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The 1000 Hours Outside Podcast
1KHO 630: No One Hands You a Rule Book for Belonging | Leland Lucky Vittert, Born Lucky
01:00:21
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- [00:01]
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- [00:31]
Jenny Ertz
Welcome to the 1000 Hours Outside podcast. My name is Jenny Ertz. I'm the founder of 1000 Hours Outside, and I am so excited for today's guest. I read his book, and I absolutely adored it. It is a New York Times bestseller, like, immediately. The book is called Born a Dedicated Father, A Grateful Son, and My Journey with Autism. And the author, Leland Lucky Holt Vittert is here. Welcome.
- [00:51]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
Great to be here. Thank you.
- [00:53]
Jenny Ertz
I love the book. I love the book so much. So much. So every year, Lucky, I work. I. Well, I'm gonna say every year, but I only started doing it last year, so it's not really every year. But last year, I gave a book as gift for my friends. I. I read a book I really loved. It was also a memoir. It's called Will the Circle Be Unbroken? By an author named Shawn Diedrich.
- [01:14]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
Okay.
- [01:15]
Jenny Ertz
And I liked it so much that that's what I gave as a Christmas gift to, like, my girlfriends. And I really like doing it. So I thought, well, this year I'm gonna do the same thing, but it's November. And I was kind of like, I don't know. I guess I'm gonna have to look through my book stood out the most. And then I read yours, and I was like, this is the one. This. I have 13 pages of notes on your book. And it. It just, like, made me feel a lot of things. I made me feel convicted. It made me feel challenged. It made me have questions about how I'm doing my life. It made me feel hopeful. Just have, like, a lot of feelings. I got chills. I got teared up. It is just a. A wonderful book.
- [01:52]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
Well, thank you very much.
- [01:54]
Jenny Ertz
Yeah. It's just incredible.
- [01:55]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
And I think you. Yeah, you picked up on it. It's very easy to think that it's an autism book, which it's not. Right. Because it's the story of me growing up with autism and my dad adapting me to the world rather than the world to me, but really, it's a father son love story, and it's the power of what great parenting can do. And it's showing parents the agency they have. And as you said, the magic word, which is it's hope.
- [02:19]
Jenny Ertz
It's.
- [02:19]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
And it's hope for every parent of a kid who's having a hard time. Doesn't matter why. And I think what you're picking up on is a little bit of what we hoped when we wrote it, which is that people would be able to experience their own lives and their own childhoods and parenting situations and everything else through these stories.
- [02:38]
Jenny Ertz
So now you are a host of this incredible show on News Nation. I heard you talk about, just actually today, I was looking through and you were saying, you know, it's the fastest growing, maybe the only growing news, cable news. And you, you know, you're really diligent and specific about making sure that you're asking everyone hard questions. And so people love it. They hear different perspectives. So, so that's where you're at now. But you talk about your childhood. I mean, this is very heart wrenching. And you talk about the, the bullying and that it was almost beyond bullying. And even your younger sister, who's five and a half years younger now, she's a professor, she said, I mean, I've never seen anything like it. She talked about how socially you couldn't function. You didn't start talking until you were three and then all of a sudden you're talking full sentences. But you just really had a hard time with the social and, and that's probably an understatement to say you had a hard time. You talk about how you repelled friends, you talked about how the loneliness was crushing. You didn't have any friends that were peers. The kids were incredibly mean that even a lot of the teachers were mean and lied. I mean they, they wouldn't stick up for you. They would even lie and tell incorrect versions of events. So I mean it is, it is a heart wrenching tale of childhood and yet here you are and you see the power of people stepping in. So obviously the, the main character, the main one here is your dad. But really there were a lot along the way. So I actually really wanted to start off by talking about Mr. Mick.
- [04:03]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
Yes. My flight instructor.
- [04:05]
Jenny Ertz
Yes, so your flight instructor. So one of the things that really stuck out to me, Lucky, is that you, you have so many hobbies and throughout your childhood you did all these hands on things. So you learn how to fly as an elementary schooler, fly an airplane, you're into scuba diving, you're into golf, you're into skiing, you do rowing. And I just think That's a such a beautiful. That was inspiring to me because there are people saying kids need to have a lot of hobbies today in order to combat the screen time. So at a young age you're, you're eight, you decide that you want to fly an airplane. And then you had a goal. You wanted to be the youngest kid to fly across the country, but that didn't work out. So then you had to come up with these other goals. I realized I have no goals, Lucky. So I was actually really challenged. I was like, shoot, but can you talk about the power? You know this Mr. Mick, he takes you on for flying lessons. You're throwing up in the plane and yet he doesn't. And your dad's nervous about it. You say your dad's risk averse and yet Mr. Mick like doesn't quit you. Your dad wants, your dad wants him to be like, we can't do this anymore, you're throwing up too much. He doesn't quit you. So first of all he like is so impactful on your life, this Mr. Mick, taking an eight year old flying. But then there was like this full circle moment where you realized you were really impactful on his life as well.
- [05:21]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
Yeah. So the whole point of flying, you know, wasn't to teach an 8 year old to fly. It was that my dad realized that I needed something outside of the normal constructs of childhood life to have self esteem about, to focus on and to give me an outlet. Because you know, the three main ways that people get self esteem as a kid is either by being good at school, by having friends or by being good at athletics. And I wasn't good at any of those. And my dad realized very, very young that was going to happen. So the first thing was starting with push ups, you know, 200 push ups a day, five days a week, for however many months and then you get some reward. And the idea was one, sort of the physical exertion, but two, what it meant for me to set goals and achieve them. And when there's a 7 year old who can do 200 push ups, it was kind of something that was mine. Right. And so flying was very much about that as well. I had seen a story about a young kid who had flown across the country. I was 6 or 7 years old, the kid flew across the country, was 10 and I said, I want to beat him. So my dad had always talked to me about setting goals and the first goal was to convince my dad that I should be able to take flying lessons. So I badgered the hell out of him. And then he brought us to this little, you know, hangar that looked like it was something out of the 1970s at this little airport in northern Michigan. And we went to see the head of the. The flight school. And, you know, there was the guy behind the desk and, you know, papers and models of airplanes around and everything else kind of like think about, like, something out of the 50s or 60s in a flight school. And my dad's sitting across from the. The desk of this guy, and I'm in a chair, and my legs are sort of, like, doing this. I'm so short. And he says to my dad, well, you know, what are you here for? My dad goes, well, my son wants to learn how to fly. And Bob Buttleman looks at me and goes, really? I said, yes, sir. He goes, why do you want to learn how to fly? And I told him, well, my goal is to be the youngest, to fly across the country. And my dad was just hoping and praying that Bob Buttleman would say, you know, kid, that's a great goal. And here's a pair of pilot wings. Have a nice life. Come back and see us when you're 16. And instead, he said, you know, he said, let me introduce you to somebody. And he took us all the way in the back, these tiny little, like, metal desk cubicles with diagrams of airplanes. And now, learning to fly an airplane now is like learning a video game. Back then, it was. Had much more to do with the technology for the 1950s than anything else. So all round gauges. So everything was no computer simulators, no way to sort of teach people that way. So everything, when you go back and. And these flexibles with all diagrams of cockpits and everything else on the walls. And Stan Mick was about 60 years old. He was the retired head of advanced engineering at General Motors. Very sort of slender, quiet man. And Bottleman said to him, you know, I think you can teach Lucky how to fly. And that was the beginning of this relationship. Flying. It wasn't about, you know, I was going to go be Chuck Yeager. It was about my dad teaching me that hard work, which the things I had to do to be able to have flying lessons were significant. And then it was about the extra reading and the extra math and doing all of these things that were outside of school. So the culmination of this, obviously, was me flying from St. Louis to Paris when I was 11. But before that, I think the thing that was so important in this relationship with Mr. Mick and I is Mr. Mick was the first Person other than my dad who believed in me. And we would fly and almost every time, especially in the beginning, I would get airsick and I would throw up all over the cockpit. And we think of a cockpit as like an airliner, okay, this is a Cessna 152. If as a grown adult now, I spread my arms out, it would touch both sides of the cockpit and really, actually one arm would touch both sides of the cockpit. So to have this little 8 year old vomiting all over the instrument panel and mix trying to land the plane, it was really awful for him. And then I'm still sick. If you've ever been motion sick, doesn't wear off immediately. I'm laying on the, you know, tarmac sick, and he's cleaning up the plane. So it says a lot about Mr. Mick, of what his level of patience was. But one day my dad said to him, you know, Stan, why don't we just call this right? Why don't we just sort of let Lucky know that he can't do this and maybe try it again in a few years. And Stan is there, having just cleaned up all the vomit and everything else, and he looks at me laying on the ground and he says, if he won't quit, I can't to my dad. So that was really, I think, a moment for me of understanding the power of not quitting. Just never ever quit. That's been a great lesson. It's one of the really most important lessons that came out of, yeah, flying. And again, you know, I don't fly anymore. I get on Delta Airlines. It's never done. You know, it's not a profession for me, but it is something that is so important in my life for what it taught me.
- [10:56]
Jenny Ertz
So this is just one story in the book. And I got so much out of the one story. First of all, we're in Michigan. So Mr. Mick was from Mount Pleasant, worked at GM, had, had patents, you said he had more patents than anyone else at GM at one point. So this is someone who has a hobby. And I think that going by the wayside with screens, so there was like this, you know, reminder of how important hobbies are and how they can really enhance your life. He didn't have to do that. He could have just worked at gm, made his money, done all his patents, but he has this hobby. You say he was quiet, gentle and devoutly religious. And here you are, you're 8 years old, you're throwing up all over the plane. You're throwing up mid flight. And he sticks with you. And so There is this lesson of that first of all, we can make such a difference. I mean how he would never have known. No, he since passed away. Passed away a long time ago. He's like this main character in your book. So we can make such a difference. You know, he would have had no idea that someday he's going to be in this New York Times bestseller book. Then because you were so driven, he ends up flying across the ocean with you. So you said it really briefly, lucky. But St. Louis to Paris, you were like when I was 11, I from, you're like, what is a normal 11 year old doing? They're playing video games. So you know, you say you landed or died and, and you're learning all of these things during that time about am I going to scream the success? Am I going to announce that I'm 11 and I went over the ocean? But you say success is about knowing you've had success, not about public recognition. Achievement is something that's quietly acknowledged, not about applause or headlines. So obviously there's so many things that you can learn from Mr. Mick. Learn from your dad who allowed you to do something. He's a risk averse person. He allowed you to do something that made him really nervous. He wasn't a fan of flying. He was actually terrified flying. He had experience where a plane had crashed, not his, but he was maybe going to be on that plane. So he's trying to get Mr. Mick to get you to quit. So obviously you, you learn then like you talked about sticking with it and you learn that skills transfer. But I think one of the biggest things for me, and this is one of my favorite parts of the book was when Mr. Mc passed away. He ended up having brain cancer. He passed away. When you're 16, you wrote around his casket were articles and awards from our flights.
- [13:12]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
Yeah.
- [13:12]
Jenny Ertz
All around his casket. And you say I didn't realize how much he had cherished our time flying. Gosh, that made me tear up.
- [13:21]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
It makes me tear up thinking about it too. He was a great man and believed in me when nobody else did. I mean other than my dad. So for those not watching the YouTube stream you could, you can see I'm having a hard time. But 16 years old and obviously, you know, I didn't know it at the time because my parents never told me. But you know, I was probably far more on the spectrum than I am now and certainly hadn't done the work that I've done now about understanding emotion and matching emotion, everything else. But I went to his funeral to Honor him. I think I was 17, 16 or 17, 16 years old. Just drove down about four hours from northern Michigan to go to his funeral. But the thing I think that strikes me about Mr. Mick is you pointed out that he took such an interest in me and was so willing to believe in me when no one else will. And if you read through the book, when you read Born Lucky, you see the really soul crushing emotional cruelty that I went through, right? You see the teacher in 8th grade who didn't think that I was going to become Picasso, he was an art teacher. So we're sitting in art class with paintings around and pottery and whatever else is in an art room and he looks at me and he says, you know, Vitter, if my dog was as ugly as you, I'd shave its and make it walk backwards, right? So there was that set of adults, there was the principal who called my parents in two weeks after I started seventh grade in a new school. This was the, my third or fourth, maybe fifth school by seventh grade. And my parents were hoping this was a new start. And two weeks in, she sits my parents down to the principal's office. They've got coffee and whatever else. And she looks at my parents and says, you know, everybody at this school thinks Lucky is really weird. And frankly, I do too. So two arrows through my parents heart. But the reason I say this is that in the book, I really thought the hardest thing about writing it and telling the stories was going to be remembering all the people who were mean. And frankly, you know, it actually was pretty easy and it was not that emotional. The part that has been the hardest is talking about Mr. Mick and talking about all the people who are really kind. And you said something really important, which is the difference people can make, right? And as we wrote the book, I made the decision not to use the names of anybody who was mean to me, which was not, certainly not what my little sister wanted. Certainly not. And it wasn't what my co author, Dodd Yeager wanted either. Because he said, you know, these people really need to, you know, people need to know that you know who they are. And everything else. I said, they know I know who they are. I've not forgotten. But I wanted to use the names, and I did use the names of everybody who was really nice because I wanted people to know not only the people who were there. And I've heard from a couple of people that I totally lost touch with about, you know, thank you so much for acknowledging this and on and on and on. But I've also heard, you know, from people about how it makes them realize what a difference they can make.
- [16:41]
Jenny Ertz
That's right.
- [16:41]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
And I think people don't realize how when a kid's struggling, doesn't. You know, when a kid's struggling, I think about the difference my rowing coach made and other people made my life. Like when a kid's struggling, the difference you can make in a kid's life is extraordinary.
- [16:54]
Jenny Ertz
That's right. Yes, that. I mean, I took away so many lessons just from that one story of Mr. Mick. You guys, the holidays are almost here and you know what that means. People to feed, guests to host, and a whole lot of cozy moments ahead. I've been getting our home ready with Wayfair, and it's amazing how just a few updates make everything feel warm and welcoming again. I grabbed a beautiful new dining bench so everyone has a seat at the table, swapped in flannel sheets for the guest room, and found the cutest Christmas wreath. All from Wayfair's Black Friday sale. Everything shipped fast, the prices were unreal, and it made me actually excited to host. This year, Wayfair really is the place to shop for all things home, from sofas to spatulas, rugs to refrigerators. And during their Black Friday event, you can save up to 70% off. Plus they have styles you won't see anywhere else, so your space actually feels like you. And if you haven't heard, Wayfair now has a loyalty program where you earn 5% back, get free shipping, and have access to member only sales. It's totally worth joining, so don't wait. These early deals are already happening. Head to Wayfair.com now to shop Wayfair's Black Friday deals for up to 70% off. That's W A Y F A I R.com sale ends December 7th. When I think back on my own childhood, I remember the freedom of the neighborhood. How hours spent riding bikes with friends until the street lights came on. That's what childhood should feel like. Movement, laughter and connection. And that's exactly what our friends at Womb Bikes are helping families rediscover. Womb makes the lightest, smartest and safest bikes on the market. Perfectly designed for kids, not just shrunken down adult bikes. Every detail matters. The balance. The brakes, the handlebars, the way the frame fits their growing bodies. You don't just learn to ride with boom. You learn to love the ride. In our own family, we've seen that magic firsthand. Our daughter received a Womb Explorer 6 in that stunning magnetic blue. And from the moment we opened the box, we could feel the difference. The packaging was intuitive, the setup was simple, and within a short period of time, she was riding down the driveway with the biggest smile on her face. When kids have a womb bike, they want to be outside. And that's the heartbeat of what we do. Helping families reclaim time, connection and joy through real world play. So this holiday season, don't just give a gift. Give them adventure, give them confidence, give them outside. Check out all the holiday deals now@womb.com that's W.com as the air turns crisp and the holidays draw near, comfort becomes the best gift of all. And for me, Quince delivers comfort that lasts. They have it all. 50 Mongolian cashmere sweaters made for everyday wear. Denim that never goes out of style. Silk tops and skirts that add polish and down outerwear. Built to take on the season. Perfect for gifting or let's be honest, upgrading your own wardrobe before those holiday photos. Honestly, Quince's Italian wool coats are at the top of my list because the cut feels designer. The quality rivals high end brands, but the price is about half because Quinn's works directly with ethical top tier factories and skips the middlemen. So you get luxury quality without the luxury markup. For me this season, my go to has been my Quince cashmere because it is soft, classic and somehow it goes with everything. Oh, and my all black quince puffer jacket is always at the ready for those chilly mornings. So step into the holidays with layers made to feel good, look polished and last from Quince, perfect for gifting or keeping for yourself. Go to quince.com outside for free shipping and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada too. That's Q-U-I-N-C-E.com outside free shipping. 365 day returns quince.com outside I want to read just a little bit in here just so people can get a sense of what's in the book. When you're talking about refusing to quit, you have all these quotes. It's hard to beat a man who refuses to quit. Life is a series of mental battles and the people who win aren't the smartest or the strongest. They're just the ones who refuse to quit. If you have even a modicum of skill but are willing to outwork everyone else, you have an enormous advantage. You talk about how you always would say yes.
- [20:49]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
Yes.
- [20:50]
Jenny Ertz
Saying yes gets you a long way in life. But these, these adults, I mean, I was not shocked because I was a teacher for A period of time. And I had students where they. They were. I taught math. And math is one of those ones where kids really have a chip on their shoulder. Like, at a really young age, they feel like they're not good at it, and they're really discouraged. And I had a student who would come. Who came to me and said in front of the class, similar to, you know, you said, like, for choir, you're like, with 200 kids, middle and high school. And the choir teacher says, lucky, can you. Your mouth and pretend like you're singing? Like, don't actually sing. And then you talked about how, by.
- [21:26]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
The way, he wasn't wrong in terms of my musical abilities, but still, like.
- [21:31]
Jenny Ertz
Professionalism with a child would be. I mean, if it. First of all, it's school, so who cares about the performance, right? This is a learning environment. But also professional would call you in with your parents and say, this is a really important performance for whatever reason. So we're going to ask that Lucky sings a little quieter. Whatever the. I. I still think that that is not the right thing. But the fact that he does it in front of all these kids. And then you talked about at the International School, and you're five years old, and they're like, he doesn't fit here. And you're. You're like, he's five. Or there was the gym teacher who said, you know, you're getting in trouble for something that you hadn't done. Your story was correct. And the gym teacher was like, but I have to go with the lie or I'm gonna lose my job. And so it's like adult after adult is failing.
- [22:17]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
Yeah.
- [22:18]
Jenny Ertz
Yeah.
- [22:19]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
And I think. I think it's important to note, right, that my parents, you know, six or seven years old, they're told they need to have me evaluated. So they take me with one of those medical testing centers. They give me to the woman to go test me. And they're sitting there in the. The little linoleum floor waiting room with bad magazines and stale coffee, and they're nervous. And we've all been there, right? And then the person brings me back and sits us down in a conference room, and she says to my parents, like, look, there's a lot going on here. Horrible behavioral issues. So he has, you know, kind of the inability to even. Not even get along, but just even be around people his own age. If somebody's own age touches him, he turns around and slugs, number one. Number two, terrible sensory issues. So if he has socks on, he doesn't like or A jacket on he doesn't like or anything like that. He melts down. Which translated into all sorts of other things. Number three, he has terrible learning disabilities because they did me, they did this IQ test. And IQ test is two halves of one test and they're average together. A 20 point spread between your two scores is a learning disability. I had a 70 point spread. They said it was the biggest spread they'd ever seen. So there was a lot of issues. And my parents, my dad said, what do we do? And she said, well, there's not a lot you can do. And this is a guy who had been a very successful entrepreneur and was sort of used to bending the world to his way. And he says, is there anything we can do? And she says, generally not. And you know, the, the implication of that is just sort of meet him where he is, right, and you know, put him in special classes and give him extra time on tests and just let him be him. And that is. I'm trying to think, I mean, the, the general rule then was you just sort of adapt the world to the kid. And it sort of still is. And my dad said, I'm just not going to do that because if I do that, he's not going to understand how to operate in the real world. So the whole premise of born lucky, right, is that my dad, rather than trying to take the adversity away, he said, I'm going to hold your hand through the adversity and we're going to do this walk together. And what it meant over time was I knew I could kind of get through anything. And to be fair to, you know, to be fair, a lot of these teachers, I was a really weird kid. You know, the, you know, the, the behavior, it's not like the behavior changed overnight. You know, I would act out and I would say, things are right. Now, does that excuse the behavior of an adult to a child? No, no. But I think it's important for people to realize, like I probably was screaming when I was singing even in seventh grade, you know, and the choir teacher before the Christmas pageant said, you know, Mr. Vitter, your off note singing is quite noticeable. He had this big British accent that I can't do. And then he says, you know, he says, sing softly. And then in front of the whole 200 people, he goes, as a matter of fact, do not sing at all. Just mouth the words. Okay, thank you. Silent night will never be the same but it's important to know that of how off putting I was to people. And then my dad's journey to sort of try to.
- [25:40]
Jenny Ertz
Yeah.
- [25:41]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
To mold me and morph me into something that could. Could interact in a way that the rest of society does.
- [25:49]
Jenny Ertz
Yes. But still, these are adults. These are adults. And I. So I guess you just. In the book. The book is Born Lucky, which you talk about how born Lucky. Your doctor called you Lucky from the very beginning just because of your birth story. And that's in the book as well. But the. The fact that you can. It kind of just shows that you can go one of two directions. You can be the teacher that says, you know, Lucky's version of the events is correct, and you didn't start the fight, but if the gym teacher tells. Tells that he could lose his job. So, you know, you just see the. The juxtaposition of Mr. Mick versus these other adults. Whether you are hard to deal with or not, that is your job. Like, you've signed up to work with children. Mr. Mick didn't. He signed up to be a flight instructor. And yet he had such an impact. And like you, you said this earlier, you realize what a difference that you can make as one person. And there is this verse in Proverbs that I've always been drawn to, and it says. It's Proverbs 10:17. It says, he who heeds instruction and correction is not only himself in the way life, but also is a way of life for others. And he who neglects or refuses reproof, not only himself goes astray, but also causes to air and is a path toward ruin for others. And I just felt like that was like the two types of people. Like one type of person was a path toward ruin, a path toward your story, the correct story not being told. And then. But then the other set of people, they were the path of life, the way of life. All of these different people that you mentioned in the book. So Mr. Mick. And then in the end, it meant so much to him too. And you pushed him and he got to do the flight across the ocean. I mean, there is just that beautiful, I think, symbiosis of when we do the right thing. So, okay, we talked about Mr. Mick. I love that whole part of the book. And then you talk about how. And I really think this is good for parents. Your dad. So he's there for you, right? He's there emotionally. You're like, every single day you come home from school, he spends hundreds and hundreds of hours helping you work through social skills and learn these different things. You're going to dinner with your dad. He's touching his watch, he's giving you these social cues, but he really invested in your hands on life. So you talk about how the skills, so the skills from flying, Flying taught me more than how to handle a plane, that the skills are transferable. So in a day and age and we're really inundated with screens and it can be hard I think to source our kids interests. Like you specifically said, for the flying, you said no, no, it was for. What was it for? It was for the rowing, you said, okay, so you're interested in rowing. You have to play sport at Burroughs. So you're like, I don't want to play a sport, I don't want to touch anyone. I don't want people to touch me. What am I going to do? It's in the handbook. So I have to do a sport. So you, you say rowing catches my attention. And so your dad finds the St. Louis Rowing Club. This was before Google, so I don't even know how he tracked it down. So your dad is really going to great lengths to give you different opportunities. And one of the things that you talk about then is that these skills, they transfer. So can you talk about the story where now you want to scuba dive and your dad similar doesn't want to scuba dive? Yeah, he's risk averse. He doesn't like the flying, doesn't like the scuba diving. And in fact you have to save his life at one point. But you talk about the skills from flying transferred to the scuba diving.
- [29:12]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
Yeah. And the skills from doing push ups. Right. Which is sort of the most basic thing around of doing 200 push ups a day, five days a week for however many months to get some reward starting at 5 years old. You know, those skills transfer, right. It's not just doing these sort of really exotic things. And those transferred to rowing which is, you know, this very, it's a team sport, but it's also very singular sport. It's also a sport in which hard work equals results. I mean, you know, you don't need a lot of innate skills as you get farther advanced. Being tall helps and other things help. But rowing is basically effort in equals results out. The story about. God, I haven't told the story about being about scuba diving in a long time. So I start scuba diving and I was always looking for things and I think this is understandable, you know, for what you talk about, right? For is a kid who had nothing going for him other than parents who loved him. I was always looking for something I could do outside of school that I Could focus on. Because I wasn't going to be happy or do anything at school. So I start scuba diving. And I was. I guess I got fairly good at it, whatever. And I'm with my dad. I convinced my dad one day that I really wanted him to try it. So we were down in the Florida Keys and my dad gets seasick. And we're out on the boat before the dive and he's getting seasick and we. I go off into the water and swim around for a little while and then it's his time to get in the water so he jumps in. And in scuba diving, you always have buddies, you know, and you never leave your buddy, right? Like, you guys always go together. And that's why you have, like, in scuba diving, you have an extra breathing system for your buddy. You have all these things that, you know that your buddy's there for you if you get tangled, if you. Something happens. And my dad got in the water, it was very clear. He was already really motion sick and disoriented. And the. The person who had taught him for an hour in the pool didn't know what they were doing. And my dad started doing what they call porpoising. So he would go up to the top of the water, you know, to the surface, and then he would go down 40 or 50ft and then he would go back up and he had his breathing regulator in. But it's very dangerous to do that because of how the gases change in your joints and everything else. And in your lungs. And I kind of was hanging out at about 30ft watching this happen. And I would swim behind him and I. He would keep shooing me away. And obviously he was frustrated and he was motion sick and didn't really know what was going on and was trying to scuba dive. And he eventually got to the point, he got so frustrated, so panicked that he got to the top of the surface and ripped his regulator out, which is the thing you breathe through. And he still had his weight belt on, so he started sinking and the air is coming out of his mouth and I could see him sinking, sinking, sinking, and kind of pass me. And I'm, you know, I'm watching my dad die. He's flailing, which is what happens is. So I. I kind of thought to myself, I got one chance at this. And I. I done some, what they call rescue diver training. So I sort of knew what you were supposed to do about 15 or 16 years old. And I swim up behind him, maybe 14, and I grabbed the back of his scuba Tank, there's a grab handle on someone's back in scuba diving. And I think I got one chance at this because he was a lot bigger than me at the time. I'm. I'm bigger than he is now, but I was, he was a lot bigger than me. And I grabbed the controller for his vest, which is the thing that keeps you either afloat or lets you sink. And there was no air in his vest. And I thought, I got one chance at this because if he hits me, he's gonna knock me out too. And I sort of held him on my back and I hit the inflate button and we just rocketed to the surface, which is really dangerous. But. But he didn't have any air left in his lungs anyway. He's sort of graying out. And we get to the surface and he's on his back. And I'm holding him on my back right like this, trying to make sure, you know, he has air. And we're 100 yards, 250, 100, 150 yards from the boat. There's no way to like, do CPR or anything on him. So he starts gasping and trying to flail and hit me and everything else. And I got him calmed down and then I kept him on, you know, on his back, and I dragged him to the boat. So he, he, you know, he says I saved his life then, which. That said he wouldn't have been scuba diving if it wasn't for me. But it was, I think it was a very important point for, for both of us. And I think, you know, he asked me, you know, why didn't you leave me? And I said, well, you never leave your buddy. That's the rule. You know, those are the rules. And Mr. Make had taught me from a very young age. And it's weird as an 8, you know, as an 8 year old to hear somebody say, like, you need to do this or people die, right? Like we do. You know, we go through this checklist every morning, you know, you know, every before every flight, pre flight checklist, pre flight, walk around like you do these things in these steps or people die. And as an 8 year old, that's a kind of a weighty thing to hear and to experience, but it has ended up being very important in my life is something to kind of think about and be able to, to have this very exacting criteria in how I handle things.
- [34:29]
Jenny Ertz
It's just a, I think, such a reminder and a push that when we invest in different experiences for our kids, that those skills transfer so like you said, you fly Delta now, and your dad, you know, you talked about how the flight lessons were sort of expensive, at least for the 90s, but you say, dad believed in the value of what this meant to me. I'm so happy we can do this for you, but if we couldn't, I'd go talk to everyone I know and find a sponsor for you. So you have this intention of making sure that you have these experiences. And then you say, flying taught me more than how to handle a plane. If you've had enough bad landings in bad weather, you learn to control that sense of panic and fear and to trust your instincts, trust your training and trust your instruments. That discipline to stay calm in chaos and rely on preparation saved us that day. My experience with flying ended up saving Dad's life. Even now, I think back to the lessons flying taught me. Repetition, discipline, trust in the process, and I realize how much they've shaped. They've shaped me.
- [35:30]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
Yeah. And that saved my life in the Middle east, too. You know that when you, when you start doing dangerous things, and obviously, you know, when I was a foreign correspondent, being in dangerous places, you realize pretty quickly how important that process and the disciplines that come with it, you know, whether. Whatever they are, why they're there and how you come back to them in sort of the worst of times. So, yes, starting that at a young age was really important. Yeah.
- [36:06]
Jenny Ertz
I mean, this whole book is like, do, do, do you do the skiing, you do the golf, you, you know, you do this. It's a lot of doo doo. And then you even talked about that as an early adult, where you're, you're doing. People are doing internships and you're going into radio. So people are doing internships and they want to land the big names, but you're like, well, if they're there, they're just delivering coffee. But you're like, I'm going to go to the smallest one, the one that's in a trailer with cockroaches, so that I can get actual experience.
- [36:37]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
Yeah. So Born Lucky kind of has these different stories. Right. You know, it's my childhood, and what my dad's doing is I'm a little kid trying to deal with autism and everything else. And then probably the last third of it is my career. And I started off this, I think, applies to anything in life that you do, which is that the best piece of advice I ever got was, go practice your craft. Right. And the craft I wanted to do was being on air. So rather than when I was in college, all the kids were getting internships at the Today show or Fox News or whatever else. I thought, well, I'm not going to be able to do anything there. I'm going to go learn the craft at a place where I could actually do it rather than watch it. And that is a truism across life. And I think what you find when you read Born Lucky is that it's not really. It was not an autism book. It's not a how to book, it's not a prescription, it's not a cure. It's just sort of my stories and what worked for me. And people will take from that what they will. I think what's so important about this in what we're sort of picking up, right, is like how when you set goals in one thing, it becomes easier to set goals in the next thing when. And you talk about transferring skills. You know, the most important skill that my dad ever taught me was not to quit. It wasn't anything that was about a tangible task or skill. It was just a mindset. And that really is the Born Lucky story. And we take you through as a reader where that comes from, which was my dad, who, when he was 21 years old, decided to start his first company. This is long before the Internet or entrepreneurs or anything like that. And he starts his first company, he blows through his first 60 or $70,000 of investment and the company's broke. He's got five or six people. The, the company's idea was to start marketing, to be able to go to Tide or the, the oil companies in the time, you know, beer companies, whatever, and give samples to college students. Because the college students, as they got to college, were a very impressionable group. They'd never been advertised to two before. So he had made 106 sales calls and been told no 106 times, and the company was ready to close. They had six or seven employees in Indianapolis in this little closet. And at the end of the summer, after they had all graduated from college, all these guys were ready to go off and go, you know, start their lives now that the first business venture had failed. And as a way to get out of town, dad went on his last trip that had been booked to go down to Houston more just to get out of town than to do anything else. But he went to Houston to, to make his last sales calls. And on his 107th sales call, the guy said yes. And so if dad hadn't gone on that trip, you know, if he, if he just, if he, if he had just quit. If he just said, okay, we're done and I'm gonna go, you know, sort of move my life on, then it wouldn't have worked. But he fought to the very end. And that, that to me is this, this lesson through Born Lucky of just do you. You can never quit. And it's no different than what Mr. Mick. To take us back to what you first brought up, Mr. Mick. When I'm laying on the ground throwing up, my dad said to Mr. Mick, you know, look, Stan, why don't we just call this. Let's just tell Lucky he can't do this. And Mick looked down at me throwing up and said, you know, if, if, if he won't quit, I can't. And, and that, that, that applies no matter what you're dealing with in life.
- [40:18]
Jenny Ertz
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, what an incredible thing for him to. He's not quitting on you. This is a lesson you really take from the book. You. It's a. It's a lesson of faith, you know, you, like. Does it always work out like, you know, it worked out in the very Last sales call 107th. And you see in your story, you know, you talk about times when the. There was a man that you were working with at Fox and he gets let go and who was it? Bill was his name Bill Shine. Bill Shine. But then it ends up working out that then you end up being at News Nation. And so you said, it's funny how life works. If I had stayed at Fox News, if things had gone the way I thought they were supposed to, none of this would have happened. I wouldn't have had my own show. I wouldn't have the opportunity. Have had the opportunity to build something at News Nation. I wouldn't have met my wife Rachel. In the end, that door closing was the best thing that could have happened. And then you keep on. You keep on. It's. It is. It's a book of hope. And then you, you. I think I love memoirs because then you, you sort of start to see yourself in the story or, you know, could I have that much hope or tenacity or persistence or resilience or those types of things. Could I parent in a different way? I want to talk about the house in Leland, obviously, because I'm from Michigan. So this is a gorgeous area of the country. And like, Fishtown is so incredible. There's so many cool rocks up there that you can search for. There's these ones called Leland Blues. We've got an audience that's trying to get their kids outside. And you talk about your summers. And really there was an interesting part because there was no screens back then. And your dad brought that up at the very end. He doesn't afterward, a short afterward. And he said, with the advent of so much bullying and other negative effects from today's social media culture, it will be hard to escape. We did not have to address that issue. So you had these free summers, like probably in the 90s or early 2000s. You talked about how it was like 90 days. Can you just, I mean, tell people about Michigan and how beautiful. And then you people would come. I mean, if you've got a lake house in the Lake Michigan area, like one summer, 300 people came.
- [42:25]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
Yeah. I don't think I've ever heard my dad say the word social media culture other than in this context. I didn't know he knew what social media culture was until he wrote the afterword for the book. You know, I think you pick up on this idea that the reason we wrote Born Lucky and the reason I shared these just really intimate and awful stories about myself is to give people hope. Right? Yeah. And you talk about the power of being outdoors and the power of getting kids off their screens and off the couch and everything else. And it's weird saying this because I work in an industry where I spend 10 to 12 hours a day staring the screen in TV news, and then I am on a screen afterwards. And the one thing I love more than anything on vacation is to turn my, you know, I delete Instagram and Twitter actually off my phone when I go on vacation. I basically turn my phone into a dumb phone. So all. All it will do is make calls and I can text people or take pictures. But the whole concept for, you know, Michigan, which was a place that my dad fell in love with because my mom's family had. Had built it well back in the 1930s. It's just a cottage up on a lake. But it was an escape, obviously, from the horribleness that I experienced nine months out of the year and the emotional torture and everything else. And, you know, you think about as a little kid, you know, when I was, say, in. In fifth grade, I didn't know that, didn't remember this until we wrote the book. But I asked my sister what was the. The first memory she had of me, and she said, oh, it's really easy. She said, when we were in fifth. When you were in fifth grade, I was in kindergarten, and every day you would walk down from fifth grade to my kindergarten classroom and pick me up. And we would walk home. So we would walk through the PE fields and then to this little wood path that or path through the woods that would lead us to my house. It was about half mile. And my sister said, my first memory of you is every day when we would get to the woods, you would start crying, just sobbing because of the emotional torture and everything else. And she goes, and I would hold your hand. Story always has to be about liberty. We just, you know, put that out there, but in. Liberty's always the hero, but she is. But you know, to escape that and to go to Northern Michigan was like nirvana. It was like freedom, total freedom up there. And, and I, I loved when I was preparing for our interview to think about a thousand hours outside of like what a difference being outside physical activity, doing hard things as a kid. And it kind of, you know, I think it probably matters more for kids who are really struggling like I did, you know, whether it's autism or ADHD or anxiety or all these things that being outside and having real physical activity really matters for as it did for me, 200 push ups a day for me, rowing for me still today, working out is a big part of my life and my routine. And when, you know, there are days that my wife will look at me and be like, just go for a run. Just leave, go for a run. Here's your shoes, here's your headphones, go. We'll talk when you get back. And it's way better than any drug I could imagine. It's harder than taking a drug, but it's way, way better. So Michigan was like that for me. And I, I really think what's so important in the Born Lucky story is how that, you know, my dad didn't, my dad didn't read anything that told him that. He just sort of instinctively understood it of how, of how important that is and how important it is for kids to have that, that other outlet. So, you know, and one of the things that's been so remarkable about the book, you were really nice to say at the top that it was a New York Times bestseller. What's meant so much more to me and so much more to my dad is the letters and the stories we've gotten from so many other families. And it's just been stunning. And this isn't quite outside, but it's close. And I think Jenny, you'll really like this is, I heard from a father of a kid who was profoundly autistic, so non verbal, had a really hard, you know, was in a group home and this father saw in the reports that he would get about his son that his son was happiest when he would splash in the pool. That's what it said. So you know, three days a week they would take the kids to a rec center and they would splash in the pool. And this father says, you know, I think we should teach my son how to swim. And they kind of people were like, can't really do that. And it's, you know, dangerous. And what if he drowns and he's 20, you can't really teach him new things. And my dad goes, no, he's happy in the water. We're going to teach him how to swim. Swim. So now the kid swims a mile and a half every morning. Wow. And it's totally changed his life. Right. And he's happier and he's happier physically and his physical fitness is there and he's not as angry. And he gets up in the morning and puts on his swim clothes and is ready to go because he knows he's going to go swim and he loves it and he loves his physical activity on and on. And that's all because the father said, I want my kid to be more. And that really is the takeaway from Born Lucky if sort of every parent has that power and that agency to help their kid be more.
- [47:39]
Jenny Ertz
Yeah. What a. I can't even imagine the letters that you're getting because the book is, is so moving. It's so moving. And there's so many takeaways from the different stories that you tell. One of the things that I thought was interesting about the Leland house. So this is Shorewood. That's what it's called, right? Okay. This, you said it was like running a hotel. Actually there was this really funny story in there Lucky where you said the delivery driver, there was a fill in delivery driver who was like how can I book a room?
- [48:11]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
Well, it's a, it's a, it's a lake house. But we, we had, you know, my parents had tons of friends, especially my dad and we were, we were there all summer so we would have, you know, people there every day.
- [48:24]
Jenny Ertz
Everybody wants to come. Michigan. There's nothing more beautiful than a Michigan summer.
- [48:29]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
There is nothing more beautiful. And it, it's fun. My, my now wife really fell in love with Leland when I took her up there. And maybe one of the reasons she decided to marry me but the added perk. But we used to. Not anymore but we would have I think one summer, 300 guest nights in 100 days. So in 100 days. We had an average of three guests every night for 100 days. And so it was like running, running a hotel. And God bless my mother. But one day there was, I think it was a UPS driver because, you know, we would get so many deliveries of stuff and, you know, there was people always around. And he asked my mom, you know, how to book a night at the inn for his wife for their anniversary. And my mom said, this is just our house. He kind of like, okay, I don't know what kind of house this is, but good luck, fellas. Good luck, folks. But no, it was, it was a, it was a great escape. Right? And I think, you know, you, you point out again how important being outside is. That really is the best medicine for any kid. And you think about, like, that's how kids grew up for millennia was outside and doing things and working and working with their hands and running around and having physical activity. And then all of a sudden, over the past, you know, 70 years, we just sort of like the, you know, kids worlds went from the whole world to, you know, a 17 inch monitor.
- [49:55]
Jenny Ertz
That's right.
- [49:55]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
And of course that's going to have effects, obvious, bad ones.
- [49:59]
Jenny Ertz
One of the things that stuck out to me, Lucky, was that there is this legacy in your family. And it starts, it's on both sides. So it was your mom's side who had built this cottage. There was like, health problems. And so this is your. Probably your great grandpa, right, that. That builds this cottage?
- [50:15]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
Yeah, my mother's, My mother's. My mother's grandfather built the cottage in 1938.
- [50:20]
Jenny Ertz
So this is your great grandpa. And he built. And he built it big. It's like six bedrooms. So, you know, there's this legacy, I think, of hard work and of going the extra mile because then your dad, he has this goal becoming a. Selling a business for a million dollars or something around there by the time he's a certain age. So in his early 20s, he's wildly successful at business. And you think, Lucky, that someone could just like you could have a cottage and have it, have six bedrooms and never have anybody come over at all. That's a lot of work. Like you said, bless your mother. To have three guests on average every single night for a whole summer. And you talked then about how the steady. I want to read this. The steady stream of guests made up for the absence of friends my age. The house was always full and I was content to sit among the adults, listening to their stories and absorbing whatever I could from their conversations. I was so unusual. So offer them. I never shut up. I would badger the guests. You're like. I would grab their face and be like, talk to me. Answer my questions. But it was so impactful for you to have all these people around, interesting people, CEOs, newspaper owners, doctors. And they taught you say they tolerated your quirks the way that other kids wouldn't. You saw that your dad had good friends. You wanted to have those kind of relationships. He allowed you to come to the dinners. He's helping teach you the social cues. And then after the dinner, you would go over it like it was, you know, a football game. Like, what went well, what didn't go well. And I thought, like, he. Like, he could have just as easily, because he was such a successful business owner at a young age, done none of that. Like, he could have just kind of sat back and relaxed and like, enjoyed his life. And you just see that the continued hard work of your great grandfather on the one side to build the big cottage and of your dad, and I'm sure a lot of other people in the. Along the way, a lot of those relationships benefited you in a lot of ways. And so it's just challenging for me as a parent. Like, can you do a little bit more? Like, that's sort of what I'm getting out of it. Because your dad did. And it wasn't just his. It wasn't just his training and his emotional support, and it wasn't just that. It was also the fact that he had worked hard and built something that benefited you. And we can all do that.
- [52:33]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
Yeah. I think the other part of this. Right. Was what dad's guiding light was, which was his father. And in Born Lucky, you know, you. You see where my dad's sort of instincts and drive comes from, which is his father. Most defining day of my dad's life is when he's 16 years old, he's at home, he's getting ready to go out on a date, and his older brother shows up. His older brother lived away from the house. He was like 10 years older. So Dad's getting ready and he's shaving, and he sees his brother, my uncle, in the mirror. And my dad goes, bruce, what are you doing here? And Bruce says, our dad died. He just had a heart attack. So totally sudden shatters my dad's world. And that night, they go down to the family's construction business, which is small construction business in St. Louis, and they open the family safe. And in the safe in my grandfather's office, they're. He and my dad and my uncle are sitting now in my dad's conference, my grandfather's conference chairs, these old leather chairs, and says, you know, we need to read this letter. My uncle says that our dad wrote for us. So they get the letter out of the safe and they read the letter. And the letter, which we have in Born Lucky talks about how the only thing that matters for a man is his character. Man is defined by his character. He's defined by whether he tells the truth, whether he pays his debts, who he is as a person. And that always was my takeaway. That was sort of how my dad measured himself and would later and still does measure me. So I come back to that, and you're right that the family legacies of all of these come together. And I think the two things my dad always taught me I could control. Right. So when you're a little boy, you. Especially with dealing with the issues I had that you can't control much, and you're not gonna be good at much. But he said you can control two things. You can control your character and your work ethic.
- [54:44]
Jenny Ertz
Yeah.
- [54:45]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
And. And those are the two things. And there's a lot about being outdoors. Right. That those are. Those are the two things in a world that is totally chaotic, which it is, especially outdoors, that those are the two things you can control.
- [54:57]
Jenny Ertz
Yeah. Wow. And that is the legacy. It is a legacy of character and work ethic. Then your dad wrote you a letter when you're heading overseas to be in a foreign correspondent. The afterward from your dad is. Is just really. It's stunning. It's so short. And I was like, this is really impactful. One of the things he said was, this was one of my favorite lines. We did not discuss Lucky's issues or label with anyone, nor did we seek outside assistance. Perhaps that would have been better. I do not know. And that is how it is in life as a parent, as a person. There's just so many things that you do not know.
- [55:35]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
So you want me to give you the other. You want to give me the other part that you don't know? Because it wasn't in the book.
- [55:40]
Jenny Ertz
Yeah.
- [55:41]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
Okay. So I'll give you and your listeners just this little insight into. Into this, into. Into all of this. I would argue that it not telling anyone was the best thing because it never gave me an excuse or let me use something as a crutch or say, oh, this is my autism, and make it an excuse for my behavior. But that's beside the point. So we start working on this book, and every Time I would be interviewing my dad, or we would get to a story that we were trying to tell in the book. He'd go, whoa, wait a second. Do we really want to tell this story? And when you read Born Lucky, you'll realize what a private person my dad is. And I'll go, yeah, I think we should. And he goes, no, I don't know. And this is too personal, and this is too raw. On and on and on. So, you know, do we really want to say that the principal, when you graduated, looked at me and said, there's been kids who've had it rougher at Burrows, but no kid, you know, rougher that Burroughs than Lucky, but no kid who's ever graduated who had it rougher. You know, do we really want to say that? Do we really want to talk about all the nights for my father that he was downstairs in the living room by himself late into the night, crying because of what I was going through? You know, all these things? And I finally said, dad, you got to stop. He goes, what do you mean? I said, we can't adjudicate every story as we're working on the book. So here's what we're going to do. You're going to be as raw with me as you possibly can. I mean, just tell me everything. And I'm going to write the manuscript with Don, and if you don't like it, we won't turn it into Harper Collins. And he's like, okay, so we write the book. And I think that. I think the book is due on a Friday. And you know what it's like. I see your book behind you, right?
- [57:25]
Jenny Ertz
It's.
- [57:25]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
You know what it's like when you've got a book contract and you need to turn this in, and it's Tuesday or Wednesday, and I send him the manuscript. I said, all right, take a look. And he reads it and he calls me and he goes, oh, I don't know if we can do this. I can't do this. I go, what do you mean, you can't? He goes, it's just. This is just too personal. This is just too much. And he goes, I don't think this is a good idea. I said, all right. I said, let me turn this around for you. And he goes, okay. I said, you remember that woman who diagnosed me who looked at you and told you there was no hope and there was nothing you could do? He goes, huh? And you know that the story's in the book. He goes, huh? Because you just read it. I said, okay. I said, what if that woman, instead of saying there was no hope, had said, I don't know what the future holds, but here is this book. It's a story. It's not a prescription, it's not a cure. It's just. Just a story. Just read this and handed you Born Lucky. And my dad said, I would have read it every single week because it would have given me hope. And I said, okay. I said, I think that we need to do the book. And he says, yeah, okay. And I said, why don't you write the afterword? Because. What do you mean? I said, I said, I think people need to hear from you directly. And he goes, nobody wants to hear from me. I said, they do. And I said, I think they want. You know, because he kept saying over and over in this, you know, I'm not a hero. And I feel like it's putting me on a pedestal. And I feel like it's, you know, making me out to be somebody I'm not. On and on and on. I said, well, the only way people are going to hear that is if you tell them them, and that not. And he says, okay, well, when. When do I need to write the afterward bias? Tomorrow. And he goes, I. He goes, you know, you can't do this. And on and on and on. And I said, I said, you have till tomorrow. And that night, it was a Thursday night, I called him at like 10pm I said, if you want to brighten afterward, you need to do it right now. And he goes, I'll call you back. And an hour later, he goes, are you ready? And I said, for what? He goes, I wrote it. Okay. And I turned on the recorder on my phone because I wanted to, because I didn't have time. I didn't know how long it was going to be. I didn't want to transcribe it, whatever. And I can't read his writing, so I wanted to get a transcription of it. And he read. The least edited part of the book is his afterward. I think we changed one comma, and he wrote that in an hour. And that was it. I think it's the best part of the book.
- [59:52]
Jenny Ertz
I think it's remarkable. I think the whole book is incredible. I. I really liked all the parts about the handbook. I love, I love that, all the stories about the handbook, you're like, look, I can park here. It's not in the handbook. Also, this is my club. I mean, this was fantastic. He does end the book by saying, you can make an enormous difference for the ones you Love dearly. That's one of the best books I've ever read. Well, and it's my Christmas book for this year. And this is coming out when it's on sale. It's going to be on sale Black Friday. So go grab your copy now. It will leave you with a lot of feelings, a lot of deep feelings. It will challenge you. It will encourage you. It will give you hope. And it's just a page turner. It's such a page turner. Lucky, what an honor to get a chance to talk with you about it. We always end our show with the same question. What's a favorite memory from your childhood? That was outside.
- [60:39]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
Oh, favorite childhood memory outside. Sunsets in Michigan.
- [60:47]
Jenny Ertz
Yes. Isn't that the truth? They're so beautiful.
- [60:50]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
Or camp. Or campfire. I don't know. I'm gonna amend that. Campfires in Michigan because you had s'. Mores.
- [60:55]
Jenny Ertz
There we go. There we go. Lucky, huge congrats on the success of this. Please tell your dad heartfelt thank you for for saying yes to sharing your deep stories because they are very touching. Thank you for taking your time with us. The book is called Born Lucky. A dedicated father, a grateful son and my journey with autism can also see you 9 o' clock on News Nation.
- [61:14]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
Thank you. Hey, Ryan Reynolds here wishing you a very happy half off holiday because right now Mint Mobile is offering you the gift of 50 off unlimited. To be clear, that's half price, not half the service. Mint is still premium unlimited wireless for a great price.
- [61:35]
Jenny Ertz
So that means half day.
- [61:39]
Leland Lucky Holt Vittert
Give it a try@mintmobile.com switch.
- [61:42]
Jenny Ertz
Upfront payment of $45 for three month plan equivalent to $15 per month required new customer offer for first three months only. Speed slow after 35 gigabytes of network busy taxes and fees. Extra.