The end. Hi, and welcome back to Tell Me What
Happened, the podcast that features folks from
all walks of life telling us one story from their
childhood and how that event impacted who they
are today. I'm your host, Jay Rehack, and like
you, I've had my share of childhood experiences
that impacted who I am today. But I'd like to
think that everything that happened to me has
helped make me a better person. Tell Me What
Happened is sponsored by Sidelining Publishing.
Publishers of quality books, including Susan
Salinor's classic, One Little Act of Kindness,
available on Amazon .com and wherever quality
books are sold. Tell Me What Happened is also
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for you now and forever. It's free and your children
and your grandchildren and your great grandchildren
will thank you for it. That's LaughSaver .com.
And by the way, LaughSaver .com will be available
as an app come May 2022. All right. Well, today
I have as my guest, Travis Corey. Travis is a
friend of my daughter's and also a friend of
mine. He's also a ceramic teacher and student
at the Lil Street Art Street Center. He creates
small batch functional ceramics for Lucky Duck
pottery. Welcome to the show, Travis. Thanks
for having me, Jay. Excited. Fantastic. Travis,
are you ready to tell your story? I am. Yeah.
All right. Well, listen, I'm going to get out
of the way. And at the end, I'm going to come
back and ask you really just one question. How
do you think that story and that event impacted
who you are today? But take it away, Travis.
All right. The story takes place the summer I
was going into high school. I was 14. It also
involves my sister who is 10 years old at the
time. And a little bit of background on our relationship
is that we basically raised each other. We were
the children of a single mom who worked really
hard and also worked the night shift as a bartender,
which meant she slept a lot during the day. So
we kind of seldom saw her. So growing up, my
sister and I were essentially these... feral
children running around, these kind of outdoor
cats with no rules or discipline. And we did
what we wanted when we wanted. And we kind of
had no structure. And our living situation changed
very often. We would move just about every year
into a new apartment in our town. We were usually
evicted from the previous lease or my mom had
a new boyfriend and we would move in with him.
So change was essentially the only thing that
was constant. And that meant my sister and I
would hang out together a lot. We would play
together. We would cook for each other. I'd help
her with her homework. We were generally very
supportive of one another. And then when I was
14, we moved in with my mom's new boyfriend.
And this was the first house we had ever lived
in. It had this huge yard and it had an upstairs
and this big unfinished basement. So to us, it
was a mansion essentially. And every house in
the neighborhood was pretty much the same. It's
just really big houses, big yards, big families.
But my sister and I did not get along with my
mom's boyfriend. He was incredibly strict and
loud and just a generally scary looking dude.
He was well over six foot bald, had this big
bushy red beard and a beer gut. He looked like
a member of like a biker gang. And he may have
very well been in the past. He used to ride motorcycles
and then he got into an accident and like half
of the bones in his arm had to be replaced with
metal. He was like a terminator. And what I really
remember about him were his cabs, which is oddly
specific, but he had like these... monster sized
calf muscles that were just going to pulse when
he wasn't even doing anything. And it terrified
me as a kid. And I had a history with him before
I moved into his house. He was my fourth grade
football coach. And I remember in a fourth grade
football practice, I dislocated my pinky finger
when I got tackled and I ran up to him and I
was in tears and I was crying. And I told him
that I broke my finger and it looked broken to
me. And he's like, come on, it's just out of
place. So he took my hand and he popped my finger
back into place and he kind of sent me back on
the field. And I don't think he did it right
because that pinky is not like my other one still.
But anyway, it's like the kind of guy he was.
No excuses, kind of quit crying, just get it
done mentality and attitude. So we move into
this new house and my sister and I have to really
start pulling our own weight. We have to do chores
and yard work, which is all very new to us. He'd
wake us up very early on the weekends and I would
mow the yard and pull vines and weeds out of
the lawn. And my sister would have to clean up
around the house. And yeah, we were not used
to this kind of structure and we hated it. We
hated being told what to do. We hated having
to ask permission to do things. It simply wasn't
the way we were raised. And my mom's boyfriend,
he owned this construction business. He was a
contractor and he would do these small odd jobs
for folks in the area. And one day on a weekend
morning in the summer, He woke me and my sister
up and there was this ream of paper on the kitchen
table. And it was, it was a stack of flyers that
said A to Z custom carpentry and had his phone
number on it. And he told my sister and I that
he wanted us to walk around the neighborhood
and put these flyers on every house. And we shouldn't
come back home until all these flyers were passed
out. And it was like 500. flyers. And I don't
even think there were 500 homes in this neighborhood.
The homes in the neighborhood were, it was a
suburban neighborhood. So everything's very spaced
out, very far away. It would have taken us all
day. We would have walked 15 miles probably.
So, and it's a weekend day in the summer. So
we weren't happy about that, but this was not
a guy that you talk back to. So my sister and
I walked around the neighborhood and we started
handing out these flyers and we put them in people's
screen doors. and in their mailboxes and on their
windshields of cars. And we did that for all
about 15 minutes. And then the whole time, my
sister is, she's crying. She doesn't want to
do this. Obviously she's 10 years old. And so
I'm like, okay, come on, follow me. And I walk
her a couple blocks away from the house and I
do the most environmentally conscious thing I
could do, which is stuff a huge stack of flyers
into a storm drain. And then she saw me do that.
And she looked at me and she smiled and then
she did the same thing. And it was literally
in that moment, like a weight had been lifted
off of us. We knew we couldn't go home right
away because there's no way we would have been
able to pass all those flyers out. So we just
walked around the neighborhood together for a
couple of hours and talked and like explored.
And it was it was just like a great summer day.
And I remember feeling very happy in that moment.
And it felt like we kind of took back some of
our our agency, like a thing that we didn't really
feel like we had in this new house. And we told
each other we would never tell anyone what we
did. And now it's nearly 20 years later, and
I'm spilling the beans about it. So to my sister,
I'm, I'm sorry, but I had to get it off my chest.
Yeah, that's my story. I love it, man. I'm glad.
I was afraid that the guy was going to find out
about it, that somehow that storm drain was going
to get mucked up and then call up the A to Z
and say, we found 500 of your flyers. Yeah, right.
So glad you got away with it. I'm so glad. Oh,
is that guy still in your life in terms of your
mother's life? No, no. That was probably a couple
years for us, which was one of the longer ones
relationship wise. But yeah, no longer in the
picture. Yeah. I just want him coming after you.
Yeah. Right. Yeah. He'll hear this and wonder
why his business failed. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, gosh.
Well, I love the story in the sense that you
were also the big brother taking care of the
problem. You know, your poor sister didn't need
to pass it out papers either. Yeah. Yeah. So
let me ask you. How do you think that particular
story? has impacted who you are today. How do
you think that relates to who you are today?
Yeah, I think, I don't know if this event particularly
impacted it, but I think it's maybe solidified
a lot of things in terms of my personality. And
like I still really don't like being told what
to do or asking permission to do things either.
I like autonomy and agency in my own life. But
in a way, I think it also, those like brief couple
of years. did introduce some like structure and
rigidity to life that was probably desperately
needed as someone going into into high school.
So it was almost like a little kind of life boot
camp in a way. But it was also nice to feel like,
oh, my sister and I can still maintain our relationship.
And yeah, I think it's come across in a few a
few different ways, but it's still there. Yeah.
So if your mother hears this story, is she going
to be mad at you or is she going to be cool with
it? I can't remember if we told her or not. I
think at this point she would be all right with
it. But yeah, not a surprise either. This is
probably behavior she would have assumed from
my sister and I. Yeah. Very cool. Well, I like
the story. I like the courage to a certain extent
that it took because you got this football coach
of a guy telling you what to do and you have
to sort of You would underhandedly, I suppose.
I'm wondering down the road if by chance you
ever have children and you have a business and
the kid's 14 years old, are you going to send
him out to pass out flyers or are you going to
assume that he'd probably throw it in a drain?
Oh, I guess it won't be flyers then. I'll have
him on his social media account promoting my
business. No, yeah. Yeah. I don't think I would
ever, I would be a pretty hands -off guy, but
I would like to think that my kid would throw
the flyers down the sewer as well. I would only
assume. Right. You'd be proud of him if he didn't.
You'd be ashamed of him if he didn't. Yeah. A
little disappointed if he didn't. Yeah. Thank
you for the story, Travis. I appreciate it. It
is one of those little slices of life that...
I think people can identify with, you know, I
mean, most, most identify with to some extent,
either the moment that somebody did do something
to say, no, I'm not doing this or remembering
the times when they were forced to do things
and they went through with it, but still carry
the resentment of having to do it. That's right.
It goes both ways, but yeah. Sorry for that little
guy and that 14 year old guy and that 10 year
old girl. It turned out all right. It turned
out okay. Your sister's okay. All good. Yeah.
Okay. All good. All right. Well, thank you so
much, Travis. Yeah. Thanks, Jay. All right. That's
our show. I'd like to thank Travis Corey for
that slice of life that I can certainly identify
with a little resistance. I guess that's it.
He's a resistor. And so thank you for that story,
Travis. I'd also like to thank our sponsors,
Sidelining Publishing, publishers of quality
books. And laughsaver .com. Visit laughsaver
.com and record your laughter. We'll keep it
for you. It's free now and forever. So I'm going
to end this show, as I often do, with Susan Saldor's
classic, I've Got Peace in My Fingers. So until
next time, this is Jay Reank asking you all to
please stay safe out there and try not to hurt
anybody. I've got peace. Peace, peace in my fingers.
Watch what I can do. I've got peace, peace, peace
in my fingers. I'm gonna shake hands with you.
I've got peace, peace, peace in my fingers. Watch
what I can do. I've got peace, peace, peace in
my fingers. I'm gonna shake hands with you. I've
got words, words, words in my head Watch what
I can do I've got words, words, words in my head
I'm gonna talk things over with you I've got
words, words, words in my head Watch what I can
do I've got words, words, words in my head I'm
gonna talk things over with you I've got love,
love, love in my heart Watch what I can do I've
got love, love, love in my heart I'm gonna give
some to you I've got love, love, love in my heart
Watch what I can do I've got love, love, love
in my heart I'm gonna give some to you I've got
peace, peace, peace in my fingers. Words, words,
words in my head. I've got love, love, love in
my heart. I'm gonna give song to you.