Tactical Wisdom: David Dorrier's Journey from Air Force to Entrepreneur

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Today is Tuesday, July 29th 2025.
We're talking with DavidDorrier, who served the United
States Air Force, so welcome,David.

Speaker 2 (00:08):
Yes, thank you so much for inviting me to be here,
Bill.

Speaker 1 (00:13):
It's a pleasure and it's a pleasure to finally meet
you, as we said before therecording.
So, david, I'm going to startout super simple when and where
were you born?
Super?

Speaker 2 (00:22):
simple when and where were you born?
When was I born?
November 25th 1956.
I was born in Bayshore, newYork, but did all of my growing
up in Babylon, long Island, newYork.

Speaker 1 (00:35):
Well, so tell me about growing up in Long Island.

Speaker 2 (00:44):
Well, you know, I think, like many folks, is not
realizing how good you have itGrowing up on the shores of the
great South Bay, having a boatin the family, going out and
clamming and crabbing andfishing and water skiing and
just a hop skip and a jump overto Fire Island and Jones Beach.
And you know you kind of takeit for granted until you're not
in a place like that.

(01:04):
You know you kind of take itfor granted until you're not in
a place like that.
It's, uh, it was it was fun, butit was also challenging as a
kid as well, right, somebodywrote a song about fire Island,
didn't they?
I'm sure I'm sure they havemovies and, uh, I'm sure there's
songs.

Speaker 1 (01:18):
Oh, yeah, yeah, so did you have brothers and
sisters growing up?

Speaker 2 (01:22):
I did.
I'm the oldest of five.
We were very close in age.
I have two brothers, Mark andJohn, and then I have twin
sisters, Sharon and Karen.
They're the youngest.

Speaker 1 (01:32):
So almost a baseball team Almost Now.
As kids did you guys do a lottogether.
Were you fairly close in thatrespect?

Speaker 2 (01:42):
Well, that's a great question.
No, not really.
It was very competitive in thefamily.
We were great when we would goout as a group and visit other
families and my mother wouldeven get compliments Boy, your
kids are so great.
But as soon as we got back inthe car or as soon as we got
home, we were killing each other.

Speaker 1 (02:01):
Did your mom kind of want to know where those kids
went, the ones that were beinggreat?

Speaker 2 (02:06):
Exactly.

Speaker 1 (02:07):
Well, yes, yes, so, speaking of your mother, tell me
a little bit about her.

Speaker 2 (02:13):
Well, yes, great question years of therapy and uh
, and a variety of other things,learning about my mother and
growing up and and, and learnedabout why the trauma came into
my life as a kid and so on.

(02:33):
That my it.
It came from a narcissisticmother of um.
So you know, I don't know whereelse to start.
However, I should have startedwith the things that I learned.
You know, I learned, please,and thank you from my mother.
I also learned how to cook frommy mother.
I was the oldest of five and shewas working, my father was

(02:54):
working and she was just tiredof walking in the door.
You know, as kids, we don'trealize this.
You know, here's mom walking inthe door.
The first thing out of my mouthwas when are we going to eat?
And not realizing until I wasan adult, being in the workforce
myself and understanding whatit was like working eight or six

(03:14):
or 10 hours a day, and thencoming home and after all that
and the first thing you hear isthis kid, when are we going to
eat?
So she taught me how to cookand how to prepare things, but
and I'm thankful for that,because today I love to cook and
today, you know, please andthank you as a part of my, as a
part of my repertoire, so I'mthankful for that.

Speaker 1 (03:36):
Yeah, I mean, even in the most difficult situations,
right, there's always somethingto be gained from it.
I think, what about your father?
You said he worked a lot.

Speaker 2 (03:47):
My father was very industrious.
My father started his ownbusiness with five kids and I'm
sure it was tough.
And when I'm asked about myfather, my first reaction is I
really didn't know him.
He died in the early 80s.
He was only 54 years old at thetime.
I was already in the service atthat point I was in Guam, so I

(04:11):
had to fly home from Guam andI'm standing over the coffin
saying to myself I don't evenknow this guy.
In some ways I felt I wasafraid of him in some ways, but
he worked hard.
I should also say about myfather.
The funeral director said thathe has never seen so many

(04:31):
flowers in his life.
So that said something to meabout my father, about his
reputation outside of the family.
He had very high regard and andand and I also learned some
things from one of his bestfriends years and years after my
father passed that I could tellthat my father had a good heart

(04:53):
, was very compassionate, but athome it was very different so a
lot of people knew him, but youdid exactly yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (05:02):
So do you think maybe you got your work ethic from
him though?

Speaker 2 (05:06):
I think we all did, we for the most part.
I have that entrepreneurialspirit.
Even when I was in the militaryI've always felt that I've had
that entrepreneurial spirit.
My brother John, he, he tookover the business from my father
and he's been very successful.
My other brother, mark,business from my father, and
he's been very successful.

(05:26):
My other brother, mark, he'salso six.
We are all five of us are verysuccessful in our own ways and I
think we we have adopted someof that entrepreneurial spirit
from my father.

Speaker 1 (05:35):
So it begs the question do you think it's
nature or nurture?
Do you think it's in your DNAto be entrepreneurial, or do you
think it's something youlearned from your dad or
somewhere in between I?

Speaker 2 (05:44):
think it's somewhere in between.
We never sat down and said thisis how you do it, this is what
you do, this is how you start,this is what you think about.
I didn't go to business school,or my brother John did, but uh,
I I think it's in the DNA.

Speaker 1 (06:02):
Okay, All right.
Well, let's uh, let's shiftgears and talk a little bit
about school.
What was school like for yougrowing up?

Speaker 2 (06:09):
I didn't like school, I liked working and I still
feel that way today.
I learned best by just doing it, by getting out there, making
the errors, doing some researchI'm not a book reader, doing
some research I'm not a bookreader when it came.
I spent years in working intechnology and the way that I

(06:30):
learned was just dive into thispiece of software and see what
happens when I click this, whathappens when I click that.
It's just learning.
I've learned by the seat of mypants.
I've gone to the Dave D Schoolof Hard Knocks.

Speaker 1 (06:43):
Sometimes the best place to get your diploma.
So was there anything, though,at school that you enjoyed doing
, like?
What were some of the thingsthat brought you joy?

Speaker 2 (06:55):
Yeah, you know that's a great question.
When I was in 11th grade inhigh school, my English class
for that semester focused onmedia and radio television
broadcasting.
Again, we're talking.
I graduated high school in 75,so we're looking at 72, 73,

(07:18):
somewhere in that area.
But I grew up with a fascinationwith radio broadcasting.
I had a transistor radiounderneath my pillow whenever I
went to sleep.
The radio was always on.
We had two local stations thereon Long Island that I would
listen to all the time and also,you know, some big powerhouse
stations coming out of New YorkCity WABC, wnbc and so on.

(07:42):
But radio was just afascination for me.
So that one year, that onesemester in English class I know
, I got an A and that wassomething very rare.
And me and another student weput together a mock radio show
of some sort because we had todo some sort of and we had a.

(08:04):
We were all tasked with doingsome sort of a skit of some sort
and I just loved it.
And at that same time I wentdown to the local radio station.
They were offering ColumbiaSchool of Broadcasting there at
the station and I had to take atest, like an ASVAB test almost
to come in and I didn't scorequite high enough on the test,

(08:27):
so I couldn't go into the school.
But eventually radiobroadcasting did eventually
become a big part of my life.

Speaker 1 (08:36):
Okay, and so when I think about radio, so at that
time you had some really goodrock and roll stations.
So at that time you had somereally good rock and roll
stations, but you also had someother talk radio that was around
, usually on AM stations, Iguess.
So what attracted you?
Was it the music stations orwas it talk stations, or was it
kind of a mix?

Speaker 2 (08:57):
It was all music stations and I don't know what
it was about it and when I know,when I was very young and
listening, I thought all thesebands were in this huge building
.
This radio station had thishuge building and every floor
had different bands on it andjust said, okay, you play, you
play, you play.
Uh, there was just somethingabout that medium.

(09:18):
And I was also fascinated withwith old time radio, with the
old radio shows the War of theWorlds, with what's his name,
the director that he had theradio show.
I think it was back in the 30swhere the Martians were coming
to New Jersey and so on, justthe old radio plays.

(09:41):
I was fascinated with those.

Speaker 1 (09:43):
Okay, so even going way back, um, just curious, on
the rock and roll front, thislike completely has nothing to
do with the conversation.
You remember don kershner'srock concert?

Speaker 2 (09:54):
yes, I, I think, don, I know, yes, I do.
Yes, and I don't know if armedforces radio had it, but I know
I heard it over in Guam.
But yes, I'm very familiar withit.
Okay.

Speaker 1 (10:06):
Yeah, because it used to be on late night.
It was the last show that wason before all the channels went
out, so that's how I rememberthat.
So you make it through school.
I'm assuming you get yourdiploma.

Speaker 2 (10:21):
I graduated by the whiskers on my chin.
Yes, I don't know if I wouldmake it through school today,
but I did.
I graduated.
I did get left back in thefourth grade.
A couple of things happened infourth grade.
I got glasses for the firsttime and I'm sure I deserved to
get left back.
But I did get left back oneyear.

Speaker 1 (10:41):
So your eyesight impacted you.

Speaker 2 (10:45):
Yeah, I didn't get glasses until I was in the
fourth grade.
The doctor wondered how Ididn't get hit by a car walking
across the street.
We figured it out.
I was at a baseball game.
I was at a Yankee game with myfather and my brothers and I
kept asking my father what's thescore?
What's the score?

(11:05):
And he says the scoreboard'sright there.
It's right there, and I can'tsee it.
I can't see it.
And so he finally came home andsaid listen, june, my mother,
you better bring this kid to gethis eyes checked.
And I still remember to thisday when I put on those glasses
for the first time and I'm inthe room and there's all these
diplomas and what have you onthe wall?

(11:25):
And I'm seeing all of thisstuff for the first time.
It was just unbelievable how itopened things up wow, I never
really looked at that way.

Speaker 1 (11:34):
I mean, my eyesight has steadily gotten bad, but I
didn't have that moment likethat.
That's incredible.
Yeah, all right, so did you.
You know, I always ask kind ofdid you play any sports or
anything like that in highschool?

Speaker 2 (11:48):
no, no, we played baseball with the kids in the
neighborhood with in the parkacross the street.
But no, uh, no, no organizedsport.
Well, little league, I playedthat okay, all right.

Speaker 1 (12:00):
Oh, by the way, orson wells is the name you were
looking for.

Speaker 2 (12:03):
Orson Welles yes.

Speaker 1 (12:04):
It took me a minute.
Yeah, I think it was like 1938or something like that, that
they did that stuff Anyway.
So I digress.
So you make it through school,though you get your diploma.
It's 1975.
What's next?

Speaker 2 (12:21):
Well, interesting, at this point I wasn't thinking
about the military.
I was working for a company atthe time, a warehouse company.
However, a couple of yearsprior to this, I did try to get
into the Air Force.
At that time you could go inwithout a high school diploma,

(12:41):
as long as your parents wouldsign.
I was under 18, I guess 16 or17, whatever I was at the time.
Uh, but you still had to takethe ASFAB test.
But you had to score higher onit and I didn't score high
enough on the ASFAB test to beallowed in.
So I did.
I finished high school, I was inworking for a company and then

(13:03):
the company moved out of stateand I had to figure out what am
I going to do?
So I said, well, I'm going togo and talk to the talk to the
recruiter.
So I originally went down tothe Navy Now originally went
down to the Coast Guard becauseI thought it was cool, I want to
work at the Coast Guard stationover on Fire Island, right, and

(13:23):
uh, uh.
But.
But the coast guard said no, wegot, cause they're so small.
He said, no, we got two, we gota year, year and a half waiting
list to get in.
I said I don't want to waitthat long, I don't want to go in
the Navy.
Even though I grew up on thewater, I'm saying to myself, I
don't even know how to swim.
I got, I don't want to dealwith the Navy, so I went down to
the Air Force and uh, yep andthat's.

(13:44):
I went in with a guaranteed job.

Speaker 1 (13:47):
Okay and um, what was that experience like for you?
Uh, you took the ASVAB, youwent to to the enlistment
station, right, all the physicaland everything Right.
And then, um, what, what jobwere you offered?

Speaker 2 (14:01):
I, I, uh, volunteered uh for air, air transportation,
air cargo.
Uh, the AFSC at that time was605.
They changed it to two T two,but it was air logistics,
loading everything and anythingthat you can fit onto anything
that flew.

Speaker 1 (14:19):
Okay, and what was the?
What was the timing betweenenlistment and actual going to
basic training?

Speaker 2 (14:27):
I was on delayed enlistment for eight-ish months.

Speaker 1 (14:31):
I think, okay, and how was that?
As I know, I was in delayedenlistment for a while myself
when I joined the military.
How was that for you, like thatperiod of time where you're
kind of in limbo maybe?

Speaker 2 (14:44):
Yeah, period of time where you're kind of in limbo
maybe.
Yeah, Well, I was onunemployment at the time because
the job that I was working atleft which entitled me to get
unemployment, and I was able tostay on unemployment without any
issues for that entire time,because I would go in and just
tell them I'm going in the airforce and here's my date, that
I'm going in.
So I, I was making this money.

(15:06):
My parents let me stay at home.
They didn't charge me any rentbecause they knew I was going to
.
I was going and I was just.
It was, it was party time.

Speaker 1 (15:16):
Eight months of no responsibility, almost.

Speaker 2 (15:19):
Exactly.

Speaker 1 (15:20):
Nice, well, talk, talk to us a bit about, uh,
basic training and what it waslike to arrive there.
What, what, what are your firstimpressions of that?

Speaker 2 (15:32):
Great question.
Uh, it's well, I can stillvisualize it.
It's like anybody that it's,it's, it's, it's, it's, it's,
it's changed.
Your world changes, but I feltthat I adapted well.
I adapted well to the, to theregime, the regiment, the, the

(15:53):
knowing when to wake up and whento go to bed, and what you're
going to do here and what you'regoing to do there.
I stumbled like every kid, I Inaturally I have one leg a
little shorter than the other,so I was called the duck,
because whenever we marched Ialways waddled a little bit from
side to side.
I didn't realize that I didthat until I was in the service.

(16:15):
I felt that I adapted well.
Prior to going into service.
I was a loner.
I didn't really socialize withfolks.
I had.
I had things going, voices inmy head and so on, but all of
that kind of lifted when I gotthere and I just fit in.

Speaker 1 (16:38):
It was, uh, just kind of a natural thing for you then
, huh.

Speaker 2 (16:42):
To a certain extent, even though that that you know,
learning about myself as yearsgo by, I kind of beat to a, beat
to a different drum a littlebit, but I, I kind of do things
my own way, but I, I liked it.

Speaker 1 (16:56):
I, I loved the service, I loved my time in the
service well, talk to me a bitabout, like, if you, if, if you
know, you know if you justencountered someone, and you're
talking about your military time.
What do you remember most aboutbasic training?
Is there something during basictraining that pops into your
head?

Speaker 2 (17:14):
So, um, uh, that's a great question.
It's just, it just had afeeling to it.
It just it, just uh, it alsohad a smell to it.
It just it, just uh, it got.
It also had a smell to it.
These brand new uniforms putand the new t-shirts and and the
barracks we were in the iffolks were familiar with the Air
Force Lackland Air Force Base,they, we were in the old

(17:37):
barracks.
Uh, they had these new ones,but we were in these old World
War II barracks.
Two story but it to me it had asmell, uh, the smell of new
green fatigues now.

Speaker 1 (17:50):
Do you ever like, do you ever smell that now and it
takes you like right back.
Do you ever encounter somethingthat's similar to that and it
just kind of takes you rightback to that moment?

Speaker 2 (18:00):
I, I, uh, I don't know if I have that smell.
There are smells that makes methink of my father, not
specifically my father, but whatmy father did working with
blacktop, and whenever I hear orsmell that tar and diesel fuel,
that reminds me of the vehiclesmy father had and also the

(18:22):
blacktop and the seal coatingthat he did.

Speaker 1 (18:25):
Yeah, it's interesting how that can happen.
Same with music, too.
Right, there's songs that takeyou right back.
Yes, you probably have amillion of those.
So you get through basictraining.
And for the Air Force, how longwas it at that time?

Speaker 2 (18:40):
Six weeks.

Speaker 1 (18:41):
Okay.
And then what happens at theend of six weeks?
Six weeks, okay.

Speaker 2 (18:44):
And then what happens at the end of six weeks?
At the end of six weeks, thenit's off to your school.
Well, I knew, going into basictraining, what my job was going
to be with air transportation.
I may not have known where theschoolhouse was going to be.
So after basic then they put uson a bus, sent us up to Shepard

(19:09):
Air Force Base, which is up inWichita Falls.

Speaker 1 (19:11):
Texas, okay, and you went there to learn how to do
the basics of your job then yeah, air transportation, and I
think that was about seven weeks.
Okay, and was that?
Did that?
Did that feel more like anextension of basic training, or
was it a little bit more freedom?
How did that work out for you?

Speaker 2 (19:29):
it is a lot of freedom they had.
Uh, this was uh, this was 1976.
They had beer vending machinesI remember those david.

Speaker 1 (19:40):
I remember beer vending.
It's like 75 cents or whatever.

Speaker 2 (19:44):
Yeah, I was not.
I've never been a really bigbeer drinker or drinker in
period, but yes, I never boughtone out of the vending machine.
It was like night and day.
Yeah, there were restrictionsas far as you had a roommate, I
guess you had to be at certainplaces at certain times, but it
was very relaxed.
Yeah, yeah, and then so you getdone with that.

Speaker 1 (20:04):
You had to be at certain places at certain times,
but it was very relaxed.
Yeah, yeah and then uh.
So you get done with that.
Where?
Where was your first dutystation then?

Speaker 2 (20:11):
First duty station was Anderson air force base Guam
.

Speaker 1 (20:15):
Okay Now.
Did you go home at all inbetween all of this?

Speaker 2 (20:19):
I did.
I went home and it happened tobe around Thanksgiving by the
time I did go home.
I went home for 30 days andthings at home, even though I
was only away for a couple ofmonths at basic training, the
six weeks and then the sevenweeks at tech school.
Just being away for that periodof time, it seemed like

(20:39):
everything changed.
People that I knew were doingother things and so on and so
forth.
It was I probably shouldn'thave been home for a full 30
days.
I think I wore out my welcome.
My parents were ready for me togo by the time those 30 days
were up.

Speaker 1 (20:55):
Yeah, were you ready to go?
I mean, 30 days does seem likea long time.

Speaker 2 (21:00):
Yeah, uh, I think I was ready to go.
I I was.
Yeah, I think I was ready to go.
I was ready for this adventure.
I'm ready to.
I'm on my way across the otherside of the world.
I was going to be.
You know, flying on planes wasbrand new basic training first
time on a plane.
Coming home after tech school,again new to plane.

(21:22):
And now I'm going to go toCalifornia, travis Air Force
Base, catch a flight out ofTravis to take me all the way
over to Guam.
I mean, I think, if anything, Iwas pretty excited at this
point.

Speaker 1 (21:34):
Oh, I'll bet.
So talk to me about Guam.
I mean, how was that?
How was the trip over?
And then what was it like whenyou got there?

Speaker 2 (21:41):
I remember that we were on a DC-8.
It seemed like the flight wasgoing to take forever because
it's, if you're familiar with,from California to Hawaii it's
five hours and then from Hawaiito Guam is seven hours.
So it seemed like it tookforever.
But by the time we got there itwas it was New Year's Eve

(22:02):
morning.
It was very early in themorning on new year's eve, 1976.
Because of the internationaldate line, I never saw december
29th.
I think it was december 29th ordecember 30th.
I never saw that day, sosomebody owes me a day it took a
whole day away.

Speaker 1 (22:20):
Lucky you weren't flying.
Lucky you weren't flying onyour birthday.
It lost that.

Speaker 2 (22:24):
Exactly.

Speaker 1 (22:25):
Yeah, so Guam on New Year's Eve day.
Talk to me about that.

Speaker 2 (22:31):
Uh, it was the again, I guess smells really stand out
.
If that that smell of that,that heat and the jungle of the
humidity which you can cut witha knife, it was just very.
I still remember that it'salmost, in a way, can take your
breath away that humidity, ifyou're not used to that.

(22:53):
I love Guam.
I love the beach Guam is.
I mean, it's surrounded bybeach.
It's 36 miles by six miles.
At its widest point there is abeach on the base.
Tele, uh, telefofo, telefufu,telefofo, something like that.
There's a, there's a beach onthe base.
I had I was working swing shiftso I had every morning to go to

(23:15):
the beach.
Uh, I was black when I.
There's pictures of me when Icame home on leave.
I spent a lot of time in thesun.

Speaker 1 (23:24):
That sounds really nice.
So tell me about your job there.
What were you doing and whatwas it like kind of being the
new guy, and just let's talkthrough that a little bit.

Speaker 2 (23:33):
Yeah, so got there as a slick sleeve.
I had no stripes.
But by the time I got there and, yes, being the new guy, there
were a couple of other new guyswith me at that same time, so we
were all kind of workingthrough this together.
But I know, my first day in thebarracks, I was welcomed, I

(23:55):
created friendships.
There's one guy that I'm stillin touch with to this day,
harley.
He lives up in Maine and westay in touch with one another.
So I created some goodfriendships this day, harley, he
lives up in Maine and we stayin touch with one another.
So there, um, so I created somegood friendships.
I I eventually got a car, a Guambomb, while I was there, and so
I was the popular guy in thebarracks that are with our

(24:16):
little group of guys and drivingdown to the beach, driving
downtown, going to the fancyhotels and what have you, and I
just loved it.
I loved my job.
We were kind of an in-transitstation from flights coming from
the Pacific, coming from theOrient, going back to the States

(24:37):
and from the States goingacross.
So there's a lot of in-transitstuff and certainly cargo coming
off to replenish the supplythere in Guam.
But I loved working aroundplanes.
I should have said, even as akid, that smell of jet fuel, of
those infrequent times that wewould drive past Kennedy Airport

(24:57):
and you could smell that fuel,or driving into the airport for
whatever reason, that smell ofthe fuel.
And I just loved the planes andthe size of them.
And here I was working on aflight line, working around
airplanes.
The smells, the sounds, the youknow everything about those
planes.
I just loved it the C5, the 141, eventually the C17 and the

(25:22):
C130.
Flying on those planes andloading them is just.

Speaker 1 (25:27):
I just loved it yeah, c130, that's a an interesting.
I flew a lot on c130s when wewere overseas.
But you're right, there's athere's a smell, a distinctive
smell to that, absolutely, butit sounds like a wonderful
experience.
How long long were you in Guam?

Speaker 2 (25:52):
I was in Guam this time.
I was in Guam three separatetimes.
This first time I wasunaccompanied, so I was there
for 15 months, and after Guam Iwas supposed to go to Sardinia,
italy.
I had orders to go to Sardinia.
The day that they were comingto pick up my household goods or
my baggage from my room, I gota call from personnel, I guess,

(26:14):
and they said your orders havebeen canceled.
Where do you want to go?
And I said well, I want to goto the Philippines or Korea.
So I ended up going to Koreaafter Guam.

Speaker 1 (26:24):
Okay, and how was that?
What was Korea like for you?

Speaker 2 (26:28):
Uh, to me, I, I, I, I loved all the places I went to,
for a variety of reasons.
Uh, korea, uh, just the well.
First of all, that's theweather.
The weather was very similar towhat I remember from New York
those hot, sticky summers andthe cold, wet winters.
I love the topography.

(26:50):
I love traveling, getting onthe bus, going on a train,
traveling throughout the country.
People were very cordial.
I didn't eat a lot of theexotic foods.
I love the bulgogi and rice andI like kimchi.
I love kimchi.
Uh, so I, I, I, I liked Korea.
So you really assimilated kindof into the culture to a certain

(27:13):
extent, because I and then Ieventually married a Korean
woman and we were married forseven years.

Speaker 1 (27:19):
Okay, was that on this tour that you met her?
Yes, okay, do you want to talkabout that?

Speaker 2 (27:25):
Yes, uh, so at that time in Korea there were, um,
there were many women that wereKorean women that were looking
for, um, american men to marryand so on, and uh, I, I, I was
never, very, very, I did nothave a lot of experience with

(27:46):
women up to that point, andgirlfriends, and really had no
experience and thought that, nomatter who I marry, it's going
to be a perfect situation.
She did speak English very well, more so than others, and she
dressed very Western and I was20 years old at the time.
And you think that no matterwho you marry, it's all going to

(28:10):
just be just like the movies?
Of course it wasn't like themovies and it took work and,
yeah, it just didn't work out.

Speaker 1 (28:17):
Yeah, so did she come back to the States with you
then?

Speaker 2 (28:20):
Yes, so we were married for seven years.
So after Korea I was thenstationed in Homestead, florida.
So she was with me at thatpoint.
I guess she wasn't an Americancitizen yet.
No, but I think she had to havesome sort of a visa.
After Homestead Florida we wentback to Guam.

(28:42):
Now it was my second tour onGuam and during that time she
got her citizenship.
While we were on Guam thatsecond time, Okay, did you have
any children?
No kids.

Speaker 1 (28:54):
Okay, all right.
So anything stick out in yourmind about being stationed in
Florida before you went back toGuam?

Speaker 2 (29:03):
Well, I loved it down .
We were in Homestead down therein Southern Florida.
One of the things thatsurprised me was well, it was a
lot of swampland down thereduring the summer months.
Those mosquitoes are bitingright through your uniform.
It was crazy.
The winter I was kind ofsurprised.
Not that it got cold At times,it got cold enough overnight

(29:26):
where there'd be kind of a filmof ice on the windshield.
It would very quickly melt away.
But I was surprised that itwould be get cold enough to have
that little bit of ice.

Speaker 1 (29:39):
Yeah, that's kind of surprising.
So you, uh, you leave there,you go back to Guam.
Now, now you're married, it'san accompanied tour.
Accompanied tour.
Um, how was that different fromthe first time you were there?

Speaker 2 (29:50):
well, now I've got a base house, I have a two-bedroom
home.
It was absolutely beautiful.
I was there now because it'saccompanied.
It's now a three-year tour, um,so I guess it's.
It's it's just now the, thefamily life and having a home

(30:11):
together.
And and while we were inhomestead florida, we had a very
tiny little apartment, but nowwe had this huge house wow so
living, living the life.

Speaker 1 (30:22):
You're still going to the beach at this time, and all
that too.

Speaker 2 (30:25):
Yeah, it was a little different this time.
I wasn't the single guy.
I wasn't hopping in the car,going here, going there, like it
was before.
A lot of it to me was alsolearning how to be a husband,
learning how to be a spouse,learning how to be accountable
to someone else.

(30:46):
I grew up being that loner ofnot talking to people, not
communicating, not learningabout how to treat women and how
to start relationships and howto talk.
So those were a lot ofstruggles.
However, with that said, it wason.

(31:09):
This second tour on Guam iswhen I got started in radio
broadcasting, part-time,off-base at a rock and roll AM
station.

Speaker 1 (31:18):
Okay, well, talk to us a little bit about that, and
how did that come about?

Speaker 2 (31:23):
That's an interesting , that's a great story I love
telling.
This story is uh, there was aguy that was in the building
where I was working on base andhe was working part-time for the
radio station and I told himI'll do anything, I'll file
records, sweep the floors,whatever it takes, just to get
my foot in the door.

(31:44):
Because I still had thisfascination with radio when I
was in Korea.
I went down to the local armedforces station there on Osan and
at that time they had they wereproducing one or two local
shows and I went down toaudition to do one of these
local shows and he put me in thestudio, put a microphone in

(32:07):
front of me, gave me a scriptand said read this.
And up to this point I had noon-air experience, no training
at all, and he said I don't haveenough time to work with you.
So I kind of gave, I gave it upat that point.
But now this opportunity inGuam.
So I went down to the radiostation with this guy one time
and he was this was back withrecords queuing up a record,

(32:31):
putting, putting uh the reel toreels and bringing in the CBS
news at exactly the top of thehour following this music wheel,
use the 45s and the albums andthe library of music, and
reading all of your dials,because you also had to log what

(32:53):
the transmitter was doing youhad to do that on an hourly
basis and your commercials andso on and the board.
You have a board in front ofyou with dials and switches and
all this other stuff and it justcame very natural to me.
I think it's that logisticalmind.
I ended up in a logisticscareer field where you have

(33:17):
planes coming in at a certaintime, they have to be on the
ground for only a certain amountof time and have to be in the
air at a certain time beforethere are delays and people
having to answer why did thishappen?
So my mind was always kind oflike that I can picture in my

(33:39):
mind of the plane coming in, ofwhat we had to download and what
we had to upload and gettingthings staged.
And radio was kind of like thatof where are my hands, what's
coming up next?
What do I have to do?
Where do I have to plan?
How many records in advance doI need to have pulled out?
So I'm prepared along the way.

Speaker 1 (33:59):
So it came very natural to me okay, all right,
and that makes sense it all.
It almost sounds like anengineering component to it,
though, right yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 (34:10):
Back in those days it was very labor intensive radio.
You had to plan your bathroombreaks appropriately and hope to
god that the record doesn'tskip it's funny you say that, um
, but yeah, but yeah.

Speaker 1 (34:23):
So I mean that's what a great experience though, what
a great way to kind of breakinto it with, uh, very little
downside and a ton of upsideright.

Speaker 2 (34:33):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I uh, I guess I didn't finish the
story.
I went down and visited downthere and then, less than a week
later, the program directorcalled me and he says hey, I had
this guy quit, do you want ajob?
Uh, and so I started workingSaturday nights from six to
midnight, and then again Sundayfrom noon to six, and from on
Saturdays, six to nine, Ibabysat a three hour canned

(34:59):
program.
It was Gary Owens soundtrack ofthe sixties.
Do you remember Gary Owens?

Speaker 1 (35:04):
I do.

Speaker 2 (35:06):
From from, he's.
The guy from laughing is wasthe announcer with his hand over
his ear.

Speaker 1 (35:12):
Yeah, yeah, gary.

Speaker 2 (35:13):
Owens.
It was a great program, but itwas also a great way for me to
learn, because you're it's.
The program would come on arecord and so you'd have to
queue it up at the beginning ofthat segment.
It would play the nationalcommercials.
Then you'd have to stop it,play the local commercials and
whatever else needed to beplayed locally.

(35:34):
But you're also looking at theclock.
You're also making sure that.
Are we going to get right thereto the top of the hour?
Because at the top of the hourI had to bring in the CBS news
news feed live, and so that was.
You know it's, it's.
Oh, I love that planning offiguring it all out.
You know what do I got to do tomake sure I get there?

Speaker 1 (35:52):
right, well, and you want to.
You don't want to get there toosoon and you don't certainly
don't want to get there too lateexactly right, yeah, and so how
long did you do that?
How long were you on guam andthen how long did you do the
broadcasting?

Speaker 2 (36:04):
So radio broadcasting was a part of my life for 15
years.
I guess.
I spent about two years on Guamworking radio.
I was there on Guam for a totalof three years Two, two and a
half years I guess I was doingit and so I knew that well.

(36:25):
I left Guam that second timeand I was going to Travis.
So before I left, before I leftGuam, I was sending out air
checks.
I was sending out cassetteswith a sample of my voice and a
resume to a bunch of radiostations in that, uh, travis is
there between San Francisco andand and Sacramento in that area,

(36:50):
and I I we got there, my wifeand I got to Travis.
We checked into the building Ihad just I hadn't even started
my in processing yet and Icalled the local station right
there in Vacaville and he sayshey, we've been waiting for you,
come on down, we got a job foryou.
So I was on the air at thatradio station before I started

(37:14):
my in processing into into thebase.

Speaker 1 (37:18):
That's.
That's an incredible story allby itself, right there, yeah.

Speaker 2 (37:23):
You really had the part-time you really had the bug
, then I mean that's yeah, I did, I, I was, uh, I was very
motivated, very driven, uh, I.
There were more than there wereother occasions where I was
buckling down, putting out myresumes, putting out tapes and
so on, and uh, I stayed in radio, stayed in radio, uh, and you

(37:46):
know, this period was part-time,but then I went into full-time
radio.
I came off active duty atTravis in 1986.
Um, or whatever, it was 84, 86,I forget.
But I came off active duty.
The Air Force had a programcalled Palace Chase which, uh,

(38:07):
you can come off your your, youcan get out of your orders or
your your enlistment early.
You just have to serve doublethe time in the reserves.
Okay, so I, I came off activeduty after 10 years, went into
the reserves, did spend a totalof 18 years in the reserves
after that, but I wasn't goingto give up those 10 years active

(38:28):
duty.

Speaker 1 (38:29):
No, I don't blame you .
I don't blame you at all.
So you were just two years shyof retirement then from the
military when you got done.

Speaker 2 (38:40):
Well, 10 years, I was 10 years active.
Right and, and then 18 years inthe reserve oh, 18 years.

Speaker 1 (38:46):
My, I'm sorry, I I misunderstood.
I thought you said eight.

Speaker 2 (38:49):
I was like oh yeah, I was like you're this close.
Yeah, yeah, no, 18, it was atotal of 28 years.

Speaker 1 (38:54):
Yes, okay and so this .
So, at this time, when you'restill married, um was your wife
supportive of your radioambitions?

Speaker 2 (39:07):
Not really, and it was evident when it was getting
close to those 10 years where Iwanted to get out.
I was looking for jobs.
I was even offered a couple ofjobs.
I was offered a job up inCrescent City, california, which
is right on the coast, rightpretty much on the Oregon border
, just absolutely beautiful upthere.

(39:28):
They offered me a job and mywife was not.
This is my wife from Korea.
She was not supportive.
She wanted me to stay in themilitary.
I ended up re-enlisting uh, uh,uh.
About a year.
My enlistment was coming up atabout nine years or eight,
whatever years at that point andso I ended up because of her, I

(39:50):
ended up re-enlisting.
Well, a year after that I I gota divorce and that's when I did
the palace chase.

Speaker 1 (39:57):
After that, Okay, all right.
What was it like for you tocome on well, this is so when I
usually when I ask this question, uh, I think the answer is a
little different, but you werereally kind of assimilating into
civilian life anyway.
But what was it like for you tocome off from active duty and
now you're you're done with thefull-time military and now

(40:19):
you're in the civilian world.
How was that for you?

Speaker 2 (40:22):
Well, you're right, I was very fortunate because, yes
, these radio jobs werepart-time, but I also had other
part-time jobs.
When I was in Florida, I wasdelivering newspapers in the
morning.
I didn't have to be to workuntil noon every day, so I was
delivering newspapers early inthe morning.
I didn't have to be to workuntil noon every day, so I was
delivering newspapers early inthe morning.

(40:43):
I was also had a.
Before I had the radio job inCalifornia I was also doing some
some well, no, I forget, yeah,but I did the.
Yeah, I did the newspapers inFlorida, in Florida.
So I had these, these part-timejobs when I was air force.
So the transition, the weirdestpart of it was I went, I was in

(41:06):
the same career field uh, airtransportation, active duty, and
then air transportation in thereserve.
So one of my first weekends ofreserve duty was working in the
same office where I was workingactive duty at Travis.

Speaker 1 (41:22):
Now we're some of the same people there.
Oh yeah, oh boy, how was that?

Speaker 2 (41:26):
You know.
So it was good.
But I remember how I was as anactive duty person, when the
reservists would come in for theweekend, and how we treated
those reservists on the weekend.
You know, think.
You know, look at these,they're just here.
They're just here doing theirtime.

(41:48):
They're not doing anything,they're not volunteering,
they're not doing this or doingthat.
You know, they always had a badrap.
But you know, realizing thatthese guys are only doing it one
weekend a month, they're notliving this, they don't live
this job like we do active duty,so to think that they could
just walk in here and just justtake over the place was

(42:09):
ridiculous.
So now, as a reservist, I'mkind of feeling that at times,
from not from the folks that Ihad worked with, but when,
throughout my years, when Iwould go TDY or when I would do
my annual tour at Dover orCharleston or or Japan or
wherever it happens to be, youknow, I'm sensing that same kind

(42:30):
of anxiety coming from thoseactive duty guys.
Oh, here are the stupidreservist again.

Speaker 1 (42:36):
Right.
It didn't take the time tounderstand that you'd done some
time active duty, right?
They just assumed.

Speaker 2 (42:41):
Yeah, just assume you're just some guy.

Speaker 1 (42:45):
Wow, what a great way to give you some perspective,
huh.

Speaker 2 (42:48):
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (42:49):
Yeah, so 18 years on the reserves, that's quite an
accomplishment.
That's a long time, and so wereyou working mostly in
broadcasting then during thatperiod.
So were you working mostly inbroadcasting.

Speaker 2 (43:02):
Then during that period For a good portion of
that time I was so I started inthe reserves at Travis.
I was working full-time radiowhile I was at uh outside of
Travis at the station inVacaville.
I then um took a job outside ofradio for a little bit and I

(43:27):
said I got to get back intoradio, I can't.
I started working for one ofthe large shipping companies out
of Oakland, california, and Iwas just just absolutely
miserable.

Speaker 1 (43:36):
So I I picked up the phone one day and I called over.

Speaker 2 (43:37):
I called the Guam.
So I picked up the phone oneday and I called over.
I called the Guam.
I knew that they were going tobe opening an FM station.
The group that I worked forover there was they were
building an FM station and Icalled them up and they said,
hey, we were thinking about you.
Do you want to come back?
And I said sure.
And I said, well, we'll pay foryour airfare and for half of

(44:02):
your personal belongings to getover here.
I was working for a ship linecompany at the time and this was
the company that also wasshipping all of the military
folks, their vehicles, over tothe Pacific.
And so I went to my boss and Isaid, hey, can I?

(44:22):
Because most of those shipswould go over to the Pacific
empty because they would comeback full of stuff from the
Orient.
So I said, well, can I put mytruck on that ship that's going
over to Guam?
They said sure, so I got mytruck sent over there for free.

Speaker 1 (44:38):
Well, that's a good price.
Yeah, exactly.
For free well, that's a goodprice.
Yeah, exactly.
And I'm you know, I'm sure thatthe, uh, the, the, a company
like that, probably reallyappreciated your knowledge and
and all that you'd learn fromthe air force.
Again, it was a nice, national,natural transition into that
work.
So they I'm guessing they kindof missed you when you left the,

(44:59):
the ship line company yeah well, uh, I'd like to think that,
but I'm not sure I it.

Speaker 2 (45:06):
It is a very different world when you're
working with unions yeah uh, Iremember one time I came in kind
of I had a clash with a unionleader.
There were we would get thesecontainers coming off the ships
and we had several containersthat were full of cars, maybe
Toyotas, but they were trying anew way of loading them in the

(45:30):
container where they could kindof stack them on top of each
other in this container, whichcreated a lot of wood that they
had to build up underneath thesevehicles, created a lot of wood
that they had to build upunderneath these vehicles, and
so they were starting to pullout these vehicles and there was
a lot of wood that was kind oflaying on the ground and I
started moving some of it awayand the union leader says, okay,

(45:53):
that's it, we're leaving.
And, uh, because if, if thisguy's going to do the work, that
our work, then we're out ofhere.
And I was like holy crap, youknow, I'm just thinking, I'm
just a guy just kind of helpingout, they're getting ready to
pull it out of the thing and Iwanted to move the wood out of
the way to kind of help them outand I caused this big ruckus.

Speaker 1 (46:13):
Yeah, yeah.
Everyone has a job, and that isclearly not yours.

Speaker 2 (46:17):
Right.

Speaker 1 (46:24):
That's not my job.
No, no, so so you get back overto guam.
Now you're single andunaccompanied again, I'm
assuming.
Yeah, um, so what was it likenow?
Because now you're not in themilitary, you're, you're living
your dream, basically yep, I'm acivilian, but I was.

Speaker 2 (46:34):
I I did stay in the reserves.
They had a reserve unit thereon anderson.
I think that was the 44th APSuh, aerial port squadron, and
again, I am now working as areservist in the squadron that I
was at previously active dutyright now there weren't really

(46:54):
any people there that I knewfrom my active duty years, but,
uh, I'm working in the samebuilding, but, but I'm working.
I'm living off base.
Um, uh, I have access to thebase because of, uh, my military
uh, but uh, I'm pretty muchliving on the economy, working
full-time radio in the eveningshift and, yes, in a way, living

(47:16):
my dream.
I'm going to work in flip-flopsand shorts and Hawaiian shirt
every day.
I've got my truck here from theUnited States, my Toyota pickup
truck.
I'm living the life.

Speaker 1 (47:28):
Wow and um.
So what was the format therethat you were like what, what
kind of work were you doing onthe air?

Speaker 2 (47:35):
I was a DJ uh working the seven to midnight shift and
it was top 40 radio at the timeyeah, did you guys do casey
casem on sundays?
we didn't do casey casem.
There was another station thatdid casey casem.
Um, I, I, we, we did have aprogram that I babysat.

(47:57):
Well, I did years ago when Ifirst started was with their am
station, the.
The uh soundtrack of the 60swith gary owens is kind of a
similar format, but it was allmusic from the 60s.
But uh, yeah, yeah, those, uh,I kind of like those casey casem
, kind of babysitting thoseshows because they're three

(48:18):
hours long and it's just, it'suh, it's an easy gig yeah, just
got to make sure the the traindoesn't come off the rails.

Speaker 1 (48:24):
You're all set exactly yeah, so how long were
you there?

Speaker 2 (48:29):
so this time I was there for about a year and a
half okay and then, because of agirl, I left guam and went back
to california, went back tolive in that Travis Air Force
Base area, I went back into myold reserve unit there and then
got a job working in radio for astation in Concord, california,

(48:52):
which is outside of SanFrancisco.

Speaker 1 (48:56):
Anytime a story begins with because of a girl,
you got to include that part ofthe story, david.
So what happened begins withbecause of a girl you got to
include that part of the story,david.

Speaker 2 (49:03):
So what happened?
Well, here we go, all right.
So we got to back up a littlebit.
So I, I, I divorced my wife, myfirst wife, while I was at
Travis and while and, and I cameoff of active duty, we got our
divorce.
I met a gal.
Uh, shortly after we became hotand heavy and then the

(49:25):
relationship went south.
I needed to get away.
That's why I left radio,because I just couldn't keep my
head in the game.
I went into the shippingbusiness, still was all screwed
up in my head.
I called Guam and I left andwent, went to Guam and then,

(49:47):
mistakenly, I reached out to herand then she's, she's back in
my life.
She comes to Guam, gets me allscrewed up again, she leaves.
I eventually leave Guam to bewith her and it just doesn't
work out.

Speaker 1 (50:01):
And so I, I, I, hopefully that's enough, that's
all I need to hear I you know,yeah, I think we can all relate
to somewhat to that story atsome point in our lives.
So so now you're back in theStates and, uh, where, where are
you working?
Uh, when you get, back in the.
States and where?

(50:22):
Where are you?

Speaker 2 (50:22):
working when you get back.
So I'm working full time for astation in Concord, california.
K K, k, k, k, k I S K K.
92.1 FM, 990 AM.
I think that they have sincechanged their call.
Sign their letters, but at thetime it was KKIS.

Speaker 1 (50:44):
Okay, all right, and this would have been right
around what year?

Speaker 2 (50:50):
So this was the late 80s.

Speaker 1 (50:52):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (50:54):
Late 80s, early 90s yes.

Speaker 1 (50:57):
All right.

Speaker 2 (50:59):
I was in radio and I was at that station where we
transitioned from records to CDs.

Speaker 1 (51:07):
Oh, that's a huge deal.

Speaker 2 (51:09):
Yeah, I remember watching on Johnny Carson one
night where somebody from Sonydid a demonstration on their
stage of a CD and even with thesound coming through the
television it still was quiteimpressive and I know Johnny
Carson's reaction to the sound.

(51:30):
And we started with CDs and wehad these huge jukeboxes where
on your board you would programcd number 10, cut number seven,
so you'd plug it into the, intothis little keypad, and when it
was time to and you had the cdswere behind you and 9.9 times

(51:54):
out of 10 when you push thebutton, it worked.
But there were those infrequenttimes when you push the button,
nothing and and and that'swhere, that's where your
training, or that's where whereit it really kicks in, is when
you hear nothing.

Speaker 1 (52:12):
And now you got to do something like well,
interestingly enough you can'tsee it, but right across from me
is a uh, a rockola mirage cdjukebox with 100 cds from the
80s and 90s in it.
So yeah, very similar.
You punch in the cd number andthe track number and it pulls it

(52:32):
up so, uh, um, now these.

Speaker 2 (52:36):
Yes, I used to have a jukebox, but they eventually
made them very small, a lotsmaller.
These carousels the one we hadwas, uh, like the size of like
four suitcases piled on top ofeach other.

Speaker 1 (52:49):
They were huge yeah, yeah, then they weigh a ton oh
yeah, especially when you putall those cds in it was.
It takes two men and a smallboy to carry it anywhere.
I think is what my dad used tosay anyway.
Okay so, yeah, so you got tosee that transition.
I want to ask a question kindof again off topic, but on topic

(53:09):
.
So you know, I like CDs but Ireally prefer vinyl.
What's your thought on that?

Speaker 2 (53:19):
Well, I like the clarity of the CD.
I like not hearing the pops andthe hiss and so on.
I know that people have saidaudiophiles will say that you
can get more sound, more deepersound from records, and that

(53:39):
certainly could be true.
But I I know that records willwear out with uh, they they call
the cue burn.
Uh, at the beginning ofespecially 45s because you would
put it on the turntable, you'dbe able to hear where it was
cued up through your headset orthrough a speaker on your board

(54:01):
and just by doing that sometimeskind of creates this cue burn.
Many times when you would startthe record, you hear this when
it first started.
So that was the problem withwith records being used over and
over and over again, that you'drun into that problem and you
definitely would never have thatproblem with cds.

(54:22):
Oh, true it's a lot smaller.
To to uh you.
Now you don't have to have thishuge room with all these albums
.

Speaker 1 (54:29):
Oh, absolutely, absolutely.
Did you ever see the movie fm?
Yes yeah, one of my.
You can't find it.
I had to watch it on youtube acouple weeks ago.

Speaker 2 (54:38):
One of my favorite movies, though yeah and wkrp in
cincinnati yeah, yeah, howrealistic was that so the
certainly the room is realistic,the with the turntables and the
board and the microphone and umhaving to have you know to, to,
uh, you know, you got gotta be,you gotta be awake and you

(55:01):
gotta be uh uh ready for thenext transition from one record
to the next and so on.
Where today it's, everything iscomputer operated and you
probably don't even have a DJ inthe room.
Everything is pre-recorded,even the drop-ins and so on are
all pre-recorded.

Speaker 1 (55:19):
So it a very different world yeah, yeah, you
know I'm a big fan of and I'mnot advertising for anybody but
a big fan of sirius xm, onlybecause I can listen to whatever
genre of music I want to listento at any time.
Um, but yeah, I mean very, verydefinitely can tell it's all
orchestrated, you knowpre-recorded, but still, uh,

(55:42):
it's the music yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 (55:44):
So I, I, I had serious for a number of years
and I enjoyed 70s on 7 to listento the reruns of casey casem
yes, yes, that's.

Speaker 1 (55:54):
you know, when we were talking about that earlier
that popped into my head thatyou know, on a on a any on a any
given Sunday, it's some someyear in the seventies and um,
you know that's, I graduatedhigh school in 83, but I grew up
kind of in the seventies, sothat music really resonates with
me.
You had the advantage ofactually being a part of the
music industry uh, during thattime, which is kind of cool.

(56:18):
I don't know if you noticed.
So if you, if you look at therock, just look at the music in
general in the 60s, it seemslike after the vietnam war
people listening to music wantedto just chill and so you have
all that like yacht rock typemusic and you know all of the
really like mellow love songkind of stuff that you hear a

(56:39):
lot on 70s, on sub yeah.

Speaker 2 (56:42):
So it's interesting you brought up yacht rock on um.
It's uh on um on on uh max.
They have a a documentary aboutyacht rock and I had heard the
term yacht rock but didn'tunderstand what it was.
I thought it was just music youwanted to listen to while

(57:04):
you're sitting on a boat.
But this really opened my eyesto that genre of music and
Steely Dan was very instrumentalin influencing that yacht rock
sound.

Speaker 1 (57:19):
Oh, yeah, yeah, absolutely.
I've got a ton of Steely Dan.
I love that music really wellengineered too, yeah.
So how long did you stay?
Oh, you know I did want to askyou another question.
So is this a myth or a truththat radio stations east of the
Mississippi are W and radiostations west of the Mississippi
are K?
Is that true?

Speaker 2 (57:40):
That is true.
However, there is one stationin Philadelphia, I think that
does start with a K, and I thinkthere is one station somewhere
west of the Mississippi thatstarts with a W.
Even the stations on Guam, theyall started with a K as well,
because again west of theMississippi.

(58:00):
But yes, that is true.

Speaker 1 (58:03):
Okay, cause I'd heard it, but I you know, and I'd
lived in California for a while,but I never you know, never met
anybody who would know, so.
So how long did you stay at?
Uh, what was it?
Kkis in California.

Speaker 2 (58:14):
KKIS.
I stayed there, uh for, uh.
I was there for several years.
I got fired from that jobbecause they got new, they had
new owners.
So I left that job and wentworking for a, a small AM
station, for a while, uh, andthat was also in Concord,
california.
Um, then I then again met agirl and she worked for Chevron

(58:44):
in California and was beingtransferred to Houston, texas.
So I went with her and thenended up working for a, uh, uh,
uh, got back into radio inHouston working for shadow
traffic.
So now I was a traffic reporterand for some of that time I was
airborne traffic reporter.
I was, I didn't fly the Cessna,but I was up in it on a daily

(59:08):
basis.

Speaker 1 (59:08):
Oh, that must've been pretty cool.

Speaker 2 (59:10):
It it.
To a certain extent it was, butit it it wasn't as glamorous as
you might think where I'd haveto do the morning shift I lived
quite a ways from it was I hadto go.
We flew out of Hobby Airport inHouston, which is down the
southern part, I guess, ofHouston, and it was a good hour
and a half or so from my home.

(59:31):
So it wasn't really convenientfor me to finish my morning
shift and drive all the way homeand then go all the way back
and fight the traffic.
So I had this long time duringthe middle of the day where I
didn't have anything to do andhad to wait to the afternoon
shift.

Speaker 1 (59:49):
That's yeah, that's not good.
Not good at all.
Now, you're still in thereserves at this time.

Speaker 2 (59:57):
No, I've since retired 2004.
I retired from the reservesafter 18 years.

Speaker 1 (01:00:03):
Okay, all right, then you were in Houston, this would
have been.

Speaker 2 (01:00:08):
So I was in Houston.
I got there around 91-ish.

Speaker 1 (01:00:11):
Okay, so yeah, that's what I was saying.
So you were still in thereserves when you went to.

Speaker 2 (01:00:15):
Oh, at that point.

Speaker 1 (01:00:16):
Yeah, yeah, yes.

Speaker 2 (01:00:17):
I was still in the reserves at Kelly.
I was still in the reserves atKelly.
I was driving from Houston toSan Antonio every month.

Speaker 1 (01:00:23):
So you were able to find reserve units whenever you
decided you were going to movefor some girl.

Speaker 2 (01:00:32):
Yes, the air transportation career field is
very big.
In the reserves it's everywhere.

Speaker 1 (01:00:39):
How fortunate that you're able to do that.
And so how long did you stay inHouston and did you marry this
girl?

Speaker 2 (01:00:46):
Did not marry her.
We broke up.
I was there until 95 when myfirst sergeant came to me and
said there's an opportunity tobe an instructor at Dobbins Air
Force Base, marietta, georgia.
I had been in the career fieldactive duty 10 years and now I

(01:01:08):
was in the reserves I don't knowfive or eight years or whatever
it was and so I was doing some.
I also have a theater backgroundwe didn't talk about that, so I
you know, getting up in frontof people and acting and so on
was came very natural to me, andso I was doing some training in
our unit with the reservistsand I got noticed for that and

(01:01:30):
my first shirt came to me andsaid there's this opportunity
for us to put you on active dutyorders.
Send you to Dobbins for sixmonths.
Would you like to do that?
We're going to make you.
We're putting you on activeduty orders for six months.
Would you like to do that?
We're going to make you.
We're putting you on activeduty orders for six months.
Do you want to do it?
I said yeah, cause I wasn'tmaking any money in radio.
I needed something, and that'swhere I started my career in

(01:01:53):
learning and development.

Speaker 1 (01:01:54):
Okay, so before we get there, you, um, you said you
had some experience in theater.
Was that earlier in life or wasthat like when you were in the
Air Force?
How did that come about?

Speaker 2 (01:02:05):
It started when I was on Guam the second time.
There was a gentleman that Ihad worked in radio with, fred
Nelson, and he was going to bedirecting a dinner theater show
at one of the local restaurantsgoing to be directing a dinner

(01:02:25):
theater show at one of the localrestaurants and he comes and
visits me in the studio one dayand throws a script in my lap
and says here you're the lead werehearse next week Wednesday,
something like that.
So that's where I startedgetting the bug of theater, of
stage.
You know, there was a lot thatI had to learn.
I learned by the seat of mypants and when I first got up on

(01:02:49):
that stage it was David, withall the insecurities and the,
the, the voices saying that Iwas no good and so on.
I had those same voices when Istarted in radio.
Uh, and what?
And what I eventually learned?
Cause I did stay in in, uh, incommunity theater for a number
of years in Houston, texas.
When I was back in California,I I was working, uh, community

(01:03:13):
theater here in in Georgia.
But what I learned along theway is I I love being on the
stage and I and I feel morecomfortable on the stage than I
do in small talk.
I've watched a number of actorsbeing interviewed and many of
them say something very similarit's easier to be somebody else

(01:03:35):
than it is to be yourself.

Speaker 1 (01:03:38):
Yeah Well, it's scripted, right.
You know what's expectedExactly, and it's scripted, you
know.

Speaker 2 (01:03:42):
You know what's expected exactly and it's
scripted.
My, my wife will say to me now.
She'll say well, wait a minute,you were an actor, you should
be able to act.
Yeah, but there was a script.
I don't know what to deal.
How to deal with this right,right.

Speaker 1 (01:03:54):
So so by by a lot of things for you I mean kind of
happened by chance, right, Imean yes, yeah, happy
coincidences, or whatever youwant to call them yes, but yeah,
so.
So I mean, if we think aboutwhat you?
I'm sorry I didn't interrupt no, go ahead.

Speaker 2 (01:04:13):
No, I I wasn't, I'm just, I was just agreeing with
you.
I, I go ahead okay, no, I.

Speaker 1 (01:04:17):
So I'm thinking like you said you, you end up with
this six-month gig ofinstructing and it kind of is
the springboard into yourcurrent vocation, where you're
working with coaching people andtraining people.
So how did things work out forthat six months?
And let's talk a little bitabout that.

(01:04:38):
And then what happens after youget done there.

Speaker 2 (01:04:40):
So the six months was up, and let's talk a little bit
about that.
And then what happens after youget done there?
So the six months was up.
So at this point I left andwent back to Houston Texas
because this was a kind, it wasa change of station.
It was a change of change ofstation, but not a change of
unit or something like that.

(01:05:01):
But it entitled me for uh, forhousehold goods and entitled me
to put stuff into storage.
The government paid for all ofthat.
So I came back to Houston Texasand found an apartment, got back
into my reserve unit, got backinto my reserve unit and then

(01:05:26):
the, the, the, the, the trainingfacility here at Dobbins.
They called me up and said wewant you back.
And my unit again put me onactive duty orders.
But I said this time at the endof those active duty orders,
I'm staying in.
And so I came back here.
I completed again another sixmonths or so and then I went

(01:05:47):
into the art program, airreserve technician program.
The Army has something similarto this where you are civil
service during the week, butthen I would have to do one week
.
I still have to do one weekenda month and still do my reserve
duty.

Speaker 1 (01:06:06):
Right, yep, let's see .
Yeah, the technician programthe national guard has um.
I'll have a word for it too.

Speaker 2 (01:06:12):
But yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:06:13):
There you're full-time civil service and then
you're still in the guard, butyou still have to be in the
reserves in order to maintainthat slot.
Right, yeah, exactly.
And then there are otherprograms where you don't anyway,
um, so yeah, so you end up inthe, in the technician program,
and so how does that work foryou?

Speaker 2 (01:06:31):
I did that for about five years, uh, and I certainly
could have made a career of it.
I was able to buy back myactive duty time and apply it to
my civil service time and I wasmaking good money, because
civil service they give you twoweeks of military leave.

(01:06:53):
I'm getting two paychecks, onefrom the government, two from
the government.
You know, getting two checksfrom the government, one for my
civil service job and the otherone for my when I do my reserve
annual tour, and so on.
I had a great gig but I just, Ijust just didn't fit in.
Uh, there was just I felt thatI was thinking outside the box.

(01:07:17):
I approached my, my, uh, uh,the chief one time and we were
in a meeting with all the otherfolks and I said you know, let's
imagine that there is a, anorganization that's outside the
gate, that wants to competedirectly with us.
Our job, our job, uh, with theair transportation training was

(01:07:41):
we were training reservists thatwere coming into the air
transportation career field.
These were folks that might'vebeen transferring from another
job in the reserves into airtransportation.
Maybe they're coming from theguard and they're going into the
reserves and air transportation, or they had been out for a

(01:08:01):
number of years and they'recoming back in the service for
the first time, into thereserves, into this career field
, so we're training them forthose two weeks that they would
do their annual tour.
And I just was gettingfrustrated with there's just no
innovation, there was no.
It was just like we were alljust phoning it in and it was
the.
The chief was saying I don'tcare if these guys learn

(01:08:22):
anything, I just want seats, Iwant butts in the seats.
So when I raised the question,what if we had a competitor
outside the gate that said we'regoing to steal all of these
students from them and how wouldwe compete with that?
And I was laughed out of theroom, right.
But there was something abouttraining that really, uh, made

(01:08:45):
sense to me that there's still alot that I had to learn.
But the thing that stood out tome was learning, understanding
objectives and understandingthat there's a difference
between a task and an objective.

Speaker 1 (01:08:59):
Yeah, yeah, so you, uh, you got out, um, uh, or you
didn't get out, but you leftthat duty and he went back into
the regular reserves then, atthat point so yes, so not yeah,
but I had a had a little detourokay so the detour was that I
took a job.

Speaker 2 (01:09:18):
I left left the the full-time uh civil service gig.
I left that and took a jobworking for uh Lockheed, um
Lockheed, in Saudi Arabia.
I I went over to Saudi for 15months to train the Royal Saudi
Air Force on cargo loading ofthe C-130 aircraft.

Speaker 1 (01:09:41):
Wow, that must have been very interesting.

Speaker 2 (01:09:44):
That was yes, this was pre-911.
This was back.
I arrived there in early 99 andleft in early 2000,.
Was there for 15 months.

Speaker 1 (01:09:55):
Okay, did you make some friends there, or was it
more just a business?

Speaker 2 (01:10:02):
Well, there were the, the expats that I, that I lived
with in in the office where Iwas, where other, um, military
retirees, uh, they, they weremore focused on the maintenance,
maintenance aspect of the c-130.
I was the only cargo guy, uhand um, so, yeah, I certainly

(01:10:27):
developed those relationships.
We lived on a compound together, a western compound, and it was
uh, it was easy work yeah, yeah, I that's never been to saudi
but it's always intrigued me.
Yeah, and this was in Jeddah,right on the coast of the Red

(01:10:48):
Sea.
I guess that is Wow.

Speaker 1 (01:10:52):
So you do your time in Saudi and you come back, and
what's next for you?

Speaker 2 (01:10:58):
So I come back and again, being very fortunate that
this is this is early 2000 andthe business of training and
development is really hot rightnow, and I was sending resumes
to different trainingorganizations I went back into

(01:11:19):
the reserves.
I I went into a reserve unit atdobbins and and then very
quickly found a job working fora training company.
They were designing training,customized training for
proprietary softwares, and oneof their big clients was Turner

(01:11:39):
Broadcasting and GE were two bigones where they would have
these proprietary softwares thatwould be designed to
specifically handle whatevertask it needed to handle.
This is back in the early 2000sand there's no training manual
for this stuff.
Training manual for this stuff.

(01:12:03):
So we had to go in.
My job would be to go in, learnthis program and then design
the training and then train theusers on how to use it.

Speaker 1 (01:12:08):
So you had to go in and basically pretend to be an
end user, right?
Oh, wow, okay.
So you wrote the whole book onhow to do whatever it was they
were trying to do.

Speaker 2 (01:12:18):
We were writing the manuals, writing lesson plans.
We were also.
This was also the infancy ofonline training, where we are
designing this uh asynchronoustraining or this uh this uh
training that you can uh just doany time online.
This was kind of the infancy ofthat okay, so the self-paced

(01:12:40):
training self-paced that's theword I was looking for.

Speaker 1 (01:12:43):
Yeah, so how long?
How long did you do that?

Speaker 2 (01:12:47):
So I stayed with this company.
I was there, uh, uh, 9, 11.
Uh, uh, uh, I was.
Things, trains changeddramatically at at 9 11.
I was, uh, I was at Turnerbroadcasting on that day and
evacuated the CNN center inAtlanta that day.

(01:13:08):
Went back to the office andGeorgia Pacific was another one
of our big clients and we weregetting ready to do this big
training program with them whereI was going to go around to all
of their different plants andtrain on this, train them on
this one piece of software, andthey said, no, forget it, we're

(01:13:29):
not doing that.
Uh, the company I was workingfor was they just put everybody
on 1099 at that point, put usall as contractors.
But at that same time my unitwas calling me up right after
9-11.
They were calling everybody inthe unit saying if we have a
need to deploy people, do youwant to go?

(01:13:52):
Yes, so again, very fortunatehere that just before I became a
contractor I was sent off toTurkey for three months.
I come back from Turkey afterthree months and I do a little
bit of work for this trainingcompany.
Then I go off to Saudi Arabiafor three months and then I come

(01:14:15):
back and do more work, then Igo off to Germany for three
months Charleston Dover.
It was just unbelievable howthat all worked out.

Speaker 1 (01:14:24):
Yeah, yeah.
And because this all happenedbefore they converted you to a
contractor, they had to keep youon as an employee, right?

Speaker 2 (01:14:30):
No, I was.
I was transitioned into a well,I left there while I was still
full-time.
I hadn't.
I had not transitioned into thecontractor job because I left
to go into the military.

Speaker 1 (01:14:41):
Okay, and then you were traveling.
It sounds like these shortstints to just train people.
Is that what you were doing?

Speaker 2 (01:14:48):
No, I was being deployed.
I was volunteering to deploy inthe reserves.
You were limited to 70.
I think it's 79 days.
Oh, you could.
You couldn't do more than 79days.
If you did 80 days now you'reconsidered active duty, which
entitled you to additionalbenefits.

Speaker 1 (01:15:08):
Right.

Speaker 2 (01:15:09):
And so the orders were always written for 79 days.

Speaker 1 (01:15:12):
Well, kind of like what some of the big automotive
companies do with the 90-daywonders or the 89-day people,
right, yeah, bring them out for89, kick them out.
Bring them back out for 89.
Yeah, maybe it was 89.

Speaker 2 (01:15:22):
day people right?
Yeah, bring them out for 89,kick them out, bring them back
out for 89.
Yeah, maybe it was 89, I don'tremember.

Speaker 1 (01:15:24):
It was 89, 79, but you, you, you, uh, yeah, uh,
yeah so you, how many, how manyof those like mini deployments
did you do?
That sounds like quite a few Ithink I did five or six of those
okay and then, um, so whathappens after that kind of slows
down and you're not deployinganymore?

Speaker 2 (01:15:47):
Yeah, what did happen ?
Uh.
So, um, coming back, uh, I, uh,well, I got a full-time job.
Let's see.
So this is yeah, this so yeah.
So I got another full-time jobworking for a company in
Asheville, north Carolina, intheir training department and uh

(01:16:08):
, things kind of changed, uh,that things I can't can't
remember the year when itchanged.
But then I, I, I stayed intraining and development.
I kind of bounced around to acouple of different places but
staying in the training worlddesigning training, delivering
training, training trainers totrain and then eventually ended

(01:16:30):
up in some large organizationsMcKesson being one of them, and
some other healthcare industry,some others and then eventually
I started my own businessbusiness.
I was doing that on the sidefor about five years while I was
still in corporate okay, and atthis point had you met your
wife, yet we haven't talkedabout her yeah, so I've been

(01:16:51):
married.
I'm on number three, the lastone okay number two.
if we want to jump back to thatone, yeah, sure.
So number two I mentioned thatI came to Georgia, was here for
six months.
I went back to Texas.
Within that first week I wasback in Texas, I met my who

(01:17:13):
would then become my second wife.
I met her at church and then.
So then she, when I came backto Georgia, she followed me to
Georgia.
We got married in Georgia, gotdivorced in Georgia after seven
years.
Uh and then, um, yeah, so thatwas number two.

Speaker 1 (01:17:34):
Seven years seems to be a number for you, David.

Speaker 2 (01:17:37):
Yeah, yeah, seven, yeah, but I've, um, I'm long
past seven now, that's, I'm evenpast 14 now, so I've even
doubled it that's good, I'velearned my lesson so then, where
did you meet your current wife?
I met my current wife throughone of those online dating apps
oh, okay through um, which Ican't remember the name of it

(01:18:00):
now, right now, but I was at thepoint where I was ready to give
up.
I was meeting people and, uh, alot of times their profile
didn't match who they reallywere and I had in there, I don't
want to have any kids and Idon't, I don't, I want to find
someone with no kids, and I'msitting across the table from a
young lady that's got five kids,sitting across the table from a

(01:18:21):
young lady that's got five kids.
Uh, no, that it's so I was.
I was ready to give up and so Iwent in this last time.
I guess it was eHarmony, that'swhat it was.
I went in this last time and Ijust said, ah, let me go ahead
and scroll through this and youcan see people that have looked
at your profile.
And so Donna, my now currentwife, I could see that she, she,

(01:18:43):
uh was looking at my profile,so I explored her bio and said,
ah, she looks interesting, solet's go ahead and started the
conversation, and we've beentalking ever since.

Speaker 1 (01:18:54):
Oh, that's great.
That's great.
Uh, third time's the charm.
By the way, I can vouch forthat myself, but this is your
story, not mine.
So you've been married for howlong, then?

Speaker 2 (01:19:09):
It's been well.
We've been together, for Iguess we've been married for
about 14 years, and we've beentogether for at least four or
five years, longer than that.

Speaker 1 (01:19:18):
Okay, so you met her just kind of as you were
transitioning into your ownbusiness then.

Speaker 2 (01:19:24):
No, before that we met in about 2006.

Speaker 1 (01:19:28):
Okay, all right, but by then you had been retired
from the reserves, correct?

Speaker 2 (01:19:33):
Yes, Because I retired in 2004.
But with the reserves you haveto wait till you're 60 to start
collecting your benefits.
So I wasn't 60 years old yet.
I still had to wait a number ofyears before I'd get to 60.

Speaker 1 (01:19:47):
Yeah, you and me both .
I retired in 2010, and I juststarted collecting my retirement
pay because I turned 60 thisyear.

Speaker 2 (01:19:55):
There you go.
Uncle Sam, for me, has beenliving up to his obligations.

Speaker 1 (01:19:59):
Yes, yep, get that check every month now.
It's kind of a nice thing, sowell, good.
So you uh, so you read, talk tome a little bit about what it
was like for you, uh, to retire.
Did you have like a bigceremony or did you just like
see you later, kind of thing?

Speaker 2 (01:20:16):
it was a see you later kind of thing.
There was was no ceremony,there was nothing.
I don't even know if I went tomy final reserve weekend.
It's just I, just I, I, I justgot to the point where I, I, I,
I, I did my time and I was readyto leave.

Speaker 1 (01:20:34):
Yeah, how did it feel to not be in the military
anymore be in the militaryanymore.

Speaker 2 (01:20:47):
Well, you know, I guess in some ways my head was
already out and um, you know,being, you know, part-time,
transitioning out of part-timemilitary definitely is going to
be different than someone who isjust 100% full-time military
and then makes that transition.
That's going to be quite anabrupt change.
But for me, I'm so acclimatedinto the civilian world, working

(01:21:11):
in the civilian world, thereare aspects of it that I miss,
certainly the camaraderie.
One of the things that Ienjoyed with the reserves was
when we would deploy for ourannual tour, for example.
Uh, once a year we had to doour two week annual tour during

(01:21:32):
our normal weekends, kind ofeverybody just kind of just
doing their thing just to getthrough the weekend, right, and
but when we would deploy, andnow we're at an active duty base
somewhere, we really gelled,and so I, I, I miss that, I that
we really came together as aunit during those times yeah,

(01:21:55):
yeah, that's easy to, easy tomiss, easy to kind of.

Speaker 1 (01:21:57):
You're right, it was kind of easy to to leave the uh
reserve component, but yeah,there's still those things that
you like and and uh and and it's.
It can make it make it tough, Iwould imagine.
So you, you're all done withthe military.
You're uh working, um, you'reyou're working for a company

(01:22:19):
doing, doing training Uh, butthen you're also got kind of
have your side business.
So what, what was like thecatalyst for you to uh go into
full-time?
I'm doing this on my own.

Speaker 2 (01:22:32):
Part of it was my age Cause I was just about I was
like three months shy of gettingmy social security at 65.
So I, uh, I felt that this wasa good time.
I had already been getting mymilitary retirement since age 60
.
And I was getting to a point atwork where I was just bored.
I was getting more satisfactionout of building this business,

(01:22:58):
working with entrepreneurs,working with business owners,
helping individuals with theirpublic speaking.
I was, uh, developing thisbusiness as a public speaking
coach.

Speaker 1 (01:23:09):
Okay, and so you make , you make the jump and you're,
you're now full-time in thisbusiness.
Um, what so?
What year would that have been?
I'm just trying to kind of pullthe timeline together, Um what
so?

Speaker 2 (01:23:22):
what year would that have been?
I'm just trying to kind of pullthe timeline together.
So this was, uh, 2020, 2023, Iguess the end of 2022, I left
corporate.

Speaker 1 (01:23:30):
Okay, and were you ready?
Was it scary?
Talk to me a little bit aboutwhat it was like to kind of
break away from that steady work.
And now you, you're.

Speaker 2 (01:23:43):
everything depends on you yeah, yeah, that that it
all.
It didn't hit me at at thebeginning.
Um, you know what?
Let me also say that what alsoended up happening at this same
time is my wife ended up havingsome medical issues.

(01:24:03):
So now I'm full-time in thisbusiness trying to figure this
whole thing out, and now I'm nowhaving to be a caregiver, okay,
and which became a a a I don'twant to use the word distraction
, but it it certainly waskeeping me away from building
the business, right?
So that, to me, was that was astruggle, but also learning.

(01:24:29):
There were so many things Ididn't know about about running
a business, about my brandingand who am I?
What do I do?
Who's my client?
Uh, all of those, a gazillionquestions to really figure out
of what lane am I going to begoing down.
You know, at first I was sayingpeople would say, well, who's

(01:24:51):
your client?
Well, everybody, everybodyneeds public speaking coaching.
But that does, that doesn'twork.
You've got to have a, you gotto have a lane.

Speaker 1 (01:25:01):
Right, yeah, absolutely.
And so what made you, what madeyou think public speaking
rather than training andtraining materials and training
programs, and all of that?

Speaker 2 (01:25:13):
Well, I, I still do the, the training.
I can still do theinstructional design piece and,
uh, you know some of that stuff.
Yes, I can do it, but I do farmit out.
So I but it's because of thatinstructional design background
that has been the big benefitfor me in my career as a public
speaking coach.
So why public speaking?

(01:25:35):
I, while in corporate, Istarted training folks within
the organization on how to bebetter communicators.
I was training a lot of softskill stuff leadership,
communication, delegating,counseling, coaching type

(01:25:55):
courses that I was teaching.
But the one course that I foundthat I enjoyed the most was
training trainers to train andtraining executives to be more
confident when they're going togo speak at a conference or run
a breakout session.
I've been a part of Toastmasterson and off for 30 years and

(01:26:18):
bringing in what I've learnedfrom Toastmasters into my
training and I found that I justI feel I have a good stage side
manner of, I'm a good listenerand I I also feel that I know
what it's like to have extremeanxiety around speaking.
I I've had to work through myown stuff.

(01:26:39):
I've had to work through thosevoices telling me I'm no good,
that you can't do this, thatwhatever negative thing you want
to incorporate in there.
I've been through all of thatstuff.
One of my first questions topeople when they come to me is
that why are you here?
Why do you feel you need thistraining and do you need this

(01:27:00):
training?
Hear, why do you feel you needthis training and do you need
this training?
Do you need to get up and speakto people?
Well, no, well, great.
You don't have to, you don'tneed this training.
But if you have to get up infront of people and you have to
do this, and it's a matter oflife and death for you to get up
there and do it I know I canhelp you do it by not only
developing the confidence, butalso with the writing the

(01:27:27):
writing instructional materialis identical to writing a speech
.

Speaker 1 (01:27:31):
I hadn't really looked at it from that
perspective.

Speaker 2 (01:27:33):
It's all about objectives, right, if you're
writing instructional material.
What's the objective?
What's the purpose?
What problem are we solving?
Why do we need this training?
What expectations do you havewhen you get to the end of this
training?
What should I be able to dobetter In a speech?
When you get to the end of yourspeech, whether it's 60 seconds

(01:27:54):
, 30 seconds or a full dayworkshop what's the objective?
What is it that you want peopleto walk away with and never
forget?
So it all starts withobjectives.

Speaker 1 (01:28:07):
Well, so when you look at the two helping people
with public speaking and, youknow, helping people with
putting together training andthat sort of thing which one is
most gratifying for you and why?

Speaker 2 (01:28:24):
It's the public speaking, it's the, where you
can see those immediate resultsthe, the, the training materials
like the workbook or a lessonplan, that's kind of the all in
the PowerPoint.
That's the ancillary stuff thatyou provide to reinforce what

(01:28:46):
it is you're talking about.
You have a handout to reinforceyour PowerPoint, reinforces
what you're saying.
It all starts in the same placeAgain objectives Once we have
the speech.
Same place, again objectives.
Once we have the speech we.

(01:29:06):
We then can design everythingelse around it.

Speaker 1 (01:29:07):
so I think that what I like is is is getting that
speech uh, uh, concrete okay,and you, I mean you just really
kind of started out so you'vegot, uh, you've got some more
years to to, to work and dothings, but it looks to me like
you're enjoying yourself.
Yeah, I do, that's a good thing.

Speaker 2 (01:29:27):
Yes, yes, thank you so a couple other questions.

Speaker 1 (01:29:33):
So I'm making some assumptions here, but you never
had children then.

Speaker 2 (01:29:36):
No kids.

Speaker 1 (01:29:37):
Okay, and how's your wife doing now?

Speaker 2 (01:29:40):
Much better.

Speaker 1 (01:29:41):
Yes, thank you Okay good, well, I mean we've covered
a lot in the last kids, okay,and, and how's your wife doing
now?
Uh, much better.
Yes, thank you, okay.
Good, well, I mean we'vecovered a lot in the last uh
hour and a half or so.
Uh, is there anything wehaven't covered that you want to
talk about?

Speaker 2 (01:29:51):
well, um, I recently, uh, attended a program for
veterans and first responderscalled Warrior Path.
It's a 90-day program for PTSDand the first seven days are
done on site.

(01:30:13):
There are sites all over thecountry.
This is a program thatoriginated from Boulder Crest,
if you're familiar with that,and the Warrior Path was
provided here.
It's absolutely free.
The first seven days are doneon site and it's quite intensive
, and it was part of my healing.

(01:30:36):
When I left those seven days, Ileft there feeling a lot
lighter, and the remainder ofthose seven days I left there
feeling a lot lighter, and theremainder of those 90 days is
done through an app that's onthe phone.

Speaker 1 (01:30:50):
Okay, so it sounds like a great program.

Speaker 2 (01:30:54):
It's a super program.
It was through a gentleman thatI met at the program, john, who
you interviewed, and his dad,but John was in that program
with me, uh, back in April ofthis year.

Speaker 1 (01:31:09):
Oh, okay.
Now this is interesting to me,um, because having talked with
John, having talked with you,you seem to be, uh, uh, an
upbeat or a happy person.
You've done things that you'vewanted to do your whole life.
You've made your I would sayyou've made your own luck in

(01:31:30):
many instances.
But, just like a lot of atleast veterans that I know, it
sounds like there was some stuffyou were carrying around with
you that no one really was privyto, that you just kind of drove
through and did what you neededto do and um.
So I'm curious, what promptedyou to go through this program?

Speaker 2 (01:31:51):
ah, great question.
You know, to tell the truth,when, when I was originally
approached with this programWarrior Path at first, I knew
for like three months that I wasgoing.
I applied for it, I had myinterview, I did all the things

(01:32:14):
I needed to do and they said,yep, here's the date and this is
where you show up, and so on.
It was like three months downthe road Part of me was thinking
, seven days away from my wife,it's going to be like a men's
retreat.
I've been a part of a men'sgroup at church for a number of
years and we would do retreatsand so on.

(01:32:34):
So, yeah, I really didn'tunderstand what this was all
about, to tell you the truth.
And then, three days before Iwas scheduled to leave for
Warrior Path, I started doingsome research and I came across
a video from Boulder Crest aboutWarrior Path.
Within the first minute I wasin tears and I was saying to

(01:32:59):
myself I don't deserve this.
I'm not worthy of this type ofprogram.
Again, I didn't reallyunderstand what the whole I knew
.
Ptsd Did I have PTSD?
I don't know.

(01:33:19):
Do I have trouble?
Yes, did I have addictionproblems?
Yes, have I been in counselingand therapy for years, yes, but
it was the catalyst that reallystarted me in a different
direction.

Speaker 1 (01:33:40):
And how has it changed your mindset since
you've been through the program?

Speaker 2 (01:33:45):
Well, it it.
I have a habit maybe it's morethan a habit of closing down, of
just shutting down, of nottalking.
And I'm in the business ofcommunication.
You put me on a stage and youcan't shut me up, but in the
house, even as a kid, I didn'ttalk, I didn't express, because

(01:34:12):
I felt that if I talked, nowI've got to engage and now I've
got to open up and now I've gotto be vulnerable, and these are
the last things that I want todo.
I was all closed up.
One of the stories that I tookaway from Warrior Path was about
the shell that's on a lobster,that the lobster grows but the

(01:34:38):
shell doesn't, and how thatrelates to us as humans, that we
have our shells, we have ourweight on our back of all of the
things that we've brought withus through the years, the
traumas and what have you.
But I felt that for the firsttime, I've got all this stuff

(01:34:59):
that's going on underneath thisshell, and that was that was
eyeopening to that release ofthe shell and being allowing
myself to be vulnerable enoughto build that new shell around
me to now, uh, be big enough foryou know who I am now in my

(01:35:22):
life.
That was one of the bigtakeaways for me is was that
your question?

Speaker 1 (01:35:29):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely so.
I mean the, the, the synopsisis it allowed you to grow.
It allowed you to get rid ofthe small shell and grow into
who you are.

Speaker 2 (01:35:42):
Exactly and, and, and I've had to release that shell
a couple of additional timesover the.
You know, I went through thisin April.
The 90 days is over, um, andwhen I first left there after
those first seven days, I wasriding a high.
Holy crap, I was riding a highand some great things happened
during those initial weeksafterwards, but then you come

(01:36:04):
crashing again.
But the difference is I've gotthese tools.
Now that I know what'shappening, I know I've got to
release that shell.
I know I've got to find thatsafe place where I can release
the shell and be vulnerable, mycommunication with my wife is
much better than it was before.

(01:36:24):
Can it be better?
Yes, but it is better than itwas before.

Speaker 1 (01:36:30):
Kind of reminds me of a plumber that you know.
The plumber goes and does allthe plumbing but his house, the
plumbing sucks right, yeah, thecarpenter too.
Right, and you're out thereteaching people to communicate
and to train and to do all thesethings, but you're not doing it
like right, yeah, when I gohome, I'm not plumbing anymore,
I'm just gonna, I'm gonna, it'sjust gonna work the way it works
, yeah.

(01:36:50):
So it's great that you found away to uh break out of that.
And the other thing is, um, youknow, because I'm 60, I can say
this, like it's never too lateto figure it out.

Speaker 2 (01:37:01):
Yeah, yeah, uh, I was the grandpa in the group.
I was the oldest in the group,68.
I am uh going off to anotherprogram called warrior week,
which is also here in Georgia.
It's run by a differentorganization but it's at the
same location, but these areboth programs.

(01:37:21):
Warrior Path is open to allveterans, all ages, no matter
how many years you put in theservice.
It's also open to firstresponders as well, again, no
matter the age, but Warrior Weekis only available to veterans
post 9-11 oh okay, and who?

Speaker 1 (01:37:43):
who runs that program ?
Do you know?
Uh well, the is it the samegroup?

Speaker 2 (01:37:49):
yeah, it's at camp southern ground that they're
running that program okay, sothat's um that zach brown's
group exactly.
Well, it's zach brown.
He owns the, the property there, and certainly I think he had
an influence of bringing inthese programs.
But, yeah, he owns that andit's during the rest, during the

(01:38:09):
summer months, it's used as acamp for kids.

Speaker 1 (01:38:12):
Yeah, it's, the whole thing's an incredible.
I mean, I, I would.
I would urge people to go outand check it out.
If you're a vet, if you're aveteran, you know a veteran.
Go check that out because it'svery cool, it's a great program
but?

Speaker 2 (01:38:24):
but they have programs other places around the
country right, right, there's.

Speaker 1 (01:38:29):
There's not a lack of programs and by and large,
they're all pretty good at whatthey do.
You, I think, sometimes youhave to find what works for you,
right?
Some?
Some of it works for certainpeople and some of it doesn't
work for others.
Yeah, Exactly.

Speaker 2 (01:38:48):
I felt that the folks at Camp Southern Ground for
Warrior Path they are excellentat what they do they provided
that safe place.
They took us through thecurriculum in a way that just
kind of chipped away at stuffand allowed each of us.
There were seven of us thatwent through that program and
you know, the other takeaway isthat uh and all seven of us, the

(01:39:13):
trauma, the initial trauma,started in childhood.
It's the same with myself.

Speaker 1 (01:39:19):
I don't, that's just not, that's not uncommon, I
don't think because, the way.
The way that we deal with itwhen we're kids informs how we
deal with it as adults and andthat's probably not a great path
to go down yeah, yeah and andin some ways, uh, you know,
going into the military of you.

Speaker 2 (01:39:39):
well, number one, when I went into military, I
didn't realize that I enteredthe military with a rucksack
that was already full of all ofthis stuff, right, and so now
you're just told what to do,when to do it, how to do it,
what to think, what not to think, and all of this other stuff.
You're not, you're not.
Give you, don't.

(01:40:00):
You don't end up in a placewhere you, well, let's talk
about that, let's think aboutthat.
Why do you feel that way, david?
You know you don't have thattime.
And number one and number two,I didn't even know I had all
this weight with me.

Speaker 1 (01:40:13):
Right.
And then people are puttingmore bricks in your backpack the
whole time.
You're out there doing yourthing, right?

Speaker 2 (01:40:19):
Right, and then some of these guys, they they had
those traumas where they were ina war zone and seeing people
blown up and so on and so forth,and them themselves having
atrocious injuries and and thethat trauma on top of all the
other stuff that was already inthe backpack.

Speaker 1 (01:40:40):
So there's a lot to unpack, yeah, and it's a lot to
unpack, yeah, and it's a goodthing we have programs to help
veterans do that.
We need it for sure, yeah.
So, yeah again, we've covered aton of stuff over our
conversation today and, uh, youknow, as we get towards the end
of the conversation, we'regetting ready to wrap things up.
Um, I do have like just onemore question to ask.

(01:41:02):
I ask everyone the samequestion, and that is for
someone listening to this yearsfrom now, what message would you
like them to take away from ourconversation and from the way
you've lived your life.

Speaker 2 (01:41:18):
Well, great question what do I want people to take
away years down the roadwatching this and saying, maybe
a relative or someone that mayhave known me and just know that
I gave it my best shot, veryfortunate, in my travels.

(01:41:47):
I'm very grateful for all ofthe experiences that I've had
that have brought me to righthere right now the challenging
things, the extraordinary things.
All of those I'm grateful for.
And if you know, I was askedthe question.
My therapist was asking me thequestion just earlier today
about what would you tell youryounger self if you could go

(01:42:10):
back and visit with thatnine-year-old, 10-year-old,
whatever, david and just letthat that, let them know that,
that you know that I'm.
I'm kind of like a.
My wife calls me a genius.
Uh, that there's.
I've got many talents and justto just to relax and to allow,

(01:42:34):
allow things to just kind ofhappen.
Don't get all wrapped up inthis stuff and don't, uh, don't
get all wrapped up in this stuffand don't.
You know the voices.
Just find a way to put them tothe side.
Be happy, exercise, go forwalks, don't feel like you've

(01:42:55):
got to have that externalconnection of that.
There were times where I didn'tfeel complete unless I had that
external connection of that Ididn't.
There were times where I didn'tfeel complete unless I had that
external connection of somesort whether it was a woman in
my life or or a drug or alcoholor something else external from
my life to feel complete, thateverything I have is is within

(01:43:19):
me.
So what people can take away isthat that all of us have the
tools we need.
When I coach people, I tellthem you already have everything
you need right inside of you.
My job is to pull it out of you.
So what people can take away iswe've.
What people can take away iswhat we've already that I

(01:43:40):
already had everything I neededinside of me at age 10.
I just needed to allow it toflourish.

Speaker 1 (01:43:47):
All right, great message.
Well, thanks for taking timeout on a Tuesday afternoon to
talk with me.
I really appreciate it, david.

Speaker 2 (01:43:55):
Thank you, Bill.

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