‘Some things aren’t that great any more’: Paddy Daly on knowing when to say goodbye

Less than two weeks ago, Paddy Daly announced he was done as host from VOCM’s Open Line, as much of a political institution in Newfoundland and Labrador as the House of Assembly itself. I mentioned it in this post, and there was definitely some chatter about what surely must have been going behind the scenes. Nature abhors a vaccuum, but not as much as social media.

As it turns out, there was no drama, no political intrigue, no pending overnight reinventions as a Tory aide or a Liberal candidate.

Daly appeared last week on CBC Radio’s On The Go and told Krissy Holmes he knew in December that he was just not feeling that he could do the show justice.

“I was thinking, boy, this is really grinding me down,” said Daly, who gave himself a break over Christmas to get perked up again, and come back feeling refreshed.

It didn’t happen.

“I never really got back up there,” he told Holmes (his former colleague from Rogers’s Out of the Fog).

“Some mornings, I wake up with a pit in my stomach, and I thought, I don’t need to live like this, and so I just decided, you know, maybe go out when the getting is good.”

Daly said the decision to leave the call-in show was his alone — and people can stop guessing about what was driving the departure.

“Social media is also telling me that my future’s already planned, when they must know more than I do, because it’s not,” he said. “Some things are just not that great anymore. And I think that probably played a role in where I arrived at my final decision.”

I understand all of this, and empathize with Daly’s comments. It took me a while to come to a decision to retire, and I’ve had countless conversations over the years with people who’ve made fateful decisions about their careers.

Daly’s calculations and feelings are not uncommon. When that motivation — that zing, the mojo, an impetus, the driving force, whatever — is fading, it’s hard to be enthusiastic. I plan to explore this down the road.

Daly meanwhile mentioned he’s open to doing a podcast. Well, I’d be open to listening to it.

Let’s see (and hear) what he does next.