365 Letters My Parents Won't Let Me Read | My Dad, On the Record | Family Edition #1, Dan Watkins

My dad wrote my mom a letter every day for a year from Iceland. 365 letters, and they still won't let us read them. I sat down with my dad, Dan Watkins, to get some of his stories on the record. We start at Motorola, where he spent most of his career as the sales engineer designing 911 dispatch console systems. Just after he turned 50, he helped build Impact, software that checked all the rules he knew by heart. Then we go back to the beginning: the Vietnam-era draft, why he chose the Navy ("three hots and a cot," and the best technical training around), two years of school at Great Lakes, a totaled Plymouth Valiant, a red MGB, and a part-time job at Hal's Drive-In, where he met my mom. When his orders came for a year in Iceland, they made a promise to write each other a letter every day. They still have every one of those letters, and they won't read them to us. We'll get to read them when they're gone. We finish on Dad's favorite question, "Why?", going one level deeper in a conversation, and the advice a friend at Motorola gave him: if you want to talk to somebody, first you have to get their ear. Part 2 picks up after the break with Apple Computer. This is the first FIBERS™ Family Edition episode, a set of conversations with my own family, recorded so their stories don't get lost. If it made you think of someone whose stories you want on the record, send it to them. Please help the show by subscribing and sharing this video. It helps more people find FIBERS™. CHAPTERS 0:00 Cold open: "Not what to think, but how to think" 0:26 Welcome: getting Dad on the record 1:39 Any five years to relive? "The decade of my 50s" 4:19 Credibility, confidence and the "cycle up" 5:50 Turning 50 at Motorola: the Impact software 7:50 What a 911 dispatch console is 10:06 Do dispatch centers still exist? Motorola then and now 12:25 AI on the phone: calling Home Depot 14:38 Why the Navy? Electronics, college and the draft 17:44 "Three hots and a cot" and the Navy's tech school 19:58 First duty station: Iceland (and a totaled Valiant) 21:14 A red MGB from the used car lot 22:01 Hal's Drive-In: where he met Mom 23:45 Why Hal's paid well above minimum wage 27:01 Orders for a year in Iceland 27:44 "Stay away from the sailors" 29:46 A letter every day for a year 30:56 The 20th anniversary and the box of letters 32:09 Old records: "different lives ago" 32:54 Listening back to your younger self 34:10 "Why?": his favorite question 35:19 Deep conversations, not surface chit-chat 37:09 Going one level deeper 38:28 Learning to talk to people: "get their ear" 39:37 From field tech to sales engineer 40:56 Building disarming trust 41:25 The shared cubicle and the cream chairs 42:14 Next time: Apple Computer 42:30 Outro FROM JOE 📘 Joe's Playbook (free): https://fiberspodcast.com/financial-p... 🎧 More episodes: https://fiberspodcast.com/ LISTEN & FOLLOW FIBERS of Life and Business™ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast... Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4cDNwo2... YouTube:    / @fiberspodcast   Instagram:   / fiberspodcast   TikTok:   / fiberspodcast   Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/share/18Gjv5... #FIBERSFamilyEdition #LifeLessons #NavyVeteran #Motorola #FatherAndSon FIBERS of Life and Business™ with Joe Watkins