0:00
for me, for mine or I guess the
0:03
inspiration, you know, it's hard. I got
0:05
a I got a 20 year old son and I got a
0:12
they in a space where I'm not certain
0:16
they they know they can, you know, I
0:18
tell them they can talk to me. I try to
0:20
make sure they feel like they can talk
0:22
to me, but you never really know it. you
0:25
know, I don't know what truly goes on in
0:28
their minds and I don't know if they're
0:30
listening when I'm speaking. You know,
0:33
you know me well enough to know, you
0:34
know, I choose my words carefully.
0:37
>> my verse was to them, just not to them.
0:40
I knew talking to them would be,
0:43
>> you know, that that could go in one ear
0:45
and not out the other.
0:46
>> You make it direct to them.
0:48
>> Right. So, maybe you need to hear what I
0:50
would tell me when I was your age. Oh my
0:56
>> Right. Exactly. Exactly. And when I was
0:59
their age, I know that I didn't have
1:03
>> And I don't really know how it would
1:06
have, you know, how it would have turned
1:07
out had I had somebody to talk to. So I
1:11
>> create an avenue for them to understand
1:13
that I am a person that they can talk
1:15
to. Although I'm their father,
1:17
>> understand that they're young men. On
1:18
top of that, they're young black men.
1:21
>> And you know with that that's why I
1:23
spoke a lot about what I went through
1:25
when I was younger. You know I when I
1:28
was younger I felt like every everything
1:30
I was going through was permanent.
1:32
>> And you know a lot of time a lot of time
1:35
pains feel pain feels like it's forever
1:38
and you'll make it through it. You know,
1:40
especially for like it was moments like
1:42
even in that in that record I say um it
1:45
was a point in time we wanted to kill
1:47
our stepdad and you know we was really
1:49
on that type of time but we just
1:52
>> you just said that
1:53
>> yeah and he br it like he was he was
1:55
reading he's like in one of those
1:57
classes and they was going over the
1:58
syllabus. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Just wanted
2:01
to kill stepdad just body him real
2:02
quick. Get rid of him. Well, I said that
2:04
to say if we, you know, in that moment
2:08
in time, we felt like that was the
2:10
solution to what the turmoil we was, we
2:16
>> looking back, of course, you know, I'm
2:18
older and mature enough to say that
2:21
>> could have been the end of it. We could
2:23
have, you know, been in jail for the
2:24
rest of our lives. We ain't, you know,
2:26
Mendez brothers, we wouldn't even been
2:28
on TV. Wouldn't have been no book deals.
2:30
They wouldn't no nothing,
2:32
>> right? And you know, I I just felt like,
2:35
you know, sometimes again, you know, we
2:38
got the the um the habit of thinking
2:41
that the space that you in, you're going
2:44
to be stuck there forever.
2:46
>> And you know, we never when we was kids,
2:47
we was, you know, 10 and 11. We never
2:51
dreamed about being adults.
2:53
>> So, you know, we couldn't see we
2:55
couldn't see a moment where we wouldn't
2:57
be in the the space, you know, in the
3:00
situation that we was in. And I just
3:02
wanted to, you know, I guess um tell
3:05
them that without directly talking to
3:09
>> And and similarly, I was speaking to
3:12
almost in a in a way that someone trying
3:14
to get into this lane or that may aspire
3:17
to take this on as a career path. the
3:19
idea of like be mindful of what you
3:22
putting out there, you know, in the
3:25
>> you know be choose your words like they
3:27
words have meaning or value and and also
3:31
save the money so the money can save you
3:33
know like be wise about what you able to
3:36
purchase just cuz you're able to maybe
3:38
you shouldn't necessarily and that's
3:40
just something that comes with trial and
3:41
error and otherwise in real time
3:44
>> wanted that nice fast foreign car and
3:47
>> it's like it's more of a liability than
