Insight: Going nowhere fast

By Ed Pierce
Managing Editor

Seeing a photo of a hang glider last week jogged my memory of a time in my past I’d rather forget.

Ed Pierce's 1978 Buick LeSabre.
COURTESY PHOTO

It was October 1987 and I was working the 2-11 shift as a reporter at a daily newspaper in Albuquerque, New Mexico. When I left home to drive to work that afternoon, I was low on gas and figured I’d cash my paycheck on my lunch break and fill up. It was also 75 degrees and sunny, so I got into the car without taking a jacket.

Somehow, I got busy at work and never took a lunch break. When I stepped outside to drive home after my shift, the temperature had dropped to 38 degrees and snow flurries were in the air. Starting my car up, I noticed the fuel gauge was close to low but the grocery store where I would cash my paycheck was closed. I decided to drive home and hoped I had enough gas to make it.

About six miles south of Albuquerque on I-25, my car ran out of gas, and it was near some steep hills where I would spot hang gliders taking off from time to time.

I stepped out of my 1978 Buick LeSabre and stuck my thumb out to hitchhike. At about 11:45 p.m., an Army soldier in uniform stopped and offered me a ride. He said he had just attended a Christian concert in Albuquerque, and that it was the Christian thing to do to drive me the remaining 10 miles south to my house in Peralta, New Mexico.

Reaching my home, I thanked the soldier who then drove off. I then grabbed a warm coat, about $8 in quarters, and my gas can. It was a short walk of under a mile back to Highway 47 and the Circle K convenience store. I used $2 to fill the gas can and waited for someone driving north to ask for a ride back to my car on the side of I-95.

At about 12:30 a.m., a rusty old yellow pickup truck pulled into the Circle K lot, and a fellow wearing a cowboy hat got out and pumped $5 of gas into his gas tank. There were two other men in the pickup’s cab and two more bundled up under blankets riding in the pickup truck’s bed.

I approached the driver paying for his gas and asked if he was headed north to I-95 and if so, could I ride with him to where my car was. He smiled and asked me how much it was worth to me. When I offered him my remaining $6 in quarters, he scooped it out of my hand and instructed me to jump in the back.

The guys riding in the truck’s bed with me said they were oil workers heading home after working at an oil rig near Artesia, New Mexico. They had exited I-25 hoping to find a gas station, had become lost, and ended up at the same Circle K where I was. Inside the store, the clerk had told them to head straight up Highway 47 past the Isleta Pueblo reservation as they would reconnect with I-25 in about eight miles.

Riding in the pickup truck bed was brutal. It was now snowing and between that and the wind blowing all around me while driving at 55 mph, I was absolutely freezing. 

Nearing my car on the opposite side of I-25, I banged on the pickup’s rear window and signaled to the driver that it was where I wanted to get out. He pulled over and I thanked him for the ride. I put the gas in my car, and it started right up.

But before I could leave for home, I noticed one of the oil workers waving his arms and shouting at me from across the highway. He ran across the highway divider and told me that one of the front tires had blown out on the pickup truck and it was now flat all the way to the rim. They apparently didn’t have a spare tire or even a tire jack for emergencies.

The driver asked if I could drive him back south to the Circle K store where he could buy a can of Fix-A-Flat. As a joke, I asked him how much it was worth to him and he said he would give me my $6 in quarters back. I told him that was a deal and I said that I would even bring him back to the truck after he bought the Fix-A-Flat.

We took off in my LeSabre and I waited while he went inside the store. I drove him back to the pickup truck and stood by while they inflated their front tire. I made a U-turn and headed back south for the 10-mile ride home.

I crawled into bed about 2:15 a.m. and the next morning, I called my friends and shared my experiences of the previous evening with them.

Here’s what I learned. First, I always bring a jacket with me in October while driving at night. Second, I always keep plenty of gasoline in the gas tank of my car. Lastly, I always have some cash available in case of an emergency. <

Andy Young: A spooky month for certain Mainers

By Andy Young

This weekend is going to be a real treat.

For the first time since 2020, Halloween falls on a Saturday. And since Daylight Saving Time ends on the first Sunday in November, savvy trick-or-treaters know they’ll have an extra hour to sleep after bobbing for apples, carving pumpkins, and engaging in similar Halloween-themed activities.

This isn’t a trick. Two hours after midnight this coming Sunday morning, clocks in 48 of the 50 states will fall back an hour, making 2 a.m. magically become 1 a.m. That means Americans everywhere outside of Hawaii, Guam, Puerto Rico, American Samoa, the Northern Mariana Islands, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Arizona (excluding the Navajo nation) will be treated to a 49-hour weekend.

Dedicated Halloweenies had better take advantage of this opportunity though, because their favorite holiday doesn’t fall on a Saturday again until 2037. By that time Congress may have decided to emulate Hawaii, Guam, Puerto Rico, American Samoa, the Northern Mariana Islands, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Arizona (excluding the Navajo nation) and eliminate DST once and for all. Doing so would finally relieve people in every state not named Arizona or Hawaii of having to re-set their clocks twice a year. Enacting such legislation would permanently eliminate November’s annual 49–hour weekend, but it would also end the tragically short 47-hour weekend that occurs early each March.

Daylight Saving Time isn’t the only thing going away this weekend. Saturday is officially the last day of National Book Month, National Pizza Month, LGBTQ+ History Month and Italian American Heritage Month. It will also mark the end of National Chemistry Week, National Massage Therapy Week, National Lead Poisoning Prevention Week, and National Magic Week.

But some people, specifically those connected with college football in Maine, probably can’t wait to see November arrive. October hasn’t been a particularly good month for our state’s collegiate gridders.

With this Saturday’s games still to be played, Maine’s five oldest college football programs are a combined 0-19 this month. Bates, Bowdoin, Colby, and Maine Maritime have all gone 0-4. The UMaine Black Bears are 0-3, but only because they didn’t have a game scheduled on the weekend of October 10th. The overall record of those five Maine schools so far this season is 1-32; UMaine’s 21-18 win over Towson University on Aug. 27 is, as this is written, the only victory any of that quintet has earned so far this year.

Maine’s two other college football teams, the University of New England and Husson University, are both 2-5 heading into this weekend. But UNE’s two victories came against Husson and Maine Maritime. Husson’s wins over New England College and Western New England University are, aside from UMaine’s long-ago triumph at Towson, the only two victories by a Maine college football team this season over an opponent from out of state.

Has there ever been a calendar month when every college football team in a state lost every game on its schedule? Well, yes. 

It happened in September 2026.

Last month Maine’s seven college-football-playing squads played 21 intercollegiate football games and lost them all, getting outscored 690-258 in the process. UMaine, UNE, and Husson each went 0-4, Maine Maritime lost all three of its games, and Colby, Bowdoin, and Bates were all 0-2.

It’s doubtful that any of the state’s five oldest collegiate football programs have all gone winless for two consecutive calendar months, and thankfully that won’t happen in Maine this year.

But only because college football games can no longer end with a tie. And while the rest of us are trick-or-treating Saturday night, Colby’s football team will be hosting Bates. <

Insight: Smooth criminal steals the show (Shamone)

By Ed Pierce
Managing Editor

Halloween has always been a favorite for me as an adult because I could act silly while wearing creative costumes. Over the years, I’ve been an angry nun, an old woman on a walker, Kosmo Kramer, a pirate, a pregnant bride, Flava Flav, and even O.J. Simpson. But the costume that brought the house down, without question, was Michael Jackson.

Ed Pierce entered a Halloween costume
contest in 2004 while dressed as the late
singer Michael Jackson.
 COURTESY PHOTO

It was 2004 and the daily newspaper that I worked for in Florida would offer a Halloween costume contest for employees on Halloween each year. Staff members would take time to put on a costume and march in a parade around the newspaper building including visiting the newsroom, advertising, circulation, the pressroom and the publisher’s office. At the end of the parade, everyone would gather outside the cafeteria, and prizes would be awarded for the best costume by the Human Resources staff.

That year, I chose to create a costume of Michael Jackson, who spent most of that year appearing in court in California, charged with criminal behavior toward children. Televised coverage of his bizarre courthouse arrivals wearing pajamas or dancing on top of the limousine he rode in for pre-trial activities were borderline comedic in my opinion, so I thought that he would be a great celebrity to lampoon in the newspaper costume contest.

I leaned heavily on my soon-to-be wife Nancy for advice on how to put together the costume. She suggested that we start creating the costume by visiting a nearby thrift shop, and it yielded my first part of the MJ wardrobe, the black fedora hat for $4.

On our next trip to a local flea market, I purchased a pair of used black sunglasses for 50 cents. At a neighborhood garage sale, I found a pair of men’s black pants with my correct waist size, but the length came to about my ankles about two inches above my shoes for just $1.

With two weeks left before Halloween, I revisited the original thrift store and was able to buy a cheap pair of black loafers in my size for $2 and a used black wig for $3.  

My mother contributed to my costume by giving me a leftover painter’s mask from when she had the family room repainted by a contractor at her house earlier that fall following some hurricane damage at her home. I also had a pair of white socks to wear with the MJ apparel.

Nancy’s sister lived on the other side of the state from us and was attending chef school at the time. I had an idea that if she could get me a white chef coat, perhaps Nancy could die it deep red for me in the washing machine for the MJ costume. The weekend before Halloween, Nancy’s sister Diane visited us, and brought with her a white chef coat for me.

Two wash cycles using red RIT dye for the chef coat were a disaster though. The red dye somehow became diluted and left the chef coat a shade of pink. We tried washing it again with a different brand of red dye but no matter how many times we attempted it, the chef coat remained pink, and I had to accept that my MJ costume would include a pink coat. I also abandoned the idea of adding a white sequined glove because stores in Florida seemed to be out of those items that year.

About 10 minutes before the costume contest, I reached under my desk in the newsroom and retrieved the brown paper grocery bag I had stored my costume in. I walked to the men’s restroom in the newspaper lobby and changed into the MJ costume.

The receptionist in the lobby started laughing when I emerged as Michael Jackson and so did other newspaper employees when we lined up near the lobby for the costume parade. I was near the end of the parade line and walking past the offices of the newspaper’s top editors when I noticed that they found my costume to be humorous. Even the ultra-serious managing editor gave me a thumbs up, one of the few times I ever saw him smile in all the years I worked for the paper.

As the parade moved along, just to liven things up, I attempted to moonwalk and I would occasionally belt out a few “hee-hees” for those watching. 

Reaching the judging area, parade participants walked up and down before the judges, and I had a hard time keeping a straight face when I had to reveal my identity by taking off the sunglasses, mask, wig and hat.

When the judging had been completed, I won “Best Costume” and received a restaurant gift certificate for my efforts. I changed back into my street clothes and endured a lot of good-natured Michael Jackson jokes from some of my co-workers for the rest of that afternoon.

Other newspapers that I have worked for during my career have had Halloween costume contests, but none have ever come close to the enthusiasm generated by that event. Each year dozens of employees would plan, create and participate in the contest and they’d have a blast doing it.

A decade ago, I dressed like the character Offred from The Handmaid’s Tale television show in yet another newspaper costume contest in Maine.

Nothing comes close to the MJ costume though. <

Andy Young: The frugal gourmet shares his secrets

By Andy Young

All of us are works in progress.

However, not everyone progresses at the same rate. For example, I still can’t tie a necktie, although I’ve compensated for that imperfection by not wearing one for the past three decades. And while my parallel parking skills remain sub-standard, I did recently squeeze my Prius into a parking place that was no more than two and a half Lincoln Continentals long.

But one ability that’s improved by leaps and bounds over the past few years has been my culinary skills.

Unlike formally trained chefs, I cannot claim expertise in any particular ethnic fare, like Italian, Chinese, or French cuisine. My specialty is based on finances and availability of ingredients, rather than on more traditional epicurean arts.

Even though I’m still a work in progress, I’m confident I’ve mastered the WNWN (waste not, want not) school of meal preparation. That’s why I’m using this space to generously share some of my most-enjoyed recipes.

LEFTOVER CEREAL SOUP

Empty every box of cereal in your pantry that isn’t quite finished but still has a few odd flakes (or similar dregs) left, into a standard cereal bowl. Crumbs from Cheerios, Rice Krispies, Corn Chex, Mini Shredded Wheat, Bran Flakes, and similar cereals are all acceptable. Then sprinkle leftover blueberries and strawberries onto the pile, slice up your oldest banana, pour milk (or leftover Greek yogurt) atop the mixture, and enjoy. Serves one.

VEGETABLE RICE PILAF

Read directions on the oldest box of Rice Pilaf mix you own. Then boil appropriate amount of water. Toss in box’s contents, stir, then add in any and all leftover spinach, onions, carrots, red and/or green peppers, celery, zucchini, and/or any other elderly produce that’s seen better days. Adding leftover frozen veggies to flesh things out (corn, beans, peas, etc.) is fine as well. Cover, simmer for amount of time recommended on box’s side. Serves four. Or two, if one of the two is a growing child with a healthy appetite. Or one, if the one is an aspiring competitive eater.

SALMON RICE PILAF

Follow the directions for making VEGETABLE RICE PILAF (above). Then prepare a modest-sized salmon fillet. When the Rice Pilaf is done, cut the cooked salmon into small pieces and then mix them into the Rice Pilaf. Serves four or one if your three guests all hate salmon.


EVERYTHING-BUT-THE-KITCHEN-SINK VEGETARIAN PASTA 

Prepare your preferred pasta (spaghetti, linguine, orzo, rotini, or similar product), following the instructions on the side of the package. Pour a thin covering of olive oil into a large frying pan. Cut up every elderly mold-free onion, pepper (green or red), mushroom, carrot, zucchini, eggplant, or celery stalk in your produce drawer. Saute for 1 to 2 minutes. Add spinach, Swiss chard, or whatever other withering greens are handy. Continue to saute, and stir frequently, for another minute or so. Drain fully cooked pasta, then put it into a large microwave-safe bowl. Pour last week’s leftover generic marinara sauce on the pasta, then top it with the sauteed vegetables. Microwave for 3 minutes; then remove and stir. Microwave for another 3 minutes; stir again. Microwave for a final minute, and…voila! It’s ready to enjoy. Serves 1 to 6, depending on amount of pasta prepared, and how many guests are confirmed gluttons.

EVERYTHING-BUT-THE-KITCHEN-SINK VEGETABLE CHICKAGHETTI

Prepare spaghetti according to instructions. Then follow instructions for preparing EVERYTHING-BUT-THE-KITCHEN-SINK VEGETARIAN PASTA (above). Subsequently add chicken or, if your guests are vegetarians, veggie-based chicken.

Having prepared each of these dishes on numerous occasions, I can personally guarantee that each one is delicious, and a nutritional bonanza.

Except for Leftover Cereal Soup. That’s still a work in progress. <

Insight: Born to be branded

By Ed Pierce
Managing Editor

Janet Robinson, the former Chief Executive Officer of the New York Times, thinks that there is a significant difference between customers who purchase for convenience and those who are highly loyal to certain products.

“Repeat business or behavior can be bribed. Loyalty has to be earned," Robinson once said.

I’m not entirely sure that’s the case and taking a closer look into my upbringing shows that not all brand loyalty is passed down from parents to children. That’s a process marketing agencies call consumer socialization, where family habits, emotional rituals, and shared identities shape long-term product choices.

Those who subscribe to that theory say that the routine of everyday domestic life can embed certain product brands deep into the emotional framework of our childhood. They can cite studies showing that a parent's passion for certain brands may transfer directly to their children through shared experiences and nostalgic association later in life.

No matter if it’s a cleaning product, a brand of juice, a type of car, or a breakfast cereal, marketers believe that children start identifying brand names as early as 24 months old, and many have developed favorite specific brands by the time they reach first grade.

As for me, I grew up in the 1960s and would accompany my mother on her shopping trips to the neighborhood grocery store. Having grown up in poverty during the Great Depression, she was set in her ways and fiercely loyal to her chosen products and brands.

She did most of the cooking for our family and would also make the lunches that my brother and I would take to school. We grew up eating the products she would select, and she had come to rely on as an adult.

Among her favorite products and brand names were Chicken of the Sea tuna fish in vegetable oil; Campbell’s Pork and Beans, Campbell’s condensed soups, Hellmann’s mayonnaise, Heinz ketchup, French’s mustard, Archway cookies and Del Monte canned fruit and vegetables. She also would bring home Peter Pan peanut butter, Mister Salty pretzels, Welch’s grape jelly, Chase & Sanborn coffee, Lipton teabags, cartons of Sealtest milk, Swanson TV dinners, Dream Whip powdered topping, Minute Rice, cans of Franco American Spaghetti and Meatballs, and Chef Boyardee Beefaroni.

My mother didn’t bake very much and instead would purchase Hostess snowballs, cupcakes and Twinkies to put in our lunchbox. Sandwiches were made with Wonder Bread and cans of Hershey's Syrup were purchased for making chocolate milk. She’d buy Pepsodent toothpaste to brush out teeth with, Breck shampoo, Brylcreem hair cream, Oxydol laundry soap, Comet cleanser, Ivory soap for the bathroom, and Joy dish soap.

Purchases made by my father were usually something sweet to be shared with the kids like Fruit Stripe chewing gum, a tub of orange sherbet, boxes of Cracker Jack, bottles of Hires Root Beer or Grape Nehi soda pop.

In all the time that I lived with my parents growing up, they never wavered in the products and brands they were loyal to and were steadfast in their choices.

My own personal picks for products and certain brands came not from the theory of consumer socialization passed down by my parents, but from the reality of higher living expenses and inflation of the 1970s and new technology such as the invention of the microwave oven in the 1980s.

While still in college and making $2.50 an hour, I shopped for groceries based upon the most affordable price and value. A few years later, I was earning a regular paycheck while serving in the U.S. Air Force and my priorities changed. I could afford more brand-name products and a few of the products I grew up with became regular items in my food pantry.

An inspection of my kitchen shelves and refrigerator in the 1970s and 1980s would reveal new products created in the 1960s such as Pop Tarts, Shake 'n Bake coating mix for chicken and pork, Cool Whip whipped topping, Bugles snacks, and jars of Tang instant orange-flavored drink mix made popular by TV commercials with astronauts. I also developed a liking for crunchy peanut butter, but my brand of choice became Skippy or Jif. I brushed my teeth with Closeup toothpaste and sometimes every now and then, I would buy a package of Freshen Up cinnamon liquid center chewing gum.

One Thanksgiving Day around 2008 my mother was our guest, and she looked in our cupboard and spotted several cans of Campbell’s Bean and Bacon soup, a jar of Hellmann’s mayonnaise and a small can of Campbell’s Pork and Beans. She mentioned to my wife Nancy that she always fed me Campbell’s Bean and Bacon soup for lunch in the winter and she was happy that it was still a favorite of mine.

Maybe there’s some truth to her embedding product brands deep into the emotional framework of my childhood, although now I purchase canned tuna fish in water, haven’t bought Wonder Bread in decades and Swansons stopped selling TV dinners in America years ago.

Hires Root Beer is long extinct and so is Freshen Up chewing gum. Franco American is no more, and the Mister Salty pretzel brand was phased out in the 1990s.

Time marches on. <

Andy Young: Got milk?

By Andy Young

Some decades ago, my mother informed me in no uncertain terms that my habit of having a daily after-school bowl of cereal needed to change. Our family’s milk consumption rate was becoming excessive, and my choice of midafternoon refreshment was a big reason for it.

My initial reaction was outrage. How did this heartless woman expect her growing son to subsist on a mere three meals a day? It quickly became clear to me that a viable and economically feasible substitute for milk was needed.

When a crisis occurs, being willing to think differently and/or defy convention is paramount. Fortunately, I have that ability. It occurred to me that no one actually tasted the cold liquid they poured over their breakfast, and/or their afternoon snack. Milk had no perceivable flavor; it was the cereal we were savoring.

That’s why, after thinking outside the (milk) box, I theorized that tap water could serve the same purpose as milk did, and at a 100 percent reduction in cost!

Most ordinary people think only an idiot would consider consuming cereal soaking in room temperature water, and I agree. But it takes a true visionary to discern that water which has been refrigerated overnight isn’t lukewarm any longer; it becomes chilled water, which I brilliantly conjectured could be the perfect cold liquid to immerse one’s breakfast cereal in.

Back then orange juice came in one-quart glass bottles which were far too valuable to throw away, so before retiring on the night of my life-altering epiphany I filled an ex-Tropicana container to the top with water. That night’s dreams consisted solely of what I knew for certain would be the revolutionary, delicious, and significantly less expensive breakfast I’d be consuming the following morning.

A few short hours later I leaped out of bed, crept quietly into the kitchen, and poured myself a generous bowl of Rice Chex. Then I opened the refrigerator where the bottle of water I’d prepared the previous evening was waiting. It was cold enough to the touch to provide me with both literal, and figurative chills. Preparing to savor the fruits of my ingenuity, I unscrewed the cap, and poured a modest amount of the clear cold liquid atop the cereal. Quickly grabbing a spoon, I energetically dug in, knowing that soggy cereal is no way to start one’s day, regardless of whatever liquid it is that renders it that way.

The first mouthful of Rice Chex was reasonably crisp, but it was obvious something was lacking. Considering the possibility that the first bit of water wasn’t watery enough, I chewed, swallowed, and inserted a second spoonful. The taste didn’t improve. A third mouthful was similarly underwhelming.

Wondering if I hadn’t used enough water, I added another few ounces.

The taste didn’t change.

Rice Chex with water was disgusting. But like other bold innovators, I wasn’t discouraged. Shrugging off the disappointing first trial, I disposed of the sodden Rice Chex, filled a fresh bowl with Cheerios, and subsequently added cold H2O.

Disappointingly, Cheerios were no better with cold water on them than Rice Chex were.

In retrospect, I probably should have admitted defeat at that point. But like many ambitious young trendsetters before and since, I couldn’t bring myself to capitulate without making one more try at finding a more affordable liquid cereal enhancer.

Corn Flakes with orange juice on them were even more revolting than the first two combinations I’d tried. But my humiliation wasn’t over. Just when I thought things couldn’t get worse, fate poured salt into my wound.

Orange juice, it turned out, was even more expensive than milk! <

Insight: We rise by lifting others

By Ed Pierce
Managing Editor

Even though we all share space on this planet, I’ve found that truly knowing what others carry around inside them is never easy.

That fact was evident for me this past weekend when I accompanied my wife Nancy to a funeral service in St. Albans, Vermont for our sister-in-law Millie Boyd. She had been married for 34 years to Nancy’s oldest brother Will, and they lived in St. Albans.

Over the years we saw Millie when we visited them on trips to Vermont, and she came across to me as a talented artist who was warm and welcoming to us. She wanted to know about us and our lives, and we were never there long enough to carry on long conversations with her about her own life.

On the drive over to Vermont, I asked Nancy how Will and Millie met and I had forgotten that they had met while struggling through issues with alcohol. Nancy told me that both Will and Millie had devoted their lives after overcoming alcohol problems to helping others, serving as sponsors, listening to people struggling as they had, and serving as their mentors.

Until we had arrived at the funeral home though, I was not aware of the full extent of Millie’s life. She was a mother of three daughters, a loving grandmother who taught her grandchildren gardening, and had completed nursing school.

During her eulogy, I heard that in 1988, she fulfilled a lifelong dream and earned a degree from Trinity College in Burlington, Vermont. The speaker said Millie was proud that she and her three daughters all attended college full-time at the same time and graduated by birth order.

I did not know that Millie enjoyed singing classical acapella music with Gigi Scriggins' Morning Glory Singers, and later, the Side Effects barbershop quartet. She had great fun performing for Cardiac Capers, a hospital benefit show, and at other venues in Vermont. I learned that Millie was also involved with The Aphasia Choir of Vermont, a community group founded by her daughter Karen McFeeters Leary, a former speech-language pathologist who is a gifted singer and songwriter. The choir is for stroke and traumatic brain injury survivors with speech difficulties so they can communicate fluently through music.

Millie also was an avid reader and in later years, she discovered a passion for watercolor painting. She belonged to numerous artists' groups, especially enjoying painting and learning with the "Tuesday morning gals." She exhibited her work in Franklin and Chittenden Counties in Vermont.

In fact, I had forgotten that on one of our trips to Vermont to see Nancy’s family, she had given us a painting completed by Nancy’s mother, who was a professional artist. The painting had been hanging on a wall in Will and Millie’s home. It shows Nancy at about the age of 14 and her mother at the lake and now is one of the centerpiece paintings in our living room in Maine.

That led me to remember that Will and Millie were frequent visitors to the nursing home in St. Albans where Nancy’s mother was cared for until her death in 2005.

But the most humbling thing that happened to me during Millie’s funeral came during the “Community Remembrance” portion of her service. 

One by one, people from all walks of life stepped forward to say how Millie had been someone who truly cared about them and had been instrumental in helping them forego dependence upon alcohol and change their lives for the better.

Each one talked about how tough and strict Millie and Will were as their sponsors and yet they felt that the couple always treated them with respect and dignity and most of all with kindness.

I was moved when a man discussed how he had “burned his life to the ground” because of alcohol and walked away from his children when they needed him. He said he saw no point in going on, but it was Millie who had convinced him that he could overcome his problems and start again.

Another speaker discussed how many lives Millie had touched and through her faith in humanity and using her own example as inspiration, had transformed hundreds of lives through her willingness to volunteer on behalf of others struggling with sobriety.

A woman who worked as the only female on a construction crew talked about how kind Millie had been to her and that she continually told her to smile.

Many other speakers mentioned that smiling was the cornerstone that Millie used to calm people’s fears of talking with her and how she felt no matter how hard a day someone might have had that a simple smile showed kindness to them.

Driving home that evening, I told Nancy that it was very humbling to hear all of those speakers talk about what Millie had done for them, how her persistence had led them to turn their lives around, and why they felt they needed to be there to express their love for her.

I carried one big question away from that entire experience that day. When my time comes, as it does for everyone, what do I expect my friends and family to say about me? <