Tag: grandpa stories

Grandma’s Karmann Ghia

May 21, 2024 4:33 pm May 21, 2024

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On December 3rd, 1947, the blond-coiffed professional wrestler known as Gorgeous George ascended into the ring of the Olympic Auditorium in Los Angeles, basking in the applause and jeers of…

On December 3rd, 1947, the blond-coiffed professional wrestler known as Gorgeous George ascended into the ring of the Olympic Auditorium in Los Angeles, basking in the applause and jeers of the massive crowd.

He was joined in the ring by his opponent, a six-foot-tall muscular black wrestler who went by the name of Reginald Siki, sometimes called The Panther. The instant the starting bell rang, George ran at Siki, took a flying leap and delivered a dropkick to his chin. Siki obligingly collapsed, ending the match after only 12 seconds. Gorgeous George’s path to fame accelerated, his telegenic theatrics a perfect match for the burgeoning age of television.

Siki would be dead within a year, a relative unknown today, yet far more deserving of recognition. Siki won numerous matches in this career, but due to the color of his skin his name was never entered in the record books.

Born Reginald Berry in Kansas City, Missouri in 1899, Siki was—according to a fascinating article in Slam magazine—among the most prominent Black athletes of his day, achieving fame largely in Eastern Europe where he could escape from the rampant racism of North America (in Canada the press once dubbed him “gorilla man”).

After performing for a stretch in Germany in the months leading up to World War II, Siki and his wife were arrested in 1942 and imprisoned in Tittmoning, a Medieval castle in Bavaria along with hundreds of Americans. Siki nearly starved to death. At one point, a fellow inmate, Max Brandel, drew a caricature of him which Siki inscribed with the words, “Let’s keep going.” Brandel became a contributor to MAD magazine (“What, me worry?”).

I learned the story of Siki when I met up with his great-great grandson, James Lott Jr., in Zoom-land recently to further my deep dive into the varied lives of grandpas.

James Lott Jr.

James, 55, has a detonation of black hair that expands out in all directions, a neatly trimmed white goatee, and a vibrant and friendly personality. He has a whole string of letters after his name—CTACC CDC LVN PMO OA DD—that speak to his thirst for learning. “I’m a chameleon of many sorts,” James said. I’d call that an understatement. James is the CEO and Founder of JLJ Media, the CEO and Founder of Super Organizer, certified as a professional organizer and life coach, holds a nursing degree and a PH.D., has done acting gigs on commercials and an episode of House (season four, episode four), has his own YouTube channel, and does a podcast called Really! I’m a Grandparent!. James, who’s single, lives in Englewood, California, and stays close to his many nearby grandchildren.

James started his career as a farm and agricultural insurance specialist, but during the recession of 2008 he had a major epiphany.

“I realized I hated my job,” James told me, “hated everything in the city, my kids were grown and I’d already become a grandfather. I decided to change my whole life.” He made a list of all the things he loved to do, “I like filing. I like organizing. I like people. I like media. I don’t mind speaking in front of people. So I talked about it with my grandfather’s sister, and she said, There’s a business in there. Entrepreneurship!”

James moved back to his family home in Los Angeles and started Super Organizer L.L.C., providing organizational services to a growing roster of clients that today includes movie stars.

He also followed his passion for video and podcasting, with a flair for being on camera, through his media enterprise. The media world is James’s version of the Forever Letter. “My grandkids know me as this person who talks to celebrities. When I die, they can just go online and see their grandfather.”

When I learned that James became a grandpa at the tender young age of 39, I said, “Wow, I thought I was young at 55 when my first grandchild was born. You were way ahead of me!”

“Here’s the deal,” James replied, “I started my podcast because I saw the face of grandparenting has changed. My show is for young grandparents. I come from a long line of them. I grew up with grandparents who still jogged and dated and were having kids.” When James told me this I tried, and failed, to imagine the grandparents in my life jogging. The only time I could see them moving that quickly was to run away from bears.

One of James’ grandfathers—Grandpa Bob— was an executive with Chase bank in Manhattan.

“He was young, a Rolling Stone,” James said, “dressed very sharp, smoked a cigar, totally New York, the whole thing.” James’ other grandfather was white and Dutch, a little older, with a white beard. “My two grandfathers were like chess pieces on opposite sides of the board.” One of James’s youthful grandmothers would start her day running ten miles and swimming five. She drove a sporty Karmann Ghia (my Gram, in her late 70s, drove a vintage pink Rambler, cheerfully oblivious to the concept of lanes).

Through his podcast, James has connected with all kinds of young grandparents. “I’m meeting more and more people in their 30s and 40s who are grandparents,” he said. “It’s no big deal in their lives. It’s like, ‘I had a daughter at 18, and she had a child at 18.” Being a single grandpa who’s active in the LA dating scene is also a different ballgame. “I never know when to bring it up,” James said. “Sometimes it comes out organically, like, What are you doing this weekend? I’m seeing my grandkids in Sacramento. It’s a mixed reaction.”

James also sees that many of today’s youthful grandfathers are playing a larger role in the lives of their grandkids.

“I always think it’s a generational thing; a lot of times the grandmother is seen as the nucleus of the family, but there are some good grandfathers out there who do run families. It’s part of my mission to share that.”

“The second thing for me,” James continued, “is the multiracial aspect. I have grandkids that look the spectrum from blond hair and freckles to brown.” During the period of civil unrest after the George Floyd killing, James had honest talks with his grandkids about the police based on his own negative experiences. The brown grandkids had a different talk than the blond ones. “But the Gen Z’s and Gen Alphas,” James said, “they’re actually not caught up in all that suff. We’re the ones caught up in it—we Boomers and Millennials. My grandkids have a set of friends whose parents were same-sex. Their first President was Black. So, their whole outlook is different.”

James has found there’s a generational shift in perspectives on work-life balance as well, with many young people choosing educational and career paths outside the norms pounded into us by our Greatest Generation parents.

“These kids are saying, you want to pay me $10 an hour to do that?” James said. “They’re questioning. Some are choosing trade schools instead of college. I was taught to work at a job until you’re 65 and then you retire and travel. I’m actually impressed with how much these kids don’t care about certain things that we’re holding on to. They just want to live their lives. They’re going to do it their way.”

This idea resonated with me—a lot—when I thought about it within the context of nurturing the next great generation.

Being fully accepting of differences and unconstrained by old-fashioned career paths seem all part of the same new vision. And these changes seem to be happening naturally as a result of the guidance and wisdom we gave our children when we were young parents. We—and I mean ‘we’ in the larger sense meaning so many parents everywhere—taught our kids to treat everyone the same. We also encouraged them to choose the career that would allow them to do what they loved, even if that meant making less money. By the time our kids left the house as young adults, we’d largely completed our job. And through that parenting—ours and James’s alike (and yours)—the newest generation is already greater in many ways than any that came before.

James summed it up best when he said, “They have the freedom to live a different life.”

This doesn’t mean we grandparents can’t continue to play a strong supportive role. We can help lead a discussion about generational greatness. And we will always be the elder Maple trees who’s leaves nurture the seedlings. We can be there for them. But we have to be careful not to preach to them like we know everything, because we don’t. Tom Brokaw said he learned more from his grandkids than they’ve learned from him. Wise words.

I saw this principle on glorious display on a warm July day a few years ago on the shores of Lake Willoughby, a place I will continue to return to in my upcoming book. All of our grandkids and their cousins where down at the beach with their parents and everyone was buzzing with excitement because we knew that this was the day that my cousin’s son, William, would become engaged to his boyfriend, Brendon. The plan was that Brendon would take William out on their vintage wooden motorboat and pop the question. The grandkids made signs of congratulations that they could hold up when the boat returned to the shore, and sure enough, an hour later as the boat approached—William and Brendon beaming—the grandkids jumped up and down on the dock with their signs, shouting “Yay!” and “Congratulations!” and “We love you!”

Nobody on the beach that day had to explain that William and Brendon were different, that they were gay.

Because they are, in fact, no different than any of us. They are simply a young couple in love, one that is today happily married.

Before James and I parted ways in Zoom-land, I asked him for his #1 piece of wisdom for the next great generation. He instantly said, “You can survive anything. Life isn’t fair. Life is tough. Life is wonderful. It’s all those things, three dimensional. I wish I could have told myself that when I was 18. Just don’t worry, James. You will go through a lot of stuff, but you will survive, and that’s what I tell my grandkids.”

Our ancestors continue to shape who we are now, through genetics and remembrance. When James talked about survival all I could picture was the greatest wrestler of the 20th century, the indomitable Reginald Siki, languishing in a German prison camp, so hungry he lay still to conserve energy, yet he smiled as he looked at the caricature drawn of him and wrote the words I will say to my loved ones any time our multidimensional lives get tough: “Let’s keep going.”

Author’s note: Be sure to check out James’s Really! I’m a Grandparent Podcast. James had me on his show, even though I’m not a young grandpa these days (thank you, James!). Also, if you or someone you know has a grandpa story to tell, please reach out to me at ted [at symbol here] GoodGrandpa dot com. I’m writing the Good Grandpa book for Regalo Press which will be distributed by Simon & Schuster in mid-to-late 2025.

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BUCKET O' WISDOM

The Profitable Lemonade Stand: Enlightened Capitalism for the Next Great Generation.

grandpateddy1

January 28, 2024 4:45 pm January 28, 2024

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One Christmas, a year when three of my brothers were in college, my parents were feeling especially strapped due to the simultaneous tuition payments. These days, most people would…

A lemonade stand staffed by very young entrepreneurs.

One Christmas, a year when three of my brothers were in college, my parents were feeling especially strapped due to the simultaneous tuition payments. These days, most people would take out college loans. Not mom and dad. We came downstairs Christmas morning to see the usual festively wrapped boxes under the tree.

When we opened the boxes, we found that each was empty except for a notecard with an IOU; mine read “IOU one Monopoly Board Game” signed, “Love, Mom & Dad.”

It turned out to be my favorite Christmas ever because I missed my older brothers and it was great to have them home for the day.

A few years after the IOU Christmas, my mom discovered that a large bag of brown rice she’d purchased a long time ago was crawling with worms. I begged her to throw it out, but she refused. “It’s perfectly good rice!” she said, handing me and my brothers tweezers to pick the wriggling worms out — a maddening task because the worms were the exact same color and size as a grain of brown rice.

My parents’ extreme frugality manifested itself throughout my childhood, including my Dad’s habit of draping used paper towels to dry in the kitchen so he could use them again later, mom making her own clothes at her Singer sewing machine, and my having to wear only hand-me-down shoes from my older brothers.

Growing up, my feet were often scrunched in shoes one or two sizes too small for me, resulting in permanent hammer toes.

All this despite the fact that my dad was a successful executive with Polaroid at a time when it was a high-flying company. We weren’t poor. We just acted that way. Having scraped by in the Great Depression, my parents saw waste as a cardinal sin and saving money as Godly in some agnostic Unitarian way. Within the mythology of Brokaw’s greatest generation, hard work and skimping pennies were valuable weapons in the arsenal of our economic battle for a better life.

Having lived like a middle-class sharecropper as a child, I swore my kids would indeed have a better life, even if I went broke making it happen.

When our daughter was in middle school, she begged us to go on a trip organized by People to People, a group founded by President Eisenhower to foster better relations with other countries. We ponied up over $3,000, which was a lot for us to spend back then. And the country Abigail visited in order to improve global relations? Australia.

My wife and I have been knuckleheads in many ways with our money (or lack thereof), but we did save on the road to retirement thanks to a recurring character in this book: my Gramp. I never inherited money from him. I did, however, take lessons from him that I’ve carried with me to the bank.

Gramp was an independent sales rep who traveled around New England selling retail displays. These were the early days of three-dimensional plastic signage that could be affixed to glass storefronts. The trunk of Gramp’s Rambler was always packed with these signs (for some reason the penguin smoking a cigarette display stuck in my mind). Gramp made decent money and saved what they could.

Once when talking with me about investing, Gramp grinned and said with a wink, “Oil stocks.”

All through the 1950s and beyond they socked money into stocks in the booming post-war energy sector. When they retired, they could afford to keep their place in Vermont and buy a nice condo in Tucson, Arizona.

Why do these stories matter? Earlier in the book I wrote about the first grandparents 30,000 years ago, the ones who began the tradition of teaching their kids and grandkids the everyday tips needed to survive and thrive. The grandparents could, for example, demonstrate the best way to plant seeds for successful crops — marking a shift towards agrarian versus nomadic communities. The wisdom imparted by these grandparents had a snowballing benefit as more and more techniques for living longer and more productive lives became broadly shared.

Thinking metaphorically, what are the seed planting tips that will help our grandkids become the greatest generation?

One area they need help with, desperately, is finance. The United States is considered a wealthy nation. Yet roughly half of Americans aged 65 and older get at least 50 percent of their family income from Social Security, and 25 percent of them get 90 percent. The Social Security Administration projects that the funds will run out by 2041. In that year my youngest granddaughter will be 19. How and when will she ever be able to retire?

Social Security’s woes wouldn’t be such a huge problem if people saved enough to sock away money in their retirement accounts, but they don’t. The average median retirement savings in the US is a meager $87,000. Saving for retirement, of course, is only one part of the financial challenge our grandkids face. About half of Americans have no emergency savings whatsoever. Zero.

Inspired by Gramp, I bought my first stocks when I was a junior in High School and have kept at it.

My wife and I never seemed to have much left over after paying for things like the kids’ braces—not to mention my daughter’s visit to the Great Barrier Reef to repair relations with the Australians—but we put away money each year in our 401k plans and that has grown over time. Following Gramp’s independent work example, I started my first company—a housecleaning business—when I was a High School Senior. Making money cleaning toilets seemed like magic, literally turning shit into gold, and I could set my own hours. After starting out as a copywriter with an ad agency in New York City after college I founded my own marketing agency and never looked back.

And now—shazam—all these grandkids are running around. The Fundamentals of Finance classes are not taught in their schools, not even at the best high schools.

Which means it’s up the parents and grandparents to get the job done. How, I wondered, could I as a grandpa help them learn from me as I learned from Gramp, but take it up a notch. Maybe, like a second language, entrepreneurship is best learned in childhood. While I was ruminating on this idea I happened to be visiting my daughter and her boys in Connecticut one day when they decided to set up a lemonade stand. The other grandpa in my grandsons’ lives, Jack Moore, was visiting as well. Jack, 75, headed up State Street Bank’s pension fund division before retiring in 2017.

“Great idea!” said Jack. “I’ll help.”

Everyone threw in ideas for getting started. Abigail and her husband, Ryan, said they could pick up some lemonade mix and cups at Costco. The boys would draw a sign. A card table was carried up from the basement.

I said to the boys, “Make sure you write down the cost of the lemonade and cups so you can keep track of your profits.”

“What?” they said in unison through mouths full of breakfast.

“It’s not about how much lemonade you sell,” I explained, “it’s about how much money you actually make per cup of lemonade after you take your cost of goods into consideration. The money you have after you subtract your expenses for lemonade and cups will equal your profit.”

The boys stared at me, chewing, digesting this concept thoughtfully.

“Ordinarily,” I went on, “you’d have to pay someone to sell the lemonade for you. That would be your cost of labor and you’d have to subtract that from your profit, but since you’ll be selling it yourselves you don’t have to pay anyone else.”

After some initial head scratching they were all over the idea of making a profit.

When Ryan returned from Costco with the supplies, they boys examined the receipt and did the math, then we discussed how much they should charge per cup of lemonade. How much would people reasonably want to spend per cup? If they paid $1, how much would be left of each dollar after the cost of the cup and the Lemonade mix was subtracted. Doing this real-world math was really fun for them.

Jack helped them set up their stand on the street and soon, like Tom Sawyer painting the fence, they were joined by other kids up their street. They were all hopping up and down with their sign to get cars to pull over – which they did, in droves. At one point, the kids flagged down a firetruck from the local fire station. Grinning and evidently thirsty firemen hung out with the kids, and my grandsons got to try on their helmets.

The kids got to wear the fireman’s helmet.

As the afternoon wore on, the dollar bills in their bucket grew like leafy green plants in a fast-motion time lapse film. Stepping back from it all, seeing them boisterous and laughing in the sun, I saw these boys and girls growing in fast-motion, too, spouting up before my eyes. They had one foot in childhood. The other in business school. They rocked it!

We grandpas played our role that day, but the ultimate lesson came courtesy of their dad.

Ryan encouraged them to set aside a percentage of their lemonade stand profits to donate to the local fire department. They loved this idea. I loved this idea. What a fantastic lesson: pull money out of thin air, make people happy with a refreshing roadside beverage, earn a video game versus begging for it, and allocate a percentage of profits to help others.

Capitalism is by no means perfect, but at its best it is the greatest engine of prosperity. The Captains of Industry of the 19th and 20th centuries built their vast summer “cottages” in Newport, Rhode Island. Yet they also established philanthropic organizations that to this day benefit millions of people every year. Paul Newman famously allocated all of his Newman’s Own brand profits towards charity. “Give it all away!” he said.

To create large-scale positive change in their lifetimes, our grandkids need not become fabulously wealthy. They can start by simply making a decent living, regardless of the color of their skin or what town they grow up in, and along the way do the small things that matter — modest donations to their fire department or a local charity. The littlest gestures repeated by millions of young people will add up to the better world they will live in. We need to help put this power in their hands, one cup of profitable lemonade at a time.

If there is a heaven—and I strongly suspect there is—Gramp smiled and chuckled at the site of his great-grandsons jumping up and down with excitement at the lemonade stand, their whole lives ahead of them. “That’s just dandy,” he said, “wonderful!”

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STORIES

Heirlooms of Wisdom

grandpateddy1

November 29, 2023 8:54 pm November 29, 2023

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When is something passed down from our ancestors more than just an antique? Can an idea be an heirloom? These questions come to mind because I’m writing this story on…

When is something passed down from our ancestors more than just an antique? Can an idea be an heirloom?

These questions come to mind because I’m writing this story on the desk that belonged to my great-grandfather. When my father inherited it, he used it as his personal desk at home in his “inner sanctum,” an office on the top floor of our house outside Boston, the place where he did his deepest thinking.

As a kid I would sometimes sit at this desk and look at the note cards dad had pinned on the wall. He’d created a compendium of wisdom gleaned from his voracious reading, one profound statement per card written in his neat all-capital lettering. The idea that stayed in my mind is a quote from George Washington Carver, the most prominent African-American scientist of the early 20th century. “Anything will give up its secrets if you love it enough.”

I love this desk. I love it so much it has given up its greatest secrets, which I will share with you.

This matte black 19th century antique is solid as an icebreaker, with drawers painted inside in the particular red of British phone booths. Its lines are simple and angular, unadorned by flourishes. This is a desk for work.

Its family origins date back to the Civil War. My great-great grandfather, Albert Kidder Page, served with a Massachusetts regiment. In July of 1863—the same month as the epic battle at Gettysburg—Albert was fighting his way through North Carolina when he contracted a severe case of malaria. When Albert’s father, Luke, learned that his son was extremely ill, he traveled by train from Boston to retrieve him from the army hospital and bring him home. Albert’s wife, Maria, was nine months pregnant. No doubt the family held out hope that Albert would recover and live to see his child born. But it was not to be. On July 3rd, Albert passed away in Maria’s arms. Three days later, she gave birth to their son. She named him Albert Kidder Page (curiously, he was not a ‘jr’).

Albert grew up, studied hard, and became a doctor. The desk was his.

Boston, at the time, was a destination for Chinese immigrants and Albert would accept them as patients regardless of their ability to pay. He often received china in lieu of money. I’m guessing Dr. Page was right-handed because there’s a small spot on the top right of the desk where the paint is worn away due to repeated pressure from a writing instrument — his hand filling out prescriptions for all those in need of care.

The china Dr. Page received from patients is still in the family, its value not measured in dollars.

Nearly one hundred years after the Civil War, when the desk was in my dad’s office, he flew to California to attend a scientific conference. On his trip back to Boston, on June 30th, 1956, an unknown woman approached him at the ticket counter at LAX and said, “Excuse me, I was wondering if you’re on the earlier flight. It’s urgent that I get home to my family faster and I was hoping you’d consider switching flights with me.” My dad was unfailingly kind and considerate of others, and he never seemed to be in a hurry, so it’s no surprise to me that he agreed. She took his seat on the earlier TWA flight.

That plane collided with another over the Grand Canyon. All lives were lost. It was the worse civil air disaster that had ever occurred in the United States.

My dad arrived home safely and went back to work, continuing to read voraciously and write down new nuggets of wisdom to pin on the wall, including a new one: Life is a gift. Whenever my dad told the story of the switched flights, he’d finish by saying, “And the moral of the story is, if someone asks you for a favor, do it!”

I was born three years later.

The only reason I’m here, the reason why I’ve been able to live, to raise children, to know my grandkids and to write stories on this old desk, is because of pure chance, and kindness. The gift of life that a total stranger gave my father—and by extension to me—must be somehow repaid (I did try to track down the identity of the woman who switched seats so I could contact her surviving family members, but it was not possible).

Life went on. The desk was put to good use by my dad over the following decades, with countless letters written, scientific papers perused and annotated, wisdom captured.

An underlying current of all my dad’s thinking was the need to promote world peace.

Having lived through the horrors of Okinawa, he believed all war was incredibly stupid. We could do better. The imperative for peace was infused into our family life in myriad ways, such as hosting exchange students. Building bridges of understanding with people from many countries would, in his view, create a more loving family of mankind.

This is how a young student from Kenya came to live with us in the mid-1960s. His name was James Odhiambo.

While James spent time with us five boys—expanding our world view in the process—it was really my dad that he bonded with. The full extent of that bond didn’t become fully clear until recently. A month ago, one of my brothers discovered a letter written to my father from James’ wife in 1983. In my mind’s eye, I picture dad opening the letter as he sat at this desk. Below is verbatim what she wrote:

12-10-83
Mrs. Dinah Odhiambo
P.O. Box 30101
Nairobi, Kenya

Dear Mr. Page,

It is a really long time since you read from us and also read from you. I remember, the last time was, I sent you our family photo, you never mentioned whether it reached you or not.

I thank God who has given me this chance to remember you. The [?] had come because of ups and downs, and thereafter, to give you a surprising news, I got my fifth baby. This one came after 7 years and I had not planned. God gave me a baby boy and my husband named him you, thus William-Page Odiwuor. Odiwuor means from midnight up to 3am and my baby arrived at 12:45am at night on 28-2-83. So, this means my husband together with me have not forgotten you.

I have been troubled every now and then that I have you in our family, but I have never let you know. I don’t know how you will take it but my husband insisted we must name you in our family, and I think that is why I got this one after many years.

I’m sure your wife is doing well together with the rest of the family. Please pass my warmest regards to all and may God bless you.

Sincerely,
Dinah Odhiambo

Later in the 80s we heard that James had died of AIDS.

My dad likely sat here when he wrote a check to help pay for William-Page Odiwuor’s college education. Since my dad was, like his grandfather, right-handed, the scratched paint on the desk was partly due to the tip of his pen bearing down as he wrote the check for young William, as dad did for so many other people and the causes he cared about.

So, here I am today, writing here at this old desk. It’s the nature of the publishing business that books are sold, not given away. But it’s not possible for me to write this and not think of those who wrote here before me. The prescriptions. The wisdom. The checks. Every fiber of this wood is imbued with the kindness of my ancestors and the gifts of strangers. I feel their presence as I sit here and type. To honor them, and simply to do the right thing, when my book is published a donation will be made to a non-profit that benefits children across the globe.

I’m fortunate to know the secrets of this desk, passed down to me by spoken word and a letter found by chance. Through this book, the stories will be available to my children, my grandchildren, and hopefully everyone else. Heirlooms are nice things to receive. They are even better to give.

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BUCKET O' WISDOM

Unsilly Wisdom from John Cleese

grandpateddy1

November 3, 2023 8:11 pm November 3, 2023

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A big part of my research for The Good Grandpa Project book entails meeting with grandpas of all kinds, from the famous to the unknown: Movie stars, African villagers,…

The author with the Minister of Silly Walks, John Cleese.

A big part of my research for The Good Grandpa Project book entails meeting with grandpas of all kinds, from the famous to the unknown: Movie stars, African villagers, Vermonters, New York Captains of Industry, Native Americans, and everyone else I can think of.

My goal is to gather and curate the stories and collective wisdom of grandpas so we can better nurture the next great generation.

I have a hunch that as I hear the stories of grandpas from different backgrounds and cultures that patterns will emerge. At present I can see glimpses of leaves through a nebulous white fog. The more people I meet, the more I’ll see trees, then forests, and the undulating roots beneath that connect everything into a greater vision.

It’s been said that a journey of a thousand miles begins with taking a step. I’ve been asking myself, who can I meet with right now? Who has a unique perspective and stories to tell? Most important, who might be able to share the kind of wisdom that only emerges through a long and eventful life?

John Cleese, of course!

I was very lucky to have had the opportunity to work with John on several marketing projects years ago. On the first project, John was cast as several characters in my script for The Institute for Backup Trauma, a digital marketing project for a client launching a more reliable product for data backup. John played the head of the institute— Dr. Harold Twainweck—who catered to people who had lost their minds after losing their data. Being a ham myself, I made sure I wrote myself a cameo so I could appear briefly on camera with him.

In addition to playing the role of Twainweck, John gamely wore a dress, curly wig and tight red sweater to play the role of Hilda, an office manager.

The author with John Cleese (Hilda in The Institute for Backup Trauma).

John carried it well, and still managed to keep his mustache, lending him the appearance of an elderly cross-dresser. Ron DeSantis would have banned him from Disneyworld.

John has played many roles since the time he worked with me, including that of Nearly Headless Nick, one of the Hogwarts ghosts in Harry Potter. But these days John also plays the role of grandfather, presumably managing to keep his head on.

My friend Doug and I met up with John over lunch recently when he was in town to do a show. It turned out to be a sprawling and fascinating 2-hour lunch conversation. I’ve been a fan of John’s work since his early days with Monty Python, so it was a real treat to kick back, have a good meal and just talk. Of course, a few tidbit remembrances of those days were served, such as the crafting of the Parrot Sketch. Apparently, John and his main writing partner, the late great Graham Chapman, knew that the dead animal returned to the pet shop could not be a dog or cat because people are rather fond of them, but everyone hates parrots.

In the course of our conversation, I mentioned that I was writing The Good Grandpa Project and hunting for people who could share the #1 thing, the most essential wisdom they believed would help the next generation.

John immediately jumped in. “It’s very simple,” he said, “because I’m reading about this all the time: It’s more important to find out what’s right than to know you’re right.”

When I pressed him to unpack this idea, he explained that for two hundred years everyone knew that Newton’s laws of physics were the last word, then Einstein came along with the theory of relativity and the old assumptions went out the window. Then quantum physics upended even Einstein’s brilliance. The mindset of assuming one knows the truth can be highly detrimental, whereas finding the answer—which can be a long, painful, fascinating, beautiful journey—is what really matters.

I love this idea and I’m glad I had a chance to talk with John in the early stages of my quest to better understand grandfatherhood. At no point can I truly believe I know the answer. The magic will be in traveling to find it.

John Cleese may be a comedic lion in winter—his 84-year-old legs long past the silly walks stage—but he’s still sharp as a tack and as funny as ever. His show the night of our lunch was billed as “An Evening with the Late John Cleese.” I laughed uproariously, gleefully, endlessly, a 64-year-old grandpa who felt 17 again.

Thank you, Mr. Cleese. I’m so happy you are not dead yet.

Dear Grandpa reader: would you like to share your essential wisdom? Do you have a story to tell that can help nurture the next great generation? Post a comment here. And feel free to email me at ted@goodgrandpa.com.

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STORIES

Babysitting the grandsons. Is this my best job ever?

grandpateddy1

October 28, 2022 6:53 pm October 28, 2022

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When my kids were little, it seemed like my wife and I were constantly and frantically juggling daycare and illness. There’s no pleasant way to put this, but let’s just…

When my kids were little, it seemed like my wife and I were constantly and frantically juggling daycare and illness.

There’s no pleasant way to put this, but let’s just say there was a lot of vomit involved. This was of course in the 1980s, when the concept of “remote work” was a euphemism for simply not working. So we got very good at making bargains with each other.

“If you stay home him with him today, I’ll stay home tomorrow.”

Or….

“If you stay home with her, you can sleep late on Saturday.”

Flash forward to this year when our daughter, the mother of our two grandsons (8 and 6), called to let us know her nanny had given two weeks’ notice.

Our daughter had interviews lined up with a few nanny options, but nobody great had taken the position yet. A few weeks after that, with no nanny on board, we grandparents kicked into gear to help.

First, my son-in-law’s parents stayed with them for a week, dropping the kids off for the morning school bus, picking them up in the afternoon, taking them to lessons, sports practices, and on and on.

Then it was our turn. My wife and I packed up our laptops and headed off, picking up where the other grandparents had left off, kind of like a marathon race with senior citizens running and passing off the baton, except the baton was lunch boxes and backpacks or the bag for swim practice or soccer shin guards or, wait, there was something else, oh forget it the school bus is coming!

In short, the mad dash of our child rearing years comes back full bore, quickly morphing out of memory to a very present and urgent reality.

And here’s the thing: I loved every minute of it. One day one our youngest grandson couldn’t go to school because of a lingering cough. I let me clients know I was going to be in meetings all day and not available for calls. This was true, but I omitted the fact that my meetings were with my grandson.

We visited a graveyard nearby my daughter’s house and played the game of finding the oldest date etched in stone.

Then we went for a long walk by the ocean on a treelined road, the fall leaves showing red and yellow and orange, the sun bright.

I took him to Shake Shack for lunch and we kept talking over hotdogs and burgers.

When we got back to the house, my grandson wrote with invisible ink in his diary, played with dinosaurs, and watched My Little Pony.

Out of all the packed days I’ve had at work over the past 30 years, this was one of my most productive and enjoyable. I’m confident that if I live to be 99, chances are I won’t look back on that day and wish I’d spent it making more money.

It turns out there’s evidence that babysitting grandchildren, at least periodically babysitting them versus full time, has been shown to help grandparents live longer. The researchers don’t know why that’s the case, but the data backs it up.

I have my own theory and it’s pretty simple: Helping our kids with the grandkids renews our sense of purpose.

We like knowing that we’re needed and loved. Just as important, being with our grandkids—even if they have hacking coughs—is a recipe for joy. And joy is a very healthy thing, not just for us grandparents but for everyone.

The next day, my grandson was feeling much better and went off to school with his older brother. My wife and I waved to them as the school bus drove off, then we want back to our other jobs.

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STORIES

Back on the Trail: My Custom Boot Adventure, Part II

grandpateddy1

October 25, 2022 2:37 pm October 25, 2022

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In April I posted about ordering a pair of custom boots with the goal of hiking again. This is the second part of the story, and—spoiler alert—there is a happy…

In April I posted about ordering a pair of custom boots with the goal of hiking again. This is the second part of the story, and—spoiler alert—there is a happy ending.

Leahy Custom Boots’ fitting process was incredibly thorough, with multiple steps: tape measuring, tracing, pressure assessment, a foam impression, creating a fiberglass mold, followed by visual observation of how I walked.

All of this, or course, was just the first phase of the fitting process. In August, Kevin Leahy shipped me a pair of “trial boots.” These were not fully finished but were sturdy enough to wear for a month to assess the fit. Not only could I determine where the boots fit well and what needed adjustment, but once the boots were shipped back to Kevin he could analyze the wear. With his 40 years of experience, Kevin could see subtle things mere mortals could not, like markings on the soles that revealed my unique walking gait and pronation.

My trial boots were made as an interim step to help further refine the fit of the finished boots.

I wore the boots on a short hike up Mt. Pisgah overlooking Lake Willoughby near my home in Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom (NEK). Getting out on the trail for the first time felt like I’d been let out of jail. I ascended to Pulpit Rock, an outcropping that affords a breathtaking view of the lake and surrounding mountains. It would indeed be a fine place to give a sermon, except for the two-thousand-foot cliff at the edge, so the only attendees in church would be hawks and butterflies.

By the time I got home that day I fully appreciated why wearing the trial boots mattered.

I’d developed a blister on my small left toe. I sent the boots back to Kevin with photos and a note about the blister. He emailed back: “Point taken!”

Over the summer I mostly went barefoot. I literally had no shoes that fit me that didn’t cause discomfort or pain, at least for longer walks.

When the finished boots arrived in October I did a silent prayer: “Oh please, God, let them fit!”

I took the enormous (size 16 wide) boots out of the box and was immediately impressed with how heavy and solid they were. Inserting my feet and lacing up felt a bit like strapping into a glove, sturdy and supple at the same time.

Kevin advised me to break the boots in gradually over a month. Each day I’ve taken longer and longer walks, and with each step the boots have grown even more comfortable.

They are, in a word, fantastic.

For about four years my poor wife, Nancy, has gone for long walks without me, often lamenting, “I miss walking with you.” But last week we went for a hike together around Walden Pond in Concord. The fall foliage was near peak, the air brisk, the sky a Maxfield Parish blue.

When I ordered the boots in April I was thinking primarily about what they could do for ME: get me out on the trail again, enjoy the woods, see the broad beautiful world from the mountaintops. As I held Nancy’s hand along the Walden path, I came to realize what the boots did for US.

On Kevin’s website he describes his early years as an apprentice with a German alpine boot maker in the 1970s. The skills Kevin learned have been passed down for generations.

I hope that some young apprentice has a chance to learn from Kevin and carry on this tradition.

If you want to experience the difference that custom boots can make, check out Kevin’s work. You’ll need to be patient. It can take six months or longer to get them made. And you’ll need to spend a lot more than you would for off the rack boots. But they’re worth it.

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BUCKET O' WISDOM

Fostering the Best Future for our Daughters & Granddaughters

grandpateddy1

May 4, 2022 3:41 pm May 4, 2022

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In Walter Isaacson’s wonderful book, The Code Breaker, he describes the life and work of Jennifer Doudna, a scientist credited with the creation of CRISPR gene editing technology. If you…

In Walter Isaacson’s wonderful book, The Code Breaker, he describes the life and work of Jennifer Doudna, a scientist credited with the creation of CRISPR gene editing technology.

If you or a loved one benefited from the COVID vaccine developed at astonishing speed, you can thank Jennifer. CRISPR allowed scientists to rapidly edit the RNA used in the vaccine, and millions of lives were saved in the process.

What really struck me about Doudna’s story, however, was how this Nobel-winning scientist was strongly discouraged from pursuing a career in science. Her high school guidance counselor advised her that “science is for men.” Fortunately for Doudna—and all of us—she didn’t listen.

As a grandfather I think of Doudna when I see my daughter and granddaughters. As grandparents, how can we help them live in a world where nobody, ever, under any circumstances, tries to confine them within boundaries fabricated by men?

I grew up in a traditional male dominated household.

My dad, a chemical engineer and executive with Polaroid, walked in the door at 6:30 pm every weeknight with the expectation that mom would have dinner on the table for all the males: my dad, me and four older brothers. And she did. These days people would say she was a “stay at home mom.” In the 1960s that’s just the way it was.

To my mom, having four sons in a row was a blessing and a curse. She loved us all but really longed to have at least one girl in the family mix. Just one daughter to make dresses for, or perhaps commiserate with about the male-run world. After giving birth to my older brothers mom tried one last time to have a girl, but then I was born and those hopes were dashed. She gave up and bought a girl Labrador Retriever puppy and tied a pink ribbon around its neck. Her name was Holly (apparently this would have been my name if I’d been a girl). To get the full story of Holly and the puppies she would eventually give birth to, you can read my book, The Willoughby Chronicles.

You might wonder, how did a busy exec like my dad commuting home in heavy traffic from Cambridge, Massachusetts, manage to walk in exactly at 6:30 each night?

Because he always stopped at the library, then left there at 6:25 to get to our house on time for dinner. He could have arrived some days at 6 or earlier and helped out, but somehow that thought didn’t enter his mind.

My mom was a smart, creative woman. Her frustration with her lot grew as the 70s and the womens’ rights movement progressed. I often heard her say, wistfully, that she could have done something with her life. In truth, raising five of us—each one gigantic and constantly ravenous—was certainly the most demanding job in the Page household. There was no leisurely stopping off at the library for mom. The vats of baked ziti needed to be cooked for the boys. Or a million other thankless tasks completed.

She did stage some occasional token protests, like the time she complained that my dad didn’t always eat the food she had carefully prepared. “That really hurts my feelings,” she said.

Dad apologized and swore in the future he’d always eat her meals. A few days later she served him a sandwich made with cat food (Kal Kan, no less, a slimy odiferous mush). I’m not entirely sure he realized he was eating cat food. It’s possible. In any case he downed the whole sandwich and thanked her for it.

The present and future I want for my daughter and grand girls is one where all career choices are open, all pay is equal, and no high school guidance counselor will ever seek to enforce limits. If women choose to pursue lives where they are raising kids full time, then that direction must be fully respected as well. “Stay at home mom” should never be a pejorative expression.

So, how can we foster the best possible future? Perhaps it starts with how we play with the kids, because the path towards being something starts with imagining it.

We can have bright plastic kitchen play sets with dishes that both the girls and boys can play with. But have a bright plastic science lab right beside it. During playtime, we could ask a boy or girl if they want to make some pasta for dinner. And we can ask if they’d like to edit genes to invent a new vaccine to save humanity. Let them choose their play, just as they choose the future they will inhabit.

Jennifer Doudna was born with many gifts. She’s brilliant, but also lucky to have a forceful personality that helped her push back against her guidance counselor. Not every kid will have this. We have to work harder, wherever we can, to make career and life paths fully accessible to all.

What are ways you can think of to help our kids help their kids, the next great generation, become who they were meant to be? Post a comment to join the conversation.

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STORIES

The Mouse Autopsy: How Grandparents Can Nurture the Next Great Generation.

grandpateddy1

August 16, 2021 7:31 pm August 16, 2021

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What do we learn from our grandfathers and how do we learn it? This question has been on my mind a lot lately. While my four grandchildren swirl and dash…

What do we learn from our grandfathers and how do we learn it? This question has been on my mind a lot lately. While my four grandchildren swirl and dash around me on these warm summer days by the lake, I know these times together are fleeting. What will I remember of this when I’m older, and what will they remember as adults?

While remembering and sharing stories has become easier thanks to the Internet, it’s still a challenge to create genuinely memorable and wisdom-rich experiences. This is something I’m working on (I know I have a lot to learn). My dad, however, was a born master at creating unforgettable experiences that helped shape my children to become the wonderful people they are today.

I invite you to come back with me to a summer day in 1999.

My wife and I were up at my parents’ house in Northern Vermont with our son and daughter. The house, which dad designed, has 9-foot tall windows overlooking the mountains. Nature is everywhere – and there is a lot of it. This neck of the woods is chock full of every variety of critter, and quite a few of them make it their business to get into the house.

Mice were the bane of my mother’s existence. Mom was a big, tall woman who loved watching Julia Child and cooking up feasts for me and my four older brothers. The sheer volume of food cooked and consumed in the house probably attracted the mice to have their own boisterous family gatherings. Mouse traps and poison were the preferred methods of extermination, yet neither worked well enough to rid the place of scurrying vermin. So when a mouse did meet its end, mom was jubilant. “Got one!” she’d exclaim.

On the day of this story, mom had sent two mice to meet their maker. “Got two!” she said, pointing with two fingers.

My dad, an MIT-educated chemical engineer, had a lifelong fascination with science. At the urging of one of his professors he learned the habit of always asking ‘why?’ So much so that when I was growing up, the word WHY! (always all caps with exclamation point) was taped to every mirror in the house.

Well, dad wanted to know why the two mice had died, but instead of asking mom he enlisted my children to conduct a science experiment. Dad explained to my wide-eyed offspring (13 and 10) that they would perform an autopsy on the mice to ascertain the cause of death. Necks broken in a trap? Poison? Something else?

Dad brought the kids out to the driveway, our de facto laboratory.

There, before my astonished and delighted children, dad stapled the mice to a big board, arms and legs splayed out and belly up. He handed my kids scalpels and told them where to cut. I looked on from a distance, chuckling and shaking my head. In hindsight the scene was like some kind of CSI Vermont episode.

In short order, both mouse stomachs were revealed to be chock full of little pink pellets of mouse poison. This was a real ‘aha’ moment for my kids. While it was just two mice, the forensic process was truly scientific in nature. My kids learned that being curious is the first vital step in discovery. In time, and with enough effort, all the secrets of the world could be revealed.

The lesson stuck.

Many years later, when my daughter spoke at my dad’s memorial service, she credited the mouse autopsy as a key experience that sparked her interest in science, and ultimately inspired her to get her Masters (speech pathology). Every child she teaches is living a more rewarding and capable life because of my daughter’s scientific viewpoint, the demand to ask WHY!, the insatiable hunger to know.

What are experiences you had with your grandparents that stuck with you, and why? What experiences are you creating now? Please share your ideas here so we can learn from each other.

My dad, William (Bill) Page, and the word he sought to teach his children and grandchildren.

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