Prologue 

It is the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic and everything is shutting down. The news is painting a very dire picture of our immediate future. We are told not to leave home and people that have gotten COVID-19 are under quarantine. I decided to make the best of the situation. I have a new Mac that takes dictation so this seems to be as good as any as a time to write my memoirs. I have been blessed with an awesome and beautiful wife, five wonderful children and ten beautiful grandchildren. I am so proud of my family! At one point we could walk to eight of our grandchildren's homes. I am fully aware of how blessed Mary and I are to have them so close. I primarily wanted to pass my story down to the grandkids. They may not be that interested now but I'm hoping when they get older this will change. How many grandpa’s have operated railroad locomotives, driven army tanks, participated in a full-scale riot, surfed, raced motorcycles, had a dream job and a second career as a State Park Commissioner and more? My life has been very full and I have been very blessed to have had so many interesting experiences along the way. Mary and I have had many wonderful travels as well, both road trips in a car and by motorcycle in the US and beyond to Europe. I'm certainly not a journalist and one of my excuses is that I had the worst english teacher at my high school Loyola for two years in a row. Having said that please read this for what it is. Mary's memory of details is much better than mine but I'm gonna push ahead and put down on paper as much as I can. I need to do this while I still have most of my faculties; so here goes. I am going to skip around a bit from a timeline standpoint so key topics like family, surfing and motorcycle riding fit together better. There are times when I am going to declare a “Divine Intervention”. What that means is I firmly believe that I have been presented opportunities or found myself in situations that I can't explain except by divine intervention. For example, my attendance at Loyola High School. I was a terrible student in grammar school. I really can't remember getting any grades over a C and in fact got kicked out of two schools. How could I be accepted to that prestigious college prep high school Loyola without help from the beyond? There were over 500 kids taking the entrance exam and they only take a little over 200! If I had not gone to that high score my life would've definitely taken a different path and probably not a good one. Another example: getting hired on at Honda and ending up with a dream job for about 15 years then after Indiana finding ourselves living in Huntington Beach. There have been a long list of these Divine Interventions in my life, read on.