How Curiosity Turned Into the 20 Year Time Out Podcast
If you have ever wondered what happened to someone from your past, you are not alone. A simple spark of curiosity recently pushed me into creating a brand new podcast called The 20 Year Time Out, where I reconnect with people I have not spoken to in twenty years or more. What started as a random flash of nostalgia turned into a full creative project with real conversations, real memories, and a surprising amount of meaning.
This blog post expands on the video, goes behind the scenes, and walks you through how a sixth grade yearbook and a little curiosity turned into a podcast about lost friends. If you have ever had a “whatever happened to that person” moment, you are going to connect with this.
Let’s dive in.
1. It Started With a Sixth Grade Yearbook
One day I was in my basement flipping through old papers, and tucked in the pile was my sixth grade yearbook. I started looking through it just for fun, but names and faces kept hitting me. People I used to hang out with. People I joked around with. People who were pretty important at one point in my life.
And I realized I had no idea where any of them were now.
So the curiosity kicked in.
Where did they go.
What are they doing now.
Did life treat them well.
Did they stay in town or move across the country.
I tried finding them on Facebook. Instagram. LinkedIn. A few had profiles, but some of the people I really wanted to reconnect with were nowhere to be found. Not even a blurry old profile picture. That is when my curiosity really started buzzing.
2. No One Knew What Happened to These People
I started messaging friends:
“Hey, do you know what happened to so and so.”
Every reply was the same.
“No clue. I have not thought about them in 20 years.”
And for some reason that made it even more interesting.
If nobody knew where they were, I wanted to find out.
That is when the idea hit me:
What if I reached out to these long lost friends?
What if I sat down with them and actually caught up?
What if we talked about the last twenty years of life?
At first it was just going to be a coffee shop thing. No cameras. No microphones. Just two people catching up on decades of life. But the more I thought about it, the more I knew I had to document it. These conversations should be on film. They deserved to be captured.
3. The First Yes Happened Fast
I got on Facebook, sent out some messages, and the first “I am in” came back almost immediately. Chris said yes without hesitation.
So I booked a tiny studio.
Gathered some gear.
Figured out how I was going to shoot the whole thing.
And suddenly the podcast was real.
For the first episode I wrote a small script with five bullet points.
Reminisce.
Catch up.
Talk about life.
Talk about work.
End with some reflections.
The moment we sat down, I threw the script out the window. The conversation just moved. It was natural. It was honest. It was not forced at all.
4. The Conversations Needed No Script
As I filmed more episodes, I realized something really fast:
When you reconnect with someone from your past, the conversation does not need a structure. It just happens.
We went from sixth grade stories to twelfth grade memories to old jobs to life updates without even trying. It felt like no time had passed.
The comfort was still there.
The humor was still there.
The energy was still there.
Even though my guests had twenty years of life experiences to talk about, at the core we were the same kids, the same teens, the same young adults who used to hang out after school or work.
That is when I decided to freestyle every single episode. No script. No outline. Just authentic talks with people who shaped different parts of my life.
5. When I Run Out of Lost Friends, The Podcast Will Evolve
Eventually I will run out of long lost friends to interview. Most people do not want to get on camera after twenty years of silence. That is fine. When that happens, the podcast will evolve into something new.
I will keep the same conversational style.
I will keep the same energy.
I will just start talking to interesting people of all kinds.
No scripts.
No forced structure.
Just real people having real conversations.
So if you enjoy honest dialogue, nostalgia, storytelling, curiosity, or just seeing what two humans can uncover in a conversation, this podcast is for you.
Wrapping It Up
So that is how a sixth grade yearbook turned into the 20 Year Time Out Podcast. Pure curiosity. A desire to reconnect. A belief that conversations matter.
If you have ever had a moment where you thought, “Whatever happened to that person,” you are going to love this show. Every episode is a time capsule. Every episode is a reunion. Every episode is a reminder that people from your past never fully disappear. They just drift until something brings them back.
You can watch the full episodes on YouTube.
Give the channel a subscribe if you want to follow the journey.
I am Rich Marks the Spot.
Thanks for being here.
