Thread by @GeoffLaTulippe

I want to make a short thread about something very important to me.

As many of you know, I lost my dad to FoxNews and soft-conspiracy theorist probably starting a decade ago, and fully during the Trump Presidency.

It was awful and hard. Many of you know.

He refused to think. He wouldn't reason. He wouldn't challenge his preconceived notions or his ingrown biases.

He became angry and bitter and vengeful: and he didn't even know why, or with what.

It's been devastating to watch. He's 75 now.

About six-eight months ago, I made a hypocritical decision. I decided that he was going to get a pass on his horrible thoughts and opinions. I've cut people out of my life. But I will only ever have one dad.

I called him up. I laid it out. We live far apart. You're getting old.

We are NEVER going to agree on much of anything politically, and we are never going to change each other's minds.

So my proposal was this: we never talk about politics again. Never. It has no purpose. It goes nowhere.

And we're wasting precious time battling anyway.

To my profound shock, my dad agreed. Immediately. Our relationship was more important to the both of us than our convictions.

Not many people I'll say that about.

Haven't talked politics since. And I've gone from grieving the time we lost being angry to looking forward to a...

...future where I don't have to worry there's a blowup inevitably on the way.

I don't know if it was that conversation, but over the ensuing months, Dad started to...change. Not in huge ways - again, he's 75. But in small, incremental, extremely important ways.

His first instinct, less and less often, is to go on the offensive when challenged. He's admitted he's wrong about something on more than one occasion - OUT LOUD, TOO PEOPLE.

Unprecedented.

Our phone calls became kinder. Smoother. More joyful.

I wonder if, again, a switch had flipped. And why.

I also wondered if it was real.

And to find out, I needed to poke the bear. But in a very strategic way.

So I took deep breaths. Called him. Asked him for ten minutes. He eagerly obliged.

I told him I wanted to have a discussion - not a debate - about something political. I wanted to know his deeper thoughts about a current event.

And I promised the only pushback he'd get would be me suggesting, "OK, maybe think about it this way as well."

No cudgel. No bite.

I had no interest in changing his mind. Only to better see the world as he sees it, and for him to understand why my opinions differ. He thought that was fair. So I asked him a question.

I didn't get ten minutes. I got 49 minutes. We didn't get angry or raise our voices ONCE.

It was calm. It was thoughtful. It was honest. It was sad. It was edifying. It was wonderful.

The question I asked him? The one I wanted 10 minutes on, but he gave me 49?

"When you think of Pride Month, what does that mean to you?"

Forty. Nine. Minutes.

I won't bother with all the details. That's between us. But bottom line, my dad admitted this:

"I don't understand it very well, and I don't agree with that, and I understand that might be biased. But it isn't about me.

They deserve to live and be happy."

He's talking: equal treatment under the law. Gay marriage. Education in schools. Whatever leads them to being safer and less vulnerable.

We at least came to that.

It was one of my favorite conversations with my father. Ever. And it changed my mind.

Even people who have gotten themselves lost deserve at least *a chance* to let you find them and lead them back towards home.

Not everyone's situation is like mine. I'm lucky. Not everyone has this opportunity.

But YOU might. And I'm telling you: of you see it, take it.

Help them rediscover the road back home.

Be good to yourselves this weekend. And #HappyPride. From MY father.

Fucking seriously.