The Prepper Broadcasting Network - Thanksgiving in the 90s with IC

Episode Date: November 28, 2024

https://bit.ly/3Zn2iOt

. It's the Wednesday before Thanksgiving. I want you to play a game with me, okay? I'm sitting at the back of an old diner, and there's people smoking in the diner like it's ages ago, but it's today, and the waitresses are older and, you know, middle-aged. Let's go with that. Middle-aged. The place is a little dingy, a little dirty, a little messy. Little stained, a little yellow. You know what I mean?

A little nicotine. Coffee mugs are a little dirty. The glasses are a little foggy. There's dots and specks on the silverware. And you come to my table. You sit down across from me at the diner. And I'm sitting there with a black coffee, of course. Gotta have the black coffee. And you sit down and I tell you, you know, it's the Wednesday before Thanksgiving.

And I want to tell you about what it was like in my family. Now, one of the strangest things about Thanksgiving in my family is it's impossible. It's impossible. So the thing you have to understand about growing apart, it's different from growing into the ground, which the majority of my cousins have done. The Thanksgiving that we had, as magical and wild as it was, could never happen again, because half of the people who attended are dead. Well, even more when you start talking about old age, your grandparents are gone, you know. But it's astounding to me that even if we sought to gather together and reflect on,

you know, reminisce on sort of the nostalgic feels, that it would be, you know, impossible. I'd have to go from headstone to headstone to have that kind of a conversation, and I could never expect any reply. Because that's the course of life of mortal men, right? Now, to set the scene, I have to talk to you about 6 West 8th Street. Now, there's a million things going on in the world right now. There's a million things we could be doing on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving. I want to do this. This is what I want to do. And I've been doing what I want to do ever since I started this

show and there's no reason to change it now. Just for Vladimir Putin. So the day starts in a row home. Six West State Street, a tiny little bedroom. Four bedrooms in the house. A four bedroom home. Somehow we could fit a four bedroom home in a row home.

Somehow we could fit a family in a row home. Somehow we could have a life. Somehow a marriage could last in a row home. The things my parents lived through with each other. Oh my God. You know, you tell me you're getting divorced because, uh, you know, he's, he doesn't buy you the house you want, or you're getting divorced because you put on a few pounds. It's like, I think about my own parents. I don't know if it's good or not, to be honest

with you. I look at them, I'm not sure. But I can tell you this much, you know, they've lived through nuclear war from the marital sense of it all, right? And stayed together through thick and thin. You know, they took till death do us part and they, they didn't tattoo it on their flesh. They carved it in there. Um, they sewed the aortas together. You know what I mean? It's for, for good and bad, you know, through sickness and in health and through alcoholism and depression and drug addiction. But the story starts out in a little row home like that where a family I'm assuming is relatively happy. I don't remember being depressed. I don't remember being upset,

sad, miserable that much. You know what I mean? I remember times when I was sad as a kid, not getting my way, not getting what I wanted. But I don't remember looking at life on a whole as a bad thing. In fact, the days were basically carved up by playing with action figures, playing with my friends outside, and playing video games. Pausing only for meals, and yeah, and then the cycle, the cycle of summer, of course, if it was school, then, you know, the cycle of school, but the story starts here, and I wake up, and, you know, incredibly excited about the day to come, in pajamas, probably some Ninja Turtle pajamas or something like that, this little house. Football curtains on the window, a little television in my room. The women of

my house, they slept in, they liked to sleep in. You know, they'd stay in bed a while, even on the holidays, no big deal, It was fine. Christmas, everybody was up. I really can't remember what time we'd wind up at my grandmother's house, but all the festivities took place at Mamaw's, right? And she was a short hop, skip, and a jump away. We probably never even should have driven. We drove there, I think. And we literally were like, I don't know, like three blocks. I don't know if we drove or if we walked. We should have walked. Chances are we drove. Because literally we could walk through the process and be there in less than five minutes.

So maybe we did walk. It's hard to remember. But when we arrived... Well, maybe we should talk about the house. Because the house was set on one side of the street, and the opposite side of the street was an oil refinery. And it was a small pack of row homes. I think it was four in total. And there was something like a... Some other house next to those row homes that were connected. And my grandmother lived at the end of the four row homes. Which was also next to a house on the corner.

And these houses were like shotgun style. You know what i mean they did everything moved from the front to the back and they were like longish houses tiny once again you know what i mean from some today's standards right like i feel like the average woman if she woke up um married with children in one of these houses, she'd like start cutting, you know what I mean? God, you know what I'm saying? Like that level of depressiveness would come over her, you know, it didn't matter if the family was healthy or happy. This is the day of gratitude, PPN family, and I started thinking about gratitude. There's a lot of people who talk a lot of shit about gratitude.

There's a lot of America haters that tell you they talk, that they are grateful and they have a lot of gratitude. And I was wondering the other day, because I am a very grateful person, man. I'm intentionally grateful. And I was thinking to myself, how the hell could you be grateful and not and hate this country? Like, how does that how did those two things go hand in hand? Like, how can you say, God, I'm so grateful for everything I have, the opportunities I've had, you know, the chance to be here on this planet.

How do you not wind up saying, God, I'm so grateful I'm in the greatest nation on Earth. I'm driving in a new car, on a new phone, with nice clothes and access to everything I could want. And even if I fall off the horse and get addicted to fentanyl, they'll still take care of me. Right? Like, how? There's police I can call on. The trend de Arguagua is not that bad yet. The trend de Arrabita is not that bad yet. The trend de Arabita isn't that bad. Listen, it's a beautiful time to be alive.

Okay? Gratitude is the easy part. And that's what Thanksgiving's all about. You know what I mean? I didn't know it at that age. What the hell did I know? I'm talking seven, eight. You know what I mean? I didn't know it at that age. What the hell did I know? I'm talking seven, eight. You know what I mean?

I think I was about done with my family after about eight, nine. I don't remember. But I know there came a time we didn't go over anymore. Now, my grandmother had these crazy bushes outside. My grandmother had these crazy bushes outside, these weird sloping front yard rocks, like a rock sort of staircase that you went up to get to the house. It sounds majestic. It was small, but it was fun for kids, you know what I mean? Front porch, you know, that led into the house. And they had a big screen back in the day, a big screen in 92 ish 95 94 something like that and the big screen was like one of those ones that was a massive cabinet you know what i

mean it was like uh it was massive you know it probably took three grown men to get it in the house something like that but it was a big screen you know what I mean? Wow, look at it, it's huge. Our little TV. At home. But when you cross the threshold on Thanksgiving, it wasn't the big screen television that caught your attention, it was the picnic tables. I don't know when the picnic tables arrived, I was never part of it.

All I knew is that when I walked through my grandmother's front door, the living room would be dominated by two side-by-side picnic tables. I don't know who came up with this. I don't know if this was tradition elsewhere. I have no clue. But what I know is that Thanksgiving at Mamaw's meant two picnic tables side-by-side, covered in tablecloths, and somehow everyone fit. Somehow the grandparents fit. Five children and eight grandchildren and even great-grandchildren fit. Amazing when you think about it, right? Like I said, you look at the modern couple. The modern couple walks into a 2,000-square-foot house,

and they look around and look at the kitchen, and what am I going to do in this tiny little kitchen, honey? They don't cook. You know what I mean? It's not like they all say the same thing. I watch the shows with my wife. They all say the same thing, right? We love to entertain.

Oh, do you now? What? Tell me about this entertainment. Tell me about the entertaining that, oh, we're going to entertain in here. We've got this nice big island with 12 seats because we have one kid and there's two of us. And he's away on business most of the time to afford this gigantic house. But we're going to entertain. We love to entertain.

We love to have people over. So long as they're not Trump voters, we love to have people over. I work for FEMA. I'm just kidding. So we'd all pile into this little living room. There's a Christmas tree up on top of it. There's a Christmas tree up at one side. A gumball machine where the staircase leads down.

A big screen television. A table where they put puzzles together. A couch behind it all. Right? All of this in the living room. Right? And the creepiest pictures of clowns you ever saw in your whole life. The homeless clowns.

My grandmother was in love with clowns. It's amazing to me that someone could fall in love with clowns. At my age, I look back on it, I don't even understand how it could be. It's not because I'm, like, ruined by Stephen King or something like that. Right? It's just maybe one of the creepiest things of all. I don't know. Really weird.

Really, really weird. You know, maybe there was a time when they were cementing something different or maybe she was tethered to a wonderful moment with a clown. I don't know what it was. It was Bozo Age. You know what I mean? I don't even know if you guys remember Bozo, but... Anyhow, kitchen was tiny, okay?

The food that came out of the kitchen, you couldn't even believe. You'd get to the house, and there was already food on the table. Platters laid out. Pickles and gherkins and veggie trays fruit trays cinnamon dips ranch dips uh what's it called uh finger what is it finger salad you ever had a finger salad have you ever had a finger salad before we would eat finger salad at every every party it was absolutely delicious wonderful cream cheese on some kind of like a, almost like, I don't know what they used, but it was almost like,

what's the thing? Focaccia. It's like a thin focaccia covered in cream cheese and maybe some ranch or herbs or something. I don't know what the hell it was. And then they just chopped up vegetables real small all over. Broccoli, carrot, little onion, you know what I mean? Everything was cut up on this finger salad and they cut it into squares. You'd eat it, square at a time. Delicious! And the table would be filled with this stuff and you'd snack a little bit and your mom would yell at you,

the meal's coming, she knew you had to eat big in front of grandma, you know what I mean? And she didn't, you know, you didn't have, in front of grandma you know what i mean and she didn't you know you didn't know you didn't have like my kids you know what i mean they my kids don't even hardly eat thanksgiving they don't sit around the table and scarf like we did and it wasn't that we were starving or anything like that it was just everybody else was doing it so we were like pressured into it you know my kids are playing madden with their uncle and they're like eating a piece of turkey a duck off a plate, whatever that. You know, I'm out there stuffing my face.

Nowadays, I eat the whole day because I'm cooking. But anyway, back to it. So, you know, before long, everybody starts mulling and we're moving in. And the whole crew's there. And the kids, we're running around the house. We go upstairs and play in the clown room. Yeah, she had a whole room of clown shit. And we play in the clown room until something thumps too loud and she yells or mom yells or, you know, an aunt yells.

Come down here and stop it. We go downstairs, go out back, play under the... I remember we used to play this game and I used to love it. It was such a fun game. I have no clue why. It was like my life was calling me from the future. But we used to play this like Indian game, my cousin and me. My cousin Lauren and I, we would sit under the deck.

And we would grab these pieces of brick. And the brick was all busted up. And I'd look at it and I'd say, you know what this is? This is deer meat. So I'm going to gather up this deer meat and we're going to make a fire. Okay? And we'll, you know, it was resource management somehow. I don't know what it was.

We didn't actually make a fire, obviously. But we'd gather up sticks and pretend we had a fire. And I'd stack up the deer meat. And we would be like an Indian tribe. You know what I mean? And we would be, I don't know. I remember getting giddy about it. I remember being like, this is great, love this.

How did I know, right? So eventually everyone's called inside, you know what I mean? There's beer drinking, you know, this is 1990s. The men came to eat, they did nothing but eat, you know what I mean? There was no changing diapers, there was none of this shit there was it was the men were there to eat and drink beer and watch football and that's exactly what they did they talked they laughed hey red what's going on yeah what are you doing you know what i mean they called they called we called our grandfather boppy my father would walk in the door and call it red and i'm looking at the situation like what is what the hell's going on here so you know i don't i don't know how it all went down

the conversations and all that kind of stuff i was oblivious to i remember crawling underneath the picnic tables when we shouldn't be and getting yelled at for that but eventually we'd all sit around the table and we'd all eat and we'd'd joke, you know, my family is funny. They were always funny. They were evil, but they were funny too. You know what I mean? And that was the fun part. You know, we'd pass your gym, pass me the corn, hand up the, what do you want?

You need the gravy? What do you need? Everybody, you know. I'm talking about, what did I say, say eight cousins five siblings of the grandparents right um all spouses so five more spouses right and then the grandparents it's just a massive operation in a tiny little row home in trainer pennsy, and everybody came for years and years, you know, it wasn't like, everybody came, and the eating would commence, you know what I mean, and one of the things that my dad always, my dad was like, I don't know, man, like, he was really good

know man like he was really good at cheerleading and he still is you know what i mean he he has a knack for this i don't know because i know his childhood was rough but what i know about my dad for certain there are a lot of things you know what i mean he's a man who lived through the 1950s till now 1950 was born right and you know he lived a rough childhood man rough and uh made a lot of mistakes you know what i mean um but something happened to that man and he has always had this quality he always had this quality. He always had this thing where he would just, you know, every meal my mother made was the best meal he ever ate. You know what I'm saying? Everything we did as kids was the most amazing thing he ever saw. And it sounds stupid when I say it out loud, But of course. Of course.

It almost seems like no duh. Like of course. Because if you're remotely grateful. And you work all day. And you come home. And your wife cooks you a meal. And it tastes good. Like wow.

Look where I'm at. Again it's back to gratitude. You know what I mean. It's back to the gratitude of life. Like people get lost in this. In this weird game that everybody plays. But my father, like, I'm talking about a guy who's, you know, has so little in life. You know what I mean? He says things, you know, now he says things to my kids, you know what I mean, and I watch him, and I watch the way he interacts, the same thing, you know what I mean, like,

what he can, I don't know what it is, he sees their hopes and dreams, and feeds him you know what i mean like like here's an example my son's been playing football we've been going to the games he's been going to all the games having a blast right and my dad will compare him to like an all-star he's been playing linebackers you call him like comparing to an all-star oh he's like zach bond out there you know what i mean and and in my my instinct is i'm not like the dad that tells people you know that tells his kids like you you gotta get better you know what i mean i always say good job and all that kind of stuff but i'm a reserve to a point i don't want to give him i feel weird giving him BS, you know what I mean? I feel weird being like, dude, you're like the best player out there, because he ain't the best

player out there, you know what I mean? And he knows it, so for me to say it, it's silly, right? But there's something beautiful about dad, you know what I mean? And the way he does things, and the way he's always done things, you know? looks at his i think it's because he looks at his progeny with such pride and just says you know this is of course you know you of course you're going to be the best like this is just how it works he would always tell you always he's sitting on the couch and late always like in the evening you look over at me you got it jim you know that right you got it and i'd be like yeah yeah i know i know no i mean you got it i mean i watch you you you got it you know what i mean the only thing i ever feel bad about with my dad is that i never got like

everybody when i was a chef and when I was coming up everybody thought I was going to be on tv everybody thought I was going to be a star they really did like classmates my teachers all those people in culinary school they were like oh James is going to open a restaurant it's going to be one of the best restaurants he's going to be a chef he's going to be on the food network all that kind of stuff and I think my dad always thought that too. And you know what I did, man? I did that thing that they always tell you to do in movies. You know what I mean? They like go the way you want to go. You know what I mean? Like I went the way of love and marriage instead of whatever. You know what I mean? Like that's what I really dug into. And then I fell even further from the possibility of fame and fortune because I left cooking to have a real job so I could be with my family. Imagine.

Right? any possibility of fame and fortune for a while because I decided to vote Republican in America in the early 2000s and do a podcast criticizing the government and everything. But then again, who knows? The truth of the matter is when it comes to that stuff, if I wrote a book and they told me i had to do a book tour in order to get the paycheck i probably would tell them i'm not doing it because i've committed to being here you know what i mean for the kids i've committed to that and that time will end you know and likely lady liberty and i will be doing preppers circuits and all that kind of stuff and living a different kind of lifestyle but this chunk this chunk right here I'll never forget this chunk right here

I'll never get back you know what I mean everybody used to live this way it's funny really when you think about it everybody used to be around you know what I mean it wasn't like people weren't around it's weird so where was I oh so the cheering on of the children and the dad and everybody cheer you on you know what oh god what are you going for another one you're going for another plate well how many plates you in now three plates what are you and it was like you know it was like a game you know it's like how much can you stuff yourself i was at a birthday party the mom the kid eats cake and ice cream. He's running around in the field, right? And the mom says, all right, that's enough running.

Come on back. That's enough running. What the hell? Well, I've never heard a parent say that in my life, right? My parents are letting me stuff my face. I'm gagging on cranberry sauce and mashed potatoes and they're cheering me on. And all the kids, too. It wasn't just me. It was my sister. You know, everybody who was eating, we just keep eating. And you got to understand, you know, these are people that are, like, coming out of tough times.

You know what I mean? My parents, both my parents, neither of them were rich. They were both poor as kids. So they're sitting there feasting, man. And they're like, look at this. You know what I mean? Fill yourself up. Not that we went home and didn't have food. We never didn't have food. You know what I mean? We weren't in that sort of situation. You know, and eventually we'd all be stuffed. And that's when dessert started. You know, you get stuffed to the absolute gills, right? And then we'd walk out to the kitchen. And out in the kitchen, there was a, an old telephone with

a spinny thing, right? But it wasn't a spinny thing. It was a touch dial. It was designed to look like an old phone right there. As soon as you walked into the left, my grandmother also kept a giant spoon and a giant fork in there to beat the children with or to threaten to beat the children with right um hung on the wall you know what i mean the dining room table to the right and a counter to the left okay little little corner spot there four burner stove corner spot uh sink on the back corner two windows windows on the right, refrigerator. Then it led to a shed. They called it a shed, but really it was just a room in the house.

Sometimes I have dreams where I'm walking down different halls in like a business building and I open up a door and I'm in that kitchen you know what I mean I'm over there like doing dishes in that kitchen and it's wild but anyway you go out then you head out there and then now all of a sudden there's multitudes of desserts okay they put a couple pies down all All the food's cleared. The women cleared the food. The women did the dishes. All the food's cleared. The men are nauseated, right? They can't move.

They slump over from like the table seats, the picnic seats, onto the couch. And the football's on, you know what I mean? The Dallas Cowboys,? The Dallas Cowboys. The unstoppable Dallas Cowboys. I got to watch them win again. And the desserts start hitting the... It's an apple pie. It's a pumpkin pie. It's a...

I don't think... I think that was about it on the... I don't remember other pies, really. But it's at least an apple pie. It's a pumpkin pie. You go in there. It's an ambrosia... Have you ever had ambrosia salad

it's uh it's uh what else did they do in there now there was always like three things on the counter the one was the ambrosia i always ate it because it had the coconut and the cherries and the marshmallows folded and oh the chocolate mousse the only thing i ever looked forward to my whole life that my aunt judy did was the chocolate mousse she The only thing I ever looked forward to in my whole life that my Aunt Judy did was the chocolate mousse. She'd bring over the chocolate. My cousin Danny would karate kick your head off for the chocolate mousse, right? I'd try to get in there and get it before he got some. And yeah, the chocolate mousse, man, that was a great one. And so we'd keep eating, you know, and then like more platters would come out. then like more, more platters would come out after the dessert. More platters came out for the watching of the game with peanuts and I don't know, pretzels, that kind of stuff.

More gherkins and like cheeses, I remember. And, you know, the eating just went on and on and on and on. And you just you couldn't fathom the amount of eating. And you'd look around and you realize, like, this is amazing, you know. And, you know, eventually everything would break down. I don't remember being old enough or smart enough or wise enough to sit around and watch it all. You know, I'd love to go back and watch it all from a rocking chair and just watch everyone interact and go like, wow, this is this is family in the 1990s. You know what I mean?

This is a thing because it was a beautiful thing, man. You know, it was a beautiful I mean, it doesn't get much more beautiful than that. Does it? It doesn't get much more beautiful than that. Massive. Five siblings. You know, grandkids, even great grandkids. Parents.

Spouses. You know, everybody had a spouse. It wasn't like, you know, there were not really many broken homes in my family. And then, you know, people would break down into groups you know the men watching football my uncle richie's trying to pretend like he cares about football sometimes and you know he usually rolled out pretty early with his wife and they didn't have kids yet i loved uncle richie man i wanted to go with him everywhere see i don't know it's cool i kind of had the hots for his wife, who was my aunt. But you know what I mean?

By marriage, whatever. But anyway, you know, the whole thing, right? And then eventually, you know, it would happen. You know what I mean? The worst thing in the world that could happen to a kid in a situation like that would start to happen. Friends and cousins. The cousins would start to happen. Friends and cousins. The cousins would start to leave. I would hold on to my cousin Lauren.

Don't leave. You and Aunt Donna must stay. We're going to stay and play. Can we sleep over? Please don't let it end. We're having too much fun. Eventually you went home. I have no idea what happened when i went home i'm sure i passed out i'm sure one of the things we probably watched something you know what i mean

well i forgot about the parade we always watched a parade before the parade was like you know rainbows and transgenderism i don't even know what it is but it can't be good um we'd watch the parade you know what i mean we'd get to watch the parade and then we'd all go home you know till next year till till christmas we'd be back for christmas to bum bums to man malls and it was just uh you know that's what it was it was a beautiful thing and it lasted only here's the thing about life in these beautiful moments. These beautiful moments, they happen time and time again. They happen several times. It's not like it was a 10-year span of my life. We're talking probably five occurrences, I have to imagine.

Maybe a little more than five. But it wasn't like the massive part of my life. But it wasn't like the massive part of my life. But sometimes things are so damn good that they just cement into your memory. You know what I mean? They just get ground into your memory as something magic. Even when you're that little, you understand this was special. And my family had a propensity to fight, and would fight and you know we would get in arguments and the older we the grandkids got they would fight you know the whole thing

fell apart fundamentally at the end of the day uh and then they started not dropping off you know what i mean then you start losing people you know i mean people start dying on you and you're like holy mack what's going on here i was long gone by then i left it all behind i did it was a little too much drama for me at a very young age i knew undoubtedly that if you don't cut the cancerous people out of your life you're gonna deal with them until the day you die okay i mean it's it's true it's hard but i knew it at a very young age these people have to go you know what i mean there's there's things here this was not when they were dying of drug addiction either this was just arguments and fighting and all that kind of stuff there's

always a battle going on so it's always fighting so i mean we were all cordial during the holidays we shut the hell up and ate and had fun together. You know. But it was off season that was rough. You know. There's wind blowing through the leaves right now. It's been blowing all day. And I was walking. From my favorite little cafe. And I was watching the my favorite little cafe.

And I was watching the wind rustle the leaves. Listening to the voice of the fall. You know what I mean? Watching the wind have a conversation with the leaves. Something so mundane and so ridiculous. And I started thinking to myself, as hard as it is to believe, one day you will pay anything to hear the wind rustle through the fall leaves. To see the color, that sort of rubyish color is what the tree I was looking at. To see that ruby color, you'd pay almost anything to see it one last time. A day will come in your life, a day will come in your life and they will come in my life

when we're down to those last moments those last days of suffering before we cross over and in that in those moments will be there'll be things you know what i mean and one of those things that you would give your entire life for in that moment. Every penny you earned. Every possession you had you would give for a chance to walk on your own two feet of your own free will. Down a stretch of road. A familiar stretch of road. Where you know the trees and you know the leaves. And the sky is blue and high.

And the clouds are puffy and it's fall again. and it's beautiful and your youth is there with you. And you carry your youth and you take the steps through that familiar pathway and you listen to the conversation between the wind and the rustling trees and you realize how amazing it is to be alive. Because that's gratitude, PBN family. You know, if you can find gratitude for the wind blowing through trees, it's impossible for you to exist in depression. And then you start to realize

that every blade of grass, every little thing that you look at is a miracle. And most people just need to slow the hell down and enjoy it, you know. So be gracious, PBN family. Happy Thanksgiving to you all. And this will either be my surviving America or I may drop it specifically on Thanksgiving. We'll just have to wait and see. Talk to you soon, folks. ¶¶ ¶¶ © transcript Emily Beynon