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Mirthell: Hi and welcome to the onyx family podcast Halloween edition I remember growing up
Sinead: yeah
Mirthell: my parents it was one of the darkest holidays and it wasn’t just dark because of ghosts and monsters and goblins and death but it was dark because my parents would literally turn off the light literally it would be like everybody goes upstairs to your room it’s dark now turn off the lights don’t let anybody know and I mean when I stop and think about it I can understand I grew up you know very traditional Christian family and so some of these things it was just like you know kind of taboo
Sinead: yeah
Mirthell: but I decided that when we had our family that we were going to do things a little bit different and it’s not like I’m embracing death and darkness because we’re children of the light right I felt like it was more important to meet darkness with light as opposed to meet darkness by turning off the light so we as children of light we’ve embraced every single day of the year all holidays and we just figure out how can we bring light to whatever space that we occupy and that’s what the onyx family is about we’re about bringing light wherever we go so um with that said we just want to share with you some of our Halloween traditions
Rita: Well
Shasha: I’m gonna say though I thought that was only in movies where they turn off the light to avoid
Mirthell: no like literally like it was like turn off the light because we don’t want them to egg us because you know there was a time period back like in the 80s where if you did not turn off your light and they thought that you were home but you weren’t answering teenagers would be like egging your home and I didn’t know
Sinead: I didn’t know that was a thing.
Shalom: Woah
Mirthell: no it was actually a thing
Shalom: did anyone egg your home?
Mirthell: no but we’ve seen it being egged or people would like take toilet paper and like toilet paper your trees
Shalom: you see
Sinead: it’s movie things I didn’t think that people would actually do that
Shalom: yeah
Rita: I feel like in my opinion back in like the probably 70s 80s people were just more adventurous they would just do things right
Shalom: but now we have a ring now
Rita: the thing is when people did it when the people did it it wasn’t like malicious
Mirthell: it wasn’t malicious it was all part of a game
Rita: it was like pranks and it was you know it’s not like it was fun to clean up or anything but it was literally I think nowadays people are so touchy and sensitive that it would just set off probably violence but back then it was just like all those teenagers
Shalom: well you guys are children of the 80s have you guys ever done that?
Mirthell: I never threw eggs I didn’t throw eggs
Rita: not for that I’ve gone to a house to TP like I went to sleep over things like that
Mirthell: and back then it was huge like they put razor blades inside of your candy and things like that so it was really
Rita: well that’s different but yeah that’s definitely a part of the fear
Mirthell: but it was all that’s fear around Halloween like avoiding Halloween at all costs because you know it’s bad in every single way in every single way it’s bad and it avoids it and that was like the sort of like that was the response that was the fear response to Halloween it was like just completely avoid it turn off your lights get through this day and you know with by any means possible
Shasha: sorry were they actually like it was purge day?
Sinead: Purge day? no no, The Purge.
Mirthell: well I don’t know it’s just that like I said
Rita: I think so
Mirthell: we were really conservative traditional we’re very conservative traditional so it was like it was not just avoiding TPing and all this stuff but it was just avoiding the whole day because it was dark it was evil and there they decided to turn off the lights and avoid it and I think we do things differently I think that we turn on our lights and we engage the community we engage our fans we engage um people and we’re more and more about hey how can we use this day to spread light
Rita: well I think for me as growing up my family, we did it differently we were also Christian family um so and I went to a Christian elementary and high school but when I was in elementary school especially we’d have at the same day of Halloween but it was not a Halloween party I want you to know it was not a Halloween party
Mirthell: they wanted you to know that.
Rita: it was a fall party, okay so don’t get it twisted just cause you guys just because we were allowed to dress in costumes on Halloween night and there was lots of candy there and there was bobbing for apples pre-covered um event and there were a whole bunch of likes yo know spooky things but not spooky because you couldn’t be a skeleton you couldn’t be anything like evil
Mirthell: So, what could you be?
Rita: you could be like any characters angel you didn’t have to be spiritual things or biblical things but you just couldn’t be anything like witches no mummies nothing ghoulish no skeletons nothing like that but let’s just make sure that you guys knew it was not a Halloween party it was a fall Party
Shiloh: it was a Halloween party but like some rules changed
Mirthell: basically if you missed the sarcasm
Rita: yeah basically obviously Shiloh that’s what it was but for those who don’t get it I’m glad you said that
Mirthell: right but then you know as we did it I think I think when we were younger when you guys were much younger I think we didn’t get into Halloween no we had candy and things like that we gave you guys candy but we didn’t get into it I think it was at this one year where we had a friend and she started to do this thing called hallelujah night and on this time like it would be sort of like your fall party where it’s sort of like they would dress up like angels and they would dress up like Bible characters and they would dress up you know in these positive things and then they would um and then they would give candy and they would do like different things like that and that year I remember that was one of our first years that we kind of embraced the day as something that we could do something positive I remember we gave candy out to the community and we began to engage the community and um and then you guys what was the theme again.
Sinead: the theme oh are you talking about
Mirthell: hallelujah night that that that year that
Sinead: we did that we did hallelujah night um we were like early teenage years like 2015 or something and it was a medieval theme it was kind of like not just medieval-themed it was um you know that this is the time period where they were going
Rita: like the middle ages
Sinead: yeah middle ages right that’s what I meant
Mirthell: right middle ages
Sinead: yeah right so we dressing up as people like uh Martin Luther um and asked I don’t know who that like the queen Elizabeth the first right stuff like that
Mirthell: and then you guys like did like the art of that error and all the food
Rita: and food and stuff like that so we’ve been creative we tried to do different things but I will say that um I don’t think that we’ve taken an approach where it’s like oh if we did turn off the lights it wasn’t because of how like you were raised per se it literally could have been also because like do we have any candy oh we’re tired.
Mirthell: yeah we didn’t have candy this year right
Rita: I’m tired
Sinead: I don’t feel like dealing with this every day, all night
Rita: exactly
Shiloh: it was just laziness guys
Rita: yeah sometimes it was just laziness I mean because a lot of times you know I’d be working yeah you know be like working until like you know almost midnight so it was like yeah this is when I was you know working as a nurse so I was just like I’m done I was tired but I think that our approach now it’s just it varies you know we’ll give out candy.
Mirthell: right
Shiloh: yeah yeah things I mean
Rita: yeah so
Mirthell: it’s really a fun time to engage a community get to know our neighbors
[Music]
Rita: now our tradition though is to watch a scary movie together
Mirthell: yes yes
Rita: that is really really fun
Mirthell: so what is it like what are some of our favorite like shows even kid shows or like back
when you’re a kid some of your favorites scary shows or even now like what are some of your most your favorite
Shiloh: I mean it doesn’t really fit the Halloween aspect well it does but like okay kind of like harry potter in a way but like
Sinead: oh hey harry potter is a good one
Shiloh: it’s not like Halloween-ish I mean like it’s it is like magic and everything but like
Sinead: no I think that’s a good one I like Harry Potter
Shiloh: yeah yeah yeah it’s a very good very cool series
Mirthell: what do you guys like about that series
Shiloh: um I really love how like every single movie he grows older so we like to explore his
how he acts each age and plus like the adventures that happen so yeah adventures
Rita: I think my favorite part of that movie was the wall with the talking portraits they were funny
Shiloh: yes definitely I love that one I don’t think I watched that did I watch it?
Sinead: I feel like that you probably
Mirthell: I might have been sleeping
Sinead: you know you probably fell asleep and you were like I’m done
Shalom: you know you know what’s funny about this in the week prior we watched as we had like a harry potter marathon we watched twilight and you were there the whole time
Mirthell: I actually liked the highlight I like the story theme of twilight
Shasha: are you serious?
Mirthell: no the star you know I like I love a good love story kind of thing
Shalom: well I know that’s twilight well twilight is my favorite Halloween um sort of movie the franchise you know vampires and everything like that and werewolves so
Shasha: that’s true, It’s a Halloween movie.
Sinead: I guess you could say that
Rita: I didn’t even think about it like that
Mirthell: see the reason why I liked it and like I said I like a good love story so I mean I just forget the fact that someone’s like sucking a person’s neck with blood like that’s that that is like the make-believe stuff I could do without
Shiloh: They didn’t even do that
Mirthell: well I’m just saying like I don’t know I don’t know but I’m just saying but I like stories like love stories and things like that and couching love stories in a creative theme I love that.
Shasha: that’s crazy I really did not know that you watched twilight.
Sinead: yeah yeah
Shiloh: I did as well
Shasha: I was expecting to say that you didn’t know that movie
Mirthell: no no I remember that
Sinead: like he usually does
Shalom: what about you Sinead and Shasha?
Shasha: oh man when it was my favorite Halloween movie or what?
Shiloh: scary movie
Sinead: or scary movie
Mirthell: scary show
Sinead: something that you would like to watch
Shasha: not a movie I loved when we watched stranger things 2, season two
Rita: Stranger things is Shasha’s faves
Shasha: when we remember when we watched actually season two during Halloween actually we were filming our act for our Halloween movie and we watched it after our Halloween movie
Rita and Sinead: oh yeah
Rita: yeah that was funny
Mirthell: you guys even went to the stranger things?
Rita: stranger con
Shasha: this was years ago
Sinead: no we were saying that we went to stranger con as well like you met some of the casts
Shasha: right yeah that Halloween was really that was a good Halloween that one.
Sinead: that one’s a good one um I would say that my favorite this one’s more like a cartoon I really liked gravity falls watching gravity falls
Shiloh: oh yeah yeah yeah
Mirthell: I don’t know bout that one, what is that about?
Sinead: it’s about two kids and they go to this mysterious town and there’s like a secret in the town and there’s like a missing person’s case and everything like that but it’s like a kid’s cartoon but it’s really good I don’t know I like
Shasha: spooky
Mirthell: it’s hard for me to keep up with a lot of the new shows
Sinead: well it’s not even new it’s actually pretty it is
Mirthell: um see for me it would be scooby-doo that sees that’s how far back I go
Shiloh: we like the newer scooby-doo mystery incorporated
Mirthell: oh really?
Shiloh: yeah
Sinead: Mystery incorporated?
Shiloh: yeah mystery incorporated
Mirthell: I loved all the Scooby-Doo I just love the characters and how shaggy and scooby are silly and then and then, of course, it never actually is a ghost or it’s never actually.
Sinead: it is like
Rita: so my favorite ones I would say mine are more throwbacks like I would say scream when it first came out was one um nowadays I don’t know I just feel like it’s just weird to me I know that I don’t know that one is I don’t really like violent stuff
Mirthell: yeah that was a little violent
Rita: I didn’t really like that I used to like that franchise um I’ll tell you which ones I regret watching why I regret watching a nightmare on elm street when I was a kid I regret that it was to me I felt like um the 80s Halloween stuff including Friday the 13th Halloween series texas chainsaw massacre nightmare on elm street they were all so gory
Mirthell: right and I just don’t like the killing like I didn’t like that why do we have to glorify all that killing so it’s just like I don’t know I just do I like the horror films that are more like m night Shyamalan where
Rita: yes I like his stuff
Mirthell: his stuff is very meaningful there’s always some positive message behind it a message.
Rita: the village
Mirthell: the village things like that it’s scary but then when it all comes together there’s a deeper meaning
Shiloh: what about IT? like IT the movie
Rita: I never watched that
Sinead: what?
Shiloh: you watched it before
Rita: did I?
Sinead: yeah
Shiloh: she did
Sinead: you watched it no what happened
Shasha: It might be the new one.
Sinead: no no not IT 2 you didn’t watch IT 2 no
Shiloh: no you watched the new one.
Sinead: but you watched IT with Shasha.
Shasha: no I mean the old one the old IT
Sinead: oh the old IT
Rita: First of all, I never saw the old one I never saw the old or the new one
Sinead: you saw the new one
Shiloh: You saw the new one, You saw the new one.
Shasha: You saw the new one, Okay listen up they were going to they were applying to college, and one day that they were out there there was like this practice
Rita: oh yeah I did see it
Shasha: okay let’s watch IT together since they’re in our home and we watched IT
Rita: oh
Shasha: I’m talking I have a good memory
Shiloh: I was downstairs
Rita: You know what Im thinking of? It was “IT 2”. We decided not to watch IT 2
Mirthell: did we actually go to the movies to watch that?
Sinead: we did and then we were like it was too much
Shiloh: I didn’t see a few minutes
Sinead: we were like it’s too much for us
Shiloh: I didn’t see it I was so scared but I already know y’all I was just scared I could have watched it with no problems.
Mirthell: it’s not scary
Rita: it’s not scary it’s like we didn’t want to point we didn’t like the gore
Mirthell: right we a lot of times we’ll walk out like I remember even when we were dating I remember we would walk out of films because we’re just like we don’t like the messages we were dating Saw, the Saw Series started right and I remember we saw like the first one and we were like oh this is too violent
Shiloh: y’all say that but y’all love zombie movies
Rita: I stopped watching zombie movies
Mirthell: Zombie Movies I know that mommy used to love um Zombie
Rita: I used to love walking dead
Sinead: yes you stopped watching walking dead
Rita: I haven’t watched it in a few years.
Mirthell: so, first of all, let’s just talk about it on many levels because on a creative level a lot of the reasons why sometimes these shows do so well and sometimes we wouldn’t even want to watch it it’s because creatively they’re really good like cinema cinematic they’re really good they have great storylines all that kind of stuff so you’ve got to give them the credit for credit is due
Sinead: That’s the thing we like to appreciate even if it does have some violence and stuff if it’s a really good story or there’s great symmetry we love the art of it but if it’s something where we feel like that man there’s just they just throw it right make it entertaining
Mirthell: That’s just my thought.
Shiloh: I think it’s the repetitiveness like of
the going everything
Sinead: the repetitiveness but also if there’s no other meat to the meal you know what I mean
Rita: yeah, for example, I like war movies I like um
Sinead: but they’re always violent because you know
Rita: exactly
Sinead: but there’s always a story and there’s a purpose to it
Mirthell: there you go, there you go exactly
Rita: no when I stopped watching the walking dead there was an episode and this zombie um he was like you said it they had impaled it they had shot it they started kicking the head they started stomping on the head they started doing all this stuff and I was just like I can’t take this because the thing is you’re supposed to start making connections between these zombies and people who were like family right you know and so I just couldn’t take it but I mean that’s just us though and that everybody has their limits
Mirthell: sure exactly
Shasha: like you know remember uh the dog one where that woman was hiding in the car from a violent dog
Rita: Cujo
Mirthell: Cujo oh my goodness that was intense that was intense
Shasha: I forgot was it gory
Shiloh: it was yes it was yes it was it was
Mirthell: it was intense it was a dog but it’s explainable because that’s what dogs are rabid dogs
Shiloh: well no no no because um you got bitten by a bat that’s why
Mirthell: right right
Rita: but I think Shiloh the point that we’re saying is not first of all what we do is what we do well we’re comfortable in what we’re comfortable with I am not telling the audience so this is how you must be
Mirthell: yeah, no no no not at all
Rita: but also my level is not going to be someone else’s level my compromise is not going to be someone else’s my compromise is not even what daddy’s
Mirthell: I know and look how many times I may watch something and you’re like ah I’m not really into that and I will be like I’m not interested
Rita: so guys since we’re talking about the horror we gotta talk about squid games
Shalom: it is
Shiloh: sorry I’m sorry I kind of like squid games like
Sinead: no, I do too like that’s I always watch the first Episode
Mirthell: it sounds like Spongebob um squid Squidward or something like that like
Shasha: no it’s called squid game it’s like okay think about it like hunger games basically where it’s like a k drama like hungry pity against games like a tournament
Shiloh: yes
Shalom: it’s kind of money
Shiloh: yeah toy money basically I think every time someone dies um money is earned yes and every time like you survive like a game it’s like the money keeps on adding up as much people
Sinead: And the thing is if they don’t want to play the game then the money is going to go to the families of those that die so basically it’s almost like they still won the money that even the people that are dead they still want the money because it’s gonna go to their families they’re gonna get billions of dollars or well well no I looked up how much it was a billion one is like only a couple like maybe twenty it’s something
Shiloh: it’s like 30 million
Sinead: no no it’s only like a couple thousand a couple thousand
Shasha: is that Korean currency?
Sinead: Korean Currency is one yes
Rita: well I will say this that I did see the first episode because everyone was talking about it I said okay let me look at the first episode um first of all I love k drama movies
Sinead: yeah Korean movies
Rita: I loved Parasites
Mirthell: Korean movies are really popular
Shalom: Parasites
Shasha: I just watched parasites the other day I was like I didn’t watch it
Rita: and see and this is why
Sinead: did you like it?
Shasha: I loved it it was great it was
Rita: okay this is why anybody watching will be like she is Rita is a hypocrite because I’m telling you because parasite had a violent um scene um trained to Busan which I really like that one was violent what was the other one remember the other one we saw and there was like an underwater creature I can’t remember what it was called but the thing is I can watch movies with violence it’s just I don’t know it has to there has to be more to the story and a lot of times like there was a lot more and people say well So does walking dead. I get it, but if you watched walking dead for years and years I just started to after a while say okay I can’t do this like for several seasons over and over.
Shiloh: it’s like um playing like since Mortal Kombat since the beginning like if you played one two three four five six seven eight nine ten eleven you get tired of the girl
Rita: right right so basically saying you gotta vary the violence for me or something
Shalom: Yeah well basically like there’s been articles have been written about how violent
the first episode of squid games was and you know
Sinead: they’re saying the other ones are not as violent?
Shalom: no they’re just saying that the audience when they watched it you know when you’re promoting something you’re always gonna you know say like the negatives of you know what it was so yeah it was violent at the end um at the end of the episode but I think that if you watch the whole series there’s like a point to it where it’s definitely talking about um greed capitalism and just you know there’s like a purpose towards you know what you know it’s talking about like the whole series
Sinead: well that’s what I find a lot with a lot of the Korean movies and stuff because even when we were watching parasite there was a message trying to Busan there was a
message because we, I remember I can’t remember what the message was but I just remember being like wow this is a really good movie and then there’s another one we watched where they were in a cave something like that I can’t remember what it was called
Shasha: that was a good one
Rita: yeah I can’t remember what that one was called
Sinead: I can’t remember what it was called.
Shalom: that was good
Shiloh: it’s not a horror one though
Sinead: it’s not a horror movie but I’m just saying that I find that a lot of Korean uh movies
Shalom: there’s a purpose
Sinead: there’s a purpose or there’s a message
Rita: Shasha you were gonna say something to me what was it?
Shasha: no um no I was saying that yeah there were there was even though it was a very um two games were very gory there was a message of basically um money is not everything like spoil alert during this
Sinead: I don’t want to be spoiled for watching it
Shasha: well I’m just saying that basically, it gets even more and more greedy as you can see the characters get more and more greedy one of the scenes where one of the old men had uh what was called an Alzheimer’s? Alzheimer’s so they were so you know they were all buddy buddies and stuff but once they got so greedy he started using the Alzheimer’s against him in it so it’s just like the overall message is you don’t um it’s not worth sacrificing everything for money I was like wow
Shiloh: yeah
Rita: it’s called the host that’s what we saw
Shalom: The host
Mirthell: did I see that one too?
Rita: no
Mirthell: oh okay
Shasha: their jams are another level
Rita: I don’t know I just,
Sinead: I think these are types of conversation that people need to have like it’s going to sound hypocritical sometimes but everybody has a limit for everything
Rita: everybody has a limit
Mirthell: right that’s true
Sinead: it’s for gore whether it’s foreign everybody has their personal opinion on it and that’s why we’re not necessarily telling anybody what to do this is what we do
Mirthell: you know from our family perspective
Shasha: some people even think Onyx kids get too scary
Rita: oh my goodness let’s get into that
Mirthell: That’s true, let’s get into that let’s get into Onyx
Sinead: some people actually, be like I don’t let my kids watch onyx because it just it scares them too much
Mirthell: especially our early stuff
Sinead: our early stuff
Shasha: oh I have to say our early stuff was really good
Shalom: it was good I was so proud I was so proud
Sinead: of parents when you compare our stuff though to something like it, it’s just scary mediocre.
Rita: it’s unbelievable to me that people thought that was scary like okay so like one of the first ones that blew up was the Santa and you were in a black morph suit in a Santa in a blow-up Santa costume and the way that it was filmed there was like some thrilling aspects of it there was like some maybe jump scares but I would not call it horror I would not call it
Sinead: no
Shiloh: no wait wait wait I wouldn’t call either but I do remember some episodes had me and Shasha as skeletons like
Sinead: no, but that’s not like scary scary
Mirthell: but if we stop and think about it who were the parents that were saying it more than likely it was younger children see we were making it for older kids we weren’t really making it for young kids
Sinead: That’s right, we were making
Mirthell: so young kids it would be scary
Sinead: maybe
Shasha: but like when I was little I mean I feel like I would have gotten scared of this like
Shiloh: yes
Sinead: right but our content was definitely not made for four years
Rita: that’s true, but there was one that was scary that you guys did and I had to tell you guys to tone it down remember?
Sinead and Shalom: I remember
Shasha: it was the gorilla one
Rita: yes
Mirthell: oh the gorilla one?
Rita: with the jack in the box
Mirthell: yeah
Shasha: basically there was a jack in the box and whenever you didn’t do it at the end, A gorilla will appear in front of you and scream
[Laughter]
Sinead: It will make the gorilla scary, I don’t even know-how.
Mirthell: no-no but a gorilla because the gorilla costume really looked like a real-life gorilla
Shiloh: it was freakish
Mirthell: It looks like bigfoot
Rita: yeah there was this scene you guys edited though and the gorilla thing where it was so creepy because it was just the gorilla quietly just doing the jack in the box and then it was like getting closer and closer and it was just like I was like Uh uh this one is gonna scare kids I got scared
Mirthell: I feel like I want to make a retake of that one for our older audience because that one was good
Shalom: Okay that video too I remember this father saying that he couldn’t he wouldn’t allow his daughter or he said his daughter was scared of this bunny video that we did and I was like how is that scary
Shiloh: no no okay okay um what was the bunny video the easter bunny we took it to our house and we fed it stuff but then it went okay
Rita: trying to eat that
Shiloh: yeah yes it was trying to eat us so it was a giant one we hid in our closet and then we’re like Shasha did you hear that he looked behind us the easter bunny was right there and we ran out
Shalom: when you explain it like that it sounds scary but when you watch it, I promise you
Sinead: watch it doesn’t seem that
Shalom: it’s common
Rita: oh yeah remember guys do you remember the skeleton one where it went viral
overnight like you got like I don’t know 15 or 18 million like overnight right yeah that was like the first time anything we did got that much right that many views in that sort of amount of time
Mirthell: Was that the one that was in our Backyard? Where did we have the cemetery?
Sinead: no not even though
Mirthell: oh okay
Sinead: no and the thing is that one and also whenever we did a mannequin one mannequin we ended up I don’t know how we ended up making we started making the mannequins kind of scary slash comical
Mirthell: yeah right right right, Our stuff has always been comedy slash horror
Shiloh: It was skeleton slash shadow slash mannequin
Mirthell: right
Shiloh: and maybe the bubble if you include that in like maybe
Mirthell: the bubble
Rita: but I just feel like I can’t really understand how people think our stuff was scary but I will say this that it just shows it goes to show you that that’s why you can’t say your level of scary should be the way everybody’s like you know right because like, for example, like I will watch like Jordan peel stuff now you know and I’ll be like whoa that’s a different type of horror
Sinead: yeah different type
Rita: you know so all these things have different are different types we have ours which is like comedy horror kids we have things that are now more racial with other things people things that have to do with just like you know like um I would say like what do you call it like retro stuff like stranger things like everything is just it has its own flavor and so that’s why around this time of the season I actually do like it because you know you I know no matter what people like to say we do kind of like that thrilling kind of scary
Sinead: yeah that feels scary
Mirthell: right right right right
Rita: we do enjoy it but I guess there’s a limit to how much you expose yourself I guess to these things um and how you live your life around these things I feel like you know going in like our tradition of watching a scary movie I feel like you know if we were doing that every week
not that there’s anything wrong with it for me, I could not do that
Mirthell: right yeah I just gravitate like I said I like to gravitate to if there’s gonna be scary horror or gratuitousness because scary is one thing scary can be very light-hearted like how we did scarily but if it’s gonna be somewhat gratuitous where it’s going to be because I don’t support killing you know I don’t think killing is something I think the vast majority of people on this planet don’t support just gratuitous killing just for entertainment and if it’s killing for entertainment I just don’t support that I just don’t just personally just me myself and laugh at it and things like that i
Rita: but the critics will say to you that nothing is just for no reason, they will always say that this is their like
Mirthell: exactly but that that’s what I’m saying and that’s what I said it’s for
Rita: You just have to give your reasoning that you’re uncomfortable.
Mirthell: my reason is not for laughter killing someone for laughter that’s what I’m saying I don’t just for entertainment value but killing within the context of telling a story about war or right or killing in the context of telling a story about the crazy psyche of a murderer and getting into the mind of a murderer you know you know those are things that I could say okay I’m learning something from that but for me I just the entertainment value of I’m laughing because it’s f it’s not funny to me like a lot of these things it’s just like what other people find funny I just personally don’t find it funny and to each my own I just personally don’t find I entertaining
Shiloh: yeah in my opinion I don’t have that much of a problem with horror movies are the one that gets me the most are horror games I cannot play that for any reason, I will chicken out every single time someone tells me to play a horror game because I can not do it for you don’t seem to play horror games on planets at all because there’s a reason to that I cannot do it
Shalom: I think that’s another I think it’s really different because it’s like you’re the player is the one that’s killing and so I feel like that has a lot of
Sinead: no no you’re being hunted
Shalom: what?
Mirthell: oh okay
Rita: I’ve never played a horror game
Mirthell: yeah I don’t play that either.
Shiloh: that is the scariest thing ever Sinead I have games right on my computer that are horror games and I never even open them because I buy them like do I actually want to play this no like I’m so serious
Shalom: well I definitely see that you have your limits yes yes
[Music]
Mirthell: let’s transition to our cartoon that we have onyx monster mystery would you guys consider that scary you know?
Shalom: no it’s so silly
Shiloh: no no no no it’s like scooby-doo like you said um it’s not actually it is a monster but like it’s friendly it’s not out there for like killing or anything it’s just kind of you know scared like
Rita: it’s the fun aspects of this type of season
Sinead: yeah fun aspect of the spooky season.
Mirthell: so maybe you want to share with the audience what it is about for those that don’t know what Onyx monster mystery is what’s the overall premise
Rita: right onyx monster mysteries is our cartoon where it features our family, we do all the voice-over work um Shalom has written a few episodes Sinead wrote every single song in every single episode plus the theme song now what we did was we um we created this series to kind of show how a family works together and what we do is we rescue monsters so what happens is we get an alert that monsters are scaring humans in some sort of way and we go there before they’re hunted and brought down we go there and we bring them to our island and on our island atlas island we have um a haven for them so on that island we share with a bunch of different monsters and they have to learn to get along and have fun and and it’s just a really fun movie where we, i mean show where we talk about togetherness we talk about sometimes facing our fears sometimes just family issues working together like it’s just really it’s a really fun um light-hearted take on the spooky season but it has some really one of the things I think we’re the proudest of really is the music is really really good it’s fun those are the types of things that can you can hear probably for generations
Sinead: because when we were younger and when we watched different cartoons some of the things we always remember is songs if songs were in a cartoon right we’ll always remember it things like Phineas literally you will remember the songs from every Phineas verb episode like
Shalom: literally songs make a cartoon right like literally they make a show
Mirthell: I feel like it’s um jetson meets scooby-doo sort of yeah but the jetsons is like the
family working together on missions scooby-doo it’s never what you think it was the monster is really not
Rita: well the Jetsons didn’t work together on missions I would say the jetsons the reason why ours is jetsons meets that is that scooby-doo is because it’s very futuristic like we’re using gadgets, yeah yeah we are up to our outfits or something that you probably see on the jetsons things like that
Mirthell: and what I like is that it some of the messages that you can gain from it is not only just family how families work together teamwork and things like that facing your fears but one of them is also how we oftentimes can misunderstand others that we don’t know because a lot of the monsters, they’re not really much like you know when you what we don’t want to give any spoilers but when you meet the monsters when the average person in the world sees the monsters they’re scared of it but once we meet them we find out the reality behind
story right who this monster really is and it’s always comical and it’s always interesting to find out who the bigfoot really is or who sasquatch really is
Rita: yeah yeah it’s really good it’s really it’s a really fun one I think you’re going to enjoy it
Sinead: We’re really proud of it and yes we hope you guys enjoy watching it
Shasha: it’s a perfect Halloween cartoon
Rita: right so well if you guys want to watch onyx monster mysteries you can catch it on several different platforms um it’s on amazon kids plus it’s on amazon prime uh season one is on youtube and guys it’s going to be on a ton of other platforms that we will be announcing soon yes and um and also season and we will give you a sneak peek of season two as well because that one um you know is continuing more of the fun so guys it’s a really really great thing to watch even together as a family let us know what you all think yeah
Mirthell: right yeah so talking about you know some of the themes that are in Onyx Monster
Mysteries like family and facing your fears
[Music]
Mirthell: I thought it would be nice to kind of share you know what are some of our fears and how we have faced our fears
Rita: well I’ll start with mine so when I was younger I don’t know at what point I became afraid of dogs but there was a point where somehow I was scared of dogs I would always do though the way I would cope was I would run
Mirthell: not a good idea
Rita: I was a lot skinnier a lot faster okay so that was really fast as soon as someone brought
around a dog that was off-leash and I felt like it was coming towards me I was out of there and of course, that dog is like yay she’s playing so I was chased so many times I cannot tell you it’s I cannot count how many times I was chased by a dog and it got so bad okay I’m gonna admit this it’s gonna embarrass them but I’m gonna admit this, guys I would pee my pants all the time as I’m running I was so afraid
Sinead: not embarrassing me but kind of
Mirthell: it might be embarrassing for you
Rita: I don’t do it anymore, it’s not like I do but the point is though I was so scared that it was just like I was it was I was like terrified so the neighborhood kids that I was friends with got a kick out of it, they would be crying I would be crying but I’d be crying from fear they would be crying from laughter
Mirthell: oh my goodness
Rita: and so what they would do is every now and then I’m laughing now but back then I’ll be so mad um sometimes just a dog would come around maybe someone I don’t know maybe walked out of its yard and whatever they would be like let’s go to Rita’s so they’d be like Rita, you want to come and play and I would be like oh sure
Mirthell: oh that’s cruel
Rita: and at first like I wouldn’t know and then all of a sudden, there’d be a dog be like
hey we found this dog and then I’d be like oh and then you know I would start backing up a bit and then that dog would say as the dog would sense your energy you know now I know like dogs they can sense your energy so then it would start coming towards me and then, of course, it would start finally I wised up and started saying no I can’t play you know
Mirthell: right I’d be scared of my friends too
Rita: when there was like a group of people there and they’d be like Rita I want to come and play and I’m like no because I know I know what y’all want to do but that fear really it just plagued me I was feeling like okay this is just plaguing me like every single area of my life and I and now guys I love dogs and it’s because I decided to face my fear so what I did was um I actually bought two dogs years ago two dogs that I knew were going to grow very big and they were black and they were called shady and shadowed you all remember them some photos of them um and I was like well, first of all, that’s a whole another podcast because we were supposed to train these dogs and that didn’t work out but they were really really really great dogs and they helped me get over the fear I started becoming desensitized to growling or barking or the jumping or whatever and I realized that wow I could have done this years ago and I would not have had as many issues with dogs
Mirthell: wow
Rita: So the way I faced it was I bought the dogs and of course now we have Sug um and Sug is just he’s just the most precious dog in the world
Mirthell: so facing your fears sometimes you have to face it and just come up with a strategy anybody else?
Shasha: okay so I have a fear of elevators and I have to say I did face my fear for one period of my life so we were living in a condo and we were living on what floor again
Sinead: 23rd very important
Shasha: 23rd floor I remember we first visited there I was like okay so we went up on the elevator and it only wasn’t until we left the elevator I realized how high we were like I was like we’re living here?
Mirthell: Shasha to be honest with you I never thought that you would ever get into an elevator like that
Shasha: I never thought either and we lived there for a long time
Rita: but not only that you didn’t just like tough it out you literally got used to it
Shasha: right down to get the mail exactly it doesn’t help with
Rita: right became a normal part of your life
Shasha: I mean I even never wrote it alone that’s one thing I’ve never been in an elevator alone
Sinead: the only reason why you didn’t write it alone
Mirthell: because you’re young
Sinead: reasons we just wanted to all stay together right as like just you know because you were like what uh 12?
Mirthell: right we didn’t want to put you down in the elevator we had other things that were scarier than the elevator itself right having you alone
Sinead: right so that’s the only reason why you wouldn’t ride it alone because I feel like that if it was if you were now you would probably ride it maybe
Shasha: no, no I still wouldn’t
Shiloh: yeah remember till this day you’ve only ridden our elevator once
Shasha: once
Rita: and that was because
Mirthell: we asked you to do it
Rita: and I apologize
Shasha: no everything is so I need to okay I need to face my fears okay I can’t just ignore it because what if I broke my leg and I need to use it I need to face my fear
Shiloh: Shasha okay after this go ride it down now
Shasha: no, um the 15th birthday I rode in the elevator once and it was it was great again
Mirthell: so okay so whoa okay okay so what is your actual fear about the elevator exactly?
Shasha: I don’t like that I can’t control it
Mirthell: and you just don’t like the feeling inside right?
Shasha: yeah I just can’t control it
Mirthell: right but there’s nothing that actually happens in the elevator because every time you ride it you’re fine
Shasha: right yeah but the thing is if see, listen to this if it was if it wasn’t enclosed like enclosed I would be fine but it’s like a robot controls it
Mirthell: that’s true and another thing is that you’re fine if there’s a glass yeah so I wonder are you really scared of elevators are you not good with you’re claustrophobic because if you see a glass if you see out of it you’re fine with elevators, in fact, we go to the mall and when it’s a glass you go in
Rita: see I missed I well I wasn’t alive during this time but I miss and I wish we had
elevators from the time before where there would be someone who manually did it
Shasha: yes I would trust that
Rita: guardian door you could like it just felt like I get what you’re
saying like you have control
Shasha: yeah so uh now I don’t like how you can’t get out into that thing until a robot tells you
[Laughter]
Mirthell: well one of the things I like about what you’re saying Shasha is is that fear I sometimes something that is tangible where there’s actually like a beer is in front of you you’re in a forest there’s a beer in front of you that bear can actually maul you okay that’s tangible it’s real life and it’s in real-time but a lot of fears are also like not in real-time and they’re not tangible they’re just in our head and so when you get into an elevator and it goes up and it goes down and everything is fine then that is a fear that is probably not so much real-time like a bear in front of you but it’s more like a mechanism of emotion in your mind and one of the reasons why it’s really good when you have a fear if your family has a fear to talk about it the way we’re talking about it is because as we talk we’re letting the fear out sometimes if we just keep our thoughts in and we don’t talk it out and to see to kind of reason it out we can maintain that fear because we’re we’re keeping that thought in our mind even though there’s not it’s not substantive and so talking about it actually lets the fear out but talking about in a way that is understanding so not like if we if you were talking about your fear and we were like that’s so silly Shasha just go in the elevator okay that’s not a really great way to address fears it’s like get it out we can talk about it is one good step
Sinead: Shalom isn’t yours similar to Shasha’s?
Shalom: yeah
Sinead: or is it similar to moms I don’t know which one you’re going with
Shalom: no no I’m gonna go similar to Shasha’s so I’m very scared of escalators I’m terrified actually and maybe this coincides with me being afraid of heights but I don’t know I just don’t personally like escalators I’ve been scared of it since I was little and there were some times and a few events where I’m like okay I’m just not going down look here’s the thing
Mirthell: is it down and up or is it just?
Shalom: It used to be up I’ve got over the up part the down part is where it’s scary
Shiloh: no you’re not gonna hold that part
Shalom: yes I have
Shiloh: You have not
Shasha: How come you’re scared not scared with up and not down
Shalom: well we’re going up it’s like you can’t look behind you but when you go down it’s just it’s scary yeah
Mirthell: You think that you’re gonna fall down the stairs or something
Shalom: ah yeah but you know what it’s it’s not it’s like it’s not even the during it’s actually the beginning of it
Sinead: it’s like when you step stepping on it
Mirthell: so it is so so what I find that happens to you Shalom is that you’re trying to coordinate your hand and your feet at the same time to get on there but your back feet oftentimes stay
Rita: guys if we can show you footage of Shalom getting on an escalator it’s hilarious
Sinead: no not like a hold on hold on the can and you know the escalator is going forward she’ll be like this all the way down until she falls forward so I’m not falling forward but you know what I mean
Mirthell: right and it’s a real fear though it’s a real
Sinead: yeah in universal studios when we have to go down I’m not gonna lie universal studios explainers are a different story they are tall
Rita: the one in LA
Shiloh: yeah everyone was scared except for me of course but like everyone was scared it’s exciting
Rita: I wasn’t scared
Shiloh: yes you were
Rita: No I was not
Mirthell: I’m not scared of escalators
Sinead: No I’m not it was kind of just like
Shiloh: oh yeah but um also Shalom in California when you and they were at that mall you were afraid of going up so
Shalom: no I wasn’t going down I wasn’t afraid of going up because I didn’t know I had to go back down.
Mirthell: yeah going up I can see what you’re saying because going up you kick
you can’t fall forward because it will just be
Shiloh: right here but the stairs were on the left side and the escalator was on the right side you went to the left side and that was a month ago.
Rita: That’s true!
Mirthell: where was that?
Rita: we were in L.A when we were filming for onyx family dinner
Mirthell: oh yeah
Rita: and you guys there was some store or something in that outdoor wall
Mirthell: I was thinking about the escalator when we went and to lion king or something like that.
Sinead: yeah I remember that
Shiloh: oh
Sinead: yeah yeah yeah that one
Rita: which one was that one?
Sinead: in New York broadway
Mirthell: that was at the New York broadway escalator
Rita: oh that escalator that wasn’t that big
Shalom: it wasn’t but I was so scared because
Rita: that’s true you did avoid that one you climbed up the stairs there
Shalom: yeah I did I know I climbed down no I went up but we’re going down Shasha like Shasha I was holding you
Rita: Shalom, when you go up it’s because I force you
Shalom: because I know I had to go down and I was just really scared like we had to we had this whole commotion where Shasha was dragging me to the escalator and the crowd was like coming out and they were like what is going on
Mirthell: right so there’s uh so that’s another thing when you’re dealing with fears as a family it can be frustrating to deal with people’s fears and so Shasha started dragging
Shasha: So I don’t wanna go on the elevator, Shalom don’t wanna go to the escalator
Mirthell: right
Sinead: exactly like why are people afraid of elevators and escalators?
Mirthell: it’s good to encourage as a family when you’re working together with fears it’s good to encourage one another and to be patient you really have to be patient with one another because if we drag it’s not the best idea to drag or force each other to face their fears fake when facing fears it really has to be something that that person comes to determine that this is good for me and so the best way to do that is if you’re working together as a family is to find ways to encourage that person to see that it’s important that they face their fears as opposed to you forcing them to face their fears.
Shiloh: so what are you scared of?
Sinead: You go first, Shiloh.
Mirthell: well yeah you go first Shiloh, anything? and we haven’t heard from Sinead either
Shiloh: yeah yeah you first
Sinead: No you go first
Rita: Don’t waste time here, don’t waste time going
Mirthell: all right let’s go with Sinead.
Sinead: all right um so I have a really huge fear of needles but okay so hear me out well okay it goes even deeper than needles because I get afraid when even tacks drop on the floor
Yes yes I hate when there are tacks and people are not careful they’re dropping like oops I dropped a tack a thumbtack well looks like it’s got no no
Mirthell: so sharp objects?
Sinead: well no because I’m not really I’m like I’m not scared of knives okay I’m scared like I don’t know I’m not scared of like razors or shaving kits and stuff I’m just I don’t like maybe pointy things
[Laughter]
Sinead: Like I thought I’d be puncturing my skin like no
Mirthell: How about the popping balloons?
Sinead: I hate popping balloons
Mirthell: Sinead is scared of balloons
Rita: guys this fear is deep for her though because when you guys were um you guys had to get some shots
Sinead: yes
Rita: and she, and this girl she’s an adult
Sinead: okay yeah
Mirthell: yeah you’re like 19, 18?
Sinead: You know when you get to college and you have to get the certain shots to go to the dorms right so we had to go get those shots and I had to get my blood drawn too so it was both I could not handle it I could, first of all, I don’t even know how I handled it I was actually shaking before getting my wisdom teeth were taken out but before that anyways for the shot I was freaking out like I was good I was shaking and stuff but when I got in the chair to get the blood drawn and stuff I started bald like I literally could not hold together I was crying tears
Rita: I had to hold her hand and encourage her the whole time
Sinead: yeah
Rita: I literally had to be like it’s okay sweetie
Mirthell: but then there’s another one too there’s blood too, you’re scared of
Sinead: but I’m not as afraid of looking at blood like I can look at blood and be like oh that’s kind of gross nasty but
Mirthell: Oh okay so it crashes
Sinead: but I don’t like the needle aspect of it, it’s so much just like if somehow you could just get blood without doing any of that may be like a suction thing whatever I don’t know I just like
Rita: so explain to them your earrings then
Sinead: I don’t have one, yeah I wear clip ones I don’t have pierced ears, no pierced ears for me I don’t have tattoos not because I can’t get them but because I don’t want to
Mirthell: the needles
Sinead: needles I cannot stand needles.
Mirthell: There’ll be thousands of needles like
Sinead: exactly, the needles be just no like no
Mirthell: wow so how about you Shiloh do you have any fears?
Sinead: okay nobody’s gonna help me get out I’m not gonna say
Mirthell: oh okay okay okay, how have you, no but how have you that’s true how have you gotten over here? I don’t know if you have gotten over that fear though
Sinead: I am not alright that’s what I’m saying
Shalom: what is the expectation? like what do you fear that it’s gonna do to you?
Sinead: what am I fearing its gonna do to me
Mirthell: right also storms because you’re really scared of storms
Rita: well I know but let’s just keep with the needles
Mirthell: right right right
Rita: I don’t really know if there’s a way I think one of the reasons why daddy moved on, is because there’s really no way to face your fear of needles.
Mirthell: and that’s one of the reasons why I mentioned the storms are
Because I know that you have been scared of storms and you will look at the tracker
Shalom: yeah but this is the needles
Sinead: yeah honestly but the thing is I don’t break down and cry over that’s more like anxiety
Rita: this is the worse
Mirthell: oh okay
Sinead: This is like real fear. I breakdown, I cant
Shiloh: okay, so Im not gonna say my obvious one.
Sinead: what? Are you skipping me?
Shiloh: no
Mirthell: how have you addressed your fear?
Sinead: I haven’t just I just
Shiloh: exactly
Mirthell: so avoidance
Sinead: yes avoidance but I was like like basic things like getting clip-on earrings to avoid having to get weird stuff like that like right I will do everything to avoid it
Rita: I don’t really know if there is a way to get over that I feel like and the thing is you have a high pain threshold so it’s not even like it’s not even about the pain it’s not about pain but can you, I think this begs the question can you get over all fears in life maybe some things you stay afraid of
Mirthell: right
Rita: because like there’s no way to really she should not have to keep poking herself with a needle you know
Mirthell: no but I think that I think that when it comes to fears I think that it’s important to talk about them address them and face them like for instance like if you notice how mommy had dealt with her fears she had a plan and action plan we all had to be patient with her we’ve spoken about dogs before the same thing with planes you have a fear with planes we had to go through a certain kind of talking about it and dealing with it and then we even went to the airport one time and actually like went through everything bought the plane tickets and everything and at the very last minute we left and we didn’t go on that flight.
Rita: okay but I just want to say that I had flown a lot before this I had flown a lot and then I had one bad experience coming back from Europe that made me afraid and
Shasha: say how it dropped down
Rita: it just I heard a boom and dropped down and then I said oh planes can do this okay I don’t want to go on planes anymore so I stopped flying for like 20 years then so now we’re going to what Mirthell is saying
Mirthell: right but then she was able then we when we were going on vacation she started working on it she got tapes she was able to talk about it in a safe environment where she didn’t feel judged
Rita: right I got a coach I got a coach
Mirthell: she got a coach and she was able to face it and so I just wanted to share that with you
Rita: and I did four flights guys almost back to back and then COVID it happened
Mirthell: yeah so so so just kind of share that with you um and even I remember there was another time where we, you guys were scared of storms I think we all were scared that time I think we can all collectively say when we were in Florida and there was like uh
Sinead: that’s more of an experience more than a fear that’s a constant fear
Mirthell: yeah you know yeah but at the same time I think that storms are a constant fear for a lot of you guys
Rita: you guys like for example we have our home here in the south and you guys do not like being around here during tornado season
Mirthell: right, so that’s constant
Rita: for me though I don’t necessarily have those same fears.
Mirthell: right and I think that one of
Shasha: you don’t? tornadoes are scary
Rita: it’s not that I think tornadoes aren’t scary it’s just that I’m not afraid to be around here during tornado season
Mirthell: so one of the reasons why I mentioned that is because there are many ways to address it talks about it being patient coming up with a plan but when it came to the
storms remember when I could honestly say that I generally am not scared of a lot of things but at that time I was a bit scared and we jumped I remember we were in Florida we jumped in the car and we’re running away from this storm and we’re driving the car and we’re like trying to like listen to where the storm could be that was a real threat probably but yet still it was a fear nevertheless and I think that and I and during that time period one of the um strategies that we did or we implemented was the prayer we all collectively realized we needed we need to pray
Sinead: you know you know what one time that I know we were all scared besides the storm was when there were fires and we were all praying
Shasha: Oh my Goodness
Rita: I wasn’t that afraid of that
Mirthell: but prayer is a great um tool that you can use just to know that there is somebody bigger and greater than whatever challenges that you’re facing that you can turn to and that you can ask and you just have that calming assurance um in your faith that everything is gonna be okay so I wanna also mention that because that’s another way that we can address our fears and so when you’re looking at your fears these are many ways that you can deal with it you can talk and get it out of your head you can talk with each other so that you can encourage each other and not pressure each other to force them into something um and you can and you can develop a plan and a strategy
Shalom: guys dad is not the type of person to have fears some people just don’t have one
Mirthell: I just don’t have a lot of fears I don’t I just don’t have a lot of fears like that
Sinead: Shiloh, do you have fears?
Mirthell: right right right we want to get your fear in
Shiloh: we’re running out of time right now
Mirthell: all right it would be good so I’ll be very good if you share your fears but if you don’t have any fears that’s fine because I don’t really have a lot of fear so if you don’t have a lot of fears that’s fine
Shiloh: I think I don’t I don’t have a lot of fear uh I think I’m oh a very constant fear is me being
alone in places and well no here’s the thing hear me out because when I’m alone in places I start hearing stuff
Rita: oh look like little creaturesI
Shiloh: yes
Mirthell: so unknown sounds you know there’s a lot of people that do not like unknown sounds were you just like what was that
Shiloh: no
Mirthell: like some people are okay with it but some people are just like ah I need to know what that is
Rita: I guess we all have some sort of fear that’s why
Mirthell: okay so I know what fear I have what I got into an accident when I was a teenager and it was a write-off in the car and so now every time that I turn in a way that I would turn or when it rains or anything I overcompensate when I’m driving I will overcompensate on that particular bend just because I fear that I am going to repeat that accident so you guys are right I do have a fear
[Music]
Mirthell: our world is going through a really difficult time dark times even confusing like who’s a monster? who’s your friend? you know and uh the onyx family wants to challenge you at this time to face your fears you are full of light so be brave and face these dark times don’t let the darkness in and here’s how
Shasha: choose to love not to hate
Shiloh: be compassionate towards those in need
Shalom: choose to be fair in how you treat others
Rita: choose to be bold and courageous by standing up for what you believe is right
Sinead: but don’t forget to have mercy and forgiveness in your heart
Mirthell: we believe that you can be a light change the world even not so much by pointing out all those you think are monsters but ensuring that you do not become a monster towards others so that’s our podcast thanks for joining us here’s where we tell the story feed the soul make them laugh heal the heart
Everyone: bye
