Tim Ryan's family reflects on his career, talks about life after retirement
What Tim Ryan's family really thinks about his retirement
Tim Ryan's retirement starts tomorrow. He's looking forward to spending more time with his family but are they looking forward to it too? Lauren Przybyl sat down with his wife Beth, daughter Meghan, and son-in-law Brandon, to talk about what life will be like in the Ryan household when he doesn't have such an odd sleep schedule.
DALLAS - Tim Ryan is looking forward to his retirement and spending more time with his family.
But even though he’s been the star of his family for all these years, he might have been replaced at home too. All eyes are now on his sweet granddaughter, Lucy.
The way little Lucy looks at him will many anyone’s heart melt. And he is just as smitten with her.
Lauren Przybyl joined Tim and his wife, Beth, their daughter, Meghan, and her husband, Brandon, for a quick chat.
Tim and Beth’s son, Patrick, and his wife, Haley, weren’t able to make it but they were probably glad. Lauren quickly put Meghan on the spot.
"Three words to describe you dad?" she asked.
"Oh my gosh. Sarcastic. Smart. That doesn’t even feel like a strong enough word. Intelligent, intellectual. I mean, like, I don’t know what the strongest word is that you could put to that, but he just loves facts. And, I would say humble. He wants the best for other people and that he doesn’t really think highly of himself," Meghan said.
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"When we were getting married, he was like, ‘Just work to try to outserve each other.’ And I think that kind of sums up his personality in many ways," Brandon added.
Tim worked odd early morning hours while Meghan and Patrick were growing up. But having afternoons free was a key for the whole family.
"He left them a note almost every day. They both had a sticky note on the breakfast bar where I would give them breakfast before they went to school," Beth said.
"He made it a priority to still connect with us. And then we were the lucky ones that had dad in the pickup line at the end of the school day. And dad would come. Mom would volunteer at school and dad would be right by her side. And so we actually got to see more of dad than we probably would have gotten to see had he worked a normal job," Meghan said.
Tim’s wife of 38 years has been though all the media madness with him.
"You know what? He’s a journalist down to his core," Beth said. "He is the guy that always will dig for the facts. And he has a standard that is frustrating to some of the people he works with, especially about grammar. We all know about that. He is well read and informed. And no matter what his personal values and opinions are, he’s able to balance that with what people really need to know."
Tim has done some incredible things in his 44-year career as a journalist that people who know him for Tell It to Tim might not even know about. He once traveled to the Middle East to cover the wars and slept on roofs in Somalia.
Tim Ryan and Good Day co-anchor Lauren Przybyl
"You have to be looking forward to this. Are you nervous, happy, excited?" Lauren asked Beth.
"All of those things. I mean, I’m really happy for him because he’s exhausted. And I’m happy because he’ll quit clipping years off of his life with these weird sleep hours he has. But there’s going to be an adjustment there. You know, we’ve lived these weird lives. I’m a night owl. He goes to bed at 8 p.m. So we have dinner and an hour TV show together at night and a lot of lunches," Beth replied.
"So, what do you think he is going to miss? What’s going to be the hardest part for him?" Lauren asked.
"Evan making his coffee," Beth replied.
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"You are going to have to step in and make his coffee," Lauren said.
"No way. We have a Keurig. He can do it himself," Beth joked.
With the coffee will come more travel, more biking and, of course, more time with little Lucy, who for sure lives up to her name – a bright light in Poppy Tim’s world.
"The world works in a weird way sometimes. But you had your baby and now he’s retiring. Like the timing.. it’s almost magical," Lauren said.
"Yeah, I mean, it really is. Lucy was a long time coming for us," Meghan said. "It is so cool that it’s all kind of happened when it has because I’ve seen this spark of joy in my dad."
Meghan has been on maternity leave for her dad’s last weeks on the air. She’s been able to watch him for every minute every morning.
"And that’s really cool," she said.
Tim has a second grandbaby on the way. Patrick and Haley are expecting a little boy soon.
He now has a blue version of the same Tell It To Poppy onesie he got after Lucy was born.
