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Welcome to Stuff I Learned Yesterday. My name is Darrell Darnell, my favorite burger place in San Diego is Hodad’s , and I believe that if you aren’t learning, you aren’t living.
I absolutely love visiting San Diego. There was a stretch of about a decade where I was visiting San Diego almost once a year for some sort of conference or convention and I absolutely loved it. It’s now been nearly six years since my last visit to America’s Finest City, and I’m itching to go back.
My first two visits came in the summer of 2011. I first visited in June of that year for a work-related conference and returned the following month for San Diego Comic-Con. I launched my first podcast, The Fringe Podcast, in the summer of 2008 with two of my coworkers, Courtney and Jason. Since the show had a heavy science element to it, we began looking for someone with a science background to come on and help us. That search ended when my good friend Clint agreed to join the podcast as our fourth host.
Nearly half way through season two Jason and Courtney dropped out of the podcast, so from December of 2009 until the show ended in January of 2013, it was hosted by Clint and I. As sci-fi geeks and Fringe fans, we longed to someday go to San Diego Comic-Con. San Diego Comic-Con was THE place to go each year if you wanted to see the cast and get news about the upcoming season.
Fortunately, for the 2011 con, one of our listeners reached out and offered to sponsor our podcast on an ongoing basis. He loved the content we were creating, and not only wanted to support our work, he wanted to provide a way for us to be able to attend the con. That listener was Michael Purcell, and he’s now a cherished friend that I still talk with regularly.
Michael’s sponsorship also allowed us to attend the 2012 con as well. There are two major rooms at San Diego Comic-Con. Those rooms are Hall H, which holds just over 6,000 people, and Ballroom 20, which holds just under 5,000 people. The con doesn’t clear the room after each session, which means if you have a panel you want to attend in the afternoon, you need to get in line in the morning. The hope is that you can get into the room before your desired panel, and then you just stay there until your panel is finished.
That year Fringe was in Hall H on Sunday. It was a monumental panel as it would be the final one before Fringe entered its final season. Clint and I got in line right around dawn so that we could secure good seats. It turned out to be a beautiful event which gave both the fans an opportunity to show love and support to the show runners and actors, and it also gave them a chance to reciprocate that love and appreciation back to the fans.
But the inspiration for today’s story came two days before. That Friday Clint and I were hoping to get our way into Ballroom 20. The day started with at 10am panel featuring the stars of Community, which Clint was looking forward to. But the big draw for us was the 10-year anniversary panel for the show Firefly at 12:30. Later that day we’d enjoy panels for Falling Skies and Breaking Bad. The line was slow moving, but fortunately we did make it to the back of the room just as the Firefly panel was starting.
But that morning as we waited for the doors to open, we found ourselves standing on the shore of the San Diego Bay a mere quarter mile from our destination as the crow flies, but closer to a full mile away due to the way the line wound through the grounds of the convention center.
To the southeast was the Hilton San Diego BayFront decked from top to bottom with a banner promoting an upcoming new NBC show called Revolution. To our northwest was the Manchester Grand Hyatt and the Marriott Marquis also clad in similar promotions. Due north of us was a line of yachts, the cost of which I can’t even imagine. Positioned on the lawn on the southeast corner of the convention center was a series of tents which housed every single Batmobile ever featured in film.
As we stood there taking it all in and waiting for the line to move, Clint looked at me and asked, “Darrell, why do you do all of this?” “What do you mean?” I replied. He clarified that he was talking about coming to comic-con. Why was it that I saw it as important?
I was a bit surprised by the question, to be honest. I mean, why was he even asking a question like that? To ask a question like that seemed to indicate that we were not aligned on our reasons for being there. Up to that point, I thought we were aligned in our purpose for the trip.
I took a moment and gave him an answer I wasn’t happy with then and I’m not happy with now. I told him that I enjoyed being around the celebrities and learning about all the new stuff that’s coming out on TV this season. He looked at me with a dissatisfied expression.
I gave him that answer because it was the first thing that came to mind. It certainly had SOME truth to it, but it wasn’t entirely a truthful answer. The truth was, I didn’t know. I hadn’t really considered my motives. It was a cool experience to be there. Going to San Diego Comic-Con was something we’d once dreamed about, and now we were there for the second consecutive year. Why should I question that?
I don’t recall if I asked the question back to Clint and I don’t recall any more of the conversation that we had that morning while in line. But that question and my response has bothered me so much that I think about it often.
The truth is, I don’t care about celebrities and I’ve never been impressed with them. I’ve enjoyed meeting famous people, but no more than I have enjoyed “regular” people. Both through my podcasts and my previous corporate job, I’ve had the opportunity to meet quite a few celebrities, and except for one instance of a Christian singer whose music I really enjoyed, I’ve never once become nervous meeting a celebrity.
Here’s another secret about me. I don’t care about TV and film. I know that sounds surprising coming from a guy who runs a podcast network mostly based on TV & film. But the truth is that I know how disgusting and abusive the industry is, so I don’t care about it. I do care about certain TV show and film projects, but I’m very selective on which ones I invest myself in.
And when Clint asked me that question, I hadn’t really thought that through. I didn’t know my why, so I just gave him a flippant answer.
I’ve thought a lot about it since then, and here’s the truthful answer he deserved that day.
I never really cared about TV until I saw LOST. From the moment I saw the pilot episode I was obsessed with knowing more about the show. That led me to podcasts and relationships with podcasters. I saw the notoriety that was possible with podcasting, and I wanted that.
I wanted to be the most knowledgeable person on the planet about my show, Fringe. I wanted our podcast to be the most acclaimed, provide the best content, foster the best community, and get all the special access that was possible. San Diego Comic-Con provided ways to achieve those desires more than any other single event could.
Providing the best content, getting special access, fostering the best community, and being the most knowledgeable about the show I was covering are not bad things. But I wanted those things for me. I wanted the recognition. I wanted the notoriety. For example, I often wore Fringe related t-shirts to the cons. When someone asked me where I got it, I told them I made it rather than pointing them to my Cafepress store where they could get their own. Certainly part of that is due to my complete lack of marketing skills, but I know that I was also motivated heavily by my selfish ambitions.
Here’s what I learned.
Clint was obviously asking me that question because his why was different. While I don’t know his why, I do know why he asked me.
Both Clint and I were there in San Diego on vacation. That is, we were using up vacation days that we’d earned at our 9-5 jobs. I don’t know how many days he got, but either way, those days are limited. For me, it didn’t matter. My wife hates to travel. We never took actual vacations. When I took vacation days from work, they were used to do stuff around the house or doing things locally as a family.
With Clint, that was not the case at all. His family loved to travel and explore. They took road trips, and did other things like that for family vacations. They biked, hiked, camped, and enjoyed the outdoors in various ways. Honestly, we could not have been more different.
While my use of vacation days to be in San Diego away from my family was no big deal, for him it was a very big deal. He was standing there looking at all the frivolity of Hollywood marketing and realizing it wasn’t as great as a camping trip with his family.
And it wasn’t just that.
Clint traveled a lot for his job. He traveled so much that we bought a traveling podcast kit for him so he could still record while staying in a hotel. Our recording studio was at my house. So not only did I seldom travel, I never had to leave the house, my wife, or my kids to do the podcast.
And our recording sessions were long. They were always at least 4 hours, often 5 or even 6 hours. This meant that Clint was taking most of his Sunday and giving it to the podcast.
Or let me put it this way. Clint had Saturday and Sunday at home most of the time. Sundays were church days, which meant he had just enough time to go to church and eat lunch before he had to be at my house for the podcast. That left his wife alone with their three kids, trying to get them down for naps and do all the other things by herself.
All so Clint could go chat about a TV show with me. There were days where he felt like doing the podcast was a mistake; his priorities out of place. There were also times where he wasn’t enjoying the show. If Courtney and Jason had still been around, he very likely would have stepped away completely. But he didn’t want to abandon me and the community we’d built. It was a tough place for him to be in.
It took me forever to see this, and I didn’t fully see it until the dust had settled from the podcast once the show ended. When we were doing it, it was a frenzy. Our schedules were largely dictated by the show and we had to act fast to make sure we were getting content out at the peak moment. The show was moving on week to week with or without us.
I’m so grateful for Clint, his dedication to The Fringe Podcast, and the way he tried his best to balance the responsibilities of his family while doing it. And I think the world of his wife, Mandy too. I still remember the night I invited them over for dinner and they knew I had something up my sleeve. They were sure I was going to pitch a new podcast idea and Clint was prepared to tell me all the reasons why he couldn’t do it.
But I didn’t pitch a podcast idea to him, I pitched it to Mandy. The pitch was for her to come on as a co-host for Stuff I Learned Yesterday. She loved the idea and, as you may recall, hosted several episodes of this podcast between 2014 and 2016. She even volunteered to come back for the show’s second stint in 2021. She and Clint have their fingerprints all over this podcast network and we are better for it.
But here’s the lesson for today. I failed to check my why. If I had understood my true reasons for doing the podcast and going to cons, it would have revealed some flaws that I would have pivoted from. More importantly, I assumed Clint’s whys were the same as mine. Looking back, I wish I’d done things differently and found a way to help him find a better balance with his podcasting and family responsibilities.
Keep in touch with your why, communicate that to others, and don’t assume your why matches theirs or is better than theirs. This will put you in the best place for success in all the ways that matter most.
I’m Darrell Darnell, and this has been Stuff I Learned Yesterday.
I want you to be a part of the next Monday Mailbag later this month on June 30th! Monday Mailbag is your opportunity to Share what YOU’VE learned, so that other listeners and I can learn from YOU. It can be a message as short as 30 seconds or several minutes long. It really doesn’t matter just as long as it’s something that will benefit others. You can send in questions or responses to my SILY episodes, and I’ll respond to them via Monday Mailbag episodes. You can participate in Monday Mailbags by visiting the Golden Spiral Media listener feedback page.