We're Back! - Did You Miss Us?

The co-hosts of the With the Quickness Podcast share the heartfelt story behind their year and one-month absence. For Angeline and Resa, God called them into a "Jonah Moment", a time of reflection and surrender, to face an unexpected season of life that brought earth-shattering revelations about their family. Through this deeply challenging period, the Lord unveiled lessons about faith, resilience, and choices that ripple across generations, inviting this mother-daughter duo to grow spiritually and rediscover themselves and each other.  

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome Back and Reflections on Time Off
• 3:41 Work-Life Balance and Personal Growth
• 6:40 Exploring Family Ancestry and Connections
• 12:08 Meeting Family: A Journey of Discovery
• 17:50 Generational Choices and Family Patterns
• 20:35 The Impact of Family Dynamics on Identity
• 26:01 Navigating Relationships and Healing
• 28:41 The Importance of Communication in Marriage
• 32:53 Navigating Family Dynamics and Connection
• 34:19 The Spiritual Significance of Marriage
• 35:13 Work-Life Balance and Family Time
• 37:19 Podcasting Intentions and Content Creation
• 38:42 The Importance of Stillness and Listening
• 41:10 Personal Growth and Hobbies
• 45:57 Family Matters and Public Scrutiny
• 53:34 Politics as a Reality Show
• 59:32 Hope for Family and Community
• 1:01:42 Embracing Change and New Beginnings
• 1:07:04 Navigating the Journey of Self-Expression
• 1:30:25 The Struggle of Letting Go

Transcript

WTQ Intro (00:08)
Yeah, you, you always make me

You're

You're

Just

Trying to boost my subscribers, I'm trying to maintain the vision People that know me closely slip different than what they show me It's to feel like they know me when I'm scrolling through images Truth be told I feel pain but I'm on the pinnacle Chasing this music thing for a minute though Know some good people that never see success And here I am sitting worried about show appearances

Angeline Bishop Thomas (00:52)
Hi everyone, I'm Angeline and she's Resa and we welcome you to season four, episode 149 of With the Quickness.

Resa Crippen (01:01)
Happy Saturday, everyone.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (01:03)
Happy Saturday indeed. Today we're gonna explain why we've been away. We've been away for a while, Resa, right?

Resa Crippen (01:10)
Yeah, you know, for a little bit, needed a little breather.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (01:13)
Yeah, as somebody in the boomer generation would say, welcome back, like welcome back Carter, or my generation, they would say, don't call to come back. I've been here for years. What would your generation say?

Resa Crippen (01:20)
You

Well, mine would say, we're back. Did you miss us? (Laughter)

Angeline Bishop Thomas (01:30)
(Laughter) I like yours best.

Yours is more realistic. Mine is like you're living in a musical. Well, in order to explain what we've been up to, it's been about a year and a month now since we've been away. Has it felt like a year and a month for you, Resa?

Resa Crippen (01:34)
It is, it is.

Hahaha!

Honestly, my perception of time for the past two years has been off, so it feels a little bit longer to me. But if you're saying it's a year and a month, then I believe you.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (01:53)
You

Yeah, there was a different president when we left. There's a new president now.

Resa Crippen (02:00)
A different president,

a different life, like a different climate. Yeah, things are definitely different. Yeah.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (02:04)
Yeah, a different government. Yeah.

So let's explain what's going on with us. Last time we were in the studio, in the springtime with 2023, but I remember very clearly what motivated a big shift for us. One was we were a little overworked, right? I remember saying to you, it's like, oh,

You want to record? And I was trying to get the recording date done and you had stuff going on and you were like, you said, yeah, I'll be ready. And I was like, are you tired? Do you want a break? And you're like, yeah, I want a break. You remember that day?

Resa Crippen (02:42)
Yes, because that was the day that at well at that point in time in my life, I was starting a new job. And with this new job, I wanted to I wanted to focus on my work-life balance because my last job I was very pro work and not a lot of personal, which in the end, like by the time by the time I left, I was just burned out.

So, and I didn't take a break between my last job and my new job. Even though I could have, I chose not to because I like to have a consistent paycheck. So, because bills don't stop. So I went into my new job. And of course with any new job that you take on, you have to learn, you know, your role. Right. So I'm in the medical field. I had to, you know, not only

Angeline Bishop Thomas (03:27)
And you're in the medical field for those that don't know,

Resa Crippen (03:33)
learn my role, but also just get comfortable with the work that I'm doing. So I am the type of worker that I like to give 100%. And I can sometimes fall back into old habits because again, it was like seven years of me being pro work and putting work first. So to leave that and to start something new and to say, okay, I'm going to, I'm still going to be pro work, but

Angeline Bishop Thomas (03:41)
You

Resa Crippen (04:01)
I'm not gonna stay later if I don't have to. I'm going to just work my scheduled hours and then I'm going to leave and then I'm going to do, I'm going to enjoy my time outside of work. And what I realized was when I, what I realized when I needed a break from taping was I was working and then it was like,

I would have like a day or so to myself and then like we are recording. So it wasn't like I had like a full 48 hours to just like, right, right. And the thing is too with people, what I want people to also understand too is even though I'm not at work, let's say on a Saturday, Saturday is like my errand day. Like I'm running around, like if I'm hanging out with people, I normally put it on a Friday or a Saturday just so I can, you know, enjoy that. So.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (04:31)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Because we recorded on Sunday nights. Yeah.

Resa Crippen (04:54)
but I at least wanna have like a full day to myself. So when I don't have that extra day to like decompress and to just do whatever that is, whether it's watching, know, Abbott Elementary or whatever show that I'm trying to catch up on and, you know, take a nap, what have you, I start to feel rundown because I didn't have me time. I didn't have time to just shut everything down for a day.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (05:17)
run down.

Yeah.

Resa Crippen (05:24)
and just do my own thing. So because for a while it was, but it basically was that where it was like, okay, I'm going, going, going. It got to a point where I was like, I need a break. I need to just shut everything down. I need to, I need to rework how I view work. And I also need to fix my personal life. So I'm like,

also pouring into my friendships because some of my friends were starting to suffer because I would get in these moods where I wouldn't want to talk to anybody and they didn't do anything. just like when I get overwhelmed, I naturally shut down my isolate. My isolate because I just need to, I don't know, just need, yeah.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (06:06)
It's like a reboot thing. Like you take a computer

and need to like shut it totally down and reboot.

Resa Crippen (06:12)
Right, so it's like my thing that I need to like shut down. I need to find my grounding because I'm feeling like I'm not, there's no grounding. And I also feel like too, if I'm not good, I can't give anything to any of my friendships. I, so when I realized things were starting to get rocky, like the time away, I definitely made some shifts and I make it a point to, like I said before, work only the hours that I am legally scheduled to work.

And, you know, when I am off, I'm hanging out with my friends, I'm doing my own thing. I also make sure that I'm in constant contact with my friends and I also keep that communication open. Yeah, and I'm just living life, yeah. So whenever things come up, if I want to do it, I just do it. I don't think about it, because I'm in that season right now. I'm in my soft girl era. So I am, yeah.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (06:51)
and you're enjoying life, right?

The soft life, babe.

Resa Crippen (07:03)
I'm soft life babe, so I'm just living life and doing fun things and just being selfish right now, because could do that, because I'm single.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (07:10)
Yeah, that's the beautiful thing about being a

single word a single girl in Jersey. That's the beautiful thing about that And I know when you took a step back my whole heart sunk a little bit because I was ready to keep going but it was a blessing because God had to wrestle with me a little bit I mean it happened right the way it was supposed to happen because I was like well Maybe I can go on you know without her and maybe I can do a couple and God was like When I say God, I mean the impression I got from the Holy Spirit

Resa Crippen (07:15)
Right. Right.

Yeah.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (07:38)
was like, you got stuff, you got to pay attention to yourself. Now it's interesting because before you took the break, we and Pastor Quick were on the same wavelength because in November time or somewhere like that, he had did something about family ancestry at First Baptist Church of Lincoln Gardens and had everybody wanting to.

Resa Crippen (07:57)
Mm-hmm.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (08:01)
spitting vials and find out what tribe you're part of, right? And so I remember saying to you, it's like, oh, I'm like, Khalid, my cousin had already done our family, you know? So I was like, and I didn't know very much about my father's side. So I was like, maybe we just need to, you know, not do that. Maybe we'll do just regular ancestry. And then you, you volunteered and said, well, Nicole, who's my daughter and your younger sister said she'd already done 23 and me.

Resa Crippen (08:03)
Right.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (08:30)
And I was like, really? She was like, yeah. She goes, and she said, ain't no Puerto Rican in us. I was like, what? Because I always grew up thinking my father was Puerto Rican. You know, that made me half. A dark skinned Puerto Rican, but Puerto Rican. And so I was kind of shocked. I said, get out of here. said, my first thought was 23 and me is sometimes wrong. And now we see in 2025, there might be a point to that. But I said, well, you know, then we need to do our ancestry. I need to.

Resa Crippen (08:53)
Yeah.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (08:58)
bit in the cup and figure it out, you know? So I did it, my husband did it, and we got our results back and come to find out, yeah, there's no Spanish descent there. And we both felt like, what? You know, after everything I've been through for what I've been told and the tests and things I've took, it's like, come on, really? But then we realized things have come a long way since when I first did my work to find out.

Resa Crippen (09:15)
Yeah.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (09:29)
you know, what I could possibly be without having anyone in my father's side helping me, you know? And the beautiful thing about it is that there's a lot of people that decided to, that are curious about their background that, you know, also spent in a violin and uploaded it. And...

they got connected with family and you don't get connected with family just like in some random way that somebody pops up and go, hey, what's your family? What happens is your DNA matches come up and this person is most likely to be your cousin. This person is most likely to be your aunt. This person is most likely to be your brother, your half brother, whatever. And then you have to contact the person and figure it out or you have to figure out the family tree. So when I told you, I said, I think I found my family. And you're like, what?

Resa Crippen (10:05)
Mm-hmm.

you

Angeline Bishop Thomas (10:18)
And I contacted two people at first. The first one was my niece, my half niece on my father's side. Her name was Courtney. And I said, I think we have a grandparent in common or something like that. That's what I thought it was. I thought we had similar grandparents or something. I said, you my father's name to her. And I said, you know, is that your grandfather? Is that any relation to you? Cause she came up as a half niece. And then

A cousin came up too and I was like, do..., I did some of the tracing back a little bit. I said, I think we have a similar grandfather and I think my father might be your uncle. And we figured out because the markers of our genetic codes were so high, like 400, 500, 300, they're high numbers. It's not like a 45 where it's like you're the fourth cousin half removed, you know? And so when we got to talking,

You know, the first thing my cousin, my cousin Latia was like, well, let me ask my mother, you know, let me ask my mother. Her mother is my first cousin, Sheila. And Sheila's like, what? think I met someone that might be connected to our family. And so they're kind of like speaking over here, you know, trying to figure stuff out. And then my niece, Courtney.

Resa Crippen (11:23)
Yeah.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (11:32)
I'm telling her, she's like, think your father is my grandfather. I never met my grandfather. So she's speaking to her dad and her family over here. And I'm still reaching out to other people I'm matching with, right? At the same time too. I mean, I found people on my mother's side that never knew and stuff like that. And so to make a long story short, my cousin Sheila, my first cousin Sheila asked her mother, Ms. Shirley, she goes, there's someone that I believe is,

Resa Crippen (11:39)
Mm-hmm.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (11:57)
your brother's daughter. the first thing Aunt Shirley said was, I want to see a picture. She's old school. Don't give me this spitting in a cup and what some computer said. I know what our people look like, right? So she asked for a picture and I gave her a picture and she showed her and the first time she looked at it she goes, oh yeah, she's one of us. Yeah, I believe it. She looked just like my sister, Georgia.

Resa Crippen (12:02)
Right.

Right.

Mm-hmm.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (12:23)
And I never knew who I looked like before. But sure enough, I look like my aunt, I look like my aunt Georgia. And me and aunt Shirley talked and we talk all the time. She's just a delight. And I told Resa what was going on. Courtney and I only talked via email and she has been an absolute breath of fresh air. She is intelligent. She is kind.

Resa Crippen (12:26)
Mm-hmm.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (12:45)
She is very thoughtful. She's very respectful of her family unit that she has and the fact that I'm someone that's practically a stranger that popped up. But she's been very kind to even like help me understand a little bit more about her life and what she's experienced in her family and what she kind of can remember growing up about different people in the family. And I just feel blessed. My family is big. I've been able to trace my family back.

maybe eight generations on my father's side. I was able to speak to my father. I was able to text with my brother. I learned that one of my brother, the veteran has passed already. I have two brothers and two sisters on my father's side. And I haven't met the siblings, but I definitely met some cousins and I definitely met an aunt. And I've looked at a lot of pictures and done a lot of genealogy.

Resa Crippen (13:14)
Thank

Angeline Bishop Thomas (13:40)
And one of the governors of Maryland is in our family. I was shocked. Chastity Folks, one of the richest black women in Maryland, back in the day in slavery time, she's in there too in the family tree. have, gosh, I'm gonna have to do a genealogy show, Resa, because there's a lot of great people in there. I can't think of all of them now. I gotta get the charts in front and show you.

Resa Crippen (13:58)
Yeah, there's a...

Yeah.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (14:02)
But

because we connected this way, the next step, if you know anyone worth their salt in the family, it's like, we want to meet, you know? And I had already been watching this show called Relative Race that BYUtv puts out. Look it up on YouTube, where they get people that want to meet family members and the cameras follow them along. So I was like, I'm ready. Yippee-ki-yay, let's ride. I told Resa, let's go down to Maryland and meet the family.

Aunt Shirley was ready. So was Latia and so was her mother, Sheila. And they were all gonna be there too. And we met in a common, public place and it was great. It was great. Right, Resa?

Resa Crippen (14:41)
was it was definitely I will admit because this is like the first time that I was driving across state lines but you know I'm glad that you and I have that memory together because I was nervous but then once I got over the couple bridges to get there I was okay. The five bridges yeah the five.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (14:51)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm. was five bridges to get to Annapolis, Maryland. Yeah,

but the beautiful thing about it is, you know, when you look at different people in your family tree, you don't think about, like somebody like has a different look and you're wondering, you don't look like mommy, don't look like dad, who they look like. And it's hard when you don't have a part of your tree you know about. The minute we saw my father's side of the family, I looked at you and I was like, my gosh, I said,

My cousin Sheila is beautiful. looked just like you look so similar in different ways. You know, I can see, I can see more of the stuff people say. Resa looks like you're like, I don't really see that too much. I see it. She looks like me in some things, but not all things. But then when I looked at you around my people, I was like, yeah, Resa's a part of the Bishop side. can see deep. I can see the traits, you know? Yeah. And I looked at Aunt Shirley. was like, I see her hands, her beautiful hands. have similar, you know, in her bone structure. And she's just...

Resa Crippen (15:43)
Not deep. Goodness gracious.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (15:54)
strikingly beautiful, you know? And it was great that she took the time to come out and meet me, because it was like right before, what was the holiday? It was right before, it was, was it Thanksgiving? It was about to start or something? And we were worried about if we put it off too much longer, it could be bad weather. So we wanted to do it.

Resa Crippen (16:06)
Yeah, it was right before Thanksgiving.

Right, because around,

yeah, so around that time there were also some, like basically word on the weather streets was that there was like a possible storm was gonna possibly come through, so we didn't wanna delay it too much.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (16:22)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Yeah, and it was really good. then we get on Facebook, you just, you there's nothing but cousins and family and they were all, Latia gave an account on her Facebook page about the reunion and you know, we chimed, I chimed into and just a gracious, beautiful family, very God fearing. We have a lot of reverends and pastors and in the family, a lot of first ladies and you know, people that are very dedicated to faith. And we also have people that have fallen away, you know, from the faith in the family, like any family tree, it's a lot of branches.

Resa Crippen (16:33)
Mm-hmm.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (16:54)
And one thing I hope that Pastor Quick will talk about one day, and maybe we can give a real plea to him when the podcast comes back for the next episode, is that I notice a lot of generational, I like to call them choices that kept coming up in my family. People say generational curses. I don't believe in curses. I believe in generational blessings you can have on a family line, and you can have generational choices, the same choice that keep coming up.

that you have to make one choice or the other. And I'm looking forward to diving a little deeper into that with you and with our listeners on the podcast. I think it's something that God had this happen for me to see and understand the patterns. Like you talked about when you get overwhelmed and overextended, how you have to like reboot and reset. Your Aunt Sandy was the same way. And I look in the family tree, one of my uncles is the same way.

You know, and I go further back and then one of my great grandfathers, sister, was the same way. So you can see some of the patterns of how people operated. Same thing with religion. You get the choice of, I going to be faithful or am I going to be faithful and maybe fall away or am I going to never accept Christ? You get those choices in the family. You always get the choice of, do you want to believe? You know, and I think I'm going to make a list of some, I'm noticing so many patterns

So that way you can be aware. Like if you know your family has in this family tree, the choice about money to be a good steward, to be frivolous with it, or to be someone that's always trying to steal it or take advantage of people to get it. If you know how the family has always had to wrestle with the choice around funds or money, and you can see how it has operated and shown out in your family tree, then you can say, no, I want to be a person in the family

that continues the legacy of being a good steward. I want to be the person in the family that continues to be faithful in my walk with Christ. Those things you have to consciously do and be and make the decision because there is no lukewarmness with that stuff either. I think it appears every generation in my family, other people's families for a reason. Everybody can look at their family and see what choices keep coming up, right? Yeah.

Resa Crippen (19:12)
Right.

Every family has something that they are like, you know, that's popping up or maybe it's not popping up and you're kind of like, well, I don't understand. then if you actually do the research, nine times out of 10, it can explain why you may do certain things, why certain relatives do certain things, why certain outcomes are the way that they are. And you can also change the outcome of certain things based on the history of

Angeline Bishop Thomas (19:16)
Mm-hmm.

Resa Crippen (19:40)
where your family comes from.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (19:42)
Like some people, some families, they never have a problem drinking wine with dinner, you know? But then you got some people that do things in excess and maybe that's a tipping point. You have some people that never would never cheat, steal, lie, you know? And then other people, have a hard, other people have a hard time telling the truth and other people have a hard time keeping, not being a kleptomaniac when it comes to other things that they like and see out in the world. So you never know.

Resa Crippen (20:07)
Right.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (20:08)
what your patterns are until you start going back in the family tree, looking at the old newspapers, the articles, reading some of the accounts, hearing some of the stories from the family. Like every family. I noticed that Satan is working a lot on this, making everybody be divided. Because when this first happened and I found out that my father's people was alive and they said that the first thing they said is we haven't spoke to him. We know.

where he, I know he's in California somewhere, but we don't really speak to him that often. He speaks to only like one sibling right now. And it was saddened my aunt, you know, because she loves her brother tremendously and she couldn't figure out why. So when I located him, I gave them all the information. Here's where he lives, here's his phone number. Cause you know, I like to put my little, you know, some, my little detective hat on Nancy Drew, you know, hey.

Resa Crippen (20:59)
Yeah.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (21:00)
that might be too old. What's the what's the private eye that you guys talk about in your generation? Because Nancy Drew is kind of old. I'm like encyclopedia brown. I'm like really like understand it. Yeah.

Resa Crippen (21:04)
See, for me, I...

Well, for me, I just say Carmen Sandiego, because that was my favorite cartoon growing up, and she was like a private eye that traveled the world. Yeah, well, Olivia Pope was known as the fixer. So I guess in this instance, we can call you Olivia Pope, because you were giving everybody's information.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (21:14)
That's true. Or Olivia Pope, she was good at finding out stuff.

man, I

was on the hunt. Once you realize that your people's there, you want to know who all the people are. You want to fill in all the blanks. you want to make perfectly clear you're talking and finding the right siblings and everything else. Because the last thing you want to do is tell someone, I think you're my sibling. And you didn't even do enough research to really make sure that their mother is who their mother supposed to be and the timelines all work out. It was really hard to realize that my father

Resa Crippen (21:35)
Right.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (21:57)
had a family and then started another family and then started another family. And it was hard to hear that. my aunt didn't know that I existed. My grandmother on his side didn't know. He didn't know. When I told him, he's like, yeah, I'm your, what are you talking about? You know, what are you talking about? You know, and at least that's what he.

thing to say to me. And it was disheartening. Part of me was like, I want to go back to being Puerto Rican. When you realize your natural father who is alive that was once dead doesn't recognize, like, no, don't, what are you talking about? I don't know anything about this. That was kind of hard.

Resa Crippen (22:25)
No, you don't understand.

Yeah, I can understand that because before when we were under the impression that you were Puerto Rican, it was different. It was like a different, Oh, yeah, sorry. Yeah, like it was technically for me because I'm her daughter, I would have been a quarter. So I used to joke around and say, OK, I'm a quarter Puerto Rican. I was proud.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (22:45)
Let's say half, not pure. Anybody tuning in late? Not pure.

Resa Crippen (22:59)
Obviously now that I realized that I'm not, that I was told that I'm not, I realized that there might be some documents out there that might say that I'm a Puerto Rican, but I didn't know. Yeah.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (22:59)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, I thought about my census record so bad. I said, I gotta go back and clean up that

census record, man. I gotta call them folks. But other than that, I look at it this way. Anytime you take part of your life to embrace a culture, that's a good thing. There's people that are bilingual, there's people that know more than one language, and it's okay to be totally immersed in other cultures and learning a lot about them so you can have a better understanding. Because I understand...

Resa Crippen (23:12)
Yeah.

Right.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (23:34)
our Latin brothers and sisters better than a lot of people in my family, because the amount of time I spent with them as friends, as colleagues, learning the language, learning the customs, learning the food, the music, all of it. And I don't regret a minute of it. Not a minute, Resa.

Resa Crippen (23:48)
Yeah,

I don't either. Even though I am not a quarter Puerto Rican, I still love the culture. My best friend is Puerto Rican. I love the people. So the love that I have for the culture and the people is not going to go away. But there is a little bit of heartbreak because I can't... Even though technically you can still go to the Puerto Rican Day Parade that happens every year, I'm not a real Puerto Rican. I'm an honorary Puerto Rican. Honorary.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (23:54)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

You know, I hear ya.

Yeah, yeah, we a cousin. We

a distant, distant cousin. Most of my roots come from, Chastity Folks is one of my great grandmothers. One of the governors of Maryland is one of my great grandfathers. And I'm

Resa Crippen (24:16)
Yeah, we're the cousins. Yeah.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (24:27)
I go, have some stuff from Wales, some from Ireland, Africa, of course, our people are in the Maryland area. And that's great. When I told my mother and those that remember it was like in 2023 about my mother who had her, she got mauled and lost one of her legs and.

She had a difficult recovery, but she's doing better now. And I remember saying to her, said, mom, I found my dad. know, the dad she said that was dead? Yeah, that was some conversation, guys. And she was a little shocked. And I said, yeah. I said, yeah, he's in California. And she's like, I talked about his people a little bit.

It startled her. She doesn't really want to talk about that time in her life. Sometimes when older people close a chapter, they believe leave the past in the past, which you hear a lot as a kid. And the thing about doing genealogy and looking at the paths and the patterns and things of that sort is when some person decides to not tell the story to the next generation, they lose a lot. That's the beautiful thing about the Bible.

It had everything written down to pass the next generations. And even though she held it and tried to, because of whatever hurts or pain she went through and or for whatever reason she had, God in his infinite wisdom said, take a break from that podcast. You gotta work on some stuff. And one of the things worked on was the family tree. He knew I had a deep longing in my heart to know that side of me.

And he also knew I was under the guise of misinformation. So nothing is better than bringing something to the light. Part of me felt like, should I be ashamed of what I've learned? And I've learned a lot of stuff. But no, no, it's OK if people didn't know I exist. The ones that do know now, they know what kind of person I am. And they're great people. I was able to honor my

Uncle Listene when he passed away by being able to send down a big thing of flowers, you know, when he passed, because I couldn't be there. I didn't think it was right to sit among the family about really first being introduced and knowing my family a little bit or knowing some people in it. And so far, everyone has been just gracious, very gracious to you, to me. We took pictures with Aunt Shirley and Sheila and Latia. We found out some wonderful things about, you know, the family tree.

Resa Crippen (26:46)
Mm-hmm.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (26:52)
which we'll share on another broadcast, know, big families, right, Resa? Big families, from what we can see. A lot of people. We saw pictures of like, what, Thanksgiving and past Thanksgiving's and Aunt Shirley's birthday party. And there's like a lot of people at these things. Yeah, yeah, a lot of people. So I hope the beginning of this will be that one day my siblings and I will be able to sit down and have a real honest talk as adults, you know.

Resa Crippen (26:58)
Yes, yes, yeah. A lot of people.

Yeah, birthdays, graduations, yeah, for a lot of people.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (27:22)
There's some hurt there because the mothers of each of the children, there's three mothers involved in the process. Everybody feels some kind of way about what our dad has done to our mothers. And there's a sense of loyalty to mothers. And I get that, but he might be my father and he might be their father's, but we don't have to be our father's children in that way. You can definitely heal a family and not be on the side of division.

I love my children. love my parents. I love my aunts. I love my uncles, cousins, everybody. And I don't think there's anything too big to talk about and talk through. Satan wants you to believe that division is the best thing. They don't understand you. Exit stage left. Check their action later. They don't like you. I ain't got to talk to them. He makes a lot of things division. It doesn't have to be. It really doesn't.

Resa Crippen (28:03)
Mm-hmm.

No it doesn't.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (28:12)
Yeah. How did you feel about meeting all the family for the first time, Looking around and seeing your own face on different people, different things.

Resa Crippen (28:16)
So, because...

I honestly, so for me, when I meet new people, I'm just naturally shy. So it takes me a second because I have to adjust and I'm trying to read the room. So when I met my cousin and my aunt and she's my, yeah, and my other cousin, yeah, my two cousins and my aunt.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (28:37)
And your other cousin, you have two cousins.

Resa Crippen (28:41)
I was nervous, but I also excited because I was like, oh, OK, I have more relatives that I haven't met yet. So I was excited to meet them in there.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (28:49)
Yeah. I mean, to meet a great aunt

is important because she's like older to be able to meet them before they're gone. That's great.

Resa Crippen (28:56)
Right, right.

And like they were lovely, they were super nice and kind and very open and welcoming. So I was like, okay, this is like the beginning of like, you know, of a beautiful relationship.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (29:10)
Yeah, yeah. And so taking a step back to work on the family and get some things answered in the break was a good thing. And another thing that happened to me, reason why God, and when I say God, you know, mean the prompting to the Holy Spirit, because God doesn't talk to me one-on-one. Unless there's a burning bush somewhere, I don't hear him as clearly as that. I get impressions and I get...

Sometimes I get things in my head that pop up like the Holy Spirit will say things and I know I can differentiate between when God says something and when Holy Spirit, God doesn't talk that much. I don't know about the rest of y'all. He doesn't talk that much. I hear from him when I read my word. I hear from him when Holy Spirit gives me an impression or something, but he's not sitting up there kicking back his feet and talking to me like, you know, doing a diatribe about my life in the corner. It's not like that.

Resa Crippen (30:03)
You know, I...

Angeline Bishop Thomas (30:03)
People that might have that

kind of connection, I don't have that kind of connection. Mine is very much, know, every blue moon, I get an impression or get something from him that I know it's him. Most of time it's the Holy Spirit for me. It just is. I get impressions from the Holy Spirit.

Resa Crippen (30:15)
Yeah,

I was going to say for me, even though yes, every year I watched Ten Commandments and there is a burning bush, I don't hear him directly. But what I do get consistently is confirmation, whether it's through people or through different events, depending on what I'm praying about during that time. So that's what I get consistently. And sometimes I'll get some dreams that are like, OK, now it makes sense. Yeah.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (30:37)
Yeah, you've had a couple of dreams. That's true. I've had

maybe a handful in my lifetime of dreams I can recall that seem very much like it might be something I need to be aware of, nothing, you I get words of knowledge from other people. They'll say something in my life. I'll hear a sermon and be like, it's speaking right to me. And the Holy Spirit is going, yep, that confirms your question you had that morning in the prayer closet, you know, or I open my scriptures and it'll, the chapter I'm reading for the day.

Resa Crippen (30:43)
Mm-hmm.

Right.

Mm-hmm.

Right.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (31:04)
answer something that was a problem for me. So the other thing that was a reason why we need to take a break is that, marriage is ebb and flow. And I have a good marriage, but at the time we were on a rough patch and we were plotting away as season four, you know, and I was just like, the Holy Spirit said, you know, you, if you didn't take this break, you would keep going and not look back and tend to what's

falling apart over here, you know? Marriage is ebb and flow. I tell everyone that gets married, it's not for the weak of heart, marriage. You have to make up your mind, this is your person, and you have to do the hard work. That's the reason why they say for better or worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, because those things will happen. They will. And you have to know if this man is

Resa Crippen (31:52)
Yeah.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (31:55)
On his best day, I love him. Can I love him on his worst? You know, if he if he's sick, can I love him as well as when I can love him when he's healthy? But can you love him when he's not well? You know, can I love him when he has money and we're going on the trips and stuff? And can I love him when we're cutting coupons and eating soup all week long? Yeah, those things. And I had to look at, you know, going so hard for the podcast and some things were falling off.

some things that needed to be attended to in my marriage. cause I'm just like, you must get it from me. The work ethic is strong. You can go from work. I work two jobs. I work at Rutgers University and I work at Middlesex College and I'm a professor at Middlesex and I'm an administrator at Rutgers. And you can just keep in the rhythm of life. Gotta work here, da, and get up. Okay, now I gotta go teach my class and then I'm gonna do the podcast. Like you're saying, there's no time now.

you know, try to clean the house, try to wash my hair. And my husband was like watching me come and go, like, it was almost like he was watching a cartoon, like zoom, zoom, then she goes zoom, zoom, zooming in and out, trying to do stuff. And him and my dog is like, well, sometime today, sometime this week, she might, you know, have more time for us. And it's very disheartening, you know, to be with a family member that has so much going on and you're not really connecting. And marriage is about connection.

Resa Crippen (32:55)
Mm-hmm.

Right.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (33:22)
You know, it's a reason why God put man and woman in front of an altar, because to say their vows when you get married in church, it's because first of all, the man represents Christ, the woman represents the church, and the pastor before you represents God. When you step up to that altar, what happens at altars in the Bible, especially in the Old Testament? Things die.

Resa Crippen (33:49)
Mm-hmm.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (33:50)
and get sacrificed to the Lord. Your

Resa Crippen (33:50)
Right.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (33:52)
single, the parts of you that make you single have to die off. The parts of you that want to say, well, this don't work out. I'll go back and, you know, I'll get my apartment I used to have and I'll go hang with my boy. All that stuff has to die off. You are becoming one on that day. So what's good for me has to be good for him. And we have to work in junction with each other. So when things got so hard, because Satan saw how hard I was going to the podcast, we were getting a good rhythm and stuff.

And he started chipping at my marriage. was like, yo, my gosh, what's going on over here? You know? And when you said you wanted to break from it, I realized I couldn't hold everything. said, I said, well, that just leaves me to, and the Holy Spirit said, work on your marriage. And the Holy Spirit say, do some ancestry, work on yourself. And we need it this year off because my marriage is great.

My marriage is 100 % better than it was before. Do we still have issues like the rest of America under the president that we have right now? yeah, we still got issues. But it's not any issues in my house. Me and my husband laugh more than we ever did. It's almost like the first years of marriage for us all over again. It's like, it's happy, it's joyful. We love spending time together. That work-life balance you talked about, where we were working on the weekends and everything, God had to make that stop. He said, if we come back,

Resa Crippen (34:56)
Right.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (35:13)
Sabbath day remains holy. You don't work on Sunday. You just don't. And I said, well, I don't want to work on Saturday either though. I want my weekend to be not doing, not grading papers, not doing a little bit of work to get ahead. I want to just love on my family. I want to love on my family. I want to go back to Sunday night dinners and I want to go.

Resa Crippen (35:22)
Your weekend.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (35:37)
food shopping with my daughter, pick her up and go do things on Saturday. Cause why? Cause Saturday's free now. So we record, we're to be recording now on, on Monday, Monday nights. We'll do the recording of what we learned on Sunday. It might not be as glossy as it once was. And you're okay with that, right? Cause our YouTube was starting to get really nice and tight and I was like, yeah, we doing this. And God was like, yeah, but our, you need to step

Resa Crippen (35:56)
Yeah.

Yeah, like.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (36:02)
And then you can,

and when he told me, the Holy Spirit told me to step aside, that same day, you were like, I said, you're gonna record it? And you were like, yeah. And so I said, do you wanna break? Hoping you were gonna say no, and you were like, yeah.

Resa Crippen (36:14)
Yeah, like I needed a break. like when I think about like podcast content, don't get me wrong, like I think it's great for the ones that can have all of the creative stuff on it. But honestly, the type of podcast that I normally listen to, it's just people talking with a mic. Sometimes they look super done up. Sometimes they're like, hey, I just got done running errands. So it is what it is.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (36:31)
Yeah.

Resa Crippen (36:39)
We're just here to talk about whatever the topic is or to interview whomever is there. But for me, I'm more concerned about the content of what's being said than all of the other bells and whistles of the actual podcast.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (36:48)
Mm-hmm.

And I get that.

But what I will say is, and I thought about changing the format when we came back and I put that on in my prayer about, should we change it then? Is that, know, and he's pleased with the format. We painstakingly, before we even launched, prayed over each part and what was our intention for the podcast. We wanted something for new and rededicated Christians that are starting on their walk with Christ.

Resa Crippen (36:57)
Mm-hmm.

All

Angeline Bishop Thomas (37:19)
giving them a resource to find, you know, that one, there's other people out there doing good things and there are good people out here. That there are a lot of good pastors out there at the pulpit saying some wonderful things that can lift and edify you. know, sermons that are worth listening to, that we feel. There's music out there. You don't have to just listen to the Clark sisters when you first get baptized because you can't, because you're afraid to listen to the radio. There is great music out there for you and there's things to watch other than Housewives.

You know? So we made it very clear these are the things we wanted to talk about, you know, and like any podcast or radio show, they have their formats too. And God was pleased with it. And I asked him, should we change it in my heart? And it wasn't about change. It was about you guys need to step down. And the reason why I know it was about us stepping down and concentrating on other things is because when we went to Bible study,

Resa Crippen (37:49)
you

Angeline Bishop Thomas (38:14)
or we went to church online for First Baptist Church of Lincoln Gardens, I'd be ready to go in that chat and be myself and you too and just share and be like, hey, morning and sent flowers And he said, no, I want you just to sit and just listen. When we took our break, he said, sit and listen to the sermon. And I was like, but they're going to forget about us. I was like, but I want them to know we're still here. And he was like, that's exactly why you need to sit.

Resa Crippen (38:17)
and

Yeah.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (38:42)
because I had that need to, I wanted some acknowledgement for us in some way, someone that realized we're still around.

Resa Crippen (38:47)
I know.

Right, like there, I firmly believe that there is power in just sitting and being still for a period of time. Like, I don't know why there's always like this need of constantly having to move. I'm just like, if I need to sit still and just be quiet, I'm gonna do that because nine times out of 10 is probably needed. And once I do do that on the other side of that, there's peace and I live for peace. Cause again, I'm in my soft girl era. So, that's all.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (38:55)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, yeah, I like

the your soft girl era. I do understand the importance of peace and stillness in sitting and I'm doing all that. I was doing that, but now I'm doing it more conscious. I'm being more mindful about it, more demure about it. You know, I'm really taking it in like God is saying, don't worry. He told me, don't worry about likes. Don't worry about, you know, who's listening. Don't worry about, you know, how many views, none of that.

know that I'm watching, I'm listening. That's enough. When you go to Bible study, he goes, you don't have to say anything if you don't want to. And he goes, and I don't want you to be in the chat. I want you to be more focused on what's being said. It's great that they, you're one of the number that's showing up. That's enough. You don't have to make.

anything known, you don't have to be like, you know, do anything special. And that was hard at first because when you're used to working on a podcast that deals with being exposed via social media to other people in order to get views and to get, you know, people to know you exist, you have a lot of focus on the marketing. You a lot of focus on viewer and audience retention and stuff like that, analytics. And he's like, nope, don't do any of that stuff. He said, let it go.

Let our producer, you know, I was giving out money. He's like, the producer got to go. He goes, let him go for a while. Take this year off, work on the marriage, work on your family, find out and restore some parts of your family that were missing. It's a blessing to get restored. I felt like a foster kid that finally got to go home when you see your own people. Things make sense about you. When I see things I say and do, I saw it in my aunt. She's similar in some ways.

Resa Crippen (40:36)
Yeah.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (41:05)
It was great. It was a good time to be off for this year and a month. Right, Resa?

Resa Crippen (41:10)
Absolutely. I will definitely say a lot of things have improved. I have hobbies now. I have hobbies. Work is great. It's actually marvelous. My friendships are where I want them to be and they're fruitful. So I'm happy. Like I'm definitely at peace. I don't feel like to me it's important to have peace not only when you go to work.

but also at home, so I have that in both places. So I'm good, I'm Gucci, there's no problems. Like any issues that do come up when I realize how blessed I am, I don't stress about it too much. Now, yes, am I human? I have my days, of course, but I'm not sulking in a problem that appears. I deal with it, keep it pushing, because I'm like, have too many things that are actually going for me right now, and I focus on that.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (42:00)
yeah.

Yeah. We both learned how to be unbothered and not let stress, or we can see the signs of stress like I go to bed at a good time every night. I make sure my weekends belong to my family. I know how to turn my ringer off on my phone and not be the first thing I pick up when I wake up in the morning or let it be the last thing I put down at night. To lean into, you know, watching a show or reading a book.

Resa Crippen (42:07)
Mm-hmm.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (42:24)
I even got an adult coloring book back out. had one long time ago. I got that out and it was nice to sit up there and talk to my husband watching, you know, he's watching the news. So we like Rachel, Rachel Maddow. And so I'm just coloring away a little bit, you know, in one of those inspirational coloring books. And it was very cathartic just to sit and be. I did my brain says, you know, you can be multitasking by doing some of this while you're doing that. My brain is very used to multitasking, but

Resa Crippen (42:28)
Right.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (42:53)
I think part of that busyness and that always doing, Satan is doing that, think, making us feel like we always have to do something, listen to something instead of just be, because it kind of drowns out the promptings of the Holy Spirit. It drowns out the things that could be, you know, the little whispers of something you should be doing, like the Holy Spirit whispers, you haven't called your friend Brenda in a while. You should call Brenda.

Now would I have heard that or paid attention to it as much if I was in the middle of trying to do a little bit of work on the weekends? No. I'd be thinking, yeah, I'll call her later. I got to finish this payroll. That's what I would think, you know? Or I got to finish grading this paper. Yeah, yeah, I'll call it. I'll keep putting it off. Why? Because I'm putting other things in the way. When you're sitting there just enjoying a show with your family and it comes to mind to call a friend, you go, yeah, I haven't talked to her in a while. And so I put out the phone, I called my friend Brenda in Detroit. And I said,

Resa Crippen (43:29)
Right, right.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (43:47)
First of all, I'm so sorry I haven't talked to you in a while. And I want to do better. Let's, you know, she goes, but I know you're busy. I know you're working in the university and the college and you're doing all this. I said, oh yeah, but that's no excuse. You're my friend. And she goes, I've been busy too. You're right. It's no excuse. I said, we got to pick up the phone and reconnect more often. And they're like, yeah, we're going to try to do that. And we decided to give each other grace because, you know, it's not about what you haven't called me this week after you said, no, no, no, she's a true friend.

She still knows I'm still busy. I still know she's busy, but now we're trying to be more intentional and not let as much time go by when we speak.

Resa Crippen (44:25)
Right.

And like, I just read an article about that because I'm obviously in, I'm like 33. So it was an article about how millennials are now realizing how hard it is for like around this timeframe of like in your late 20s, early 30s, like how hard it is to not only make friends, but also maintain them because, know, when we were younger, we were obviously going to the same schools and

doing the same type of jobs, but then when you get older, some of us move away, some of us, you know, depict different life choices, which is fine. And, but then you realize like, well, it's not that easy. Like, for example, like my really good friend, she's married and she has kids. So I never take it against her if we don't have a conversation because she's handling family matters. whenever we're able to talk, we talk.

but we both make it a point to not let too much time go by without watering our friendship. So it's all about just giving your friends grace and not having this unrealistic expectation of, well, I called them last Saturday, so they need to call me. And they haven't called me, so I'm not going to call them. It's just like maybe they were busy. Maybe they're going through something. Because also, too, a lot of people

especially right now in this climate don't have the best mental health right now, which is why I am a advocate more so for therapy. you just don't know what someone is going through. So we just got to give everybody grace and just, you know, not put so much pressure.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (45:55)
Yeah.

Yeah, another thing that happened while we were gone and we were about to come back in February, so it was going to be a full year. But something exploded in our family on my mother's side. We were going to come back in February and we don't even know how to go here. But but I'm going to go there because it's national news and that's how we found out about it.

Resa Crippen (46:14)
You want to go there? Okay.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (46:21)
My cousin is Khalid Kamau, the mayor of South Fulton in Georgia. And so he's been all over the news in February, right? And so I remember we just were on the phone talking and we decided to Google him, right? Because we didn't know where he was at the moment. And I said, where's Khalid now? know, cause we only know where he is normally after the trip is over or there's something on his Instagram. And Resa follows his Instagram a little closer than I do.

And so we put his name in Google and some things came up from, I think it was the New York Post and CNN or USA Today came up about him and the council. And I believe there's been like a worrying about how funds were being used down in South Fulton. And I remember going on the family chat and saying, are you okay, Khalid, are you okay? And sending the articles.

aunts, cousins, people that didn't know were like, whoa, didn't know this was going on. Because Khalid's very private when it comes to family stuff. We see the public persona like a lot of people in public see, but behind the scenes, he doesn't really talk as in depth about all the ins and outs, a lot of stuff he likes to handle himself or keep close to the vest. He had mentioned some things about having some difficulty while he's being mayor, but he also just invited me.

before we saw this to come down that he's gonna do a mayoral like address, in May. So I said, yeah, I'll block off my counter cousin. He said he came back from Africa. We talked about that a little bit. I wasn't sure why he was in Africa. I thought it might've been a trip or something, but you know, he seemed to come back refreshed and ready to work. And he actually said he wants to run for mayor again. And he planned on doing it. And then we read the articles and I'm like, whoa, they're talking about his P card and how he...

use, funds and there's questions around that and him and the council are more at odds and I thought and I said, Resa and we're like reading this and like every day it was he was getting hit by so much stuff. And then I said, well, I can see why the Lord didn't bring us back in February because it would have been a little too hard to see all that going on with him. And then, you know, how do we help? How do we, you know, all we could do is pray.

Resa Crippen (48:25)
Hahaha.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (48:34)
I told Resa about, I some colleagues about it. And I remember saying to he's having his Jonah moment. When God wants you to go a certain direction and you keep doing something else, he makes you sit down eventually. He puts you in the body of a whale and you're gonna sit and you're gonna think and either listen and make some choices based on him or, know.

things will go another way. But he's having a Jonah, he had a Jonah moment. The council made him, you know, sat him down for a minute, you know, locked him out of his suite, his mayoral suite for a while, took away his access for a while. His suite has been given back to him. You know, he is still doing his mayoral duties, but there's a lot of contention between him and the council. And I look back at our family tree and you can see the choice about funds and money came up again.

being a good steward, the choice of transparency, the choice of integrity, honesty. He's wrestling that people, how they interact with him and how he interacts in return. The collaborative spirit is one that's a person can foster. That's a choice to be collaborative. It is a choice to isolate. He has a lot of choices in front of him and running again is a big choice. I feel, we feel for the...

his constituents the most. Because we listened to the town hall, right, Resa? It was kind of, whew, when he came back on the first, before they actually took his suite away, it was very volatile, that one we watched, right?

Resa Crippen (49:58)
Right. I think to see any politician arguing or having a disagreement on a public platform is very alarming. I just, you know, my only hope with this entire thing is that, you know, the truth comes out regarding what exactly happened.

And that they can all figure out a way to coexist and to help the people of South Fulton get whatever they need for their city to make it be what they want it to be.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (50:27)
Yeah, because it goes to stewardship again. mean, any leadership position is really a service position. And if you look at leadership as a service position, then you're going to have the heart of Christ about how you deal with people that report to you or people that you work with or people that you are representing. it's our hope and prayer together that, he has enough time and the council has enough time to really decide they're going to work together.

for the good of the people. I think one of their constituents stood up and says, we don't need any of this infighting. We need you guys working together. Cause they're all very strong, brilliant people. But as long as you think everything is a fight or you're combative with each other, you know, then you can't get anything done. And South Fulton suffers more than anybody when people can't get things done. So hopefully they're at a place now, now that some more time has passed that

because I haven't seen anything in the news lately, which is good, that it hasn't reached national attention. I'm hoping the embers of that fire are just that embers and that there's more of a collaborative spirit and they're trying to work through some things behind closed doors. Not so much playing it out in the public. Because by the time we hear about it in Jersey, it's pretty big with something like, because South Fulton is not Chicago. It's not Los Angeles. It's not Washington, DC. So it's a smaller place to be.

Resa Crippen (51:43)
You

Yeah.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (51:53)
By the time we hear about it, it's like, what's going on down there?

Resa Crippen (51:57)
Yeah,

because again, we are in Jersey. So if something from down south is hitting up north, it's a big deal.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (52:04)
Unless it's big city down south, like if it's Atlanta, Georgia, of course we're gonna hear it. It's like we hear about stuff that happens in Dallas, Texas. But South Fulton, that wasn't, I mean, even though my cousin likes to call it, what's his tag phrase, Resa?

Resa Crippen (52:11)
Right.

he says South Fulton, the blackest city. Yeah, I think that's says.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (52:21)
Mm-hmm. Um, which I

know some people don't like down there because that's a campaign slogan that he's using as a tag for the city and the city has not voted and said they want to adopt that slogan. So that's the infighting about that. It's something my husband, not my, sorry, I said my husband, that's something that my cousin really, embraces and says, yeah, we do have per capita, you know, certain number of, you know, people of color compared to other cities, but.

until people have all come together and voted that that should be the official slogan, the more he says it, does infuriate some people. And I get that. And some people love it. So it's going to be interesting to see what that mayoral campaign looks like for him. I think this is the year they pick their mayor again, right? In November, I believe so.

Resa Crippen (53:08)
I believe

so. think this whole year there's like different states. I know we have ours coming up for our new governor. At this point, like when it comes to politics, I feel like politics have now become like the new reality show. all this stuff happening, that's crazy. was, yeah, wasn't, listen, again, I'm only 33. So I'm still new to the whole politician game, however, comma.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (53:13)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

And that's a shame, Resa. That's a shame that's become that way.

Resa Crippen (53:35)
Growing up, I don't remember all this like back and forth in in in the news and politics and it probably was still happening but it wasn't in the forefront like the way that it is right now to the point where it's like every little thing is getting said and it could also be added to the fact that you know, we have things such as Twitter and Instagram so they're able to Say things on these platforms and then these different

Angeline Bishop Thomas (53:49)
Mm-hmm.

Resa Crippen (54:01)
news outlets will pick that up and then it becomes a headline and then it's like and even the headlines sometimes can be misleading because it's just like it's more so we have entered this clickbait like arena which which can be very exhausting for most people because you don't know what's happening and it gets everyone's nerves like really bad because you're like i just read this and then you read the article and it's like well even though

Angeline Bishop Thomas (54:09)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Resa Crippen (54:27)
Even though the title says this, this article is about something else. And I'm just like, really? Why are we doing this? It's not necessary to me. I would love to go back to a time where everyone was more civilized, where everyone was willing to work together, even though, yes, we do have our differences. But there has to be a common thread amongst all this stuff, because the only people that are being hurt in this are the general public. So we need to get it together, because it's looking crazy.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (54:54)
Yeah, I honestly think that part of the issue is with my cousin's travel is that Khalid didn't sit down with the council and make sure definitively they knew his agenda, what he wanted to accomplish and get input on it. It's not that you are reporting to the council like they can, like they have complete ruling over your life, but.

There are parts of government, got the legislative branch, executive branch, you got all kinds. I mean, they're supposed to work together so that when you wanna do something, they can co-sign, they can help you execute what you want to, they can tell you why they believe it's a better time, or then to do it now, to do it at another time. I mean, that's one of the beautiful things about marriage. That's why it makes it different from being single. Single, you, you can get up and say, I wanna go to the store today.

You're with somebody, they're like, well, wait a minute now. We can't just get up and go to the store because we have to go over and see so-and-so that we promised to see last week. And you have to have a discussion. Like when you're single and it's just you, you can move how you want to move in the world. When you are with a partner or when you're part of a collective group of people, there has to be a consensus. You know how they say me and God, we're in consensus, we're aligned.

So if we're in line, when he moves, I move just like that. know, it's just, it's not any of that, God said go here, I ain't going there. He says, hey, this was, this the way we going? I'm like, yes, Lord, you go that way. So I think that's the part of the problem with the council a little bit is that they didn't know what he was up to. And I gotta admit, the family didn't know most of time where he was either. We really didn't, I didn't know he was when I would call home.

Resa Crippen (56:18)
Great.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (56:39)
Most of my aunt and my mother didn't know where he was, you know? So it's like, we find out like you and a lot of the world on his Instagram where he was.

Resa Crippen (56:47)
I feel like when it comes to my relatives, I never know where anyone is. They don't know where I am. So it's like, it's fine. It's like, I don't know.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (56:50)
Yeah. Yeah. But his only only

difference is he has been elected and they should know where he is. That was a little, that's a little hard to be as much as he was traveling and doing things for South Fulton and not have people know in South Fulton where he's actually existing at the moment until they find out later. That's a part, the transparency that has to be worked on. He needs to have his Jonah moment and say, you know what, let me look at it from their point of view. Let me put myself in their shoes and I can see.

Resa Crippen (56:56)
What the hell?

Angeline Bishop Thomas (57:20)
where I wasn't clear enough on why I was going or what I was trying to do. Maybe I didn't make my plan and maybe he tried. Maybe he tried and they just didn't want to hear it. I don't know. But until there's some kind of consensus, you really need to say, okay, they didn't want to hear about it in the meeting. Maybe when we're not in the meeting, I can go one by one and try to explain what I'm trying to do, via emails, via...

coming, taking someone out to lunch, you know, maybe, you know, going to somebody's district and seeing what they're up to and maybe just having a talk as I walk somebody to their car. I don't know. You know, it can't just be, I can only try to get my points across in a group meeting. has to, sometimes you have to try other ways to talk to people that, you know, cause maybe collectively it's a, it's a tough crowd, but individually you can get them to see what you're trying to accomplish, you know.

Resa Crippen (58:13)
Yeah,

I just feel like whenever there is any type of public squabble, there are always two sides to the story. normally, there's, excuse me, normally there is like, most of the time it's like only one side that's presented as like as the main plot of the story. But then for the ones that are actually in it and they know both sides, it can get very frustrating. So I wish all the best. I just want, you know.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (58:40)
Yeah.

Resa Crippen (58:42)
Peace. Yeah. Right.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (58:42)
I want my cousin to be okay after this. This is my cousin on my mother's side. So his mother

and my mother are sisters. And I just want him to be okay because this was a crowning moment for our family to have a mayor in our family. I haven't seen any other mayors on the Redden side. So this has been kind of nice that he got elevated to this point that his constituents voted him to be in that position. And we definitely want his legacy to go untarnished, but it...

It has a couple of stains now and he's human enough to realize that some things have to be resolved. And like I said, I haven't heard anything in the news and I'm not really looking as much as I once was. So I'm hoping everything between him and the council is working out for the betterment of South Fulton like you. We're giving nothing but good thoughts and good prayers. I'm hoping everybody cooler heads will prevail. And that's what we hope for.

And when it comes to the election, the people will put in place who they wish to be there. And those that are in place will remember it's a service position to be a mayor. It's a service position to be a councilman or a council person, I think they say. But yeah, we're watching up here and everybody's watching. So we hope for the best for South Fulton. I love the fact during the one that we watched, the council meeting they were trying to do, Ms. South Fulton to actually be represented in the pageant.

for Georgia, know, to pick Miss Georgia. So I was like, yeah, Miss South Fulton should be there, you know. It's a new city, but she should be representing.

Resa Crippen (1:00:00)
Right.

I agree.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:00:11)
So a lot has happened since we've been gone. And we are so happy to be back, right, Resa?

Resa Crippen (1:00:16)
We are happy to be back. It's been a minute, we're happy.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:00:17)
Yeah, it's

going to be more of a balanced podcast. We're not going to be taping every single Sunday, but you will get an upload every week. And we were working on how we're going to do that. We might end up doing two sessions on one night just to get, just to knock it out. And so it can be off the next week, but we're not recording on the weekends anymore. We're going to leave Sunday for the Lord to do what he wants to do.

And thank you, those that have been waiting patiently for us to come back. How many podcasts have you been watching in the past where they went away? You're of wondering, what happened? Are they coming back? So how many have you? I got two or three. Jessica Reedy, I'm still waiting for her to come back with her podcast.

Resa Crippen (1:00:52)
Honestly, out of the three that I have in rotation, they didn't really go on hiatus. So they've been consistent throughout the entire time. So they might have an off week, but they weren't taking a large break of, they weren't taking a large gap of time where it's like, we're not. Yeah.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:00:57)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Yeah, we took a large gap. We did the podcast

fade, but we didn't do it on our own volition. God kind of like sat us down. He said, yeah, you guys going to sit down and work on some stuff. And I'm so glad he did. It's like we were in his shed house and he's like, it's okay. I'm molding my own thing here. I don't care what the world wants you to do. You're going to do what I want you to do. And if you're willing to be obedient, I will reward you. And I think it's been a great reward. You feel more balanced. I feel like, you know, I have like

Resa Crippen (1:01:19)
Right.

Mm-hmm.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:01:38)
brand new marriage, feel like I have a brand new family, I feel pretty good.

Resa Crippen (1:01:42)
Yeah, I feel good too, like, you know, on the right track.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:01:46)
Yeah. And now we're in Lent. So we gave up a lot of stuff with the rest of our church, right? I want a cookie so bad. I can't wait until a Good Friday where I can have a cookie or something.

Resa Crippen (1:01:50)
Yes.

I have been craving

Yeah, I have been craving like a brownie and vanilla ice cream so bad and I'm just like counting down the days because we're at that point where we're like a little over the halfway point and I'm just like, yeah, we're past halfway but I'm starting to approach the five miles to empty brownstone and I'm just like, I just want a brownie and it doesn't help that I also got some Girl Scout cookies but I put them in my freezer because I wanted to support.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:02:08)
I noticed that the other night too that I I said, we're past halfway.

You have Girl

Scout cookies in the house? How do you go past your freezer every day? I'd be like, they'd be talking to me when I'm in the bedroom if I had cookies downstairs.

Resa Crippen (1:02:27)
Yeah, yeah.

Well, they're in

the back of the freezer, so I just, don't, it's out of sight, out of mind, but I got them, because I wanted to support the children that are out here trying to do their best. But it's a struggle, because every now and again, because my favorite Girl Scout cookies are the peanut butter chocolate ones, and I have those, but I can't eat them.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:02:53)
You know they were in the press

about what's in their cookies. You know that, right? I think in February there was an article written about what's in the cookies.

Resa Crippen (1:03:00)
at this point in my life, I have given up a lot.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:03:04)
And then I made you

the other day put the Yuka thing, the Yuka app on your phone.

Resa Crippen (1:03:07)
That's what I'm saying.

I have given a blot. I hardly even eat processed foods now because I'm always finding out something that's in them. I'm literally, I use this app and it's basically what it is, is an app where you can scan the barcode of whatever food or whatever item you, like whatever item you have bought from the store and

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:03:16)
Tell them what happened when you did the Yuuka app.

Resa Crippen (1:03:33)
You can see if it has any like harmful things in it. Some people use it for hair products as well. I'm using mine strictly for the food because my hair products are good. Shout out to Beyonce and Cécred. But I scanned a couple food items and out of those couple items that I thought were healthy because they they have real ingredients in them and real things in that like real.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:03:50)
Yep. Yep.

Resa Crippen (1:03:59)
vegetables and things that sort found out, you know, they weren't the great the greatest for me because they had a whole bunch of preservatives in it. So I got annoyed because again, I over the past, I won't say over the past two years, honestly, I have done a overhaul of how I eat. I eat mostly whole foods. I hardly eat red meat anymore. I say hardly because only everyone's in the blue moon from craving it. I'll get it. But I mostly eat

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:04:07)
Yeah.

Resa Crippen (1:04:23)
fruits and vegetables and then I will eat some chicken on occasion if I'm craving it but I try to eat mostly vegetarian. So with that obviously my choices are kind of limited but not really but kind of. So when I'm buying certain foods that I'm thinking are you know they're good you know they don't have a super long shelf life I'm thinking I'm in the clear. Clearly according to this app I'm not.

So now I'm sitting here and for example, there was like, there was this, the spinach dip that I scanned and I'm thinking, it should be fine as spinach. Right. And mind you, at the same time that we're on the phone talking about it, I was making a baked potato and putting this stuff in my potato. And then when I scanned it and I...

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:04:59)
I have it too. I bought one too when I was with you.

Resa Crippen (1:05:11)
read back the results to her about the stuff that's in it, even though, you can read on the side of the container of what's in it. Yeah, ingredients I thought I was fine. I was like, OK, it's not a big deal. And it rates the actual product from 0 to 100. 100 is the highest you can go. And the closer to 100 that you are, the better. The lower the number is, not so good.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:05:18)
The ingredients, yeah.

Resa Crippen (1:05:38)
And when I found out that, you know, there were some harmful things in this wonderful spinach dip, I realized this is going to be another thing that I have to make by hand. It's already gotten to the point where because pizza, which is one of my favorite foods, is so expensive because people want to charge like 30 dollars for a pie, not doing that. Literally, that's that's legit putting gas in my car.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:05:57)
Yeah, that's like a take a gas. Yeah.

Resa Crippen (1:06:03)
I've got to the point now where I make my own pizza from scratch from the dough that I buy that is you know from the store but I do use like Obviously real tomatoes and real cheese that I have to shred myself. So it's I'm starting to become

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:06:19)
Yes, you guys, you were freaked out when I told you about it's better to shred instead of getting it in the bags because of the cellulose, which is actually wood filler that's in cheese, shredded cheese, because they're US, they allow you to have at least 1 % of cellulose in there. And I was what do we need wood chips for? Why do we need sawdust in our cheese work? Just shred it yourself. So she's shredding it herself now.

Resa Crippen (1:06:25)
Yeah.

Right.

Right, like for the longest...

Right, so for the longest time I have been a person of convenience. But apparently with that comes a price because you don't have the greatest quality of food with convenience. So I've now become the person that makes a lot of things from scratch or I'm buying things in its raw state and then, you know, doctoring it up to make it whatever I want to make it. So...

I guess you could say I'm in like my Suzy Homemaker era right now. If you want to. Yeah.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:07:06)
Yeah, you're in your Meghan Markle and your

Martha Stewart era, which I told you too, this is the wonderful thing about genealogy. A lot of people on the Bishop side, farmers and had gardens and stuff like that. And so they're used to eating good produce. Like they know what a good tomato tastes like and like they're used to getting stuff that they've grown themselves. And you're just getting back to something in your DNA.

that most of the family loved to do anyway. You never knew you would love whole foods as much as you do. It might be more work, but you kind of like the taste of it. You made your, what do call it, Chipotle bowl, and you told me it tastes better.

Resa Crippen (1:07:43)
Yeah, don't get me wrong, I do like it. When I think about it, when I think about my history, like my eating history, I was already a picky eater as it is. So the fact that, you know, I have now come turn to the fact that I do like whole foods better, that's great. It's just the fact of the matter of, okay, we gotta take it from scratch. I can't just get, and again, I'm not like.

trying to be that person that's like, you should only buy foods that are whole food. I get it, some people can't. But I also understand too why there are people who want to get their own farms. Because I'm about to become that person where I'm like, don't want the, listen, I don't want the chickens or the cows because I love animals from afar. I don't need that in my face Like, I'm more so like.

okay, can I grow my own broccoli? Can I grow my own apple? But even then you do that, then you have little animals that want to come through and eat it. So I would still have to do the research on that, on how that would work. But I understand why people want to have a farm and want to have, and want to grow their own fruits and vegetables because there's just a lot of things happening with our food that is given to us. And it's unfortunate, but I know I'm not the only person that is like,

actually shifting how they eat, not only for health reasons, but also just for the price. Like fast food used to be cheap and now it's like expensive, like $20 for like a burger and fries. I'm gonna forget it at this point. I don't even want it.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:09:06)
Yeah.

Yeah, but people,

a family of four eating out, that's groceries, you know?

Resa Crippen (1:09:15)
It is grocery

or like, you know, paying gas for your car.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:09:19)
Yeah. And the one thing that's beautiful about it is that when you make your own, yes, it takes more time. I think America, our health is suffering because we want convenience. Like you said, that's all we want. We want things quick, fast. Let's skip over some steps in the kitchen. And rather than making a salad from scratch, we want it in the bag. Rather than shredding the cheese ourselves, we want that, you know, available in a bag. We want everything so quick, quick, quick.

Resa Crippen (1:09:29)
Mm-hmm.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:09:45)
because we're telling the world we're just so busy as Americans. We're too busy to chop up anything with real parsley. We want the dry stuff. Just take it out the cabinet and sprinkle it in. Some people don't even know what real parsley tastes like. And some people do. Some people don't. We're rushing and rushing. Used to be, parents would get up. My mother would get up. She'd make some biscuits on Sunday or Saturday morning. And when I made biscuits during this break,

Resa Crippen (1:10:10)
Ha ha ha ha.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:10:10)
I made biscuits like two weeks

ago. My husband came in the room, he stopped. He said, hold up right there. He took his cell phone out and took a picture. He's like, I've lived in New Jersey for years. I have yet to see a black woman making a biscuit. And he goes, I gotta take a picture of this. Because he grew up, his mother made biscuits, my mother made biscuits. But he's right. Most women, most people would take the easy way, easy breads, easy whatever. We go to the bakery and get, you know, rolls and stuff, or we get the...

biscuit in the can, hit it on the side of the counter and throw it in. But I said it was great to be actually to make, like you said, make the pizza. It's a great process to learn how to do those.

Resa Crippen (1:10:40)
Woo!

Right, and then when you have these successful restaurants, excuse me, that are getting deals with different stores and then they're taking their products that they normally make from their restaurant and putting it in the stores, you're like, I can use this or eat this, and you're thinking that it's good because it's restaurant quality, but then you don't realize how many things are being put into it to keep it fresh. So that's where we are right now, because I've gotten

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:11:12)
Yep. Yeah.

Your food is supposed

to expire, you're right.

Resa Crippen (1:11:18)
Yeah,

so I've gotten to the point where I used to have on deck, just on standby, I would have a bag of frozen French fries in my freezer. It's gotten to the point now where I just go to my local market and I buy the Idaho potatoes, yes, yes, and I make them myself. So I'm making French fries by myself, yeah.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:11:35)
In the air fryer, that's right.

Yeah. And you know what? Over time, your body appreciates less preservatives. So the Yuca app, it's a funny little thing because you can scan hair and face products and be wanting to throw out everything in your bathrooms. But I think because the makers of it, you know,

They're looking at what's in the product, not the amount of that thing in the product when it comes to hair and skin stuff. So I say, use it with caution when it comes to your hair care products and things of that sort. Make sure you have more than one source for those. But when it comes to food, they have no bias. No one is paying their bills. No one is funding them. They're doing it all themselves. And they are going in and saying, yes, this is a good product or no. And they're giving you alternatives. When you scanned your spinach dip,

If there was an alternative that might be better, it would be listed below. But it also tells you, maybe I want to try to make spinach dip myself and see if that's better for me or if it even tastes better for me.

Resa Crippen (1:12:35)
Yeah, like because I... Well, no, because you want to know why? Because I know before we were talking about technology and I find myself, even though I am really trying to stay off of my phone. But unfortunately, because I came up with my cell phone, my whole society did or generation did, I have found myself on TikTok. Dooms scrolling. Now, mind you, what am I looking up on TikTok?

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:12:36)
You didn't look too happy. She's like, yeah.

generation.

Resa Crippen (1:13:01)
recipes, funny things, but mainly recipes of things and people. I saw this lady, I believe she is from the Amish community and she was telling people how to make their own jam from scratch. So I was like, took a note of that. Then I had people.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:13:15)
Yeah,

because we're going to pick strawberries this year, so that would be great.

Resa Crippen (1:13:17)
Right,

right. So she was showing people how to make jam. I've followed people that have like, what, like my main thing is again, because I do eat mostly vegetarian. I was, following like a lot of people that are vegetarians that can give me different recipes. I'm not eating the same thing and getting bored. But that's like the main purpose of me having, I now have to find people that are like, okay, I did the book of the work. Here's the recipe.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:13:30)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Resa Crippen (1:13:45)
or here's a recipe book, you can just buy it and then get all the stuff for it. And then it's a whole bunch of prep, which goes back to my original sentiment of why I need my weekends to be for me so I could have a day where I'm not only shopping for these things, I am meal prepping and I am making things on the same day and things are getting put in my refrigerator so I can, throughout the week, reheat it.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:13:57)
Yeah.

Yeah, meal prepping is a thing that I think everyone's doing now more because of this economy, but it's so helpful when you buy something, you know, I'm going to use the potatoes for the baked potatoes I'm going to make and the fries I'm going to make and the mashed potatoes I'm going to make. And you can kind of plan out, you know, when I buy, my dog is even eating better. You know, my husband is like, he's like, make sure you get sweet potatoes. And like we were in the, we were in the market.

And I said, oh man, I forgot to get sweet potatoes for Truo. I said, could you get a couple of sweet potatoes? And she ran back over there and I said, oh yeah, broccoli. He needs broccoli. And she's like, dang, this dog eats better and better than most people. Cause he has rice, he has brown rice, has broccoli, he has sweet potatoes and it's mixed with some of his dog food so we can eat a little less processed. And his digestional track is better.

Resa Crippen (1:14:34)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah

Literally.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:14:59)
He doesn't itch as much. know how dogs itch a little bit and shake their heads a lot? He always sleeps really good, but he kind of likes this whole food stuff. Gary eats less meat, you know, my husband. And so he's kind of liking how he's feeling eating more vegetables. Dr. Allison said, you lost weight, you're doing great. Your cholesterol's down, what you doing? He goes, they got me eating more vegetables. He says it's bad because he thinks meat, because me and you. goes, they got me eating more vegetables.

Resa Crippen (1:15:02)
Yeah.

Right, right.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:15:26)
He's doing great, you know? So health-wise, the more you lean into the food sources and looking at it, it's hard at first to watch some of those documentaries about, you know, I don't want to hear about microplastics. You don't want to learn that stuff, but you got to learn it so you can do better, you know?

Resa Crippen (1:15:43)
Right, like I feel like it's important to learn about these things. Like I even gave up. I don't want to say completely that gave up, like for the most part, I've temporarily put a pause on my caffeine intake. And I do blame state testing for this because, you know, growing up and having to do testing, what was it? Once a year, that was my time to go to my Dunkin and get my coffee. And that's how my coffee situation happened. But.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:15:55)
Mm-hmm.

Resa Crippen (1:16:09)
because of this whole change of trying to eat better. I know presently, obviously, I'm not drinking coffee right now. Yeah, I'm not drinking coffee right now because I'm lint. But when I get off of lint, will I go back to coffee? Maybe. See, I do decaf. Yeah, I do decaf.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:16:20)
Lint.

Decaf or regular?

Yeah, me too. I don't want to be,

I want to sleep at night. I want to go to sleep at night.

Resa Crippen (1:16:36)
Now I'll be honest, the only time that I do caffeinated is when I'm going to be up late. Great example. I'm going to see Beyonce. So I will be having caffeine at some point because I'm sorry. I don't know what happens. And a lot of people have said this. Something happened when I hit 30 and I like, I used to be able to stay up late. And I mean like be out late. Like I would be like visiting family and be out late and be driving home from like, I don't know, around 11, 12. Can't do that. I want to be in the house by eight.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:16:43)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Resa Crippen (1:17:06)
before the sun go down, I'd only be back home.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:17:08)
Just be

careful though because caffeine is a diuretic. mean caffeine is a diuretic so you can't drink the coffee too soon when you're to go with your B-high friends to see Beyonce because you'll be trying to go to the restroom the whole time. You got to drink it enough further up in the day.

Resa Crippen (1:17:12)
I know. Right.

Yeah, no.

Yeah, so what I did the last time, because it's like not my first rodeo, what I did the last time was I started my day with the coffee. So I normally eat around like 10 o'clock. So around 10, I had coffee, the regular size. And then by the time it hit about like 8 o'clock, 9, normally I'd be tired. But because I'm running off of endorphins, yeah.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:17:26)
Yep.

Resa Crippen (1:17:49)
Endorphins and caffeine. I'm like wired so it doesn't hit me until I come home and Then I'm like, I'm hungry and I'm tired because it used to be like my concert like Routine used to be okay get up, you know Start my day Go get dressed get my coffee Get ready for the cut or chill for like an hour a couple hours then get ready for the concert drive up to the concert wait

have the show, come back home, go to McDonald's. Go to McDonald's. Yeah. Well, it's not even, it's like, because the concert normally ends around like 10 something. So I don't get home till about 11. So it's like, most places around me are closed, but my McDonald's isn't closed. And the last time I went there was like, obviously two years ago at this point. And I was like, oh.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:18:23)
no, now McDonald's in the middle of the morning.

Resa Crippen (1:18:45)
I want to go to McDonald's and I'm going to get me like a burger and fries and a Sprite. Worst mistake of my life because the next day my stomach was like Tims in the dryer. I was like my stomach hurts. Yeah. Yeah, so I'm going to write like I'll probably do that because I'll save money even though yes, it is convenient.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:18:51)
ever.

So now you're going to meal prep before you go see Beyonce. So when you come home, there'll be something in there that you'll be okay with.

Yep.

Resa Crippen (1:19:10)
I just, don't like that. the minute my stomach gets affected, I don't want it anymore. Like.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:19:14)
Yeah, that's

one thing about when you eat more things that you make yourself. You're right, you're right. And I think that's the important lesson we're gonna learn a lot of lessons through, you know, this economy, this administration, like we're learning to go back to basics. You started off, you know, your mother and your parents were cooking you food from scratch as a little kid. All of us are making our own foods again. And all of us are looking into gardening and looking into eating better. What's in our food that we're eating?

Resa Crippen (1:19:19)
Yeah.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:19:42)
and how we're taking care of our health and how stress is affecting us, like to know what's going on. So this comeback is a good thing for us, but it's a good thing for other people. I think something to tell people that are in any kind of ministries that they're doing for little, it's okay to take a step back. It's okay to tag team somebody else in and take a break. I mean, take a real break, not one of those, you guys will see me next Sunday. So-and-so is going to be here. I'll be back. Sometimes you got to say, I'm taking this month off. So-and-so will be here with you.

And then when I come back, they're going to take a break off and everybody's going to be okay. Yes, people missed us. We miss them. Yes, people miss people that are heads of ministry, but you got to take care of home. I don't want to see a pastor that's, that's running a ministry and he's taking care and loving Christ's bride, you know, God's bride, the church more than he's loving his own bride, you know, taking care of the kids at church, Better than he's taking care of his kids.

Resa Crippen (1:20:10)
you

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:20:38)
I thought it was great when Pastor Quick said I turned my phone off and I was enjoying my children. How you like that? I would like him to do it for longer stretches of time, honestly. He said that last week. I want him to be off for like, you know, two Sundays in a row where he's not speaking somewhere else. He ain't doing nothing but spending time enjoying his family or taking a break.

Resa Crippen (1:20:54)
Right.

Honestly, that's the way it should be. Like for any job that anyone is doing, especially the ones that are like you're constantly on and you only have like a certain limited number of days, just like when you're off, be completely off. Don't check in. Like there's really no need to, unless you absolutely have to let it be like, you know, certain times that you have to, but if you really don't have to, I would strongly advise. Disconnect, spend time with your...

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:21:14)
Be off. Yeah.

Resa Crippen (1:21:29)
you know, your kids, your loved ones, your friends, whatever, because it's like, as I have heard before in the past life of mine, the work will get done whether or not you're here. just like, so just just just decompress.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:21:41)
We all know someone that puts in days off and if people go, so and so is going to be out today. You go to work, they come right in behind you. Like, what are you doing here? I had to do this real quick. And you think to yourself, you always come in when you're supposed to be off as if, you know, wow, you're showing that you're such a great leader or such a great colleague or such a back in the day when I was growing up, they always said, you know, black people got to work hard and everybody else to get what we have.

Resa Crippen (1:21:46)
I was that person.

Right.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:22:10)
Well, you know what? We're working hard. And only thing that's happening is we're killing ourselves sooner. We need to like, you know, put the focus where it needs to be, work hard for the time you're there, but when you're off, you're off.

Resa Crippen (1:22:22)
Right. And then too, I've also seen the conversation of the only thing that happens when you are the hardest worker in the room is that you get more work. Same pay, you get more work. So it's like, you're just better off just pacing yourself and doing whatever assignment you're, know, whatever, whatever your job is, just do it well. But then also make sure that you're taking your days off. And also if you have, if you're able to like request days off, take the days.

Spend time with your family, go to the weddings, go to the birthday parties, go to the vacations, because life is too short. it's, yeah, like, right.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:22:55)
Yeah, go to the recitals, go to the practices, go to the

sports events. And another thing that happens when you work all the time is that people actually start wondering, especially if you're overextended and you're burnt out, when you start missing stuff while you're working hard, it looks like, well, you're working that hard, but you're not. You're so burnt out and you keep dropping stuff. You're not as efficient as you would be if you just step back.

Resa Crippen (1:23:19)
Mm-hmm.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:23:23)
and recouped me and Gary came down with the flu in March. He caught it. I was starting to take care of him and I caught it. And I felt terrible because I was like, oh my goodness. I'm like, I'm going to be out of work. I'm going to be not be able to teach my students. Everybody was very understanding. They said, oh, we're so sorry. And I decided, said, you know what? We both had the flu shot, but we got the flu anyway. And I said, I'm going to lay here and totally recover. I'm going to work from home and totally, I'm not going to pull myself into work like I'm trying to show everybody I'm a superwoman. I'm going to work.

Resa Crippen (1:23:23)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:23:53)
from home, I'm gonna go to my doctor, I'm gonna take care of myself. When I went strolling back in and said, I heard you were sick. Cause I was down for like a week. I was like, yeah, I was. I stayed out for three days, out of the office for three days. I came back in, I was feeling good. One, cause of the shot. Two, cause God said, yeah, you sitting down and you're gonna rest and you're gonna totally rest. You're gonna sleep when your body wants to sleep and you're gonna keep, still keep that work life balance. When it's a work day, you're gonna work. And when it's time to close that laptop, you're gonna close it.

Resa Crippen (1:24:01)
Mm-hmm.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:24:21)
And it worked out good for my body because I didn't have the pressure or the stress about, got it. I got a multitask. I'm trying to get well, but I'm also trying to do this too. When you're just totally focused on just healing, you eat better food, you sleep more, you drink more liquids and water, take your medicine on time. You know how it says take one every 12 hours? You actually take it on time because you're not focused on anything but healing.

Resa Crippen (1:24:31)
Mm-hmm.

Right.

Right, and that's one of the things that I actually love about my current job that I work at, the current company I work for. Like, they're big on telling people, make sure you use your PTO, make sure you're enjoying your time off. And even when people do get sick in my department, we're not sitting here being like, okay, so when are you coming back? We're just like, you know what, take care of yourself, like whatever you need to be.

whatever you need covered, we'll figure it out. Like we all come together and we will cover people's assignments because we get it. Like life happens and we're not gonna punish you for being human and getting sick or God forbid having like a life situation that like, that occurs.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:25:21)
One the hardest things about being someone that's like a single parent or getting back in the workforce, like when I had my first divorce, I've only had one, but when I divorced her father and I had to get in the workforce, there's so much you want to prove. There's so much you're trying to catch up on. You're trying to understand and learn and know, and you miss out on a lot of family stuff. Why? Because it's like you're trying to get the job done. You're trying to show your value and your worth. And it took a minute.

Resa Crippen (1:25:38)
Mm-hmm.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:25:52)
took my fifties to realize, you know, I missed some valuable time with you and Nicole. I really did. And if I could turn back the clock, I would. Did it make me more talented in different areas at work? And did I take a lot of my talents and multiply them in the time? I did. But my family life suffered a little bit, you know. But I was also out of the workforce for, you know, the time when you guys came into the world till about, you were about six or seven. I was totally out of the workforce. So I had to make up time.

You know, I felt like, and it's hard for anybody's out there that's trying to do it. And the kids are like, you're never around, you're never there. Or you're here, but you're not here. You're on the laptop. You're doing this, you're doing that. I feel for the kids that are trying to understand it, you don't really get a good perception of what's occurring until you have your own family, until you're forced to work, but also you might miss the first steps because a babysitter saw them instead of you or a caretaker saw them instead of you because you were aware.

Resa Crippen (1:26:21)
Right.

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:26:51)
at work. Because this is like a two income society we're in now, Resa. If you want a house, you got to you know, save up for it or, you know, it's harder out here.

Resa Crippen (1:26:55)
Yeah, like that.

Right, like that balancing act, like I commend all parents that are like trying their best to balance like their work life and their personal life with their kids. Because it's not easy. I do recognize that sometimes kids are like, oh, I had this recital and you didn't show up. And it's not as if they didn't want to show up. Sometimes like they tried their best to leave work early, but then something may have came up. So they couldn't leave as early as they wanted to. So they may have missed some time.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:27:27)
Mm-hmm.

Resa Crippen (1:27:30)
I feel as though from all the stories that I've heard from people through social media about like work-life balance, like we're all like trying our best to give the companies that we work for what they ask for within reason, but then also give that same amount of energy to the people that are outside of the workplace and, you know, make sure that we have like a fruitful life because you're right. Like even though you can be super skillful and have all these skills for work.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:27:57)
Yeah.

Resa Crippen (1:27:58)
then you turn around and your personal life is like not where, you know, not where it could be. Cause I know for me, when I was working a lot, I found myself like, I love to talk clearly, but it got to a point where when I would have conversations, it would be primarily about work. And my friends, yeah. And my friends were like, okay, but like what else is happening? Like, cause you're, all you're telling me is about like your work things, which are great. Glad you're working, like you have a paycheck, but like.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:28:01)
Yeah.

Yeah, because that's where you mostly were, yeah.

Resa Crippen (1:28:26)
What else is going on? What hobbies do you like? What shows are you watching? What books are you reading? Yeah, and I couldn't, and every time those would come up, I couldn't say, it's not that I couldn't, I just didn't know what to say. So I would just default back to work and be like, well.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:28:30)
What's the last restaurant you went to? Yeah.

But now, you know, God gave you this break. He worked on you. You took a break. You were doing a lot of stuff. You have a lot of things to talk about. And it was a good reset. You know, I mean, it was very cathartic for you. I mean, you were driving over five bridges, honey, all the way down to Annapolis from here and back in the same day.

Resa Crippen (1:28:47)
Yeah.

Yes,

right, driving over bridges, you know, spending time with my friends, with my family and friends, like, you know, just I was, I wanted to be very intentional with the year that we were off and I wanted to pour into me and be selfish. And I did that and I would, and I do it again. Like I'm not going to apologize for it. Cause again, I'm in my season of singleness. And as you stated before, when you are with someone,

married to someone, you have to answer to someone. I answer to no one besides... Well, yeah, so like, okay, so you have to be collaborative. So right now I am in a place where the only person that I am collaborative with on occasion is my mother. And God, that's it. Everybody else is like no shade, but shade, there's not... Like, unless we're gonna hang out, that's different. But like, for the most part, like, I do what I wanna do within reason.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:29:31)
We're not answered to like they're a boss, but more like you have to be collaborative with someone.

and you're God.

Yeah, I'm more like

a sounding board. mean, I just like, you know, cause if Resa doesn't want to something, she ain't doing it. Like that podcast, I'm like, do you want it? She's like, yeah, I to break. She said it kind of quick and I couldn't even like try to, you know, find a way to get her to look at it differently. She said it so quick. was like, that was confirmation from what the Holy Spirit said this morning. Cause she said it kind of definitively like, I need to break.

Resa Crippen (1:29:57)
Yeah.

You know.

Yeah, because

Well, yeah, because for someone that is still trying to not be a people pleaser, because again, I'm only 33, it's very easy for me to put other people's needs before mine. Yeah, right, right, that's what I'm saying. During that time, it easy for me to, okay, say yes to that, and then next thing I know, I'm miserable because I kept saying yes to things.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:30:27)
Not anymore, not after the year we took off. Yeah.

Yep. She

found her no somewhere in 2021. And then she's been like, it's getting stronger every year. And I know by the time you're in your next birthday, no is not going to be like, yeah, it's going to be harder and harder to get her to say yes for things that she does not want to do.

Resa Crippen (1:30:42)
Yeah.

Yeah,

right. Because when I first started saying no, I used to explain why I was saying no. So you understand now it's just like because I've learned from my therapist, like no is a complete sentence. I don't have to elaborate why I'm saying no. You did. But again, I was still a people pleaser. But the therapy and we had some in-depth conversations about it. And I was like, you're right. I don't have to explain why I'm saying no to things when you're saying no. And if someone is offended by that, that says more about them.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:31:06)
I used say that when you were a kid.

Yeah, that's their,

yeah. They have to work on why that bothered them so much. Because people are allowed that boundaries. Like your sister is newly married and we went to a wedding in 2024 and she hasn't been around the family very much. This part of the family, she's been around, you know, her dad's side, but not this part of the family very much. And it's sad, you know, it was hard for me to say that out loud that my daughter is estranged from me and you.

Resa Crippen (1:31:23)
than it does you.

Right, right, right.

Mm-hmm. Yeah. All right.

Mm.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:31:49)
But it's the truth. And I look at it as, you know, she's enjoying her marriage. She's loving life. I know when I first married, you know, my husband, I wasn't around my family very much. So I look at it like, Thelma and her new husband on Good Times. They were always doing something other than hanging out with family. They be with family a little bit and they going off somewhere. cause it's beautiful. The first, the honeymoon stage of marriage is beautiful. So let her do her.

Resa Crippen (1:31:50)
Mm-hmm.

Right. Right.

Mm-hmm.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:32:17)
And I love and adore her and she'll be back around when she's ready to be back around. And if not, you know, you know, what can I, I gotta respect her boundary. That's where she wants to be. I gotta respect that's where she wants to be. Cause though. It's a little sad. I'm not gonna lie. That's been a little hard in this season of being gone is that we weren't able to get that connection back to the way it's supposed to be, you know, during when she married and everything. But she's also

Resa Crippen (1:32:28)
Right. Right,

in.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:32:44)
trying to ingratiate herself to a new family and help show them that she's the right woman for her husband and show her husband they'll be fine making this life together. You have to put a lot of pieces of yourself out there and be so vulnerable when you're marrying somebody and marrying into another family. So it's not easy. Learning all the names alone is hard of every relative. Yeah, yeah, but you have to learn who everybody is, their personalities, the family story with the history of stuff.

Resa Crippen (1:33:06)
I'm horrible with names, my goodness.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:33:13)
It's almost like getting a PhD in a new family. I wish her nothing but the best and nothing but love as she, know, ingrates herself into this new family. you know, the door is always open. You know that reason, right? Phones can always ring. You know, we're here. Maybe one day she'll be on the podcast and have her own segment. Who knows? We'll see. Yeah, but we'll be recording her baptism or something. You know, that would be kind of cool, right?

Resa Crippen (1:33:17)
Yeah.

All

Yeah.

Never know.

It

would be cool a full circle moment.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:33:43)
Yeah,

Yeah, but we wish her nothing but the best. And we are so happy that Adrian's in the family and that they're spending their lives together and enjoying their life together, as always.

So this has been fun, Resa. Yeah, another episode concluded. We did it. In the can. We'll be back on Monday. Yeah, you guys probably won't see it until probably Tuesday. We're gonna record another one on Monday for Sunday's episode. We're gonna actually be tuning into First Baptist and seeing what's going on this Sunday. I think he's gonna talk about Marvin Sapp a little bit.

Resa Crippen (1:33:58)
Yes, another one in the can, as you would say.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:34:20)
Never would have made it. You featured that nice movie. That one, I forgot what

Resa Crippen (1:34:20)
Well, never would have paid it. Never.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:34:26)
season it was, but it was a biopic he did on Lifetime, Yeah. Yeah.

Resa Crippen (1:34:29)
Yes.

Yeah. The new catchphrase for him is never would have paid it but we'll elaborate more on that on Monday.

Angeline Bishop Thomas (1:34:36)
On, yeah, on Monday. Yeah, yeah. That's true.

We will. So we are so grateful that you tuned in today. Our prayer is that God reveals to you that he is real and able to meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus. You guys have a great rest of the weekend. All right. Bye now.

Resa Crippen (1:34:57)
Bye!

WTQ Outro (1:34:59)
I've been trying to forget But you won't let me Something in my brain holds you I've been hanging by myself Asking for help But nothing seems to work on you With everything crazy You steal my soul to peace You filter out the lows You give me what I need me feel like oh yeah You You never leave

You're the reason I'm going out with mine I just can't stop thinking about you You got me feeling some type of way You make me wanna stay in all the you You're the reason I can't get out of my head I just can't stop thinking about you