Scotty Survived Ten Gunshots in an Ambush, Then Found His Voice in Music

Army veteran Scotty Hasting survived being shot ten times in Afghanistan. He recalls the ambush that started it all, the recovery process, the survivor's guilt that haunts him, and the different means of therapy he's used to heal. Learning to find his way again, Hasting discovered his voice and a talent for songwriting about the things he's been through. Now he's helping others heal and connect through his music, including one of his fellow late soldier's families.

Follow Scotty: @scottyhastingmusic

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:14):
Personally with Morgan Fieldsman.

Speaker 2 (00:18):
A while back, I met a guy named Scotti Hastein
at an event here in Nashville, and I knew as
soon as I was talking to him that he had
a story that needed to be shared, and that's why
I decided to bring him on this week. We haven't
done any episodes on veterans or military or anything really
in that space, and I feel like he's one of
the perfect people to come on and start a conversation
around that, and his story is one that will have

(00:41):
you feel all kinds of emotions, especially to see where
he's at now. So let's get into this. I'm joined
this week by Scottie Hasting. Him and I met Gosh
so many months back at an event for Creative Vets,
which was super awesome. But I'm really just excited to

(01:03):
have you guys get to know Scotty Moore and hear
his wild story and experiences. So Scotti, thanks for being here,
Thank you for having me. We are going to dive
in so quick to your story because Creative It's is
the end of your story of what really started this journey?
I want to hear the beginning. Yeah, but what got

(01:23):
this all started? Why you're even in that group in
the first place, Like your background and what got you
to where you are today.

Speaker 3 (01:30):
Yeah, it's insane. So I grew up in the Cincinnati
Northern Kentucky area and I was playing baseball at the time,
semi pro baseball. I was making a little bit of money,
not a whole lot, and I made the decision one
day that I wanted to be a part of something
that meant something or something bigger than myself. And I
decided that I was going to go in enlist in
the Army. And so I did, and when I got there,

(01:51):
it was so funny, and I was like, man, I
just want to fight. Like, to me, a soldier is
someone who goes over in fights. That's what I wanted
to be. That's what I wanted to do. And I
should have played harder to get because come to find out,
there was a signing bonus. But they did. Of course,
the recruiter didn't tell me when I went to join
because he was like, oh, this guy wants to be
like the heck, yeah, you didn't get this. But everyone

(02:14):
else who like got actually got recruited got a signing
bonus except for me.

Speaker 2 (02:18):
I'm like man, Come on, how many years did it
take for you to find out about that?

Speaker 3 (02:22):
Oh? It was at basic training when I found out
that everyone else was getting a signing bonus. Yeah, someone
had said something about it. They were like, oh, I
got half the money before I left and helped out
my family, and then I get the rest of the
half when I graduated basic. And I was like, what
it's like that meme. We're like, wait, you guys are
getting paid absolutely that meme.

Speaker 2 (02:42):
Wow it was you wanted to do this?

Speaker 3 (02:45):
Yeah? Yeah, I wanted to. I just I felt like
I needed to be a part of something that meant something.
I was living a life where you know, I just
felt like I needed to do something, and so I yeah,
I joined the Army. I went to Fort Benning for
Basic training, which the home of the Infantry, and graduated
Basic training. And probably three months after graduating Basic training,
I was in Afghanistan. Wow. Yeah, it was very quick,

(03:08):
very quick. When I got to my unit, they were like, hey,
you guys know we're deploying right.

Speaker 2 (03:12):
I was like, oh, okay, was that kind of a
shock when it first happened. You're like, I knew I
wanted this. Yeah, but also that's happening a lot quicker
than I expected.

Speaker 3 (03:20):
Oh. One, you go in and you're like, Okay, I'm
going to go to my first my first duty station.
I'm gonna be there for a little bit. I'm gonna train,
I'm gonna hang out with all the guys. And then
you get there and they're like, oh, yeah, we're deploying
in like a couple months. I was like, okay, dang,
wasn't expecting it to be that fast.

Speaker 2 (03:36):
Yeah, and when you get that notice of deployment, are
you aware of what situation you're going into?

Speaker 3 (03:43):
Yeah, a little bit. For a while there, it was
that we were going to go to Iraq, and then
we were going to go somewhere else, and then they
finally decided Afghanistan is where we're going and and yeah,
and then that by that was probably a month before
we left. So we knew going into it we were
going to Afghanistan. We knew we didn't really know what

(04:03):
part of Afghanistan yet, we didn't. Yeah, we didn't know
that until right before we left. But yeah, we knew
it was gonna be Afghanistan.

Speaker 2 (04:09):
So then you get there and how long are you
over in Afghanistan.

Speaker 3 (04:12):
For I was in Afghanistan for three months before I
got shot.

Speaker 2 (04:17):
So this all happened on your first ever deployment. Yeah, okay, yeah, wow.
I'm gonna put my reaction in comments until you continue this.

Speaker 3 (04:26):
Yeah. No, it was insane. We were there for three months.
We were there in twenty ten, twenty eleven, the end
of twenty ten, in the beginning of twenty eleven, and
it was that was a rough time in Afghanistan. We
were in the Kandahar Province, which is the southern part
of Afghanistan, which was a very rough part of Afghanistan,
and we were in firefights every day and losing people
and it was it was hard. But yeah, three months in,

(04:48):
we were on patrol April twenty first, twenty eleven, and
I walked up on a guy who had a rifle
behind his back and he just started spraying and he
was maybe fifteen feet from me, and he ended up
hitting me ten times total. So it was like up
my body this way.

Speaker 2 (05:03):
Wow. Do you remember as this was happening in the
events that followed? Oh yeah, were you coming in and out?

Speaker 3 (05:10):
Yeah? No, I was awake the whole time. I remember.
The only thing that I don't remember is falling on
the ground. I remember getting shot. I remember how it felt,
and then I remember waking up on the ground. I
don't remember that at all, but I do remember being
on the ground and trying to crawl over to my
guys because they were me getting shot was the start
of an ambush. So not only did I get shot,

(05:32):
but now they're getting shot at also, So it was
a whole thing, and I was trying to I was
trying to crawl over to them, but I was really
bad off, so I just couldn't get to him.

Speaker 2 (05:42):
When everything finally stopped, because I'm assuming that's what happened,
then you get transported somewhere.

Speaker 3 (05:51):
Yeah, I go from finally the fire stops. The guy
who shot me his gun jammed and that's the reason
why he stopped shooting me, and he I guess he
looked up as he was trying to fix the jam
and realize that I was still alive, and I pointed
my rifle at him, and that's when he dropped his
rifle and took off running. And then so he took
off running, but my team, my squad, is still getting
shot at, and then they all that subsides. It felt

(06:14):
like a lifetime, but it was probably only a couple
of minutes. Then that happens in my in between the
firefight that's happening, my medic runs to me and he
starts working on me, and then from there we go
back to the Candorhart airfield once the helicopter gets there
and picks me up. But I had lost so much
blood at one point in time that my eyesight started
shutting down, and it was just like a white film

(06:36):
that I saw. It's crazy. I attribute that to like
the when people say I see the light, like, that's
what that is. I feel it's just like parts of
your body or shutting down, and my eyesight was the
first to go. But I eventually got to the Candorhort
Airfield and then went into the initial trauma room where
the doctors were working on me, trying to figure everything out,
and they immediately started hooking me up to blood started

(06:58):
getting blood pumping back into my box. And when that happened,
I started getting my eyesight back, and I remember saying, hey,
I can see, like my eyesight's coming back. It's a
little fuzzy, but I can see you guys. And then
that's when I heard a lady lean down and say, hey,
it's okay for you to go to sleep now. I
fought like hell to try to stay awake the whole time.
I remember like how easy it felt to just like

(07:18):
drift away, Like how easy it would have been to
just just give up and push them just drift away.
And I remember fighting that feeling from the from the
time that they picked me up in the goourney until
I was in the hospital Canfield. So the lady leaned down,
she said, hey, it's okay for you to go.

Speaker 2 (07:35):
To sleep, and I was out like that, Why do
you feel like you were fighting so hard? What was
going through your mind that you can maybe recall that
was continuing to push you to fight.

Speaker 3 (07:45):
Yeah, it was just the fact that I just felt
like I wasn't ready to give up. I just felt
like I wasn't if there's still a lot of life.
It's crazy. When I was laying down on the ground
and I was bleeding and I was like, man, there's
still so much that I want to do. I can't
die here. There's so much that I want to do still,
and I just remember fighting. And the most amazing part
about it is going into basic training. You find out

(08:05):
that in all the different combat lifesaver things that you do.
They tell you that going into shock is going to
be It's a killer. If you go into shock, it's
the number one killer of combat injuries. If you get
injured or you're missing a limb or whatever. If you
go into shock, more than likely you're not going to
come back from that. So I fought to just try
to stay calm, try to stay as calm and cool
as possible, to the point of where I was trying

(08:27):
to just make jokes with my buddies that were part
with me that were there, and kudos to them because
they were picking up what I was trying to do
and they were just joking around with me. The medic
and those guys, they saved my life just doing that,
just making me stay calm as much as possible.

Speaker 2 (08:42):
Scotty, that's incredibly impressive. Also just heartbreaking, but so impressive
that you could stay calm after that just happened to you.
Did you realize how many times you had been hit
at that?

Speaker 3 (08:53):
No, I knew that I was really bad off. I
didn't know how bad. I knew that my hand and everything,
my whole arm was completely numb. My leg I remember
feeling like I remember when I got shot. I felt
all of it. So whoever says that adrenaline kicks in
is a liar, because that's true, felt all of it.
But no, it's I remember just the pain. And I

(09:15):
was like, man, like this, with how much pain I'm in,
I have to be really bad off. I was missing
a part of my hip where the guy said that
you whenever they first came to me to work on
my hip, you could see like the joint of my hip,
like the ball joint. And because I was all of
that muscle and all that tissue and everything which just
ripped away by bullets, I'm missing part of my armpit

(09:36):
because of where it hit me in the break your
plexus also, and it's just yeah, it was really bad off.
And I knew it was bad off, and especially by
the way that the medical reacted when he first came
to me, I was like, Oh, okay, this is a lot.
This is really bad.

Speaker 2 (09:48):
And yet you're still here and you're staying calm, cracking joke.

Speaker 3 (09:52):
Yeah, I'm still trying to stay as calm as possible.
That's the only thing that you can do in that situation.
That's literally the only thing that I could do was
just try to stay calm and try fight that feeling
of just drifting off and going away.

Speaker 2 (10:04):
So you get to the hospital, they start doing all
of this work on you. What are the events that follow?

Speaker 3 (10:09):
The most incredible thing of that, this whole story, is
that lady that leaned down and said it's okay for
you to go to sleep. I talked to a guy
who was in that room that day, and there was
no there were no women in that room that day.

Speaker 2 (10:25):
Wow.

Speaker 3 (10:26):
So whoever that was, whoever came into my head and
said it's okay for you to go to sleep, it's
okay for you to let go. We got you. Whoever
that was, I don't know who it was, but then
there was no women in that room that night.

Speaker 2 (10:39):
Does that feel like eerie too, and you're trying to
place maybe potentially who that was.

Speaker 3 (10:43):
Yeah, it's just it's yeah, it still gives me goose bumps.
It's crazy. There's a voice I've never heard before, and
it was just yeah, it was literally like, hey, it's
okay for you to go to sleep. We got you,
we'll take care of you, and I just passed owme.

Speaker 2 (10:55):
It's crazy what happens with your body and with your
mind when stuff like that's happened. Absolutely, just you. Even
you've sitting here talking about trying to stay really calm,
but then also this happening. It's just crazy, the things
and the events that surround a really traumatic experience like that.

Speaker 3 (11:12):
Absolutely, it's insane, man. And I remember, so that happened.
We got all that done, I went to sleep, and
I woke up like a day later, and I was
still in Kandahar and we were getting ready to move.
They asked me where I wanted to go, if I
wanted to go to Walter Reed or if I wanted
to go to Bamsea, which is in San Antonio. I'd
never heard of BAMSA, and they talked about Bamca being

(11:33):
mainly for burnen people, okay, And I was like, well,
I'm not burnt, and I've never heard of Bamsa, but
I've heard of Walter Reed. I'll go there. Why that's cool?
And so went there. But we made so they'd take
you from Candahart into Lonstool, Germany. And but between those
two they lost pulse in my arm, and they thought
they were gonna have to take my arm, and they

(11:54):
had to make an emergency stop in bogram and they
ended up taking a vein out of my right leg
and replace the artery in my arm, which is crazy. Wow,
I can even do that because I don't know what
health class they went to, but the one that I
went to said that arteries and veins are completely different. Yeah,
but apparently a vein will grow into an artery, which

(12:16):
is crazy, or at least grow into what it needs
to be. It's insane.

Speaker 2 (12:21):
It sounds like you were in the right place with
the right person to do what needed to.

Speaker 3 (12:26):
Absolutely, because like I said, they lost Paul some arm.
The thought they were gonna have to take the arm.
They just thought, Hey, like the arm's dying, we just
have to get rid of it. But luckily there was
some doctor that I said, Nope, I got something I
can do and that thank god, I still have it.

Speaker 2 (12:39):
Yeah, do you have full feeling and stuff.

Speaker 3 (12:42):
I have from I have no feeling from basically my
elbow down. I have this much movement in his hand.
These three fingers just sit there. But yeah, it's something
I've lived with for a while now.

Speaker 2 (12:53):
And we get into in a little bit. You play
an instrument, Does that change anything for you?

Speaker 3 (12:58):
Yeah? I was lucky enough that when I started learning guitar,
I didn't know how to play guitar until like before this,
because I feel like if I knew how to play
guitar before this, I would have been like, this is stupid,
I'm done, I'm not gonna do this anymore. I would
have gotten upset and I would have gotten frustrated and
just quit, because it does change a lot. It's there's
a lot of learning curves that happen with having nerve

(13:19):
damage in your hand trying to learn how to play
the guitar.

Speaker 2 (13:21):
Yeah, I could imagine, yeah, yeah, and.

Speaker 3 (13:23):
It was so they passed me up. They got my
arm still fine in bogram and then I got to
Long Still Germany, and then when I got to long
actually when I got to Bogramer is when I actually
finally got to call my family. So for the longest time,
they were told Scotty got hit, he got shot a
bunch of times, he's in intensive care. We don't really
know what's gonna happen or what's happening, like it's touch

(13:45):
and God, we don't know.

Speaker 2 (13:45):
And what is that timeframe that's two.

Speaker 3 (13:47):
Days where my family's like just trying to figure out
if I'm even alive, Oh my god, and then yeah,
and then I get to bogram and they do that
procedure and that's when I call my mom and I'm like, hey,
I'm good, I'm still here high for now at least,
and then that's when she heard my voice. I called
my wife at the time, and it was it was crazy.
For the longest time, they didn't even know if I

(14:09):
was still alive.

Speaker 2 (14:10):
Well, and just like when you were having that experience
where you're like, this felt like years for them, I'm
sure it was that saying where it was like every
minute just clicked as they were just waiting for that
phone call.

Speaker 3 (14:20):
Absolute. I couldn't imagine being now that I have kids,
I couldn't imagine being on that end and just wondering
if my child's alive. Like I couldn't even imagine the feeling.

Speaker 2 (14:30):
Have you ever talked to your mom about that moment
in time?

Speaker 3 (14:33):
Oh? Yeah, We've done different like documentaries and stuff like that.
We did a VA documentary that she talks about it
and stuff, and we've had conversations about it, and it's rough.
It's really rough to hear her talk about it and
to hear my brother and my dad talk about it.
It's yeah, it's a completely different experience than what I experienced.

Speaker 2 (14:51):
Well, and it's not ever something I don't feel like
anybody who chooses to join the army by choice, right,
like you choose your like the this is what I
want to do. I don't think you're thinking in that moment, well,
my family is going to have to potentially get a
phone call somebody. That's not what you're considering.

Speaker 3 (15:09):
Yeah, I think when you volunteer, especially volunteering into the infantry,
like you have an idea that something could happen, but
you don't ever want to think about it. I want
to think that could happen, and it does and you're like,
what do I do now? And yeah, and that's I
think more so for the family, it's harder because this
wasn't a decision they made. This was a decision that

(15:31):
I made. And yeah, now they're just having to deal
with the consequences of it. And yeah, it's just it
was rough.

Speaker 2 (15:37):
I but on all of you guys, but particularly you're
the one who's going through this entire experience. So you're
in Germany, you make that phone call, when do you
finally make it back to the States.

Speaker 3 (15:46):
Yeah, so I was in Lonstool for about another day.
I think it was about another day. They were basically
just trying to make sure that I could make the
trip from Germany to the United States. Which before we
go any further, whoever picks the nurses that go to
Lonstol Germany deserves a medal because they are beautiful. So

(16:08):
ordered shout out to you whoever it was.

Speaker 2 (16:10):
Are they nurses within like the US Army or are
they Yeah?

Speaker 3 (16:13):
A little bit of both. So in Lonstool you have
you have the German nurses, and then you have nurses
that are also still part of the United States Army,
and and then you have nurses who are from the
US that they just they get paid to go overseas
and be nurses and hospitals like that.

Speaker 2 (16:30):
Yeah, well, shout out you're in Lonsto. There's something about
your parents.

Speaker 3 (16:34):
Absolutely you're great. But yeah, so got I went from there.
I went to from Lonstool, I finally got to Walter
Reed and that was really that was where like the
fight really started was to That's why I had to
learn how to rewalk again. I had to learn how
to I had to learn how to do everything left
handed instead of right handed. And and that was when

(16:56):
I had to do other pt the occupaional therapy are
the different therapies and yeah, and then that was when
the first time that my family got to see me also,
and the hardest part for them was I was hooked
up to wound vacs, which are like the things that
helped keep your wounds clean. And I was hooked up
to four different ones. And my mom said that when
she first walked in, she thought that those machines were

(17:19):
keeping me alive. And she said that it was scared
the crap out of her.

Speaker 2 (17:23):
Well, yeah, and she's seen four different machines and then
she's seen you hooked up to all kinds of other
stuff and she's is this permanent? What's happening to my son?

Speaker 3 (17:30):
Yeah? Yeah, she didn't really know. She didn't know what
those were. You don't know what a wound vac is
until you get in that situation and you're like, oh,
this was okay. But yeah, she said when she first
walked in, like her, my dad and my brother were
all like, is he even? Is he gonna live through this? What?
They didn't know? But I was fine. I was alive.

Speaker 2 (17:47):
I was good when you get you gave the phone
call and they're like, Okay, he's alive. That's good, We're good.
They're probably not anticipating what that meant.

Speaker 3 (17:54):
No, not at all. They were definitely not anticipating what
they saw when they walked into that and yeah, but
you know they they were troopers man. They stayed strong,
and it was how long were you?

Speaker 2 (18:05):
Therefore?

Speaker 3 (18:06):
I was impatient for a month and then I was
out patient at Walter Reed but still living on the
campus for six months. Wow, but impatient. That was every
other day I was going under anesthesian. They were cleaning
my wounds every other day. For a month.

Speaker 2 (18:19):
You had to go under anesthesia every other day, every
other day, Yeah, just to clean the wounds that you had.

Speaker 3 (18:25):
Yeah, because it would have been far too painful to
not doing so.

Speaker 2 (18:29):
After that month of having that same experience over and over,
where you just.

Speaker 3 (18:35):
Yeah, it was just a blur, it really was. It
was you just get into Okay, well this is what
my life is now. There's like different stages. I feel
like you get there and you're like for me, I
still I was like, Okay, I'm gonna be fine. I'm
gonna get nurse back to health and I'm gonna go
back over. I'm gonna be with my guys. I'm gonna
go back over. That's the plan. And then at Walter reed,

(18:55):
that was slowly started deteriorating. Okay, I'm not gonna be
able to go back over because this is worse than
I thought. And then it goes to accepting that, Okay,
well this is my life now, and then you get
a little pissed off sometimes like well, why I don't
want to do this anymore. I don't want to go
back to sleep tomorrow. It's what you need to do.
It's hard, it's a hard life to live in a

(19:16):
hospital bed.

Speaker 2 (19:17):
Well, and that's so much of why I wanted to
bring you on Scotty, because those experiences that you have
are unfortunately not uncommon. Yours situation and then what happened
to you is very so woman yours, thank.

Speaker 1 (19:32):
God, because I don't recommend it, but there's so many
men and women like you who choose to serve and
they come out of serving with horribly traumatic situations that
happened to them.

Speaker 2 (19:48):
And the things that happened to you, guys after is
really what gets lost. Right, here's your story, This is
what happened to you? That's what everybody always wants to know. Yeah,
but who's Scotty after that? And what happens to Scotti
after that moment in time where everybody's paying attention, the
support is all there, everybody's doing all the things, and
you go through the six months. But then after.

Speaker 3 (20:11):
Yeah, there was a moment when I was at Well
to Read where I just I had to redefine what
my life was going to look like and what I
was going to look like. There was a time when
I was married at the time, and we were at
one point in time she had gotten pregnant and we
were expecting a baby, and I'm like, what does like
how do I change a diaper? How do I live

(20:31):
my life? Like? How do I take care of another
person when I can barely even take care of myself?
But there were a lot of moments like that where
you just had to make the decision that you were
just going to figure it out. And for a long
time at Walter Read for probably three months while I
was there, I was in that rut of just feeling
sorry for myself for so long, and then something happened.
There was a moment when I was at Well to

(20:52):
Read that kind of changed everything. And we were at
an event at Walter Read and there was a and
at these different events, like they always held, these events
build camaraderie between all the broke veterans. But it was great.
It was great to have that. It was great to
have a community. That was One of the most amazing
things about Walter Reed is that there is a community

(21:14):
of people there and everyone is suffering. Some of us
were worse than others, and but at the end of
the day, we all went through something horrific and we're
all there and we're all kind of bonding in this trauma,
and it was amazing. But there was a moment when
we were at this event and I overheard a song
that they were playing in the background. I always played
music in the background, and there was a song that

(21:35):
came on and it was a song that was cut
by Trace Akins called to the Left Shuts Fire and
Trace Akins originally cut it, and it was the first
time I'd ever heard the song. And I heard it
out of the corner of my just in the background,
and then it was like I locked into it. I
don't know what happened, but something just drew me into
the song, and after the song was over, like, I
cried for a baby for two hours and I couldn't
stop myself. And in those two hours, I was when

(21:56):
I made the decision that I was going to live
my life to the fullest and I wasn't going to
let my injury dictate my life, and I was going
to live for my best friends who would never have
the opportunity. And Yeah, that song came back around full
circle and a little bit later that we can talk
about in a little bit.

Speaker 2 (22:12):
Yeah, I definitely want to. I want to talk about
that for sure, But wow, talk about a defining moment
when you're really struggling. And do you feel like that
was the first time as you hear the song and
you talk about crying for two hours after, was that
really the first time where everything just kind of all
the emotions and everything you'd been experienced for the last
several months just came to a head.

Speaker 3 (22:32):
One hundred percent that was those two hours were crying
was one hundred percent understanding that life. Life is different now.
And while I'm here at Walter Read, I'm also hearing
about my best friends being killed, and it's there was
just so much at Walter reed. I guess in that
moment it was like everything finally slowed down and I
was able to like all the emotions, everything just came

(22:53):
rushing in and I was able to really think about
what just happened and what life looks like moving forward,
and it was just an overwhelming sense of emotion that
just I couldn't help it.

Speaker 2 (23:05):
What would you hope for someone like me who's never
had that experience, or maybe somebody who's never heard of
a story like yours. What's something that you hope they
can come away with understanding For someone in an experience
like yours, or even somebody who chooses to fight in
the army, any of the above. Yeah, but just maybe
something that helps them understand, maybe have more empathy understanding

(23:29):
of situations and things that you go.

Speaker 3 (23:32):
It's so hard to be empathetic with someone if you've
never experienced with the experience, you know what I mean.
That's something that I feel like the world is understanding now.
But at the same time it loss has lost. I
lost some of my best friends and that still sticks
to me, and the survivor's guilt behind that still is
something I still try to deal with and at the
end of the day, trauma is trauma, and trauma's relative.

(23:53):
But anyone who experiences in different ways, And I think
that it's important for everyone to understand that, just like
there's a lot of people that are like, man, I
got hurt, but it wasn't anything like you, Like it
doesn't matter, Like trauma is trauma, Like it doesn't matter
that you weren't hurt as bad as me. You experienced
something it was relative to your life, it changed your life,

(24:13):
Like it doesn't matter if it was like if it
was as bad as me or not, or at the
end of the day, we're all in this and at
the end of the day, like it hurts regardless, and
at the end of the day you have to find
a new way to live life.

Speaker 2 (24:27):
You mentioned that survivor's guilt. I know a lot of
you guys struggle with that because you're really experiencing this
a very sharp contrast between life and death. Does the
survivor's guilt happen obviously in the moment when you find out,
but throughout the rest of your life.

Speaker 3 (24:44):
Yeah, it's still something I struggle with on a daily basis.
It's actually pretty amazing. I was able to create a
best I was able to link up with them and
write a song about my survivor's guilt, and when I
signed my record deal with Black River Entertainment, it was
the first single that I ever put out, called how
Do You Choose? Because with my music and with all
that I've only ever wanted, I want to help people

(25:04):
that are struggling. I want to use either my story
or my music or something and try to help someone
who's struggling and understand that there's so much more. You
know that you can go through all of this bad
and you can come out on the other side and
do things that you never thought possible. And they're with that, though.
I had to put out songs that were very much

(25:25):
me opening my chest and letting people see my heart
and my soul. And that song is still the hardest
song I've ever written, and it's the hardest song that
I ever performed, And it's truly a song about my
survivor's guild and my best friends who never came home
and why did I get to after getting shot ten times?
And there they did.

Speaker 2 (25:42):
Do you still keep in contact with any of those families?

Speaker 3 (25:45):
My best friend Adam Hamilton, his mom is one of
my dearest friends. I love her so much. It's actually amazing.
I made my grand Ole Opper debut not too long ago,
and at the at that debut, I played a song
from Forrest Gump, which was Fortune Song. It was amazing,
it was so much fun. And then I played that
song how Do You Choose? And that song is about
my best friend Adam Hamilton, who was killed. And Adam

(26:08):
Hamilton's family was in the crowd that night, and it
was one of the most incredible experiences I've ever felt.
And it was cool because after you make your debut,
like you go into the circle room and you get
this little party, this little debut party, and all of
Adam's family was there, and it was so cool to
like just experience this moment with them. And it was
even more amazing because I had never met some of them,
so it was cool to be like, hey man, so

(26:29):
great to meet you. Like how do You Choose? Makes
me feel connected to Adam again, and like just to
like understand that like this thing that I put out
that was so personal to me, like that it touches
them and makes them feel something. That's amazing.

Speaker 2 (26:42):
You're making me feel that I'm not getting alterio, just
even hearing the story of this and how you use
such difficult moments in your life to connect with others,
which is what this podcast is all about, was trying
to help people feel less alone and their struggles. And
veterans and people who are in our military are such

(27:03):
a huge part of the population. And you were the
perfect first yes for this to share your story. And
I just like Scottie, it's so incredible watching what you've
done because here everybody's heard your story. This is what happened,
and you take this moment in time and then you're
doing what you do now, which is making music, being

(27:24):
an artist. You're working with creativeth give that kind of
background too, because that's now the big part of your story.

Speaker 3 (27:30):
Yeah, yeah, this is the Honestly, the music part of
it was the most unexpected of all of it. I'm
going to be real. So after all my injury and everything,
I went back to Fort Riley and in Kansas because
my guys were coming back.

Speaker 2 (27:42):
That's where I'm from, Kansas. Yes, I went to Manhattan
Kansas College, so Fort Riley Hike. I even did news
segments at Fort Reley. I was probing in the barbed wire.

Speaker 3 (27:52):
That's awesome. Yeah, that's so cool. But yeah, so I
went back to Fort Riley because my guys were coming back.
I had to be there, which is crazy because a
lot of times, like people who go to Walter Read
like that's where their story ends. Like they go to
Walter Read, they get out of the military, they medically
retired to the military. So for me to be like, hey,
I want to go back to Fort Riley and be
there when my guys get there, no one at Walter

(28:13):
Reid knew how to make that happen because it never
happened before. No one has ever done that. It basically
took an Act of Congress. Luckily, my congressman was an
ex ranger and he said, yeah, you need to be there,
and so he wrote up a letter and stuff and
made it work.

Speaker 2 (28:26):
But I wasn't incredible, by the way, that's just awesome
that happened, but also crazy that to your point that
it took an Act of Congress.

Speaker 3 (28:33):
Yeah, oh, it was hard to happen. And my congressman
had to write a letter just for me to be
able to go back to my duty station and see
my guys. But yeah, so I was there. I went
back to Fort Riley and they all came back and
we were there for a while. But while I was there,
I was lucky enough to find adaptive sports. I played
sports my whole life growing up. Sports was our world,
That's what we did. So when I got to Fort Riley,
they were like, adapt to sports is what we're really

(28:55):
pushing right now. We feel like it's really going to help.
It's going to help you, give get an escape, whatever.
And I was like, yeah, short, let's try it. I'll
try everything you got on this list. And I did,
and the one that really stuck with me was archery,
so to the point of where it's crazy because I'm
right handed. So I went to my first archery clinic
ever to learn how to shoot archery and the guy
was like, all right, what are you left handed? Right hand?

(29:15):
And I'm like, I'm right handed, but this hand I
have no feeling and it doesn't really work. He said, oh,
that's all right, Well, strap a will, strap a release
to this hand. You'll be fine. And then I found
out three arrows later into the ceiling that I'm not
having feeling in the hand that has the trigger on
it is a bad thing.

Speaker 2 (29:31):
I've even done archery, and I do have fulfilling and
it's even a disaster.

Speaker 3 (29:35):
It was to the point where the guy was like, listen,
your a liability. Stop shooting archery.

Speaker 2 (29:40):
Like I did tell you I was.

Speaker 3 (29:42):
We had this conversation. I don't know what you want,
but I'm way too hard headed for him to tell
me I can't do it. So I was like, man,
there's got to be a way to do it. And
I remember him saying, the hand that's holding the bow
just sits there. That's all it does. And I was like, well,
this hand, that's all it does. Anyhow, what if I
just switched to left handed? So I went back the
next day and as soon as I walked up, he
immediately like, no, like, why are you here. I told

(30:02):
you your a liability. You have to go like you
can't do it, And I was like, no, just hear
me out, Just hear me out. Man, what if I
tried this left handed? And so we did, and I
found an amazing escape and an amazing purpose and archery
to the point of where I eventually got recruited by
the US Paralympic Committee and I started shooting and representing
the United States and the Paralympic program all throughout the

(30:22):
United States, and I did that.

Speaker 2 (30:25):
Hold on, wow, yeah, Scotty, you're just like low key,
like okay, Yeah, it was that's incredible.

Speaker 3 (30:32):
It was amazing and it was I did that for
six years. I shot professionally. I got paid by the
VA and by others to shoot, and that's what I did.
That was my job. And it was amazing because for
the seven seconds before that Era releases, the PTSD, the depression,
the anxiety, all that disappeared and I was able to
focus on just one thing. And I lived for those
seven seconds. For six years, I lived for those seven seconds,

(30:54):
and then COVID happened. When COVID happened, the world shut,
which means that my therapy, my escape, got taken away
from me. And when it gets quiet is when the
demon's not the loudest, and COVID was very quiet, and
I needed something. I was struggling. I was really going
into a place that I had been before and I

(31:14):
didn't want to be anymore. And I had a guitar
in the corner of my room and one day I
was like, you know what, I'm just I'm gonna I'm
gonna learn how to play this thing. I'm gonna I'm
just gonna jump on YouTube. I'm gonna figure out how
to play this. So I did. I jumped on YouTube and
I deeped ove and to learn how to play the guitar.
And yeah, there's a lot that goes into having to
learn with the disability how to play the guitar. And again,

(31:35):
thank god I didn't know how to play before, because
I would have gotten just pissed off and be like
I'm done, I'm not doing this. Yeah, but you know
it was and for me, like I figured that learning
how to play the guitar was going to be hard
enough to where it's something that I'm truly gonna have
to focus all my time into. I'm really gonna have
to escape into this and figure out how to do this.
And it was. It gave me a new escape. It
let me escape from the PTSD and the depression and

(31:57):
the anxiety that I was feeling at that time. And
the best way for me to learn was I started
learning how to play songs I grew up listening to.
I Am a nineties country kid through and through nineties countries.
Is the best time for country music in my opinion,
and you're not wrong.

Speaker 2 (32:10):
It's not a controversial one. So you are saying there, Per,
what's the first song you were like, I have to
learn the song.

Speaker 3 (32:16):
Oh, the first song I ever learned how to play
was should have been.

Speaker 2 (32:18):
Cowboy by Oh fantastic song.

Speaker 3 (32:21):
Yeah, I love that song. I started learning how to
play songs that I grew up listening to because I
knew if it didn't sound right, I had to fix something,
and there's plenty of YouTube videos out there to teach
you how to play it. I started learning songs that
I grew up listening to, and then from there I
was like, okay, like I'm learning how to play the guitar.
This is really cool. But I still have all these feelings,
and I still have all these thoughts, and I still
have all these emotions that are just overwhelming, and I

(32:44):
need some I need to find a way to stop
this cup from overflowing. I need to figure out a
way to pour some out of this cup a little bit.
And that's when I discovered songwriting. I don't know what
I thought. Maybe I don't know. I I songs just
came out of nowhere. It was just like God just
gave them to people. I don't like.

Speaker 2 (33:06):
Dropped it on your front port.

Speaker 3 (33:07):
I don't know why. I never thought that songwriting was
the thing. It was just like people had these songs
and here you go. I don't know, I don't know
what I thought. But then I discovered songwriting, and I
was like, I want to learn how to do this,
Like I can just take these emotions and these feelings
and I can throw them somewhere. So I jumped on
YouTube and I started learning how to write songs, and
I started learning how songs are structured, and how you
go from a verse to a chorus to a bridge,

(33:27):
and then how all this comes together and becomes one
piece of work. And I found a new escape and
learning how to write, and I found a new escape
and getting these emotions and these feelings that I was
truly struggling with and putting them somewhere else. I was
able to take them out of myself and throw them
into something else, which was a lifesaver, truly a lifesaver
for me.

Speaker 2 (33:46):
You created your own therapy. Yeah, with what you were
teaching yourself. Absolutely, because songwriting is a form of journaling.
You're expressing how you're feeling. It's just almost giving it
a prettier. Look.

Speaker 3 (34:00):
Yeah, well, I don't know pretty. I mean, they were
not songs. They were not they were not good. It
was really just like word vomit put onto a piece
of paper that I could then like put somewhere else.
And I needed that and it was exactly what I
needed when I needed it, and it was amazing. And
then from there I just really deep dove into music

(34:21):
in general and all the types of music. And then
from there the world started opening up a little bit.
And I went to an open mic night in Cookville, Tennessee,
at Red Silo Brewing Company. And I don't know why
I did it. I just decided to screw it. I'm
gonna go why not? And I know songs now, so
why not go sing one? Why not? Let's give it
a shot. I went up there, I put my name

(34:41):
on the list. There was like four people there because
it's still COVID time and everyone thinks that everyone's gonna
die when you meet each other. And I was like, well,
four people here, what do I have to lose? What
are the four people are gonna make it?

Speaker 2 (34:52):
This is easier?

Speaker 3 (34:53):
Well, four people are gonna make fun of me. Cool,
I don't care. I don't live here in Cookville. I'll
be fine. But yeah, So I went up there and
I played the song I ever learned how to play,
should Have Been a Cowboy by Tobe Keith. In that moment,
that escape that I had found an archery, that sense
of purpose that I had found, that therapy that I
had found in everything else before was there, but it
was magnified a hundred times. And in that moment, that's

(35:15):
when the stage became a sanctuary for me. And then
I was hooked an archery for seven seconds. Nothing else
in the world matters except for being in that moment
when I'm playing a song or I'm playing a show
for three minutes. Now, nothing in the world matters except
for being in that moment. To the point of now
where when I play a show and I'm playing an
hour long show, nothing in the world matters except for

(35:36):
me being in that moment for an hour. I lived
for that to the point of where I would go
to all different open mic nights all around Nashville. And
then Nashville started opening up a little bit, and I
had heard through some of the other guys at the
open mic nights that down on Broadway you can play
three to four hours at a time. I was like,
whoa wait, tell me for three to four hours a day,

(35:57):
I can be rid of the PTA, the end of the
depression of anxiety. I can live in a moment for
three to four hours a day. I want to do that.
So I walked up and down Broadway for a month,
bugging the crap out of people until they lit me
on a stage, and to the point of I was
playing six shows a week. I would play a show
every night three to four hours at a time. My
vocal courts hated me, but the therapy that I got

(36:18):
from it was more than I could have ever imagined.
I was able to live in a moment for three
to four hours, And for someone who suffers from PTSD,
depression and anxiety, being able to find a moment where
you can live in that moment is magic.

Speaker 2 (36:32):
Do you feel like those experiences, everything on that as
you were having them, allowed you then to heal during
the other twenty three hours of the day.

Speaker 3 (36:41):
That yeah, Because I knew that no matter what I
was struggling with, I was going to have that outlet,
no matter what was happening, no matter all the hard
that I was dealing with, throughout the day, I knew
that there was going to be an escape, and I
knew that for three to four hours, I was going
to be able to get rid of this and I
was going to be able to get away from it.
And it kept me moving right, it kept me understanding

(37:02):
that there's gonna be something that's gonna help me get
over whatever I'm dealing with at this time. And yeah,
so I live for that, live for the three to
four hours at a time. And I always say, you
know that when I'm on stage, like you're watching therapy
happen in person, like you're truly actively watching it, because
that's what it is for me. And it's so crazy.
I don't know how it all happened, how all where
I am now and all that, and it's it's just insane.

(37:25):
It's I'm more blessed than I could have ever imagined
I would be. But for there's three to four hours,
and it didn't matter. It didn't matter who was in
the room, it didn't matter anything else. All that mattered
was that I was on that stage and then I
was playing that music and I was being able to
live in a moment. It didn't matter if there was
three hundred people in a fool bar down on Broadway,
or if I was just playing for the Bartenders, I

(37:45):
was just there for myself, for my therapy. But at
the same time, like, I'm so glad that I went
to Broadway, and I'm so glad that I played down
on Broadway because it taught me so much about being
an artist and about being a performer, and about being
able to people. And because Broadway will humble you. One
day you're playing for a packed room and everyone's having

(38:07):
a great time, and the next day you're playing for
the Bartenders and hoping someone walks in the door. It'll
humble you real quick. But at the end of the day,
you really have to love it. And it made me
find a love, a true love for music and a
true love for performing.

Speaker 2 (38:20):
Scotti. Just listening to you over just the course of
all of your stories, I think a lot of it
is also a testament to your character and who you
are as a person, which you've probably never given yourself
the credit for. But you couldn't do and have survived
a lot of the things that you've gone through without
being who you are, and you're an incredible person and
you did that, like you created this. I know you're like,

(38:41):
I have no idea how I am where I am
right now, but like you did this, and you created
all of that just hearing you talk about it, and
I know, like I can sit here and see your
a bigger picture. You're in it, so it's harder to
see when you're in it. But you did all that.
That was all you.

Speaker 3 (38:57):
Yeah, I think it was just the necessity of it.
All I needed something. I've lost way too many bodies
here in the States and I wasn't going to be
another one of them, and I needed something. I have kids,
I have things I have to live for, and I
needed the necessity of needing to find something. Outweighed anything.
It outweighed all the embarrassment that I could possibly feel

(39:19):
into that open mic night. It outweighed any of it.
And now I'm at a point in this career that
has become a dream and a career that I could
only ever imagine that would.

Speaker 2 (39:30):
Be Yeah, and it's incredible, which is what I want
you to share the three kind of stories because you
are now part of Creativet's Yes, which is an awesome
organization that employs veterans to write songs and do a
lot within the music industry. But you have three really
cool stories. Yeah, how I met you? Was that you
you were if I remember correctly, there's a George Straight

(39:53):
song connection type thing. Or were you just there that
I was just there? Okay, you're just taking out for
creativet Okay, Okay. Then there's the two stories that I
know for sure, But you were there. George Straight did
an entire album with a lot of the creative events,
which was really cool. We were there for the art
exhibit and the whole piece of that. But Dolly Parton
story and Trace Adkins story, Oh.

Speaker 3 (40:12):
Man, you know it. I'll tell another story that's pretty
amazing and bring it up to Nashville story. Okay, the
way that I got discovered. Everyone always asks this. One day,
my mom was like, Hey, I'm going to go buy
a new car. I want you to come with me.
I don't know anything about cars. I know nothing about courses.

Speaker 2 (40:28):
But when you're a woman, you need a male accomplice
for things because otherwise you get take advantage of. So
I know where your mom, you know.

Speaker 3 (40:34):
What's I was like, Man, I don't know anything about cars,
but I do know Mom's probably going to buy lunch.
So I'll go because I will never say no to
free food. And so I went and we were at
this dealership and her salesman was Michael Kerr, who is
the son of the president and CEO of Black River Entertainment,

(40:55):
Gordon Kerr, and we were talking about music and how
I used music as a form of therapy and he
grew up in music and how I use it as
a form of therapy and how I want to help
people with my music and with my story, and we
just we talked from now we were my mom was
supposed to buying a car and we're talking about music
and all of this stuff. Shut up buying a car.
But yeah, we talked about music. And at the time,
I had one song out just because I wanted to
get a taste of what being in the studio was like.

(41:17):
So he was like, man, the song's okay, but your
story is amazing. I'm gonna send this to my dad
and I'm gonna send I'm gonna send it to Doug
Johnson and our guy at Black River. I feel like
they need to meet you. And I was like, yeah, man,
like that would be incredible, that's amazing. Please, like, holy crap,
he's no promises, and I'm like, yeah, of course, but
nash was full of people who talk and then nothing
ever happens and I'm like, okay, I'm not gonna get

(41:40):
my hopes up. But three hours later I got to
call from Doug Johnson. Hey man, we need to meet
and I was like okay, and then yeah, it's crazy.

Speaker 2 (41:47):
Not because you went for free food, because I.

Speaker 3 (41:50):
Went for free food with my mom. If your mom
ever asked you to go somewhere, go because you never
know what could happen. And then yeah, So I went
into Black River and I met Doug in literally like
ten minutes, and it's into me telling my story. He
was like, stop talking, hold on, we need to go
to Gordon's office and you need to tell this story
with Gordon there. And I was like okay, yeah, I
don't know who Gordon is, but absolutely, let's do it.

(42:11):
And so I went in toil my story, told talked
about what I want to do with music and how
I use music, and they were yet, are you going
to do you live here in Nashville. I was like yeah.
They're like can you come back? Come back around? And
I was like yeah, absolutely. From then on that I
just started coming over and I just started hanging out
with Doug, and Doug is Not only did Doug Johnson
write Three Wooden Crosses, but he's the guy who developed
Blake Shelton to Blake Shelton. And I didn't know any

(42:34):
of this when I first met him, and it's so
funny looking back now. He took the time to talk
to me and write with me and develop me into
who I am now, and it's so funny. For the
longest time at Black River, I was just Doug's guy.
No one knew who I was, no one had a
name to put with my face. I was just Doug's guy.
And yeah, and then a little bit later I ended

(42:54):
up signing a record deal with him and a publishing
deal with him, and now I'm a recording artist, which
is insane.

Speaker 2 (43:01):
That's an incredibly awesome Nashville story.

Speaker 3 (43:03):
Yeah, I love that story. I know it's so and
it's even crazier because stuff like that never really happens anymore.
It's just man like that. That's crazy. But yeah, so
the Trace Akins story is wild. I told you that
I heard this song and it changed everything for me.
Fast forward ten years and I'm sitting in Doug Johnson's
office talking about signing a record deal and he's working

(43:25):
with me to become an artist and all this other stuff,
and he's, hey, man, there's a song I wrote a
while ago and me and Rob Crosby wrote it. And
I don't know if you've heard it. It's a song
called Till the Left Shots Fired. Trace Ackens version cut it.
I don't know if you've heard it. And I was like,
I was like, yeah, I know the song. I'm trying
to stay cool, trying to stay cool and calm, and
he's like, cool, you've heard it. Awesome, I'm glad you've

(43:45):
heard it. Do you want to do a version of it?
And I was like, yeah, man, I would love to
do a version of it.

Speaker 2 (43:51):
Like how long did you keep your chill for it?

Speaker 3 (43:53):
Not very long? But you know, I'm like, I would
love to. I'm trying to stay calm and cool, but
inside I'm jumping up and down a little kiddage on
Christmas morning. Oh my god, you have no idea. But
then yeah, I was like, man, yeah, And then I
think after we finally finished, I finally told Doug what
that song actually meant to me. But we did a
version of it and it was amazing, and every feeling
that I first felt when I heard that song, I

(44:14):
put it into that song and it was perfect. I thought.
I was like, this is this song is incredible And
Doug was like, man, this is really great. I love
this version. Your version where it's just you, it's amazing.
But what do you think about reached out to some
other artists and see what happens. I'm like, send it
to everybody? Yeah, man, who knows? And the first person
who said yes was Lee Brice and a testament to

(44:35):
who Lee is. He is become an incredibly dear friend
of mine now. But he basically sat down with us
and he was like, man, I don't care what part
I play in this song. I just want to be
a part of what this is. Whatever you're doing here,
I want to be a part of this. So then
we had me and Lee's version and it was amazing
and it was perfect. I thought it was perfect. Fast
forward a couple weeks and Doug's I'm driving home from

(44:56):
somewhere and Doug calls me. He's like, hey, man, Dotley
Parton wants to be a part of this song. What
do you think? And I'm like, why are you calling me?
Let her do whatever she wants to do. Are you serious?
As Dolly Parton, like what? And so he was like,
that's what I thought you'd say, okay, And I'm like,
I don't feel like you needed to call me about that.
I feel like you could have just been like, Dolly's
gonna be on your song. And then literally four weeks later,
I got a call from Doug again and he's, hey, man, like,

(45:18):
I have Dolly's version. You want to hear it? And
I'm like, again, I feel like we're making phone calls
we don't need to make and just send it. Why
are you doing this to me? Man? Just send it?
And so he sent it to me, and it, man, like,
the feelings that I felt when I first heard that
song just came rushing back and it was and I
had to pull over on the side of the road
and I was just I just cried, man, And it
was like then it wasn't just the fact that like,

(45:39):
this song is what it is and that it means
as much as it means to me, But they decided
that they wanted the fact that they wanted to be
a part of my song, but not only just a
part of my song, but a part of my journey
and a part of my story, and that means more
than they will ever know. And I don't think I
can ever tell them thank you enough for not only
I said, not only being a part of the song,

(46:01):
but just like some guy who just started music doesn't
know anything about music and they wanted to be a
part of a song that I was doing, like that
means so much.

Speaker 2 (46:11):
Okay again, Scotty, But back to the testament of you
as a human being. I think anybody meets you and
wants to be in your circle, I think they hear
your story. I think they hear who you are as
a person and are like, yes, when people are just
energizers and they have this gosh aura about them, people
truly gravitate towards that. And bad people sure, but like

(46:35):
good people too, like a Lee Brice and a Dolly Parton.
If Dolly Parton wanting to be on it doesn't tell
you what an energizer you are.

Speaker 3 (46:44):
And that's since saying. The craziest part is I have
a song with her. Still haven't met her yet, so
that's on the bucketlet Still.

Speaker 2 (46:51):
That has to happen, and did you ever meet Trace?

Speaker 3 (46:53):
Knowing that the song I met Trace, way before music
was ever a thing, was one of the first opera
shows I ever went to. I just I went to
a military opera show one day and there was like
an outing that they were doing for veterans. And I'd
always wanted to go to an opera show and I
never got the chance, and I went and I got
to meet Trace, which was crazy, and I was like, man,
like your song till Lash Shots Fire changed everything for me.

(47:15):
And then fast forward a little bit and I remember
Doug called Trace and we were talking to him because
originally I was like, man, I would love to do
this with Trace, Like that would be so cool. Can
I you think we can do that? And that was
like and originally when he was like, let's send it
to other artists and see and I was like, Trace, Trace,
maybe that would be great and we do that.

Speaker 2 (47:33):
Already has this song, can we do it with him?

Speaker 3 (47:35):
And you know what's amazing is we were on the
phone with Trace and he said, man, he said, I
already have my version. He said, let Scottie make his own.
And I was like, Okay, that's cool, You're cool, You're yeah.

Speaker 2 (47:48):
That's also the recognition that like he heard your song.

Speaker 3 (47:51):
Yeah, it was just it was just like like it's
let Scotty do let Scotty do this, Let Scotty have
his And it wasn't like it was just amazing, just
the under standing that he's man if I do another
version of this, it's going to be another Trace song.
Let Scotty have his moment. And it was so cool.
It was so cool to just hear that. And for
a part of me was, oh, dang man, like Trace
would have been cool. But you know a part of

(48:13):
me understood and was like grateful that he was like,
Scotty needs to have his version, which is really cool.

Speaker 2 (48:18):
Well, I'm gonna manifest for you that you guys got
to have your own clab and it's just a song.

Speaker 3 (48:21):
I would love that.

Speaker 2 (48:22):
I would love to do it, maybe another one. You
wrote that I like it cool. Well, man, Scotty, I'm
so happy you came on and shared your story and
all the pieces, and I hope everybody goes out and
supports you. You want to shout out your social media page
so they can go follow you.

Speaker 3 (48:36):
Yeah, it's literally at Scotty hasting music everywhere.

Speaker 2 (48:40):
Perfect you made it simple, easy.

Speaker 3 (48:41):
Super easy.

Speaker 2 (48:42):
Absolutely, so ghostream it goes support him and all the
stuff that he's incredibly doing, not just in music but
also with creativets and and the story that he's trying
to share and get out with the world. So Scotti, thanks.

Speaker 3 (48:52):
For being here, Thank you, thanks for having me. It's
been wild in a wild year, and it's looking even
crazier now.

Speaker 2 (48:59):
I was gonna say it's probably only gonna get more
while for here, but that's a good thing. Yes, Oh
thanks Scotti, thanks for being here. This is what it's
all about for me, getting to share stories like Scotti's
and so many of the other episodes that we've done.
I think it's really important to share real people and
their real experiences. That is how we connect with one another.
That's how we feel community, how we feel less alone.

(49:19):
And Scottie's story not only does just that, but it's
also a story of determination and hope, and I love
everything about what he represents. So really cool to have
him on. Be sure to go and follow our Instagram
page at Take This Personally. Also, you can watch all
of these episodes on YouTube at what Girl Morgan and
if you're subscribed, awesome. I love you. If you're not,

(49:40):
go ahead and do that wherever you listen, and as
well as be ready for next week because we're going
to talk some more veterans and families, really in the
space of homeless veterans. I have somebody coming on who's
doing great work in the community. So love you and
I'll yap at you next week