April 8, 2025 • 55 mins
Resilience takes many forms, but few embody it quite like Don. His journey from being a top car salesman to navigating life after a stroke reveals profound wisdom about adapting to life's unexpected turns with grace and positivity.
Don's friendship with Mark forms a compelling through-line in his story. Despite Mark's wild streak and eventual tragic passing, their bond demonstrates how meaningful connections shape our lives. Through Mark's legal battles over property, his relocation struggles, and his personal challenges, Don remained a steady, trusted confidant—the voice of reason in chaotic times.
When describing his stroke, Don's matter-of-fact demeanor is striking. There's no fear in his retelling, just practical problem-solving and dry humor about being stuck on his bathroom floor. This unflappable attitude extends to his rehabilitation journey, from his frustrations at a senior facility where he "couldn't gear down to their speed" to finding his place among fellow veterans where he now thrives with independence and support perfectly balanced.
Aviation emerges as Don's lifelong passion—from his first words and toys to his eventual heartbreak when medical issues grounded him permanently. Yet even this profound loss becomes just another chapter in his story of adaptation and finding new ways forward.
"I've always tried to be kind to people because you never know who you're going to meet again," Don shares, revealing the simple philosophy that has guided his approach to life. His perspective that the world grows smaller with age speaks to the interconnectedness of all our experiences. Perhaps most powerful is his ability to find the positive in every situation: "I always look for the positive things whenever something happens and I say, well, I may have lost this, but at least I can do that."
Ready to gain more wisdom from remarkable veterans like Don? Subscribe now and join us in celebrating their stories of courage, resilience, and unwavering spirit.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
So why don't we just pick it up from there?
You retire from consulting, andwhat happens next?
Speaker 2 (00:06):
Well, I had been visiting a buddy out at Cass
Lake.
He was not a vet, but we hadbeen car salesmen together.
For let's see first for a bunchof car sales in Wayne and then
(00:29):
later at Wood.
Motors on Gratiot and we werealways the top two salesmen.
It didn't matter what was goingon, we just ended up there,
yeah, and I could never beat him, but I came close.
Speaker 1 (00:43):
If I recall, you were consistently the number two guy
.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
I might have been known as Mr Number Two from then
on.
I don't know, but I could neverget to that number one position
.
It just didn't work no matterwhat I did.
And so, anyway, his name wasMark.
And so, anyway, his name wasMark, and Mark came from a
(01:14):
family of very gifted people.
I'm talking intelligence-wise.
Their IQs were high, higherthan mine, and I recognize that
that didn't mean they had bettercommon sense, right, in fact,
they had no common sense Becauseintelligence and common sense
don't necessarily go hand inhand, that's true.
(01:37):
Yeah, but his dad had been anaccountant and later a teacher
to federal agencies.
His mom was a teacher.
Both of them had advanceddegrees and you'd be
(02:01):
hard-pressed to find adifference between them.
They just coalesced perfectly.
Yeah.
Anyway, mark had thisintelligence but he had a wild
streak in him and through highschool he led a rather unusual
life.
He had a live-in girlfriend.
(02:22):
They lived in a room in thebasement that had been finished.
He had one brother and twosisters, one older sister, one
younger.
The brother was younger, andall of them were extremely
(02:49):
independent.
They were kind ofentrepreneurial and generally
they're pretty good people.
I mean I liked them, I got tobe social with them and that
sort of thing.
And I mean I liked him, I gotto be social with him and that
(03:09):
sort of thing.
Mm-hmm, and Mark bought a housein Oak Park that had been
renovated from being on thecondemned list to a modern
three-bedroom house, and a buddyof his did the work on the
house and he told Mark youbetter buy this place.
It's going to, you know, youcan get it cheap now and it's
(03:31):
going to be worth money in thefuture.
So Mark did.
Then he moved in and Mark wasnot the kind of guy that could
just live alone.
It would drive him nuts and wewere working together and so he
offered me a room and I wasliving in an apartment I wasn't
(03:53):
too thrilled with in Wayne and Isaid, okay, we'll do it.
So I moved in and you know wewere going to work at the same
time, coming home at the sametime.
You know it was.
It was pretty easy life Right.
And Saturdays we'd go to themarket, stock up on things we
(04:16):
needed for the refrigerator,come back home and barbecue all
weekend.
You know, yeah, we just, wejust had a ball.
Any any friends came over, wejust included them in the party,
you know.
Speaker 1 (04:26):
Now, was he retired at the time as well?
No, okay.
Speaker 2 (04:31):
Alright, and so this is back when we were actively
working together.
Oh, okay okay.
And, um, one day, Mark let meknow that I was going to have to
look for another place becausehe was getting married.
Oh, okay, and I met the girl.
(04:55):
Her name was Kay.
Uh-huh.
And she was an IT person.
She was setting up wirelesssystems for local governments.
Okay, so she moved around, youknow wherever the company's
center, she would go into thetown, set up their system and
(05:17):
then come back home.
Yeah.
And she was an Indiana girl hada wild streak, so she paired up
with Mark pretty good.
Yeah, I was going to say herand Mark probably were made for
(05:38):
each other.
Of course, I had my questionsabout this, because Mark drank
and he smoked and heoccasionally used medicinal
purposes to accelerate hisexperience.
You know, yes, which I wouldhave no part of and the so they
(06:03):
got married.
So they got married.
And I was there a short time.
then I moved out and Mark andKay decided to move down to
Indiana to be close to herparents.
(06:25):
She wanted to go back to thehome area.
Mark thought well, I can sellcars anywhere.
If you can sell cars in Detroit, you can sell cars anywhere.
He had that attitude.
Unfortunately, he didn't reallycheck it out.
Turns out, car sales in Indianawere at a much lower pace than
(06:46):
what he was used to.
He was working with much lowerincomes people, so he wasn't
selling the high-lying,expensive products he was used
to.
He was selling like Fords andSheffys all mixed together and
(07:06):
for him it was like nickel anddime compared to dollars.
He was.
He kept the job.
He was doing the job, but hewas not happy.
Right.
And then the woman who wasbuying the house or renting the
(07:30):
house wanted to know aboutgetting her name on the deed.
Well, that raised some eyebrows.
So he said no, I'm not, Ididn't sell you the house, I'm
renting you the house.
So she took him to court.
(07:52):
Well, I had been there when shesigned the rental agreement.
I helped, I wrote the ad and Ihelped write the agreement, so I
knew everything that was in itand what wasn't in it.
So we go to court and the turnsout this woman is working for
(08:14):
an attorney, a lady attorney,and that's how she got the case
filed for a lawsuit and ofcourse she expected to settle.
Well, that didn't happen.
We went to court and I'mlistening to the testimony and
I'm thinking the judge seessomething here we haven't and
(08:40):
he's not happy.
And I tried to let Mark knowthe judge is on your side.
So don't screw it up, Don'ttalk too much, Don't try to run
the operation.
I mean, it was Mark's forte towant to control everything.
(09:05):
Right, yeah.
And that doesn't go in acourtroom.
No.
So anyway, as time went on inthis trial, a document was
introduced into evidence by theplaintiff introduced into
(09:35):
evidence by the plaintiff and itwas.
There had been some addendumsadded on in handwriting and she
had signed it.
And it said there that aportion of her monthly rent
would go towards payments for amortgage, and it stated that the
(10:03):
house was on a land contract.
I knew that wasn't so, so weobjected, claimed the house was
not on a land contract, it hadnever been on a land contract.
It was on a mortgage.
Mark bought the house fair andsquare on a mortgage, right.
(10:25):
So that came as a shock to theother attorney.
And then we started questioningthese addendums to the contract
.
Turns out they were only on herside of the contract.
They weren't on our side of thecontract.
Yeah.
(10:45):
We had not agreed to.
Mark had not agreed to any ofthese things.
He'd never even heard of thembefore.
So the judge declared thecontract null and void.
Mm-hmm, and the lady was inarrears on a rent and the judge
gave her a certain number ofdays to pay up or get out.
Then he berated the attorneyfor bringing the case to his
(11:11):
court in the first place withoutproper due diligence, and the
attorney could just stand thereand stutter.
She really screwed up and sheknew it, and the judge called
her on it.
So he dismissed the case withprejudice.
Mark asked me later what thatmeant.
(11:31):
He said well, that means theycan't come back.
Yeah.
It's over.
So he was relieved, kay wasrelieved they were going to get
their house back at the end ofthe month anyway, whether or not
the lady ever paid her rent atall.
But she didn't, and the housewas still in reasonably good
(11:53):
condition so they didn't have todo much to clean it up.
And afterwards come to find outthis lady had done this sort of
thing several times in thecourts.
Sometimes she was successful,sometimes she wasn't.
She was like the Death Star toany attorney she got in touch
(12:22):
with.
If they got tangled up with herit imploded badly.
Oh yeah.
So anyway, mark and Kay bought ahouse like a three-level
ranch-type house with a two-carattached garage on a nice piece
(12:43):
of property in Indiana.
A two-car attached garage on anice piece of property in
Indiana, backed up to some kindof a federal forest reserve, so
no one's going to build aroundhim, right.
No, yeah, he had neighbors downthe street but they didn't
interfere much, yeah.
And we ended up shooting Clay'spigeons with shotguns in his
(13:07):
backyard, you know, had ahandheld launcher.
One guy would throw the thingand the other guy would shoot
and it was all legal down there.
I wouldn't let Mark anywherenear a fire when we were
(13:27):
drinking yeah, that could bedangerous.
Didn't want any accidents no, uh, uh and anyway.
Mark got home from work one dayand he's watching TV.
There had been an accident onan overcast pass.
Anyway, mark got home from workone day and he's watching TV.
(13:48):
There had been an accident onan overcast pass in Cincinnati.
They were just south of that,in Aurora, indiana.
And he's looking at it and hesays, wow, that looks like my
wife's car.
It was her car, oh no.
So she ended up in the hospital.
(14:10):
She was pretty banged up,healed up from that, got back to
working again, but she wasnever the same person.
Emotionally she was ascatterbrain.
Emotionally she was ascatterbrain and I had never
heard her even get angry at Mark.
(14:30):
She always thought he was likea big kid and she liked him
Right.
Well, she didn't like that somuch anymore.
Wanted him to be responsible.
Well, that wasn't going tohappen.
I mean, he had spent 30 yearsbeing irresponsible.
Why should he change now?
Speaker 1 (14:49):
Right, Mark was going to be Mark right.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
Yeah, you were going to see a firecracker going off
somewhere or who knows what.
Yeah, they ended up gettingdivorced.
She got the house, so he cameback to Michigan for a short
(15:18):
time and I had a spare room.
He stayed with me for a littlewhile I was in Waterford at that
time and he moved down toFlorida.
Well, it turned out the carbusiness was pretty good again
(15:39):
down there.
He could make money.
So he started doing that.
His mother, I think she had areal estate license.
She had a condo down there Puthim in a condo.
They were there for the bighurricane that came through and
(16:05):
there was a water shortage.
He used to drive 50 miles tothe next town to get bottled
water.
Take it down for all theretiree residents that lived in
his community.
They were all retirees.
How he got in there I don'tknow, but they loved him.
(16:26):
The local sheriff made him anhonorary deputy, gave him a
badge.
I'm just shuddering, you know.
Speaker 1 (16:37):
Right, right.
Speaker 2 (16:37):
They didn't know what they were doing there huh, I
warned him about pulling it out,right?
I said, if you try to doanything official with that
badge, you're going right tojail, so don't do it.
I mean, if you want to get atable for lunch or something,
(17:02):
flash your badge, I don't care,they don't care, they don't care
.
But you're not to talk tosomebody or make any kind of
official connotation of anything.
Right?
And Mark used to listen to mefor advice.
He'd come to me for adviceabout situations and kept him
(17:24):
pure yeah.
He'd come to me for advice aboutsituations Uh-huh and you know,
kept him pure.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
Yeah, yeah, he could trust you.
Speaker 2 (17:29):
Yeah, yeah, and I wasn't his dad.
He could tell me anything.
Speaker 1 (17:33):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (17:35):
Things.
There were things he didn'twant to admit to his dad.
Speaker 1 (17:40):
Right, so did he end up back in Michigan then?
Speaker 2 (17:42):
No, he stayed in Florida, okay, and I knew he was
still drinking I don't think hewas drinking as much but he
started playing with those partyfavors again, yeah, and they
(18:03):
eventually killed him.
So I got a call from his momtelling me that he had passed
and there was a funeral for himmonths later up here in Michigan
.
I went to that and his oldestsister, whom I knew, I'd met her
(18:28):
at family things and whatnot,and she knew her parents had
respected me a lot.
So she questioned me aboutliving with him as far as
playing with the party favors,and I said nope, it didn't have
anything to do with that, didn'tknow if it was going on, never
saw anything, and he knew betterthan to expose me to anything.
(18:52):
Right, because I would havesaid, yeah, that's him.
Speaker 1 (18:59):
Yeah, you have to draw a line somewhere, right?
Speaker 2 (19:00):
Yeah, yeah, exactly somewhere right, yeah, yeah,
exactly, and.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
So how old was he when he passed away?
Speaker 2 (19:11):
He was probably about 36.
Speaker 1 (19:14):
Oh, so he was really young.
Speaker 2 (19:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (19:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (19:23):
And it was a shame because he had the intelligence
to do really good things.
He just didn't have the rightmotivation.
I don't know why.
Yeah.
He and his dad were both onXanax for some kind of inherited
(19:46):
mental thing, but I don't thinkthat would really shape the
character that way.
And his dad was veryresponsible, gave Mark a lot of
leeway and things, butpersonally he was a real
(20:08):
straight shooter.
My dad met him and liked him,mhm.
Speaker 1 (20:17):
Yeah, so you.
After he passed away, they justlife goes on right, I mean at
some point.
And so let's talk a little bitabout after retirement.
Speaker 2 (20:35):
So all my friends were still working Uh-huh and I
had a few friends at Cass Lakewhere I lived Uh-huh, and I
(20:58):
lived in what they called theShore Club, which was a series
of apartments that had beenbuilt.
A lot of the guys I knew livedin apartments facing the water
or around the water and they hadpontoon boats and they'd invite
me out sometimes to drive theboat while they were drinking,
(21:22):
so I'd be at the helm having aball driving the boat all over
the place.
They'd be drinking and fishing.
I'd get them back to the docksafe and sound.
No tickets.
Designated driver on the wateryeah, tickets you know,
Designated driver on the waterright.
Yeah, so I was never a drinker.
(21:45):
I never had impulses to get adrink.
You know what I mean.
I never had to do that I wouldhave a drink with people late in
the day or something.
You know just one.
People late in the day orsomething.
You know just one.
Um but um, I never went toexcess, yeah.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
How long?
How long were you at Cass Lake?
How long did you live there?
Speaker 2 (22:11):
12 years.
Okay, all right, and I ended uphere.
Speaker 1 (22:17):
Okay, so you were there for 12 years and so that's
where you had your stroke.
Yeah, Was there.
Now were you at home when thishappened.
I was Okay.
Speaker 2 (22:29):
I was sitting on the couch and watching TV or
something.
I remember what I was watchingand I dropped something on the
floor and I leaned down to getit and the minute my head went
beyond the vertical, I justtumbled right off the chair.
(22:51):
I thought, well, that was funny.
And then I couldn't get up.
Oh boy, nothing would move.
Yeah, I mean, I couldn't getthe energy, the strength to push
myself in a sitting position orlike that.
My cell phone was nearby andthat's all I had.
(23:13):
I didn't have a wired phone, Ihad one that ran through a
computer.
If I needed it, it was, but itwas in the other room.
So I got my cell phone.
I called my brother I mean hehad a spare key and I said you
know, come on over here and getme up off the floor.
So he had a house, I has ahouse in Royal Oak so he drove
(23:37):
over, got me off the floor.
I seemed normal after that.
So he left.
A few hours later I decided tofix dinner, no problem.
So I thought, well, I need ashower, I'll take a shower.
So I got in, took a shower, hada hard time getting out of the
(24:04):
bathtub, couldn't get my legover the edge of the bathtub and
I'm standing there laughing atmyself.
Well, this is a fine, dumbthing, I mean.
Here I am, take a showerstanding up, and I can't get out
of the bathtub.
What the heck is this?
Yeah.
So I realized if I sat on theedge I could slowly get my legs
(24:26):
over and get out, and I had abig padded shower mat.
So I got onto the edge of thetub, got my legs over and I fell
onto the floor.
And now I was down on the flooragain.
So I deliberately kept my cellphone on the edge of the counter
(24:48):
so I had something and I battedthat off the counter and got it
.
I called my brother I'm on thebathroom floor, come and get me.
So he came over, got me up andI could do things with help.
(25:08):
Right.
So I said, just sit me down onmy bed.
I put on some night shirt orsomething you know and said I'm
too tired to go anywhere now,but if I feel up to it, take me
to the hospital in the morning,the VA hospital.
(25:31):
So the next morning he cameover.
I was up, I had breakfast, Iwas dressed, we went to the
hospital, Went into emergency.
They berated for me, berated atme for not coming the night
before.
Speaker 1 (25:51):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (25:52):
But they couldn't do anything for me anyway.
Yeah, so they sent me to HenryFord in Detroit on West Grand
Uh-huh, right down the streetfrom where I my first house I
lived in, and so I was in.
I was in the ER there for fivedays.
(26:13):
They got me a room, startedgiving me physical therapy and
things like that, and in themeantime my brother and sister
were looking for a place to getme into.
Speaker 1 (26:31):
Right.
So they had figured out thatyou had a stroke at the hospital
.
Speaker 2 (26:36):
Yeah, but I was coming back, I was on the mend,
yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:44):
I want to point something out too.
At no point in this story didyou say you were afraid or
anything.
You just sort of just ah, thisis just what's happening.
I mean, was there any fear inthe back of your mind as all
this was going?
Speaker 2 (26:56):
on None.
Wow, okay, I've been throughtoo much already.
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:01):
I mean, we've talked about a lot of things, so I was
just curious.
So you're just.
This is what it is.
Speaker 2 (27:08):
Yeah, all those months of the Navy dumping off
in the Army, right, right,exactly, the Army didn't know
what to do with me.
Speaker 1 (27:17):
Yeah, yeah, finally gave me back to the navy, yeah,
so here you are.
So you go to Henry Ford andthey determine you probably, at
least for some period of time,shouldn't be on your own they
would not release me to go backhome.
Speaker 2 (27:35):
I had to go to a facility, so they found a place
called my Doctor's Inn, whichwas really for older people.
I mean it was designed for, itwasn't designed for somebody
that was young and active.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
Yeah, and I want to point out when we're talking
young and active, we're notreally talking about age, we're
talking about you.
So anybody who's watching thisknows that your physical age is
way different from your actualage.
It's way different from yourphysical age and your mental age
because you're 100% here.
(28:13):
Oh yeah yeah, and that's gotgotta be a little depressing and
they didn't have therapyequipment.
Speaker 2 (28:22):
They had ladies come in with rubber bands yeah and I
worked with those and I waswalking with a cane and I would
do.
I was on the second floor ofthe facility and I could do laps
on the second floor from myapartment down the hall around
(28:44):
all the way around the buildingback to my apartment.
So I was doing that forexercise and meals were
downstairs at a dining table andI got with a couple of guys
(29:05):
that were more mentally coherentthan the other crowd so I could
talk to them and I mean it wasit was a place they had
activities for the old people.
Yeah, I mean they played old,old music, they played old games
(29:30):
, right, a lot of it was memorystuff, yeah, and I mean I was
going to sleep.
I couldn't gear down to theirspeed at all, so I would mostly
read yeah, spent more time in myroom, had a TV, watched that
(29:50):
occasionally and I was never bigon politics but I always paid
attention to elections.
Yeah.
And there was a lot ofcampaigning going on at that
time.
Some of it was outrageous.
Speaker 1 (30:12):
Nothing like election season.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
And to think that they were spending millions of
dollars to do this just boggledmy mind In some cases a billion
dollars, I mean that's a lot ofmoney if you think about it.
Yep, I thought well, it's not abad time to be in the TV
business.
Speaker 1 (30:33):
Or the consulting business.
Either one right.
So how long were you there,Seemed like years?
Speaker 2 (30:42):
Yeah, probably three or four months.
Speaker 1 (30:48):
All right.
At some point did you like callyour brother and say hey, we've
got to find something else?
I mean, what happened that youended up here at the veterans'
home?
Speaker 2 (30:58):
Well, my car was there but I couldn't use it.
I mean, I wasn't really allowedto drive yet and I had promised
my family I wouldn't driveuntil the doctors gave me an
okay.
So after about four months Igot my brothers to take me back
(31:24):
to Henry Ford to meet with mydoctor and he gave me a test.
I mean, he sat me in the room,question and answers, had me
stand up.
We walked down the halltogether in the back, you know
for mobility, that kind of thingand he signed me off.
(31:44):
He said yeah, I don't see anyreason why you couldn't drive.
You've been driving for a longtime you know Right.
And then I had to see my eyedoctor.
Tom was there both times.
They signed me off.
Yeah, your vision's good, youknow.
(32:07):
And I knew I had cataracts inthe beginnings of glaucoma, so
that was going to have to beaddressed sometime in the future
, right, anyway, tom McCarrollgot me into here, so that was
going to have to be addressedsometime in the future.
Anyway.
Tom McCarroll got me into hereand I've been pretty much happy
(32:27):
ever since.
I do miss the apartmentoccasionally, but I know what I
can't do for myself down thereanymore.
I mean, the washer and dryerwere two stories down in the
basement and there's no way Icould carry bundles of clothes
up and down, plus the number oftrips I'd have to make to them.
(32:52):
Yeah.
And I had a cooking experience.
I was heating up oil to frysome pierogies.
Speaker 1 (33:06):
Oh, love pierogies.
Speaker 2 (33:12):
Wednesday is pierogie day at Sugarbush Inn.
Speaker 1 (33:16):
Oh, I got to come here on a Wednesday then, for
sure.
Speaker 2 (33:19):
Any Wednesday, I'll be glad to take over.
Speaker 1 (33:20):
All right, it's a date.
Speaker 2 (33:24):
And anyway, I heated the oil and I was wearing
sandals instead of regular shoesor even slippers.
Yeah.
And somehow I spilled the oil.
(33:46):
It splashed down and it burnedmy foot.
Oh, in a pattern of the sandals.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So I turned the heat off, puteverything away and tended to my
foot.
I knew what to do.
I even had all this properstuff in my cupboard just in
(34:08):
case and I used like a silveriodide on it.
After I washed it, taped it up.
I said, well, it'll be that fora while.
And then I think it was laterin the day I decided to go down
(34:34):
to emergency at the VA hospitaland they looked at it, did the
same thing I did exactly Right,said you should be good, uh-huh,
and they gave me extra stuff totake care of it with.
So I was doctoring myself and Ihealed up from that.
(34:58):
I still have the discolorationon the skin but the foot is all
healed up.
But that scared my sisterpretty bad.
She was afraid of me cookingagain.
Uh-huh.
(35:22):
So after the stroke happened shethought well, that's it, we
can't let him go back thereanymore.
Right.
My mom was in her 90s living inan apartment in a senior complex
right over here in MacombCounty and at an apartment in a
(35:43):
senior complex right over herein Macomb County and it was the
same building that her sisterand brother-in-law lived in when
they were getting older.
They had passed, she had goneto a nursing home and had passed
away, and I used to drive mymom over to visit them all the
time.
So we were back in the samebuilding.
(36:06):
Mom had her own apartment, nicefurniture, had a view, with a
little tiny balcony that nobodywould step on.
Yeah, just didn't look thatsecure, but she was comfortable.
She was doing things downstairsin the group room.
(36:27):
You know she even got an awardfrom Macomb County as the Senior
of the Year for packing bagsfor the group that gives lunches
away.
Speaker 1 (36:42):
Oh, like Meals on Wheels.
Speaker 2 (36:44):
Yeah, meals on Wheels exactly.
Speaker 1 (36:46):
Oh, that's very nice.
Speaker 2 (36:47):
So she'd go down in the morning and pack 100 bags.
Yeah, and it turns out theywere looking for somebody to be
the senior of the month and theyran an ad on TV that said we
need applications.
So my sister sent one in.
Turned out it was the only onethey got.
(37:09):
So mom got the title by default.
Speaker 1 (37:12):
But in your mom's defense she was doing good stuff
.
Oh yeah, so that's good.
She was thrilled yeah.
Speaker 2 (37:18):
That's pretty amazing .
Thrilled, yeah, that's prettyamazing.
And I mean a city official cameout and they made a big deal of
it at the home to order thecertificate and everything.
So that went all right.
I was there for that, yeah.
But one day the firearms wentoff in her apartment so they
(37:46):
were evacuating the whole floor.
The apartment was full of smoke.
Turned out she'd left one ofthose.
I think it was like asilver-toned pan.
It has the covering on it soyou don't have to use anything
in it.
Oh yeah.
Well, she fried the hell out ofthat one.
She had gone to do laundry andforgot it was on the stove.
(38:10):
Yeah, that's all it took.
So I spent the whole daycleaning the stuff out of the
apartment.
I mean, that soot was oneverything In the cabinets, on
the cabinets.
Speaker 1 (38:22):
It gets everywhere.
Speaker 2 (38:25):
And I must have used a half a dozen bottles of Lysol
and you could still smell thesmoke.
Fortunately, the worst of itwas contained in the kitchen
area, right.
It didn't really get that badin the living room.
It didn't enter the bedroom atall that bad in the living room
and didn't enter the bedroom atall.
We couldn't leave Mom living onher own after that.
Speaker 1 (38:49):
Right, right.
So your sister's seen a coupleof cooking issues.
Yeah, yeah, so I can see that.
So, being here at the VeteransHome as opposed to like a
retirement center, do you findyou?
There's a lot of people herethat are similar to you in age
(39:10):
and in ability, and all of thatI mean, have you made friends
here, or how's that going?
Speaker 2 (39:19):
I've got friends, mm-hmm.
The staff are wonderful.
I know most of the staff fromthe general manager on down
Never had a bad word withanybody.
Don't expect to no, it'sagainst the rules here, anyway,
(39:41):
you know.
That's what I understand.
Yeah, don't expect to, no, it'sagainst the rules here, anyway,
you know.
Speaker 1 (39:44):
That's what I understand, yeah.
Speaker 2 (39:47):
And if you have a problem, take it outside.
You don't need it here.
Speaker 1 (39:50):
Right, well, I mean, you're mobile, you've got a
vehicle and you can go places,and so it's got to be a nice
situation then for you, and soit's got to be a nice situation
then for you and you don't haveto cook.
Speaker 2 (40:04):
Yeah, I don't.
I still do my own laundry, butit's right down the hall, it's
on one level Right, so that'seasy.
Speaker 1 (40:12):
Right.
Well, that's the nice thingabout the new facility is
they're all like one singlelevel, right?
You're not having to go up anddown stairs.
Speaker 2 (40:24):
The one thing that's different.
Everything here is pretty level.
When I go outside of here,every parking lot I've been in
has been like the surface of themoon to me.
It's harder to get around thanI would have thought.
Speaker 1 (40:36):
Now I remember that when we went to lunch the last
time you made a comment aboutand for me, I'm walking on
uneven surfaces all the time, soI didn't even think about it.
Speaker 2 (40:48):
Well, if you're not used to it, it's really strange.
Yeah, yeah.
And you wonder what's wrongwith this place.
Speaker 1 (40:54):
I'll bet I'll bet.
Well, don, we have covered alot.
We've talked a lot about yourlife and the things that you've
done and you know I've shared alot of your stories with other
folks and people love to listento your life.
But you know, as we sort ofkind of wrap up our discussion
(41:21):
today, I always ask the samequestion of everyone before we,
before we're done, and that isyou know, years from now, when
somebody is listening to this,you know and they're listening
all about your life and allabout the things you've done.
What message would you like togive to people you know in the
(41:41):
future?
Speaker 2 (41:45):
Well, I've always tried to be kind to people
because you never know whoyou're going to meet again, and
every experience I've had hasshown me that the world is
getting smaller and smaller bythe day.
I guess it's maybe me aging.
I don't really think the worldhas shrunk any is getting
smaller and smaller by the day.
I guess it's maybe me aging.
Yeah, I don't really think theword has shrunk any, but I do
(42:06):
come in contact with people thathave shared experiences been in
the same part of the world orthe same city or whatever and
it's always interesting to heartheir perspective of whatever
happened.
It's always interesting to heartheir perspective of whatever
happened.
I'm a flyer.
(42:26):
I've been an aviator my wholelife.
My mom said my first words wereyou know which probably meant
airplane.
Yeah, my first toy was a rubberairplane with a Mickey Mouse
head in the pilot seat.
Uh-huh, and I remember the headswolled.
(42:48):
Yeah.
And I had so many greatexperiences flying and being
involved in the flying community.
I still watch a lot of stuff onYouTube right now about well
(43:12):
accident investigations.
Yeah.
Or new airplanes or flying oldairplanes, and I think I like
flying the old airplanes thebest.
The older the better.
I went to Oshkosh one year.
That's a big fly-in they have,and if that was an actual Air
(43:38):
Force it would be the thirdlargest Air Force in the world.
That's how many airplanes showup.
Speaker 1 (43:44):
Wow, that's big.
Speaker 2 (43:46):
And way in the corner in the back of the place I
found a Curtis Pusher.
This goes back to around 1906or 19, 8, somewhere in there,
and the guy flying it was a guynamed Dale Kreitz and he had
(44:13):
more time flying Curtis pushersthan anybody else in the world
and he was very proud of it.
He loved flying that airplaneand it was not like your
conventional airplanes.
It had differences.
One of them, for example youhad a big wheel in front of you
(44:35):
to steer.
Well, the wheel turned therudder.
The wings, the aero arms werecontrolled by leaning the seat,
so the seat would actually dothis.
(44:55):
So somehow you've got to keepyour balance, stay strapped in
hold on to this wheel to turnthe rudder while you're leaning
the seat to turn the plane,Because planes turn by banking.
Yeah.
They don't turn by the rudder Awhole different kind of flying.
They'll fly sideways all day.
You've got to bank the wings toturn the airplane.
Speaker 1 (45:15):
A whole different kind of flying.
Speaker 2 (45:19):
And you don't have any instruments to help.
Yeah, there's no flightinstruments.
Maybe you got a little glasstube that shows you how many
gallons you got left, possibly,but those things you only fly in
like no wind days and fromairports that have plenty of
grass around them, and fromairports that have plenty of
grass around them, because youmight end up coming down
(45:42):
anywhere.
Yeah.
But he's a fascinating man totalk to and I used to go see him
every time I went to Oshkosh.
He was there and years later Ilooked him up on Google and
found out he had a brother andit was the two of them that had
(46:06):
restored the airplane.
So if you look up Dale Kreitzon Google, you get the story.
I'll have to check it out.
C-r-i-t-e-s.
Speaker 1 (46:15):
A couple of farm boys you know, yeah, it almost feels
like your world was small, kindof all along, Like you've
always had these groups ofpeople or these you know your
interests, where you would go.
I mean the world's big right,but wherever you went you seemed
(46:37):
to make it seem like home.
Speaker 2 (46:43):
Yeah, I never felt out of place anywhere really.
Yeah, that's kind of the sensethat I get Is that yeah, I mean,
I'm a Christian, I know Godsees everything, so he's with me
all the time.
Right, remember that book.
God is my Co-Pilot.
Speaker 1 (46:59):
Yes, I do by.
Speaker 2 (47:01):
Robert Johnson.
Yep.
Speaker 1 (47:05):
And what an appropriate book for you.
Speaker 2 (47:08):
I adopted it as my own.
You know, I always felt he waslooking right over my shoulder,
no matter what I was doing, so Ihad to act accordingly.
Speaker 1 (47:22):
Well, I think, if you reflect on your life too,
you've always had that guardianangel, because even when bad
things have happened, goodthings have come out of it.
I think a lot of that's justyour attitude, though you
determine.
What was it?
That's been said that life is1% of what happens to you and
(47:44):
99% of how you react to it.
Speaker 2 (47:47):
It could be.
Speaker 1 (47:47):
Yeah, and I think that you're kind of an example
of it.
Really depends on your attitudeand how you react to things.
Speaker 2 (47:55):
Well, I kind of feel my attitude is, from wherever it
came, has given me like asecond chance every time.
Yeah, I always look for thepositive things whenever
something happens and I say,well, I may have lost this, but
at least I can do that.
Right, you know yeah.
(48:16):
The hardest thing was when theFAA decided my medical didn't
qualify me to fly anymore.
And uh, I mean, I went to adoctor for a flight physical and
he said nope.
Speaker 1 (48:37):
Yeah, that must've been a tough day.
Speaker 2 (48:39):
Yeah, that's.
That's when I learned out forsure I was diabetic and I should
start looking into that.
And I did and learned that Igot it from Agent Orange,
amongst other things, some ofwhich have not bothered me yet.
(49:02):
I've got a heart problem thatis benign.
I do have neuropathy in myhands and feet, but I'm on
medication for that.
I never was a smoker, so Idon't have to deal with all that
(49:24):
issue.
Speaker 1 (49:27):
Right, never got into drugs or heavy use of alcohol
or anything like that.
I think it's close to good,clean living as you can get
Really.
I mean you've really taken careof yourself and you have your
faith and your health and yourfamily.
Speaker 2 (49:48):
And my faith really has led me into a position where
I'm always looking out to tryto help somebody else, maybe
somebody not as fortunate.
I've always come to bat for theyoung, you know, the less
fortunate.
Yeah, it started with bullies.
(50:12):
I responded badly to bullies.
Speaker 1 (50:16):
Yes, I think I remember a story about that too.
Speaker 2 (50:20):
Yes, I think I remember a story about that too,
and I realized the best way todeal with bullies is to go up to
the biggest guy in the bunchand take him down, uh-huh, or
scare him so bad.
He didn't want anything to dowith me and for the most part it
worked yeah.
Speaker 1 (50:39):
You know, I think bullies are just insecure people
.
Oh yeah, they pick on peopleweaker than them, right?
And the minute you challengethat, they aren't so tough
anymore.
Yeah Well, I appreciate youspending all this time with me
talking, and we definitely haveto make sure that we go to lunch
(51:05):
when I'm out here for otherstories.
But, don, thanks again forspending time with me.
This has been amazing.
Speaker 2 (51:12):
Oh, you've been a good interviewer, Bill.
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (51:15):
I appreciate that.
So why don't we just pick it up from there?
You retire from consulting, andwhat happens next?
Speaker 2 (00:06):
Well, I had been visiting a buddy out at Cass
Lake.
He was not a vet, but we hadbeen car salesmen together.
For let's see first for a bunchof car sales in Wayne and then
(00:29):
later at Wood.
Motors on Gratiot and we werealways the top two salesmen.
It didn't matter what was goingon, we just ended up there,
yeah, and I could never beat him, but I came close.
Speaker 1 (00:43):
If I recall, you were consistently the number two guy
.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
I might have been known as Mr Number Two from then
on.
I don't know, but I could neverget to that number one position
.
It just didn't work no matterwhat I did.
And so, anyway, his name wasMark.
And so, anyway, his name wasMark, and Mark came from a
(01:14):
family of very gifted people.
I'm talking intelligence-wise.
Their IQs were high, higherthan mine, and I recognize that
that didn't mean they had bettercommon sense, right, in fact,
they had no common sense Becauseintelligence and common sense
don't necessarily go hand inhand, that's true.
(01:37):
Yeah, but his dad had been anaccountant and later a teacher
to federal agencies.
His mom was a teacher.
Both of them had advanceddegrees and you'd be
(02:01):
hard-pressed to find adifference between them.
They just coalesced perfectly.
Yeah.
Anyway, mark had thisintelligence but he had a wild
streak in him and through highschool he led a rather unusual
life.
He had a live-in girlfriend.
(02:22):
They lived in a room in thebasement that had been finished.
He had one brother and twosisters, one older sister, one
younger.
The brother was younger, andall of them were extremely
(02:49):
independent.
They were kind ofentrepreneurial and generally
they're pretty good people.
I mean I liked them, I got tobe social with them and that
sort of thing.
And I mean I liked him, I gotto be social with him and that
(03:09):
sort of thing.
Mm-hmm, and Mark bought a housein Oak Park that had been
renovated from being on thecondemned list to a modern
three-bedroom house, and a buddyof his did the work on the
house and he told Mark youbetter buy this place.
It's going to, you know, youcan get it cheap now and it's
(03:31):
going to be worth money in thefuture.
So Mark did.
Then he moved in and Mark wasnot the kind of guy that could
just live alone.
It would drive him nuts and wewere working together and so he
offered me a room and I wasliving in an apartment I wasn't
(03:53):
too thrilled with in Wayne and Isaid, okay, we'll do it.
So I moved in and you know wewere going to work at the same
time, coming home at the sametime.
You know it was.
It was pretty easy life Right.
And Saturdays we'd go to themarket, stock up on things we
(04:16):
needed for the refrigerator,come back home and barbecue all
weekend.
You know, yeah, we just, wejust had a ball.
Any any friends came over, wejust included them in the party,
you know.
Speaker 1 (04:26):
Now, was he retired at the time as well?
No, okay.
Speaker 2 (04:31):
Alright, and so this is back when we were actively
working together.
Oh, okay okay.
And, um, one day, Mark let meknow that I was going to have to
look for another place becausehe was getting married.
Oh, okay, and I met the girl.
(04:55):
Her name was Kay.
Uh-huh.
And she was an IT person.
She was setting up wirelesssystems for local governments.
Okay, so she moved around, youknow wherever the company's
center, she would go into thetown, set up their system and
(05:17):
then come back home.
Yeah.
And she was an Indiana girl hada wild streak, so she paired up
with Mark pretty good.
Yeah, I was going to say herand Mark probably were made for
(05:38):
each other.
Of course, I had my questionsabout this, because Mark drank
and he smoked and heoccasionally used medicinal
purposes to accelerate hisexperience.
You know, yes, which I wouldhave no part of and the so they
(06:03):
got married.
So they got married.
And I was there a short time.
then I moved out and Mark andKay decided to move down to
Indiana to be close to herparents.
(06:25):
She wanted to go back to thehome area.
Mark thought well, I can sellcars anywhere.
If you can sell cars in Detroit, you can sell cars anywhere.
He had that attitude.
Unfortunately, he didn't reallycheck it out.
Turns out, car sales in Indianawere at a much lower pace than
(06:46):
what he was used to.
He was working with much lowerincomes people, so he wasn't
selling the high-lying,expensive products he was used
to.
He was selling like Fords andSheffys all mixed together and
(07:06):
for him it was like nickel anddime compared to dollars.
He was.
He kept the job.
He was doing the job, but hewas not happy.
Right.
And then the woman who wasbuying the house or renting the
(07:30):
house wanted to know aboutgetting her name on the deed.
Well, that raised some eyebrows.
So he said no, I'm not, Ididn't sell you the house, I'm
renting you the house.
So she took him to court.
(07:52):
Well, I had been there when shesigned the rental agreement.
I helped, I wrote the ad and Ihelped write the agreement, so I
knew everything that was in itand what wasn't in it.
So we go to court and the turnsout this woman is working for
(08:14):
an attorney, a lady attorney,and that's how she got the case
filed for a lawsuit and ofcourse she expected to settle.
Well, that didn't happen.
We went to court and I'mlistening to the testimony and
I'm thinking the judge seessomething here we haven't and
(08:40):
he's not happy.
And I tried to let Mark knowthe judge is on your side.
So don't screw it up, Don'ttalk too much, Don't try to run
the operation.
I mean, it was Mark's forte towant to control everything.
(09:05):
Right, yeah.
And that doesn't go in acourtroom.
No.
So anyway, as time went on inthis trial, a document was
introduced into evidence by theplaintiff introduced into
(09:35):
evidence by the plaintiff and itwas.
There had been some addendumsadded on in handwriting and she
had signed it.
And it said there that aportion of her monthly rent
would go towards payments for amortgage, and it stated that the
(10:03):
house was on a land contract.
I knew that wasn't so, so weobjected, claimed the house was
not on a land contract, it hadnever been on a land contract.
It was on a mortgage.
Mark bought the house fair andsquare on a mortgage, right.
(10:25):
So that came as a shock to theother attorney.
And then we started questioningthese addendums to the contract
.
Turns out they were only on herside of the contract.
They weren't on our side of thecontract.
Yeah.
(10:45):
We had not agreed to.
Mark had not agreed to any ofthese things.
He'd never even heard of thembefore.
So the judge declared thecontract null and void.
Mm-hmm, and the lady was inarrears on a rent and the judge
gave her a certain number ofdays to pay up or get out.
Then he berated the attorneyfor bringing the case to his
(11:11):
court in the first place withoutproper due diligence, and the
attorney could just stand thereand stutter.
She really screwed up and sheknew it, and the judge called
her on it.
So he dismissed the case withprejudice.
Mark asked me later what thatmeant.
(11:31):
He said well, that means theycan't come back.
Yeah.
It's over.
So he was relieved, kay wasrelieved they were going to get
their house back at the end ofthe month anyway, whether or not
the lady ever paid her rent atall.
But she didn't, and the housewas still in reasonably good
(11:53):
condition so they didn't have todo much to clean it up.
And afterwards come to find outthis lady had done this sort of
thing several times in thecourts.
Sometimes she was successful,sometimes she wasn't.
She was like the Death Star toany attorney she got in touch
(12:22):
with.
If they got tangled up with herit imploded badly.
Oh yeah.
So anyway, mark and Kay bought ahouse like a three-level
ranch-type house with a two-carattached garage on a nice piece
(12:43):
of property in Indiana.
A two-car attached garage on anice piece of property in
Indiana, backed up to some kindof a federal forest reserve, so
no one's going to build aroundhim, right.
No, yeah, he had neighbors downthe street but they didn't
interfere much, yeah.
And we ended up shooting Clay'spigeons with shotguns in his
(13:07):
backyard, you know, had ahandheld launcher.
One guy would throw the thingand the other guy would shoot
and it was all legal down there.
I wouldn't let Mark anywherenear a fire when we were
(13:27):
drinking yeah, that could bedangerous.
Didn't want any accidents no, uh, uh and anyway.
Mark got home from work one dayand he's watching TV.
There had been an accident onan overcast pass.
Anyway, mark got home from workone day and he's watching TV.
(13:48):
There had been an accident onan overcast pass in Cincinnati.
They were just south of that,in Aurora, indiana.
And he's looking at it and hesays, wow, that looks like my
wife's car.
It was her car, oh no.
So she ended up in the hospital.
(14:10):
She was pretty banged up,healed up from that, got back to
working again, but she wasnever the same person.
Emotionally she was ascatterbrain.
Emotionally she was ascatterbrain and I had never
heard her even get angry at Mark.
(14:30):
She always thought he was likea big kid and she liked him
Right.
Well, she didn't like that somuch anymore.
Wanted him to be responsible.
Well, that wasn't going tohappen.
I mean, he had spent 30 yearsbeing irresponsible.
Why should he change now?
Speaker 1 (14:49):
Right, Mark was going to be Mark right.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
Yeah, you were going to see a firecracker going off
somewhere or who knows what.
Yeah, they ended up gettingdivorced.
She got the house, so he cameback to Michigan for a short
(15:18):
time and I had a spare room.
He stayed with me for a littlewhile I was in Waterford at that
time and he moved down toFlorida.
Well, it turned out the carbusiness was pretty good again
(15:39):
down there.
He could make money.
So he started doing that.
His mother, I think she had areal estate license.
She had a condo down there Puthim in a condo.
They were there for the bighurricane that came through and
(16:05):
there was a water shortage.
He used to drive 50 miles tothe next town to get bottled
water.
Take it down for all theretiree residents that lived in
his community.
They were all retirees.
How he got in there I don'tknow, but they loved him.
(16:26):
The local sheriff made him anhonorary deputy, gave him a
badge.
I'm just shuddering, you know.
Speaker 1 (16:37):
Right, right.
Speaker 2 (16:37):
They didn't know what they were doing there huh, I
warned him about pulling it out,right?
I said, if you try to doanything official with that
badge, you're going right tojail, so don't do it.
I mean, if you want to get atable for lunch or something,
(17:02):
flash your badge, I don't care,they don't care, they don't care
.
But you're not to talk tosomebody or make any kind of
official connotation of anything.
Right?
And Mark used to listen to mefor advice.
He'd come to me for adviceabout situations and kept him
(17:24):
pure yeah.
He'd come to me for advice aboutsituations Uh-huh and you know,
kept him pure.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
Yeah, yeah, he could trust you.
Speaker 2 (17:29):
Yeah, yeah, and I wasn't his dad.
He could tell me anything.
Speaker 1 (17:33):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (17:35):
Things.
There were things he didn'twant to admit to his dad.
Speaker 1 (17:40):
Right, so did he end up back in Michigan then?
Speaker 2 (17:42):
No, he stayed in Florida, okay, and I knew he was
still drinking I don't think hewas drinking as much but he
started playing with those partyfavors again, yeah, and they
(18:03):
eventually killed him.
So I got a call from his momtelling me that he had passed
and there was a funeral for himmonths later up here in Michigan
.
I went to that and his oldestsister, whom I knew, I'd met her
(18:28):
at family things and whatnot,and she knew her parents had
respected me a lot.
So she questioned me aboutliving with him as far as
playing with the party favors,and I said nope, it didn't have
anything to do with that, didn'tknow if it was going on, never
saw anything, and he knew betterthan to expose me to anything.
(18:52):
Right, because I would havesaid, yeah, that's him.
Speaker 1 (18:59):
Yeah, you have to draw a line somewhere, right?
Speaker 2 (19:00):
Yeah, yeah, exactly somewhere right, yeah, yeah,
exactly, and.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
So how old was he when he passed away?
Speaker 2 (19:11):
He was probably about 36.
Speaker 1 (19:14):
Oh, so he was really young.
Speaker 2 (19:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (19:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (19:23):
And it was a shame because he had the intelligence
to do really good things.
He just didn't have the rightmotivation.
I don't know why.
Yeah.
He and his dad were both onXanax for some kind of inherited
(19:46):
mental thing, but I don't thinkthat would really shape the
character that way.
And his dad was veryresponsible, gave Mark a lot of
leeway and things, butpersonally he was a real
(20:08):
straight shooter.
My dad met him and liked him,mhm.
Speaker 1 (20:17):
Yeah, so you.
After he passed away, they justlife goes on right, I mean at
some point.
And so let's talk a little bitabout after retirement.
Speaker 2 (20:35):
So all my friends were still working Uh-huh and I
had a few friends at Cass Lakewhere I lived Uh-huh, and I
(20:58):
lived in what they called theShore Club, which was a series
of apartments that had beenbuilt.
A lot of the guys I knew livedin apartments facing the water
or around the water and they hadpontoon boats and they'd invite
me out sometimes to drive theboat while they were drinking,
(21:22):
so I'd be at the helm having aball driving the boat all over
the place.
They'd be drinking and fishing.
I'd get them back to the docksafe and sound.
No tickets.
Designated driver on the wateryeah, tickets you know,
Designated driver on the waterright.
Yeah, so I was never a drinker.
(21:45):
I never had impulses to get adrink.
You know what I mean.
I never had to do that I wouldhave a drink with people late in
the day or something.
You know just one.
People late in the day orsomething.
You know just one.
Um but um, I never went toexcess, yeah.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
How long?
How long were you at Cass Lake?
How long did you live there?
Speaker 2 (22:11):
12 years.
Okay, all right, and I ended uphere.
Speaker 1 (22:17):
Okay, so you were there for 12 years and so that's
where you had your stroke.
Yeah, Was there.
Now were you at home when thishappened.
I was Okay.
Speaker 2 (22:29):
I was sitting on the couch and watching TV or
something.
I remember what I was watchingand I dropped something on the
floor and I leaned down to getit and the minute my head went
beyond the vertical, I justtumbled right off the chair.
(22:51):
I thought, well, that was funny.
And then I couldn't get up.
Oh boy, nothing would move.
Yeah, I mean, I couldn't getthe energy, the strength to push
myself in a sitting position orlike that.
My cell phone was nearby andthat's all I had.
(23:13):
I didn't have a wired phone, Ihad one that ran through a
computer.
If I needed it, it was, but itwas in the other room.
So I got my cell phone.
I called my brother I mean hehad a spare key and I said you
know, come on over here and getme up off the floor.
So he had a house, I has ahouse in Royal Oak so he drove
(23:37):
over, got me off the floor.
I seemed normal after that.
So he left.
A few hours later I decided tofix dinner, no problem.
So I thought, well, I need ashower, I'll take a shower.
So I got in, took a shower, hada hard time getting out of the
(24:04):
bathtub, couldn't get my legover the edge of the bathtub and
I'm standing there laughing atmyself.
Well, this is a fine, dumbthing, I mean.
Here I am, take a showerstanding up, and I can't get out
of the bathtub.
What the heck is this?
Yeah.
So I realized if I sat on theedge I could slowly get my legs
(24:26):
over and get out, and I had abig padded shower mat.
So I got onto the edge of thetub, got my legs over and I fell
onto the floor.
And now I was down on the flooragain.
So I deliberately kept my cellphone on the edge of the counter
(24:48):
so I had something and I battedthat off the counter and got it
.
I called my brother I'm on thebathroom floor, come and get me.
So he came over, got me up andI could do things with help.
(25:08):
Right.
So I said, just sit me down onmy bed.
I put on some night shirt orsomething you know and said I'm
too tired to go anywhere now,but if I feel up to it, take me
to the hospital in the morning,the VA hospital.
(25:31):
So the next morning he cameover.
I was up, I had breakfast, Iwas dressed, we went to the
hospital, Went into emergency.
They berated for me, berated atme for not coming the night
before.
Speaker 1 (25:51):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (25:52):
But they couldn't do anything for me anyway.
Yeah, so they sent me to HenryFord in Detroit on West Grand
Uh-huh, right down the streetfrom where I my first house I
lived in, and so I was in.
I was in the ER there for fivedays.
(26:13):
They got me a room, startedgiving me physical therapy and
things like that, and in themeantime my brother and sister
were looking for a place to getme into.
Speaker 1 (26:31):
Right.
So they had figured out thatyou had a stroke at the hospital
.
Speaker 2 (26:36):
Yeah, but I was coming back, I was on the mend,
yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:44):
I want to point something out too.
At no point in this story didyou say you were afraid or
anything.
You just sort of just ah, thisis just what's happening.
I mean, was there any fear inthe back of your mind as all
this was going?
Speaker 2 (26:56):
on None.
Wow, okay, I've been throughtoo much already.
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:01):
I mean, we've talked about a lot of things, so I was
just curious.
So you're just.
This is what it is.
Speaker 2 (27:08):
Yeah, all those months of the Navy dumping off
in the Army, right, right,exactly, the Army didn't know
what to do with me.
Speaker 1 (27:17):
Yeah, yeah, finally gave me back to the navy, yeah,
so here you are.
So you go to Henry Ford andthey determine you probably, at
least for some period of time,shouldn't be on your own they
would not release me to go backhome.
Speaker 2 (27:35):
I had to go to a facility, so they found a place
called my Doctor's Inn, whichwas really for older people.
I mean it was designed for, itwasn't designed for somebody
that was young and active.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
Yeah, and I want to point out when we're talking
young and active, we're notreally talking about age, we're
talking about you.
So anybody who's watching thisknows that your physical age is
way different from your actualage.
It's way different from yourphysical age and your mental age
because you're 100% here.
(28:13):
Oh yeah yeah, and that's gotgotta be a little depressing and
they didn't have therapyequipment.
Speaker 2 (28:22):
They had ladies come in with rubber bands yeah and I
worked with those and I waswalking with a cane and I would
do.
I was on the second floor ofthe facility and I could do laps
on the second floor from myapartment down the hall around
(28:44):
all the way around the buildingback to my apartment.
So I was doing that forexercise and meals were
downstairs at a dining table andI got with a couple of guys
(29:05):
that were more mentally coherentthan the other crowd so I could
talk to them and I mean it wasit was a place they had
activities for the old people.
Yeah, I mean they played old,old music, they played old games
(29:30):
, right, a lot of it was memorystuff, yeah, and I mean I was
going to sleep.
I couldn't gear down to theirspeed at all, so I would mostly
read yeah, spent more time in myroom, had a TV, watched that
(29:50):
occasionally and I was never bigon politics but I always paid
attention to elections.
Yeah.
And there was a lot ofcampaigning going on at that
time.
Some of it was outrageous.
Speaker 1 (30:12):
Nothing like election season.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
And to think that they were spending millions of
dollars to do this just boggledmy mind In some cases a billion
dollars, I mean that's a lot ofmoney if you think about it.
Yep, I thought well, it's not abad time to be in the TV
business.
Speaker 1 (30:33):
Or the consulting business.
Either one right.
So how long were you there,Seemed like years?
Speaker 2 (30:42):
Yeah, probably three or four months.
Speaker 1 (30:48):
All right.
At some point did you like callyour brother and say hey, we've
got to find something else?
I mean, what happened that youended up here at the veterans'
home?
Speaker 2 (30:58):
Well, my car was there but I couldn't use it.
I mean, I wasn't really allowedto drive yet and I had promised
my family I wouldn't driveuntil the doctors gave me an
okay.
So after about four months Igot my brothers to take me back
(31:24):
to Henry Ford to meet with mydoctor and he gave me a test.
I mean, he sat me in the room,question and answers, had me
stand up.
We walked down the halltogether in the back, you know
for mobility, that kind of thingand he signed me off.
(31:44):
He said yeah, I don't see anyreason why you couldn't drive.
You've been driving for a longtime you know Right.
And then I had to see my eyedoctor.
Tom was there both times.
They signed me off.
Yeah, your vision's good, youknow.
(32:07):
And I knew I had cataracts inthe beginnings of glaucoma, so
that was going to have to beaddressed sometime in the future
, right, anyway, tom McCarrollgot me into here, so that was
going to have to be addressedsometime in the future.
Anyway.
Tom McCarroll got me into hereand I've been pretty much happy
(32:27):
ever since.
I do miss the apartmentoccasionally, but I know what I
can't do for myself down thereanymore.
I mean, the washer and dryerwere two stories down in the
basement and there's no way Icould carry bundles of clothes
up and down, plus the number oftrips I'd have to make to them.
(32:52):
Yeah.
And I had a cooking experience.
I was heating up oil to frysome pierogies.
Speaker 1 (33:06):
Oh, love pierogies.
Speaker 2 (33:12):
Wednesday is pierogie day at Sugarbush Inn.
Speaker 1 (33:16):
Oh, I got to come here on a Wednesday then, for
sure.
Speaker 2 (33:19):
Any Wednesday, I'll be glad to take over.
Speaker 1 (33:20):
All right, it's a date.
Speaker 2 (33:24):
And anyway, I heated the oil and I was wearing
sandals instead of regular shoesor even slippers.
Yeah.
And somehow I spilled the oil.
(33:46):
It splashed down and it burnedmy foot.
Oh, in a pattern of the sandals.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So I turned the heat off, puteverything away and tended to my
foot.
I knew what to do.
I even had all this properstuff in my cupboard just in
(34:08):
case and I used like a silveriodide on it.
After I washed it, taped it up.
I said, well, it'll be that fora while.
And then I think it was laterin the day I decided to go down
(34:34):
to emergency at the VA hospitaland they looked at it, did the
same thing I did exactly Right,said you should be good, uh-huh,
and they gave me extra stuff totake care of it with.
So I was doctoring myself and Ihealed up from that.
(34:58):
I still have the discolorationon the skin but the foot is all
healed up.
But that scared my sisterpretty bad.
She was afraid of me cookingagain.
Uh-huh.
(35:22):
So after the stroke happened shethought well, that's it, we
can't let him go back thereanymore.
Right.
My mom was in her 90s living inan apartment in a senior complex
right over here in MacombCounty and at an apartment in a
(35:43):
senior complex right over herein Macomb County and it was the
same building that her sisterand brother-in-law lived in when
they were getting older.
They had passed, she had goneto a nursing home and had passed
away, and I used to drive mymom over to visit them all the
time.
So we were back in the samebuilding.
(36:06):
Mom had her own apartment, nicefurniture, had a view, with a
little tiny balcony that nobodywould step on.
Yeah, just didn't look thatsecure, but she was comfortable.
She was doing things downstairsin the group room.
(36:27):
You know she even got an awardfrom Macomb County as the Senior
of the Year for packing bagsfor the group that gives lunches
away.
Speaker 1 (36:42):
Oh, like Meals on Wheels.
Speaker 2 (36:44):
Yeah, meals on Wheels exactly.
Speaker 1 (36:46):
Oh, that's very nice.
Speaker 2 (36:47):
So she'd go down in the morning and pack 100 bags.
Yeah, and it turns out theywere looking for somebody to be
the senior of the month and theyran an ad on TV that said we
need applications.
So my sister sent one in.
Turned out it was the only onethey got.
(37:09):
So mom got the title by default.
Speaker 1 (37:12):
But in your mom's defense she was doing good stuff
.
Oh yeah, so that's good.
She was thrilled yeah.
Speaker 2 (37:18):
That's pretty amazing .
Thrilled, yeah, that's prettyamazing.
And I mean a city official cameout and they made a big deal of
it at the home to order thecertificate and everything.
So that went all right.
I was there for that, yeah.
But one day the firearms wentoff in her apartment so they
(37:46):
were evacuating the whole floor.
The apartment was full of smoke.
Turned out she'd left one ofthose.
I think it was like asilver-toned pan.
It has the covering on it soyou don't have to use anything
in it.
Oh yeah.
Well, she fried the hell out ofthat one.
She had gone to do laundry andforgot it was on the stove.
(38:10):
Yeah, that's all it took.
So I spent the whole daycleaning the stuff out of the
apartment.
I mean, that soot was oneverything In the cabinets, on
the cabinets.
Speaker 1 (38:22):
It gets everywhere.
Speaker 2 (38:25):
And I must have used a half a dozen bottles of Lysol
and you could still smell thesmoke.
Fortunately, the worst of itwas contained in the kitchen
area, right.
It didn't really get that badin the living room.
It didn't enter the bedroom atall that bad in the living room
and didn't enter the bedroom atall.
We couldn't leave Mom living onher own after that.
Speaker 1 (38:49):
Right, right.
So your sister's seen a coupleof cooking issues.
Yeah, yeah, so I can see that.
So, being here at the VeteransHome as opposed to like a
retirement center, do you findyou?
There's a lot of people herethat are similar to you in age
(39:10):
and in ability, and all of thatI mean, have you made friends
here, or how's that going?
Speaker 2 (39:19):
I've got friends, mm-hmm.
The staff are wonderful.
I know most of the staff fromthe general manager on down
Never had a bad word withanybody.
Don't expect to no, it'sagainst the rules here, anyway,
(39:41):
you know.
That's what I understand.
Yeah, don't expect to, no, it'sagainst the rules here, anyway,
you know.
Speaker 1 (39:44):
That's what I understand, yeah.
Speaker 2 (39:47):
And if you have a problem, take it outside.
You don't need it here.
Speaker 1 (39:50):
Right, well, I mean, you're mobile, you've got a
vehicle and you can go places,and so it's got to be a nice
situation then for you, and soit's got to be a nice situation
then for you and you don't haveto cook.
Speaker 2 (40:04):
Yeah, I don't.
I still do my own laundry, butit's right down the hall, it's
on one level Right, so that'seasy.
Speaker 1 (40:12):
Right.
Well, that's the nice thingabout the new facility is
they're all like one singlelevel, right?
You're not having to go up anddown stairs.
Speaker 2 (40:24):
The one thing that's different.
Everything here is pretty level.
When I go outside of here,every parking lot I've been in
has been like the surface of themoon to me.
It's harder to get around thanI would have thought.
Speaker 1 (40:36):
Now I remember that when we went to lunch the last
time you made a comment aboutand for me, I'm walking on
uneven surfaces all the time, soI didn't even think about it.
Speaker 2 (40:48):
Well, if you're not used to it, it's really strange.
Yeah, yeah.
And you wonder what's wrongwith this place.
Speaker 1 (40:54):
I'll bet I'll bet.
Well, don, we have covered alot.
We've talked a lot about yourlife and the things that you've
done and you know I've shared alot of your stories with other
folks and people love to listento your life.
But you know, as we sort ofkind of wrap up our discussion
(41:21):
today, I always ask the samequestion of everyone before we,
before we're done, and that isyou know, years from now, when
somebody is listening to this,you know and they're listening
all about your life and allabout the things you've done.
What message would you like togive to people you know in the
(41:41):
future?
Speaker 2 (41:45):
Well, I've always tried to be kind to people
because you never know whoyou're going to meet again, and
every experience I've had hasshown me that the world is
getting smaller and smaller bythe day.
I guess it's maybe me aging.
I don't really think the worldhas shrunk any is getting
smaller and smaller by the day.
I guess it's maybe me aging.
Yeah, I don't really think theword has shrunk any, but I do
(42:06):
come in contact with people thathave shared experiences been in
the same part of the world orthe same city or whatever and
it's always interesting to heartheir perspective of whatever
happened.
It's always interesting to heartheir perspective of whatever
happened.
I'm a flyer.
(42:26):
I've been an aviator my wholelife.
My mom said my first words wereyou know which probably meant
airplane.
Yeah, my first toy was a rubberairplane with a Mickey Mouse
head in the pilot seat.
Uh-huh, and I remember the headswolled.
(42:48):
Yeah.
And I had so many greatexperiences flying and being
involved in the flying community.
I still watch a lot of stuff onYouTube right now about well
(43:12):
accident investigations.
Yeah.
Or new airplanes or flying oldairplanes, and I think I like
flying the old airplanes thebest.
The older the better.
I went to Oshkosh one year.
That's a big fly-in they have,and if that was an actual Air
(43:38):
Force it would be the thirdlargest Air Force in the world.
That's how many airplanes showup.
Speaker 1 (43:44):
Wow, that's big.
Speaker 2 (43:46):
And way in the corner in the back of the place I
found a Curtis Pusher.
This goes back to around 1906or 19, 8, somewhere in there,
and the guy flying it was a guynamed Dale Kreitz and he had
(44:13):
more time flying Curtis pushersthan anybody else in the world
and he was very proud of it.
He loved flying that airplaneand it was not like your
conventional airplanes.
It had differences.
One of them, for example youhad a big wheel in front of you
(44:35):
to steer.
Well, the wheel turned therudder.
The wings, the aero arms werecontrolled by leaning the seat,
so the seat would actually dothis.
(44:55):
So somehow you've got to keepyour balance, stay strapped in
hold on to this wheel to turnthe rudder while you're leaning
the seat to turn the plane,Because planes turn by banking.
Yeah.
They don't turn by the rudder Awhole different kind of flying.
They'll fly sideways all day.
You've got to bank the wings toturn the airplane.
Speaker 1 (45:15):
A whole different kind of flying.
Speaker 2 (45:19):
And you don't have any instruments to help.
Yeah, there's no flightinstruments.
Maybe you got a little glasstube that shows you how many
gallons you got left, possibly,but those things you only fly in
like no wind days and fromairports that have plenty of
grass around them, and fromairports that have plenty of
grass around them, because youmight end up coming down
(45:42):
anywhere.
Yeah.
But he's a fascinating man totalk to and I used to go see him
every time I went to Oshkosh.
He was there and years later Ilooked him up on Google and
found out he had a brother andit was the two of them that had
(46:06):
restored the airplane.
So if you look up Dale Kreitzon Google, you get the story.
I'll have to check it out.
C-r-i-t-e-s.
Speaker 1 (46:15):
A couple of farm boys you know, yeah, it almost feels
like your world was small, kindof all along, Like you've
always had these groups ofpeople or these you know your
interests, where you would go.
I mean the world's big right,but wherever you went you seemed
(46:37):
to make it seem like home.
Speaker 2 (46:43):
Yeah, I never felt out of place anywhere really.
Yeah, that's kind of the sensethat I get Is that yeah, I mean,
I'm a Christian, I know Godsees everything, so he's with me
all the time.
Right, remember that book.
God is my Co-Pilot.
Speaker 1 (46:59):
Yes, I do by.
Speaker 2 (47:01):
Robert Johnson.
Yep.
Speaker 1 (47:05):
And what an appropriate book for you.
Speaker 2 (47:08):
I adopted it as my own.
You know, I always felt he waslooking right over my shoulder,
no matter what I was doing, so Ihad to act accordingly.
Speaker 1 (47:22):
Well, I think, if you reflect on your life too,
you've always had that guardianangel, because even when bad
things have happened, goodthings have come out of it.
I think a lot of that's justyour attitude, though you
determine.
What was it?
That's been said that life is1% of what happens to you and
(47:44):
99% of how you react to it.
Speaker 2 (47:47):
It could be.
Speaker 1 (47:47):
Yeah, and I think that you're kind of an example
of it.
Really depends on your attitudeand how you react to things.
Speaker 2 (47:55):
Well, I kind of feel my attitude is, from wherever it
came, has given me like asecond chance every time.
Yeah, I always look for thepositive things whenever
something happens and I say,well, I may have lost this, but
at least I can do that.
Right, you know yeah.
(48:16):
The hardest thing was when theFAA decided my medical didn't
qualify me to fly anymore.
And uh, I mean, I went to adoctor for a flight physical and
he said nope.
Speaker 1 (48:37):
Yeah, that must've been a tough day.
Speaker 2 (48:39):
Yeah, that's.
That's when I learned out forsure I was diabetic and I should
start looking into that.
And I did and learned that Igot it from Agent Orange,
amongst other things, some ofwhich have not bothered me yet.
(49:02):
I've got a heart problem thatis benign.
I do have neuropathy in myhands and feet, but I'm on
medication for that.
I never was a smoker, so Idon't have to deal with all that
(49:24):
issue.
Speaker 1 (49:27):
Right, never got into drugs or heavy use of alcohol
or anything like that.
I think it's close to good,clean living as you can get
Really.
I mean you've really taken careof yourself and you have your
faith and your health and yourfamily.
Speaker 2 (49:48):
And my faith really has led me into a position where
I'm always looking out to tryto help somebody else, maybe
somebody not as fortunate.
I've always come to bat for theyoung, you know, the less
fortunate.
Yeah, it started with bullies.
(50:12):
I responded badly to bullies.
Speaker 1 (50:16):
Yes, I think I remember a story about that too.
Speaker 2 (50:20):
Yes, I think I remember a story about that too,
and I realized the best way todeal with bullies is to go up to
the biggest guy in the bunchand take him down, uh-huh, or
scare him so bad.
He didn't want anything to dowith me and for the most part it
worked yeah.
Speaker 1 (50:39):
You know, I think bullies are just insecure people
.
Oh yeah, they pick on peopleweaker than them, right?
And the minute you challengethat, they aren't so tough
anymore.
Yeah Well, I appreciate youspending all this time with me
talking, and we definitely haveto make sure that we go to lunch
(51:05):
when I'm out here for otherstories.
But, don, thanks again forspending time with me.
This has been amazing.
Speaker 2 (51:12):
Oh, you've been a good interviewer, Bill.
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (51:15):
I appreciate that.
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