MSSP Deian McBryde 25.12
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Michael Schweisheimer: You good? Alright,
Michael Schweisheimer: here we go.
Speed.
Michael Schweisheimer: 3, 2, 1. It's time for the Mission Story Slam podcast brought to you by PWP Video. I'm Michael Schweitzer. I'm the executive producer at PWP Video Mission Story Slam, and I'm a proud cat parent to Scout and Bandit. We are recording this episode of the pod on Thursday, November 13th, so that's the day before our media sponsor the Philadelphia citizen is holding their big festival ideas we should steal.
And we are just five short days away from Mission Story Slam 13. We're very proud to have been invited to be a part of Generosities. Philanthropy week, and we're using their theme of braver today. There is so much to do in this world, and it is more fun when we say yes to great opportunities. And today's guest, Deian McBryde story was all about saying yes in life.
So [00:01:00] let's listen to that story. To start out,
Deian McBryde: my name is Deian McBryde. I'm a brand new Philadelphian. Thank you. I bought my apartment last year over FaceTime, so if you are an age appropriate gentleman, I will probably marry you with just a photograph as long as you're a fixer upper. So, uh, I wanna talk tonight about best friends.
Do you have one? Yeah, mine, Eric. Uh, smart, funny, generous. Uh, gregarious, sassy. And dead. Eric died March 31st, 1992 of hiv aids, and I think about him every day. I, uh, we met when we were very young men in the Air Force, and an early memory was us watching some, uh, female lieutenant, we called them Lady Lieutenants back then.
So a female lieutenant walking down the hallway with [00:02:00] her heels, click, click clicking on the floor. And so the sound of determination for us became click, click, click, click, click, click. Right? And which evolved into, if you're angry. Sort of boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. And then, you know, my feet are booming. My, my lips are getting little, my eyes are winging, whatever.
We just sort of would manifest all these physical descriptions to describe how irritated we were. And then we'd laugh, I dunno why it was funny. It's what we did. Um, we liked to make fun of people. I think Eric called me one day from, uh, work. He was very irritated, uh, at what had happened at work that day.
And he's ranting about it. And I said, you know, sweetie. You just gotta remember people are stupid. And he said, yeah, I should write that down, right? So as Eric got sicker, uh, I wanted to go and see him. I real, really did, but money was tight and my partner didn't think it was a good idea and, uh, couldn't get time off work.
So we would talk on the phone and, and I tell him, [00:03:00] I, I want to come see you. I'm, I'm gonna come as soon as I can. I'm gonna come and see you. But I didn't, and he died and I get the call that he died and voila, time off work. And we found the money for me to go for a funeral. At the funeral I sing, uh, pretty sure it was wind beneath my wings, kind of on point.
And, uh. His family was very, very excited to share Eric's diary of deep thoughts, but Eric really wasn't a deep thinker that wasn't on the list of things that I said. So there were four entries in his diary. One of them had only three words. People are stupid. Oh. He wrote it down and at a little memorial party, people were sharing stories and his.
Partner Bob, who's also dead. [00:04:00] He told a story about Eric's dementia and as it got worse, he would say, sweetie, you know what? I'm getting you for Christmas this year. And Eric would say, what Bob would say, same thing. I got you last year,
Michael Schweisheimer: bitch.
Deian McBryde: Um. I learned a lot of things about my friend that night. I learned, for example, that when I would come to town, he would cancel all of his other friends and he would just block that time off just for me, and they would say, why don't we get to meet Deion? Why don't we get to hang out with Deion? And he'd say, Deon's my friend.
I want him to myself. I'll see you in a few days. I'd never had anybody love me like that before. I'd never had anyone tell me that I was number one, that I was the most special. Before other stories his friends told with some of the crazy things he did. Again, as he [00:05:00] was getting close to death and he was making things up, he was having all kinds of fantasies happening.
And one of the big ones was he would say over and over again, Dion's coming to see me.
He said it a lot, but I didn't go. I got distracted. I got distracted by my relationship and my job and my money and I didn't go. So, you know, a story they say in the rules. Thanks for the warning that we shouldn't be too on point, but here are all the rules. Okay, so they say in the rules, the story has a beginning, a middle, and an end.
So in my story, the beginning was two young guys meet in the military. They drink too much. They have a really long friendship, and one of them dies. But just because that's the ending of that story doesn't mean it has to be the ending of the story,
Michael Schweisheimer: right?
Deian McBryde: My takeaway, my mission [00:06:00] of that is that I cannot be distracted from the things that I must do, that I want to do, that I need to do that I must say, yes.
I must say yes to what's right in front of me to what is right now. We all have a story. We all know what the beginning was, and we all already know there will be an end. But how do you feel the middle? How do you create the story? Say, yes, life is happening now. Your life is now.
The time is now. Live your life, bitch.
Michael Schweisheimer: Thank you. Welcome. Thanks for being here. [00:07:00] That's a lot to listen to, isn't it?
Deian McBryde: That's a pretty good story I have to say.
Michael Schweisheimer: It's a beautiful story.
Deian McBryde: It surprises me to hear back and. Try to step into that moment of wanting so much to communicate, wanting to follow the rules, and really wanting to share this very important relationship in my life that also affected my entire outlook of how I was gonna live every day Since then.
Michael Schweisheimer: It's over 30 years ago now, isn't it? That you lost her? It is.
Deian McBryde: I can I show you all? I know this is audio, so we'll have to describe it, but this is a photograph of Eric and me. Oh my God. Just before he, he left for Korea. And then he got sick after that. I was gonna say, we have to describe it
Michael Schweisheimer: and we, you're gonna have to take a photo of the photo so that we can put it on the episode webpage.
'cause it's amazing. So go ahead and describe it.
Deian McBryde: Well, it's an old timing photo of the two of us dressed as bar mates.
Michael Schweisheimer: And, uh, [00:08:00] I, I think you're, you look a little looser than just barmaid in that photo, my friend.
Deian McBryde: Well. The side hustle was being a barmaid.
Michael Schweisheimer: Okay, there you go.
Deian McBryde: And Eric and I were in New Orleans.
He was about to leave for Korea. It must have been 19 84, 19 85. So a long time ago. And we saw this old time photograph place and I said, we should do that. And he's like, I'm not gonna do that. Shy and had his own awkwardnesses. And I said, oh, come on, let's do it. We can be cowboys. So he agreed after some, after another cocktail, he agreed to be a cowboy with me.
So we went in and we got online and we started being cowboys and we are looking around, but then we noticed, you know, the girls going up and they would have a boa and they would have a thing and I'd say, oh, that'd be funny. What if we were a cowboy? Boas, you'd be, oh, that would be funny. And then what if we were cowboys and we also had a satin shawl, [00:09:00] and what if we were, and it just continued till we got to the front of the line and
Michael Schweisheimer: you were just in drag.
Yeah, I love it. So good. So funny. I gotta tell you, a lot of times people feel compelled that they must say the theme in their story and it isn't required. But man, if you're going to do it. You really nailed it.
Deian McBryde: Thank you. I've always been a rule follower. I've had a. Kind of a crazy, amazing life. I told your team, I'm not a hundred percent sure why Michael wants to talk to me, but I'm happy to do it.
'cause I'm gonna say yes, right? But I often feel like I'm not a very special person. I'm kind of boring. But I've had this amazing life mostly based on saying yes to things. But my whole life has been, I've been a rule follower. I celebrate birthdays on the birthday. 'cause that is the rule. I was up late last night doing a legal filing that had to be in.
They rejected my filing. I had to resubmit it. But the way they rejected it, they wanted me to not follow the rules. So I had to have a little conversation [00:10:00] about that. So I'm very much a rule follower. So in getting ready for your event, I felt really inspired by the rules and also by the theme. I can't believe I'm the only one, but I think that for me, it is often nice to have a container for my creativity.
Yeah, sure.
Michael Schweisheimer: You're not the only one. And
Deian McBryde: to, yeah, and to be able to say, I can do anything I want to. Let me keep it inside of this space, and suddenly you don't have to be a very bright bulb to make a small room look lit up. Right. You don't have to be that spectacular if you create some parameters for yourself and you decide to fill the space that you have.
I think so often it's easy to try and fill every space with light, and maybe we don't have that much light to give. I don't know. But I know that I feel like I have limited ability and limited light. So I want to try to define that space to find this life, to find my relationships. So that they can be fulfilling to me, but I can be [00:11:00] fulfilling to them.
And so I really thought in terms of appearing at your event, I wanted to fulfill the event.
Michael Schweisheimer: Well, you did, by the way before I forget. You ended up having your name drawn first, I think, didn't you? Yeah. That was
Deian McBryde: really not a happy thing for
Michael Schweisheimer: me. Listen, whoever goes first, that is a, that is the toughest spot no matter how we, and we can't eliminate it.
I always tell a host story first to try to soften things, but you did it. You really kicked butt for being in that first spot. But I want to, um, completely contradict you. For just a moment, because you're saying that you're not that bright of light or that not that unique. I wanna shout out Carrie Gonzalez, who's the administrative manager at pwp.
You talked about telling my team your story and Carrie's the one that brought you or told you about the story Slam, right?
Deian McBryde: Right.
Michael Schweisheimer: So I asked Carrie, because I really didn't know you until you came to the story slam. I didn't know you were a creature on our planet. So I needed some information to be able to talk to you today.
So I was like, could you get a little. Biographical stuff from Dean for me, and so I'm just gonna [00:12:00] read what Carrie wrote down from speaking to you.
Deian McBryde: Okay.
Michael Schweisheimer: Dean McBride is a speaker, storyteller, confidant, lawyer, and judge who used to be an Apple trainer, who was an organizational behavioralist, who taught yoga, meditation, and sub continental chanting across the country.
Who sang in New York Lounges and across Europe, Australia, and Russia, who won two fringe festival awards and two green room awards in Australia, who recorded six albums, who had backup dancers, who was a young life insurance company executive that started as a typist. Who received an Air Force commendation medal for tracking nuclear missiles who got accepted at Carnegie Mellon, but his father refused to sign the student loan forms, who was the first boy allowed to be his high school mascot who taught himself the viola to get a gig in the seventh grade who didn't graduate college until 48 or law school until 53, and who moved to Philadelphia?
Sometime between May 20, 24 and October of [00:13:00] 2025. So, yeah. So I'm just gonna say, I think you might be slightly more interesting than you're letting on. I'm just because I have a lot of questions. So many questions.
Deian McBryde: Thanks. I'm glad you do and if I can be interesting to somebody else, it's great. I just feel.
I'm, I feel very ordinary. I'm happy eating the same sandwich every day. I just find myself in these places where something crazy is about to happen and I get to bear witness to it
Michael Schweisheimer: or maybe participate.
Deian McBryde: I don't know that I feel like I get to be interesting because I was at the interesting thing. But something interesting happened and I was a hundred percent, you were de there for sure.
Michael Schweisheimer: I think you were there somehow quite often. So, so many questions from that. I love that list. I love the randomness of the order. It goes backwards and forwards. It's great. How in the hell does someone move for 18 months? How are you unsure when you moved here? How does that happen? And where did you move here from?
Deian McBryde: Well, all of my stories Michael, are going to be the James mission answer [00:14:00] to whatever. So it all starts with, you know, panga and just, oh God, that just how it goes.
Michael Schweisheimer: Can we just all settle that there are multiple continents now and there was continental drift and sciences? Yeah, no,
Deian McBryde: I a hundred percent agree with that.
Lemme tell you how that happened.
Michael Schweisheimer: Let's, let's skip ahead.
Deian McBryde: So I grew up in Albuquerque. I went into the military. I was stationed in Denver, was stationed in Florida, traveled a little bit with the Air Force, doing some entertainment. Came back to Albuquerque, had a move to New York City. Stayed there for 15 years, came back to Albuquerque, and then a couple years ago.
Started this Philadelphia conversation, so about four years ago. I wish I could remember this woman who blessed me in such a great way. I've had a couple of mysterious older women who've wandered into my life, said one thing and changed the trajectory of everything she said. Where you live, where you're 60, that's where you're gonna die.
Michael Schweisheimer: Oh my God.
Deian McBryde: And I just have this instant visceral feeling, like when [00:15:00] somebody reads you, your horoscope, and even though you're one 12th of the population, and surely not a 12th of the population is having what happens that day, but it feels like, oh my God, you're so right. So I had this visceral feeling washed over me that I just couldn't die in Albuquerque.
I love it. It's my hometown. Beautiful. I have so many friends there. The mountains, the skies. Yeah. But I'm alone there. I don't have a partner. I, I'm, I don't have much family and I thought, what does my story look like closer to the end? And how do I want that in between time to go? So I went through a journey of saying I'm ready to inhabit a different space.
Okay. And to see how that light shines there. And so I decided I wanted to live in a bigger city. So I started looking around at cities, and then I came to Philadelphia for a legal training. In 2023, stayed a week for that. Then I came back in 2024 for a couple of weeks. A friend introduced me to a realtor.
I just ended up buying an apartment and I didn't have a job. I didn't know anybody. I really didn't. I don't know what I was [00:16:00] doing. It was crazy, but it was a great deal. I was really happy about it. So I bought this apartment. I closed in May of 2020. Four.
Michael Schweisheimer: Mm-hmm.
Deian McBryde: However, just prior to then, between the time that I was here in March and looking at apartments and the time I went to contract in April, a judge in the family court in New Mexico decided to retire, and I wanted that job.
Michael Schweisheimer: Oh,
Deian McBryde: so. I ended up in a like seven month odyssey trying to become a state court judge in New Mexico. So my apartment here sat pretty empty. Yeah, I would think. Uh, I had to take floors out because it was asbestos and I bought an air mattress, but I would be here, so every two weeks to a month I would just fly to Philadelphia and spend two, again, two weeks to four weeks here.
Then I'd go back to New Mexico and I went back and forth from. May of 2024 and until my renovation was done. Okay. I just brought my stuff from New Mexico in October, so I'm not a hundred percent [00:17:00] sure when to pin my date as a Philadelphian, but that's
Michael Schweisheimer: fine.
Deian McBryde: Sort of like a relationship, like is it the day we met?
Is it the day we linked up? Is it the day that you said? I do so? I'm not sure when my romance with Philadelphia is official, but anyway. You know, I know where to get a cheese steak. That's what I know.
Michael Schweisheimer: I can't speak for all of Philadelphia because I'm not a native. I moved here from Chicago in the late nineties, so I've now been here over half my life, and here's what I can tell you now that I have exceeded half of my life.
I am no longer new. Welcome to Philadelphia,
Deian McBryde: right? Yeah. Great. Excellent. Yeah,
Michael Schweisheimer: knowing, knowing where to get a good cheese steak, that's, that barely scratches the surface of moving to this town. It's a great city, but it's, it's a tough town in some ways, in terms of feeling, and I think you'll melt hearts very quickly, but it's very interesting.
It's not like friends are hard to come by here. They're actually wonderful, but the overall city takes a minute to melt to you. That's all I can say. You have to learn to speak [00:18:00] Philadelphian.
Deian McBryde: Right. Well, everyone here has been very kind since the beginning. Oh,
Michael Schweisheimer: well then you haven't left your apartment.
Deian McBryde: Maybe that'll change. Maybe the more Philadelphia I get, the more Philadelphia they'll get. It's hard to say, but it's been good. And I see Philadelphia has a lot of problems, of course. But I don't know. There is just something great about having human collision.
Michael Schweisheimer: Yeah.
Deian McBryde: Be so accessible. And somebody, if they just have to step out of your way, that's a very human experience that you don't get just driving.
When you're driving and you're in your little bubble and you know you're going from a place and to a place and you're not experiencing the in-between space at all. I think that can dial down a little bit of our humanities. You know, you may not like the person that you see in the park. You might wish they weren't there.
But they are there. And so that's not a bench you get to sit on today. So your choices are gonna be fully informed by what another human being is doing. And I love that. Of course, I love Center [00:19:00] City. I feel very fortunate that I get to see Philadelphia from, of this spot, which is fairly magnificent.
Michael Schweisheimer: That's cool. Uh, don't get me wrong, I really love this town and it's full of amazing people. It's just, it's also, it has an edge to it that is really interesting. I'm from the Midwest, I'm from Chicago, where we're very nice and. When I go home and someone says hi to me on the street that, I don't know, I check for where my wallet is.
It's just a different vibe. One of my really good friends who grew up in Philly found a shirt that I think more than one person has in this town, but it says, I'm not angry. I'm from Philadelphia, so it's pretty good. So, but under that exterior veneer of edge is a lot of love for the city and, and it is a really great place to be and I'm really glad that you're here.
So
Deian McBryde: I had an experience with, with my contractor, um. I think he thought I was doing the apartment as a flip and I wasn't gonna move here. Okay. And at one point I said, well, I really want that because when I'm here, I want blah, blah, blah. And he's like, wait, you're gonna, you're gonna live here. [00:20:00] I said, yeah, I'm, this is my house.
I'm gonna live here. And he, his whole ance changed. He said, oh, we gotta get this right then.
Michael Schweisheimer: Yeah. And that kind of, in some ways it's that there's some unspoken stuff in this town that I think if your contractor thinks you're just gonna come in, buy something and flip it. You're not part of town, but once you're gonna live here, you can be, you can become part of Philly.
So it's a place that will have that edge. But once, once it knows that you're embracing it, it will embrace you back. It's a cool town. Right. I gotta ask you something in that list that I read that. Carrie had shared with me, it did say, judge, and you just said that you did not get the judge spot. So help me understand how you're both judge and not judge.
Deian McBryde: Yeah, I am. I'm making little zen hands right now. I am judge and not judge. I am an appointed tribal court judge for Native American courts. Oh. So I sit as, as a judge pro tempore, which means from time to time, the Native American tribes, nations, [00:21:00] they are sovereign. Many of them have established their own court system.
And so they need lawyers and they need judges and it's great if it comes from the community, but sometimes those resources aren't available. So they'll invite an outsider to come and sit as a, sit as judge. And so I got very fortunate just before my fifth anniversary as a lawyer. So you mentioned I went to graduated law school at 53.
So I got invited to be a judge pro tempore for a tribe in Arizona. And I still sit on that court. I'm responsible for, um. High conflict and complex family law cases primarily. Oh
Michael Schweisheimer: wow. Okay.
Deian McBryde: But I do fill in for the judge so I can do all sorts of things. So it's pretty surprising when family law is a very specific and general sort of thing all at the same time.
Like you've really gotta know it, but it's not like any anything else that people will do. So I am judge and I'm not judge. Got it. I'm actually happy I couldn't leave New Mexico until I knew if I got that. And I [00:22:00] really needed to try it taught me a lot going through it. I think people should apply for things.
Even if you're a hundred, you're not sure that you're right for it, because I didn't get the job and there were politics involved and lots of it was awful. On one level, it was a terrible experience trying to become a family court judge in New Mexico.
Michael Schweisheimer: Okay? But
Deian McBryde: on the other hand, you're allowed to have people come and speak on your behalf before this appointment commission.
Cool. 13 people came and spoke on my behalf. They said they'd never had that many people come and speak for any other candidate before. And the things they said were so lovely, so amazing, so kind and generous that the letters people wrote on my behalf, the judges. All up and down our judicial system who helped me prepare for the interview.
I mean, what a gift. Like gift of intellect and time. Oh yeah. And so what do I know? I know I'm not a judge. Like that could be the takeaway. I tried for something, I didn't get it. I'm not a judge, but the takeaway I choose to have is that [00:23:00] a couple dozen people were very invested in me. Yeah. And wanted me to succeed and be great and were.
Thrilled for me and worried for me and loved me. So being able to say yes to trying and then re recognizing that what you're really getting is the journey, not the destination. Just to sound like my own calendar. That's this whole thing about Yes, Michael, right? If you're saying yes, you're not making a contract with the universe to get what you want.
You're getting a contract with the universe to try
Michael Schweisheimer: or to show up or to be present. You're getting an
Deian McBryde: agreement with the universe to have an adventure. And so that's what happened.
Michael Schweisheimer: If that list makes it clear, you've had many adventures for sure. So I'm just, my brain's connecting a couple things. I'm gonna guess there's a story of what led you to Yes.
To return. To college studies and then to go on to law school. [00:24:00] Oh, was it a random old lady?
Deian McBryde: No, it is not. But I, I, by the end of this podcast, I'm gonna have you and your listeners convinced that I'm just not, that I'm not that interesting. I just stumble into things. It's crazy. So I was in my late forties and I had a lifetime of helping my partners.
Mm-hmm. Do things. Had a partner who, whose father was a dentist, but for some reason I paid to have his teeth fixed. I've had a partner who almost lost, you know, his home and we had to save it. And I, I just felt like I've just been saving people and saving people and so my last partner and I broke up. In my late forties and I was devastated 'cause I thought this was the forever person.
But as I looked around, I thought, well, I don't have any family and I don't have children and I don't have a partner and I don't even have a degree. And anytime I change jobs, I have to start at the bottom. I have to start at the beginning because I don't have any credentials. So I decided that I would go back to school.
So I wandered into the University of New Mexico. And they took a [00:25:00] look at all my 30 years of transcripts, and I guess they were feeling particularly generous. They said, you should just do this. You're a senior. Nice. So I, I grabbed my advisor's bowl of candy and I went around the office and I just thanked them on behalf of the senior class for all of their hard work.
And so I finished my undergrad and I thought that was it. And then I thought, well, I should get another, I should do another thing. So I really wanted to become a therapist. That was really what I wanted to do, and so I enrolled. Yeah, so that's how you
Michael Schweisheimer: became a lawyer. That makes complete sense. Yeah, a hundred percent.
Because they're completely parallel careers.
Deian McBryde: I enrolled in little therapy school to become a little therapist and I would. Negotiating the terms of my acceptance, which included that my email address had to be DN at the college name, like it couldn't be something with Dotson in numbers. I was very insistent, so they went through a lot of hoops to give me my email address.
Sometimes I just out gay myself. I don't even know how, where it comes from, but there it is. That that was [00:26:00] all happening. And a friend took me to dinner and he said, if you become a therapist, you're gonna make about the same money you're making at Apple. I think you should become a lawyer. And I said, I'm too old and I'm not smart enough to become a lawyer.
And he said, you think you're plenty smart? And we're the smartest people I know. And here's a friend of mine who. He went back when he was a, he was a therapist. He went back, he went to be a lawyer. He's doing great. And then he was a little relentless, so I finally just signed up for the lsat. And then along with doing that, you just applied to a school.
So I applied to my local law school who apparently does holistic admissions. And then I got a, an email that said, congratulations, you're in the class of 2015. I said, I guess I'm, I'm going to law school, so I think people can go to law school for lots of reasons. You can be a legacy person who my dad did it.
That's what I did. You can certainly go to law school if you have a passion for people and the constitution and justice, but it's also okay to make a change because you. You're working retail, you're broke, you're [00:27:00] old, you're single, and you need a career. And so that's the path that I took. But man, I didn't expect how many great things would flow from this decision of I want a career and I'd like to make a more stable income.
Mm-hmm. I just stumbled into it and then I went to law school and I wasn't a great law student 'cause it's the worst job training ever. They don't teach you really, I tell people. Learning to be a lawyer at law school is like learning to be an accountant by reading dead people's taxes. There's just, it's not a great way to study.
No one is doing the paper chase Socratic method. You know, I'm not a fan of the process, but man, I love the job. So it's
Michael Schweisheimer: been great. Okay. And I haven't heard a good paper Chase reference in a while.
Deian McBryde: Yeah. Well, I'm that generation, right? I went to law school expecting to have John Ousman ask me Socratic questions.
I was prepared in. Instead, I got a lot of Mr. McBride, please recite the facts of the case, and then I'd start and say, I'll just take it from here. And then they just teach it. I'd like, I would, excuse me, I would like some Socratic teaching. So I got about three professors who are pretty good at [00:28:00] Socratic stuff.
And I also love that 'cause that's Apple's way of teaching. So I was an Apple trainer. Okay. And Apple's way of teaching is called lead learning out. It's you, you know, you sort of think that people know the answer inside of themselves in your job is to help them find it. So the number of lawyers who've been surprised that I don't start my intakes with clients by telling them my biography.
Hmm. But instead saying, so tell me what you had in mind today. How do you think I can help you? What are your top three questions?
Michael Schweisheimer: You did sign up to be a therapist, so that, that kind of makes sense, you know?
Deian McBryde: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. I, I like that part of the job a lot.
Michael Schweisheimer: Back on the college thing for one second.
Did you ever end up at any time. Stepping foot onto the Carnegie Mellon campus or going there at all? Or did that just never happen?
Deian McBryde: It never happened. My dad and I had a really complicated, it wasn't that complicated. He didn't like me and I didn't really like him, so I guess it's not super complicated, but you know, he's passed away and so that was complicated.
There's lots of. Stuff. So I don't wanna over minimize it, but at the end of the day, I also don't wanna storm and [00:29:00] drawing it about to death. It was what it was. But you know, I got accepted to study music at Carnegie Mellon. I was a little kid in Albuquerque, very lower middle class family. It felt huge and wasn't given any scholarships.
So I was just, they just said, yes, you can come. And so I asked my dad to help me go, and my dad said no. And it was at a time you had to be 21 to sign student, your own student loan forms. Okay. So my dad just said, no, I'm not gonna do that. And I didn't know what else to do, so I went into the Air Force instead.
And I have never stepped foot on the campus of Carnegie Mellon. I was driving through Pittsburgh recently and I thought, oh, I should go there, but it didn't really happen 'cause I have a car full of stuff and.
Michael Schweisheimer: Yeah. And then what are you gonna do? Be like, hello College? I never went to, I
Deian McBryde: would probably, me knowing me, I would get a bunch of people together and I would start some sort of a Carnegie Mellon alternative cheer squad and then whatever, we'd be building pyramids on the front lawn and I don't know, I'd probably get something going 'cause that's what I do.
Yeah.
Michael Schweisheimer: Or maybe you'd have the first, not actually an [00:30:00] alumni alumni group or something like that, you know? Who knows? The
Deian McBryde: woulda, coulda, shoulda.
Michael Schweisheimer: So listen, I told you I had a lot of questions from that list. Sorry if I'm distracting
Deian McBryde: you.
Michael Schweisheimer: No. If it's all very distracting, can you even tell us about this tracking of nuclear missiles part that's, I'm assuming that was during the Air force.
Deian McBryde: Yeah, well we had a, so there was a Soviet Union, so there was stuff like that. I don't think I can really say an awful lot about it other than that was just my job. I tracked missiles in space, junk and um, and
Michael Schweisheimer: space junk. We already know, like
Deian McBryde: the space is full of junk and somebody's gotta know where that stuff is and hopefully we know where that stuff is.
That would be great.
Michael Schweisheimer: I do know it's a thing, but with, there's a lot of satellites up there now, so there's, I think there's more junk than ever to track, so I'm sure someone's very busy. So with all of this other stuff. How in the hell did you fit in a music career? So I think I picked up from what you were saying, that this was during your time in the Air Force, you were also, you were tracking missiles, space junk, and singing in lounges.
Is that
Deian McBryde: what I'm getting? Well, [00:31:00] it's all, it's all a blur, Michael, you know? Yeah. It's getting blurry for me too. I hope this is interesting when it all comes out.
Michael Schweisheimer: It's interesting right now.
Deian McBryde: So I sang as a kid. I played violin and viola, and I was in choirs and I did all that stuff. Always wanted to be a singer.
I wanted to be a dancer on the Carol Burnett Show. And then after the Air Force, I was just living in Albuquerque and working, and I felt really unfulfilled. So I just decided I was gonna move to New York. So I packed up all my stuff and I landed in New York City and I lived there for 15 years. I joined an acapella group.
We did street singing. Rudy Giuliani kicked us off the streets and shocking. I started a little singing group. Then I started performing on my own. My very first solo show was in Brooklyn on the Saturday Night Live. Light up dance floor. So I had the guy light it up for me, so Oh, that's cool. For show. Oh
Michael Schweisheimer: my God, that's awesome.
Deian McBryde: I was never rich, famous, or powerful.
Michael Schweisheimer: But you had backup singers.
Deian McBryde: Yeah. I don't know why I did that. It's, I'm not a [00:32:00] natural. I love it, but I'm not a natural dancer. Somewhere in my computer world, there's still a video of me with my two backup dancers. It's pretty spectacular to watch.
Michael Schweisheimer: Oh, I bet.
Deian McBryde: I did it when I could do it.
My dad once got mad at me 'cause I traveled over Europe for three months. He said, you don't have the money to do it. I said, well, I wanna see Europe from my roller blades. I don't wanna see it from a tour bus with my cataract glasses. That was my retort. Anyway, I did it. I had backup dancers and we did it.
I have a video that proves it and every once in a while I'll watch it and just like watching the video you showed a little bit ago, Michael, just can't believe that's me. My mother also used to say, I called her one day and I said, what are you doing? She said, well, I'm watching your ghost Said, what do you mean?
Yeah. She said, oh, I'm, I'm watching this video of you singing when you were in the military and you're just on the stage. I said, well, why are you saying it's my ghost? And she said, well, it is everything you were at that moment.
Michael Schweisheimer: Oh, that's cool.
Deian McBryde: And so when I [00:33:00] look at the picture of Eric and me mm-hmm. I get to not only visit his ghost.
But I get to visit my ghost. I get to remember the guy who talked my friend into being a cowboy.
Michael Schweisheimer: I will say, when I was putting my questions together, I was thinking the nukes and singing in Russia. I was wondering if those things were happening at the same time, I was gonna ask you if your backup dancers were spies.
Deian McBryde: Ah, that's a good question. No, they were just Broadway gays because you know, when I was in the Air Force, we, there was no traveling to the Soviet Union.
Michael Schweisheimer: I was like, how did you end up in Russia? Yeah.
Deian McBryde: Yeah. I went to Russia in like in 2000 or something like that. I was, um, leading a, a gay musicians organization in New York City, called out music, and we had a member who was in Moscow.
I went to Moscow for a month. And while I was there, he knew somebody in St. Petersburg. And so they sent me up to St. Jazz at a hookah bar in St. Petersburg, and I'm the last year of the baby boom. Right? And so I grew up with mutually assured destruction and Leonard and yeah, [00:34:00] all that kind of stuff. It was pretty head trippy.
And the Soviet Union being a place we could never go, it was always gonna be off limits like North Korea now. And to find myself in red square. At Lenin's tomb walking through, seeing the body or the wax figure or whatever, whatever the hell they've got. Yeah. Supposed to be. I remember thinking, I can't believe I'm doing this.
I'm actually here in Moscow at Red Square staying with friends and at Lenin's Tomb, a place that I never thought I, yeah, why would I do that?
Michael Schweisheimer: Not exactly. High on the list of things one expects to do, particularly coming from the Air Force. Yeah. And also I have to say, I'm impressed or just have, have to think about the idea of being an out musician in Soviet Russia thinking about Putin's Russia.
It is not a safe place to even consider being openly out. I would think it's gonna be very difficult.
Deian McBryde: This was not Putin's Russia I yet, [00:35:00] so there were gay bars there, you know, the.
Michael Schweisheimer: Yeah. I just, I wonder, do, are you still in touch with your friend from Russia?
Deian McBryde: I am not in touch with that friend from Russia and then I, there were a couple other people I knew from Russia and we've lost touch in the last couple of years.
Sometimes the Russians are allowed to be on social media and sometimes they're not allowed to be on social media, so there've been times that there's been like blank spaces in, in that contact.
Michael Schweisheimer: I don't want to get through this podcast without. Really intentionally. Talking a little bit about Eric. I know you said in your story that you think about him every day, and I'm just wondering if, what's a recent time that Eric's come into your thoughts?
Was there something that you'd like to tell us about Eric besides the cowboy and other things that we've learned?
Deian McBryde: Well, Eric is on my mind a lot because I often think that if he had lived to be my age, he would've been magnificent. And so I, and I can be a little rough on myself and a [00:36:00] little self-deprecating,
Michael Schweisheimer: just a little,
Deian McBryde: but I am not that magnificent.
But I have the good fortune of knowing somebody who fully inhabited his life for as long as he had it, and he inhabited his friendships and all the things that he was going to do. He did. And so I often think when I'm feeling that I cannot accomplish a thing, I'm not the right one. I'm not smart enough.
I'm not good enough, I'm not interesting enough, I'm not whatever. It might be enough. I just think, well, I'm the one who's here. I have to show up because Eric can't show up. You know, and it doesn't have to be a real person. You can have a little imaginary friend that you think is gonna make the world better, but that person's not gonna show up.
You have to show up a mission slam. That story would not have been told. I had to show [00:37:00] up.
Michael Schweisheimer: Yeah.
Deian McBryde: So when I think about Eric, I think a few things. One is I have to show up 'cause Eric would've shown up and he would've brought so much more. But I'm gonna bring what I've got. The other thing that I think about often is because I am on my own.
I don't have, I don't have family, I don't have children. I don't have a partner.
Michael Schweisheimer: Mm-hmm.
Deian McBryde: And now I'm in Philadelphia. I don't really have any, I don't have a lot of friends and I don't have, I don't have a job here, so I work remotely in New Mexico. I'm alone here a lot. But Eric is with me and he reminds me that I am not only capable of loving, but I am capable of being loved.
And that whether anyone is there to do it or not, it doesn't change that I'm still there and showing up for these relationships and still showing up for that moment. So that's also super helpful. Sometimes I just say things that Eric and I would say, even though [00:38:00] it's been 40 years, you know, we used to make fun of a friend of his.
He had a mother who was quite old and quite sick, so only young people can make fun of old and sick people. You can't really get away with it after a while, but. I guess she would call out and say her son's name is Carrie, and she'd go, Gary,
Michael Schweisheimer: get me a glass of water and a cigarette.
Michael Schweisheimer: It sounds like she really needs a cigarette.
Michael Schweisheimer: I'll still walk around my
Deian McBryde: apartment every once in a while. I'll say like,
Michael Schweisheimer: Carrie, get me a cigarette.
Deian McBryde: And when that happens, you just feel that rush of love and laughter and shared experience that you'll never have with anyone else.
Michael Schweisheimer: I want us to land the plane. I have to ask one question. One of the fun things that happens at Mission Story Slam, I think, is that after someone tells a story, I know there's often interaction in the audience, like people coming up and sharing an appreciation or sharing something that they took away from that.
So I'm curious if anyone had any comments or if any age appropriate Fixerupper men approached you either. Or both?
Deian McBryde: No age appropriate. Fixer up for men approached me. [00:39:00] Damn. A couple of women said they had friends and they were definitely going to get me hooked up, but sadly that did not happen.
Michael Schweisheimer: Um, we're gonna have to follow up.
They need to get on. Yeah. Yeah.
Deian McBryde: No, for sure. I kidding. I'll be there next week. We'll just see what happens. All cool. Contact lenses in. Ready to go? I'm ready to go. All right. Fresh shirt. Ready to go. I was the first. Yeah. And I wish people would stick around and hear all of the speakers. And so it was hard because a lot of people, as they were leaving early, so they didn't stick around to vote and they would stick around to talk to everybody.
They left a little early, but as they were leaving, they stopped and thanked me and told me that they enjoyed my story or they had touched them, that it moved them, that they were really grateful that they know about Eric now, and that they know about me. And that was great. But I will say that at the end of it, it made me sad because very shortly after that I had to get on a plane and go back to New Mexico.
So I felt like I got to be a part of this amazing community experience and then I had to leave. Wow. So [00:40:00] I would be excited to participate in other things around the city and not have to leave so that I can just continue to know the people that I met.
Michael Schweisheimer: Well, I'll tell you what. One of the things that we talk about Mission Story Slam is this really is a community, and so why don't we do this?
What is the best way for our community to find you or reach out to you?
Deian McBryde: Well, I always recommend they start with my OnlyFans page.
Michael Schweisheimer: Okay. The link will be in the pod description. I mean,
Deian McBryde: I feel like, you know what I mean? Why make the first conversation free? Really just go ahead and start monetizing it right away.
Michael Schweisheimer: Right away. Yeah.
Deian McBryde: Um, I'm a gentleman of a certain generation, so I'm on Facebook.
Michael Schweisheimer: Oh, I've heard of that.
Deian McBryde: Yeah. Yeah. I'm Deian McBryde on Twitter X.
Michael Schweisheimer: So it's just at Deian McBryde.
Deian McBryde: Yep.
Michael Schweisheimer: So, do me a favor spell it
Deian McBryde: spells just like it sounds. Let's see. It's D as in David, [00:41:00] E-I-A-N-M-C-B-R-Y-D-E.
Michael Schweisheimer: The DN probably confuses a lot of people, but the McBride, there's, I wouldn't have expected the Y, but I'm glad it's there.
Deian McBryde: Yeah. Well, and if people put that into the Googles, you can also just, you'll find my firm's website.
Send an email. You can reach out, say hello. Keep it clean. People keep it clean.
Michael Schweisheimer: You're the one who started with OnlyFans, my friend. That's on you.
Deian McBryde: Yeah, that's true. That's true. That is true.
Michael Schweisheimer: I have no idea what the case is, but is there anything going on in your world that you would want to, besides the firm and the OnlyFans page that you'd like to promote?
Deian McBryde: I think what I would really say to anybody who's listening is to look around your life and see if there's somebody who. New who could use a cup of coffee, could use a conversation and ask them. Everyone gets busy. You all have primary attachments. You're worried about your kids. You're worried about your job.
You're worried about your stuff, but your friends need you. They need nurturing. And there are probably new people in your community who feel very lonesome, especially during the [00:42:00] holidays and find them. Ask them to do things. Include them, make them a part of the community's. This will be controversial, but kids can go to soccer practice without you watching them.
At soccer practice, you can get a cup of coffee with a friend while your child learns how to do something without you, you can have lunch without your husband or wife or partner having to be there. You can go to the museum with somebody, you can experience the world and experience culture. I wanna give everyone who's wrapped up in their own stuff permission to step out and have an adventure with someone.
Michael Schweisheimer: I love it. I will say, while you were talking, I was a little distracted by the elephant in the room. What is that sound? Is there an elephant in your room? What was going on? Did you hear that? Banging? Oh,
Deian McBryde: well
Michael Schweisheimer: do you have a hippo living upstairs?
Deian McBryde: No. No, but you know it is a condominium. Yep. And so. [00:43:00]
Michael Schweisheimer: Things happen.
It was very boomy. It was just interesting. I'm like, what is going
Deian McBryde: on? Oh, I'm sorry about that. Oh, I think they're dragging something across the ceiling now.
Michael Schweisheimer: Hopefully it's not bodies.
Deian McBryde: If somebody's collecting bodies, I wish they would ask me for names first. That's what I would say,
Michael Schweisheimer: and this has been an absolute riot.
I know that. I will make sure to continue to invite you. Into our community and I hope, I hope a lot of our friends from Mission Story Slam will do that as well. You are endlessly fascinating no matter what you say, and I really enjoyed having you on today's episode.
Deian McBryde: Thank you very much you, I'm so grateful to be asked.
Michael Schweisheimer: I hope that everybody here found today's episode as inspiring and motivating as I did, and will be saying yes to a number of opportunities. And I also hope you'll take inspiration from Carrie and invite some friends to come to the Slam, maybe even tell a story, especially if they are born storytellers like Dion.
So by the time you're hearing this episode, we will have just had mission Story Slam 13, and I will be busy [00:44:00] interviewing those winners. But as pod listeners, I'll let you in a little secret. We are aiming for June 2nd, 2026 for Mission Story Slam 14. Don't have a theme yet. Feel free to send me some ideas.
Info at pwp video is a good way to reach us. But consider this your save the date, a good six months in advance, June 2nd. Until then, I know you'll be listening to this podcast because you are one of our super fans, or as we like to call you missionaries. So please keep doing what you do best, which is spreading the word about our community.
You can direct people to our website, mission story slam.org, or have them follow us on LinkedIn or Instagram and reach out anytime. Tell us what we're doing well or tell us what we could be doing better. We really count on our community to give us the straight story. This straight story, the Mission Story Slam Podcast is produced by Dave Winston and it's edited by James Robinson.
The pod is produced and brought to you by pwp [00:45:00] Video. We are video with a mission. Find us@pwpvideo.com till our next episode. I'm quite confident that I shall remain Michael Schwemmer and I really do look forward to sharing the next story. Behind the story with you soon.