Good Life Project - Dallas Graham | The Story of a Lifetime

Episode Date: July 5, 2021

Dallas Graham never planned to help kids tell their life stories. A fiercely creative and compassionate Salt Lake City graphic designer, poet, and writer, he’s worked on a wide variety of projects over the years. But, his experience of one particular moment, family and child, would change everything. Setting him down a path to blend everything he’d learned about writing, poetry, and design with his deep love of kids and story to create an offering and an experience that would change so many lives. As the publisher and executive director of the Red Fred Project, Dallas is currently creating life legacies, in the form of books written and created by kids as a way to help them share their stories, ideas, and lens on the world at a moment of an otherwise profound challenge. After seven years of this life-altering work, his belief has strengthened in this idea: “We are producing the greatest stories ever told.” You can find Dallas at:Website : http://redfredproject.com/Instagram : https://www.instagram.com/redfredproject/If you LOVED this episode:You’ll also love the conversations we had with Mitch Albom about his love of story and service : https://tinyurl.com/GLP-Mitch-------------Have you discovered your Sparketype yet? Take the Sparketype Assessment™ now. IT’S FREE (https://sparketype.com/) and takes about 7-minutes to complete. At a minimum, it’ll open your eyes in a big way. It also just might change your life.If you enjoyed the show, please share it with a friend. Thank you to our super cool brand partners. If you like the show, please support them - they help make the podcast possible. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hey, my guest today, Dallas Graham, never planned to help kids tell their life stories. A fiercely creative and compassionate Salt Lake City graphic designer, poet, and writer, he has worked on a wide variety of projects, industries, endeavors over the years. But his experience of one particular moment and family and child, it would change everything, setting him down a path to blend everything he learned about writing poetry and design with his deep love of people and kids and story to create an offering and an experience that would change so many lives. As the publisher and executive director of the Red Fred Project, Dallas is currently creating life legacies in the form of books written and created by kids as a way to help them share their stories, ideas, and lens on the world at a moment of otherwise profound challenge.

After seven years of this really life-altering work, his belief has strengthened in a single idea, and that is that we are producing the greatest stories ever told. So excited to share this conversation with you. I'm Jonathan Fields, and this is Good Life Project. The Apple Watch Series X is here. It has the biggest display ever. It's also the thinnest Apple Watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist, whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest-charging Apple Watch,

getting you 8 hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series X. Available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone Xs are later required. Charge time and actual results will vary. Mayday, mayday. We've been compromised. The pilot's a hitman. I knew you were going to be fun.

On January 24th. Tell me how to fly this thing. Mark Wahlberg. You know what the difference between me and you is? You're going to die. Don't shoot him, we need him. Y'all need a pilot. There's so many places I want to go with you and dive in.

And I also know it's been a bit of a tough month for you. Yeah. So I just kind of wanted to also ask, how's your heart? It's good. um yeah so i just kind of wanted to also ask just like how's your heart it's uh it's like uh it's it's uh you know feeling out again and it's it's um it's quieter. It's quiet, but it's feeling grounded. And it's, oh, look at these pauses. Yeah, that's how it is. Yeah. But it's better than when it was, than when she was admitted

and we had heard certain things about. Like it was honestly much more difficult to me when I found out she was being admitted and she was on end-of-life care and that was communicated and yeah that was that was really rough so we we lived knowing it was near the end and it's just a really delicate place it's a really delicate place and and sometimes because you know i'm not her parent i'm not her sibling i'm not her lucky aunt or uncle but i am someone who cares about her and loves her and you know these moments of i guess the last time i talked to her was the last time and i guess our last exchange was that like just you know these fluctuations of of um finality

in a really real physical way with people like it's just really silvery and soft and sometimes it doesn't quite make sense to me either. Right. Like I'm just, I didn't. So I appreciate you just saying that and asking that out front too, but, um, you know, we, uh, it's been, I do feel a lot of times smiling and then on our social media, we've been highly concentrating just on her, just on her story, on the aspects

of her life. Because I believe it's also important immediately and following that we are calling the memory current and forward and hopefully in a beautiful way that's really showing deep gratitude for her and the intersection she had with my life and the people that we connect with. Yeah. And, and maybe it's, it's good to hear that you're sort of in the place that, that, uh, that you are, you know, we had originally scheduled this conversation to happen about a month ago. Um, and clearly it, it wasn't the right moment for it to happen, but I'm glad to be sort of like back in conversation with you today.

And maybe this is sort of like a good way for us to ease into the work that you're doing also. And then, and then we'll probably take a bigger step back in time and then come back to the present moment. The she that you're talking about right now is a girl named Anissa, I believe is how you pronounce her name. Tell me how you and Anissa came to be connected and how it relates to this sort of magical foundation. And then we'll kind of work our way back from there, actually, instead of going forward. Let's see if we can work backwards a little bit today.

You know, I have on her little, I have, I keep these Google docs of each of the kids and it has profiles and information and parents' names and birthdates and all this kind of stuff. And one of the things I started doing quickly, my mother has asked this, actually, my mother, you know, is number one fan, but she's always like, so tell me how, so I've, she's like, I like always like so tell me how did you get so i've done this little backwards link to each of the kids because it's really important to me the links of how i found them because when people ask like this it's always it's a very different story each time so a really wonderful guy named barry reached out to me after I presented at a death and dying symposium in Brazil called Infinito.

And I was a guest presenter there. It happened in September. We'd actually all been planning to be in Brazil for that. But the way the coronavirus is happening, it was all remote. And he was one of the audience members that was listening to what I was doing. And so he reached out cold turkey via Instagram and just he's from Atlanta, Barry's from Atlanta. And he's just like, Hey, I'm just really interested in this topic. And I actually work doing funerals and burial kind of services and ideas for people. And he said, and I've done film a lot, but I've,

I just really want to help you out. And I think I could help you out. And I was like, well, that's great. Cause we haven't found a child yet in Georgia. So, you know, she said, great, help me out. So he, he had a friend and she, her name is Linise and Linise is a hospice care nurse and Lenise contacted me and she said I have the perfect person for you which is really exciting to hear right as soon as I heard that I was like really and she's like yes and her name is Anissa and one of her lifetime dreams and I found out later when he's told me she said it was the last thing on her bucket list she's like she wants to be a published author and this is back in November and you know hospice is a very silvery space again too because it doesn't necessarily mean it's one direction only it's just but but generally

we can see that it means a certain thing but as soon as that word i was like oh this is this is really time sensitive um time's always an interesting thing with the red red project sensitivity of time and you know so but we knew like we had to get working immediately so um and she introduced me to anisa and then uh so anise through Barry, through Infinito, and it was really wonderful to be part of that event too, which was taking place in Brazil or being shot out from Brazil. So all those people to me are really significant and important on how I found and was able to get to know this wonderful person, Anissa. Yeah. Tell me a little bit more about her and what you ended up doing together. Anissa was 16 and she had a very vibrant interest in life. She was very active in acting. She was

an avid reader and loved every time I saw her, like how her fingernails were all done up and how she presented herself was a big deal. She had, you know, as some of the kids too, she was also very mature, you know, for a 16-year-old. And a lot of the times the kids I talk to, they just have that sense and that presence. And that sometimes comes across literally how they talk. They have a way of speaking. They have a way of associating with an adult that feels very understood and grown and mature. She was very poised. She loved food and she loved to cook with her mom.

This is one of her favorite things was cooking food with her mother, going to the farmer's market and spending time with her cousins. Her family was just her whole sky. And when she would tell me they'd be going on trips to go visit cousins and see things, she always got really, really excited. She also has a sister, Asea, who's been my primary contact outside of Anissa. And Asea has been incredible to work with through texting and talking and getting information, especially in this last month or so when there's a lot going on at home. His life is changing pretty dramatically for everybody so yeah i just and and we had a really fun time all the time shaping and forming her story you know this fictitious story that she dreamed up and that she wanted to get out there and it was really fun to continually discover

that each time i workshop each workshop that we do with the kids, it's really fun to see their brains, you know, sort of move around and think. And it's really nice to give them permission to say like, yeah, it might change tomorrow. This possibly, you know, as this little thing grows, the story we're going to be shaping it.

So don't worry too much. So she was nice and flexible and you know the next time we meet hey i think what about this can we add this and so yeah but like all the kids i work with she ended up you know having this very strong idea which came out in her book but just generally you know the theme of this book was, we become new creatures when we defend people we love. We become new creatures when we defend the people we love. And this like, totally comes out in her story that she has dreamed up. And it's, you know, but never in those words, I've never heard that in those words before. And i've never had that association about transformation and defending those i love so you know so that's

right to me you know anisa who's so specific in the project just like all the kids are very specific they really have a specific view and words and ideas that really come blazing through, which to me makes these books really, really important and hopefully getting them into people's lives. Yeah. As you were sharing a little bit more context, you know, you, you referenced a number of times Red Fred project and the project. So if we continue to zoom the lens out, like this, these conversations that you're having with her in the context of, hey, you have a book in you and I'm going to literally drop into your life at this moment in time, a total stranger, and we're going to get it out of you. We're going to get it into the world so that no matter what comes your way in a relatively short order, you can call yourself

a published author and this story that's inside of you, it's no longer going to be locked inside of you. We're going to tease it out. We're going to share it with everybody. This is all happening under the greater umbrella of this larger scale project, which I guess you launched what, about seven years ago, six, seven, eight years ago? Seven and a half-ish. So tell me what it really is, like the bigger context. What is this thing called Red Fred Project, and how does it begin? It begins with Red Fred, and Red Fred is a bird.

And since this is an interview via the ears, our audience will have to imagine for a second with me. I named Red Fred because I was locked onto my balcony one morning. This is before the project started. And I have these cute little house sparrows that bit-bop, bit-bop, boop-boop all over my balcony. And it faces east. And I look at these gorgeous mountains. And it was a Saturday morning at the farmer's market.

And my background is in design and some other creative expressions. But I actually went to school in graphic design and fine art. I'm just sitting there, and I have this funny question just into my head, which is, I wonder if I can make a bird out of a comma. You know, I shake my head. I was like, what?

As I buzz in here, sit down to my Akatosh and just put a little comma, tiny, tiny, tiny, tiny, tiny comma. And I, it's an illustrator, so I just blow it up and marge it 500 times and I flip it 90 degrees to the right. And it looks like a bird body. Just has that bulbousy and a tail that goes up and then it just went all the other thoughts was like well it needs legs it looks like bags out exclamation marks are big legs they look like drumsticks let's stick those in too okay what about the eye okay so the font the font nerd in me is bizarrely wondering did you go through like 100 different fonts

to find the right comma to be the right bird? Thanks for asking that. You know, we don't get that asked. No one asks that question. Yeah, so it actually, when I was even thinking about it, so Bodoni, Bodoni is a very ubiquitous typeface

that like most, a lot of the general public doesn't know what it is, but it's actually so everywhere. It's almost like water. It's beautiful though. It's classical. It's like from Italy. It's, you know, Bodoni, I think he was, he lived in the 1600s, 1700s. So it's like this typeface, this font has been around. So it has a transcendence, you know, this certain typeface. And so I went to this idea, like I even was gravitating to, okay, what's, so I found this comma, right? And then I periodized, boop, and then I took the less than sign and then just pulled it, so it looked like a pyramid for the beak. And I assembled them within five minutes and honestly i fell back on my chair and i just stared at it on the screen

and i had colored in red and i said you're gonna change my life and i was like who are you i mean he just sat there in this such understood space. You know, I didn't design the comma or the exclamation. Those were already made, you know, but the pulling them together really sat this really strong shape. And I was like, I think your name, I think you're Red Fred. But then I thought he looked like a kind of gentlemanly bird. So I was like, you need a last name. Oh, the typeface

you're from oh you're red fred badoni this makes total sense and then that was the niagara fall so suddenly it was just like whoa so if this is one comma one typeface and one bird my exploded had a lot of fun. So I ended up creating Red Fred and his friends. They're called the Jolly Troop. And I started just telling stories in the form of a blog for fun. I'd photograph something, put the birds in it,

tell a story. So I was working in that space just for fun when this corner came about my life and where I was headed and what I was doing and what's intention and so so you said where did red fred start or come from and I do say red fred first so people get an idea like I had a relationship with this wonderful bird and children loved him and adults loved him and but it wasn't like I was hugely published somewhere or something I was just making something I really loved and devoted myself to.

So that when I got a phone call in December, a number of years ago, my sister told me, she's like, hey, check on Facebook. And I looked on Facebook and saw that an old friend of mine from 20 years back in high school, she and her husband were sharing what life was like having a child who

has a rare disease. This is called Mitchell's Journey. So sister, my sister was on the phone. She's like, look it up, Dow. This is incredible. So I'm looking at it and seeing this real life thing of these parents sharing what life was like watching, helping, assisting Mitchell. And my sister, who I always give credit for, who knows me really well,

you know, how just some people know you. She's like, don't you think you can do something? I'm not trying to assume I'm anyone to them. Natalie hadn't seen me in 20 years, you know, but like Red Fred was like, Dallas, we could write a book with this little boy.

So I reached out to him and I said, hey, would Mitchell like to write a book with my birds? Like, can we talk to him and ask? And you can tell me no, you can tell me to like buzz off. It's none of my business, you know, but Chris and Natalie kindly, gently, and with exclamation marks said yes. So we started into the book process and I hadn't done it before, you know, like I hadn't

made a book with a kid and I, you know, there's aspects, but I'm a designer. So it's not like total rocket science. I'm like, I know how to design and make a book, you know? Tell me more about, I mean, what was Mitchell's circumstance? What was, I know it's, it's interesting because you use this phrase in your messaging and on the website and you share around of extraordinary circumstances. And it sounded like, you know, like, I don't know whether you coined that phrase from that first moment with Mitchell, but it't know whether you coined that phrase from that first moment with Mitchell, but it's certainly when you talk about that, maybe let's start out by

exploring him and where he was at in that moment in time in connection with that phrase. Yeah. 10 years in living with Duchenne muscular dystrophy. And I had never heard of Duchenne muscular dystrophy. I'd heard of the muscular dystrophy, but I'd never heard of Duchenne muscular dystrophy. I'd heard of the muscular dystrophy, but I'd never heard of Duchenne muscular dystrophy. And I feel like I'm pretty much pretty in the know person, but I didn't know that.

And so when I was being educated through Chris and his wife, you know, this is a rare form of it. And that children will lose their ability to talk and move. And it's many times means a shortened life, you know, immediately. So the reality of a lived life went really quickly to me that this person, this little star boy who's 10 years old,

there was some hard realities that he was, he knew and was living with and his family was. So soon after Mitchell, it wasn't actually Mitchell, but it was soon after the first couple of kids, we really thought about that wording. Who is this person? Who are these children? We had some learning going on. You know, one of the first pieces that was done on us was the news was saying these kids with terminal illnesses. And at the time, I didn't think by calling someone having a terminal condition was bad. I just thought it was like that was what you say and and then one of the loving mothers that was following our project that also had a child that was living in extraordinary circumstance she called me she said hey you know it helps those of us that have the circuit like

we don't need to have that term labeled to our kid like we know they know like it actually isn't helpful and I got correct right then and there. And I said, please tell me, what should I say? And then she was like, well, there's critical illness, there's chronic illnesses, some diseases are so rare. And I was like, oh my goodness, yes, great, great. Put these in my pocket. So then the evolution of what we now use, which is also a really true fact, is that these are children who live in extraordinary circumstances. They're extraordinary. They're extraordinary. They're beyond ordinary. They are plus that. So if listeners can think of like, if extraordinary circumstances is the couch,

I like to then think it has a couple of cushions on it. One is rare disease and the other is life-threatening illness. And there's probably other ways you could say those things too, but those both are mainly the cushions that help form that couch of extraordinary circumstances. And extraordinary circumstances also,

I believe, honors the person who lives in those circumstances in a way that feels honest but then also speaks right to the point that it's extraordinary how they live yeah and honors the possibility of extraordinary in all ways extraordinary in crisis extraordinary in crisis, extraordinary in potential and possibility in humanity, you know, it's sort of not defining their existence by a sense of demise. The Apple Watch Series 10 is here. It has the biggest display ever.

It's also the thinnest Apple Watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist, whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest charging Apple Watch, getting you eight hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series 10, available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone XS or later required, Charge time and actual results will vary. Mayday, mayday. We've been compromised. The pilot's a hitman.

I knew you were going to be fun. On January 24th. Tell me how to fly this thing. Mark Wahlberg. You know what the difference between me and you is? You're going to die. Don't shoot him, we need him. Y'all need a pilot.

Flight Risk. So when you drop back into the life of Mitchell and his parents, which really becomes the inciting incident to take this wonderful character and world and troop and turn it into something bigger, tell me how that experience unfolds and how it leads to this bigger thing. I'm just always really grateful that they said yes. You know, it's even, I know a hundred percent, one of your listeners, two of them, five of them probably right now, you know, someone or they themselves, like they have children or friends who are in this circumstance and it's a really silvery space.

And so I want to just acknowledge that and, and say there, those of us that are looking on who really do love you guys and we want to help. And that was part of like helping the way of just how all of us want to help each other. All of us want to help each other all of us want to help each other really and so i was grateful that they said yes because i i also just believe this this kid had something like his life means something like just because you're 10 and i'm 40 whatever like doesn't i i i hold it like we both have the same coefficient of life in front of our lived life you've done 100 i've done 100 on those grounds we were equals you know you had different experiences but you've lived 100 i've

lived 100 so that's something so protein christenality they were really flexible with how we were starting to do the book you know know, I had ideas trying to set up times. It was like hopscotch trying to do it because his health was declining so quickly. And before we got very far into the actual bookmaking process, he died. And I'll remember where I was sitting. And just when I got that text from his dad, he said, hey, we're leaving the hospital for the last time. I'm really sorry we can't get the book done, but we're going to go home. We're going to close the door. He is our kid. And it was fascinating to watch everyone who had loved this family, everyone coming together virtually, actually, and just honing in and so when little mitchell's became a star in march 2013 the galaxy

in my head went boom because suddenly i it was seeing this whole populace on the planet it's here like they're all over they're all children they all are living in extraordinary circumstances the specific and i remember the couch there's a ton of them there's so many and so just one of those life moments that just went and it's like whoa what if we could actually do this what if we asked children what children's books should be about what if we asked children who'd had extraordinary circumstances what would you want to tell the world that you had the chance like those books don't exist and so i was you know quickly like who's making these books what are these being made

anywhere? I love children's books, illustration. I'm a comics guy. I love cartoons always growing up. So I didn't know anything like this. So that is where the concept just cracked, which sometimes that's what happens. Life does spring from death and sometimes dissolution regenerates into innovation and imagination this is actually not my truth it's a natural truth it's how the world goes and i'm so that's why our little star in our logo is Mitchell like red frets looking up at the star because he's our lodestar he's our he's our north and his life mattered to me his life mattered to me it literally cracked open the way I saw people differently and um I am really honored that we get to share that aspect of our story and that he is so much a part of why we're doing things and to help, help see this group of

people differently who sometimes get really, they get kind of sidelined into behind their disease and what they can't do. they're you know it's hard for them to get out they can't go to school and they've got to be mindful if they're wearing masks anyway by the way just because they have immune compromised immune systems like there's just so much happening going on but what's also going on is that they're living very synthesized like they're processing things that you and I usually don't have to. We haven't, because we haven't gone through that same rigor of physicality and emotionality of living. You know, a lot of us, I'm just saying for me, and I can't speak for you,

but things like we're not really worried right now about our health. So I just saw this wonderful, beautiful group of people and an opportunity in that it's not here, but how wonderful would it be? So then we started with our next storyteller. His name's Nathan Glad, and he's from Utah. And then I developed basically the process nathan's family said yes we did it we designed a kickstarter it took me a number of months like six months to get it all ready and then we launched a kickstarter in a parking lot in utah and balloons and face painters and nathan's book was there and hundreds of people came and got his signature and he pushed go on the Kickstarter and uh it was just awesome air and it was like

everyone's like dude what's gonna happen and we luckily were fortunate to be funded 30 days later so that early experience you know it didn't just wake you up to Mitchell and his family, but it woke you up to this universe of their families and the community around them, you couldn't unsee it. But also the way that your heart is wired, you couldn't unfeel it, and you couldn't just sit there and know that they existed. This had to become central in who you are in your contribution. Thanks for saying those things. And it also was nice though, John, I have to just say, like, I know I can make books, you know, that's not a, that also was like some technical expertise. So I was like trying to figure out, I was skilled and ready and like could do this. So that was kind of removed, right? That could have been an obstacle maybe in like this idea or

you know so i really like the idea of just like assessing you know i think a lot of us again i'll say like i know all of us want to help someone something sometimes and some i think we project something like we want to maybe be that this other thing that helps them but it's like it'll take a while to get us there to get to that point so i'm i think there's more opportunity it's just like what do we have like on here right here like on me at my desk like what do i know what's my language there's an efficiency there there is a you know 10 000 hours thing it's like we've been doing this thing we're really adept at it maybe not some glassy and glamorous or like maybe whatever we think it's like not that big of a deal but like that's actually where we can be

very efficient and possibly helping helpful yeah it's things we're already in how are we lacing that and stitching it with this maybe other piece of fabric over here that we didn't think those two things went together but actually maybe they do but it's because i'm i have a certain proficiency which allowed me to be able to produce books quick you know what i mean so i i like that though just stepping back from a minute just being like because there's several times i think we feel helpless sometimes because I can't fix Mitchell's disease. I'm not a doctor. I'm not like his parents. I can't like, there's a number of things I can't do. So instead let's look at what I can do. Actually, what's easy for me.

What am I proficient in? Then let's marry that idea. Let's bring that to someone else who actually can't do what I can do and let's solve a problem. Yeah. You mentioned among that sort of like your toolbox, like what you showed up with already proficient in, you know, it's a background in art and design, also language, you know, words, poetry, prose and hearse, you know, have been a part of who you are for basically your entire life, you know. So you bring this skill set and this deep reservoir of not just knowledge about language, but also, you know, it is kind of breathes you from what I know of you. You know, it has been a part of you and you have a sensibility around it. So when you show up, like you said, it's less about how do I figure out how to do this? You kind of have that, you have enough of it in your history, in your experience,

in your toolbox, and you have a designer's mind, which basically says I can figure out anything. And in fact, you can, but you're dropping into this, a new world where it's not just about the process of creation. It's not you sitting down and helping to ghost write a book like you were hired or ghost illustrate or ghost design it by just sort of like somebody who's on the commercial market who does this for a living. you're dropping into an extraordinary circumstance. You're dropping into a family, very often a family in a really, in a, in a tough season of their life. And it's not just, it's not just the kid slash client, you know, it is the entire community that wraps around them. And you, you mentioned the word, you know, you want it to be helpful. I have to imagine part of that there was another question running in your head too. And I'm really curious about this, which is how do I also not cause harm?

Yeah. Right. I think, I mean, just the quick was trying to be very open about asking questions because I am kind of a new territory. I'm like, I don't even know what the road signs are necessarily. Like, please. And I, there's just always this deep respect to like drop whatever you think, you know, start Start with really basic questions and do your discovery in a curious and honestly curious space because I don't want to say the wrong thing. I don't want to do the wrong thing. I do not want to cause more harm. And so open to being taught and picking up nuance and being sensitive

were things I had to cultivate in order to be with these wonderful people all of whom you've already wrapped up yes like not just the storyteller the child but their sibling and their parents their caretakers and sometimes I even meet like their principals of their schools and librarians like which is really beautiful when I start to see also this lattice of people that are intersecting this child's life and their family's life and who loves them. Yeah, because I mean, the story that you're helping to draw out

and put into pages and illustrations and words, it's all of theirs, really, which makes me curious sometimes also where you've got a kid who I'm sure I would imagine some of you showed up and there was a back and forth and you sort of figured out collaboratively, like what is this thing going to be? And I would imagine also that there were some kids who just had very strong opinions and beliefs and storylines and characters and like, this is the way I want it to be. And I wonder sometimes because also at this tender moment, whether there was any, you've experienced these moments where the child has a thing that needs to be out in the world

that does not necessarily align entirely with what the family wants to be out in the world. And I realize very often you're working with younger kids and maybe there isn't that level of differentiation. But I'm curious whether you ever walk into a circumstance and realize that in a weird way, there are almost competing storylines about what this could should might be that's a great question um part of the discovery you know when i speak with the families is to kind of hopefully lay out a pretty open space to say you know i have this springboard diving board question that is if you could write a book for the entire world to read what would it be about what's kind of fun even just a little bit of process like even ask the family that guess what

you're gonna get all these different answers that's kind of fun when people hear each other like oh i oh you oh and yet it's something that everyone can easily be accessible to. It's also what pulls out the person. Like their, you know, it's just not, if you could write that book, what would it be about? And I've also found that children, a lot of the kids, like immediately figure that out. Versus kind of the older we get sometimes, I'm like, oh, that's nuanced. Let me get back to you in two weeks. And what's beautiful is that mature,

no, not mature, all of them, all of the kids end up talking about these very human, basic, connective things. Like, how do you walk away from friends that maybe aren't good for you, but they've been your friends and you need to find new ones. That's all right. Or how do you treat a sibling that's just been adopted? How do you just be brave? Period. How do you, if you can't get out of a tree, how are you ever going to get to the forest? So in some of the, in some of the books and the workshop that I'm doing, I also provide them,

provide them with some options for themes too, to just help the kids start forming out like, what could the story be? And I'm like, Oh, it can be a couple of things. It could be about being brave generally and loving others, or, you know, it could also just not make sense it could just be magical and also about you know taking care of the earth so we try to in a way that we're systematized a certain how we break out our workshops we give enough form for the kids to communicate but we also give them some choices to start wondering about their, the themes they want to share. And they're never, ever the same. Like meaning generally there's some thematic things that are similar, but the messages and how the story comes out is just always different. And it

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Along with the sort of the thematic and the actual, the words and the images that end up coming out, part of that process for you is also really trying to figure out somehow it can be a matter of conversation. Sometimes they're intermediaries. Sometimes you may not be able to face with somebody. You worked with one kid, I think fairly early on, Alejandro. Yeah. He's more recent. A year ago. Oh, got it, got it, got it. And which required sort of like a new approach. Oh my goodness.

Share a bit about Alejandro and about how your collaboration unfolded. He's 10. He's half Hawaiian, half Spanish. He's bilingual. He loves numbers and he can literally tell you what day your birthday is on in a second. If you tell him I was born on X, he'll tell you the exact day of the week it's on this year. That's how quick he is. Alejandro was born with spinal muscular

atrophy, which is SMA. There's a variety of SMA types and his is the most severe, which causes basically the whole entire body is paralyzed. The only thing that he has control over, like autonomy that he controls are his eyes. So everything else he doesn't eat, he doesn't masticate. So he doesn't swallow. He doesn't chew, um, nothing. He doesn't do anything on his chew nothing he doesn't do anything on his own he doesn't even breathe on his own so um but he speaks through his eyes i hadn't had that happen before i've never met anyone like that and so when i arrived in the suburb in chicago last march and we'd already talked actually through video, but to see him sit opposite, say, look at me,

and then he can't move his head, right? He's looking at me and then looks at the screen. And in this wonderful, it's called Toby, this little computer's name is Toby. It's an actual software, piece of hardware, whose father, by the way, helped design the software for this incredible thing.

And it's, you know, this interface on the screen that has like tabs, letters and numbers on the sides. And it looks like there's pages. I was like, wow, this is neat. And his eye is moving. And there's a piece in the equipment and the screen that's tracking his eye movement so that he controls what he says. It types it out for him. And then the computer talks. So I'd ask what he says. It types it out for him. And then the computer talks. So I'd ask him a question.

Computer would talk. Ask him a question. And listen to the... Well, Dallas, your birthday's on Thursday this year. So Alejandro, brilliant, brilliant boy, looking through these gorgeous windows of his eyes, was able to communicate to me. And what was fun is that our process of what we do is still applicable to him. He still was able to go through all the same things all the other kids have done, which is really great that we can find ways to communicate.

Even though he couldn't speak to me with his mouth, he could speak to me through Toby, through his eyes. And the story he ended up sharing was absolutely phenomenal and terrific. And his book signing, his virtual book signing that happened about three weeks ago was a day I will never forget as long as I live. Nor will any of the people who were on that virtual Skype call or that Zoom call. We were just all in awe. And it was really great to take a moment together and just say like, thanks, buddy. Like, honestly, thank you for this amazing book and this tenacity to share.

And I had sent him all these questions weeks in advance. And he had filled out all the questions by himself and then uploaded them to the computer so that when we were having the book signing, when I asked him, he could push play. You know, extraordinary. You know, just like so cool. You know, and we all felt elevated. We all felt bigger. We all felt we can do things, which was amazing to get this all stemmed from seeing this tenacity of this young boy. Yeah. I'm curious when you think about your working life, whether you were getting paid or whether you were sort of like the mind of a creative individual who loves to in so many different forms and channels and

be expressive and build work and life around that. And the rewards that tend to come from living that kind of life, sometimes financial, sometimes through all sorts of other ways. And then seven or so years ago, Red Fred Project becomes a much more central focus for you. It comes into existence and then consumes what feels like a substantial amount of your waking hours. Since then, I'm curious about where you're essentially repurposing all of these things that you've already been doing, but deploying them in different domains for different reasons, in different contexts with different people, different sense of collaboration.

I'm wondering how being able to do what you do, but differently in this context has changed you, has changed the way not only that you think about creation and expression, but just who you are as a human being. Yeah. I know, it's a big question. Yeah, I mean, I think I'm this and. Like, I'll think of something, and then I say, and then I'm that. I want to say it's changed me in every way, almost.

You know, like, it's made me a lot softer energetically and the heart i also like a little harder about i just i don't i'm not very good with like the complaining thing because legit like the people i'm working with are living really hard so i it i must have for myself i'm a lot harder about like and this is not so bad for you like you really don't have it that's bad like you literally don't have it that bad at all when the lens has shifted in such a way of seeing the problem solving i've also been absolutely delighted by the community or communities that like come together for a magical minute called the book signing that's actually an hour and a half and i sit in the same room together and just watch this all happen hold hands buy the books go home get a photograph of someone reading the book with their kids or the kids sending me a video

or like children like i love what you do so i'm going to do a fundraiser like raise more money for you as i'm like trying to pound on grown ass people's home help support this work please help you know i have the children just like seeing their peers in a different light you know that's just i mean it's just like all sorts of goosebumps so it makes life very crackly it's been like very just wow and it's also been exhausting the physicality of this and the emotions of this, just being totally candid with you. Like it's, it's, um, it's not where I thought I was going to be in this part of my life, or I don't know how much we could plan for that anyways, but, and yet the landscapes that I've

personally been able to discover within myself and through myself, through these people, through this work, it is stunning to me, stunning. And at the same time, like totally hard. It's heartbreaking. And yeah. And then even if I was to sit here and be like, what would I do if not this? I really have a hard time thinking of that because I'm like, what's actually that interesting to me? What? This is so interesting to me, the human component of this, all aspects of it. Yeah.

So then I have a hard time thinking like, I don't know what else is like that curious to me right now. I'm really fascinated by it on this level of like, it really pulls at me. So I don't know if that's a great answer to the question, but. It's a real answer, which means it's great. You're part of what you're, you've experienced over the years also is, is loss, you know, is sort of a series of, of losses and, and grief, you know, and you can never compare your grief to someone else. And then there's no rating system based on the quality or the closeness of the relationship. But you wrote a poem that I think you... I don't know if you've ever ended up turning into a book. You left a hole. I know you were planning on it. I don't know. Did it ever actually

make it into book form yet? No. I mean, that's near top things to do. I'm actually doing some like line work and sketches right now because it actually is probably not going to be in the form of a Red Fred book per se. Like it's probably going to be more my illustration, like fine art, like stuff which I haven't touched in years. And so, yeah, somehow or somewhere, yeah, I think I shared it. Yeah. And I remember seeing it and hearing you read it. And it was, you know, this was you, this was your perspective, but you writing it sort of as a kid's book about the context of, you know,

like losing someone and saying essentially you left a hole, but there's, there was a turn that sort of said, you know, is there any chance you still have that somewhere where we could actually read that into the conversation? Yeah, of course. Happy to. I'm happy to. Okay.

You left a hole when you flew out the door and winked to the cotton clouds over the shore. You left a hole in the woods yesterday on the tom-tom stump where we used to play. You left a hole in our pink picnic place near the red berries with black licorice lace. You left a hole by the fireplace glow under the love leaves of green mistletoe. You left holes in my swing, my forts in my bed, in my holiday rocking chair, in my heart and my head.

Holes in my blue nights when the moon is awake. Holes in my mornings by a golden glass lake. And sometimes the holes make me lonely for you when I stand on their edges looking for clues. At first they are dark, endless and flat, then exhaustingly long and ever pitch black. And if I fall in them, they toss me around. What once was right up flips wrong side, face down. So, I remember the colors your life held with me,

the same way a cup cradles aspel spice tea. Sipping this rainbow I drink till I'm full of myriad memories of your color crayon soul. With a snap tap clap the holes disappear. All I can feel is your soul whole and here.

Your soul in my blue nights when the moon is awake. Your soul in my mornings by a golden glass lake. Your soul in my swing, my forts in my bed, in my holiday rocking chair, in my heart and my head. Your soul sitting by the fireplace glow under the love leaves of green mistletoe. Your soul picnicking in our picnic place near the red berries with black licorice lace. Your soul romping through the woods all today on the tom-tom stump where we used to play. Your soul soaring out there, just past the door.

Hole in the cotton clouds over the shore. Gorgeous. What are you thinking about? Everything, everyone. What are you thinking about? Everything, everyone. Being present to it all. The upside and the downside of the truth of impermanence. There's something else you shared a couple of years back, which kind of ties in to this, I think maybe in an interesting way. And it's maybe a nice place for us to go as we start to wind down our conversation, which you did this two cents project where people would sort of like

share these quick things. And you decided that you kind of had to participate too. And you shared these two words, unconquerable light. And I'm curious why, what that meant to you. That's a long time ago. It is. I just remembered the image of where I was. I think whoever photographed me, I was actually a half a block away on Pierpont Avenue

and someone had positioned that. What would your two cents be? And the rules for the project were they can be any two words. They don't have to be a duo. People will probably read them as a duo, which doesn't mean they have to be together. It's just like any two words you want. I think I liked the idea of those two words together though because light in its most basic like symbolism and essence i quickly think of just the sun and just how that is unconquerable

and i live for this i just love the sunshine i love a sunny day i love heat and um there's just something like even as small as a little light can be or a little flame like it's still like that's unconquerable like the dark everything dark can be around it but if it's if it's still white it's still light and it's still there which is like it hasn't been taken in through shadow or darkness and there's something really beautiful like how ephemeral light can seem or be it's still like this very strong thing when everything else around it's dark or like stars in the sky they're still there they're still unconquerable you know and i like that idea i hope that i'm sure i was in a space

too i'm sure i was you know thinking of the work i was seeing and felt like that was coursing through me in my life like i was seeing that happen in the lives of other people. I'm sure there's an aspect of, I hope to be able to provide light for people and to remind them that their light is unconquerable too. So yeah, that's what's coming to mind. Yeah. I mean, there's some foreshadowing in that.

Yeah. That was a really fun project. That was so fun. Dazzling, actually. Totally dazzling. Which is a good reason to do pretty much anything for the possibility of being dazzled or participating in the act of dazzling. Yeah. I mean, people are so interesting, you know, just when we think there's no hope in humanity, but you know, people are really curious. I mean, there's, you know, we get each other in

the right space and time. We feel genuinely curious. We sit down really with someone and be curious. I have to remain curious and open with all these people I intersect with. But what doesn't ever stop is just the astonishment. I'm astonished and I'm dazzled when people get to show up as themselves. They're seen as themselves they're seen as themselves and the sicknesses go away and that label of that goes away and it's it's just about this essence of person that i get to sit opposite from and it's important though that i in that space i am openly honest and curious with those people. That authenticity, I think, just bounces off each other. Yeah.

Yeah. I can meet people like you. It feels like a great place for us to come full circle as well. So sitting here in this container of Good Life Project, if I offer up the phrase to live a good life, what comes up? Oh. if I offer up the phrase to live a good life? What comes up? Being able to feel myself and my most down in the ground, but up in the sky self, just to feel myself.

Hopefully to feel that and then feel that in concert with other people feel themselves and those kind of moments just makes life like super bridge and super unique and different at each time um so i think on a personal level, I hope I'm trying for myself to have a good quality life or a good life. I want to hopefully be the most Dallas I can be as Dallas. Which doesn't mean it's not changeable or my due thing, but it's just to feel really comfortable with who I am and then hopefully be with other people who feel comfortable with who they are. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you.

Hey, before you leave, if you love this episode, safe bet you will also love the conversation that we had with Mitch Albom about his love of story and service. So you'll find a link to Mitch's episode in the show notes. Thank you. never miss an episode and then share the good life project love with friends because when ideas become conversations that lead to action well that's when real change takes hold see you next time The Apple Watch Series 10 is here. It has the biggest display ever. It's also the thinnest Apple Watch Series 10 is here. It has the biggest display ever. It's also the thinnest Apple Watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist, whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest-charging Apple Watch,

getting you 8 hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series 10. Available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations. iPhone tennis or later required charge time and actual results will vary. Mayday, mayday. We've been compromised.

The pilot's a hit man. I knew you were going to be fun. January 24th. Tell me how to fly this thing. Mark Wahlberg. You know what the difference between me and you is? You're going to die. Don't shoot him.

We need him. Y'all need a pilot. Flight risk.