Transcript
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They call me Grandpa Shannon. Every day is a story. I'm Shannon Cason. I have seven grandkids. Seven. My ex wife had two older kids when we met and those kids went on to have kids. And now I'm Grandpa Shannon to seven kids. And that's all they known since birth. You know, four of them live here in Detroit and three of them live in Albuquerque, New Mexico. And they come out most summers to Detroit. And here's a quick rundown of the four that's here. There's Shy, he's the oldest. He loves his phone. He's like Linus with his blanket with his phone. You know, when he puts the phone down, he could build anything. But most times you're going to see him on his phone. Then there's Avery. He's the next oldest and he's like the Eddie Haskell. And if you don't know these references, Eddie Haskell or Linus, you know, if you're too young, that's for a certain generation. If you're too young, go Google it. I'm not gonna tell you. But Avery smarter than most 10 year olds, even most adults, he's smarter than. Sometimes he'll, he'll answer questions that I'm like, how did you know that? Manipulative and handsome, which is a dangerous combination. Most times he's at the lead of any, any kind of things that's happening with the kids. Then there's Jeremiah. Jeremiah is the youngest boy. He's a sweet tough guy. He's like, like Mike Tyson with a smile, you know. He's the sweetest thing in the world if he gets his way. But if he doesn't get his way, he turns from the sweetest thing to just the thing. And the little kid looks like they can take his shirt off and be running around and stuff. Look like he already lift weights. Look like he already lift weights. I know he ain't lift the weight in his life, so I'm gonna get him into them weights eventually. But. And then there's there's Anaya. She's the youngest, she's the only girl. And she's gorgeous. Just this most beautiful, breathtaking thing in the world. But she can hold her own with all her brothers. All her brothers she can hold her own with, which is, which is something. She, she's the first to run to me always, like Grandpa Shannon and Grandpa Shannon and give me a big hug. So she got my heart. She got my heart. So they all stayed with us over the weekend and it was a big house of energy. Noise, screams and laughter. Mostly screams. They like to break shit. You gotta watch them because they'll break some shit. But here's one of the encounters that I watched. I watched like Avery was trying to take the phone from his older brother Shaim, who. Who Shaim is pretty strong, too. So he pulls it back from Avery. Then Avery says, well, that's my charger. I'll let you charge it if you let me play with it or else it's going to die and just no one can play with it. So Shaim thinks about it and hands the phone over to Avery so he can play the game. And I'm just sitting there on the couch watching Daredevil Born Again. But I'm seeing the whole thing out of my peripheral. You know, I'm just watching. I'm gonna take over the Disney Channel to watch the Daredevil got a new season out, so I'm watching that. And so Shine goes back to him, to Avery, after a while to get his phone back, play his video game. He need that blanket. And Avery tells him that it's not 100% charged yet. But Shine doesn't care. Take a long time for it to charge. So. So it turns into a shove and match, and they shove him back and forth. And then Jeremiah gets knocked over because he's the little one. He gets knocked over in the shoving match because he's watching the game. And Jeremiah immediately, I'm gonna tell her. I'm telling Grandpa Shannon. And Anaya can see me looking at it already. And she says, grandpa Shannon already knows. And this is constantly happening. This is like constantly, constantly, you know, just watching out of your peripherals while something's going on. But the moment of meaning for me is that family isn't always as expected. You know, I'm honored to have an opportunity to play a part in their lives and to see their growth as they grow up. And I'm actually moving. The place I'm moving to is like walking distance from the house that they're going to be at. So I'm going to put more responsibility on myself, to give more of myself to each of them. Kids, the good parts, the good parts of me, as much as possible. But who in your life is family? Even though they may not be blood? Or do you play that part in someone else's life? What's your story?