people think, well, I want to get along perfectly with my partner.
[535] It's like, no, you probably.
[536] probably don't.
[537] You just get bored, and then you go looking for trouble.
[538] And so you want a little bit of trouble in the relationship and a little bit of mystery and a little bit of combativeness and the ability to exchange opinions forthrightly.
[539] And I trust her, which is a huge element.
[540] I mean, when we finally did decide to get together permanently, we were both in our later 20s.
[541] And, you know, one of the things that I had learned by that point and insist, to her about was that we had to tell each other the truth.
[542] And she took to that wholeheartedly, you know, and for better and for worse, because truths can be harsh.
[543] Does that include, like, does this outfit make me to look like that?
[544] Yeah, well, the truthful answer to that is I don't answer questions that are likely to get me in trouble.
[545] Yeah, so.
[546] I have a son who will answer honestly, and it's, infuriating, but then I realized if you want the truth, talk to Tamler.
[547] Well, that's the thing, you know.
[548] It's useful to know.
[549] Truth is empowering.
[550] Truth tellers are charismatic.
[551] And, you know, actually, both my sons are, like, brutally honest, which is disconcerting.
[552] But it's, I can see that it's made them very formidable.
[553] And because of the people trust them and the friendships.
[554] And just, it gives them a, and you've written a lot of.
[555] Well, you know, if I tell my wife that she looks good in an outfit, she knows that I mean it.
[556] Yeah.
[557] And so there's some utility in that.
[558] And then if you're silent and say, I don't answer questions, she goes and she knows it.
[559] Well, sometimes, you know, she'll say, you know, do you like this?
[560] And I'll tell her that I don't.
[561] And, you know, and that doesn't necessarily make her happy in the moment.
[562] Right.
[563] But if I do say I like it, she knows that I mean it.
[564] And, you know, I actually like her sense of style a lot, so it turns out that 90 % present of the time, it's pretty easy for me to say, look, I think you look great, and mean it.
[565] And, you know, she's a fairly harsh standard bearer, too.
[566] Like, she's insisted that I stay in whatever reasonable physical shape I happen to be in.
[567] You know, that was something that she's very demanding of.
[568] And I would say that it's the same from my side.
[569] And we've been good at negotiating, which is, you know, what do you want from a partner fundamentally?
[570] What do you want and need?
[571] I mean, the first thing is that, well, hopefully, like I said, you're blessed with the fact that you find each other attractive, and I think it's very difficult for the relationship to begin or proceed or sustain itself without that.
[572] And I think of Tammy, and I think of you, and we don't hear a great deal of Tammy, but you guys are, I'm sure, working really hard, you're contending, you're confronting all this stuff and you're processing it, and I'm sure your marriage is strengthening.
[573] I trust it is.
[574] And I'd love some insight on that if you can speak to what you're learning about marriage in this season of your life.
[575] Well, the first thing we're doing is that Tammy is traveling with me. So that's very helpful, and she's paying attention.
[576] You know, and we talk a lot about what is going on, but also a lot about our family, because there's complicated things going on in our family like there are in most families.
[577] And we do our best to communicate, you know, and she says what she thinks.
[578] And I say what I think.
[579] And we don't always think the same thing, you know, but we do our best to listen.
[580] We do our best to assume that just because the other person has a different opinion doesn't mean that they're wrong, even though it would be lovely if they were.
[581] And then we try to come up with a negotiated solution that's mutated.
[582] acceptable, you know, and we discussed strategy as well.
[583] I mean, for example, when we started this tour, which was more than a year ago, we thought, you know, there's a lot of competing things that you could think about a tour, especially when we had no idea how long it would be.
[584] Like, what was this?
[585] Was this a vacation?
[586] We were going to, you know, spectacular cities all over the world.
[587] Um, um, was it time for us to spend together?
[588] Like, what was it?
[589] What were we doing?
[590] And, and we spent two.
[591] And we spent two.
[592] hours thinking.
[593] It's like, no, this is work.
[594] We have a remarkable opportunity here, and we're going to do the work.
[595] We're going to hit as many cities as we can.
[596] And so what does that mean?
[597] It means we get the hell up in the morning.
[598] We make sure we're packed.
[599] Our suitcases aren't too full.
[600] We don't carry anything that goes underneath the plane.
[601] We make sure that I don't get hungry because then I can't perform properly.
[602] We make sure that I'm at the theater at the right point in time and we make sure that our eye is focused on the fact that it's a great privilege and it's very unlikely that we can do this and so we thought okay that's the deal and then we thought well and then we can take an hour or two here and there if we're fortunate to see some of the city and to take a break and to do that when we can and you know we've negotiated other details about exactly how intense the scheduling was going to be but it's a constant negotiation and it is a contentious negotiation which is good because these things are complicated you know and to think something complicated through you need a good argument on this side and you need a good argument on this side and then you got to have at her and see if you can come out with an even better argument as a consequence and so that seemed to work now there's other advantages it turns out that Tammy is very suited I'm sorry I'm speaking for her but she doesn't have a microphone and actually prefers to stay in the background to some degree for various reasons.
[603] She's very suited to a life like this.
[604] She's quite stable emotionally, so she doesn't suffer from a lot of anxiety.
[605] She likes to travel.
[606] She likes meeting new people.
[607] She likes the adventure.
[608] And she's supporting what I'm doing.
[609] And so that's working.
[610] And thank God for that.
[611] And then she also keeps an eye on what I'm doing and lets me know when it's going well and when she thinks it needs improvement and and and she helps me figure out where I'm going next because for the last two years my schedule has been so busy that I don't know what I'm doing next usually maybe the next day and so her job because we've also parceled out jobs is to make sure that I get wherever I'm going next on time and ready.
[612] And so far, that's brought, I would say, incalculable benefits fundamentally.
[613] And because we agreed on it, we had our little constitution in place.
[614] We were able to handle the stress because I think we've been in a hundred and, it's damn near 150 cities in 350 days.
[615] And so it's very heavy traveling schedule.
[616] But, and the other thing is, and the other too is I trust her.
[617] She tells me the truth.
[618] It isn't necessarily what I want to hear.
[619] Well, you can tell.
[620] That's the truth, man. It's what you don't necessarily want to hear.
[621] But so she's a very good counselor.
[622] And that's turned out to be exceptionally helpful.
[623] So.
[624] And I'm with my wife.
[625] I've been with her for, well, I've known her for 50 years.
[626] And we stuck together through good times and bad times.
[627] And it's definitely worth it.
[628] It's continual.
[629] negotiating and effort but you know we have a we have a narrative of our life that's complete and unbroken and it's that's unbelievably valuable if you're told your parent or your wife of almost 30 years has no chance and is going to be dead in the next 10 months that's what we were told that surgery doesn't help and that chemo doesn't help and that this is a fast -growing cancer and you're screwed no matter what.
[630] That's what we heard in one day.
[631] So, yeah, anxiety.
[632] We went all over North America to New York and to Houston and to L .A. looking for different opinions before we decided to settle on surgery.
[633] And everyone gave us the same opinion.
[634] Yes, which was that nothing is going to help, but surgery was probably the best low probability bet.
[635] Well, you know, when I was first diagnosed with cancer, they told me it was treatable.
[636] And so I thought, okay, it's treatable.
[637] I'll just do this and move on.
[638] And so I came home from Australia.
[639] I had surgery.
[640] Six weeks later, I was walking from, you know, midtown to the lake front and back.
[641] I was in good shape.
[642] Then I went to my six -week doctor's appointment.
[643] They told me, actually, no, we were wrong.
[644] What you have is a type of cancer that's, we never see because everybody dies so fast.
[645] You're going to die in 11 months.
[646] if we have to do surgery like right now and there's no chemo already we don't know how to treat this so all we're going to do is take your kidney out and all your lymph out and hope for the best and I thought oh I'm going to die when I got that terminal illness prognosis I was at the hospital with my husband we came home and I thought I was thinking on the way home I'm 57 I had many aunts that lived this long.
[647] Many uncles, they died when they were in their 50s.
[648] Maybe I'm one of them too, you know, so I can accept that.
[649] If I'm going to die now, I can accept that.
[650] I've lived a good life and I've always thought I was in control of my life and I always thought I was a tough person that I could do whatever I wanted to do.
[651] And I decided I'd make this decision as well.
[652] But when I got home and told my son and my daughter, the looks on their faces made me think, oh, oh, I'm not thinking about this, right?
[653] This isn't about me. None of this is about me. This is about my loved ones.
[654] And I'm here for them, and they need me. And so I'll do it.
[655] That's why people go through surgery and really.
[656] radiation and chemotherapy and all that's why people will have limbs removed and everything and you think god that's awful why do people do that's because um of people that they love that's why we live is because we are social creatures like we were speaking before our arms are made to hug we are here to serve others and uh i all of a sudden it was really quite a momentary change for me that I understood that this was a whole different story than I had thought in the beginning.
[657] So when I went back in the hospital and had surgery and I wanted to live, you know, I, and I said I would do anything and I would be grateful for all the care and the help that I was getting, like as far as i'm concerned i died and came back to life so and probably and spiritually i've been reborn and i think i understand what reborn means now and i think this is something that when you get sick and it looks like there's no way back then you have to prepare yourself for what might happen and um i was put in a position where where I was at the mercy of medicine and luck, really.
[658] And so all the prayers that came through all the people that Jordan and I had met on tour, I breathed in those prayers, you know, the night before my surgery.
[659] I breathed in gold prayers to myself, and I asked myself why I turned against myself and like why these little cells, it was like they had turned away.
[660] that's what it was like it was like hey you guys like where'd you go we have a job to do here we everybody else is keeping me alive you guys what are you turned away for but they were turned away for good and i couldn't turn them back to me again and then i realized you know through this meditation i was doing that i had to give the cancer to the universe because cancer's too big for one person and so after that moment anybody who would offer me any prayer or any relief of any kind or or just a smile or anything i would i would take it i would take it and bring it to myself and i was i realized that it wasn't that it wasn't a it what i wasn't doing it exactly for me i was doing that to survive so that I could be someone who could be of service to Jordan, right?
[661] Be of service to you, be a grandmother for my grandkids.
[662] So I had these other things in my life that were important.
[663] And maybe I was going to die, but I was going to do whatever I had in my power to do to stay alive and really prayer.
[664] was a big part of what I did.
[665] You know, I had a very good friend come to the hospital when I was in the hospital for five weeks.
[666] Every day she came at 10 in the morning, and we prayed for two hours a day.
[667] And I just cried and told her my life story, really, and prayed.
[668] And I still pray every day.
[669] She taught me the rosary, and I'm not Catholic, but she taught me the rosary, and I memorized it.
[670] And I read about it and I understand it, and I pray it every day to start my day.
[671] And I meditate every day to start my day and my intention always is thy will be done.
[672] I'm in service for God's will, and that doesn't mean that I'm not taking part in life.
[673] I am, but I'm not the person who's making the decisions.
[674] I'm not playing God anymore.
[675] Tammy, my wife has always taken the idea of truth very seriously.
[676] Her recent rush with death has deepened her religious sense and impelled her towards a life that's more consciously focused on service to others, her family in particular, but not only her family, people beyond the family.
[677] And I also think that's a function to some degree of our stage of life.
[678] She's a grandmother now, and her children are grown and able to take care of themselves, and so she can turn her attention to other people, maybe farther afield from the immediate family.
[679] I'm watching what she's doing and listening to her and watching her practical application of her faith.
[680] And that affects me just as everything she does affects me because I watch what she does and take it seriously.
[681] And her recent actions have indicated she's helped a number of people quite substantially, the group that she's been communicating with.
[682] And all of that's very interesting to me. She's showing me, I mean, I've taken the idea of God seriously for a very long time.
[683] And I've said on multiple occasions that I try to act as though God exists and that that's essentially my definition of belief.
[684] When people say, do you believe in God?
[685] Belief is a multi -dimensional word.
[686] And the question, one question is, well, what do you mean by believe?
[687] And for me, the proof of belief is to be found in action.
[688] And I decided that I would act as if God existed a long while back.
[689] And of course, I'm imperfect in that inevitably.
[690] Now, she's doing that more explicitly as well.
[691] Not she wasn't doing it quite well to begin with.
[692] She's doing it more explicitly and also more within the confines of traditional religious conceptions.
[693] Although she's not attending church, she's associating with a number of people who are formally religious and all of that's informing the way that she conducts herself.
[694] So it's watching her do that has also highlighted for me the missing praxis in Western Christianity.
[695] If you want to be a Christian, let's say if you think that's necessary, it's not exactly obvious what you should do.
[696] You should go to church.
[697] But that's not enough, I don't think.
[698] I find it useful to contemplate the highest good on a continual basis.
[699] I'm trying to keep myself oriented in that direction.
[700] It's a religious orientation fundamentally.
[701] It's an overwhelming orientation.
[702] But there's no escaping the questions of the ultimate meaning of life.
[703] When Jordan first asked me to marry him, he told me that if we didn't tell the truth, our relationship couldn't work.
[704] And so that was going to be, and that was when he was 25, something like that.
[705] And so that was the first thing that we were to tell the truth.
[706] And I hadn't really understood what that meant.
[707] I first took that to me and the truth in my relationships, what I'm, where my goals are, to make sure that that was all truthful.
[708] so that was the first so honesty honesty was paramount and he still talks about that as being very very important and so that is what got us started and really took us through the other thing was that not we we didn't let we didn't if there were was a problem we didn't just let it go.
[709] It might have taken three days in the beginning to uncover what was happening because we both were pretty strong headed and probably didn't really want to admit that we had done anything to cause the trouble.
[710] So in the early days, but we didn't give up on it he was very good at even though he doesn't like conflict he's a very soft -hearted very compassionate person as you can tell through his public image he's a very compassionate person but he would and knowing that this would be uncomfortable he would still insist that we talk about it until we understand at it.
[711] And that was really good.
[712] We got through a lot of trouble by perseverance.
[713] And, you know, at the end of every mystery in the rosary, you pretty much pray for perseverance.
[714] It's all about trying again and getting up and trying again and getting up and trying again, no matter what.
[715] Well, look, I'm old now, I'm 60, and my wife is 60.
[716] Okay, so we're grandparents, and I can tell you what makes our lives worthwhile.
[717] Go on.
[718] Well, I'm really attracted to my wife.
[719] Get it, girl.
[720] Well, and we've been, sorry.
[721] Don't be sorry.
[722] We've been isolated from each other for a long time because we were both so sick.
[723] It's been two years, really.
[724] And the physical intimacy element of our marriage is extremely important.
[725] very careful about that and value it extremely highly and pay a tremendous amount of attention to it's really important that the sexual element, the romantic element, but those two things when they're properly handled, they're indistinguishable.
[726] And if you think that sex is okay without romance, you don't know anything about romance because sex is so much better with romance that it's not even the same thing.
[727] So that's all important.
[728] But as you get older, what's important is that, well, you have a family, you have your children, you have your grandchildren, you have a continuity of narrative, you have a long -term relationship that you've built.
[729] Yeah.
[730] Like, that's what's important.
[731] And when you're doing things impulsively, when you're young, you're not paying attention to the old you.
[732] You have to have the old you in mind.
[733] You're going to be old, and you have to be building towards that.
[734] Or you're going to be old and things are going to be a catastrophe.
[735] We were very close friends.
[736] We enjoyed each other's company when we were kids.
[737] I thought he was smart back then.
[738] He was fascinating to be around.
[739] He had different ways of looking at things and dissecting problems.
[740] And, you know, when we were really little, we played with a chemistry set.
[741] You know, we liked that.
[742] And he really liked that.
[743] And I got to be a part of that.
[744] He taught me how to play chess when I was a little kid.
[745] That was really great.
[746] And I was five years younger than my siblings.
[747] so I didn't really grow up with my family.
[748] I grew up with my friends, and he was one of the friends that I grew up with.
[749] And I never got tired of being with him.
[750] And then when I left home when I was 18 and didn't really see him that much until I was in my 20s or my mid -20s.
[751] And I went to, he called me and had moved within a couple of hours of where I lived.
[752] when we were in our 20s and I went to visit him and he was getting his PhD so it looked like he was getting his life together he was taking responsibility for himself and moving forward and I thought you know if I don't marry him I won't know what happens in his life how did I meet my wife and why did you marry her Oh, well, I'll tell you one of the earliest memories I have of my wife, because it kind of tells her what she's like.
[753] So she lived across the street from me in this little town that we grew up in called Fairview, Alberta.
[754] And I think I fell in love with her the moment that I saw her, and although I don't think the feeling was necessarily mutual.
[755] And so I was about like seven, I think, something like that.
[756] So I've known her for like 48 years.
[757] And here's one memory, because there are two memories I'll tell you.
[758] you.
[759] So one of them was, when I was in grade five, I got glasses.
[760] And I was pretty proud of these glasses.
[761] They were horn -rimmed glasses, you know, and I was pretty proud of them.
[762] And I went out and I, she came out onto the street and she looked at my glasses.
[763] I said, what do you think of those?
[764] And she says, I think you look really funny in those.
[765] And then she pointed at me and ran into her house.
[766] And it was like 20 years later that she finally told me that she had always wanted to have glasses and she was jealous about it.
[767] But, you know, she decided she'd give me a good teasing and a good poke and so that and then we used to play croquet together and one of the great delights she would take is I don't know if you've ever laid croquet but you know you're sometimes the one person's ball that they're hitting and another persons will come together and then you can stand on your ball and you can nail it with the croquet mallet and like knock the other person's um croquet ball halfway down the block and she used to think that was pretty damn amusing when she did it to me so and uh let's see what else can I remember about her that was but yeah I mean I told my dad when I was in grade 5 I was sitting with her on this big armchair in our living room and she was sitting beside me on the armchair which I was pretty damn thrilled about and she was being chased around by all the boys in the school at that point even though she that was in the elementary school you know so she was very hot property let's say among the elementary school boys and so I was pretty happy to have her sit by me and so anyway she left and I told my dad that I was going to marry her and I remember that and he told that story at our wedding which was quite cute and then I'll tell you one more story which I really think is funny this is so funny so we we were friends when we were kids and then you know girls mature faster than boys and she's a year older than me because I skipped a grade in school we were in the same grade in school and so you know when she had about 13 or so we kind of went our separate ways a little bit although we still remain friends and she had a paper route and I took her paper route over when she hit 13 or so and I like quadrupled the damn thing I think which I think is pretty funny but I also delivered paper to her house and one day she was there with another another of her friends and who was kind of a cute chick too and I liked her quite a bit and they were sitting around talking about like talking about how they were feminists roughly speaking and they were talking when I walked in about the fact that neither of them were going to take their husband's last name when they got married.
[768] And Tammy, my wife, I think, said to her friend, well, that really means I'm going to have to find some wimp and marry him.
[769] And she turned around and looked at me and smiled evilly and said, hey, Jordan, do you want to get married?
[770] And of course, I'd heard the whole conversation.
[771] And, you know, she knew I liked her, obviously.
[772] And so that was a nice little comical dig.
[773] She has a very vicious sense of humor.
[774] And, you know, I kind of laughed.
[775] And I thought, ha, ha, ha.
[776] Okay, yeah, okay.
[777] So fine.
[778] So then when we were, I was like 28, and she had come to see me in Montreal, and we were talking about getting married.
[779] And she said, we were talking about what that would mean.
[780] And then we started talking about what the name would be.
[781] And I said, hey, I've got a story for you.
[782] Remember when you were 13 and I was delivering papers to your house?
[783] And because I suggested that she took my last name.
[784] name and she wasn't so sure about that and I said, well, you remember that little story that little episode that we had when you were 13 and I came over to your house and you told me that you weren't going to take your husband's name and that you're going to have to marry some wimp, said, okay, well, you know, here I am, but you know, if we're going to get married, you're going to take my name and that's the end of that argument.
[785] And so, you know, she had the good graces to go along with that, but that was actually, you know, extraordinarily comical and ridiculous.
[786] So, yeah, so that's a good one.