August 6, 2024 • 29 mins
Welcome to another engaging episode of Project Sapient, where we dive deep into the efforts and initiatives of 22 Mohawks, an organization dedicated to supporting veterans and first responders. Our hosts kick off the episode with updates from their sponsors, AAA Police Supply and Havoc Journal, emphasizing the importance of community support.
This week, we are joined by Dave Campisano, the founder of 22 Mohawks. Dave shares the inspiring journey of the organization, from its early stages to its current success in providing life-changing programs for veterans and first responders. He discusses the three core programs of 22 Mohawks: providing service dogs, organizing parachute jumps, and offering mental health services.
Dave highlights the massive impact of their parachute jump program, 'Operation Airborne for Vets,' which brings veterans together for adrenaline-pumping experiences. These jumps not only provide a sense of camaraderie but also help participants reconnect with their sense of purpose. The discussion also touches on the organization's growth, with over 140 emotional support dogs given to veterans and first responders, and the introduction of mental health and suicide prevention training.
The episode wraps up with Dave offering heartfelt advice to veterans and first responders, emphasizing the healing power of community service.
Tune in to hear how 22 Mohawks is making a significant difference in the lives of those who have served and continue to serve.
SHOW NOTES
The Resolute Path (Ayman's book)
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Project sapient is a podcast meant to engage our brothers
and sisters in the law enforcement and military communities and conversations
that we all know we need to have all opinions you hear are our own are protected
by the first amendment of the united states constitution they are no way to
reflect or are meant to reflect the opinion of any specific agency officer or
service member some opinions may be controversial listener discretion is advised.
(00:26):
Music.
All right, Project Sapient. I decided to bring back the Western tune a little bit.
(00:52):
So, I know Dave likes it. I love it. Love it.
So uh project sapient y'all so
it's uh been busy we've had
quite a few things going on and you guys all know it's quite the summer and
yeah but you know we wouldn't be here if it wasn't for all our supporters and
(01:14):
sponsors starting with our good friends triple a police supply if you are a
law enforcement listener looking for one-stop shop for all your supplies lies
in duty gear, you need to look no further.
Head over to AAA Police Supply and make sure you enter the code HYBRID10 to
get 10% off every single order you make.
And that's not just a one-time code. You drop it in any time.
(01:37):
And our next friends over at Havoc Journal, the voice of the veteran community,
focusing on current affairs and articles of interest to the the public in general,
but really the veteran community and law enforcement specifically for independent news,
Basically, everything that you want, you know, geopolitics, science,
tech, finance, contemporary affairs, entertainment, art, whatever,
(01:59):
they're all there over at Havoc Journal.
And you can probably read all my stuff on there, too, if you search me for all
my articles. I think I've written close to 100 now.
But, yeah, actually, I want to dive right into it.
And, you know, one of our great supporters is 22 Mohawks. and who we have here today.
(02:21):
If you remember, we had him on a long time ago, probably when we were still
getting our feet together with podcasting.
We got the founder of 22 Mohawks. We got Dave Capasano. What's up, Dave?
Hi, Matt. How are you, my friend? Oh, it's been good. It's been good.
So I wanted to bring you back on, one, to kind of talk about how the growth of 22 Mohawks.
(02:46):
You guys, you know, you've done such a fantastic job of, uh,
you and Stacey have done such a fantastic job of just really putting the message
out for 22 Mohawks and what it's all about.
And I think we met what, 2019 maybe or something, uh, when, when,
uh, Tony, mutual friend, Tony had us meet up and, you know, you were still,
(03:06):
I guess you were still not starting out, but still kind of developing.
The infancy stage. Yeah.
Infancy stage of 22 Mohawks. And I mean, we are at the beautiful skiff,
you know, in Massachusetts, a skiff, if you guys don't know, that's a military term.
And Dave will explain that in a little bit about why we're calling it the skiff.
And, but it's a, it's a beautiful area and it's a great spot to have kind of
(03:29):
like, I call it the 22 Mohawks headquarters for everything that,
that you and Stacy and everyone else that's part of 22 Mohawks, what they do.
And yeah. So if you want to kind of go over some of the things that,
you know, help you guys just grow. Yeah, yeah, well, first of all,
it's wild that you're actually came to us and are in our building right now
because normally we take the trip to you, so I appreciate you coming down here. Yeah, yeah.
(03:49):
Yeah, I mean, God, it's been like four years, so it's been a massive grind,
massive learning experience.
And you know, we have our three programs, right? We give dogs,
train them, we parachute out of planes, as you know, and we have mental health
services and mental health suicide prevention training and crisis intervention training.
So it's been a massive growth mode up until about this point where we're kind
(04:11):
of just like sitting on trying to grow our mental health piece.
Yeah. But yeah, it's been a lot of fun.
And, you know, we look forward to just continue to grind and help as many vets
and first responders as we can.
Yeah. I mean, to date, how many dogs have you given to?
We're sitting at about 140. Okay. 140 dogs. So in four years, 140 dogs.
Wow. That's amazing. And they are not just veterans, first responders also.
(04:34):
So you've kind of branched out. You started hitting the first responder community too.
That's right. Yeah. So as of January 1 of 2024, we transitioned over to helping
first responders as well, but obviously there's a big need there and you guys
are on the ground every single day, so it, and it makes sense and a lot of our
first responders are vets too, so it's, you know, it's, it makes a lot of sense to do that.
Yeah. No, I mean, that's, that's a, that's quite the number,
(04:54):
140, a hundred, that's 140 that wins,
you know, that, that you would call them where, you know,
most of the veterans that came in struggling with whatever that
they have going on whatever demons are fighting and you
know giving them that sense of purpose that new purpose of having
a companion and having a dog with them yeah you could literally
(05:15):
you know i've come to a couple of the times where you've handed the dog over
and you could see kind of like that life in their the veterans eyes kind of
come back like oh this is this is awesome you know you know just something sparks
in them yeah it's always a big a big deal to see that happen every single time
and never change. It's heartwarming. Yeah, no, absolutely.
And like some of the other programs that you put together, I know you said you
(05:36):
were talking about the veteran suicide education piece. When did that start?
So last year we sent five people to question, persuade, refer,
instruct a course where they become trained to teach suicide prevention.
So we sent five people there and then we sent another five to the CISM course.
So crisis intervention, stress management.
So every year we're going to try to send 20 people to each course and each person
(05:57):
is going to be required to teach at least one class per year.
Nice. I mean, that will kind of educate the local communities on suicide prevention.
And we think that that's kind of a, a no brainer for our organization,
right? Get out in the public, educate and, and just bring people together.
That's awesome. I mean, so are they going out to like VFWs and stuff like that?
Yeah. So last year we went, we actually taught a couple of 911 dispatcher building
(06:19):
locations in Massachusetts.
We taught a few drug facilities, basically people who, you know,
go there for inpatient and outpatient services.
We went there and taught the staff there, Safe Coalition actually in Franklin and some schools.
And then we taught at some of the local, well, the recruiting,
USAREC, USAREC, suicide prevention.
Yep. Oh, okay, cool. And have any of them kind of brought back to you any sort
(06:43):
of information or any like feedback?
Yeah, it was interesting to teach at the reserve units in the user rec recruiting,
right? Because it's like active duty and AGR people.
And I remember teaching suicide prevention on active duty. It was like,
you had your ACE card and it was death by PowerPoint.
But like we went in there, we told stories, we followed the methods of QPR.
(07:05):
And after they came right up to us and
they were like hey we want to invite you back because everyone's saying that this was like the
best course that they've had right it's not like death
by power yeah we're actually telling stories of things that have taken place
and i think that's kind of a big value idea so i think yeah i mean the death
by a pop on when you and i were both in the army it really destroyed any sort
of training that and you sort of message especially when it comes to suicide
(07:28):
prevention or something like that any sort of message that was going to get
put out really got lost in the powerpoint because you're just you're tired you're
fucking you're like dude would really,
you know, you got to sit through a hundred slides of whatever.
And I think, you know.
One thing that always misses the mark with these types of trainings is that
human connection. That's right.
And I think that's what is always needed, especially with these types of conversations,
(07:52):
because you can't really do suicide prevention by just looking at a screen.
I think sharing stories and actual testimonies, suicide survivors,
we'll call them, that almost did it and decided not to for whatever reason,
I think impacts people so much more.
Big time. Big time. Than just looking at a PowerPoint.
(08:12):
And your, you said the schism. So are they both doing similar things or are they two different?
The, so it's basically we send, right now we have 10 people starting tomorrow.
Okay. They all just certified in QPR this week. Okay. So we all got all their
certifications this week in QPR. So they're all instructors now.
Okay. And tomorrow schism starts, so CISM, crisis intervention stress management.
They start tomorrow. It's a three day, eight to five course.
(08:36):
Yep. And they learn individual and group crisis intervention.
Basically, you're probably familiar with it just by trade.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, you know, you go places, a crisis just happened,
you get the group together and kind of like hash it out, talk about things and stuff.
Yeah. Um, but we're trying to have a, a therapy dog join the team.
So we're going to get a therapy dog trainer to go. So like if it happens locally,
we can, we can send our people.
Yeah. So yeah. That's, that's been happening in the first responder that a lot
(08:57):
of therapy dogs are starting to be kind of like part of a police department.
We're starting to see more and more. I know Rentham has one. Walpole has one.
I think Franklin maybe. I know several departments around us.
Stacey and I just went to Jersey last week. We have three dogs in three departments
down there. And they're the town's therapy dog for the police.
Oh, that's awesome. Yeah, it was really cool.
(09:19):
Yep. Jersey's been taking advantage of our programs, which is really good.
That's awesome. Actually, it reminds me. So I had on the podcast a while back, Janine Baguette.
She's down in Texas. And she does the, she trains therapy dogs.
She was a cop, retired canine cop, you know, all that good stuff.
She did a bunch of high-speed things. But an interesting thing she does is she trains therapy dogs to.
(09:44):
To go to scenes of crisis for police officers.
A little different. Interesting. It's different. And it's really interesting
to hear her talk about it where, let's say, it was right after a shooting or something.
And she'll bring the therapy dog over and the therapy dog will just do its thing
with the cops and with the SWAT guys and whoever.
(10:06):
And it's a really interesting program that she has down there.
Actually, now that I think about it, I'll connect you to it.
That's really cool. See how… It's needed.
Yeah. And it's just interesting how the dog, man's best friend,
really hits home for a lot of us, that connection with the dog.
And we'll talk about some of the other events that you've had over the past
(10:29):
four years that helped with this growth of 22 Mohawks. Yep. Yeah.
So, gosh, so when me and you first met, Tony, Tony connected us and,
you know, you came to a couple of our, you know, coffee nights.
And then I think after the, I think it was after the DAV 5k,
we went to Conrad's and Walpole and you're like, Hey man, I want to talk to
(10:51):
you about something. So we went over each other. You're like,
Hey, this is my friend, Dave Kras.
He's got a connection with X35 airborne school.
Would you want to do static line? And I'm like, you know, I,
I definitely would do static line.
Cause we have our, our tandems, right? Right. We, it'd been our second year
doing tandems, which is cool. Right. Yeah.
And I was like, I would definitely entertain that. So you connected us with
crafts. We had a bunch of meetings. Then we connected with Graham Jones,
(11:12):
who's the senior guy at X 35.
Yeah. And then before you know it, there's 10 of us flying a Danelle in Florida
to do static line airborne school again. Yeah.
And that was, I mean, that was a massive inflection point for the organization,
because it allowed us to see the effects of.
Parachuting and adrenaline with these guys that have been
(11:34):
out for so long and disconnected from service and bringing them
together community diving out of an aircraft hitting
the ground and being like wow that was awesome and then everyone's like connecting and the
adrenaline rush just like opened everybody up and i was like we got to do this
again yeah so we're coming up on our our fifth rotation in october yeah and
you know we've toyed with kind of the number at the first one we did with you
(11:56):
yeah um operation airborne for vets uh we had 10 jumpers yep Then we've gone to 15,
we had two 15s, then we had a 20 and the 20 was just, it was out of control.
So we're trying to figure out like a good number where we can,
you know, really control it. But we're sitting probably at about 12 or 15 to go on the next one.
Yeah, that's, that's awesome. And, and, you know, even, you know,
thinking back to that first one, when we went down there and we were still trying
(12:20):
to figure out how to make it work.
And it was, it was really cool to see one, XR5 is awesome.
They are, they were so welcoming to the idea.
I mean, I can't say that enough. Let me tell you, man, Graham, he gets it. Yeah.
Graham gets it. One of our guys last class, he jumped three times and he just had enough. Yeah.
He's like, you know, you know, I don't want to jump anymore.
(12:41):
And he says to, he goes up to Graham and he says, am I a pussy?
Because I'm not jumping the five jumps. And Graham goes, are you shitting me?
You jumped three times. Most people don't even jump once. Yeah, exactly.
You know? And, and the kid told me that story. I say kid, but he's a grown man. Yeah.
And he was like, yeah, he's like, Graham said that and said,
you know, he's like, you can always come back and jump whenever you want.
And I remember just talking to Graham, like Graham, you know,
(13:01):
we're here to help vets. Yeah.
Right. Like obviously the airborne school is like a lot of fun and we want to
do it. But the fact that you weren't kicking this kid in the ass being like,
get out the bird really meant a lot to me in the organization.
Like, Hey, you got our guys back. Like, you're not trying to stress this kid out. Right.
Who knows why he's down here. I mean, so our jump when, when you and I went
down there, we had two guys who had lost their two best friends the same week. Yeah. We had no idea.
(13:23):
So like none of us know what anyone's going through and we don't probe them.
If they want to tell us, they tell us. that's the thing and i find that like
you said with the adrenaline and all of us really.
Connecting that way they open up a lot more because they told us why we were down there,
right i mean like maybe it was day three or four yeah
is when they actually told us and we're like oh shit because because that was
(13:44):
i think day four is it is when we do the dedication jumps for you know our friends
that committed suicide and we would write their names on you know names on the
helmets yeah put it right on there and that's where they told us Like,
and again, we didn't probe nothing.
We just said, you know, if you want to honor somebody for this jump,
you know, please, here's a, some tape, write their name, stick it on your helmet and do it.
(14:06):
And they just opened up, man. And it was really amazing.
It was awesome. It was. It's such a good program that we have going here.
I mean, it's not going anywhere. I think we have like 150.
This is the most jumpers we've ever had. We have 150 names. Yeah,
on standby. That we have to pull. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Wow, it's insane. See, that's what I love is like watching something like that grow from the ground up.
(14:28):
Dude, it's insane. Kind of like watching 22 Mohawks, like you and Stacey Starnett
and watching it grow. You came into my living room at my house,
my condo. Yeah, yeah. And we're like, who's calling the names?
Yeah, yeah. Our first name call. Yeah, that was actually, yeah,
living room. That's right. I still got that video.
Yeah. I mean, but again, though, that shows you the growth and the need of this
type of service for our service members, for our law enforcement,
(14:49):
for our firefighters, for our first responders.
And, you know, with that said, again, like Stacy was funny.
She said, you know, sometimes you disappear and then you come back and kind
of give us some awesome stuff to do.
So I'm like, well, that's, you know, that's just what I do. I just kind of,
I like working behind the scenes because it really helps, you know,
helps me, helps the organization grow.
(15:10):
And also having other outside the box thinkers such as yourself,
like, is there just one way of doing this?
And you're like, no, there's all kinds of ways, you know? Yep.
Yep. Dude, you know, what's funny is you actually also connected us with Corey
Schaefer. Oh, that's right. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
That's right. So Corey is doing another t-shirt for us. Oh, nice. Yeah.
He's going to do the second round of t-shirts for us. And he's also referred
(15:31):
a couple of people who've got dogs from us across the country. Oh, nice.
(16:03):
Outlets, right. Uh, to deal with stuff and we, we all do. And for those who
don't know, Corey Schaefer, so it's funny. So during our first airborne for
vets, quick backstory, one night while drinking whiskey,
I decided, because we were trying to raise funds and whatever,
because we literally had, what, two months to raise money? And I'm like, oh, shit. All right.
Now this is where we hit the ground running. And that night,
(16:25):
I think I sent, I don't know, 50 emails out to any organization I can think
of. And one of them was Tova Ahala.
And by the way, we got some enormous funding for that, which was awesome,
which we thank all the sponsors.
I mean, they helped us a lot. W&R Vets. Yeah.
And so, yeah, W&R Vet. And so when I sent an email and I get the email back,
(16:46):
you know, a couple of days later and I call him, hey, just email me back and they want to meet us.
And apparently the founder of Corey Schaefer wants to meet us and let's go.
You know, so, I mean, he took his Sunday off. He came down and opened up the warehouse for us.
And, you know, he walked us around and we talked and I'm really glad that he
still, you know, loves the program.
(17:08):
Obviously, that was one of the T-shirts. I mean, I have it. But the first one
he made was the canine one. The canine one, yeah. And I still have that.
And it's so cool to see, again, that sort of networking where – that's one thing
I love about the veteran community is how we elevate each other. No matter what.
He saw that we were still brand new 22 Mohawks, still new, still up and coming.
(17:30):
And he just opened up for us, right? Just told us his story,
told us his why, and what caused him to create the plaques.
And it's really moving. It's kind of like, you know, similar with you when starting
22 Mohawks, you had a couple of your personal friends that committed suicide
and you found a mission and you went with it.
And that's the whole thing with, with guys like us who we were talking,
(17:52):
I think the other day is like, you know, when we have a task,
we execute, you know, we're like, Hey, this is what we need.
And this is what needs to be done.
And we just go. and and it's a testament to
show again how much 22 mohawks has grown with
that kind of drive right because it just doesn't
happen working nine to five you and i
both know that you know it's like a constant constant your phone's ringing middle
(18:16):
night in the morning whenever you know and you just keep going yeah right and
and what what let me ask you this what what gives you what continues to drive
you just knowing that you know there's people out there just like us that that,
you know, need us. Right.
I mean, just, I mean, just watching this thing take off and grow and do good
for the communities is you can't really put a, put a price on it. Yeah.
(18:39):
You know what I mean? Yeah. Watching people like when people really,
you know, like you're in your uniform, people are like, oh, thank you for your service.
But like here it's different when a grown man shakes your hand. He's like, thank you.
Yeah. You know, like, and actually know that they mean it for helping them out.
Yeah. We're happy to do it. Yeah. You know? Yeah. Cause we can.
Yeah, exactly. I think that's what it is. It's just, yeah, you're right.
I mean, you know, that's something, that drive that you have, you know, is more of...
(19:02):
Helping fellow vets right you know and that's all it is it's
not it's not this like big i don't
know what do you want to call it like the side gig that you want to
do to like you know whatever like this is your passion
project this is like what you devote your time
to yeah you know and yes we both have full-time
jobs and we all do other things but in the
(19:24):
end we always come back to the community to help
out yeah you know that's for me like you know veteran law enforcement
like whatever like i will drop what i'm doing to help out right
you know i just you know i remember when i first decided to kind.
Of put this together and i lost john hatfield and i
remember like the guilt yeah the guilt of losing john you know and
i'm like holy like i don't ever want anyone else to one die
by suicide but to feel the guilt of not being there for your
(19:47):
buddy yeah it's like if you can be there if you can answer
your phone do it because i'm going to tell you over the course of four years
my phones rang and i didn't answer it and
someone's died man yeah it happens happens yeah and it's
like wow you know it's like 20 years
of war it's gonna suicide's a
product of 20 years of war oh my god yeah and it's only gonna get
(20:08):
worse it's not gonna get any better because i mean
now you want to think about politically right you
know not to get into politics but the way we i
mean actually you know what was the
result of the airborne for vets is because the fall of the dana stand
if you remember oh yeah like i remember
i was on vacation key west everybody start calling me my phone
(20:28):
blew up you even told me when i called you and we were on
the phone dude yeah we're on the phone shit dude the phone won't stop ringing yeah
like we need to do something and then that's when i connected with dave i'm
like dave can you you know that's when that whole thing was born is based out
of what happened in afghanistan and all every single one of us felt the same
thing right every single one of us felt that betrayal you know by by our or
(20:51):
freaking politicians to abandon our allies.
And then 20 years of war for what?
You know, like, yeah, great to have an exit strategy, but not that kind of exit strategy.
That was total abandonment, you know? And it brought back a lot of bad feelings during that timeframe.
And that's where I was like, we need to jump out of planes, Dave. Let's just go.
(21:12):
Yeah, exactly. And, you know, get the frustration out somehow, you know?
And I think that was probably one of the best things we've, We've,
again, it's still the best thing that we've put together.
It's a core program. Yeah. It's like our core program. Yeah.
And kind of, you know, I want to go over a couple of future programs that we're working on.
So there's nothing set in stone, but I figured it'd be a good venue to announce it.
(21:36):
Right now, so in my own way of just seeking shit out, I found this deep end
fitness in San Diego, which was founded by two Marine Raiders.
And I actually had on my podcast, Laura Gordon, who was one of the head coaches there.
Total awesome, awesome coach. But-
(21:57):
I started to think, I'm like, you know what, this might be a good collaboration
to do because what they do is they basically force you to feel those physiological
changes of being uncomfortable and teaching you to be comfortable being uncomfortable.
So when you're carrying kettlebells underwater and you don't have enough air
and your body's starting to do weird things, well, yeah, you're supposed to
(22:21):
feel those things. It's not unnatural.
So they teach you that, yeah, it's natural to feel this way.
You know so so you know you know
that's one thing that we're working on and again dave being
outside the box like me was like hell yeah let's do it yeah you
know i think the cool thing about that is like you think about all this like like
these ketamine things and write those like
micro dosing and it's like okay that's an option right but like when you think of i
(22:44):
feel like this should be a step before you even consider that like let's go
into water and tie knots yeah yeah yeah and like see if
we can do it and see how that makes you feel maybe that might like fix you
a little bit well that's the thing like like that adrenaline rush that
adrenaline like all that stuff and even you know
the the other thing is you know through second mission foundation which
is going to be awesome we are going to
(23:04):
do a sort of shooting competition down at west point which
is something we're working on again there's early early stages and again
you know talking to you about it and you were like hell yeah let's let's do
it i mean because we went down to west point you know back on the first airborne
for vets and we got to teach a class And that was such a surreal moment for
(23:26):
two NCOs to be standing in a room, you know, with,
uh, with cadets and talking to them about suicide prevention and,
you know, what 22 Mohawks is and what we're doing and stuff like that.
And it really kind of, it gave a different perspective to the West Point cadets than it did.
And talking to who's now retired, Colonel Charlie Faint, who it was his class he invited us to.
(23:47):
And he said, oh, the kiddos couldn't stop talking about it after we left.
Yeah. I got messages from a couple of those guys. Yeah. And that's the thing.
We never know how we impact people. Nope. And that's the cool thing.
Like you said, you don't pry, we don't probe.
It just naturally comes out and i think that's the
(24:08):
best way for any sort of let's say quote unquote
therapy sessions we're not therapists by any means but versus
sitting in an office and having to be like so how are you feeling today like
here we go you know versus you know shooting guns or jumping out of a plane
going underwater doing some sort of activity and then afterwards you're like
(24:29):
damn you know yeah all of a sudden you you feel what you're feeling and you share it out of
nowhere because it's just because now you're comfortable you're back
with your tribe right with your veterans your squad and and
that's one thing about x35 what i loved is when they had some platoon formation i'm
like god damn yeah like we're back in platoon formation you know
i'm like you know so it was it was i mean exactly exactly
(24:50):
and it was just like a lot of good memories you know
those are the good memories like i want we mean
you all of us want to showcase and remind mind our vets
that yeah we saw some awful shit but we also did a lot of cool things yeah you
know if you really think about it we did you know a lot of badass things and
you know what 18 year old jumps out of planes these days you know other than
(25:13):
in the military you know what i mean like like you know so so we've done some
really cool things and and i love seeing the growth.
Of 22 mohawks and you know
it's it's growing man yeah i mean
i you know it's the guys like you and me we have these great ideas because
we know what the veterans need mentally physically right we know how to create recreate
certain environments for them but you know again
(25:34):
it's like we couldn't do it without the stacy coins
of the world and the in the taraka fours of the world and
the kylie davis's like those are the people are that come
in here every day and take our visions and make them
a reality yeah you know what i mean so we have to like tip our hats oh
absolutely like so the you know it's it's funny so every
once in a while i'll scroll through facebook or whatever which is
(25:55):
always a bad thing but you see these some
of these facebook groups like you know shitting on pogues and whatever
you know just joking around whatever and the reality
of it is like you know when you're overseas if it wasn't for
the mechanics your trucks wouldn't run wasn't for the cooks you wouldn't be
fed if it wasn't for the armor your gun would be shitting the bed all the time
you know so so these support elements are what causes guys like us to be able
(26:20):
able to execute our missions because we wouldn't be able to do it if the support
wasn't there. That's right.
You know, and, and any, you and I both know as NCOs and even leading troops
and all that, you need your support element.
Big time. Have to. And you have to develop your plan based off,
are your soldiers fed? Is the equipment running?
Did they sleep? There's several things that you want to make sure that is good
(26:44):
to go before you send your A-team out there to do the job.
So support is huge, especially with this type of endeavor where you and I will
put together this big event. Yeah.
But then there's the back round that no one sees. That's right.
You know, like you said, there's Stacy, Carol, like all, all the support staff
(27:07):
for 22 Mohawks of what they're doing to get that to happen. Yep. A hundred percent.
That's a good analogy. Yeah. So that's, well, I'm full of analogies today, I think.
But, but before we wrap up, Dave, you know, I always like putting guests on
the spot and I tell, I asked them this one question and usually it's,
(27:27):
if you want to give any sort of veteran law enforcement firefighter,
any sort of advice today that they can take to think about,
you know, something for them to think about something for them to do, what would it be?
Yep. I mean, I think one of the most important things that I've learned over
the last four years is that we all feel booboo at the times, you know what I mean?
(27:49):
But if you, if you're laying in bed and you're feeling booboo lips,
you got to get out and you got to be around people, it's all about community,
but the best medicine for combating shame and guilt from your experiences that
you've had, it's not therapy, it's not a pill, but it's service to others.
Yeah. So if you can get up and go to a soup kitchen and give somebody soup or
come in a 22 Mohawks and hand over a leash to somebody, like it's going to make
(28:11):
you feel better, I promise you. Yeah. That's awesome, dude.
Yeah. So, uh, anybody that lives in the area, man, come, come visit 22 Mohawks,
uh, skiff actually talk about the skiff. Well, what is the skiff?
So the SCIF is a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility. There we go.
We love our acronyms. That way it makes it easier for us to do things.
(28:32):
I just thought it sounded cool and it just kind of stuck.
Yeah, yeah. No, I love it. But Dave, man, hey, thanks for coming on,
dude, and updating everybody as in the world of 22 Mohawks and some of the events
that you've got coming down the line.
I know you guys got a, we have a golf tournament that's coming up. Yep. So.
August 12th. Yep. I will add the link to the show notes.
(28:55):
If anyone wants to register, donate, everything's done through the website.
So please help out my buddy, Dave.
Let's keep this mission going. Let's keep throwing people out of planes and
other future things that are coming down the line.
Yep. Appreciate you. I'm a family man and I look forward to your amazing ideas.
Music.
Project sapient is a podcast meant to engage our brothers
and sisters in the law enforcement and military communities and conversations
that we all know we need to have all opinions you hear are our own are protected
by the first amendment of the united states constitution they are no way to
reflect or are meant to reflect the opinion of any specific agency officer or
service member some opinions may be controversial listener discretion is advised.
(00:26):
Music.
All right, Project Sapient. I decided to bring back the Western tune a little bit.
(00:52):
So, I know Dave likes it. I love it. Love it.
So uh project sapient y'all so
it's uh been busy we've had
quite a few things going on and you guys all know it's quite the summer and
yeah but you know we wouldn't be here if it wasn't for all our supporters and
(01:14):
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(01:37):
And our next friends over at Havoc Journal, the voice of the veteran community,
focusing on current affairs and articles of interest to the the public in general,
but really the veteran community and law enforcement specifically for independent news,
Basically, everything that you want, you know, geopolitics, science,
tech, finance, contemporary affairs, entertainment, art, whatever,
(01:59):
they're all there over at Havoc Journal.
And you can probably read all my stuff on there, too, if you search me for all
my articles. I think I've written close to 100 now.
But, yeah, actually, I want to dive right into it.
And, you know, one of our great supporters is 22 Mohawks. and who we have here today.
(02:21):
If you remember, we had him on a long time ago, probably when we were still
getting our feet together with podcasting.
We got the founder of 22 Mohawks. We got Dave Capasano. What's up, Dave?
Hi, Matt. How are you, my friend? Oh, it's been good. It's been good.
So I wanted to bring you back on, one, to kind of talk about how the growth of 22 Mohawks.
(02:46):
You guys, you know, you've done such a fantastic job of, uh,
you and Stacey have done such a fantastic job of just really putting the message
out for 22 Mohawks and what it's all about.
And I think we met what, 2019 maybe or something, uh, when, when,
uh, Tony, mutual friend, Tony had us meet up and, you know, you were still,
(03:06):
I guess you were still not starting out, but still kind of developing.
The infancy stage. Yeah.
Infancy stage of 22 Mohawks. And I mean, we are at the beautiful skiff,
you know, in Massachusetts, a skiff, if you guys don't know, that's a military term.
And Dave will explain that in a little bit about why we're calling it the skiff.
And, but it's a, it's a beautiful area and it's a great spot to have kind of
(03:29):
like, I call it the 22 Mohawks headquarters for everything that,
that you and Stacy and everyone else that's part of 22 Mohawks, what they do.
And yeah. So if you want to kind of go over some of the things that,
you know, help you guys just grow. Yeah, yeah, well, first of all,
it's wild that you're actually came to us and are in our building right now
because normally we take the trip to you, so I appreciate you coming down here. Yeah, yeah.
(03:49):
Yeah, I mean, God, it's been like four years, so it's been a massive grind,
massive learning experience.
And you know, we have our three programs, right? We give dogs,
train them, we parachute out of planes, as you know, and we have mental health
services and mental health suicide prevention training and crisis intervention training.
So it's been a massive growth mode up until about this point where we're kind
(04:11):
of just like sitting on trying to grow our mental health piece.
Yeah. But yeah, it's been a lot of fun.
And, you know, we look forward to just continue to grind and help as many vets
and first responders as we can.
Yeah. I mean, to date, how many dogs have you given to?
We're sitting at about 140. Okay. 140 dogs. So in four years, 140 dogs.
Wow. That's amazing. And they are not just veterans, first responders also.
(04:34):
So you've kind of branched out. You started hitting the first responder community too.
That's right. Yeah. So as of January 1 of 2024, we transitioned over to helping
first responders as well, but obviously there's a big need there and you guys
are on the ground every single day, so it, and it makes sense and a lot of our
first responders are vets too, so it's, you know, it's, it makes a lot of sense to do that.
Yeah. No, I mean, that's, that's a, that's quite the number,
(04:54):
140, a hundred, that's 140 that wins,
you know, that, that you would call them where, you know,
most of the veterans that came in struggling with whatever that
they have going on whatever demons are fighting and you
know giving them that sense of purpose that new purpose of having
a companion and having a dog with them yeah you could literally
(05:15):
you know i've come to a couple of the times where you've handed the dog over
and you could see kind of like that life in their the veterans eyes kind of
come back like oh this is this is awesome you know you know just something sparks
in them yeah it's always a big a big deal to see that happen every single time
and never change. It's heartwarming. Yeah, no, absolutely.
And like some of the other programs that you put together, I know you said you
(05:36):
were talking about the veteran suicide education piece. When did that start?
So last year we sent five people to question, persuade, refer,
instruct a course where they become trained to teach suicide prevention.
So we sent five people there and then we sent another five to the CISM course.
So crisis intervention, stress management.
So every year we're going to try to send 20 people to each course and each person
(05:57):
is going to be required to teach at least one class per year.
Nice. I mean, that will kind of educate the local communities on suicide prevention.
And we think that that's kind of a, a no brainer for our organization,
right? Get out in the public, educate and, and just bring people together.
That's awesome. I mean, so are they going out to like VFWs and stuff like that?
Yeah. So last year we went, we actually taught a couple of 911 dispatcher building
(06:19):
locations in Massachusetts.
We taught a few drug facilities, basically people who, you know,
go there for inpatient and outpatient services.
We went there and taught the staff there, Safe Coalition actually in Franklin and some schools.
And then we taught at some of the local, well, the recruiting,
USAREC, USAREC, suicide prevention.
Yep. Oh, okay, cool. And have any of them kind of brought back to you any sort
(06:43):
of information or any like feedback?
Yeah, it was interesting to teach at the reserve units in the user rec recruiting,
right? Because it's like active duty and AGR people.
And I remember teaching suicide prevention on active duty. It was like,
you had your ACE card and it was death by PowerPoint.
But like we went in there, we told stories, we followed the methods of QPR.
(07:05):
And after they came right up to us and
they were like hey we want to invite you back because everyone's saying that this was like the
best course that they've had right it's not like death
by power yeah we're actually telling stories of things that have taken place
and i think that's kind of a big value idea so i think yeah i mean the death
by a pop on when you and i were both in the army it really destroyed any sort
of training that and you sort of message especially when it comes to suicide
(07:28):
prevention or something like that any sort of message that was going to get
put out really got lost in the powerpoint because you're just you're tired you're
fucking you're like dude would really,
you know, you got to sit through a hundred slides of whatever.
And I think, you know.
One thing that always misses the mark with these types of trainings is that
human connection. That's right.
And I think that's what is always needed, especially with these types of conversations,
(07:52):
because you can't really do suicide prevention by just looking at a screen.
I think sharing stories and actual testimonies, suicide survivors,
we'll call them, that almost did it and decided not to for whatever reason,
I think impacts people so much more.
Big time. Big time. Than just looking at a PowerPoint.
(08:12):
And your, you said the schism. So are they both doing similar things or are they two different?
The, so it's basically we send, right now we have 10 people starting tomorrow.
Okay. They all just certified in QPR this week. Okay. So we all got all their
certifications this week in QPR. So they're all instructors now.
Okay. And tomorrow schism starts, so CISM, crisis intervention stress management.
They start tomorrow. It's a three day, eight to five course.
(08:36):
Yep. And they learn individual and group crisis intervention.
Basically, you're probably familiar with it just by trade.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, you know, you go places, a crisis just happened,
you get the group together and kind of like hash it out, talk about things and stuff.
Yeah. Um, but we're trying to have a, a therapy dog join the team.
So we're going to get a therapy dog trainer to go. So like if it happens locally,
we can, we can send our people.
Yeah. So yeah. That's, that's been happening in the first responder that a lot
(08:57):
of therapy dogs are starting to be kind of like part of a police department.
We're starting to see more and more. I know Rentham has one. Walpole has one.
I think Franklin maybe. I know several departments around us.
Stacey and I just went to Jersey last week. We have three dogs in three departments
down there. And they're the town's therapy dog for the police.
Oh, that's awesome. Yeah, it was really cool.
(09:19):
Yep. Jersey's been taking advantage of our programs, which is really good.
That's awesome. Actually, it reminds me. So I had on the podcast a while back, Janine Baguette.
She's down in Texas. And she does the, she trains therapy dogs.
She was a cop, retired canine cop, you know, all that good stuff.
She did a bunch of high-speed things. But an interesting thing she does is she trains therapy dogs to.
(09:44):
To go to scenes of crisis for police officers.
A little different. Interesting. It's different. And it's really interesting
to hear her talk about it where, let's say, it was right after a shooting or something.
And she'll bring the therapy dog over and the therapy dog will just do its thing
with the cops and with the SWAT guys and whoever.
(10:06):
And it's a really interesting program that she has down there.
Actually, now that I think about it, I'll connect you to it.
That's really cool. See how… It's needed.
Yeah. And it's just interesting how the dog, man's best friend,
really hits home for a lot of us, that connection with the dog.
And we'll talk about some of the other events that you've had over the past
(10:29):
four years that helped with this growth of 22 Mohawks. Yep. Yeah.
So, gosh, so when me and you first met, Tony, Tony connected us and,
you know, you came to a couple of our, you know, coffee nights.
And then I think after the, I think it was after the DAV 5k,
we went to Conrad's and Walpole and you're like, Hey man, I want to talk to
(10:51):
you about something. So we went over each other. You're like,
Hey, this is my friend, Dave Kras.
He's got a connection with X35 airborne school.
Would you want to do static line? And I'm like, you know, I,
I definitely would do static line.
Cause we have our, our tandems, right? Right. We, it'd been our second year
doing tandems, which is cool. Right. Yeah.
And I was like, I would definitely entertain that. So you connected us with
crafts. We had a bunch of meetings. Then we connected with Graham Jones,
(11:12):
who's the senior guy at X 35.
Yeah. And then before you know it, there's 10 of us flying a Danelle in Florida
to do static line airborne school again. Yeah.
And that was, I mean, that was a massive inflection point for the organization,
because it allowed us to see the effects of.
Parachuting and adrenaline with these guys that have been
(11:34):
out for so long and disconnected from service and bringing them
together community diving out of an aircraft hitting
the ground and being like wow that was awesome and then everyone's like connecting and the
adrenaline rush just like opened everybody up and i was like we got to do this
again yeah so we're coming up on our our fifth rotation in october yeah and
you know we've toyed with kind of the number at the first one we did with you
(11:56):
yeah um operation airborne for vets uh we had 10 jumpers yep Then we've gone to 15,
we had two 15s, then we had a 20 and the 20 was just, it was out of control.
So we're trying to figure out like a good number where we can,
you know, really control it. But we're sitting probably at about 12 or 15 to go on the next one.
Yeah, that's, that's awesome. And, and, you know, even, you know,
thinking back to that first one, when we went down there and we were still trying
(12:20):
to figure out how to make it work.
And it was, it was really cool to see one, XR5 is awesome.
They are, they were so welcoming to the idea.
I mean, I can't say that enough. Let me tell you, man, Graham, he gets it. Yeah.
Graham gets it. One of our guys last class, he jumped three times and he just had enough. Yeah.
He's like, you know, you know, I don't want to jump anymore.
(12:41):
And he says to, he goes up to Graham and he says, am I a pussy?
Because I'm not jumping the five jumps. And Graham goes, are you shitting me?
You jumped three times. Most people don't even jump once. Yeah, exactly.
You know? And, and the kid told me that story. I say kid, but he's a grown man. Yeah.
And he was like, yeah, he's like, Graham said that and said,
you know, he's like, you can always come back and jump whenever you want.
And I remember just talking to Graham, like Graham, you know,
(13:01):
we're here to help vets. Yeah.
Right. Like obviously the airborne school is like a lot of fun and we want to
do it. But the fact that you weren't kicking this kid in the ass being like,
get out the bird really meant a lot to me in the organization.
Like, Hey, you got our guys back. Like, you're not trying to stress this kid out. Right.
Who knows why he's down here. I mean, so our jump when, when you and I went
down there, we had two guys who had lost their two best friends the same week. Yeah. We had no idea.
(13:23):
So like none of us know what anyone's going through and we don't probe them.
If they want to tell us, they tell us. that's the thing and i find that like
you said with the adrenaline and all of us really.
Connecting that way they open up a lot more because they told us why we were down there,
right i mean like maybe it was day three or four yeah
is when they actually told us and we're like oh shit because because that was
(13:44):
i think day four is it is when we do the dedication jumps for you know our friends
that committed suicide and we would write their names on you know names on the
helmets yeah put it right on there and that's where they told us Like,
and again, we didn't probe nothing.
We just said, you know, if you want to honor somebody for this jump,
you know, please, here's a, some tape, write their name, stick it on your helmet and do it.
(14:06):
And they just opened up, man. And it was really amazing.
It was awesome. It was. It's such a good program that we have going here.
I mean, it's not going anywhere. I think we have like 150.
This is the most jumpers we've ever had. We have 150 names. Yeah,
on standby. That we have to pull. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Wow, it's insane. See, that's what I love is like watching something like that grow from the ground up.
(14:28):
Dude, it's insane. Kind of like watching 22 Mohawks, like you and Stacey Starnett
and watching it grow. You came into my living room at my house,
my condo. Yeah, yeah. And we're like, who's calling the names?
Yeah, yeah. Our first name call. Yeah, that was actually, yeah,
living room. That's right. I still got that video.
Yeah. I mean, but again, though, that shows you the growth and the need of this
type of service for our service members, for our law enforcement,
(14:49):
for our firefighters, for our first responders.
And, you know, with that said, again, like Stacy was funny.
She said, you know, sometimes you disappear and then you come back and kind
of give us some awesome stuff to do.
So I'm like, well, that's, you know, that's just what I do. I just kind of,
I like working behind the scenes because it really helps, you know,
helps me, helps the organization grow.
(15:10):
And also having other outside the box thinkers such as yourself,
like, is there just one way of doing this?
And you're like, no, there's all kinds of ways, you know? Yep.
Yep. Dude, you know, what's funny is you actually also connected us with Corey
Schaefer. Oh, that's right. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
That's right. So Corey is doing another t-shirt for us. Oh, nice. Yeah.
He's going to do the second round of t-shirts for us. And he's also referred
(15:31):
a couple of people who've got dogs from us across the country. Oh, nice.
(16:03):
Outlets, right. Uh, to deal with stuff and we, we all do. And for those who
don't know, Corey Schaefer, so it's funny. So during our first airborne for
vets, quick backstory, one night while drinking whiskey,
I decided, because we were trying to raise funds and whatever,
because we literally had, what, two months to raise money? And I'm like, oh, shit. All right.
Now this is where we hit the ground running. And that night,
(16:25):
I think I sent, I don't know, 50 emails out to any organization I can think
of. And one of them was Tova Ahala.
And by the way, we got some enormous funding for that, which was awesome,
which we thank all the sponsors.
I mean, they helped us a lot. W&R Vets. Yeah.
And so, yeah, W&R Vet. And so when I sent an email and I get the email back,
(16:46):
you know, a couple of days later and I call him, hey, just email me back and they want to meet us.
And apparently the founder of Corey Schaefer wants to meet us and let's go.
You know, so, I mean, he took his Sunday off. He came down and opened up the warehouse for us.
And, you know, he walked us around and we talked and I'm really glad that he
still, you know, loves the program.
(17:08):
Obviously, that was one of the T-shirts. I mean, I have it. But the first one
he made was the canine one. The canine one, yeah. And I still have that.
And it's so cool to see, again, that sort of networking where – that's one thing
I love about the veteran community is how we elevate each other. No matter what.
He saw that we were still brand new 22 Mohawks, still new, still up and coming.
(17:30):
And he just opened up for us, right? Just told us his story,
told us his why, and what caused him to create the plaques.
And it's really moving. It's kind of like, you know, similar with you when starting
22 Mohawks, you had a couple of your personal friends that committed suicide
and you found a mission and you went with it.
And that's the whole thing with, with guys like us who we were talking,
(17:52):
I think the other day is like, you know, when we have a task,
we execute, you know, we're like, Hey, this is what we need.
And this is what needs to be done.
And we just go. and and it's a testament to
show again how much 22 mohawks has grown with
that kind of drive right because it just doesn't
happen working nine to five you and i
both know that you know it's like a constant constant your phone's ringing middle
(18:16):
night in the morning whenever you know and you just keep going yeah right and
and what what let me ask you this what what gives you what continues to drive
you just knowing that you know there's people out there just like us that that,
you know, need us. Right.
I mean, just, I mean, just watching this thing take off and grow and do good
for the communities is you can't really put a, put a price on it. Yeah.
(18:39):
You know what I mean? Yeah. Watching people like when people really,
you know, like you're in your uniform, people are like, oh, thank you for your service.
But like here it's different when a grown man shakes your hand. He's like, thank you.
Yeah. You know, like, and actually know that they mean it for helping them out.
Yeah. We're happy to do it. Yeah. You know? Yeah. Cause we can.
Yeah, exactly. I think that's what it is. It's just, yeah, you're right.
I mean, you know, that's something, that drive that you have, you know, is more of...
(19:02):
Helping fellow vets right you know and that's all it is it's
not it's not this like big i don't
know what do you want to call it like the side gig that you want to
do to like you know whatever like this is your passion
project this is like what you devote your time
to yeah you know and yes we both have full-time
jobs and we all do other things but in the
(19:24):
end we always come back to the community to help
out yeah you know that's for me like you know veteran law enforcement
like whatever like i will drop what i'm doing to help out right
you know i just you know i remember when i first decided to kind.
Of put this together and i lost john hatfield and i
remember like the guilt yeah the guilt of losing john you know and
i'm like holy like i don't ever want anyone else to one die
by suicide but to feel the guilt of not being there for your
(19:47):
buddy yeah it's like if you can be there if you can answer
your phone do it because i'm going to tell you over the course of four years
my phones rang and i didn't answer it and
someone's died man yeah it happens happens yeah and it's
like wow you know it's like 20 years
of war it's gonna suicide's a
product of 20 years of war oh my god yeah and it's only gonna get
(20:08):
worse it's not gonna get any better because i mean
now you want to think about politically right you
know not to get into politics but the way we i
mean actually you know what was the
result of the airborne for vets is because the fall of the dana stand
if you remember oh yeah like i remember
i was on vacation key west everybody start calling me my phone
(20:28):
blew up you even told me when i called you and we were on
the phone dude yeah we're on the phone shit dude the phone won't stop ringing yeah
like we need to do something and then that's when i connected with dave i'm
like dave can you you know that's when that whole thing was born is based out
of what happened in afghanistan and all every single one of us felt the same
thing right every single one of us felt that betrayal you know by by our or
(20:51):
freaking politicians to abandon our allies.
And then 20 years of war for what?
You know, like, yeah, great to have an exit strategy, but not that kind of exit strategy.
That was total abandonment, you know? And it brought back a lot of bad feelings during that timeframe.
And that's where I was like, we need to jump out of planes, Dave. Let's just go.
(21:12):
Yeah, exactly. And, you know, get the frustration out somehow, you know?
And I think that was probably one of the best things we've, We've,
again, it's still the best thing that we've put together.
It's a core program. Yeah. It's like our core program. Yeah.
And kind of, you know, I want to go over a couple of future programs that we're working on.
So there's nothing set in stone, but I figured it'd be a good venue to announce it.
(21:36):
Right now, so in my own way of just seeking shit out, I found this deep end
fitness in San Diego, which was founded by two Marine Raiders.
And I actually had on my podcast, Laura Gordon, who was one of the head coaches there.
Total awesome, awesome coach. But-
(21:57):
I started to think, I'm like, you know what, this might be a good collaboration
to do because what they do is they basically force you to feel those physiological
changes of being uncomfortable and teaching you to be comfortable being uncomfortable.
So when you're carrying kettlebells underwater and you don't have enough air
and your body's starting to do weird things, well, yeah, you're supposed to
(22:21):
feel those things. It's not unnatural.
So they teach you that, yeah, it's natural to feel this way.
You know so so you know you know
that's one thing that we're working on and again dave being
outside the box like me was like hell yeah let's do it yeah you
know i think the cool thing about that is like you think about all this like like
these ketamine things and write those like
micro dosing and it's like okay that's an option right but like when you think of i
(22:44):
feel like this should be a step before you even consider that like let's go
into water and tie knots yeah yeah yeah and like see if
we can do it and see how that makes you feel maybe that might like fix you
a little bit well that's the thing like like that adrenaline rush that
adrenaline like all that stuff and even you know
the the other thing is you know through second mission foundation which
is going to be awesome we are going to
(23:04):
do a sort of shooting competition down at west point which
is something we're working on again there's early early stages and again
you know talking to you about it and you were like hell yeah let's let's do
it i mean because we went down to west point you know back on the first airborne
for vets and we got to teach a class And that was such a surreal moment for
(23:26):
two NCOs to be standing in a room, you know, with,
uh, with cadets and talking to them about suicide prevention and,
you know, what 22 Mohawks is and what we're doing and stuff like that.
And it really kind of, it gave a different perspective to the West Point cadets than it did.
And talking to who's now retired, Colonel Charlie Faint, who it was his class he invited us to.
(23:47):
And he said, oh, the kiddos couldn't stop talking about it after we left.
Yeah. I got messages from a couple of those guys. Yeah. And that's the thing.
We never know how we impact people. Nope. And that's the cool thing.
Like you said, you don't pry, we don't probe.
It just naturally comes out and i think that's the
(24:08):
best way for any sort of let's say quote unquote
therapy sessions we're not therapists by any means but versus
sitting in an office and having to be like so how are you feeling today like
here we go you know versus you know shooting guns or jumping out of a plane
going underwater doing some sort of activity and then afterwards you're like
(24:29):
damn you know yeah all of a sudden you you feel what you're feeling and you share it out of
nowhere because it's just because now you're comfortable you're back
with your tribe right with your veterans your squad and and
that's one thing about x35 what i loved is when they had some platoon formation i'm
like god damn yeah like we're back in platoon formation you know
i'm like you know so it was it was i mean exactly exactly
(24:50):
and it was just like a lot of good memories you know
those are the good memories like i want we mean
you all of us want to showcase and remind mind our vets
that yeah we saw some awful shit but we also did a lot of cool things yeah you
know if you really think about it we did you know a lot of badass things and
you know what 18 year old jumps out of planes these days you know other than
(25:13):
in the military you know what i mean like like you know so so we've done some
really cool things and and i love seeing the growth.
Of 22 mohawks and you know
it's it's growing man yeah i mean
i you know it's the guys like you and me we have these great ideas because
we know what the veterans need mentally physically right we know how to create recreate
certain environments for them but you know again
(25:34):
it's like we couldn't do it without the stacy coins
of the world and the in the taraka fours of the world and
the kylie davis's like those are the people are that come
in here every day and take our visions and make them
a reality yeah you know what i mean so we have to like tip our hats oh
absolutely like so the you know it's it's funny so every
once in a while i'll scroll through facebook or whatever which is
(25:55):
always a bad thing but you see these some
of these facebook groups like you know shitting on pogues and whatever
you know just joking around whatever and the reality
of it is like you know when you're overseas if it wasn't for
the mechanics your trucks wouldn't run wasn't for the cooks you wouldn't be
fed if it wasn't for the armor your gun would be shitting the bed all the time
you know so so these support elements are what causes guys like us to be able
(26:20):
able to execute our missions because we wouldn't be able to do it if the support
wasn't there. That's right.
You know, and, and any, you and I both know as NCOs and even leading troops
and all that, you need your support element.
Big time. Have to. And you have to develop your plan based off,
are your soldiers fed? Is the equipment running?
Did they sleep? There's several things that you want to make sure that is good
(26:44):
to go before you send your A-team out there to do the job.
So support is huge, especially with this type of endeavor where you and I will
put together this big event. Yeah.
But then there's the back round that no one sees. That's right.
You know, like you said, there's Stacy, Carol, like all, all the support staff
(27:07):
for 22 Mohawks of what they're doing to get that to happen. Yep. A hundred percent.
That's a good analogy. Yeah. So that's, well, I'm full of analogies today, I think.
But, but before we wrap up, Dave, you know, I always like putting guests on
the spot and I tell, I asked them this one question and usually it's,
(27:27):
if you want to give any sort of veteran law enforcement firefighter,
any sort of advice today that they can take to think about,
you know, something for them to think about something for them to do, what would it be?
Yep. I mean, I think one of the most important things that I've learned over
the last four years is that we all feel booboo at the times, you know what I mean?
(27:49):
But if you, if you're laying in bed and you're feeling booboo lips,
you got to get out and you got to be around people, it's all about community,
but the best medicine for combating shame and guilt from your experiences that
you've had, it's not therapy, it's not a pill, but it's service to others.
Yeah. So if you can get up and go to a soup kitchen and give somebody soup or
come in a 22 Mohawks and hand over a leash to somebody, like it's going to make
(28:11):
you feel better, I promise you. Yeah. That's awesome, dude.
Yeah. So, uh, anybody that lives in the area, man, come, come visit 22 Mohawks,
uh, skiff actually talk about the skiff. Well, what is the skiff?
So the SCIF is a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility. There we go.
We love our acronyms. That way it makes it easier for us to do things.
(28:32):
I just thought it sounded cool and it just kind of stuck.
Yeah, yeah. No, I love it. But Dave, man, hey, thanks for coming on,
dude, and updating everybody as in the world of 22 Mohawks and some of the events
that you've got coming down the line.
I know you guys got a, we have a golf tournament that's coming up. Yep. So.
August 12th. Yep. I will add the link to the show notes.
(28:55):
If anyone wants to register, donate, everything's done through the website.
So please help out my buddy, Dave.
Let's keep this mission going. Let's keep throwing people out of planes and
other future things that are coming down the line.
Yep. Appreciate you. I'm a family man and I look forward to your amazing ideas.
Music.
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