You never know when love will come to you. I have this cousin who's not at all like anyone I've ever known. He's not everyone's cup of tea, but he's brilliant and has carved out a simple life that has allowed him to smell the roses; he breathes their aroma deeply today. Standing a rail straight 6'3", he needs do nothing more than enter a room to fill it with his presence. In some ways, he is a bit larger than life. To be clear, though, the love story isn't about him - he's the story teller. (That's him in the picture driving the senior citizen's bus.)
When I was fifteen and he sixteen, his dad went to Viet Nam. He and his mom, brother and sister came to live in my tiny hometown of Scottsville, Ky., in a crazy old stone house. He was an Air Force "brat" and known to have a mile-wide streak of mischief in him; I did too, so it wasn't long before we were together almost constantly, getting in trouble and driving our parents to the brink. It was an hilarious time for us (not so much for the 'rents) and I still laugh about us roaring around town in his purple VW bug.
Since then, he's worked on river barges, taught school in the mountains of Columbia (and escaped at midnight from drug lords bent on killing him, convinced he was a DEA agent), worked deep-water tugs running between North and South America, was the skipper of a gambling boat and had a few other "careers" along the way. Each of those occupations have myriad stories attached that contain a few jaw-dropping moments in them. Best of all, he's a truthful man, so the stories are even better.
As if all that wasn't enough, he's beaten a serious type of lymphatic cancer not once, not twice but three times. The last time, they nuked his immune system and he lived in an oxygen tent for six weeks with his Dad (a career Air Force pilot with a slew of his own stories) being his only visitor. A lesser man would've been dead, but such is Bobby Goad whose robust ways flip the bird at things in nature that would challenge him.
To prove that it wasn't about to get him down, once he recovered after round three, he spent the next eight or ten years making pilgrimages to Mexico with the sole purpose of seeing as much as he could and staying as long as possible on as little as possible. He'd take a Greyhound to Texas, grab a Mexican bus (which he says are like airlines here - segmented classes, videos, etc.) and then get to a city where he could put on his backpack and hike through the country. Sometimes he'd find a little corner to hunker down in and he'd just exist for awhile.
Being an avid surfer, he once found a seaside shack on the Pacific coast that was a few miles from town ("Outhouse included - no extra charge!"). He could walk in, eat supper for a pittance, drink beer for pennies and wander home happy and sated. Or, he'd find a village at the base of a mountain where a room was a few bucks a night and he could spend the days exploring the rugged mountains and the tiny hamlets up there.
His solo expedition days are past and he's more settled. He got married in Florida about a decade ago to a lady who shares his love of a simple existence, so they built a sailboat and moved into that. They've since moved to Sitka, Alaska, and have taken to living in a cabin on a lake near town. The rugged folks in that area seem to be a good match for him, but Bobby and "T" are talking warmer climes after wintering there ... well, maybe places where sunshine and darkness are more equal each day.
Bobby has a blog called "Extrano Boogie" and much of it has to do with coming societal meltdown, the Fed and the Treasury in a ponzi-type scheme designed to keep the dollar strong, and other developments that are decidedly not mainstream news. Whether you believe what he refers to or not, you have to at least consider the evidence he presents. While it would be easy to blow it off as reactionary or doomsday rhetoric, he's been right about some rather significant things, like the banking meltdown. You be the judge if you read past the story I'm posting here.
While talking about a larger-than-life relative is fun, a recent post to his blog is the real story. He drives a bus for senior citizens a couple days a week besides his meals-on-wheels duties. He has a big heart and really enjoys working with these folks. This blog post is about some folks he's met who found love when you'd least expect it. It's a wonderful story and Bobby is a great story teller. Take ten minutes and read it. It'll make your day. Cheers!
A Senior Center Romance, by Bobby Goad
Monday, April 05, 2010
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