No one lived up to that title better than Wade, a guy I met while serving in the U.S. Army. He began the day happy, and insisted on staying that way until the lights went out that night. There was nothing fake about those smiles or him. As a person, he was genuine.
That, however, was only half the story. Although he often laughingly and sometimes with a dash of daring tried to put elastic into a normally hard and fast rule, he never broke one. Fact is, he cast a dim view toward anyone who did.
Looking at Wade from a distance, you could easily conclude that what he was doing so superbly, was simply the result of being himself. Ordinarily, that attitude would’ve been at serious odds with what was required of him during his stint in the military, but Wade handled it by not only accepting what was required of him, but also shining a good light on it. To him, there was no such thing as a bad day, only days that weren’t quite as good as all the others. That belief alone endeared him to everyone around him.
Those of us who knew him well, readily agreed that if push came to shove on the battlefield, Wade would die for any one of us so we could go on living, loving, achieving, and remembering.
Now, and after all these years, I express that same thought by imagining him being the man I’d most want with me if I were stranded on a desert island. He’d be wearing a big grin and saying, “Hey, somehow we’re going to make it. Just you wait and see.”
He loved cars, but thank you anyway, he could do without them. Ditto most all the other materialistic “must haves” usually associated with young guys. With food, clothing, and shelter, he was good to go. At the same time, he was a social animal and could readily adapt no matter who he was with. He always seasoned his outgoing manner with respect and simple graciousness.
If that weren’t enough, as a result of being around Wade for several months, I marveled at his consistency in being what he was. That even included military maneuvers in North Carolina when everything but the bullets were made to represent the real. To Wade, war and race car driving had one thing in common: It’s one thing to handle the straightaway, quite another to make the white knuckle turns. He was up to handling both.
We parted ways when I returned to civilian life. Then more than forty years later and purely by chance, I bumped into someone else with whom I’d served in the military. During our catching up, he asked if I remembered Wade. Remember him? I said, I’d never forgotten him. Well, he continued, through a rare circumstance with a mutual friend, he had an update.
After being discharged from the military, Wade decided to be a professional truck driver—get behind the wheel of an eighteen-wheeler, see the country, and deliver the goods. He lived that dream for more than thirty years.
Apparently, throughout it all Wade had steadfastly remained the same man I had come to know so many years before. As a full fledged adult, he thought of himself as having more than just a job. Rather, it was a mission often with precious little room for error, but always requiring a strong sense of purpose seasoned with eyes wide open curiosity. It didn’t hurt, either, that Wade not only liked to have a good time, but also had a perpetual thirst for relating to people, particularly when they were going through hard times.
When fellow drivers needed help, Wade was there. If they got sick or lost a parent, or heaven forbid, a child, he called them, sent a card or flowers, and after it was all over, hugged them and if needed, reached into his pocket to give financial help. At the same time, he was a model of safe driving for himself and his rig and tough fisted dependable which earned him the deepest respect from fellow drivers.
Then suddenly, and at the much too early age of 56, he was gone, victim of a massive heart attack. The story goes that on the day of his funeral, almost a hundred truckers from throughout the U.S., parked their rigs, then trudged country roads to the church to pay their last respects to a man who had been one of the best of their own.
Not all icons are famous. They are in our midst, and if you are fortunate enough to come to know one, it’s only logical that you pay attention, learn from them, and wish them well.
