Clickety-Clack, Clickety-Clack

My train continues to roll down the track in this, the Fourth and final Quarter of my life. It is easy to throw around words and phrases without giving much thought to the significance, depth, meaning, or consequences of what lies behind them. When I first coined the expression, “the train of life” in an earlier blog, it seemed like a nice phrase to use when discussing how people get on and off our own personal trains as we venture down the track on our individual journeys through life. It was a nice way to explain what happens to all of us throughout our lives but I’m not sure I ever digested the brutal reality of those words. Today I do as it has been a difficult couple of months with too many people—three to be exact—exiting their car for the last time. 

One of these, Diane and I knew was coming. Mary Stipanowich was 101 years young, didn’t leave a stone unturned, an opportunity wasted, or a note unwritten. If you are fortunate, you have a Mary in your life. Man or woman, they are people with the perpetual positive mental attitude. They exude happiness and good cheer. They write notes to commemorate birthdays or lunches or even unexpected visits. Everyone who met Mary and spent time with her was brought into her unique and very happy universe.  Need a smile? She had one for you. Need a pat on the back to cheer you up, she had that too. A little down on your luck, Mary knew how to help you find a stunning rainbow where all you could see were storm clouds. Of course, she knew everyone and was the town historian and unofficial mayor.

The Taylors must have had an inclination her train ride was nearing its end, as we felt a need to visit her just prior to our annual escape from winter sojourn to Florida. She didn’t miss a beat, asked us to stay for cookies, and gave us hugs goodbye. As we left her that day, we both teared up as we had a feeling we would not see her again. We didn’t. Yet, as sad as her passing is, I find comfort that she did indeed, “do it all” and it was simply time for my train to stop as she got off to join her dear husband Joe.  Goodbye and Godspeed Mary Stipanowich.

The other two passengers who got off the train left way too soon. Dan Ross was a former student of mine though I am only a year older than him. Somehow we crossed paths which seemed to happen to Diane and I throughout our careers as we would meet people in one venue and continue our relationship in another. Dan was a competitor in most everything he did. He was a basketball player for John Thiel at Galesburg High School, loved to play golf but could generally throw a club farther than he could hit a ball, and was a pretty good softball player. We played against each other in the local league, he for Coca Cola and me for Baymiller’s Shoes. We jousted each other intently but after the game it was time for pizza and a soda or maybe even a beer or seven.  He left Macomb and had an impressive career as a CEO, and we kept in touch. What Diane and I didn’t know was that he kept in touch with our kids as well and was there to give them career advice and a helping hand from time to time. No big deal, he just did it.

There is this part of the Taylor DNA that I don’t understand and it has to do with people and what I refer to as “connections.” Heck, this blog is part of that phenomenon. We tend to keep the communication link with friends open and still have a “landline” as we never know who or when someone will call. Dan became one of those people and over the past couple of years when he would call from Michigan, we could tell his health was failing. Lately, his tone had changed a bit and it was no longer kidding each other about athletic exploits the rest of the world had long since forgotten but instead, more serious topics. On one such call, Diane inquired, “Are you ready?” and the reply came swiftly, “Ready for what Diane?” I remember the call clearly, as she replied as only the closest of friends could, “You know.”  This time the response was slow and deliberate and I could feel the emotion in the air as he quietly uttered, “Yes I am good with my God. Thanks for asking Diane. It does my soul good to be able to tell someone and that someone is you.”

I guess in the final analysis, that’s what friends are for, to be there for the good times but also when the sledding gets pretty tough. Our last call with Dan was to tell us he was having his left foot amputated the next day. Shivers went up and down my spine as I couldn’t foresee this once stellar athlete without a foot. He gave the whole thing a positive spin. “I’ll just get a prothesis–I’ll be fine.”  We said our goodbyes and the next day his wonderful daughter, Missy, called us to say he came out of surgery OK but died soon thereafter. Dan Ross, a life well-lived but darn it, not lived long enough.

We’ve all heard the expression that it’s not the number of years a person lives but rather what we do with them that really matters. Sure, that is true but still, we generally want, “just a few more.” When I had base of tongue cancer in 2010, I remember telling the family that I had lived a full and rewarding life and if “things” didn’t work out, that would be OK. Thirteen years later I feel the same way but like everyone reading this, hopefully there are “just a few more years” out there. I’ve been sitting here for over an hour and imagine that you’ve heard way more than enough from Gordy Taylor for one day but I need to tell you about that other “too soon” exit from my train of life.

His name is Mike Houston; he recently died in Minnesota after a long illness. He was “everything” at the Carlson School of Business at the University of Minnesota—endowed chairs, international travel, books, juried articles, mentoring doctoral students, he did it all. Mike was simply a giant in the area of International Marketing but people would never know it by just talking to him.  Maybe humility says something about who a person becomes as Mary, Dan, and Mike all shared this admirable attribute. 

The Taylor story with Mike Houston is worth telling 53 years after it began in 1970. We met in Stipes Hall in the College of Business at Western Illinois University. We were both Assistant Professors. Mike would go on to get his PhD at the University of Illinois and his academic climb from there would be swift and dramatic. I would go on to be the “alumni guy” at Western after struggling mightily to get my PhD at the University of Florida.  He was probably first in his class and let’s suffice it to say, I was not. In 1970 we were both newly married 24 year-old softball players and beer drinkers who taught in order to, what else, buy beer. Yes, a bit of an over simplification but we were young, married, no kids, and having fun with no real idea of what would become of us.  Mike and Pat Houston, David and Judy Beveridge, and Gordy and Diane Taylor enjoyed many times together as young faculty members.  Here is where this story takes on meaning. Mike was in the Marketing Department and I was in Management. These were separate entities and there was territorial brinksmanship among departments in universities throughout the country that still exist today.  

I took my huge one-year salary of $14,000 over ten months (not a bad salary back then) looking forward to a summer school class to provide money to get us to the next academic year but oops, it didn’t happen. Diane and I were certainly going to run out of money before September 1971 rolled around. We were in deep trouble. Diane was going to have a baby in July 1971. What were we to do?  Well, Mike Houston had a summer school class, but he wanted to go to Champaign to complete his doctorate. So, this is what he did, this is what Mike Houston did. He told his department chair to assign his class in Consumer Behavior to Gordy Taylor in Management. A management professor teaching a class in marketing crossing departmental lines was unheard of. This could just not happen but it did. I taught the class, was paid $1,400, and Diane delivered Jennifer on July 6, 1971. Mike simply did not have to do what he did but again, friends are friends for a reason. 

I know death is inevitable but I look at “my train” today and there are three empty seats where once these remarkable people sat. The Taylor Train of Life continues chugging down the track picking up more passengers like the memorable Mary, Dan, and Mike.

ALL ABOARD!