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What happens after you finally see things clearly?

In this follow-up to The Holidays After You See the Masks, I talk about the quieter, steadier phase that comes after awareness. The part no one really prepares you for.

This episode is not about blame or cutting people off. It is about what life looks like once the fog lifts, old family roles lose their power, and you stop wishing for emotional validation where it was never available.

I reflect on boundaries, chosen family, and why clarity does not lead to bitterness. It leads to peace. I talk about honoring what was good, accepting what never was, and building forward with people who offer consistency, safety, and emotional honesty.

If you have ever reached a point where you thought, “Okay… now what?” this episode is for you.

A sober but hopeful start to 2026, focused on mental health, emotional adulthood, and choosing a life that actually feels supportive.

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In this bonus episode of Confessions of a Gen-X Mind, I pull back the curtain on what it’s really like working behind the scenes in radio.

Listeners hear a voice.
A persona.
A carefully crafted version of someone they think they know.

But when you’re the person setting up the gear, fixing the signal, and making the show actually happen, you often meet a very different version of that same voice.

Drawing from my years as a remote broadcast technician in Dallas radio, I reflect on the strange inversion I saw again and again:
how some of the most beloved on-air personalities were the hardest to work with off mic, while the gruff, prickly “heel” types were often the most professional and respectful behind the scenes.

This isn’t a takedown, and it’s not about naming names.
It’s about understanding the difference between performance and personhood, and what working in media teaches you about ego, insecurity, and authenticity.

If you’ve ever heard the phrase “never meet your heroes,” this episode explores why it’s sometimes true—and why, occasionally, it’s beautifully wrong.

A thoughtful, insider look at radio, fandom, and the people who make the magic happen quietly, without applause.

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Turning fifty is not a crisis.
It is a reckoning.
And it changed how I see everything.

In this year end episode of Confessions of a Gen-X Mind, I reflect on the moments that quietly reshaped my life at midlife. What began as recalibration became a year of closure, clarity, and unexpected forward motion.

I talk honestly about starting the year single and how difficult it was to truly move on while a past marriage still lingered emotionally. When my ex finally moved away, that chapter closed in a real and lasting way. That closure changed how I dated, how I showed up, and why meeting Alice felt different from anything that came before.

This episode also explores neurodivergence and self understanding at midlife. After years of therapy and reflection, I share why my upcoming formal ASD and ADHD assessments matter to me. Not as labels, but as medical documentation that brings clarity, protection, and the ability to advocate for accommodations in life and work. I do not experience neurodivergence as a disability. I experience it as a superpower once it is understood.

I reflect on the generational shift that arrives faster than anyone prepares you for. Parents age. Roles reverse. Stories get shared around holiday tables about falls, injuries, and the quiet realization that we are now the adults in the room. I lost my father in 2022, and Alice lost both of her parents within the last year. Grief, responsibility, and gratitude now coexist.

Love is part of this story too. This episode follows a midlife relationship built on steadiness rather than fantasy. We navigate real health challenges together, and we end the year engaged. On New Year’s Eve, we will be traveling to New Orleans to celebrate and mark this moment with an engagement photo shoot in the French Quarter.

There is also a late arriving footnote. After avoiding COVID throughout the worst of the pandemic, Alice and I finally caught it together in Las Vegas. Not dramatic. Just fitting.

This is not a highlight reel.
It is a recalibration.

If you are navigating midlife, relationships, neurodivergence, aging parents, or the sense that everything shifted while you were busy living, this episode is for you.

Fifty does not feel like the end.
It feels like standing exactly where I am, with clarity.

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What happens when you finally see the emotional patterns you grew up inside?

In this episode, I reflect on family, holidays, and the quiet shift that happens once you gain the language to understand your own history. Through personal observation and late-life clarity, I explore how my parents’ generation understood mental health, how stigma shaped family narratives, and how certain diagnoses became convenient explanations rather than curious questions.

I talk about sibling dynamics, inherited assumptions, and what it felt like to be labeled instead of understood. This is not an accusation or a diagnosis of anyone else. It’s one person’s account of growing up, unlearning old stories, and finding peace without pretending everything was fine.

*This episode includes discussion of mental health stigma, misdiagnosis, involuntary psychiatric custody, substance use, overdose, and family conflict. Listener discretion is advised, especially for those with lived experience around mental health crises or family trauma.

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For more than fifty years, Americans have been told that energy independence is just around the corner.

Drill more. Import less. Problem solved.

But the truth is more complicated.

In this episode of Confessions of a Gen-X Mind, I take a clear-eyed look at where the idea of “energy independence” came from, why it keeps getting recycled, and why it has never fully matched reality.

We start in the 1970s with the OPEC oil embargo and the gas lines that reshaped American life. We move through Nixon’s promises, Carter’s solar panels, Reagan’s reversals, and into the fracking boom that turned places like North Texas into ground zero for America’s latest energy gamble.

Along the way, we unpack what shows like Landman get right and what they conveniently gloss over. Yes, wind turbines require petroleum to build. Yes, fossil fuels still underpin modern life. But finite resources are still finite, no matter how you vote or what cable channel you watch.

We also talk about geopolitics. Why oil prices are global, no matter how much we drill at home. Why the United States still imports heavy crude while exporting the lighter crude we produce. And why recent U.S. actions toward Venezuela have far more to do with oil than with the long-failed war on drugs.

This isn’t an episode about ideology. It’s about logistics, history, and math.

Sources and influences referenced in this episode include:

• NPR reporting and historical coverage of the 1973–74 OPEC oil embargo
• Commentary and analysis from energy expert Amy Myers Jaffe of NYU
• Saudi America by journalist Bethany McLean
• Marketplace Morning Report interviews on fracking, shale economics, and energy markets
• Long-term environmental and economic discussions from college-level environmental science coursework
• Firsthand experience living in North Texas during the Barnett Shale fracking boom

Energy independence makes for a great slogan.

But slogans don’t power cars, stabilize prices, or plan for the future.

Context does.

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I’m Gen X.
I didn’t read history.
I watched it happen live.

In this episode of Confessions of a Gen-X Mind, I reflect on growing up during a time when history unfolded in real time on CNN, Channel One, and nonstop cable news. World events interrupted algebra class. Televisions stayed on in the background. The news was always there.

At the same time, I was learning journalism. The difference between fact and opinion. Why sources matter. Why a free press, trusted expertise, and respect for evidence are essential to a healthy democracy.

Growing up in suburban Texas while listening to NWA and watching CNN, I learned early that power doesn’t treat everyone the same. That justice is often negotiable. And that identity and fear can override facts if you know how to activate them.

This episode traces a Gen X media memory arc through Rodney King, Waco, Ruby Ridge, the Oklahoma City bombing, the OJ trial, 9/11, and the gradual collapse of the information gatekeepers that once separated reporting from rumor.

It’s a radio essay about watching history unfold in real time. About the fine line between healthy skepticism and conspiracy thinking. And about what happens when shared truth disappears.

This is not a hot take.
It’s a witness statement.

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If you’ve ever worked in media, broadcasting, production, or an industry that quietly automated itself out from under its own workforce, this will feel familiar.

In this episode of Confessions of a Gen-X Mind, I revisit a long, candid conversation I recorded years ago with my old radio friend, "Psycho" Dave Martin former and quite notable board op at Sportsradio 1310 The Ticket in Dallas. Much like Fred Norris famously helped shape The Howard Stern Show with 'drops' think quick funny sound bites, Dave help shape the sound and humor heard on The Ticket in the early days of the station. Dave mastered the art of the perfectly placed drop via the miracle of The Enco (broadcast DAW) It’s an unfiltered look at what it was really like working behind the scenes in radio as the industry shrank, automated, and slowly pushed people out.

We talk about remote gigs, bruised egos, thin skins, and the strange hierarchy of personalities that defined local radio in the early 2000s. We swap stories about hosts, engineers, board ops, promotions, and the moments that stuck with us long after the microphones were turned off.

But this episode isn’t just nostalgia.

It’s about survival.

Dave talks openly about getting laid off, starting over, and clinging to stability in an industry that was collapsing in real time. We get into learning automation systems just to stay employable, and the quiet shift of radio from a career into something closer to a calling. For many people, it began to resemble community theater more than a sustainable profession.

We also talk about why people stay anyway. The validation. The love of operations. The satisfaction of making the signal go out clean. The strange joy of being close to broadcasters you respect, even when the money, security, and future prospects are uncertain.

This episode pairs naturally with The Death of Gatekeepers and works as a ground-level companion piece. Not from executives or on-air stars, but from the people who actually made radio work.

If you’ve ever been laid off, automated out, or stayed longer than you should have because you loved the craft, this one will hit close to home.