A Conversation with Michael Stershic a.k.a. My Dad

Episode 100 features a very special guest, Michael Stershic a.k.a. my Dad.

We discuss the art of long-form conversation, working together, education, parenting, get into some nature v. nurture, and so much more.

During the episode we cover:

Listening to the podcast
The Art of Long-form Conversation
Working together
Childhood memories
Staying in touch…
Chasing friends
Education
Parenting
Our Venn diagram of interests
Playing guitar
Retirement
And much more…

Mentioned and Helpful Links from This Episode

Episode 50 of The Palmer Files “A Conversation with Sybil Stershic a.k.a. My Mom.”

Music created and provided by Henno Heitur of Monkey Tongue Productions.

–End Show Notes Transmission–

–Begin Transcription–

00:00:00:17 – 00:00:21:20
Agent Palmer
Previously on agent palmer dot com. One Day Ahead spins a great story about the tour de France and mental health. Klosterman ditches the rose colored glasses to look back on the 90s, and I hope you enjoyed your caffeine fix from the last episode, because I certainly enjoyed it. This is The Palmer Files episode 100, featuring a very special guest, my dad, Michael Stershic.

00:00:21:25 – 00:01:02:33
Agent Palmer
We discuss the art of long form conversation, working together, education, parenting, and even get into some nature versus nurture. Are you ready? Let’s do the show.

00:01:02:38 – 00:01:24:47
Agent Palmer
Hello, and welcome to the Palmer Files. I’m your host, Jason Stershic. Also known as Agent Palmer. And on this 100th episode is my dad, Michael Stershic. What you are about to hear is a conversation between father and son, who we are, where we’ve been, and how we’ve become who we are together. I would also like to acknowledge that not everyone has the relationship with their father that I have with mine.

00:01:24:52 – 00:01:42:19
Agent Palmer
I feel very lucky to have a father who is a close friend and confidant. I know some very close friends to me who could not have this conversation. You are about to hear with their own fathers that makes this very special to me and something I’m very thankful to be able to share with those friends and with all of you.

00:01:42:31 – 00:01:58:57
Agent Palmer
I do not take this for granted at all. For a little behind the scenes, I would like to say that the dinner I shared with my father before this recording may have been the most quiet we have ever been at a meal. It’s not that we didn’t want to talk to each other. I believe, as you’ll hear, we enjoy that.

00:01:58:57 – 00:02:20:36
Agent Palmer
But I think neither of us wanted to break the ice to discuss what was going to be said on this episode. As I said earlier, you’ll hear us discuss the art of long form conversation working together, as well as discussing philosophies of parenting and education and our very intersecting Venn diagram of interests. All of that and a whole lot more is coming your way shortly.

00:02:20:37 – 00:02:40:44
Agent Palmer
But first, remember that if you want to discuss the episode as you listen or afterwards, you can find all contact information for myself in the show notes. My father is retired, so I guess I can pass along whatever you would like me to. Don’t forget, you can see all of my writings and rantings on Agent palmer.com. And of course email can be sent to the Palmer files at gmail.com.

00:02:40:49 – 00:02:52:14
Agent Palmer
So without further adieu, and for the 100th time, let’s get into it.

00:02:52:19 – 00:03:30:50
Agent Palmer
Dad, you are my father. You were my boss at one point, which probably will come up and I know to to to date as we were recording this. You have listened to all of the episodes that have released and obviously for, you know, many, many decades I lived with you probably more than you wanted. So the question to start off is, what have you learned in the episodes that preceded this, that you have listened, that you didn’t know from being my boss and my father ahead of time?

00:03:30:55 – 00:03:38:12
Michael Stershic
That’s a that’s a good question. And I think, first of all, congratulations on this being 100. Yeah, that’s pretty cool.

00:03:38:14 – 00:03:38:36
Agent Palmer
Yeah.

00:03:38:46 – 00:04:28:13
Michael Stershic
And, I’m hopeful. I’m hopeful. Hopefully I will have listened to all 99 preceding this. I’ve listened to all the ones that we’ve done to date. Yes. However, one of the things that I have been impressed with that I, I think I thought you were capable of, but I wasn’t sure is the art of long form conversation. I think one of the things that is missing in a lot of conversations today is that they seem to be truncated or limited to, 80 character or 140 character tweet, whatever it might be, and long form conversation which has nuance, which has ups, downs, rhythms and flows doesn’t occur.

00:04:28:13 – 00:05:03:28
Michael Stershic
And you’ve shown through the 90 plus episodes of this, you know, that you’re capable of and adept at having long form conversations with diverse people, with people who have different backgrounds, people that of subjects that, you know, not so much sometimes and sometimes, you know more. Yeah, than others. I mean, it’s it’s that’s one of the things that has been a great learning experience for me in the 90 plus episodes that I’ve listened to to date.

00:05:03:28 – 00:05:29:21
Agent Palmer
But I, I think I get some of that from you because I’ve heard you good. Go on. Like we I, I don’t know if it’s genetic, but most moms the same way like that. And maybe it’s the two of you specifically because I can’t speak to my aunts and uncles as much. But like the two of you have never had problems just communicating.

00:05:29:25 – 00:05:30:00
Agent Palmer
I guess.

00:05:30:00 – 00:05:32:11
Michael Stershic
I think conversing may be a better.

00:05:32:11 – 00:05:33:00
Agent Palmer
Okay, find.

00:05:33:05 – 00:05:39:33
Michael Stershic
A better term. But I think the the the the answer to that is I don’t think it’s genetic.

00:05:39:42 – 00:05:40:07
Agent Palmer
Okay.

00:05:40:09 – 00:06:08:01
Michael Stershic
I think it’s learned. And I think a lot of it came from for me, a lot of it started in high school when we were having a long, you know, sex, pseudo intellectual discussions in classes about a variety of topics. And it and a lot of it started around movies for me, having discussions on and, you know, pretty deep discussions on movies of that time.

00:06:08:12 – 00:06:08:42
Michael Stershic
Yeah.

00:06:08:46 – 00:06:38:16
Agent Palmer
I, I didn’t get it until, well, I think I got some of it in Israel was the, the, the, the, the, the more of the debate than anything else. It but it’s out of the class. It’s not. I don’t think I got any of it. I don’t, I don’t want to put them all down, but like, I got most of it from, like, Zapata and like the friends I had that I could talk to for hours.

00:06:38:18 – 00:07:04:15
Michael Stershic
Yeah, but that’s that. And that’s where you tend to refine it when you’re in college and especially when you’re away at college, when you have all that time, free time on your hands and you’re sitting around just bullshitting. Yeah. With with a bunch of other people, you learn that art of conversation and that setting, that’s where you refine it.

00:07:04:15 – 00:07:14:38
Michael Stershic
That’s where you get better at it. That’s where you get, you know, you learn, what you can do, what you can’t do, what works, what doesn’t work. And I think that’s where you refine it.

00:07:14:42 – 00:07:30:46
Agent Palmer
Yeah, I mean, I and I got away from it, but I also feel like. Yeah. And you saw this as my boss, but like, walk down the hall and I’d be talking to a coworker for 20 minutes.

00:07:30:46 – 00:07:32:31
Michael Stershic
Two hours later, you get back to your desk.

00:07:32:31 – 00:07:52:25
Agent Palmer
Yeah, maybe. Maybe it depended on the coworker, but, I and what’s so I, I think you were my boss at least twice because I count the internship. Well, both of them. I didn’t directly report to you really?

00:07:52:25 – 00:08:02:35
Michael Stershic
In either one of them. You weren’t even in my space. You weren’t even in the space with me. You were across the street.

00:08:02:40 – 00:08:04:58
Agent Palmer
Oh. That’s right. And, Yeah.

00:08:04:58 – 00:08:14:15
Michael Stershic
Health education in, staff. Staff education for for the first one. Yeah. The second one. You were in our space. But you work with Emily.

00:08:14:15 – 00:08:50:58
Agent Palmer
Yeah. And then the the next one. I was under Kim. Under you, I, I yeah, I, I think that for the negatives that existed, at least with the second one for working for you, it was still probably. I enjoyed working with you more than like, like that, that that overshadows all the crap of being the boss’s son and having to deal with the politics.

00:08:51:13 – 00:08:53:32
Michael Stershic
Why? Why did you enjoy that?

00:08:53:36 – 00:09:09:05
Agent Palmer
I don’t know, I think. Yeah. Oh, okay. So from a, from a, a familial place.

00:09:09:10 – 00:09:33:32
Agent Palmer
I didn’t have to sell you the full bill of goods because I don’t know how we came up with a shorthand, but it felt like I could tell you. I could sell you something in five minutes. It would take me to 15 to sell to Kim. And I don’t know how much of it is just. I knew what to say to you to convey the thought.

00:09:33:37 – 00:09:44:39
Agent Palmer
We need to do this, and it’s done. And you’re like, we’ll tell Kim, and then it’s a little bit longer. I don’t know what it is, but it just it was nice.

00:09:44:44 – 00:09:52:07
Michael Stershic
It it could be that there was a trust level between us that didn’t necessarily exist.

00:09:52:12 – 00:09:52:50
Agent Palmer
Okay.

00:09:52:55 – 00:09:56:52
Michael Stershic
With the other with your direct to your direct report.

00:09:57:05 – 00:09:58:18
Agent Palmer
That’s possible.

00:09:58:22 – 00:10:13:39
Michael Stershic
And that that could be that could be part of it. The other part of it is that to a certain extent, I knew where you were coming from and that you weren’t going to try to bullshit me when when you knew I could set vet that out.

00:10:13:41 – 00:10:22:52
Agent Palmer
Well, yeah, you’re the probably the the the only boss. I never tried to bullshit if I’m, you know, I don’t know.

00:10:22:57 – 00:10:34:00
Michael Stershic
And keep in mind you, you you for most things, you really didn’t directly report to me. No. The things that you needed to come to me for.

00:10:34:00 – 00:10:34:17
Agent Palmer
Yeah.

00:10:34:31 – 00:10:52:02
Michael Stershic
Were on your tech side of the of the job. Yeah. Which is when you had to make purchasing. You needed a, you needed an okay on purchasing decisions or, platforms or whatever it might be. Yeah. That you needed to purchase.

00:10:52:07 – 00:11:10:15
Agent Palmer
Yeah, I don’t know, I liked it, I thought it was it was kind of it. It’s different having like, you’re my boss, but my dad’s across the hall. Like that was I liked that that was fun. That was I I’m glad I had that opportunity.

00:11:10:20 – 00:11:10:45
Michael Stershic
Okay.

00:11:10:52 – 00:11:14:12
Agent Palmer
I don’t, you know.

00:11:14:17 – 00:11:25:30
Agent Palmer
I don’t we were in tourism I, I never wanted to be in tourism. That’s not, you know, I don’t know if I’d like. I don’t know if given the choice, I’d even go back.

00:11:25:30 – 00:11:27:52
Michael Stershic
But we weren’t really in tourism. We were in marketing.

00:11:27:52 – 00:11:52:45
Agent Palmer
Well, okay, that’s fine, but I’m just saying, like, I it’s not I didn’t I still didn’t I still don’t know what I want to do. Like, I didn’t know then, I don’t you ended up in tourism marketing for a while and development, you did a lot of development into your career. Did you did you know what you wanted to be?

00:11:52:50 – 00:12:04:44
Michael Stershic
I didn’t know what I wanted to be, and I sort of fell into the tourism marketing component by default.

00:12:04:49 – 00:12:05:49
Agent Palmer
Okay.

00:12:05:54 – 00:12:33:47
Michael Stershic
And that was when as I changed jobs over my career. Yeah. And look back on it, the first time I was in tourism was the only job I ever regretted leaving. Okay. Up to that time I had been in before, before the before I was in tourism the first time. That was my fifth job, okay. And I was 30 at that time.

00:12:33:51 – 00:12:40:31
Michael Stershic
All right. Or no, 32 at that time. So I had in ten years I had five jobs.

00:12:40:36 – 00:12:41:25
Agent Palmer
Okay.

00:12:41:30 – 00:13:11:34
Michael Stershic
And I that that job, when I left it to go to the in the banking which I went in for the money, I the only job ever regretted. And the reason I left that job, yeah, was because at the time we had a staff of three, and I was not home any weekend between mid-May and mid-October.

00:13:11:39 – 00:13:12:41
Agent Palmer
There was always something.

00:13:12:46 – 00:13:29:00
Michael Stershic
Always something going on that I needed to be at. Yeah. Or make an appearance at. And I thought when the opportunity came up to leave, I thought that I would never see you because, you’re you’re in school.

00:13:29:00 – 00:13:29:27
Agent Palmer
I’m in school.

00:13:29:27 – 00:13:51:38
Michael Stershic
The other time the other time the times when I’m not busy on the weekends and when I’m busy on the weekends. You’re out of school and looking for things to do. So I figured I would. Now, we took you to as many things as we could at that time. Yeah, but it was still, I knew once you hit school age, that was all going to end and you were going to.

00:13:51:47 – 00:13:53:50
Michael Stershic
I’m going to I just wasn’t going to see you.

00:13:53:54 – 00:13:54:47
Agent Palmer
So.

00:13:54:52 – 00:13:57:50
Michael Stershic
And we weren’t going to be able to spend as much time as a family together.

00:13:58:04 – 00:14:44:37
Agent Palmer
So there are two like, childhood memories with you that I still vividly remember. And neither of them are specific to date, but that’s because of the repetition. I remember, I remember coming home from the, I guess, religious school on, on Wednesday night. Because, we, we would listen to Fresh Air on the ride back and we would drive by a building that no longer exists, which is still weird to me because that building has all we, you know, for that period of time.

00:14:44:37 – 00:14:58:25
Agent Palmer
And in my memory, that building still exists. And the other one, is you driving me to the velodrome to learn cycling.

00:14:58:30 – 00:15:03:14
Agent Palmer
And that one’s weird because, like, I think the religious school one was a couple years.

00:15:03:14 – 00:15:03:42
Michael Stershic
It was.

00:15:03:42 – 00:15:04:37
Agent Palmer
The.

00:15:04:42 – 00:15:06:23
Michael Stershic
Velodrome was a couple of weeks.

00:15:06:28 – 00:15:09:15
Agent Palmer
And it might have been two summers, I think.

00:15:09:15 – 00:15:14:55
Michael Stershic
I don’t know if it was two summers, but I know it was. If it was two summers, it was probably two weeks for two summers.

00:15:14:55 – 00:15:38:43
Agent Palmer
Yeah. And it, it just and I still remember because that that particular you know, to give people context like that was when Tom Petty’s Learning to Fly was on all the time because that’s the song I that that will take me there. And I think that those, those aren’t memories that I lost. I think I always had them.

00:15:38:48 – 00:16:02:49
Agent Palmer
I think moving back here after college and then buying a house in the old neighborhood that forced me to use those roads more often, made me remember them all the more, especially when I’m on the highway and the the trip from here to the velodrome is basically the same. If I take 22 and I don’t, cut through the back roads.

00:16:02:54 – 00:16:14:15
Agent Palmer
And so but those things were after you had gone to banking, right. So are those things that you’re saying if you had stayed originally, probably wouldn’t have.

00:16:14:15 – 00:16:15:17
Michael Stershic
I don’t know the answer to that.

00:16:15:18 – 00:16:15:51
Agent Palmer
Okay.

00:16:15:56 – 00:16:23:38
Michael Stershic
I really don’t. The things might not have been the same. They may have. I just can’t I can’t predict that.

00:16:23:38 – 00:16:26:35
Agent Palmer
That’s fine. But you remember. I mean, you remember those drives.

00:16:26:36 – 00:16:32:49
Michael Stershic
I remember those drives. Yeah. And I remember having to get you back home, but then getting to work.

00:16:32:54 – 00:16:45:14
Agent Palmer
Yeah. Yeah, I it’s it’s I it’s weird coming back here. You you you went to college and then stayed here basically. I mean.

00:16:45:18 – 00:16:46:42
Michael Stershic
Yep.

00:16:46:46 – 00:17:00:54
Agent Palmer
Yeah. Honesdale aside and then coming back. It was can you imagine going back to Baltimore after college? Because that was the weird the weirdest thing for me was it was a different part of the Valley. But like, we came back here.

00:17:00:59 – 00:17:06:57
Michael Stershic
I interviewed for jobs out of when I was at Lehigh, for jobs in Baltimore.

00:17:07:02 – 00:17:08:00
Agent Palmer
To go home.

00:17:08:05 – 00:17:09:19
Michael Stershic
To go back to live there.

00:17:09:19 – 00:17:09:57
Agent Palmer
Okay.

00:17:10:02 – 00:17:37:04
Michael Stershic
And, I didn’t I, I was offered one, one job in Baltimore, which I’m glad I didn’t take. Okay. Because the company doesn’t exist today and it didn’t exist probably ten years after I interviewed for the company. I don’t know that I, I don’t remember the timing of when they went out of business, but. Okay. That was for a computer that was in computer sales.

00:17:37:09 – 00:17:37:47
Agent Palmer
Oh, wow.

00:17:37:47 – 00:17:44:51
Michael Stershic
Okay. Back in, that would have been 1974. Okay. So it was a whole different world of computers, and that was you couldn’t.

00:17:44:51 – 00:17:45:45
Agent Palmer
Pick them up by yourself.

00:17:45:51 – 00:18:11:43
Michael Stershic
And pick them up. Right. Exactly. So it was a different world. And that business, that line of business disappeared. Yeah. Six years in. Okay. So I have no idea what happened to the company. And, I was offered a job here. Yep. And I graduated in December instead of May early. So I had a I got a job that I started in mid-February after I finished in December.

00:18:11:48 – 00:18:12:13
Agent Palmer
Okay.

00:18:12:24 – 00:18:13:42
Michael Stershic
And that was here.

00:18:13:47 – 00:18:20:35
Agent Palmer
Did did you fall in love with the area while you were in college, or did it take a little bit?

00:18:20:40 – 00:18:46:55
Michael Stershic
I think we did. Mom and I decided that this would be a good place. She she was willing to look in Baltimore, although she really didn’t want to live in Baltimore. After having some experiences down there. Okay. One of them, when I was interviewing for a job, she had my mother was shopping and had an interesting experience, which I won’t get into.

00:18:46:57 – 00:19:10:04
Michael Stershic
Okay. But, the, she didn’t really didn’t want to live there. The heat and humidity, you know, in Baltimore is. And when it gets humid here, people are complaining when it’s 55, 60% humidity, when it was 80, 90% humidity in Baltimore, you just couldn’t move. You know. And that was just wasn’t something that she was willing to put up with.

00:19:10:11 – 00:19:32:29
Michael Stershic
Okay. But we we did like the area we lived in South Bethlehem, when, when we first got married. And then fat moved to Fountain Hill. That right down the street from where you are now. Yeah. But we we were able to. People thought we were crazy because we would walk all over the place. We could walk to go out to eat.

00:19:32:29 – 00:19:42:28
Michael Stershic
We’d walk to go to the Godfrey Daniels for entertainment. Yeah. We all that stuff was stuff that we would walk to from wherever we lived in South Bethlehem.

00:19:42:33 – 00:20:01:31
Agent Palmer
I mean, I, I, I’ve started to do that more recently. But I don’t, I don’t get out as much. I’m not I that’s the one thing you it you and mom are much I will say more social than I am. I will say that.

00:20:01:46 – 00:20:05:49
Michael Stershic
You can say that I think you’re social, but in a different way.

00:20:05:54 – 00:20:09:13
Agent Palmer
Okay. That’s. Yeah, I mean, it it I’ve had this.

00:20:09:13 – 00:20:23:44
Michael Stershic
Is how you define social. I mean, if you define social as being out and about and a social butterfly, that’s not, it’s not, you know, but if you’re talking about getting together with a close group of friends on a regular basis, you’re pretty social.

00:20:23:49 – 00:20:25:42
Agent Palmer
Yeah, yeah, I, I.

00:20:25:55 – 00:20:30:53
Michael Stershic
And that doesn’t mean getting together physically. It could be on the phone or whatever.

00:20:30:53 – 00:20:38:23
Agent Palmer
Well, I think I’m one of the few people that’s keeping, like, phones in business as, like a.

00:20:38:23 – 00:20:39:38
Michael Stershic
As a conversation as a.

00:20:39:40 – 00:21:16:43
Agent Palmer
As a, as a, you know, not just a text SMS platform. I’ve been doing this show for decades. I, I want to fast forward for a second. You I am in college, and you have a job not where mom is. And, I think that that because I would talk to you on a kind of weekly basis, maybe a little more.

00:21:16:43 – 00:21:46:47
Agent Palmer
Maybe the average is one and a half per week or something like that. And I think that is the, that is the set up for our relationship. Now. I would come home occasionally, whether you or. Yeah, just occasionally. But I think that sets it up because obviously I was in an apartment like a mile from the house, when I first started working for you.

00:21:46:52 – 00:22:14:30
Agent Palmer
And to, to mom’s dismay, I didn’t come home. But and but but it wasn’t until you retired. I think we went back to what it was. I talked to you one once or twice a week, and I see you couple times a month. Yeah, I, I like how that’s evolved from that moment, because it feels like it evolved from that moment.

00:22:14:30 – 00:22:43:45
Agent Palmer
Because after that moment, I moved back home. And I stay with you for like 18,000 years. Yeah, it was a long time. I, I but, you know, I look around at people that don’t talk to their family willingly in that way. And I feel like it because of you through osmosis, because you talk to your brothers and mom talks to her siblings.

00:22:43:50 – 00:22:47:35
Agent Palmer
What, what it it feels like once a week, maybe more.

00:22:47:35 – 00:22:55:25
Michael Stershic
But I generally have conversations with my brothers once a week, and my one of my brothers at least twice a week.

00:22:55:30 – 00:23:01:52
Agent Palmer
Yeah. Was did did that come down from on high like when when grandad was still around? How I like.

00:23:01:56 – 00:23:16:52
Michael Stershic
One of the things that your grandfather said to all of us before he passed away. And it sticks to me to this day as he said, don’t lose each other.

00:23:16:57 – 00:23:17:57
Agent Palmer
Okay?

00:23:18:02 – 00:23:47:25
Michael Stershic
You know, because he had seen so many family members that just didn’t communicate with one another, not his immediate family, because he called his sister every day. Okay. After, after my mother. Well, after my mother passed away, he he basically called her, I think it was almost every day. Okay. And, his brother had passed at that point, so it was and his parents had had passed.

00:23:47:30 – 00:23:54:09
Michael Stershic
So the only one of his immediate family remaining was. Yeah, it was his sister.

00:23:54:14 – 00:23:55:54
Agent Palmer
Okay.

00:23:55:59 – 00:24:03:35
Michael Stershic
And he did, but I remember that distinctly. He was very you know, he said, you know, promise me this. You guys never lose each other.

00:24:03:48 – 00:24:26:11
Agent Palmer
I, I think I’ve got that for my friends now because, I’ve, I’ve had friends that I have lost in that way. Is it. I don’t call and then you don’t call. And then all of a sudden it’s been three years, and I’m probably not talking to you ever again because I’m not a I’m not a Facebook person.

00:24:26:11 – 00:24:30:29
Agent Palmer
So I’m not going to see random things pop up.

00:24:30:34 – 00:24:38:03
Michael Stershic
There’s, there’s a frustration that I have and you probably just expressed it in a different way.

00:24:38:03 – 00:24:38:51
Agent Palmer
Okay.

00:24:38:55 – 00:24:49:29
Michael Stershic
And that is that I used to chase friends, people. If I hadn’t heard from in a while, I would be the one to call.

00:24:49:34 – 00:24:50:47
Agent Palmer
Well, I got that from you then.

00:24:50:47 – 00:24:55:39
Michael Stershic
So that’s and I’ve stopped doing that to the extent that I used to.

00:24:55:50 – 00:24:56:42
Agent Palmer
Okay.

00:24:56:47 – 00:25:06:49
Michael Stershic
And the reason I’ve stopped doing it is because I have enough to do I mean, you know, there’s and there’s a lot of people I do keep in touch with that, keep in touch with me.

00:25:06:53 – 00:25:07:51
Agent Palmer
Okay.

00:25:07:56 – 00:25:30:26
Michael Stershic
And, so we, you know, we, we if I don’t call somebody within a certain period of time, they’ll call me and say, well, where you been? You know what’s up? And I think that’s the one thing I’ve done is just cut back in that work of getting in touch with people that I haven’t talked to in a while.

00:25:30:26 – 00:25:53:08
Agent Palmer
Yeah. And it’s not. I think that because I’m not on Facebook, which I pick on a lot, but like in this regard, Facebook is the one that will actively go out to get you to keep on the platform. So they’ll show you stuff from people you haven’t seen in a while. And because I don’t see that, I, I it’s on me to find out what’s going on.

00:25:53:13 – 00:25:55:59
Michael Stershic
I think people use Facebook for different reasons.

00:25:56:04 – 00:25:56:45
Agent Palmer
Well, sure.

00:25:56:45 – 00:26:26:13
Michael Stershic
Yeah. I use Facebook for two reasons. I keep up with what’s happening with with my family and, and cousins, mainly my cousins, because they’re the ones on it because they’re talking about their kids. Okay. So I can keep up with what’s happening with my cousins kids. Okay. Even though half of them I’ve never met in person. Yeah. And you know, you you’ll learn about stuff that way that you wouldn’t otherwise know.

00:26:26:13 – 00:26:26:31
Michael Stershic
Yeah.

00:26:26:31 – 00:26:27:03
Agent Palmer
That’s fair.

00:26:27:03 – 00:26:38:50
Michael Stershic
And the other one is some, some, like, high school classmates and friends like that, that I’m not I don’t have a communicating relationship with. But I want to know what’s going on.

00:26:38:54 – 00:26:40:28
Agent Palmer
Okay. That’s fair.

00:26:40:32 – 00:26:48:24
Michael Stershic
And that’s the only reason I use Facebook, because that otherwise I couldn’t care. I don’t really want to use it.

00:26:48:34 – 00:27:06:42
Agent Palmer
I look, I and I pick on some pilot because he’s like the one high school friend I still have, and there’s a few, like, around him, but, like, I don’t I don’t miss the fact that I don’t have a high school, really, like a real relationship with anybody in my high school class. And Zapata wasn’t in my class.

00:27:06:42 – 00:27:10:32
Agent Palmer
I mean, that’s the other thing. I actually don’t have a relationship with anybody in my graduating class.

00:27:10:32 – 00:27:19:52
Michael Stershic
Well, you have a different excuse for that. You left high school at the end of your junior year.

00:27:19:52 – 00:27:20:34
Agent Palmer
Well.

00:27:20:38 – 00:27:37:24
Michael Stershic
No. And excuse me, in the middle of your junior year. Yeah. So you would have had another three semesters with your class had you stayed. Yeah, but you wouldn’t have had the experience that you had without that.

00:27:37:24 – 00:27:55:50
Agent Palmer
No, I get that. I just I wonder like, because I know that one of the reasons that my college experience was so rough off the bat is because I was living that senior life ish in college, instead of as a lazy high school senior, right?

00:27:55:55 – 00:27:59:54
Michael Stershic
Yeah. You didn’t have senioritis your senior year? No, because you were a freshman.

00:28:00:03 – 00:28:30:52
Agent Palmer
Yeah. So I it’s but but and this is I’m glad we’re here because I can talk about this. So key Keystone wasn’t a big campus, but it was far enough away that I could have disappeared. Maybe. Perhaps. But you were in health care at the time, and there was an office on campus that, I don’t know. Were you on their board?

00:28:30:52 – 00:28:33:47
Michael Stershic
I was the board president at that time. Yeah.

00:28:33:51 – 00:28:39:58
Agent Palmer
So ignoring mom’s connections to the actual campus, there were people around campus that.

00:28:39:58 – 00:28:53:38
Michael Stershic
Do you and mom’s connection on campus came through me. I the reason that I know, I know that is because I had her facilitate a strategic planning retreat for that board.

00:28:53:45 – 00:28:54:29
Agent Palmer
Okay.

00:28:54:34 – 00:29:10:37
Michael Stershic
At which the dean participated. So when and that she got to know mom and hired mom to to militate something for her at Keystone, and they kept working with her after that.

00:29:10:41 – 00:29:28:09
Agent Palmer
So this is why if you go back and listen to episode 50, when I told my mother in order to get away, I’d have to move to a different country. That’s part of it is because, like, you were both so connected,

00:29:28:13 – 00:29:30:32
Michael Stershic
Well, mom’s network was more national.

00:29:30:37 – 00:29:31:21
Agent Palmer
Yeah.

00:29:31:26 – 00:29:38:39
Michael Stershic
It was her marketing association experience. My network was really regional.

00:29:38:50 – 00:29:41:22
Agent Palmer
Yeah, but it was quite extensive.

00:29:41:26 – 00:29:42:58
Michael Stershic
Yeah. You couldn’t get away with anything?

00:29:43:04 – 00:29:46:07
Agent Palmer
No, no. Anywhere I tried.

00:29:46:12 – 00:29:48:07
Michael Stershic
And no, you did, and it didn’t work.

00:29:48:09 – 00:30:10:41
Agent Palmer
No, it never did. It never did. And I, I will say it’s it, I don’t know. I still haven’t determined by the way, if it’s a blessing or a curse that I still keep running into people that remember me when and it’s like, you know, hand down it waste, you know, I still don’t know if that’s good or bad.

00:30:10:41 – 00:30:18:53
Michael Stershic
Well, if I tell you what it it from a social perspective.

00:30:18:58 – 00:30:22:17
Agent Palmer
By the way. Horrifying because I don’t remember any names.

00:30:22:17 – 00:30:23:19
Michael Stershic
Right. That’s okay.

00:30:23:19 – 00:30:23:42
Agent Palmer
Okay.

00:30:23:56 – 00:30:55:48
Michael Stershic
But from a social perspective, as a younger person. Yeah. You were more adept at communicating with adults than most of your peers were. And and I think the reason for that is because we took you to so many things that we went to, and that you had to communicate because I was out gallivanting around doing my networking and seeing the people that I had to see at those events.

00:30:55:48 – 00:31:11:27
Michael Stershic
Yep. And you and I would leave you and mom alone, or sometimes you would be sitting under the table at some event just doing playing with a game or something, or a truck and either and people would come up and talk to you.

00:31:11:32 – 00:31:22:27
Agent Palmer
Yeah, I mean part. So I again and this comes up well it’s part of it’s the only child thing. I think if you had if I had a sibling, you wouldn’t have taken two of us.

00:31:22:32 – 00:31:23:11
Michael Stershic
And we may have.

00:31:23:11 – 00:31:23:42
Agent Palmer
Maybe.

00:31:23:44 – 00:31:26:15
Michael Stershic
Not. Maybe not as often.

00:31:26:20 – 00:31:54:33
Agent Palmer
But like I have aunts and uncles in the valley that are not blood related because of how often I would see them. Yeah, at that time. And it them it’s nice to run into but like I don’t I it’s. And now because I worked with you for so long it’s blurred. Now that I don’t know how I, there are a lot of people that know me that I have no idea how, how, how, how they know me.

00:31:54:38 – 00:32:01:35
Agent Palmer
And I still haven’t figured out the tact other than just like, ignoring that and moving on.

00:32:01:40 – 00:32:27:28
Michael Stershic
Or you can just ask, I am I know there’s a lot of people that come up to me and know me, but the that say they know me. Yeah, but it could be because they heard me speak. And I spoke to so many groups around the valley. Okay, that people may have heard me speak multiple times, but they were there were 100 people in the audience or 150 people in the audience.

00:32:27:36 – 00:32:30:05
Michael Stershic
I couldn’t pick one person out.

00:32:30:10 – 00:32:31:05
Agent Palmer
Okay.

00:32:31:10 – 00:32:33:09
Michael Stershic
But that may be how they know me.

00:32:33:14 – 00:32:41:57
Agent Palmer
You. You also taught right for a bit. Yes. At various institutions around the valley and mainly community colleges.

00:32:41:57 – 00:32:42:59
Michael Stershic
Yeah, okay.

00:32:43:04 – 00:32:45:17
Agent Palmer
And in various things.

00:32:45:22 – 00:32:51:10
Michael Stershic
Mainly it was nonprofit management. Okay.

00:32:51:15 – 00:33:28:40
Agent Palmer
I, I, I’ve been saving this because I’ve, I’ve been very curious like I have floundered from thing to thing and not really found a, a I was comfortable working for you. Was that the career I should be in? I don’t know, And I think it’s the same is true of other things. But, like. And I, I had a hand at teaching for a little bit, like, for, like, half a semester, and I actually, you and I taught together right at a certain point.

00:33:28:40 – 00:33:36:52
Agent Palmer
But, and which led to me teaching a class and I don’t remember. Well, I think it was like presentational technology or.

00:33:36:57 – 00:33:37:13
Michael Stershic
Something.

00:33:37:13 – 00:33:53:47
Agent Palmer
Like that, for like a semester or something. But like, you’ve been very good at not saying, like, hey, you should do this thing. Has it been easy to just kind of like, not say, hey, you should do that thing?

00:33:53:54 – 00:34:16:55
Michael Stershic
No, not in a minute. It has not been easy. And and let me meld two things together here. Okay? My, my philosophy in parenting was never to tell you what you need to do in terms of work or life.

00:34:17:06 – 00:34:17:52
Agent Palmer
Yep.

00:34:17:57 – 00:34:22:20
Michael Stershic
I there were a couple of times that I did tell you what you needed to do because you asked that.

00:34:22:25 – 00:34:24:31
Agent Palmer
I asked, you know, but sure.

00:34:24:36 – 00:34:45:36
Michael Stershic
But that’s one philosophy. The second philosophy was that I needed you to make your own mistakes, and I tried not to protect you from making those mistakes unless it was dangerous. Yep. And and from that, that’s where you get that or I didn’t tell you.

00:34:45:47 – 00:34:46:07
Agent Palmer
Yeah.

00:34:46:18 – 00:34:58:54
Michael Stershic
What direction to go. And I know a lot of parents who managed their kids. Yeah. And they managed their kids lives. And they wouldn’t be where they are today without their parents.

00:34:58:58 – 00:35:00:50
Agent Palmer
I wouldn’t be here without you, though, either.

00:35:00:50 – 00:35:02:32
Michael Stershic
Oh, it’s a different way. A different way.

00:35:02:36 – 00:35:03:44
Agent Palmer
Right. Hey. All right.

00:35:03:48 – 00:35:05:43
Michael Stershic
They wouldn’t we were. They are. Yeah. I mean that’s.

00:35:05:43 – 00:35:30:20
Agent Palmer
Fair. I but like I don’t know because I’m not a parent and it’s obviously a conversation that happens in this house because like, there’s, at a certain point you don’t want to be like a 70 year old new father, right? But like, because I don’t know. And I’ve got friends that have kids, like, I just think, like.

00:35:30:25 – 00:35:49:34
Agent Palmer
I asked when I felt like. I asked when I was supposed to, like for your opinion. But, like, I, I, I, I don’t know if if it like, it feels like that’s the way it should have been. Like, it feels like that was the right thing for me.

00:35:49:39 – 00:35:54:31
Michael Stershic
If that’s. But that’s that’s good. I’m glad. Yeah. That worked.

00:35:54:36 – 00:36:18:53
Agent Palmer
But now, you know, if you want to tell me, I should definitely get this job. Like, that’s fine. Like, because I. Because here’s the thing. I and and and it comes up on the show quite a bit when we talk about like people that know what they want to do. And people that kind of eventually figure it out.

00:36:18:58 – 00:36:21:28
Agent Palmer
I’m just interested in too many things.

00:36:21:32 – 00:36:23:48
Michael Stershic
Well, there’s, there’s.

00:36:23:51 – 00:36:28:30
Agent Palmer
I can blame you for that, by the way, because you seem to be interested in a lot of things.

00:36:28:30 – 00:36:30:53
Michael Stershic
Yes, that’s true. And we’re curious person and.

00:36:30:53 – 00:36:39:58
Agent Palmer
We have an overlap of of immense like our Venn diagram is not a circle was not like not that.

00:36:39:58 – 00:36:47:57
Michael Stershic
Far. Yeah. The, the the thing that that I think is.

00:36:48:02 – 00:37:14:55
Michael Stershic
The most fascinating thing about our overlapping Venn diagrams, if you want to call it that or our or the reason that we’re interested in many different things is that we didn’t have a focused education. And, and what I mean by that is we were both in the liberal arts.

00:37:15:04 – 00:37:16:06
Agent Palmer
Yep.

00:37:16:11 – 00:37:48:40
Michael Stershic
And I have my my opinion on education is an outlier. Most people think that you get an education to get a job. My philosophy on education is you go to you, you go to college to train your mind, okay? To learn how to learn. And if you do college right, you’re never going to stop learning or being curious about learning.

00:37:48:45 – 00:38:14:12
Michael Stershic
And I think you’ve got that from what your background was. Mom and I got it from where we came from. And frankly, for both of us majoring in social psychology, yeah. And that was a big focus of ours. I took I ran out of courses to take in social psych by my senior year, and I graduated early, so I only had half a senior year.

00:38:14:17 – 00:38:20:46
Michael Stershic
And I ended up taking graduate level social psych courses to have other social psych courses to take.

00:38:20:46 – 00:38:21:44
Agent Palmer
Okay.

00:38:21:49 – 00:38:36:34
Michael Stershic
So I had a lot of those, but I also had a pretty broad, cadre of other courses that I took it you we do star education every day of our careers. Both of us.

00:38:36:39 – 00:38:46:16
Agent Palmer
Yeah. Yeah. Well, well, here’s a question. I and I’ve said this before, I, I learned a lot more out of the classroom than I did in a college.

00:38:46:16 – 00:38:47:39
Michael Stershic
A college. Yeah.

00:38:47:44 – 00:38:50:16
Agent Palmer
Is that is that was that true for you?

00:38:50:20 – 00:38:58:12
Michael Stershic
It was mixed. I learned a lot in the classroom. Okay. But I also learned a lot out of the classroom. All right. So I can’t put a 50, 50, 60, 40.

00:38:58:12 – 00:39:08:34
Agent Palmer
Oh, that’s fair. I just, I just, I, I just know for me, it was like astronomically more outside of the classroom. And part of that is.

00:39:08:39 – 00:39:21:06
Agent Palmer
I did it to myself. Like I got involved and I learned how to lead, despite the fact that I don’t want to be a leader. And which is a different that. That’s right. There’s a whole.

00:39:21:11 – 00:39:35:29
Michael Stershic
You had an opportunity to do things at Keystone that very few people in larger campuses have the opportunity to, to do in terms of the breadth and depth of leadership positions that you were able to.

00:39:35:29 – 00:39:41:34
Agent Palmer
Hold. Yeah, yeah. And I don’t know if it’s I, I honestly don’t know if it’s a good thing or a bad thing.

00:39:41:39 – 00:39:51:59
Michael Stershic
Well, it was a learning experience. Well you one two you had an incredibly positive relationship with the school president.

00:39:51:59 – 00:40:23:26
Agent Palmer
But that I believe, because I also had a, relationship with two of the vice presidents. And I think that goes back to you taking me to events and being able to talk to somebody decades older than me. Right? Because I, I was not intimidated. He was the like, the thing about the president at the time was given the age gap, he could have retired a long time ago before he there were people on campus that looked at him like their grandfather and treated him like with baby hands.

00:40:23:26 – 00:40:28:39
Agent Palmer
And I just talked to the guy, and I think that’s part of that other piece.

00:40:28:39 – 00:40:33:25
Michael Stershic
Right. And he appreciated that relationship.

00:40:33:30 – 00:40:34:07
Agent Palmer
I don’t.

00:40:34:11 – 00:40:35:00
Michael Stershic
I mean, he did.

00:40:35:02 – 00:41:07:01
Agent Palmer
Okay. Yeah, I mean, I, I liked it too. And I, I the the thing that I haven’t figured out yet is, and especially when you talk about, like, now, the podcast, the blog, maybe getting into video like, the, the I have, a greater fear of success than I do failure, which I’ve talked about before, but I don’t know where the fear of failure comes from, because I’ll.

00:41:07:06 – 00:41:24:58
Agent Palmer
I don’t remember failing that much if I’m like, I like and I’m not I’m not talking about grades. But just like then, like I tried to do a thing and failed and I don’t remember that. So I don’t know why I’m afraid of it so much.

00:41:25:03 – 00:41:30:50
Michael Stershic
We’re all afraid of failure. I mean, it’s it’s it’s human nature. I mean, it’s nothing. It’s it’s nothing new.

00:41:30:55 – 00:41:58:26
Agent Palmer
Maybe I don’t I, I want to get back to our Venn diagram for a moment, you know, because this started this started slightly before you retired. But, trading books with you, has been a joy that I. I didn’t know I needed until we started doing it. Because it’s not like I inherited a lot of books from you.

00:41:58:26 – 00:42:00:44
Agent Palmer
So it’s not like we didn’t read similar.

00:42:00:44 – 00:42:01:24
Michael Stershic
Similar books.

00:42:01:38 – 00:42:24:00
Agent Palmer
But like, just the fact that we were picking up new books and trading them off has been, I don’t know, enlightening a bit. Because we, we do kind of have interests all over the place. Also, would you have picked up the guitar without me. Yeah. Okay.

00:42:24:05 – 00:42:28:22
Michael Stershic
Yeah I picked actually I picked up guitar when we were in Honesdale. You recall.

00:42:28:30 – 00:42:30:01
Agent Palmer
Yeah. But I had already been.

00:42:30:01 – 00:42:37:30
Michael Stershic
Yeah you had but I, I needed a whether it would have been a guitar or something else. Yeah. It was almost banjo.

00:42:37:34 – 00:42:38:20
Agent Palmer
Okay.

00:42:38:25 – 00:42:53:54
Michael Stershic
But the guy left, the teacher left the area, so that wasn’t going to happen. Yep. And I found a really good guitar teacher. In fact, if I had stayed with him, yeah, I probably would have been a much different guitar player than I am today.

00:42:54:09 – 00:42:55:02
Agent Palmer
Okay.

00:42:55:06 – 00:43:08:05
Michael Stershic
Because I started, I didn’t start playing until I was in my 40s. Yeah, never played a musical instrument before. So just it was I was intimidated from the get go and I’m still intimidated.

00:43:08:05 – 00:43:09:49
Agent Palmer
I don’t know why you’re better than I am.

00:43:09:49 – 00:43:10:16
Michael Stershic
I don’t think.

00:43:10:16 – 00:43:11:28
Agent Palmer
So. I think so.

00:43:11:32 – 00:43:34:36
Michael Stershic
But that there were different. Well, but I think one of the things that that, I needed guitar as a therapy, it was, it was therapy for me because it got me thinking about something other than work and work. Was it? And working at, that I was doing at that time, at that time was all and all consuming.

00:43:34:44 – 00:43:43:27
Agent Palmer
But okay. But here’s a question. Wasn’t it that way up until you retired, I mean, you still had guitar, so you didn’t escape it.

00:43:43:32 – 00:44:04:01
Michael Stershic
In a different way. Okay. In a different way. The stress levels weren’t nearly as high. Okay. Except that I was running the place. And there’s a different stress level when you’re the boss. The boss, because you have the lives of X number of employees and their families that you’re responsible for. And I took that very seriously.

00:44:04:06 – 00:44:32:37
Agent Palmer
The is there. Because because I know my anxiety slightly different. But like it feels like we all deal with we and I. You, myself and one uncle seem to have a similar like stress tolerance. Is that genetic or is it just like circum kind of circumstantial?

00:44:32:41 – 00:44:43:47
Michael Stershic
I think that’s life experience. I think the three people that you’re talking about are the only three people in our immediate family that have gone away to school.

00:44:43:52 – 00:44:45:50
Agent Palmer
Okay.

00:44:45:54 – 00:44:47:21
Michael Stershic
Well that went away to college.

00:44:47:21 – 00:44:48:44
Agent Palmer
Yeah.

00:44:48:49 – 00:44:52:12
Michael Stershic
The other stayed home or didn’t go to college.

00:44:52:21 – 00:44:52:58
Agent Palmer
Okay.

00:44:53:02 – 00:44:54:34
Michael Stershic
Or we’re very close to home.

00:44:54:34 – 00:44:56:56
Agent Palmer
Yeah, okay. Because I think.

00:44:56:56 – 00:45:10:31
Michael Stershic
That’s a and that’s a life experience which is different than those folks who commute to college or, or live within, you know, even closer than you lived when you were at Keystone because you were about a little over an hour away.

00:45:10:31 – 00:45:12:31
Agent Palmer
I might as well have been. Yeah.

00:45:12:31 – 00:45:16:18
Michael Stershic
But I mean, that was a could have been a world away, depending on.

00:45:16:23 – 00:45:24:57
Agent Palmer
Yeah. I mean, I came home with like three. I mean, freshman year I came home to do laundry and by like the second semester, I stayed on campus to do laundry.

00:45:24:57 – 00:45:30:37
Michael Stershic
Yeah, yeah. And we tried to convince the college to to keep the doors open year round so that you could stay there.

00:45:30:37 – 00:45:44:15
Agent Palmer
And I did. They did I mean, I, I stay I there are at least there was at least one Thanksgiving break I stayed I have no idea why there was, two winter sessions that I was there for.

00:45:44:20 – 00:45:45:06
Michael Stershic
M summers.

00:45:45:06 – 00:46:00:22
Agent Palmer
Two summers. Which is why had it not been for the on campus requirement for credits my senior year, I might have graduated in December 2nd. Although I know.

00:46:00:26 – 00:46:05:38
Michael Stershic
They, they wouldn’t have been, they wouldn’t have been as happy to see you leave in December as they were in June.

00:46:05:43 – 00:46:05:59
Agent Palmer
They.

00:46:06:00 – 00:46:08:30
Michael Stershic
Well or May whenever that was graduation was.

00:46:08:43 – 00:46:15:21
Agent Palmer
I, I don’t think, I think I’m the only one in the family got a standing ovation for leaving.

00:46:15:26 – 00:46:23:07
Michael Stershic
Well, you got the biggest cheer from the faculty, of leaving. That’s true. You had a reputation. I.

00:46:23:11 – 00:46:25:30
Agent Palmer
I don’t know if it was deserved.

00:46:25:35 – 00:46:33:05
Michael Stershic
In some ways, it was, And people didn’t know you by your name. That, though.

00:46:33:07 – 00:46:34:31
Agent Palmer
So I don’t know if that helped or not.

00:46:34:33 – 00:46:39:13
Michael Stershic
I wish more people knew you by your pseudonym than they knew you by your given name.

00:46:39:13 – 00:46:47:44
Agent Palmer
That’s true. This is. Which is still true. I’ve kept that. Apparently, that’s been a a nice chip.

00:46:47:49 – 00:46:49:49
Michael Stershic
Or whatever.

00:46:49:54 – 00:46:53:10
Agent Palmer
I don’t know, I don’t know.

00:46:53:15 – 00:47:02:24
Agent Palmer
Has it, I you you you didn’t read the blog much when I was writing. Just writing.

00:47:02:29 – 00:47:08:04
Michael Stershic
I didn’t read it as much as I listened to your podcasts. Okay? It wasn’t as regular.

00:47:08:09 – 00:47:10:11
Agent Palmer
Well, a part of that was circumstance.

00:47:10:16 – 00:47:10:58
Michael Stershic

00:47:11:03 – 00:47:16:50
Agent Palmer
But I also think that this is a medium more for you to consume.

00:47:16:55 – 00:47:32:17
Michael Stershic
It’s not necessarily I do a lot of more reading than I do listening. This is the only podcast that I really listen to on a regular basis. And the difference is I can multitask. Yeah. And listen to this at the same time.

00:47:32:22 – 00:47:35:18
Agent Palmer
As it tuned me out and just listens to the guest, I.

00:47:35:18 – 00:47:39:06
Michael Stershic
Can’t read when I’m doing it. Yeah, but I could do other stuff.

00:47:39:08 – 00:47:42:14
Agent Palmer
Yeah. You can’t write either. I can’t write, and there’s.

00:47:42:19 – 00:47:43:04
Michael Stershic
Yeah.

00:47:43:09 – 00:47:51:25
Agent Palmer
But you I mean. Have you, have you adjusted now this is years into your retirement at this point.

00:47:51:25 – 00:47:53:35
Michael Stershic
And I’m starting my fifth year of retirement.

00:47:53:35 – 00:47:56:58
Agent Palmer
And have you like, this is good. You’re good.

00:47:57:03 – 00:47:57:58
Michael Stershic
Oh, I’ve been great.

00:47:58:03 – 00:47:58:26
Agent Palmer
Okay.

00:47:58:26 – 00:48:04:22
Michael Stershic
I’ve enjoyed it. All right. And I think the third three things that I have enjoyed most about retirement.

00:48:04:36 – 00:48:05:31
Agent Palmer
Yeah.

00:48:05:36 – 00:48:09:44
Michael Stershic
One is the lack of stress. Okay. Of of being the boss.

00:48:09:44 – 00:48:10:17
Agent Palmer
Okay.

00:48:10:22 – 00:48:31:06
Michael Stershic
You know, if I weren’t the boss, I might not have retired as early as I did. But being the boss, there’s that comes along with the stresses that as I mentioned before. Sure. Second, I’ve been able to read a heck of a lot more and read a variety of things. And I’ve been reading both paper and digital.

00:48:31:13 – 00:48:53:26
Michael Stershic
Yep. I’ve learned to read digital, which wasn’t those one of those things that I wanted to do, but I, I, I’ve been able to find a reasonably inexpensive source of books online that I can get cheaply. And it’s rather than having the I’d have a house full of books, even after I got rid of a lot of books when I retired.

00:48:53:26 – 00:49:12:43
Michael Stershic
Yeah. And then the third, the third thing is that I’ve been able to spend the time doing the things that I want. I prefer to do. Yeah. You know, the boards that I’m on or things that I wanted to do, playing guitar, taking guitar lessons, doing the reading. Those are things I want to spend my time doing.

00:49:12:47 – 00:49:24:11
Michael Stershic
I’d like we we would like to travel more, but circumstances didn’t permit that. Yeah. So as much as we’d like and hopefully we’ll be able to get back to that.

00:49:24:16 – 00:50:01:05
Agent Palmer
Okay. I, I have had a taste of this like I, I’ve, I’ve treated my unemployment as a somewhat retirement like this is what it would be like. I’m not on as many boards as you and I still have this content stuff that I’m I’m churning out. It feels kind of nice, but, like, I’m only 40, so, like, the stress level of, like, well, can I afford to have a retirement when I’m young enough to appreciate it?

00:50:01:10 – 00:50:04:33
Agent Palmer
It’s just like steadily growing year after year.

00:50:04:38 – 00:50:11:28
Michael Stershic
Yeah, but the concept of retirement for your generation, I think, is going to be different than it is for my generation.

00:50:11:28 – 00:50:32:20
Agent Palmer
All right. But here’s a question. I put out one blog a week. I put out one podcast every two. And I, for the foreseeable future, that doesn’t seem like it’s going to change. And I’ve I’ve done such as part of what would have been my retirement. Does that seem like too much? No. Okay.

00:50:32:25 – 00:50:40:04
Michael Stershic
It doesn’t. All right. I think the hard part is tracking down the people to talk to.

00:50:40:09 – 00:50:41:43
Agent Palmer
Well, in your podcast, that’s well.

00:50:41:43 – 00:50:50:35
Michael Stershic
That’s the more difficult piece. But as long as you’re comfortable doing that, it’s I don’t think it’s that’s overwhelming.

00:50:50:35 – 00:51:09:54
Agent Palmer
No. Yeah. I just, I just I look at it like, you know, I don’t I don’t need to make money at it as long as it’s fun and, you know, luckily you and mom have been pretty supportive and haven’t been asking me like when I’m going to write my next book or a book.

00:51:09:58 – 00:51:15:15
Michael Stershic
No, we’ve been asking her that question. What about the third book?

00:51:15:15 – 00:51:25:02
Agent Palmer
Yeah, she’s got a got to finish the trilogy.

00:51:25:06 – 00:51:46:36
Agent Palmer
Similar to episode 50. I think you’ve heard like that with my mother. I have a great relationship with my father, as some of the discussion can attest, and we have grown into this relationship as that is part of what growing up is all about. I think you can also agree that while we often joke that I am my father’s son, it comes up quite a bit during episode 50.

00:51:46:41 – 00:52:10:23
Agent Palmer
It’s not really a joke. I am in many aspects of who I have become. My father’s son. I enjoyed having my father on the show, and now that the first episode is out of the way, I don’t believe it will be his last. Again, I don’t take for granted the relationships I have with my parents, and I hope to have them both on again as some of these conversations we might have anyway.

00:52:10:29 – 00:52:43:58
Agent Palmer
But to have them for posterity seems extremely worthwhile. And I can say this without a shadow of a doubt. I am proud to have worked for him and with him. I’m happy he’s enjoying his retirement because he deserves it. When it comes to fathers and sons, there are plenty of cinematic moments to derive comparison and inspiration, but for me, I just hope that unlike Indiana Jones, I do not leave just when I become interesting or the very least, I haven’t left just when I became interesting.

00:52:44:03 – 00:53:05:36
Agent Palmer
With that. Have you reached out to either of your parents recently or just a friend? Perhaps you should. And remember, we are all children in front of our parents. Thanks for listening to The Palmer Files episode 100. And now for the official business. The Palmer Files releases every two weeks on Tuesdays. If you’re still listening, I encourage you to join the discussion.

00:53:05:48 – 00:53:23:04
Agent Palmer
You can find all related ways to contact myself in the show notes, and I can forward any messages on to my father. The music for this episode was provided by Henno Heitur. Links to the previous episode mentioned and other things can also be found in the show. Notes. Email can be sent to this show at The Palmer Files at gmail.com.

00:53:23:04 – 00:53:37:49
Agent Palmer
And remember, you’re home for all things. Agent Palmer is Agent palmer.com.

00:53:37:54 – 00:53:45:48
Unknown
You.

00:53:45:53 – 00:53:53:19
Unknown
See?

00:53:53:24 – 00:54:08:17
Unknown
Me?

00:54:08:22 – 00:54:12:39
Unknown
See?

00:54:12:44 – 00:54:15:14
Agent Palmer
All right. Dad, do you have one final question for me?

00:54:15:18 – 00:54:19:47
Michael Stershic
I do, and my final question for you goes back a bit.

00:54:19:52 – 00:54:20:53
Agent Palmer
Okay.

00:54:20:58 – 00:54:23:10
Michael Stershic
When you came back from Israel.

00:54:23:19 – 00:54:24:06
Agent Palmer
Yeah.

00:54:24:11 – 00:54:42:21
Michael Stershic
As at the end of your Jew, what would have been your junior year of high school? Yeah. And we told you that the likelihood of you going back to your high school was not likely.

00:54:42:26 – 00:54:44:41
Agent Palmer
Yeah.

00:54:44:46 – 00:54:50:59
Michael Stershic
What went through your mind when we had that summer, when we were going through that?

00:54:51:04 – 00:55:13:56
Agent Palmer
So that there, there are two pieces to this because, there are actually three pieces. The first is the social aspect. I didn’t care like I it’s it’s really hard to go back to that. But like one of the reasons I didn’t care was because the Potters, my best friend, and he was a year ahead of me.

00:55:13:56 – 00:55:14:50
Michael Stershic
And he was already gone.

00:55:14:50 – 00:55:43:32
Agent Palmer
And he was he had he had just graduated. And there were other people in that crew that I was the youngest kid in the crew I hung out with. So I was closer to the people that were not going to be in high school anymore. So from a social aspect, it didn’t. It didn’t matter as much. The other piece of it, which scared the crap out of me, was the possibility of because there were only there were two other possibilities.

00:55:43:32 – 00:56:17:50
Agent Palmer
If I didn’t go back and it was a private school or a college with an early acceptance. The private school scared me because I didn’t want to start over for a year. The college excited me because it felt like what I had just gotten back from, but the the before the acceptance letter came, I was just like I don’t, I don’t know if the devil I don’t know for a year is better than just going back.

00:56:17:55 – 00:56:26:11
Agent Palmer
And so that’s a, that’s we never we didn’t talk about that because luckily things just worked out in a timely manner. Like we didn’t have to rush or anything.

00:56:26:11 – 00:56:30:55
Michael Stershic
You got offered up. You got offered acceptance at your interview.

00:56:30:55 – 00:56:37:31
Agent Palmer
I did, I did, and I still don’t know what I said.

00:56:37:36 – 00:56:38:41
Michael Stershic
I have no idea. Because.

00:56:38:51 – 00:56:42:02
Agent Palmer
Because it was me, I you weren’t. I mean, I, I, I.

00:56:42:02 – 00:56:42:40
Michael Stershic
Know it was you.

00:56:42:40 – 00:56:45:06
Agent Palmer
It was just me in there with the,

00:56:45:11 – 00:56:46:06
Michael Stershic
With the dean of with.

00:56:46:09 – 00:56:56:45
Agent Palmer
The dean of admissions of. Although although the dean of admissions retired it like 14 months later. So there is a possibility that he was like.

00:56:56:45 – 00:57:00:52
Michael Stershic
Well, I’m not going to be here. So what is it, man? I don’t think he thought that way.

00:57:00:53 – 00:57:35:50
Agent Palmer
Okay. Fair enough. But I it was there was a little bit of scared ness for if it didn’t happen the way it did. Because going to a private school was a bit scary to start over for one year. And like, I think I had the conversation with somebody at one point, which was because somebody because I had a few smart friends at the time that were like, well, you just, you know, you just you just did a semester kind of starting over all by yourself.

00:57:35:50 – 00:58:03:09
Agent Palmer
But I didn’t see that as valuable because everybody that was on that trip had done a semester by themselves. I wasn’t going to be dropped into year 12 of one for me. And, you know, five, ten, 12 for everybody else. So the best situation is what happened, the other situations I was not scared of, but more nervous about.

00:58:03:14 – 00:58:22:16
Agent Palmer
Okay. Because it was just like, I just I didn’t know how that would be. But I will ask you, I presume you would have jumped at the opportunity at that age to go overseas.

00:58:22:21 – 00:58:44:21
Michael Stershic
I don’t know, I don’t I but the difference was my, my mother probably wouldn’t have liked me leaving for that period of time. Okay. You know, my mother didn’t. The Italian mother, you know, did. It’s a little bit different. Okay. You know, to just different generation. You got to remember that.

00:58:44:21 – 00:58:45:57
Agent Palmer
Was it. Oh, okay. But our.

00:58:45:58 – 00:58:46:30
Michael Stershic
Generation.

00:58:46:30 – 00:58:47:24
Agent Palmer
Is a different generation.

00:58:47:24 – 00:58:55:17
Michael Stershic
But exchange and exchange programs weren’t nearly as popular or as well known as they were when you went.

00:58:55:19 – 00:59:00:10
Agent Palmer
But how much of it would have also been that you were the oldest? Not much like that one.

00:59:00:10 – 00:59:08:31
Michael Stershic
No matter as much I think it would have mattered. Okay, no. And you got to remember, I went to a a high school different than my three brothers did.

00:59:08:36 – 00:59:09:57
Agent Palmer
Okay.

00:59:10:02 – 00:59:15:33
Michael Stershic
So I was the outlier in a lot of different ways anyway. So it doesn’t matter.

00:59:15:38 – 00:59:44:38
Agent Palmer
Yeah, I, I, I’m thankful for the opportunity. I still think it’s one of those weird. It’s I look at early admittance to Keystone the same way I look at going to Israel, which is you and mom helped facilitate it once it happened. But I feel like I fell. It literally fell into those opportunities. Like I didn’t seek them out.

00:59:44:42 – 00:59:50:01
Agent Palmer
Necessarily Keystone, maybe more than Israel, but like these were just situations that kind of happened to me.

00:59:50:06 – 01:00:09:59
Michael Stershic
Well, there were things that happened to you that people saw a solution for you. Not necessarily us. Yeah, but significant people that we knew saw a solution for you that was that worked out for the best.

01:00:10:04 – 01:00:29:44
Agent Palmer
Yeah. But I but I, I, I fell into these and it’s one of the reasons that. I don’t like a say I don’t like the sailing metaphor of like just you go where the wind takes you. But it kind of feels like that’s the way it’s been, like the how I ended up working for you.

01:00:29:49 – 01:01:01:50
Agent Palmer
The last time was that somebody left at the right time, which happened to be two years after I had started a business that gave me the skills to fill that position. Right. There’s like, you know, if that happens a year prior where I have a lot less experience or a year after, maybe that doesn’t happen. Right. And so, like, I’ve had a lot of everybody has a lot of happenstance, but all the major events have had like just an inordinate amount of like had the die roll gone a different way.

01:01:01:55 – 01:01:08:15
Michael Stershic
Serendipity is an awesome thing.

01:01:08:19 – 01:01:17:03
Michael Stershic
And in a lot of ways, serendipity has made you a big part of what you are today.

01:01:17:08 – 01:01:17:45
Agent Palmer
Yeah.

01:01:17:49 – 01:01:22:41
Michael Stershic
That’s without that serendipity, we wouldn’t be here right now.

01:01:22:46 – 01:01:26:21
Agent Palmer
And and it I mean, you get some credit for that to.

01:01:26:26 – 01:01:36:12
Michael Stershic
To a degree. Yeah. And I you know I don’t we don’t say that’s enough. Yeah. But we’re proud of the person you have become.

01:01:36:17 – 01:01:37:01
Agent Palmer
Okay.

01:01:37:06 – 01:01:39:43
Michael Stershic
And I wouldn’t have it any other way.

01:01:39:48 – 01:01:42:23
Agent Palmer
Well, I, I love you.

01:01:42:28 – 01:01:43:14
Michael Stershic
I love you, too.

–End Transcription–

This transcription was processed by PalmerTech 3.1 and may contain errors for HUMINT (human intelligence).