Kids Showing Empty Nesters New Experiences - E132

Rick Denton (00:00)
This week on the Loud Quiet, kids showing empty nesters new experiences. Hey everybody. Welcome back to the Loud Quiet. Are you finding that your kids are exposing you to new things and new ideas? Yeah.

Clancy Denton (00:13)
We were with Teagan this weekend in Tucson, well, part of the weekend. It was her 21st birthday. so we quickly did a trip out there and then got back. I have a shocker. And for those of you who have been with us for the past few years, Teagan's birthday.

Rick Denton (00:28)
We took a trip?

Clancy Denton (00:43)
since the age of six when she started requesting, it came out of nowhere. She wanted a strawberry cake in the shape of the number of the year that she was. So from six up until this year was 21, I have made a strawberry cake with strawberry icing in the shape of the number. So this was the third year of cakes on a plane because we have now had to take it to Tucson and

Yes, I had the little cake carrier with the 21 on the plane and we took it out to Tucson. It is, yes. Chapter 32 I think it is in the book. So if you'd like to read about the first cakes on a plane.

Rick Denton (01:19)
actually a chapter in the original ⁓

Get over to the Loud Quiet and you'll be able to get a path to purchasing the book.

Clancy Denton (01:36)
Or you can just head on to Amazon and it's on Amazon as well So yeah, so we did that this weekend on the way back. We were talking about huh, you know She's really Shown us some new things and this trip We got to do something that was really really cool

Rick Denton (01:55)
that would never be on a list of things that you would say, let's go to see our child, let's go take a trip to, let's go choose this. It was wheelchair basketball. And not just wheelchair basketball, this was the national championships for wheelchair.

Clancy Denton (02:14)
It was basically the final four. Yes. And Teagan has one of her classmates who has become one of her friends told her last week, she said, hey, you know, it's the final four we're playing. Arizona was hosting because they were the champions last week, last year, the women's team. And I think the men's team has, they're very, very good. This team has, and we've seen them in the airport several times. And so her friend said,

you know, we're playing next Thursday, if you want to come. And Tegan said, my gosh, my parents are coming. She said, they would love to come to this. And so when she called us and asked us, we're like, yeah, we want to go.

Rick Denton (02:55)
The shortest I think it's ever gone. I mean, we talk a lot about say yes. This may have been one of our fastest say yes.

Clancy Denton (03:02)
To say this was incredible to watch, it was something like nothing I've ever seen. mean, you think that your kids' are competitive and athletic. This was another level.

Rick Denton (03:20)
I like the way you say it the athleticism is something that I took away from this that really surprised me because of course those of us that are not experienced in wheelchair basketball are thinking, you know, you're only using half your body or all the kind of things that might weave into your mind in a wrong way. And while some of that may physically be true, the intensity of the athleticism was stunning.

The speed with which they were navigating themselves in their chairs, the ability to stop on a dime, to turn, to be able to take a shot. It's hard enough to make a basketball shot, but then add the complexity of having the motion of your chair taking you forward, backwards, sideways, and still being able to put that ball through the hoop.

Clancy Denton (04:10)
mean, was just, it was incredible to just.

Rick Denton (04:15)
I was thinking

about a description for this that would help kind of the theater of the mind. And there's a Mad Max element to this sport of it looks like vehicular chaos. collisions that are taking place. But I don't want you to think of it all the way into like a demolition derby, comical sort of way.

Clancy Denton (04:43)
These were cat-

Rick Denton (04:44)
calculated,

they were strategic in how they would box in. Two athletes would come together and box in another athlete, preventing her from moving down the court in a way that at first we're like, wait, why are they all in this section? What was because they were trapped because of the strategy of blocking with your chairs?

Clancy Denton (05:03)
mean,

it was just amazing to watch and we were just getting so into it. yeah, mean, Tegan couldn't wait to see her friend this week and just tell her how in all we all were watching it. I mean, we were on such a high. They heard Arizona did not win, unfortunately, but we were still all just on such a high because it was just...

Unreal to watch I don't know how they don't lose their hands. that is the

Rick Denton (05:38)
Yeah.

mean... That the hands alone aren't just sandpaper and that the fingertips aren't just absolutely gone from working with spokes and everything that's there. There was something that I said, and I don't remember the exact wording of it, but I remember saying, you know, that I almost felt guilty calling out an athlete when they did... I'm not the type... I don't mean literally calling out and yelling ugliness to the court, but in my mind thinking, ⁓ man, they did a bad job there, that sort of stuff.

And I think it was either you or Teagan said, you know, they want, they, they want to be treated like any other athlete. I knew that with my head, was just weird that that feeling of.

not being willing to think of some sort of play as being a negative play or anything like that, well that's totally unfair. No, these are athletes and they showed themselves to be athletes.

Clancy Denton (06:33)
Well,

and I was even talking about, know, they're all, there's different degrees of states of, know, what your injuries are that, you know, why the reasons you're in your wheelchair. And it describes each one in the little rule book. And, you know, they can only add up to a certain amount on the floor at each time. Like Tegan's It's a point system. Yeah. Like Tegan's friend, one of her legs.

is she can't use it very well and so she's this grade. And so when we were talking, I said, I bet when those kids were younger, if they had these injuries when they were younger, it's probably like when we would be on the soccer field and you'd have one parent on the other team going, no, no, that kid looks older than that kid. There's probably some parent going.

Oh, no, no, wait a second. I think that kid is a 1.5, not a 1.0. You know, I bet they probably deal with the same exact things that...

Rick Denton (07:36)
So you think that parents are a-holes regardless of the school?

Clancy Denton (07:39)
I guarantee. I would imagine. I mean, they had to make an announcement. There will be no cussing behind the benches. you know, it was the students, the Zona Zoo had come, like that's the little student section. I was like, my goodness, it's the college.

Rick Denton (08:00)
Going to

be spearing obscenities at the other team's bench.

Clancy Denton (08:04)
It wasn't even the other, they were still sitting behind the Arizona team. I was like, they're behind their own team. They're just college kids talking. ⁓

Rick Denton (08:13)
It reinforced that, that normalization of this is a sport. Sure. It's unique, but it is still a sport and it is a sport filled with fierce athletes.

Clancy Denton (08:25)
Yeah, so that was incredible and I'm so glad that she has that friend in her class that that would have been something that yeah, we would have never gotten experience then we you know Took her out to dinner. We the next day She had some friends coming in from California. This goes into another thing that we never dealt with growing up

Rick Denton (08:50)
Well, some of never dealt with it growing up is because there wasn't the technology. These are her online friends. And that is a sentence that I initially certainly made us very cautious. And I still think there is a responsibility of a parent to be cautious when you're younger kid. And we're now talking about our adult kid, but these were friends that she met when she was younger to be very cautious about, okay, well, that's fine. But what are y'all talking about?

Clancy Denton (08:53)
Reveal, yeah.

Rick Denton (09:17)
What name have you shared any information and all of that sort of checked out? Well, she developed a relationship with these friends over a year.

Clancy Denton (09:25)
Yeah. And I will say, when she was younger and there was a friend that lived locally that they had met online and they were going to visit, we did put in the caveat that a parent did go with them and we did take her out in the front yard and teach her how to use her mace in case. So I will put that in there.

Rick Denton (09:49)
not associated with this trip yet, however, that was very true.

Clancy Denton (09:52)
But that was, you know, when she was younger. So, yeah, so these were her friends that last at the end of last semester, she said, ⁓ I'm going to go to California this summer and meet my online friends in person. And you and I were like, ⁓ okay. You know, and she was like, we've transferred now to phone and text, you know, they had moved off.

of online, she had photos, which, okay, that's somewhat proof of life, but still, yeah. Then we got into, okay, she was going with one of her friends from here and the mom was going. And we were like, okay, yes. Then we were like, and the mom was not going to be with them, but she was going to California to visit her friend in the same city. So we said.

Rick Denton (10:28)
You're not quite there.

Clancy Denton (10:51)
Okay, yes.

Rick Denton (10:53)
And that's like, we're talking about kids that are exposing us to things that just weren't a part of our world. guess, you know, I have a modern day equivalent for us as adults, but just staying in the kid world, the closest would have been if you had a pen pal.

Clancy Denton (11:07)
Yeah. back then, it's not like you were really getting on a plane or a bus to go.

Rick Denton (11:15)
I realize when I think about this that it's not as odd as I think I might have originally thought it was. And that's because so much of the work world, many of my colleagues when I was in the consulting business, have, I'll use present tense, I have never met them in person. yet,

I feel like I know them and it's one of those novel experiences when you do get to meet them in person. And so that's what they got to do. This new exposure for us was it was a first for us to get to meet her California friend.

Clancy Denton (11:51)
Yes, so they had told Tegan they wanted to come to Arizona. They had never been to Arizona. And they said, ⁓ we want to come for your birthday. And, you know, we want to meet your parents. And so we were like, Nicest kids. mean, just great kids. So sweet, very kind. Just wonderful. mean, so much to say about them. Just super nice. Everything that you would want your kids friends to be.

Rick Denton (12:19)
You would just want them to be co-located so they could spend more physical time with you.

Clancy Denton (12:23)
other. And she's going out to California to see them in a couple of months, but I mean, yeah, just great kids.

Rick Denton (12:30)
Now, one of the kids did surprise us with an experience. got to have a little bit of a fan photo. So one of Tegan's friends sent a picture of him actually buying the book and excitedly showing that to

Clancy Denton (12:37)
Yeah

So you know, this is kind of funny because just as I am a stalker of people, anytime any of our children got a new friend, got a new girlfriend, anything, or boyfriend, I was always looking them up on Instagram.

Rick Denton (13:06)
And

not just looking about Instagram. You were in Private Investigator.

Clancy Denton (13:10)
So

Tegan's friend found me on Facebook and he said, I think I found your mom. And she said, yeah, that's her. Then he said, ⁓ I think I found your dad. And he said, wait, your parents have written a book? And then he told her, he said, he sent her a picture because he had ordered it and he was holding the book. And so yeah, he brought it and wanted us to sign it. It was so neat. That was fun. And then one of the girls that came, her mom, when she got

when they got to the Airbnb and Tegan went over there and she, her mom said, I need you to take a picture of Tegan and send it to me because her mom didn't get to see Tegan when she to California. And, and so the girl said, okay, mom. And she did. And, and she said, I think my mom's been listening to your parents podcast too, cause she had looked up to see who we were too. So, you know,

It goes both ways. Kids look up kids and parents look up kids.

Rick Denton (14:10)
So

what we're finding is that we thought that it was all empty nesters that were going to enjoy the loud quiet. It's actually the kids of empty nesters. That'll be the separate broadcast.

Clancy Denton (14:19)
Super

great kids. We're so glad that we got to spend. We didn't get to be with her on her birthday, which was kind of hard. That was the first birthday and first Easter that we haven't been with her. I did take her Easter basket out there. So we flew back on her birthday so that we could get back here and do Easter with Tanner and his girlfriend and her family because we're doing.

our family's Easter next weekend. Another thing that we're taught is that Tanner has kind of reopened my eyes to music that I really enjoyed back in my, I'd say early nineties.

Rick Denton (15:08)
kind of your college and your.

Clancy Denton (15:11)
Late high school, early college. I guess, yeah. And so, you know, the EDM music that he really loves, electronic dance music, house music, club music. And that's been really fun. And now what I like is that there are specific venues that only play this music. You know, back in my day, you had to go on certain nights to the clubs that would have...

Rick Denton (15:38)
We're some of those knights here in Dallas.

Clancy Denton (15:41)
I

Rick Denton (15:41)
Come on.

Clancy Denton (15:41)
can't remember all the lists. The church. The church was a little darker, but... The lounge was one of them, but they played all kinds of music.

Rick Denton (15:50)
Was Lizard Lounge one of

Well, and we even had an episode about that. mean, empty nesters go to a rave. So I'll go ahead. If you're watching on YouTube, there's a ⁓ card above there you can click and go listen to the empty nesters go to a rave or I'll put it in the show notes.

Clancy Denton (16:06)
Yeah, and we've been listening. He's been doing, you know, a DJ set for like we, I think we've talked about for his university. And so we've been listening to that on Monday nights. And, you know, it's just fun that he's brought that back up. I mean, I have my CDs in the media room across the hall of my, you know, house music.

Rick Denton (16:26)
general,

just how kids are bringing us into their music has opened my eyes to bands and artists and even just types of music that I would not have heard. One of the, guess for lack of a better term, I'll call it musical, but it's almost like an ⁓ extended opera really, that T it's called Epic the musical and it's all about Odysseus and it has all of these different sagas. I think it's

nine different sagas that some artists just created and put on YouTube and gained notoriety through that. And not just in sort of the virality sort of way, it's really good and has become something I would have never heard of that or Jiraya or Bear Ghost or any of the bands that she's in.

Clancy Denton (17:14)
And now, they're all these... the video games that they used to play as kids are now coming to the opera houses and doing symphonies. She and her friend went to the Sonic Symphony. Well, now, Tanner got her for her birthday, Undertale, which was a game that they played, I mean, when they were much younger. And so, he got her tickets for her birthday to that symphony, and, you know, he said...

And we're going to dress up. know, here's the 23 year old future lawyer and the college senior. And you know, he was like, do you want to dress up? she was like, at first, I think she was like, Oh, you want to dress up? she was like, Oh, okay. And I love when she, and she loves it. She loves when she can tell her friends when they ask about her brother.

Rick Denton (17:53)
is gonna be a school counselor.

Clancy Denton (18:11)
Cause you know, she's like, yeah, you know, he was in a fraternity. He's in law school, but he likes video games. He's taking me to undertale. We're going to dress up. know, she, she loves that she can tell them how well-rounded he is.

Rick Denton (18:31)
And that's something that has been exciting to see. And I think that's part of why we get to still learn from them is because all that well-roundedness, well, there's a lot of extended of that sphere that brings us in. You mentioning the symphony ones, I wanna talk about that a second. I don't think that video game music and even just sort of video games as an art got, I'm gonna say past tense, the credibility.

that I believe they are getting now. If you think about some of the games we played, there's still music that I bet you could hum if you really thought about it.

Clancy Denton (19:09)
But do do do do do do do but I mean but is but now it's more I'd say it's got more melodic behind

Rick Denton (19:18)
That's

some 8-bit music that is all the technology was capable of doing.

Clancy Denton (19:24)
Did anyone know when I was just hemming, if you knew? ⁓ say it.

Rick Denton (19:28)
If you know what Clancy just

It's not really... I love that. If you know what that is, would you drop it in, either reach out to us directly through the website, The Loud Quiet, or head over to the Facebook page or group and put the comments. that's fun. Let's see who all knows that. It all has to start somewhere. mean, heck, music started with banging on rocks at some point, and it evolved into what it is now. And it is something that can truly be felt.

in a symphonic and an operatic sort of way. mean, Tegan and her friend came out of that Sonic show, not emotional in sense of tears or anything like that, but just as emotionally stirred as you and I might have been leaving a concert of one of our favorite rock artists or jazz artists or a great, beautiful symphony.

Clancy Denton (20:23)
Well, I think that's music in general. I mean, I told you the other day, I was driving to meet my friend to walk in the morning. I don't even know what song was on, but whatever song it was, and it happened to be at the time that all the elementary school kids were going to school. And I see them running around the corner with their backpacks on. And I mean, I started tearing up. And I'm sure it was a mix of the song that was on.

It's, it, just stirs emotions. Happy sad. mean, when we see Tanner after he's been to one of his shows at Silo, he's just so energized and wants to talk about it and show us videos. I mean, it just stirs up emotions that I don't know. I mean, you, you can get those emotions when you watch a movie, you can get those emotions when you read a book. But I think music just.

does something different to your brain that

than any of the other creative outlets.

Rick Denton (21:33)
It somehow stirs in your soul. And that's where I mentioned the credibility of video games have that this musical artistry is there. Well, you mentioned the music and the movies and the books, the storytelling capability inside of games and just the visual artistry is something that has been in, I'm going to use reintroduce. You how you talked about EDM brought you as a reminder back to some of your old ones.

Well, the kids through their highlighting of the Zelda franchise. Well, that's what I played back when I had my little Nintendo, but the current, the last two Zelda games. Well, that's something that they have. I can't say that they exposed me to it because I already knew Zelda, but bringing me back into gaming through that, is a level of creativity that is impossible for me to describe on an audio podcast, but it is completely.

absorbing to the point that one of the games I would tell you that there'd be times that I wasn't actually doing anything in the game other than just air quote here hiking around the game like you would hike anywhere else and it was the kids that brought me back into that.

Clancy Denton (22:49)
And I would say too, y'all, because Tanner is back here and he is into hockey, his girlfriend's into hockey, y'all are all, Tegan is now into hockey, so y'all are all going to the hockey game this weekend. So that's another one that's kind of back from the past.

Rick Denton (23:10)
It has reinvigorated because yeah, you and I had season tickets when we were young adults and now our kids

Clancy Denton (23:15)
Now

you have other people to go with.

Rick Denton (23:20)
You mean you don't want to go to New Year's Eve?

Clancy Denton (23:25)
No, I don't want to go on Saturday either.

Rick Denton (23:30)
You are missing out, but I'm not going to have that debate with you here.

Clancy Denton (23:32)
When we were talking about music and its stirring emotions, I was thinking about when we would visit your mom in the memory care and how they would always play music from their generation and that kind of thing. Talking about the video games, I wonder if they will have when our, you know, somewhat our generation, but really our kids.

I wonder if that will be something that is available for them when they get into that phase because that, the ones that do spend so much time in that, I wonder if that would be something that would be a brain stimulator bringing back memories for them.

Rick Denton (24:27)
It'll be interesting because as your body is less capable, heck, there are games that they play that I just physically can't keep up with. Their reaction time is different than mine.

Clancy Denton (24:39)
But I'm sure there's one.

Rick Denton (24:40)
The

immersive capability of dropping, a VR goggle or whatever it's going to be, it'll be an implant by the time we're in the, kinds of communities where it is that kind of level immersive and you just get to go kind of re-experience and tap back into your world in that way. Yeah, that'll be interesting.

Clancy Denton (24:55)
I know, yeah. I just thought of that.

Hmmmm

Rick Denton (25:01)
Starting a new segment this week called the things that make you go. ⁓

Clancy Denton (25:07)
Something to think about in the future.

Rick Denton (25:09)
What have your kids brought to you? What have your kids taught you? I mean, we have a few that we were just thinking of just impulsively coming out of this trip, but if you've got others that you'd want to share, share it out there on the Facebook group. We would love to bring that into a future episode. So yeah, wrapped up the beginning of April, wrapped up Easter. Thanks y'all for listening to another episode of The Loud Quiet.