Speaker 1: Hi, is this Franklin?
Speaker 2: Hello?
Speaker 1: How are you doing? Franklin?
Speaker 2: You know I'm doing very good.
Speaker 1: How you get I'm doing good myself. I love your voice.
Speaker 1: You have a great diaphragm.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I've worked a lot on it in my lifetime,
Speaker 2: I guess. So that's that's very nice of you to say.
Speaker 1: Really you've worked on your voice. This is not a
Speaker 1: natural thing you were born with. This is something that
Speaker 1: you had to put active effort into.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean partly yes and partly no. You know,
Speaker 2: like I feel like, compared to most people, I have
Speaker 2: to make quite a conscious effort as to what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: You know, like I've always said that most others are
Speaker 2: on like a driving and automatic when it comes to communication,
Speaker 2: whereas I'm driving a manual car. But also, you know,
Speaker 2: like I've been told since I was like thirteen, I'm
Speaker 2: a deep voice. So that's one thing I actually a British.
Speaker 2: I'm not like faking my accent. That's not one way
Speaker 2: that I've worked my boy.
Speaker 1: So I like what you said just now. You said
Speaker 1: that most people are when they're when they're talking, they're
Speaker 1: driving an automatic, But you're driving a manual, so you're
Speaker 1: putting a lot of effort and thought behind each annunciation
Speaker 1: of each letter of each word exactly.
Speaker 2: Not only that, but like I used to be a
Speaker 2: big theater kid, and like all the time my drama
Speaker 2: teacher would she'd just like be so serious about enunciation
Speaker 2: and stuff, and like I definitely indoctrinated that, And and
Speaker 2: annunciation is something that's quite important to me, isn't that?
Speaker 1: It exhausting though, having to think so much about every
Speaker 1: single thing that you say, Oh.
Speaker 2: Very tiring. It's like so unbelievably tiring. Like scripting is
Speaker 2: a really bad thing for me because I literally can't
Speaker 2: go into a conversation without like preparing what I'm going
Speaker 2: to say and what I think the other person is
Speaker 2: going to say.
Speaker 1: Hmm, okay, let's dive into that here. Scripting so you
Speaker 1: script out to the best of your ability, using the
Speaker 1: knowledge that you have available to you almost all of
Speaker 1: your own reactions.
Speaker 2: Yes, definitely, And like a lot it's really bad because
Speaker 2: a lot of the time I will just try and
Speaker 2: script a conversation, and if I can't, if it doesn't
Speaker 2: go the way that I want it to in my head,
Speaker 2: I will just completely avoid the interaction overall. And it
Speaker 2: leads to not the best of communication.
Speaker 1: But so much of conversation is not just preparing what
Speaker 1: you're going to say beforehand. It's responding in real time
Speaker 1: to what the other person is going to say. So
Speaker 1: how do you account for that when you don't know
Speaker 1: what the other person is going to say?
Speaker 2: It's so interesting because that is such a huge thing
Speaker 2: in conversation For me, is like I hate having to
Speaker 2: react to what people are going to say, especially if
Speaker 2: they're like telling me a story that I again, it
Speaker 2: feels so annual that I'm forcing myself to be like, oh,
Speaker 2: that's so interesting, or like it feels like life is
Speaker 2: just this huge improv show. And that's why I like
Speaker 2: improvisation and theater that has helped me a lot, because
Speaker 2: it's all about like trusting your own instincts and like
Speaker 2: saying the first thing that comes to mind. But it's
Speaker 2: so much easier said than done.
Speaker 1: Why do you think you script so much of your conversations?
Speaker 1: Where do you think that desire comes from.
Speaker 2: I think it's like, because I've had so many failed
Speaker 2: social interactions in my life that I'm able to recognize
Speaker 2: this pattern of what people expect from me in conversation
Speaker 2: slash what my abilities in conversation are? I guess, and
Speaker 2: you know, like I really if I have a social
Speaker 2: interaction that goes not well, I will fixate on it
Speaker 2: literally the whole day and be like, you're such an idiot,
Speaker 2: like why did you say that?
Speaker 1: And you said this that that this fixation on social
Speaker 1: interactions is something that happens to you to this day.
Speaker 2: Yes, definitely.
Speaker 1: Let me ask you this, when you say a failed
Speaker 1: social interaction, what does that mean? What is the rubric
Speaker 1: for failure in your eyes?
Speaker 2: Basically, Like with failed social interactions, a lot of the time,
Speaker 2: it's just to do with like how I was acting
Speaker 2: in the conversation and that like sometimes I can just
Speaker 2: be really awkward and say things that aren't like too
Speaker 2: socially acceptable, but they were in my head or a
Speaker 2: lot of you make a joke.
Speaker 1: Can we get an example of something that you can
Speaker 1: think of in recent memory that you said that in
Speaker 1: your head was socially acceptable, but when you said it,
Speaker 1: it wasn't.
Speaker 2: Like a concrete example. I'm not sure. I'm sure I
Speaker 2: can think of like an exact quote of what I
Speaker 2: said that Usually it's when I overestimate how mentally ill.
Speaker 2: Others are like, I forget that not everyone is mentally ill,
Speaker 2: and I will just kind of like trauma down to
Speaker 2: something in conversation and people will be like, oh, that's weird,
Speaker 2: and I'm like, fuck, I wish I never said anything interesting.
Speaker 1: All right, So you feel like you might be, uh,
Speaker 1: what they like to call an oversharer.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yes, I have such an issue with oversharing interesting.
Speaker 1: Have you spoken to a real therapist about this? I'm curious.
Speaker 2: Yeah, quite a few.
Speaker 1: What do they tell you?
Speaker 2: That's the thing is that I don't know a lot
Speaker 2: of them don't really want to focus on that aspect
Speaker 2: of my mental health. A lot of them just try.
Speaker 2: And it's so hard to put into words, but like basically,
Speaker 2: like all this stuff to do with communication is to
Speaker 2: do with my autism basically, and therapists never seem to
Speaker 2: want to talk about autism. It's like very frustrating because
Speaker 2: and it's also very invalidating because you know, I mentioned
Speaker 2: something and it like affects almost every aspect of my
Speaker 2: life that they just want to talk about, like oh, well,
Speaker 2: have you been sleeping well or did you eat well
Speaker 2: or something like that. I'm just like, yeah, I don't
Speaker 2: really care, Like, you.
Speaker 1: Know, so you've tried to bring up your autism to
Speaker 1: therapists and they won't talk to you about it.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, especially before I was like diagnosed and stuff.
Speaker 2: And when I was trying to get diagnosed, the therapists
Speaker 2: just like were really iffy about it and didn't want
Speaker 2: to get into that process or help me with it
Speaker 2: at all. It's like, why so many people self diagnosed
Speaker 2: with autism because therapists just like aren't helpful about it
Speaker 2: and they make the process for getting diagnosed really difficult.
Speaker 1: M let's bring up what you wrote here on the
Speaker 1: screening notes because I find this interesting. It says here
Speaker 1: that you figured out that you were autistic after a
Speaker 1: bad trip on mushrooms.
Speaker 2: Yeah, what was that? Yeah, So it was the first
Speaker 2: time I'd ever done psychedelics, and it was my first
Speaker 2: year at UNI, and I the first mistake I made
Speaker 2: was that I took shrooms the same day that I
Speaker 2: actually had a therapy session literally like half an hour before,
Speaker 2: and it was not a very good one, and so
Speaker 2: I was not exactly in the best headspace. But then
Speaker 2: we took the shrooms and I didn't like see anything crazy.
Speaker 2: That's the thing, Like I was still getting visuals. People's
Speaker 2: faces looked weird. Everything was like wavy and stuff like that.
Speaker 2: But the first thing I started to notice was how
Speaker 2: much I was overthinking, and also how much I didn't
Speaker 2: want to be around other people. And like, I started
Speaker 2: having this huge identity crisis and I literally couldn't stop
Speaker 2: fixating on it because I was like, I realized that
Speaker 2: I basically just replicate the personality and persona of whoever
Speaker 2: I'm talking to or interacting with, And I was like
Speaker 2: why do I do that? And I kept thinking, like
Speaker 2: why do I do that so much? And it's because
Speaker 2: I have this like deep rooted fear of people finding
Speaker 2: out that I'm not normal, and so, you know, and
Speaker 2: it also goes back to when I was like a
Speaker 2: little kid, and I was also a non normal kid,
Speaker 2: and you know, I figured out from a young age
Speaker 2: that the best way to get other people's validation is
Speaker 2: by making them laugh, and so you know, from then on,
Speaker 2: I became like class clown and stuff like that. And
Speaker 2: so yeah, like when I was having a bad trip,
Speaker 2: I was overthinking so much and the only way to
Speaker 2: come myself down was by doing like really repetitive and
Speaker 2: like stimulating things, like we were watching music videos. Like
Speaker 2: I just kept putting on music videos because you're getting
Speaker 2: that auditory stimuli and the visual stimuli, which is really cool.
Speaker 1: I want to talk about really quick before I move on,
Speaker 1: because I this peaked my curiosity and I don't want
Speaker 1: to move on from it. You said that you mirror
Speaker 1: the personality of whoever you're talking to, and you believe
Speaker 1: that you do that because you are insecure about your
Speaker 1: own personality because you believe it is weird. Is that accurate? Yeah,
Speaker 1: why do you believe that your personality is weird?
Speaker 2: Well? I was bullied a lot when I was younger,
Speaker 2: in like primary school and stuff. Kids, You know that
Speaker 2: all the time they would tell me that I was
Speaker 2: gay before I even I knew what gay meant, or
Speaker 2: before I was even like thinking about sexuality and stuff.
Speaker 2: Because I've never I've never really had I've never perceived
Speaker 2: the world or anything in like a gendered way. That's
Speaker 2: also another thing to do with autism. There's that like
Speaker 2: a lot of the time ORTO two people don't perceive
Speaker 2: gender norms in that sort of way. And that led
Speaker 2: to me, you know, I was always like, why is
Speaker 2: it girly for me to, you know, sing Beyonce, Why
Speaker 2: is it girly for me to paint my nails or
Speaker 2: like pretend to be a mermaid with my friends. I
Speaker 2: never understood the concept of cooties. I was like, cooties
Speaker 2: are so stupid that literally doesn't make any sense. Even
Speaker 2: as like a six year old, I was like, why
Speaker 2: can't I be friends with girls? And so yeah, all
Speaker 2: the time, I was bullied a lot, and that led
Speaker 2: to a lot of like me, especially around other guys.
Speaker 2: I would feel this really strong and toxic urge to
Speaker 2: like perform masculinity. And the thing is, I've gotten so
Speaker 2: much better over time at not doing that, but I
Speaker 2: still I still mask, and I still basically just give
Speaker 2: the person I'm interacting with whatever they want. Basically, Well, let.
Speaker 1: Me tell you this. And I'm not a real therapist,
Speaker 1: and maybe this is a reductive response to to trauma,
Speaker 1: but I'm gonna hail Mary. I'm gonna say it anyway.
Speaker 1: I'm you know, when when was this bullying taking place?
Speaker 1: When you were like what ten, thirteen, twelve?
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, exactly, yeah, around like preteenage and you're and you're.
Speaker 1: You're twenty years old, now, yes, you know, thirteen year old,
Speaker 1: twelve year old, eleven year old boys, they're fucked up
Speaker 1: and they're a little mean, and it's not a it's
Speaker 1: not a fun environment to be in when you're autistic,
Speaker 1: when you have all these sort of things that you're
Speaker 1: going through, and you know your your community of peers
Speaker 1: is not emotionally mature enough to, you know, know how
Speaker 1: to accept you for as you are. And that's a
Speaker 1: fucking bummer, man. And I get that now that you're twenty,
Speaker 1: now that you're an adult, you have access to the
Speaker 1: entirety of the world, which I do believe is filled
Speaker 1: with people who are understanding and caring. And I think
Speaker 1: that you know, in this one life that you have, Franklin,
Speaker 1: you should feel empowered to let go of how you
Speaker 1: were treated when you were younger and be however the
Speaker 1: fuck you are. Definitely, what do you think about that?
Speaker 1: What is your response to that idea?
Speaker 2: Yeah, Like, I want to do that so much. I
Speaker 2: literally like that's the dream and I'm working on it.
Speaker 2: And you know that's why I'm like going through therapy
Speaker 2: and stuff and I literally just got diagnosable to this.
Speaker 1: You got you finally got diagnosed by an actual by
Speaker 1: a mushroom thing.
Speaker 2: Yes, exactly. And the beautiful thing about it is that
Speaker 2: one of the most helpful resources wasn't like the therapists
Speaker 2: or like the Internet and stuff like that. It was
Speaker 2: other autistic people that helped me realize that I was
Speaker 2: autistic because I've and from that, I've formed like such
Speaker 2: a huge community and safe net of autistic people on
Speaker 2: Tiptop that I'm friends with or that follow me. And
Speaker 2: it's honestly just like really crazy because I didn't know
Speaker 2: that there were other people out there that think like me.
Speaker 2: I always thought I was just broken and everyone else
Speaker 2: thought it the same way, and so it's very comforting
Speaker 2: that And like, autism is literally like the most specific
Speaker 2: thing ever, Like there's some symptoms that are just so
Speaker 2: fucking specific that I'm like, that's crazy that we share
Speaker 2: that in common.
Speaker 1: Well, I'm a big fan. Let me tell you this.
Speaker 1: I'm thinking about this right now as I'm talking to you.
Speaker 1: I've taught We've talked to other autistic callers on the
Speaker 1: show who have like expressed uh like anxiety over how
Speaker 1: they're presenting themselves in social situations. But like the other
Speaker 1: autistic people have talked to on the show, but very
Speaker 1: good at at at talking, like they know when to
Speaker 1: pause and let me speak there if they're good listeners,
Speaker 1: Like it's it's I almost think that the the this
Speaker 1: whole thing that you're doing where you're you're putting a
Speaker 1: lot of thought and effort into social interactions. I know
Speaker 1: why it's exhausting. It sounds like it's exhausting, but it's
Speaker 1: it's it's it's working. I mean, even this conversation I'm
Speaker 1: having with you right now, you know, I wouldn't think
Speaker 1: that that you were socially awkward at all.
Speaker 2: No, definitely. I I think it goes back to like
Speaker 2: what I was saying that with, like, it's not that
Speaker 2: autistic people don't understand a lot of social norms and
Speaker 2: stuff like that, it's that they don't come naturally to us.
Speaker 2: And that's the whole thing with like being on manual
Speaker 2: versus automatic, is that I work a much more conscious effort. Yes, exactly.
Speaker 1: Yeah hmm. So you've been able to find a community
Speaker 1: of other artistic people went on TikTok and read it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, it's amazing.
Speaker 1: That's awesome man. So I mean, how do you feel
Speaker 1: about your trajectory in terms of what we talked about,
Speaker 1: of you eventually coming to terms with who you are
Speaker 1: and being a little bit more comfortable expressing that.
Speaker 2: I think it's it's very interesting because I think I'm
Speaker 2: very much on the trajectory of doing that, but there's
Speaker 2: steps that I need to take. Like one of the
Speaker 2: biggest steps initially for me was breaking up with my
Speaker 2: ex girlfriend, and I didn't realize how much I was,
Speaker 2: you know, performing for her and changing my personality to
Speaker 2: cater hers. And I think the next step, honestly is
Speaker 2: like moving out of my family's house, because like, I
Speaker 2: love them so much, but they just don't really understand.
Speaker 2: And they also they simultaneously know I'm autistic that they
Speaker 2: also don't really want to accommodate for me in any
Speaker 2: sort of way, And you know that's just tiring.
Speaker 1: Sure, sure, well, Franklin, I I'm really I'm glad to
Speaker 1: hear it seems like you've been on quite a journey,
Speaker 1: and it seems like you're on an upward trajectory with this.
Speaker 1: You definitely seem like you're very aware of all these
Speaker 1: issues and you're currently working to fix them. I'm not
Speaker 1: telling you anything that you don't already know, but you
Speaker 1: don't need to perform for people. I love, man. You know,
Speaker 1: people are so doom Marie about the internet. But I
Speaker 1: love that you can go from you know, being thirteen
Speaker 1: and just having all these people around who just don't
Speaker 1: and don't even want to try to understand you, to
Speaker 1: finding a community of people where you go, Oh the fuck,
Speaker 1: I'm not crazy. This is a real thing that other
Speaker 1: people are experiencing as well. I'm glad you were able
Speaker 1: to find Yeah.
Speaker 2: It's useful, Yeah, definitely.
Speaker 1: Frankly, is there anything you want to say to the
Speaker 1: people of the computer before we go?
Speaker 2: Yes, I have a question for you, Lyle.
Speaker 1: You're from Maryland, right, Oh yeah, I'm from Maryland.
Speaker 2: Why what's your opinion on the flag of Maryland? Uh?
Speaker 1: You want my real answer?
Speaker 2: I do? Uh?
Speaker 1: You asking me this question is the very first time
Speaker 1: I have ever thought about the flag of Maryland.
Speaker 2: That's what everyone says. What I them about flags?
Speaker 1: It says Oh, it says here that you have an
Speaker 1: obsession with flags too, Yes, a.
Speaker 2: Very strong obsession with flags.
Speaker 1: What's what's your opinion about the flag of Maryland.
Speaker 2: I think it's awful. I think it's one of the
Speaker 2: worst flags I've ever seen. And it also has no
Speaker 2: symbolism or meaning or significance to Maryland. The only significance
Speaker 2: is that the people of Maryland love that flag like
Speaker 2: they love that flag. And I have been like bullied
Speaker 2: on the internet before because I said that Maryland was
Speaker 2: the worst state flag and literally the whole state like
Speaker 2: hoped on in my comment section and with like sending
Speaker 2: death threats and stuff. But it's just people.
Speaker 1: People were, actually people are sending you death threats over
Speaker 1: hating the Maryland.
Speaker 2: Literally, people were trying to like dock me.
Speaker 1: All right, well I will I will not be fucking
Speaker 1: with the flag community anytime soon. No, I am personally,
Speaker 1: I'm personally not offended by your slander of the Maryland
Speaker 1: flag because, like I said, I never think about it.
Speaker 1: But what, Okay, so you have an obsession with flags,
Speaker 1: What is in your opinion the best flag?
Speaker 2: Well, that's such a good question. My personal favorite flag
Speaker 2: is either between Sicily or Uruguay. Basically, a flag has
Speaker 2: to have five things. It has to have meaningful symbolism,
Speaker 2: two to three colors, no lettering or seals. It also
Speaker 2: there's a couple other things that they're like the five
Speaker 2: rules of vexillology, and basically like almost all of the
Speaker 2: state flags break those rules. Like that's why I just
Speaker 2: hate most of the state flags. That Maryland takes the
Speaker 2: number one spot for my least favorite.
Speaker 1: Well, I don't have a five point rubric, but I
Speaker 1: will say I like the California flag because it has
Speaker 1: a bear.
Speaker 2: On it, you know, and I respect that. I respect that,
Speaker 2: but I personally don't like the Californian flag because it
Speaker 2: has a bear on it. And what does that say
Speaker 2: about California? You know, it's the Golden State, and there's
Speaker 2: not even any gold on the flag. There's so much
Speaker 2: more you could represent about California's beautiful landscape, about its
Speaker 2: booming economy, about its history, and yet they were just like, oh,
Speaker 2: there's a lot of beers here, let's put a beer
Speaker 2: on the flag.
Speaker 1: And although we disagree about flags, I will not send
Speaker 1: you any death threats. And I appreciate you calling in
Speaker 1: and sharing all of this with us. It's been an
Speaker 1: awesome convo.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's been a lovely conversation, and I appreciate our
Speaker 2: willingness to agree to disagree. That's just really about human's ability,
Speaker 2: right there.
Speaker 1: Hey, I have a good night, Franklin, you too, have
Speaker 1: a good one. I really have not thought about the
Speaker 1: Maryland flag. I gotta check where I you know what
Speaker 1: I should have asked him. I should have asked him
Speaker 1: where people are arguing about flags. I want to go
Speaker 1: on r slash flags and just see if it's a
Speaker 1: fucking blood bath of people saying horrible things to each
Speaker 1: other because of the disagreements of whether Wyoming or South
Speaker 1: Dakota has a better shade of blue on their flag.
Speaker 1: That's a little I know about flags. I'm pretty sure
Speaker 1: there's no blue in the Wyoming state flag or the
Speaker 1: North Dakota state flag. All right, I'm gonna look this
Speaker 1: up really quick. Okay, it is kind of blue. It
Speaker 1: has a bull. And then let's see it with's South Dakota.
Speaker 1: That one has a bull on it. That looks kind
Speaker 1: of cool. Oh fuck, they do both. They are both blue.
Speaker 1: Holy shit, I'm a genius. They're both blue. That was
Speaker 1: a complete guess. That was a complete and other guess.
Speaker 1: And I will say South Dakota's shade of blue I
Speaker 1: like a little bit better. Oh, North Dakota. North Dakota
Speaker 1: and Wyoming both have similar shades of blue. Okay, I'm
Speaker 1: starting to become a little bit obsessed with flags myself.
Speaker 1: I see where Franklin is coming from. Hello, hey, yeah,
Speaker 1: this gino?
Speaker 3: This is he? How you doing?
Speaker 2: Man?
Speaker 1: G You know it says here that you once masturbated
Speaker 1: at the Vatican, Yes, sir, that is correct. Says here
Speaker 1: that you have a goal in life to masturbate in
Speaker 1: as many different countries as possible.
Speaker 3: If I am able to do it, I would absolutely
Speaker 3: love to.
Speaker 1: Okay, how many? How many different countries have you masturbated in?
Speaker 1: So far?
Speaker 4: Five?
Speaker 1: Which countries are?
Speaker 3: France, Italy, the Vatican because the Vaticans can have its
Speaker 3: own country, United States? And London? Well, London is my country,
Speaker 3: you can't.
Speaker 1: Did you did you masturbate in Rome?
Speaker 2: Yes?
Speaker 1: Okay, so that's Vatican, Rome, France, Italy, US and England.
Speaker 1: So that's that's six. You masturbated in six countries.
Speaker 3: In Italy?
Speaker 1: Wait? Hold on, mm hmm? Did I did you say
Speaker 1: Italy already?
Speaker 2: Yes?
Speaker 1: Okay, I think I did. I don't. I you know,
Speaker 1: I know, I have this fucking podcast where I talk
Speaker 1: to people and stuff, but I just don't. I don't
Speaker 1: know anything, and I don't care. I don't care the
Speaker 1: people are, like, oh, Rome is a thing. I don't
Speaker 1: care where anything it is. I don't care what anything is.
Speaker 1: I don't care how you pronounce things. I don't care
Speaker 1: if words that I say mean anything I do. I
Speaker 1: don't fucking care. Alaska is a city, it's not a state.
Speaker 1: I don't care Alabama and Alaska and Morocco in Japan
Speaker 1: and Laos and Baltimore and Austin that they're all this.
Speaker 1: Everywhere is the same place. I don't fucking care. It's
Speaker 1: all fine. Everything is fine. Everything I say is okay.
Speaker 3: I agree.
Speaker 1: Tell me about masturbating in the Vatican, how did that
Speaker 1: come about?
Speaker 3: So? Like the Vatican is kind of its own country
Speaker 3: within within Rome itself, like it has its own like army,
Speaker 3: it has its own like postal stuff going on. And
Speaker 3: I visited a couple of times because I was on
Speaker 3: an archaeological dig in Italy and I went there and
Speaker 3: the first time I was like, whoa, this is so cool,
Speaker 3: Like it's got this big museum and there's so much
Speaker 3: cool art, you know, the Sistine Chapel all that. The
Speaker 3: second time I went, I was like, man, they're their
Speaker 3: own country. I've spanked it in like several countries so far,
Speaker 3: I might not ever get this chance again. Okay, So
Speaker 3: I didn't like do it in public or like inside
Speaker 3: the Systeine Chapel or anything like that, but I went
Speaker 3: to one of the bathrooms in the museum and did
Speaker 3: it there. And actually the stalls were like very very
Speaker 3: nice and very kind of private, like they were their
Speaker 3: own like water closets sort of. And it like it
Speaker 3: took a little bit because I'm transgender, so like you know,
Speaker 3: it was a little bit awkward. A couple of people
Speaker 3: banged on the door.
Speaker 2: But.
Speaker 3: Your people banging on the door, yeah, because they needed
Speaker 3: to use the toilet.
Speaker 1: Can I ask you in this bathroom configuration, how many
Speaker 1: stalls are in this bathroom?
Speaker 3: So like the entire bathroom, it was rather large, but
Speaker 3: like each stall was kind of its own contained like
Speaker 3: water closet, Like it was like a closet almost like
Speaker 3: it was its own kind of private room almost. So
Speaker 3: it was very private. It had like sufficient space to
Speaker 3: get everything done.
Speaker 1: Well, Okay, so what I'm asking you is like I like,
Speaker 1: if I go into a public restroom, I won't take
Speaker 1: a shit in a public restroom unless if I see
Speaker 1: that there are other stalls, because if I'm the only person,
Speaker 1: because there's absolutely nothing more horrifying than taking a shit
Speaker 1: in a stall that's the only one. So like you're
Speaker 1: taking a shit while there's a line to get in,
Speaker 1: that's a horrifying experience. I don't know if that's the
Speaker 1: configuration of this bathroom.
Speaker 3: No, no, no, there were other toilets in this bathroom
Speaker 3: as well, Like imagine like a public bathroom that had
Speaker 3: like I would say, there were probably maybe twelve other toilets.
Speaker 1: Yeah, from what I recall, there are twelve other the toilets.
Speaker 1: Why are people banging on your stall? If there's twelve
Speaker 1: of the toils, I think I use one of the
Speaker 1: other ones.
Speaker 3: It was it was rather busy. There were a lot
Speaker 3: of tourists and things like that, so I it wasn't
Speaker 3: like there were a lot of people. This was in
Speaker 3: the Vatican Museum, proper, Okay.
Speaker 1: The Vatican Museum. And how did you feel when you
Speaker 1: completed the task?
Speaker 3: I felt very accomplished. Is that my first time being
Speaker 3: like down about like even though I wasn't necessarily in public,
Speaker 3: like it wasn't it was still in like a public space, right,
Speaker 3: Like I wasn't in the hotel room or like in
Speaker 3: my bedroom. So the first time I had ever done that,
Speaker 3: and I just felt like accomplished, Like yeah, check that
Speaker 3: box off my bucket list.
Speaker 1: And was it in the Vatican. Was it right after
Speaker 1: you jacked off in the Vatican Museum bathroom that you
Speaker 1: decided it would be your goal to master beating as
Speaker 1: many countries as possible or was that beforehand?
Speaker 3: I really didn't think about it until then. It was
Speaker 3: just like kind of a if I don't do this now,
Speaker 3: like I might never have the chance again because I
Speaker 3: don't know what's going to happen tomorrow, you know, if
Speaker 3: I get you know, blown away by a car or
Speaker 3: something like that, like it's now or never. And so
Speaker 3: I just like impulsively decided to do it. But afterwards,
Speaker 3: I like, if I ever got God, you got, if
Speaker 3: I ever do now to travel to another country, I
Speaker 3: would be like committed to doing it there as well.
Speaker 1: So this is my next question. Are you planning on
Speaker 1: traveling to other countries with the express purpose of masturbating
Speaker 1: in there?
Speaker 3: If I had the money and the like the time
Speaker 3: to do so, absolutely, like that would not like if
Speaker 3: I were to plan a travel trip now that would
Speaker 3: not necessarily be the number one goal for it. But
Speaker 3: if I have the ability, the free time, the money
Speaker 3: and everything to be able to travel wherever I wanted,
Speaker 3: whenever I wanted, absolutely, you know.
Speaker 1: What you could probably do is you could probably book
Speaker 1: a flight to somewhere like super far away and then
Speaker 1: masturbate in the airplane bathroom while it's over different countries
Speaker 1: and kind of plan it out so you can knock
Speaker 1: out a few.
Speaker 3: You know, that's a brilliant idea, and I would get
Speaker 3: into mild hog club.
Speaker 1: You also would potentially get arrested. But you don't see
Speaker 1: that's true. I'm rather stealthy, Okay, I have like a
Speaker 1: do you have like a process by which you abide.
Speaker 3: To don't get caught? But also it's like I don't
Speaker 3: have so I'm female to male transgender, so I don't
Speaker 3: have something that would be like sticking out that could
Speaker 3: be seen if that makes sense?
Speaker 1: Like, so.
Speaker 3: Is like I'm able to do it stealthier than like
Speaker 3: a non transgender man would.
Speaker 1: Yep. So you is there is there a country in
Speaker 1: particular that's at the top of your list.
Speaker 3: Man, Like the Vatican was pretty good. I think if
Speaker 3: there was a next goal, like the next summit that
Speaker 3: I could achieve probably be not necessarily a country, but Antarctica.
Speaker 3: If I could do it at least like once on
Speaker 3: every continent, that would be pretty baller.
Speaker 1: Okay, I think once per I mean every single country.
Speaker 1: That's definitely ambitious, and I think it's good to be ambitious,
Speaker 1: But once in every continent, I think that's a little
Speaker 1: bit more appropriate or more achievable. Yeah, the Vatican one
Speaker 1: is the and you know, we're talking a lot about,
Speaker 1: you know, masturbating public bathrooms. The Vatican seems like it's
Speaker 1: the only one where, you know, it necessitates needing a
Speaker 1: public bathroom, because every every other place you can you
Speaker 1: can find a there's no hotel rooms in the Vatican,
Speaker 1: I don't think, correct. Yeah, so everywhere that's the name.
Speaker 1: Everywhere else, there's the Vatican city. That's the hardest. You
Speaker 1: already did the most difficult one. Actually, No, North Korea
Speaker 1: is probably the most difficult one.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that might be a little bit difficult.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's that's Is there something to you that is
Speaker 1: sexually exciting about this or is this merely just a
Speaker 1: a sort of checking off boxes type of thing for you?
Speaker 3: I would say it's just checking off boxes. I don't
Speaker 3: have any particular affinity for you know, like I guess
Speaker 3: it is like interesting, like thrilling. I guess there's some
Speaker 3: adrenaline aspect, but I don't like think about it a
Speaker 3: whole lot. For me, Like the goal is just to
Speaker 3: be able to say that I did it.
Speaker 1: Well, let's see, we've done about ten minutes on masturbating
Speaker 1: in every country in the world. Do you think there's
Speaker 1: any part of this conversation. Do you think there's any
Speaker 1: stone left unturned in this conversation, any other aspect of
Speaker 1: this that we did not go over that the people
Speaker 1: listening might want to hear about.
Speaker 3: I don't think so. I just think that, you know,
Speaker 3: I mean, there is the aspect of it was kind
Speaker 3: of freeing in a personal aspect, since it's like, you know,
Speaker 3: a very holy religious city and be having a background
Speaker 3: of like Christian extremism, Like, it was a little bit
Speaker 3: of a freeing feeling to kind of at my own
Speaker 3: hate a little bit a little bit, no offense to
Speaker 3: anybody who's religious, but that was just my own personal
Speaker 3: like kind of being able to free myself from the
Speaker 3: trappings of the past, so to speak. Other than that.
Speaker 3: Just about following your dreams.
Speaker 1: Man. Everybody has their own way of dealing with trauma,
Speaker 1: and for some people, the way that they do it
Speaker 1: is to masturbate in the bathroom of the Vatican Museum.
Speaker 1: And you know, I believe in my heart of hearts
Speaker 1: that you should be able to do whatever it is
Speaker 1: you want in this life as long as you're not
Speaker 1: hurting other people. So yeah, you know, power to you,
Speaker 1: you know.
Speaker 3: Rock on. Thank you so much for taking my call, man,
Speaker 3: I really appreciate.
Speaker 1: Anything else, anything else you want to say to the
Speaker 1: people of the computer before.
Speaker 3: You go, Love and peace and follow your dreams, do
Speaker 3: you know forever? All right? Take it easy, man.
Speaker 1: Danny, Danny, Danny, how's it going.
Speaker 5: I'm good, are you?
Speaker 1: I'm doing pretty swell. I feel like We've had a
Speaker 1: good evening of wonderful calls and I'm ready to have
Speaker 1: some more. Is there anything in particular you want to
Speaker 1: talk about today, Danny?
Speaker 2: Yep.
Speaker 5: So this one's a funny story actually in a way.
Speaker 5: So my grandparents immigrated to America. I made like thirty
Speaker 5: years ago, and I was born and raised in California,
Speaker 5: lived someone of my life in Texas, and then when
Speaker 5: I was around like nine years old, my mom was like,
Speaker 5: you know what, let's move back to our like to
Speaker 5: our roots so you can learn more about your culture.
Speaker 5: And next thing, I know, my little gay ass went
Speaker 5: to the Middle East.
Speaker 2: Mmm.
Speaker 1: Where where exactly in the Middle East?
Speaker 3: Jordan?
Speaker 1: Jordan? Okay, all right, so you're nine years old, you're
Speaker 1: in Jordan.
Speaker 5: And this is my story of how I learned to
Speaker 5: discover who I am as a person.
Speaker 1: I would love to.
Speaker 5: So, growing up, like, I've always known that I was gay,
Speaker 5: but for the most part, there wasn't much representation and
Speaker 5: most religions obviously aren't really fond of it. So growing up, like,
Speaker 5: I've always had this notion that like it's wrong to
Speaker 5: love guys, but in my head, I always thought that
Speaker 5: I was the exception. And so growing up I've just
Speaker 5: like always had crushes here and there, like this guy
Speaker 5: in my classroom, like my neighbor, like stuff like that,
Speaker 5: until around high school and I was like, you know what,
Speaker 5: I'm just gonna like learn checked up my gulf and
Speaker 5: at home with my parents, I'd be like the very
Speaker 5: straightforward I'll do what you say dad, like of course,
Speaker 5: mom kind of kid. But then the moment. I was
Speaker 5: out on the streets, I was kissing boys nice and
Speaker 5: so one day it got me in a bit of trouble.
Speaker 5: I was in a car with this guy that I
Speaker 5: met on Grinder and Jordan, and we were having a
Speaker 5: good time, like he was really chill.
Speaker 1: Dude, Wait, tell me really quick, because I I how
Speaker 1: long were you a Jordan for it, because you're not
Speaker 1: nine years old on grind.
Speaker 2: Or are you? Oh?
Speaker 5: Yeah, okay, at the time, I think I was eighteen.
Speaker 1: Okay, damn, So you and Jordan for a while, Yep.
Speaker 4: It happened.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 5: So I was in Jordan for about like ten years,
Speaker 5: and this was like around the end of the time
Speaker 5: because I left around twenty twenty. But at the time
Speaker 5: I was twenty nineteen. I was like eighteen nineen years old,
Speaker 5: and I was in the car with the sky. It
Speaker 5: was like really nice whatever. We were having like a
Speaker 5: nice chat, and next thing I know, I'm leaning in
Speaker 5: for a kiss. And so we're in this like really
Speaker 5: like cute moment, passionate kissing whatever, and all I see
Speaker 5: are blue and red lights flashing in the background. Oh no,
Speaker 5: And so here's the funny thing. So being gay technically
Speaker 5: isn't illegal in Jordan, but that's just like on paper. Realistically,
Speaker 5: considering the society and everything, there are other terms what
Speaker 5: they call what I do. And so all I saw
Speaker 5: were a bunch of cops putting me in handcuffs and
Speaker 5: escorting me to the station and ooh that was That
Speaker 5: was the time. I think I spent like three nights
Speaker 5: there in like a trap in the jail cell because
Speaker 5: they were trying to get my paperwork done to send
Speaker 5: me off to court because apparently it was a big
Speaker 5: offense that I did.
Speaker 1: So yes, I'm very curious. So so being gay is
Speaker 1: not expressly illegal in Jordan, but is it a thing
Speaker 1: of like the police forces corrupt and so they like
Speaker 1: try to get you on something else even though they're
Speaker 1: really trying to get you for being gay.
Speaker 5: Yes, So originally my charge was actually public in decency,
Speaker 5: so it wasn't like considered homosexuality. It was just like
Speaker 5: because it was indecent to kiss the man in public,
Speaker 5: so that was my charge, but they kind of took
Speaker 5: it to the extreme side. I even remember the chief
Speaker 5: of police from the station looked at me specifically and
Speaker 5: was like put that one in a separate cell.
Speaker 1: Damn, that's fucked up.
Speaker 5: I mean, it was so funny. They even went through
Speaker 5: my wallet and they were like killing him what I
Speaker 5: had in my pocket because they were like, oh, like
Speaker 5: how much did he tying?
Speaker 2: You? Like what?
Speaker 5: This is not like y'all. I'm like, I coughed way
Speaker 5: more than just twenty bil like twenty bucks. But anyway, okay,
Speaker 5: and next thing.
Speaker 1: Where did they put I'm sorry, I want to let
Speaker 1: you finish your story, but where did they put the
Speaker 1: guy who you were kissing? Would they put them in
Speaker 1: like a different cellar or something?
Speaker 5: Yeah, they put him in the separate cell but things
Speaker 5: he had other people with him. I think they thought
Speaker 5: he was the top and I was at bottom.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure why there is there like a where
Speaker 1: do you think they were more harsh to you than him?
Speaker 1: Because of that?
Speaker 5: It's hard to tell. He did get his fair share
Speaker 5: of scrutiny, but I think for me, specifically, my physique
Speaker 5: and small stature doesn't really help my case. Not to mention,
Speaker 5: I've always been stubborn about because I've growing up in America,
Speaker 5: I've like I've been more Americanized than other people, so
Speaker 5: growing up there, I never really accepted like learning Arabic
Speaker 5: or anything, because I just wanted to stick to who
Speaker 5: I was as a person and I just want to
Speaker 5: be the unique one. So as they were trying to
Speaker 5: talk to me in my broken Arabic, it was like, Oh,
Speaker 5: you're clearly the corrupt one over here. You're the one
Speaker 5: that's changing voids.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, So you're sorry? What all you continue?
Speaker 1: You call your mom?
Speaker 5: So I call my mom and I'm like, hey, like, bestie,
Speaker 5: I'm not coming home tonight, and uh. She ended up
Speaker 5: coming uh to the station and she was like trying
Speaker 5: to convince them just to let me out, but like
Speaker 5: I said, be cause they're trying to finish my paperwork.
Speaker 5: I ended up staying there for like three nights in
Speaker 5: like pretty much two days. I think. It was like
Speaker 5: A went in there like a Thursday night, left there
Speaker 5: Saturday morning. It was a fun time, really, They gave
Speaker 5: us food.
Speaker 1: It wasn't that bad, you said. It was fun to
Speaker 1: an extent.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 5: I met some pretty cool people there. I I hadn't
Speaker 5: expected i'd be like the odd one out and everyone
Speaker 5: would hate me, But honestly, like they were pretty chill
Speaker 5: with me. Like surprisingly, it was the people behind bars.
Speaker 2: That was the nicest.
Speaker 1: Really, you said you make cool people that who tell
Speaker 1: me about the people that you met.
Speaker 5: Was this one guy who actually asked for my number
Speaker 5: that first time I walked in there. They they didn't
Speaker 5: really have any respect for me. But then we just
Speaker 5: start like chatting and I was like, yeah, like talking
Speaker 5: to them whatever. And I was pretty chill about it
Speaker 5: because at that point I was like, ocky, I'll get
Speaker 5: a shit And this dude was like, you know, you're
Speaker 5: kind of cool, Like hey, like, once you get out
Speaker 5: of you want to hang out. I'm like, sure, here's
Speaker 5: my number.
Speaker 1: Did you end up hanging out with here?
Speaker 3: No?
Speaker 5: God, no, he did try calling me, but I kept
Speaker 5: blocking the number.
Speaker 1: Ah what what what was he like in in in
Speaker 1: there for something fucked up?
Speaker 5: I think he beats someone up. I wasn't really sure.
Speaker 1: Oh Jesus, it is. It is interesting that they's like
Speaker 1: the jail because they're jailing gay men. It just becomes
Speaker 1: another place for you to meet other gay men.
Speaker 5: You no, now that you mention it kind of is.
Speaker 1: Interesting. So okay, So they weren't that rough with you.
Speaker 1: You said it was a chill experience. They weren't like,
Speaker 1: you know, it's weird because to me, when you're painting
Speaker 1: the picture of and this is me knowing absolutely nothing
Speaker 1: about Jordan, about the Jordanian police force, about what people's
Speaker 1: values are over there. I would think in a place
Speaker 1: where it's like literally illegal, well I guess, I guess
Speaker 1: you said it's not illegal, but where it's like, uh,
Speaker 1: quasi illegal to be gay, I would think that their
Speaker 1: prisons would be fucked up too.
Speaker 5: So I only say it's the police station. So for
Speaker 5: the most part, like they did drop me out of
Speaker 5: myself a few times, and they were like trying to
Speaker 5: harass me here and there. A lot of jokes want
Speaker 5: it like it was. It wasn't really a fun time.
Speaker 5: But for the most part, I kind of just I
Speaker 5: knew I didn't do anything wrong, and like, despite what
Speaker 5: they believe, I just had to bear through and it
Speaker 5: was all going to be okay. So I kind of
Speaker 5: like kept reassuring myself and it kind of was, well,
Speaker 5: not really, it wasn't that okay. When I went to court,
Speaker 5: I think a week later after they bailed me out,
Speaker 5: I think my sentencing was like a year in prison
Speaker 5: something like that. Yeah, No, it was serious. At that point.
Speaker 5: I was like, okay, so I'm not sure if I
Speaker 5: can get out.
Speaker 1: Of this, And what happened? Did you have to get
Speaker 1: to prison for a year?
Speaker 5: So not really, Here's what happened. So the guy that
Speaker 5: I was making out with, his dad had some connections,
Speaker 5: and so because he didn't want either of us going
Speaker 5: to jail, he made a few phone calls and next
Speaker 5: thing I know, they kind of change our sentences to
Speaker 5: like forty hours of community service with like a three
Speaker 5: year of probation. And at that point I already contact
Speaker 5: the American Visy. I was like, you know, get me
Speaker 5: out of here, like about this shit, I'm not doing
Speaker 5: it anymore. And I think within like three months they
Speaker 5: got all my paperwork ready, they gave me an emergency passport,
Speaker 5: bought my plane tickets, and swum me out to Virginia.
Speaker 1: God damn, you hooked up with the right grinder guy.
Speaker 5: Thank god?
Speaker 1: You know, yeah, thank god.
Speaker 2: Man.
Speaker 1: You almost had to spend a year in Jordanian prison,
Speaker 1: which I mean, apparently, from what you're saying, is not
Speaker 1: that bad, but still.
Speaker 5: It could have been worse. Honestly, for the most part,
Speaker 5: I think it really did teach me a lot of
Speaker 5: values and it gave me a lot of faith in myself,
Speaker 5: and I realized that a lot of not a lot
Speaker 5: of people are going to speak up and fight for you.
Speaker 5: So if you're not willing to do it for yourself,
Speaker 5: no one else is going to do that. I spent
Speaker 5: so long just like sitting by myself, like especially after that,
Speaker 5: my terms are furious. They locked me in my room
Speaker 5: for like probably three months.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that was that was an aspect of that I
Speaker 1: did touch on that I wanted to ask you about,
Speaker 1: is how your parents reacted to all this.
Speaker 5: Oh, now that's a funny one.
Speaker 2: It was really bad.
Speaker 5: I mean I don't to an extent. I guess I
Speaker 5: kind of tore down their reputation, so I can see
Speaker 5: why they were kind of mad. But for the most
Speaker 5: part they took it very extremely Both My parents are
Speaker 5: like very religious, so you can imagine how that went down.
Speaker 5: It was dark times all over, and they sent me
Speaker 5: to conversion therapy. Actually, they have programs there in Jordan.
Speaker 5: Oh here's a funny one beside Hata twist over there.
Speaker 5: I remember he was like telling me, like, yeah, like
Speaker 5: we all go through phases in life where we're like
Speaker 5: interested in weird things and he was telling me about
Speaker 5: his life experiences and how like when he was a kid,
Speaker 5: he he's always wanted to kiss a penis. And I
Speaker 5: had to sit there like, hey, like do you want
Speaker 5: to toss over like the notepad and everything, because I
Speaker 5: feel like you can tell me about your relationship with
Speaker 5: your dad.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: It was like, you know, hey, maybe maybe you're the
Speaker 1: one that needs some therapy here.
Speaker 5: No believe or not. It was kind of funny. It's
Speaker 5: just a lot of bizarre things. But for the most part,
Speaker 5: it didn't. Like I got to know more about myself
Speaker 5: through all the experiences. And by the time I was
Speaker 5: ready to leave, like I was born in the airplane
Speaker 5: and like I had five one hundred dollars in my pocket,
Speaker 5: I was losing everybody that I knew everything my whole
Speaker 5: I was at the time, I was a second year
Speaker 5: medical student before I dropped out, and I kind of
Speaker 5: was just like, you know what, no matter what happens next,
Speaker 5: everything that I've gone through is a testimony that I
Speaker 5: can do things by myself because nobody was willing to
Speaker 5: believe in me. So if I believe in myself, I
Speaker 5: was and I could do everything that I've done and
Speaker 5: survive everything, and I can do a little more than
Speaker 5: my more.
Speaker 3: With myself.
Speaker 1: Totally. Man, So you boarded this plane from I have
Speaker 1: a bunch of questions about the transition from Jordan to Virginia.
Speaker 1: You went completely completely alone, like no friends in Georgia.
Speaker 1: I mean, I mean no no friends in Uh did
Speaker 1: I say Georgia when I met Jordan?
Speaker 3: Just now?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Oh okay, I'm bad at but anyway, anyway, so you
Speaker 1: had no friends or family in Virginia. Did you know
Speaker 1: anybody in Virginia?
Speaker 2: So?
Speaker 5: I actually only knew one person. He was an old
Speaker 5: high school friend of mine. Once he graduated high school,
Speaker 5: he uh, because he was born in the States as well,
Speaker 5: and like me, his parents were like, hey, like, let's
Speaker 5: introduce you your like side of the family. So he
Speaker 5: graduated high school in Jordan, but then he came back
Speaker 5: to Virginia to go to college. And so at the
Speaker 5: time I emailed him, I was like, hey, like, I
Speaker 5: have no place to go, and I'm trying to just
Speaker 5: like get away from everything, Like do you know anyone
Speaker 5: that's like renting out a room or something? And he goes,
Speaker 5: you know what, you can just chill with me, And
Speaker 5: so I kind of took that leap of faith. I
Speaker 5: wasn't really sure what I was jumping into, and he
Speaker 5: was like, you know what, I'll help you find a
Speaker 5: job whatever, just to get.
Speaker 2: You back on your feet.
Speaker 5: I think the flight was about so the flight from
Speaker 5: Jordan to UH I have to go to Chicago first.
Speaker 5: It was like thirteen hours, and then there was like
Speaker 5: a twelve hour delay for a morning flight to get
Speaker 5: me from Chicago to DC and then from DC to Virginia.
Speaker 5: So it was a really help mind you, this was
Speaker 5: in twenty twenty, literally right in the middle of COVID,
Speaker 5: so it was actually pretty hard getting any tickets. That's
Speaker 5: why the embassy had to arrange.
Speaker 2: Everything for me.
Speaker 1: That's amazing that the embassy was able to arrange for
Speaker 1: you to get the fuck out of there.
Speaker 5: No, they they really did help me a lot. They
Speaker 5: so they were always I have question checking up on me.
Speaker 1: Oh really they did. That's cool there. The embassy is like,
Speaker 1: you know, checking up on you and being cool because
Speaker 1: I would think, I guess my idea, well, America has
Speaker 1: a bad rap right now, so public government services they
Speaker 1: my impression of them, I feel like a lot of
Speaker 1: people's impression of them is that they don't really give
Speaker 1: a shit, So I guess this is a good, Oh, hey,
Speaker 1: maybe this one part of the government does give a
Speaker 1: shit kind of thing. But I don't know what I'm
Speaker 1: talking about anyway. So when is the last time you
Speaker 1: spoke with any of your family back in Jordan?
Speaker 5: So once I moved, I think it was like a
Speaker 5: month or so, I tried reaching out to my sisters.
Speaker 5: For the most part, I really did miss them. They
Speaker 5: were they were my biggest supporters through all of it.
Speaker 5: They didn't really know that I was leaving or anything,
Speaker 5: but despite everything, they were still trying to do their
Speaker 5: best to support me. So I reached out to them,
Speaker 5: and my mom kind of was like, hey, like, I
Speaker 5: don't want to talk to you, and so we spoke
Speaker 5: out our differences. She never really apologized for everything that
Speaker 5: she did to me. She told me that she would
Speaker 5: she would only wish if I could understand where she's
Speaker 5: coming from, and that she never meant to harm me.
Speaker 5: It was just the way she was raised in the
Speaker 5: culture that she grew up in, so she had no
Speaker 5: other choice but to grap the way she did. But
Speaker 5: despite that, she said family of family, and she actually
Speaker 5: came to visit twice. Not that our relationship is perfect,
Speaker 5: but for the most part, it's not as bad as
Speaker 5: I thought it would be. She does tay some like
Speaker 5: really ignorant comments here and there, but could have been worse.
Speaker 1: So let me ask you when she says this to you,
Speaker 1: When she says, whatever, this is how I was raised,
Speaker 1: this is my religion. I wish you could see it
Speaker 1: from my perspective. Do you make a genuine attempt to
Speaker 1: see it from her perspective even if you vehemently disagree
Speaker 1: with it.
Speaker 5: Honestly, living on my own for almost two years now,
Speaker 5: I kind of do understand to an extent because I
Speaker 5: realized we all have our own separate experiences and whatever
Speaker 5: we're raised and taught from a young age, it shapes
Speaker 5: us into the people that we are, and sometimes it's
Speaker 5: hard to shake it off. Some of us are only
Speaker 5: lucky to be to have like accepted, like, very open
Speaker 5: ideas of you know, love and acceptance for other people.
Speaker 5: Not many other people grew up in supportive environment. So
Speaker 5: not that I completely forgive her for everything, but for
Speaker 5: the most part, I think I'll still consider it to
Speaker 5: be like to be my biological mom, like that she
Speaker 5: wants someone to talk to you.
Speaker 3: I guess I'll be there for her.
Speaker 1: What is your life like now in Virginia before we go,
Speaker 1: tell us about it? What do you what do you do?
Speaker 1: Are you a student? Are you dating anyone? Do you
Speaker 1: have friends? Because you came there completely alone, and I
Speaker 1: want to hear how you were able to, you know,
Speaker 1: build from that.
Speaker 5: Well, it's a crazy I had a lot of really
Speaker 5: bad experiences, but for the most part, I I got
Speaker 5: a job. I kept working hard. It would I would
Speaker 5: always walk to work. It would take me about like
Speaker 5: forty forty five minutes. At the time, I was only
Speaker 5: getting paid like eleven dollars an hour, so I was
Speaker 5: just trying to make enough to get by. But then
Speaker 5: I went from one job to another that like paid
Speaker 5: from eleven to fifteen, and I kept working, picking up
Speaker 5: extra shift. If I had any free time, I would
Speaker 5: try to see if I could work an extra hour
Speaker 5: or so. And I kept working hard until I got
Speaker 5: a car, until like things started opening up for me.
Speaker 5: And now I work as a pharmacy technician and I'm
Speaker 5: in try to get my license and hopefully soon enough,
Speaker 5: maybe one day I might go back to college too.
Speaker 5: I did meet someone. Actually, you should have met him.
Speaker 5: He was literally the coolest person ever. It origly was
Speaker 5: a grinder hook up. He came over, we chilled for
Speaker 5: a bit, hooked up, and we just kept talking after
Speaker 5: that for about an hour or so. And funny thing
Speaker 5: when he was walking out the door, he had his
Speaker 5: car keys in hand, mind you, and I was like
Speaker 5: walking him out and he looks at me and he goes,
Speaker 5: drive safe and two steps he stops and he looks
Speaker 5: back and he goes, God, I'm so stupid. And the
Speaker 5: whole cool guy for thought that he had just like
Speaker 5: faded away. And honestly, he was the cutest person I've
Speaker 5: ever met. We ended up dating actually for about a
Speaker 5: year or so. We did a lot together and he
Speaker 5: helped me through so much, and he's probably gonna be
Speaker 5: my best friend. And I've never loved anyone as much
Speaker 5: as I loved him before.
Speaker 1: Man, this grinder is getting you into all sorts of situations.
Speaker 5: I think this time it might have ended me up
Speaker 5: in a good situation. It didn't really last, though, Oh
Speaker 5: it didn't last.
Speaker 1: You broke up.
Speaker 5: Given my history and everything, Given my history and everything
Speaker 5: that happened to me, I'm not exactly a perfect person,
Speaker 5: so I tend to freak out on the smallest things,
Speaker 5: and I wake up with night terrors, and I kind
Speaker 5: of took it out on him. And for the most part,
Speaker 5: I really am sorry for everything that I've done to him.
Speaker 5: I tried my best to fix that. I I posted
Speaker 5: a video on Instagram, actually twenty two minutes, like twenty
Speaker 5: two minutes long, me just like sobbing on camera, looking
Speaker 5: through like old memories and stuff and apologizing to him
Speaker 5: for everything that I've done wrong, and hope said, you know,
Speaker 5: he would forgive me and might come back. I wrote
Speaker 5: him a love letter emailed it to him. I want
Speaker 5: him like different Reddit forums like dropping like letters and
Speaker 5: like notes and stuff like that, and hopes he would
Speaker 5: see it. I even made a PowerPoint presentation and like
Speaker 5: I presented it to him to try to convince him
Speaker 5: to get back with me. He's just He's a great person,
Speaker 5: and for the most part, with him, I honestly forgot
Speaker 5: about a lot of things that ever happened to me.
Speaker 5: It almost seemed like my life starts like the moment
Speaker 5: I met him.
Speaker 1: Interesting, when when did you stop seeing this guy?
Speaker 5: About two weeks ago?
Speaker 1: Okay, so you're still a little bit in the midst.
Speaker 2: Of it.
Speaker 5: Sort of. I think tomorrow he's going to give me
Speaker 5: his definite answer on whether or not we can ever
Speaker 5: get back together or not.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna say, I'm going to say this to you, Danny,
Speaker 1: because I'm just regurgitating what you said already. You've been
Speaker 1: through a ton of shit, and you've been through it
Speaker 1: like as you said, Uh, you know, you told me
Speaker 1: that all of these experiences have given you the confidence
Speaker 1: that you can tough shit out alone. And I agree
Speaker 1: with you. I mean, when I hear all this ship
Speaker 1: that you're going through and how you came from Jordan
Speaker 1: to Virginia freaking alone and you were able to kind
Speaker 1: of work your way into a stable life position, I mean,
Speaker 1: you're standing on a great foundation here. I know that
Speaker 1: people fall in love and they go a little bit
Speaker 1: wild and whatnot, But listen, Danny, I think you're gonna
Speaker 1: be okay, and I think you know you're gonna be
Speaker 1: okay too, because you clearly have this this skill set
Speaker 1: of navigating the universe just by yourself. And also you're
Speaker 1: still very young. You're only twenty one years old, it says,
Speaker 1: and I find that's freaking amazing too, that you were
Speaker 1: doing this at nineteen, So you know, I know you
Speaker 1: might be head of our heels for this guy, but
Speaker 1: I don't think all hope is lost for you no
Speaker 1: matter what happens.
Speaker 5: And I think you know that too, Yeah, I do,
Speaker 5: I guess for the most part.
Speaker 2: I just.
Speaker 5: I really saw a lot in him, and I still
Speaker 5: do when I say I loved him and conditionally are
Speaker 5: like I really do, and so I expected he would
Speaker 5: be the one I spend my whole life with, Like
Speaker 5: everything that happened to me might have happened, so I
Speaker 5: can end up with him. But right now the balls
Speaker 5: in this court. If he wants to come back to me,
Speaker 5: you can. If he doesn't, that's okay, and I have
Speaker 5: been through.
Speaker 1: Worse well, Danny, thank you for sharing your story with us.
Speaker 1: I encourage you to be open minded because you're a
Speaker 1: hell of a soldier here on this earth, and I
Speaker 1: think that you should have a mindset of abundance as
Speaker 1: opposed to scarcity, because the world is your oyster if
Speaker 1: you so choose to attack it. I believe I do
Speaker 1: believe that about you, and I know you believe that
Speaker 1: about yourself. So I just wanted to say that again.
Speaker 1: Is there anything else that you would like to say
Speaker 1: to the people of the computer before we.
Speaker 5: Go, Danny, let's see that's to be something useful.
Speaker 1: So it doesn't have to be anything, you know, go ahead.
Speaker 5: I feel like I want to share something nice with
Speaker 5: just in case someone needs to hear this. If you
Speaker 5: ever feel like you're alone and you're going through it
Speaker 5: and you need someone to believe in, I think sometimes
Speaker 5: if you just find the courage to believe in yourself
Speaker 5: and you do what you feel is right, you'll end
Speaker 5: up in better places than you could have ever imagined.
Speaker 3: I like it.
Speaker 1: What a great ad for Grinder this call has been. Yeah,
Speaker 1: thank you for calling Danny.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much.
Speaker 1: Man. You know I will say I meant what I
Speaker 1: said to Danny. H It was interesting that the second
Speaker 1: half of I guess the third fourth of that, the
Speaker 1: fourth fourth of that call was him talking about this guy,
Speaker 1: because the first three fourths of the call are Danny's
Speaker 1: adventure journey to realizing that he doesn't need anyone but himself.
Speaker 1: You know, it's wonderful that he maintains a great relationship
Speaker 1: with his sister. It's wonderful that he maintains a relationship
Speaker 1: with his mom and the things worked out for him.
Speaker 1: I really do think he's going to be fine, whether
Speaker 1: or not this guy likes him back. Danny seems like
Speaker 1: he's an adaptable person. We can tell that from everything
Speaker 1: he's been through, and once again I appreciate him sharing
Speaker 1: his story. Hello, Hello, what's up?
Speaker 4: Cringe sah, Yeah, having an inter existential crisis?
Speaker 1: I believe, yes, cringe. It says here you're having an
Speaker 1: existential crisis. It says you have a sizeable following on
Speaker 1: social media, but you feel like you don't have the
Speaker 1: motivation to do it anymore.
Speaker 3: This is.
Speaker 1: There's a juicy one. Let's say, I'm excited to get
Speaker 1: into this here. Tell me tell me, Okay, how long
Speaker 1: have you had a following on social media?
Speaker 4: I want to say, well, it's definitely been a little
Speaker 4: over a year at this point.
Speaker 1: Okay, it's been a little over a year. And what
Speaker 1: is it?
Speaker 3: What is it for?
Speaker 1: Can I ask?
Speaker 4: It's just like a random stupid shit on TikTok. It's like,
Speaker 4: because I feel like I can't be myself anywhere, and
Speaker 4: so I was up all night one night and I
Speaker 4: just started posting videos, and uh, I started getting like
Speaker 4: hundreds of follows followings at a time, like it went
Speaker 4: from one hundred to eight hundred to like do you
Speaker 4: name it? And now I'm stuck at like forty two thousand,
Speaker 4: and I just feel paralyzed, like I can't post anymore.
Speaker 4: But I feel like I'm letting people down because I
Speaker 4: did not expect to take off like that.
Speaker 1: You know what I mean? I mean, do you have
Speaker 1: a desire to create content for the Internet for any
Speaker 1: reason beyond not disappointing people.
Speaker 4: I definitely enjoy having an outlet in some way, and
Speaker 4: I like to embrace and express myself and I like
Speaker 4: to connect with people. But I also don't know how
Speaker 4: to I don't have any type of niche or anything
Speaker 4: like that. I don't know how to be, you know,
Speaker 4: an influencer or anything. I just can't seem to be
Speaker 4: authentically myself without having a secondary voice in my head.
Speaker 4: That's like, delete all your shit right now. You're weird,
Speaker 4: Like it's weird.
Speaker 1: Do you desire to ever like make money off of
Speaker 1: this or make it into a career for yourself?
Speaker 3: This thing is the.
Speaker 4: Craziest thing is I have made money off of it,
Speaker 4: and yet it's just I don't know how to just
Speaker 4: continue going. Like I've made over two hundred dollars on
Speaker 4: live streams, but I it was like the spur moment
Speaker 4: type thing and it just kicked off, and I just
Speaker 4: don't know how to find that inspiration again. I guess.
Speaker 1: Well, I'll tell you something that I that that I've
Speaker 1: learned that I've been thinking about a lot, which is
Speaker 1: that in some way with with social media, right, like
Speaker 1: these these numbers of like, oh, I want to increase
Speaker 1: my followers, I want to increase my whatever the reward
Speaker 1: now it's it's so it's important to actually enjoy the
Speaker 1: process of what you're doing, because the reward for being
Speaker 1: good at the process is just more of the process.
Speaker 1: You know, if you gain a bunch of followers on
Speaker 1: social media for making videos, your reward is that you
Speaker 1: get to make more videos. You know, it's an endless
Speaker 1: loop of process. So if you don't enjoy the process,
Speaker 1: then there's no point.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 4: It's just weird because I feel like at some point
Speaker 4: I did enjoy it, but it's the whole what is it?
Speaker 4: Like perceptions things like I will be completely content with myself, yes,
Speaker 4: and it's it's killing me at this point, like it's
Speaker 4: driving me into a hole because I feel good about
Speaker 4: something that I either off the top of my head
Speaker 4: posted or spent some time on and worked hard on,
Speaker 4: and I will publish, post it or whatever, and then
Speaker 4: immediately rewatch it and be like, no, I need to
Speaker 4: take this step just because I cannot stand to see
Speaker 4: myself and I know it's stupid, but I wish I
Speaker 4: could just jump over that and get past it.
Speaker 1: Mhm, yeah, I have. I have that myself sometimes.
Speaker 2: Man.
Speaker 1: I'm I'm I'm with you. I'm trying to figure that out.
Speaker 1: I'm trying to figure that out because part of me
Speaker 1: is always like, part part of me likes posting those
Speaker 1: kinds of things that I'm afraid to post because it's
Speaker 1: just like a big fuck you to that feeling, you know,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, you're feeling like you're your
Speaker 1: cringe will be like, well fuck you, I'm gonna personally
Speaker 1: even cringier. I'm gonna post something I don't I want
Speaker 1: to be perceived as even less. To free myself of
Speaker 1: this feeling, That's what I'd.
Speaker 2: Like to do.
Speaker 4: And that's the funny part, right, I kind of like
Speaker 4: spent my entire life being trees like rich for who
Speaker 4: I am and how I am and being called weird
Speaker 4: and tringy. And that's kind of why that's I labeled
Speaker 4: myself cringe because like, fuck, you know, you can't call
Speaker 4: me that. I called myself that, Like I kind of
Speaker 4: own that ship. But at the same time, I don't
Speaker 4: know how to go through with you know, like I said,
Speaker 4: posting stuff and keeping it up.
Speaker 1: Well, I like that attitude that you just said of
Speaker 1: owning the fact that you are Cringe.
Speaker 4: Thank you.
Speaker 1: I feel like that's a good guiding light for you
Speaker 1: through these these situations. I feel like that's a good
Speaker 1: sort of philosophy to live by for this current time
Speaker 1: period in your life. Cringe.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I'm grateful that I've gotten to that point that
Speaker 4: I can sit there and and take hate and be like, well,
Speaker 4: I mean the that's kind of what that's, you know,
Speaker 4: quirky or whatever the fuck like my niche being fucking cringey.
Speaker 1: So it feels good when you're able to successfully post
Speaker 1: something that you consider to be cringey and just back
Speaker 1: yeah in that perception and go oh wow, this doesn't
Speaker 1: even hurt me anymore. You know, it's like you're overcoming it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it was.
Speaker 4: It was really stupid because like my one of my
Speaker 4: first posts that ever blew up, I thought was so
Speaker 4: stupid and cringey, but I actually kept it up because
Speaker 4: of the whole reason I made the post or the
Speaker 4: page for you know, the cringe aspect or whatever. And
Speaker 4: it was like, oh, am I on your for you page.
Speaker 4: Fuck you keep scrolling because I sucked and I blew
Speaker 4: up and got like forty thousand likes and fucking six
Speaker 4: hundred follows from it, and I and I was like, Okay,
Speaker 4: that happened. What happened there?
Speaker 1: Well, listen, oh would you said? Name was cringe? Cringe.
Speaker 1: At the end of the day, I think if your
Speaker 1: primary desire is an outlet for creativity and thoughts, you know,
Speaker 1: if that's your primary desire, if you're not trying to
Speaker 1: start a business with this thing, or you know, to
Speaker 1: become an influence or anything like that, then you're completely
Speaker 1: free to interact with it on your own time schedule.
Speaker 1: So even if that's three months from now when you
Speaker 1: go without opening the app, but in three months you're like, oh,
Speaker 1: I have this idea and I feel like this is
Speaker 1: the best outlet for it, then you can start back
Speaker 1: up then. But I feel like if the desire is
Speaker 1: not in you to really make something out of this,
Speaker 1: then I wouldn't.
Speaker 4: Feel pressured too, right, I understand completely. I just there's
Speaker 4: a whole aspect of like I got a little too connected,
Speaker 4: so my followers might even have like a discord server
Speaker 4: and everything, and then I just kind of fell off
Speaker 4: and got distant. And it's at the point where like.
Speaker 2: I just.
Speaker 4: I want to step back into making stuff, but if
Speaker 4: I can't stay committed to it, I don't want to
Speaker 4: let people down.
Speaker 1: Don't worry about letting people down. That's you're you're You're
Speaker 1: never gonna be a you're. You have to be okay
Speaker 1: with letting people down, or else you're just gonna go insane. Okay, Look,
Speaker 1: if it makes you feel better, I let people down
Speaker 1: all the time.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 1: I made a little thing with myself, you know, because
Speaker 1: I'm doing this whole thing and I'm talking to people
Speaker 1: all the time, and you know, I would like, like, okay,
Speaker 1: I'll use myself as an example. I would like for
Speaker 1: people to uh uh, you know, enjoy watching this stream
Speaker 1: and enjoy interacting with the things that I do on
Speaker 1: the internet, but not everyone will. Some people will get
Speaker 1: disappointed if I don't stream for a day, or if
Speaker 1: you know, I don't have anything to say in response
Speaker 1: to a phone call, or I don't know any miscellaneous
Speaker 1: thing that might happen that would piss someone off or
Speaker 1: quote let them down. But I made a whole thing
Speaker 1: with myself. I was like, I have I do not.
Speaker 1: It's unsustainable for me to care about that kind of thing,
Speaker 1: so I just don't. I just made the executive decision
Speaker 1: not to care about letting people down for the sake
Speaker 1: of my own mental health and sustainability. And I'm not
Speaker 1: gonna tell you what to do, but highly high review.
Speaker 1: I give a high review of that mindset for the
Speaker 1: short amount of time that I've inhibited it. Anyway, cringe,
Speaker 1: Good luck to you and ghek bless you for a
Speaker 1: thousand years.
Speaker 3: Thank you.
Speaker 4: I honestly feel like I might try to do a
Speaker 4: live tonight, just just to reconnect a little bit with them.
Speaker 4: Has given me some inspiration.
Speaker 5: Do it up big, Thank you.
Speaker 1: Make some merch, cringe, buy it, make a T shirt.
Speaker 1: I'll buy a T shirt. How much of the t
Speaker 1: shirts never.
Speaker 2: Beak goes on the line, taking your phone calls every night.
Speaker 1: Never Bekon goes to it, and I'm just teaching you
Speaker 1: a loud in your life is not friendly. An expert