Young Loves, Strong Roots

Okay. Sarah Grady, thank you for coming to Mayor Radio. So this is weird how this came about. Your mom listens to the podcast and she wrote me and said, I don't want to come on the podcast with my husband, but, you know, who would like to come on the podcast is my daughter and her boyfriend. And I was like, that sounds interesting. And so that's you. You're you're the daughter and you're the boyfriend. Tell me, who are you guys like? Where do you live? What's your story? How did you how did you end up being on Marriage Story Radio? I'm interested to know.

So we're in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Okay. And, Yeah, we've been dating for seven and a half.

Months, so not very long in the grand scheme.

And so, yeah, we kind of, like, nervously went on your Instagram and we're like, okay, like what? What is this kind of going on? And like, these all like, it was like we were married for like x amount of years. We were like, oh no, we're about to we have no idea what we're talking about.

Nobody. However, you have been together for proportionately, you've been together. I guess this isn't quite make sense. I was thinking about how math works. Like, as a young people, seven months is a long time. Like seven months for me is less than seven months for you. I guess is the way I'm putting it. So it's it's not a super short time, relative to your life. And how did you meet? I have so many questions, but, how did you how did you come together? Seven months ago?

So Grady runs this, open mic music venue out of his backyard, and it's kind of just for kids around town to come and enjoy watching each other make some music. Okay? And I play the banjo and thought it'd be fun if I signed up to perform, so I did, and I needed a microphone for my banjo while I was on stage, but there weren't enough mic stands. And so Grady had to sit there on stage and manually hold the microphone up to my banjo the entire time I was performing. And that kind of prompted our first conversation. So that's how we met. Yeah.

Yeah, I had never really met her. And then I was like, sitting there like I was like, whoa, she's really good at banjo. And I was like, oh, she's really pretty. And then we started talking and that's kind of it.

That's adorable. All right, so you play the banjo, play banjo and sing. Are you just like, playing the banjo?

I just play the banjo.

I she sings beautifully in the color.

She. But I don't sing live.

And you're like, in you're in it. You're like, crazy about each other or something. Is that. Is that real?

Yeah.

So I would say, what can you tell me about that? It's I'll tell you why I'm asking. Because in my practice, couples come in all the time. A lot of older couples, and like, old or whatever, but they're the thing I hear a lot is like, we feel like roommates. We feel like in the beginning, it was so exciting, and it was so this, that and other thing. But now all that has faded. And I was like, oh, I'd be interested to talk to people who are at the beginning and, well, how do you understand it? How do you make sense of it? I'll have some questions that you might not have an answer to about how to protect against this thing that other people are experiencing the the fading of that. But like, how do you describe it? Or what do you even understand about this phase of being in a relationship?

I feel like for me, it was pretty instantaneously like like apparent that like kind of the way I felt about her was like just very different from like, I don't know, like, I guess high school relationships. It's hard to be like past exes and stuff, but like, we both kind of dated someone before for like a year. Not the same person, but. Okay.

And then the clarification.

From that perspective of like, having just like kind of really crappy, like for different reasons, but like and so yeah, so we talked a lot about like early on and like still now, like it's just kind of like it was almost obviously instantly apparent that like, this was a much different thing than than like that or like it wasn't forced or anything or. Yeah, I don't, I don't know. So I think that was like the logical thing to me. I was like I was like, okay, this is like not the same as anything I've done.

And now there's a lot of things I like about, well, it's fun just because at first it was really new and we didn't have any of the same friends. And so we, like introduced each other to each other's friends. And I feel like we did a really good job at, like integrating each other into our separate friend groups, which I really loved because I never felt like like I feel like it really just always did a great job of like including me in any social scene. Or it's he wanted me to meet all of his closest friends, and he wanted me to like, be a part of he wanted me to be close with his best friends. And so that was a and I feel like now that we have that established and we know each other's friends and we're like, now it's just we're just having a good time.

Okay, so you are Sarah, do you just graduate from high school? Grady, you're a senior. You dated people before. You've had other longer term relationships? And then this one is different or unique. And I wonder, do you know, why do you have I do you have ideas about or do you have theories about what what is your what makes this one unique or different?

It really it's just like a I don't know, like I feel like we started talking and then it was just.

What is it magic? Is it like luck? Is it I mean, I mean, would.

Probably more like we just our personalities meshed really well. And so as soon as we started, like, getting to know each other, we were like, oh, like, we sit really well together, and, I don't know, maybe it's just luck that we found that.

Yeah. Yeah. It's definitely. Yeah, it definitely seems like luck to me that like, I don't know because we go to the same school but in like different grades and different friend groups and like, it seemed like chance that we like, met because we were both, like, aware of each other before. And the way I've always thought about it, if like what makes it unique has been like especially early on, I always thought that like where, like my relationship in the past was a thing where like we bonded on all the like the kind of like superficial like interests or whatever, like all of the kind of like borderline stuff and like, okay, all of

the motivations it took to get to those places or like, like the morals and the and like the opinions on whatever. That's not to say we disagree. We don't disagree on things. But like, like that wasn't really the same. Whereas with Sarah, it's like we're kind of interested in different things and there's the overlap, but like interested in different things. But I think like the foundation of all that and like we just like generally on like a deeper level, agree.

Yeah. I think our fun, our foundation is the same. Whereas in past relationships it's been all the superficial things that have been the same, like, oh, we like the same TV show. I guess we have the same tree trunk, but our branches go our different ways. We're interested in different things, and we branch out in different directions, but we're able to, like, have the same kind of. Yeah. That's kind of a strange metaphor, I don't know.

I like it, I'm into it. I'll think about it a lot. I, you're talking about something that I wonder about it, particularly for folks that are maybe dating or whatever in their 20s and 30s, and they're trying to find their partner. And there's this vetting criteria that you have to go through, which is about, do we have enough in common? And you're talking about, yes, we have a lot in common, but it's more at the foundational trunk level than at the the leafy level, for lack of a better word. It's like it's okay not to watch the same TV shows or be into the same music, or play the same sports, or even like like sports or not. You know, as long as you have this other thing called what roots or foundation do you have words for that? Do you know what it is? The foundation.

In character? I think it's also the fact that, like, it's not like we are like aggressively like kind of like close minded to like, this is whatever the leaves that I like. Are you. Yes. But like, like that we've been able to now like bring those two together and like some stuff we're like, that's awesome. And like, I had no idea that that was a thing.

There's an openness to learning like that one part. The one problem with playing with metaphors is you can beat them to death and you can like really terrible. But there's like an openness to learning about each other's leaves, or there's an openness to, like, discovering new things through one another versus somehow you pre check all the boxes and then that's how the relationship works.

Yeah for sure.

Do you have I'm dying to ask this question of younger folks because again it comes up for folks that have, you know, been together and maybe they've been married for 10 or 20 years or something. Do you, as far as you know, do you have a model or a philosophy of how relationships work or how they're supposed to work? Most of us get that from our parents, and when you think about it, it doesn't have to be your parents. But when you think about like, no, this is what a good relationship is or this is what a bad relationship is at at 18, 17, 18, do you have theories about that? Yeah.

That's a good question because both of our parents are divorced. So it's like, I guess I can't really speak for you. But when I look at my parents relationship, I was I was like, I don't know if I want to be like that.

Do you look at your your parents before they were divorced.

Right.

And you're like, I'm not sure that's what I want.

Right?

Do you how do you know how to describe that thing?

Like what their relationship was like and. Well, what.

The thing is that you didn't want, I mean, just, versus the thing that you do want, I mean.

Well, I can say. So I looked at my parents and I was always like, yeah, maybe that's not the best example. But my grandparents. I love watching their dynamic because they are two wholly different people and they have different interests and they do separate things and they come back together at the end of the day and like they don't have any problem doing things apart or independently of each other. But they're still a unit and I liked that because I guess independence is something that's very important to me. So I like that we're able to do our separate things and then still act as a unit. And. Yeah. So I think that if I were to model my relationship and no no relationship is perfect.

Yeah. Of course. Yeah. I think you might I know that you're saying this, but I think healthy relationships have a really they have balance between independence and interdependence. Meaning like, I get to be me. I get to be me as a whole person, and then I choose to be connected to you as a relational person or as a as a person that's part of a system or a unit. And I think in general, being the whole person, being the independent person is the favor you do to the unit. Because if you just like if you're playing, I always use I don't know why I use beach volleyball, but it's because it's a sport that two people play. But like.

Right, right.

It's you're responsible to show up in the best shape and have studied the strategy and have rehabbed your injuries and have, you know, not be there with a hangover. Like there's all this responsibility. You have to show up as a healthy person so that you can be a healthy teammate. You know what I mean? Yeah.

To build off what she said, I think, like, I really believe in all of that. And I also just really like the idea that it's like you in a relationship have the confidence to figure out problems on your own. But like, you always have someone there that's like either like you're just like talking about how you feel about this thing. And they're like, well, here's a different perspective. Or like when things seem too big or like things people said don't make sense to you, like to just like, to like, come back from our lives and kind of like, share like, okay, like, here's what I don't understand or like, here's, you know, I'm like like, that's really important to me to, like, have, like, I don't know, just.

Like a shoulder to lean on.

Yeah. Or. Yeah, just a shoulder to like, like bounce things off, I guess. Like. Yeah. And so that's been really valuable and like in this relationship.

I wouldn't want either one of you to, like, speak negatively about your family or your parents. But I am curious to know, like, do you have examples of what you learned from your parents or from their divorce or. I don't know if they're remarried. I don't know if any. You know, like what do you have a as far as you know, have you internalized any theory or philosophy about marriage or relationships based on what you kind of the context that you grew up in?

Yeah, because the relationship with my mom and my dad is something they both speak about. Not very, you know, pleasantly like almost to the point where, like, only in the more recent years of my life have they like, ever reflected on any memory of each other in like a positive light or like, and so, like growing up, a lot of the time, it was like either like silence or like I come from a very, like passive aggressive, group of people and like the like, like, yeah, there's just a lot of, like, you know, those types of, like, comments and all that.

So I guess because so much of that relationship, what seemed to tear it apart and also what seemed to make the aftermath of it so unpleasant was like secrecy and like or like avoidance and like lying. Like I'm really, like, overly intense about just like being honest in situations where I maybe don't even need to be like, like that's I think that's been my reaction that has been like, okay, so I'll just like, I'd rather overshare your.

Course correcting to the other the other side, like radical transparency and honesty versus some passive aggressive.

And maybe you should like, say everything. But I choose to do that. I guess most of the time.

I think there's some wisdom that I think you I think you don't need to. I think you don't need to say everything you think. And I also don't think you need to believe everything you think. You know, so I think people who can't govern that boundary system, like if I, if it comes into my head, it must be true. And if it's true, I got to say it. Yeah, sure. You get in trouble if you do that. I mean.

I think either extreme is not good. Yeah, that's that's a tightrope. I guess you got to find that.

Like, I would say 100% of my clients complain about their parents. Whether they not not complain strictly, but everybody's parents let them down in some way. Even the perfect parents. It's like they never let me breathe. And they were always in my stuff, and I never got a chance to fail. And I'm like, you know, on the other side. Like, they never came to my soccer game and they didn't ever pay attention.

And there was all this.

And, and it's just a it is about finding the balance. Yeah. I think one thing that I'm interested in, both with my girls, my minor, 18 and 22 and people ask me a lot like, do I like the guys they're dating and I've come to, I've come to an answer that I, that I want to ask you guys about. My answer is, it doesn't matter if I like them. I don't I don't actually need to have an opinion about these. These guys. What I would have come to is, do I like them? Like, do I like Mary when she's with this guy? Do I like Abby when she's with this guy? And sometimes I do, and sometimes I don't. Do you guys have a sense of that like, yet? Like, do your parents have opinions about your relationship? Do they like it? Do they like you with each other?

My mom does a really good job of letting, like giving us, my siblings and I enough space to, like, kind of find our own people. And so she tries not to insert her opinions. I feel like, yeah, which I appreciate, but I kind of get a sense of whether or not she likes the person I'm dating by how much she, the effort she makes to like, invite them to dinner and okay, invite them to like, whatever. Yeah, I can't speak for her. I don't really want to speak for her. But yeah, I think, like, she's always inviting him.

Well, she invited him to be on the podcast with her. Yeah, that's I thing. Yeah.

That's a good sign.

Yeah. I'm the first time because my dad has like in the last year moved seven hours away. But it was like important to me because we kind of started dating right as he was leaving. When I introduced the two of them, my mom said that, like, he instantly said her attention was like, this is she's cool. Like, this is my favorite one.

Your father sent a text to your mother and say, yeah, Sarah. Just cool.

Yeah.

I approve. Yeah. Okay.

Which was it was that was cool because, like, my mom told me about that, and I was like, that, hypothetically, could not have been meant to for, like, for me to be seen or not. Yeah. So like, I don't, I don't like I think if he would text her would be like, I don't know about this. Yeah. So yeah. And and my mom kind of speaks very often about how much she likes the kind of like side of me that she brings out. And like.

Sarah tries out.

Yeah. And like, she talks very or she it like, early on was just always like to are just the cutest. Like I just like I like the way y'all are. Like, we just got back from, like, a week long road trip in Michigan and we went to New York earlier this summer. And like, even during the school year, like, we were just like after school, just try to drive out to like, the countryside. I don't know why that's like, our thing is just like driving to.

Go places, looking.

At things. And, so my mom has just spoken a lot about how, like, she loves it. Sarah is like like that we're smart enough to do those things and still, like, be alive and like, hey, let's just, like, out here. Yeah. And also just like that, she likes that we kind of bring that sense of, like, whatever adventure out of each other and, like, we're just like, I don't know, curiosity and stuff. Is. Is it cool?

Yeah. What are you nervous about? What do you what are you afraid of? Like when you think about being in a relationship in 2025 and trying to make your way in the world and become an adult?

I think the biggest obstacle in front of us right now is that I'm going to college in less now.

Yeah. How far away will you be?

It's an hour and a half. So it's not. Yeah, but it's the farthest away we've ever been.

Yeah, yeah. So that's all kind of been, I guess, like, looming. But now that it's, like, approaching, an interesting thing has happened where like, I think we've both gotten, like less nervous about it as it's gotten closer. That's awesome because it's kind of like in our age, whenever there's people that are in a relationship and like most of the time they're both going to college and they're going in like what, different states. And everyone's like, oh man, I don't know how we're going to handle long distance. First of all, I drive a Prius. So like an hour and a half like it's like if she's like, I miss you, I'll be like, okay, I'll be there in 20 minutes. But, but that's also been a thing that in the place of, like, we're both not really like I were, I would say I'm a little nervous about it just because I'm nervous about, you know, just change.

I'm not like, you know, but, I'm not nervous about it to the point where, like, we just have very transparent conversations about, like, okay, like when it's too soon to visit and like, how often is that that's going to be I guess, the biggest, like, that's, that's just going to be a new thing to navigate.

Yeah.

Is that there all the time. Because you know, she should be like living it up and, you know going to college. Yeah. But you know I also don't want to be like absent or so. Yeah. That's just that's the balance I guess that is to be the fun part of.

Well, yeah. I can't even hardly imagine. I went my sophomore year of college. I dated a girl who was in college two years, two hours away is her freshman year in college, and we this was 1990. This is in the 1900s.

Yeah.

And there was no I mean, we were just getting email like. Like. Yeah. And you'd go to the library and sit down at a computer, like when somebody else stood up and walked away from the computer. You had to, like, wait until you. And then you could send an email and then and then you went about your day, and then maybe you went back and you got a chance to see if the email had been returned, you know, but you guys are like, text each other and you have FaceTime. And yeah, the world's pretty full. It's a lot flatter than it was before. So this idea of distance, the distance is shorter than it was 30 years ago.

But yeah.

So you got that going for you. I guess I am. I guess I'm trying to ask a different question to you, and you might just not know, but are there are there reasons to be anxious or nervous about being in a committed relationship as an adult in 2025, like, yeah, is it harder than it was for your parents or for you? If you are, do you do you even know? Yeah. I mean, I think about this for my kids and just like the rules are so different, even just the way they just described like about how the world is flatter and you have access to so much more information and options, you know, so I just I don't know if you, but I guess, I guess I'm, I'm also trying not to just, tell you what I think is harder, because, you know, if I'm right.

I feel like now it's like the culture surrounding, like, breakup and hookup culture is so different because I was talking to my grandparents the other day and they were telling me about when they met, and they met at like, whatever, when they were still teenagers. And then they went to high school together, I think. And then they went to college and that was it. Like they had met each other and they just got like dated and then got married. And I feel like it's not. And nowadays, because people have normalized casual relationships and hookups. But that being said, I feel like I started dating Brady and automatically was like, I don't really want to hook up with anybody and I don't want to casually date anybody. I just want to think like, once you a person that you're willing to like, commit to, it's not very difficult.

Yeah. Like obviously with phones and with communication and even with social media and like online dating and things like creating those spaces, like I think like the context around the creation of like relationships and love is very ever changing. But like, I don't think I believe that like the, like the dialog and the actual like relationship is maybe any different than it was in like, you know, like Paul Revere and his wife or whatever. Like, I don't know, to like, maybe that's like, love it. Yeah. Like in the issues that people's face and that seems pretty timeless to me.

Yeah.

Like my mom is always like like you are growing up in, like, this is an evil time in the world. And yes, I believe that is true. And I believe that the circumstances of the evil to this or like the unrest and all that is, is unique and new and scary and I also think that, like, people have been finding ways to love each other in the context of just like insane madness forever. So like, yeah, it doesn't seem like less possible now or like more or less.

I think what I, what I suspect and again, this is, this is maybe I'm ahead of myself here, but I think we live in an age right now where the news cycle is so fast and there's so much competition for your attention, and there's so much like, there's so many, invitations to take shortcuts. I don't think you can do that in relationships. I think you have to pay attention. I think you can't take shortcuts. I think you have to lengthen the news cycle. And I don't mean the news. I mean, like you have to learn how to be present and and stay present and even like the idea that there's, you know, because there's dating apps and because there's this shift in this culture, like there's so many options all the time, you're like, oh, this relationship isn't working.

I got I got options literally in my pocket. I can pull out, my phone and see what options are available to me within a 15 mile radius. And I think the thing that I love, what you just said, I think it's actually true. People have been making relationships work in the midst of crazy circumstances. You joke about Paul Revere, but I think about, well, even this relationship I was describing of my own in college with the email I read John Adams, his biography, and he, he was married to Abigail.

And, you know, they have this epic love story set in colonial, colonial America. And their whole love story is letters written by hand on paper that had to go on a boat across an ocean to maybe find, you know, and they, they, you know, they had this epic love affair over several years of delayed gratification, you know, just waiting for the letter, waiting for the letter affirming the letter, believing the letter. And so, you know, for for me, for you guys, it's about trying to figure out how to latch on to something like permanence, something like this deep rooted thing that you're describing, whether it's a tree trunk or the roots themselves. I'm not sure what you guys are up to when you're on your road trip, but if it involves sitting still, looking at things, and just having prolonged conversation in the same space that's undistracted, that's that's a practice.

And you got to practice. Yeah. Particularly when there's so much competition for your attention right now. So.

Yeah, most things are at odds with just like sitting in a place and having a conversation about.

Yeah, yeah. I think the other thing too, again, that you just might not know and I don't know if I'm talking to you guys are the whole world right now. There's 7 billion people listening to this podcast right now. But you know, you're learning right now, 16, 17, 18 years old how to be. And that what you're learning right now is really good for right now, and also is going to run out of its usefulness in your 20s and 30s and 40s and 50s. Like the other thing I would say is people need to continue to learn how to be in relationship. We inherit these things from our parents. We look at them and go, I don't want that. So I'm going to course correct way over here or they go, I do want that. So I'm going to I'm going to try and model that for a while.

And it works for a while because you find a person and it's clicking and it's feels good. But then like each of you will change, Sarah, you're going to go and like the whole world's going to change. And then, I mean, your entire context is going to change. We don't know what that's going to do. So it's it's all that much more important to be vigilant about who you are in the midst of that change versus like kind of letting it happen to you.

And again, I'm not trying to be like, why is old therapist guy coming down from the sky to give you advice? I'm just thinking about what I hear in my office from couples that have been together is that they didn't change, with intention, like, change is sort of happened to them. Oh. Well, then we moved to Seattle, then we had kids, and then one of our kids, you know, got sick and then or oh, then we lost our job or we and then but they don't seize the opportunity to learn and grow from that thing. They it just sort of happens to them. And then they wake up one day and go, how do we get here? So yeah, it sounds like both of you have a measure of intentionality that is, I don't want to call it wise beyond your years, but at least it signals some thoughtfulness about how to do this thing, which is cool and refreshing.

And I just hope that the relationships that you guys have that my kids have end up being, I think this is the American dream, end up being better than the ones that your parents had, and then the ones that their parents gave you. My kids, like, I hope that their relationships are better than mine with Rebecca, because then maybe we did something right. Or maybe they did something right. So I don't know. That's that's what I think from.

Yeah.

No. Yeah. The experts chair. I'm really grateful that you gave me a little bit of time to just to chat about what it was like to be you do you have any questions for me?

No, thanks. Yeah. Thanks for having us.

Yeah, you got it all figured out. I'm glad for you. You.